Look! I Can Do It!

Well, after much humming and hawing, and procrastinating, I finally bit the bullet and just started my Stripey hat. And I can do this stranded colour thing!!! It took me 2 hours to do 7 rows, right enough, and my left hand hurt a bit afterwards, but I did it!

Photos! :




I'm using the leftover burgundy yarn from my Mariah sweater, and some unknown black yarn from my stash. It feels like it might be a wool blend. I figured I hand wash most of my knits anyway, so it shouldn't matter if the yarns are slightly different. It took me ages to decide which colour to substitute for the blue and gray of the original pattern. Maybe that's why I was so anxious about knitting with more than one colour, because I'm scared I'll choose a sucky colour combination. Eventually I decided the burgundy would be the blue, and the black would be the gray, so that the hat will have the burgundy at the top, and not be mainly black, which I was tempted to do for the safety factor - black goes with anything, and would look good as the main colour for just about anything as well. But I stepped out of my comfort zone, and chose to use the burgundy as the main one.

I'm not sure if I'm doing it "right" - I just jumped in without watching any videos or anything because I didn't want to confuse myself immediately. My stitches look correct anyway, they're not twisted or anything, and that's more important to me than if I'm doing it "right". I'm using one colour in each hand, holding the left-hand yarn like I would hold my yarn in crochet. My left hand is tenser than in crochet, trying to keep the tension, which is why it hurt a little after the two hours. I just decided to take a break after noticing it hurting, and I'll need to find another knit project to work on in between times doing stranded knitting, I think, at least until my hand gets used to the unfamiliar motion, and stops tensing up so much. I don't want to injure myself! :D

I'm totally excited about stranded knitting, now that I've jumped in and started. I keep looking at patterns (not knitting patterns, just patterns I see around me) and thinking "oh, that could be knit!" And I've got a feeling my rav queue is going to grow even more !