How to Knit: Continental Style

How to Cast On

     First, you're going to need a pair of knitting needles and a skein or two of yarn. I know you're probably thinking, "Duh!", but I decided to mention this anyway.

     Then, you'll need to tie a knot onto one of your needles. Don't tie it too tight because this will be one of your stitches later.

     Now, to cast on (abbreviated CO), hold the yarn in your left hand like the picture below and twist your hand to where the "L" is facing away from you (see the second picture below). Place the resulting loop onto the needle. You have now cast on two stitches (as I said before, your knot is a stitch)!

     Cast on as many stitches as you like. For this particular swatch, I did ten.

How to Knit

     Place the needle with your stitches in your left hand. Then, insert the right-hand needle into the front of the first stitch on the left-hand needle.

     Wrap the yarn from the back to the front of the right needle and pull it through the stitch.

     Pull the stitch off of the left-hand needle, moving it to the right-hand needle (see below). You have finished one stitch! Continue until you reach the end of the row.

     When you've finished the row and all of your stitches are on the right-hand needle, simply move the right-hand needle to your left hand, and begin again.

     After you've completed a few rows, you will have a pattern like this.

     This pattern is called the garter stitch.

At the Back of the Bookshelf...

     We've all been there.
     Just finished an amazing book and can't wait to "borrow" another from one of your siblings.
     And then, the worst happens.
     You've read all of their books! There isn't one book that you couldn't give a brief synopsis!

     What do you do when this occurs? Cry and hope they buy another one soon? Of course not! Probably. To truly get over this grievous moment, this dreadful, painful moment, one must take up a hobby to distract one's mind.

     What better hobby to distract oneself than knitting (and, to a lesser extent, crocheting)? Is there anything more gratifying than finishing a project, no matter how time consuming? I don't believe so; and it is to my great satisfaction that I have started this blog today to share my joy of knitting (and, to a lesser extent, crocheting)!

     For those who don't know (so, Zachary, you're excluded), I'm very bad at keeping up with my journal entries. If this blog is anything like my journal, it's going to have a post every few decades or so...