Learning to knit

On Sunday afternoon, my library hosted a learn to knit class. The local knitting guild was there to teach anyone to knit. The library had pulled a number of books from the shelves about knitting for us to look at and check out and the guild provided door prizes. There were so many door prizes that they had one for every new knitter! My name was called last for the prizes so I didn't get a choice of which prize I received, but I am more than happy. I got a one year subscription to Vogue knitting and a book about knitting cables. I might have preferred some yarn to the magazine subscription as I didn't have any yarn to get started on a project with, but I am glad that the cable book is what was left. I have always wanted to learn to knit socks and cabled sweaters but would have felt silly taking the cable book as a beginner. Now I have the book when I am ready to take on the challenge.

They provided knitting needles and small balls of yarn. They showed us how to cast on, knit and purl. I was fairly confident when I left the library that afternoon and very excited. I love knitted dishcloths and had a plan to make a few of them this week. I headed out to the craft store and got two balls of cotton yarn - sugar and cream was on sale. I had my size 8 needles. Monday I downloaded a few dishcloth patterns and found my favorite one - very simple and knitted on the diagonal. I started the dishcloth on Tuesday night and I am already more than half way through the dishcloth. I am sure I will finish it tonight at basket bingo. Looks like my skeins will make 3 dishcloths each.

I will be at mom and dad's this weekend. I asked mom if she wanted some knitted dishcloths. She sounded skeptical but said she'd decide after she's seen one. I am sure she will want one after she sees how nice my first attempt looks. So far I have dropped one stitch and skipped one stitch. You can find the mistakes if you look for them. Otherwise my tension is fairly nice and the pattern is simple. It's a dishcloth for goodness sake! It is going to be used to wash greasy dirty dishes and wipe down countertops. It will have the heck bleached out of it too. No way I am going to unknit just to pick up one dropped stitch or one skipped stitch - I've got this in perspective.