Day Two: Knitting and Crochet Blog Week

Today's topic as part of the Knitting and Crochet Blog Week is to discuss a way my skills have changed in the past year.

I love Ravelry, the knit and crochet online community that lets me post project info., look up yarns and patterns, talk to other knitters, etc.  It allows me to look back and see what projects I've knitted.  I'm confident I wouldn't keep track of my projects well without an online place to organize my knitting, and you all know how I feel about a good organization system!

As I looked back at things I've knitted, I noticed the colorwork projects I've done.  These projects use two colors on the same row, which means I carry one color in my right hand and one in my left.  I still have trouble keeping even tension in my left hand, but I am getting better.

My first colorwork project was the result of my only real knitting class.  I took a class in colorwork, and I struggled through these mittens:

Checks and Dots Mittens by Kristin Nicholas

from the book Kristin Knits

I made these about a year and a half ago:

Las Calacas Danzantes Socks

Then I made these

Swirly Mittens

and then another pair of those in a slightly larger size.

I made Andrew a colorwork hat.

Fake Isle Hat

I made a pair of mittens for my mother-in-law.

Snowbird mittens

I've just finished another surprise project that involves colorwork as well.  Although I've been working on this longer than a year, I find that each project gets a bit easier.  It's still fussy knitting, but I love the way it turns out.

Now that I've just finished another colorwork project, I do admit to wanting to do some mindless knitting that doesn't involve charts or more than one strand of yarn!  Bring on the garter stitch.