knitting thoughts

I've been purling backwards! I've had to re-learn how to purl properly so I won't have twisted stitches when I'm knitting in stockinette. Argh!

On the upside, twisted stitches are more visually interesting. Purling the "right" way seems faster than what I was doing before. I certainly don't mind purling.

I did recently realize that I don't like colourwork. Sure, it produces some great results, but honestly, I just don't like it. The only colourwork technique I've found that I like so far are patterns that use slipped stitches, like brioche or mosaic knitting. Embroidery's fun, too. I'm doing a fair-isle style pattern for a hat and it's more frustration than fun. Lace and patterns that are visually interesting from a texture point of view are much more enjoyable, and the charts seem less likely to give me a headache. Yarns come in multiple colours, so I don't have to bother with fair isle or intarsia unless there's a pattern I really want to do. I'll finish that hat eventually and consider it a learning project. It's got two fair-isle sections and a section that'll probably need to be done in intarsia.

Sometimes it seems like there are way too many techniques out there. I still need to learn cables. Eventually I'll get to mitred squares and entrelac. Lace and cables are probably where I want to focus. Out of about five pages of saved patterns on Ravelry, two pages are tagged with 'lace,' and one with 'cables.' I like garter stitch for its texture. There's something rather fun about it.

Well, back to knitting a lace swatch. It's a nice break from the squid and the giant lace shawl (well, not giant, but one round takes a while when there's over five hundred stitches in a round).