Cobblestone is dry so here we go!
I’m going to give 2 prizes so each of my fellows can choose a winner. The popular vote indicated yarn was in order so that’s what I have for you. There’s a hand-dye and a sock yarn for each drawing, so hopefully everyone will end up happy.
The winner of Gabriel’s drawing can choose between this:
2 – 50gm skeins of Fortissima Socka color brown/black/multi twist
or this:
9.5 oz / 275 gms approx. 265 yds / 245 m Single ply handspun. I did not spin this, but I did dye it. I can’t tell you what kind of sheep this came from but it’s very soft.
The winner of Nikolai’s drawing can choose between this:
2 – 50 gm skeins of Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool color 16
or this:
2 – 50 gm skeins Fortissima Moda. Handdyed by me.
Sound good? Now because this is a contest not just a giveaway I’m going to make you do something. (hehehe)
Since we’re celebrating my first year of obsessive knitting I want you to tell me about the project/book/yarn/breakthrough that made you an obsessive Knitter, instead of just a dabbler in wool.
Leave a comment telling me about it. Or for a double contest entry, post about it on your blog too! I love hearing your stories so have at it!
I’ll post the winners, and my breakthrough project on Wednesday, September 5th.
Hmm. I’ve known how to knit most of my life, but what got me going as a KNITTER was my first pair of socks. I was at Stitches West four and a half years ago (wow, that long?!) and found some yum-tastic Louet Gems Merino – fingering weight, not sport – in a gorgeous dark purple. I met my first Brittany Birch needles there, too. Anyway, I made Mom buy me the yarn (poor college student b(^_^) ) and rushed home and opened my copy of Knitting Without Tears to see what EZ had to say about socks – and haven’t looked back. Those socks weren’t very well made; the gauge was awful, I made an accidental YO right under the ball of one foot so that they had a huge hole in just a few months, but I loved them.
I would attribute my continuing passion to two books. The first is the Twisted Sisters’ Sock Workbook, and the second is Nancy Bush’s Folk Socks. I still refer to both.
I’ll try to remember to repost on my blog later, after I put the groceries away – I’m holding out for the Fortissima Moda! *grin*
Hmm the project that turned me into a Knitter instead of a knitter — was felted bags — seeing the variety, creativity and design availability made me turn the corner. I since expanded into all kinds of projects and fibers. Happy Knittiversary.
PS – your hand dyes are gorgeous – you did a wonderful job.
Post is on my blog as well. (http://quiltingandknitting.blogspot.com)
What gorgeous colors! Everytime I come here, I find something else I want to try because what you have done is so wonderful. Kudos!
As for the contest, I am going to have to think about what turned me into a KNITTER instead of just a knitter…what if it was not a book but a time in one’s life?
Hmmmm, as far as being obsessed with knitting. I believe that actually happend about the same time I knitted up my first pair of socks. That would about 4 years ago. I had knitted for a number of years but nothing really “life controlling.” But when I finished my first pair of socks and then decided to knit my step-sister/half-sisters/sisters-in-law each a pair for Christmas that did it. That is when my stash began to grow and grow. And not just sock yarns, but sweater yarns and yarns for bags and now lace weights. I always have some “mindless” knitting with me for stop lights, heavy traffic, long dr visits, whatever. I knit in restaraunts, during Sunday School, practically every waking moment unless it just absolutely isn’t prudent. Everyday I marvel at the act of knitting and what it produces and pity those who are not knitters. Love it, love it, love it. It is the sock’s fault.
As for me, I am not a KNITTER, just a dabbler of wool. I still dream of having my own spinning wheel but who really knows for sure. Your work may be sufficient for me to just enjoy vicariously. Ever on. Love.
Ooo, I like this one!
I learned how to knit as a kid, taught by a friend of the family during a very rainy summer, but I didn’t do much with it – a couple of random squares and a doll “dress” were my only knitted projects. When I was 24 and engaged to my husband, I was working at a coffee shop and volunteered to work late for the “Knit Night” to earn some extra cash. Well, the owner of the local yarn shop showed up with baskets of yarn and needles for sale, and I was sucked right in. I knit my first scarf (some frizzy strange yarn, soft though, with some actual wool content) in a week, and then knit a simple (but large) garter-stitch wrap for my mother-in-law.
My husband was transferred to Alaska a couple months later, and was stationed on a boat that was out of port for weeks at a time. Knitting became my balm when he was gone, particularly at night after my two step-daughters were in bed. I met a great group of local knitters, discovered the online knitting community, and now, almost three years later, I Knit everyday, as naturally (and as necessarily!) as breathing.
My breakthrough project was most certainly Christmas two years ago. I knit a teddy bear from Sandra Polley’s book for a brand new baby. My SIL had just had a little guy and it was my first non-scarf project. I LOVED it. I think I own every toy book currently in publication. Knitting toys is my passion. It seems like something that old ladies would do and I’m barely thirty and consider myself pretty hip (whatever that means). I can’t help it, I knit almost every day and every other project is a quick little toy (dolls, bunnies and bears…oh my) to keep it as exciting as it was that Christmas. This was an EXCELLENT contest…makes us think and share something that is obviously VERY important to us. Thanks!
I know EXACTLY what made me an obsessive (and I mean obsessively obsissive) knitter…one word, its a veb….:
FELTING….GO to my website http://www.she-knits.com and you will believe what I am saying….also I love knitting on BIG needles and completing projects quickly and knitting bags does that for me!
Sharon
I don’t know if I can point to just one project that turned me into a Knitter. It just happened. One day, I was learning to knit to make DH a scarf for Christmas, and then, I had 21 projects planned, and three different projects on the needles. I neglect housework, and give the kids extra yarn to play with. When I get my spending money for the month, the first thing I do is figure what I’m going to need to spend on yarn.
I’ve posted the info. about the contest on my blog.
Happy knittiversery!
I saw you on Dorothy’s blog. This is such a great question that I had to answer. My Gram was a KNITTER. Never leaving the house without a project bag. I learned to knit from her when I was 8 or 10 (guess I’ll have to look at photos to figure out how old I was). I picked it up again just after my 2nd baby to make a scarf. I became a Knitter when my Gram needed chemo caps. I learned as I knit and sent her one a week. To match every outfit…and then some to share at oncology. After she “went home” I became a KNITTER to pass that heritage on. I’m the only grandchild that ever learned to knit. She’s been gone a year and a half…but typing this still brings tears.
I felt like a real knitter (rather than “learning to knit,” although of course I’m still learning) when I finished my first pair of socks, but I’m not sure if I’d really say I’m an obsessive Knitter… yet, anyway.
Fun contest idea… I started knitting when I was 8 but stopped knitting once I finished college… but when a close friend was pregnant and asked me to be her daughter’s godmother, I started knitting again and haven’t stopped!! I knew I was addicted, but had that confirmed when I had a bad case of tendonitis and couldn’t knit for over a year. It was torture…
Happily my ‘abstinence’ helped and knitting obsession has returned full force š
– Debra (aka JavaNut)
(I posted your contest on my blog:
http://javanutknits.blogspot.com/2007/09/another-bloggers-contest.html)
I think it was the Manos sweater I knit at least 15 years ago and still wear. The variations in the color and the different textured stitches got me so hooked beyond any other previous knitting.
When I first saw pictures of the Soul tube top from Rowan’s Calmer Collection book I knew I just had to have it. I was still a new-ish knitter and that was by first taste of patterns for young and modern people vs. the fun fur poncho type of stuff they sell at craft stores (which is totally not my style). I’ve been hooked ever since!!
I’m still dabbling in wool…and not a KNITTER. I am obsessed but I feel like I’m still learning to knit. I love making dishcloths and I’m already making stuff on cirs and dpns but I still dont’ feel like a KNITTER but am desperatly hoping to get there. š My first finished scarf with no mess ups got me hooked and from then on I just love to have knitting needles working on something. š
Awesome contest….I love reading all the other comments so far.
Well, the one thing that catapulted me from non-knitter to the knitting ranks was the fact that my sister-in-law was knitting lots and lots of scarfs, and I decided that I should be able to figure out how to knit too!! I’m still a novice, but have been obsessively collecting yarn and needles, and even knitting DVDs!
Lisa
(aka lemur)
Me – obsessive? Never…
Hmmm… ok, a wee bit obsessive and how and when did that happen? My interest started when I managed to knit a pair of socks, which made me realise I could make really cool stuff which I could wear, so I swiftly went out and bought some really expensive yarn and knitted a great thick woollen jersey. My mum nearly had heart failure, as she never thought I would complete the project and the yarn really was rather expensive, but I persevered and absolutely loved it. I then moved on to a summer top, complete with a fancy lacy pattern at the top, a gorgeous jersey in an off white yarn, the pattern of which I still have and am contemplating knitting again. I used that jersey so much, and as it was knit in the 80s it’s now back in fashion… I knitted some more socks, another jersey (in some horrid black acrylic yarn!) and people started asking whether I knit for others; boyfriend got a jersey, friend another one, someone wanted socks and then I found babyknitting! I love to knit for babies. The clothes are so cool and you can experiment as much as you like. The current obsession is fine lace. I’ve just started and already I have two projects on the needles.
All right – so I’m a tiny bit obsessed. I blame my mum – she’s at least as bad, or rather, I don’t really blame her; I thank her for bringing this wonderful obsession into my life!
SOCKS that is what has made me obsessed. I was kinda challanged to knit my first pair and I have loved them since. Love the feel of sock yarn and now that I am dying my own, love the color combos.
My real “aha!” moment (where I really REALLY got obsessed) was the first time I knit socks.
I was supposed to take a class, but everyone in my whole family came down with some stomach-erupting flu bug, and I couldn’t go :*(
I had done the “homework” (knit the cuff and the heel flap), and figured that the sock pattern I had was too hard to do myself, so I put it aside for about 3 months.
Fast forward to Christmas time, and my boyfriend at the time had gotten a romantic notion in his head to go to Leavenworth (it’s a little Bavarian-style town in the mountains here in Washington State) to see the lights and do Christmas-y stuff, so on the 3 hour car trip there, I picked up the sock and futzed around with it and finally figured it out.
Then my mom commandeered them, and I realized I could knit socks in whatever size, I wouldn’t have to go for gauge, and I knew someone who would be able to wear them š
I’m weird about gauge swatches…I hate them. But now I want to knit sweaters, so I sort of have to if I actually want to wear them…but I digress.
Happy Tuesday!
I learned to knit from my mom who has always been a “speed” knitter. So there’s always been that competitive spirit in my knitting.
But I think I became obsessive when I started getting involved in knitting blogs, Websites, online shopping…and now Ravelry. It’s like being a kid in a candy store and I want to make everything, but there’s not enough time…my stash is growing…
Great question for the contest!
oh dear. it was not at school. i was sent home with a letter from my craft teacher telling my mother that she couldn’t teach me. but my mum could. i must have been about ten. but the great break through was as a teenager. i knit tunics in unspun icelandic (it was a fad at the time) and boatloads of baby clothes for my niece. and i have knitted on and off for a lot of years now. the last year to obsessiveness. i think the internet has really boosted my interest.
and i think it is really sad if knitting becomes a forgotten craft so it is pleasing that we are so many who share our knitting in the internet community and i am sure it also adds to our wishes to improve our skills all the time.
Yummy yarns, but I’m too late. . .
I need to keep up don’t I with all my blogs!!
Happy happy knittiversary! I think Zimmermania has to be it for me. EZ doesn’t really provide entire patterns but rather recipes which really exercised my brain into figuring things out which gave me that AHA! feeling of accomplishment!
I was going to post this on my blog but life conspired against me. My new little dog ate my needles on the project I am knitting for work.
SO what made me a Knitter? I had been knitting since I started college and even attended art school using my knitting as my entrance portfolio. I knit here and there always doodling little designs and such but not really doing more than that. I might have finished a project or 4 a year. typically small things like hats and gloves.
Then this Christmas my “baby” died. My husband gave me a doxie for Christmas. We loved him. He did everything with us. He died at the age of 2.
I got home and was burdened with grief. My little companion, my dog was gone and my Mother-in-law was no longer given an hope of cancer treatment. Our lives were spiraling down. So I did all I could think to do but to knit. I had been reading the sexy knitters blog and decided to join and knit whatever was chose from my giant stash of mystery yarn.
I started reading blogs. I switched from blogging about food and doxies to knitting. I read more than the knitting patterns on Knitty. I could not get enough info in my brain about knitting and knitting techniques. I sat and read all my back issues of Interweave knits as I sat and knit out my grief.
I completed my first skirt the month (March) my MIL died. I was so proud of that skirt because I found an errata in it.
I continued to knit in April learning more and suddenly I had a job interview with Blue Moon Fiber Arts. I sat and knitted so more so that I could have some really steller awesome things to show during my interview.
I even started designing my first sweater.
Then I got a job at Blue Moon Fiber Arts as a designer. (june) Who me? a designer? I never thought of myself as that. Even though I went to school to study garment design. Then it hit me. I was a Knitter and I didn’t even know it.
Nothing scares me and I can whip out a garment in a week. Yes I can knit a sweater in a week. It can’t be too complicated but I am fast.
None of this was even an awareness that I was headed in this direction. It just kind of hit me when my friends in the PDX blogger group started calling me a Knitter with a capital K.
What made me an obsessed knitted was my Psychedelic Afghan. Those squares saw me through my Boy’s self-defence classes, a couple of weekends away and several rainy Sunday afternoon movies. And of course, once the sewing them together started I had to be obsessed with getting the thing off the floor or there would have been a mutiny on the ss.serenknitity – everyone was sick of having to sidestep around the squares that I was constantly rearranging to better effect. Now those squares are still seeing me through rainy Sunday movies – but this time as a cozy cover.
Happy Knitiversary!
It seems like I’ve always dabbled in many crafts. I pick them up, do them for a while, and then move on (or back) to others. However, I was playing around with I-tunes and found a knitting podcast – Lixie Knits It. She talked about some blogs, which I went to visit. From then on, I’ve been “hooked.”
I became obessed with Knitting when my sister got cancer. It happened two years ago…she was only 30. Everything happened pretty quickly…the worst parts; discovery and Masectamy, were all over in just 3months and she didn’t have to go through any Kemo or Radiation. Its still a little scary how fast and relatively painless it all was (you know, she didn’t die, or lose her hair or even got sick) its scary cause I can’t help but keep looking over her shoulder or around the corner…could it really be that easy (i’m thankful of couse but I just keep waiting for the shoe to drop but I dont want it to of course.)
ANYWAY…I look up to my older sister (I’m the youngest) and we have that kinda of family where the love we have for each other isn’t expressed through words often but through the things we do for each other. My sister has always been the Crafy person in our family, Sewing, Cooking, Hairstylist, Sketcher, WoodWorker. She took up knitting while recovering from surgery, so I did too. I took it up so there would be something we could talk about other than just cancer and everything related to it. I also wanted to bond with here even more in case she was going to die (does that sound weird). Anyway the more and more we talked and tried techniques and the better she got the more and more I enjoyed knitting. I started reading and subscribing to Knitting magz, compulsively buying yarn, Salivating over patterns, and now my lastest symptom…Knitting Blog Trolling.
Scarfs. I. LOVE. THEM. I don’t know how many I have and I just love wearing them, looking at them, displaying them, you name it, I’ve done it. I came upon a scarf I really love but couldn’t afford – So I decided to recreate it! The rest is history…
What made me obsessive???!! That my man spends HOURS in front of the TV and it drives me crazy; I just HAVE to get into my own little quiet world – and that means grabbing some needles and KNITTING….sorry didn’t mean to shout…knitting……it’s the best escape!
From the moment I attempted my first knit, I was hooked! I was immediately obsessed with the perfect stitch! And there were so many stitch combinations to try! How could you not get immediately addicted???
Hi Peggy! I was checking to see if you had drawn a winner. I hope everything is going okay with you!
I’ve been knitting since my Gram taught me when I was four. I remember my first big project–a multi-colored vest with for my mom guided by my Gram using scrap yarn. I remember when she opened it and the expression on her face. It was only something a mother would wear with it’s loose rows, and tight rows. I’ve knit off and on over the years since.
What made me pick up knitting in an obsessive fashion lately is two things. I found some self-striping superwash wool on sale and was so enthralled with the idea of the repeated pattern, I was sold. Then my husband read a knitting article in the newspaper and showed it to me, which talked about blogs, among other things. I then discovered knitting blogs for the first time, and have been inspired to create and continue to follow the blogs ever since! I’ve made about six pairs of socks, two kid’s sweaters and two hats since March, and have a few projects on the needles and in the wings.
Crispy,
Thanks for your comment about your Doxie. It made me so sad to hear he died at such a young age. I do hope you and your family are doing well, and hope you find a way to bring another Dachshund into your life somehow.
Michelle
Dachshund training