Wednesday, August 8, 2012

Knit Like it's 2004

When I moved from Chicago to LA, I went through every single thing I own, and buried deep in a huge plastic bin, I found one of the earliest examples of my knitting: 


old school knits

The pattern is Stephanie Japel's Minisweater (aka Boobholder), and I knit it in the spring of 2004. I clearly remember wearing it for the first time to the cast party of Into the Woods my sophomore year at Michigan State (I played Granny & the Giant, for those interested). No picture of me wearing it at the time exists, but for reference, here's what I looked like at the time:

2003!

Ahhh, the days of the timestamp! Is it just me, or is there a stain on that shirt? Ok, back to the sweater.

It's knit with a lovely hand-painted superwash wool that I bought at a tiny yarn store near the MSU campus, which was probably the first time I bought "expensive" yarn. Upon closer examination, you can see that all my stitches are twisted

close up on the terrible knitting

Yup, I knit with twisted stitched for at least the first 2 years I was a "serious knitter." Since I taught myself from online tutorials and books, I didn't realize my mistake for some time. Good thing I finally corrected myself, right?

Ahhh, memories! 

8 comments :

  1. That yarn is beautiful! I love looking at project from my early years of crocheting (I would say I am still in my early years of knitting, so who knows what kind of mistakes I am making), the best is a ripple blanket that I still use in while watching movies, I just kinda gave up on weaving in the ends (this was before I discovered that you could weave them as you go)!

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    1. My early crochet blankets have just totally come apart because of lack of end-weaving!

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  2. that yarn is beautiful and really kept its colour! I have not gone back to early projects yet, but I reckon the finishing was probably quite shocking then..

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    1. Now that I'm thinking about it... I've probably never washed it! Hahahhaah! This was knit before blocking was a regular thing, and I haven't worn it much in the last 5 years....

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  3. I knit my first sweater right around the same time - I think I finished it in early 2005. The pattern is Skully from the first Stitch n Bitch book, and it's knit out of Lamb's Pride Bulky. It's so heavy I've only been able to wear it a few times, and there are numerous mistakes. I'll never be able to get rid of it though, just like my first swatch.

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  4. Exactly! Even though there were missteps, they were OURS, for the first time.

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  5. Hahahaha! My first few FOs were knit with every knit stitch actually knit TBL, so they all looked really wonky. :)

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    1. Glad to know I'm not alone in my wonky first FO's!

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