My first attempt at knitting was to do a blanket. I figured this couldn't be too difficult. No turns. No shaping. Just knit. Knit. Knit. Knit. How hard could it be?
I wandered into Uncommon Threads in Portland, Oregon (no relation to the Uncommon Threads in Los Altos, California) & found a very friendly woman who sold me an Ironstone afghan pattern, Reynolds Candide Heavyweight & Brown Sheep Company wool & size 15 circular needles. I took my knitting toys back to California with me. A friend helped with casting on & getting started. And away I went!
This was supposed to be an easy project. Big needles, nothing but knit/purl all in one straight line. Well, I decided the size wasn't big enough. I wanted a bigger afghan, something close to a blanket size than an afghan size. I added stitches. And kept knitting. Forwards & backwards & backwards & forwards & sometimes reversing myself in the middle of a row which meant I was doing short rows without even trying!
I measured again & looked at the dwindling supply of yarn. I realized that my adding extra stitches meant I was going to run out of wool. I called a few yarn stores in the San Francisco Bay Area. No one carried Reynolds Candide Heavyweight. I contacted the Portland version of Uncommon Threads. They had 9 skeins on hand. I needed 30. They would order more & let me know when it came in.
I waited. And waited. And waited. Nothing. Finally, the store went out of business. I got my 9 skeins but that wouldn't be enough to finish this blanket. Now I started searching in earnest. I found the On-Line Knitting Magazine's listing of yarn stores & started calling & emailing. I finally found a store on the East Coast (Webs) which carries Reynolds Candide Heavyweight. They could even match the dye lot on one of the colors! Unfortunately, they only had a few skeins. I asked if I could order more. The nice man on the other end of the phone said, unfortunately, that wouldn't be possible. The mill that makes the yarn had burned down.
Well, here I am with an unfinished blanket & not enough wool to finish it into anything interesting. So I stopped working on the blanket & moved onto baby booties.
My first project that made it to completion was a pair of baby booties. After finishing the first pair, I discovered that I know many pregnant women. Must be something in the water. So far, I've made 4-5 pairs.
These booties are made with Lorna's Lace's Shepherd Sport superwash wool. The label says to expect 6 stitches for one inch on US #4 needles. I used #3 Brittany double pointed needles (a set of 5, much easier than using a set of 4!).
Many thanks for Ann Kreckel for publishing the pattern on the On-Line Knitting Magazine.
The cats help, really, they do.
12/1/96