Kate Solomon

Knitting is brilliant, and – as I discovered – there’s no better teacher than the internet. If you don’t already know how, you should let the worldly wise web teach you. Here’s how I did it:

Like a lot of people, I first learned to knit at my mother’s knee. I was probably about seven the first time I tried. After a painful half hour I sort of got the hang of it, knitted about three rows, got bored, gave up and went outside to make potions or climb something or generally play at getting muddy and making a lot of noise.

Over the years, I think I asked my mum to teach me again several times, sessions that always ended with me in a huff because I wasn’t getting it and mum yanking the yarn from me in exasperation and doing it herself (NB: I may well have invented this memory, my mum is usually a very good teacher).

Honestly, I don’t know why I kept coming back to it. Somewhere in my soul there was a bullish element of Well, if old people can do it then I must be able to do it which is ridiculous, of course, but then brains can think the stupidest things from time to time.

Video tutor

After a good decade and a half of trying it, hating it, trying it again and hating it some more, I finally got the hang of it. To this day, I couldn’t tell you how or why but something just clicked into place and eureka! I could knit.  And I have YouTube and a pair of bamboo needles to thank for it.

These are my two top tips for anyone learning to knit: use online video tutorials and get yourself a pair of bamboo needles. Videos are so much easier to follow than a book and you can shout at them in frustration as much as you like and they’ll never get upset; unlike, say, mothers.

Meanwhile, bamboo needles grip the wool much better than metal or plastic sticks, meaning you’re less likely to let all your precious stitches slip off when you’re not paying full attention. Trust me, I am the world’s greatest stitch-dropper.

At last I had mastered the basic knit stitch and, to celebrate, I very slowly but surely knitted myself a lovely mustard coloured scarf. I love this scarf very much and wear it all the time.

Having conquered the knit stitch, I stopped. Stopped knitting, stopped learning, stopped lusting over particularly delicious shades of wool. And that was that for almost a year.

Purl, purl, then purl again

For some reason, I was scared to learn how to purl.

You must never be scared to learn to purl! Once you can knit and purl, the world is your cuddly knitted oyster.

Eventually, I manned up and tried it (thanks again, YouTube) and it wasn’t too bad. I’m just about as comfortable purling now as I am knitting, and that’s after a year or so of practice. The only hard bit for me now is starting a purling row and even that’s not hard, just different.

Once you can purl you can do proper knitting. Stocking stitch (knit one row, purl the next, repeat) is wonderful – it’s so flat and uniform and neat and lovely – and being able to do ribbing (alternating knit and purl stitches) means you can make hats and legwarmers and things. Honestly, you’re not properly knitting until you can knit and purl.

Then you can go on to the really exciting things, like knitting the same stitch twice to increase the length of a row, or SSK which is my own personal favourite (you slip two stitches on to the other needle, then knit and whip the slipped stitches back over). Once again, video tutorials are you friends; always look for a video for something you don’t understand.

Ravishing Ravelry

Here’s where I suggest you join Ravelry. It’s an amazing network of knitters and crocheters (you don’t have to talk to them if you don’t want to), and plays host to reams and reams of amazing patterns created by users.

A lot of them are easy to follow and free to download and then you can make all kinds of brilliant things. Ok, so yes, there are a lot of scarves and hats on there but some more exciting garments are featured in the easy sections too.

Making exciting stuff is the best way to learn the more complicated-sounding techniques; sometimes it’s worth practicing with some spare yarn first but often you can just dive right on in. One of the best things about knitting is that if you go wrong, you just unpick it and try again. No probs.

Quick wins

When you’re starting out, knitting can be a bit of a slog. It requires a lot of counting (not my forte) and a bit (read: a lot) of patience, especially if you’re working on something big. Trust me, I know what I’m talking about here – at the moment, I’m knitting a cushion cover and it’s taking for-bleedin’-ever.

To avoid losing your knitting mojo, break the project up with a couple of small, quick wins. Like this tiny mouse I made when I couldn’t take any more cushion cover knitting. He took me just a couple of hours to make and now I have a little friend to keep me company in my knitting den. Please note: I am not insane.

Another option is to make something in super chunky yarn that has lots of holes in, like a huge scarf or something. Chunky yarn works up much quicker than skinny and makes you feel like some kind of invincible knitting machine, if only temporarily.

Buying stuff

Obviously there are some essential pieces of apparatus you’ll need to get started: needles and yarn.

Don’t go to a proper knitting shop for your needles, you can easily nab some from a charity shop (you might need to ask), eBay (such bargains!) or Freecycle – I got a huge bag full of needles of all sizes by simply posting a wanted ad online.

Yarn is a bit trickier. In London, it’s outrageously expensive. In other places it’s just expensive. Charity shop yarn is hard to come by and tends to smell a bit like old ladies’ cupboards.

Ideally, I’d get a sheep and a spindle or whatever it is you need to spin your own wool, but I’m not sure my landlord would approve of my keeping livestock in the spare room and I clearly have no idea how to get the wool from sheeps-coat to, like, yknow, wool.

As far as I know, you’re pretty much stuck with yarn shops and online wool sellers. I’ve never really got a great yarn bargain yet, but I do live in hope.

That’s that

And thus, young padawan, I have taught you all that I know which the internet in turn taught me. Now go forth and knit stuff.

Once you get the hang of it, you’ll want to knit all day every day. Sometimes the urge to knit will hit me at the most inappropriate of times, like during important meetings or while dropping off to sleep. I’m not very good at the moment, but I’m getting better and faster all the time. You will too, I promise.

I’ll leave you with this essential piece of advice: If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s to never ever ever try to K6tog. Honestly. Even if the internet tells you to. You’ll thank me in the long run.

Images: Some photos in this post are taken from flickr. Please click the images to visit their sources.