Last week’s Stitch & Bitch was a lesson in casting on and off. Over the last few weeks of knitting on Wednesday evenings, everyone has finished something and has needed to cast off. Pam stopped knitting last week when she ran out of yarn since she had knitter her last ball of yarn and needed to cast off. She just brought it with her so I could show her how to cast off. Monica also practiced casting on a few different ways so that she was comfortable doing that on her own instead having to come over to our house or go back to the yarn store (where she has spent a considerable sum on needles and more yarn. She finished two beautiful scarves and is going back to finish up her first project which is a blue scarf. We also spent a little bit of time exploring one of my yarn stashes, which is pictured above. Karen likened it to one of manuscript drawers, of unfinished manuscripts (she didn’t take to the knitting, she’s sticking to the writing).
Laura is on her third item (she finished two scarves already (by week 2) and bought a book to find a sweater pattern. She went back to the yearn store to learn how to cast off. Although the pattern is two sided (knit 2 of the patterned items) she is trying her first knit-in-the-round sweater. We modified the pattern for her to knit in the round instead of in 2 pieces. That was an exercise in math. It is a good thing that everyone at the Stitch & Bitch is very smart!
The funniest cast off story was my friend Grace, who had gone camping in the Santa Monica Mountains to a family camp for a week. She finished one of her projects while there and had to figure out how to cast off. She first had a “oh, now what” moment then she went in search of otehr potential knitting ladies who also might be camping. The first one she found who said she could help, did more harm then good. Grace asked around some more and finally found a woman from Columbia who said she could help. Not only did she help Grace fix the prior created problem, but she helped teach Grace how to cast off. Now Grace is sending me knitting pattern decoding questions, like how do you knit to * and back?
We had a new person join us this week. Her name is Michelle Mahoney and she is the wife of our new school director. They moved to the area about a year ago and so are settling in(they bought the house we tried to buy when we had to move out to remodel — so there really is a reason for everything!) Michelle’s goal is to knit a blanket for a friend who is having a baby. So, we are trying to get her on her way to knitting that blanket — but first we are starting with the knit stitch. Welcome Michelle!
