1622 Soph ‘n’ Stitch

Good Evening to all, how are we all doing? I hope that we are all safe and healthy.

I have a small confession! This week’s post kinda flopped but at 11:56 pm (almost midnight) I got the motivation/inspiration to start a new group on Facebook. Yep, you guessed it, the group is called Soph ‘n’ Stitch.

I know what you are going to ask, “What is Soph ‘n’ Stitch? Well, I will tell you, I mean that is what you came here for right?

As you may know, there has been this little thing going around known as COVID-19, it’s this pesky virus which has taken over the world and it’s been making people poorly. Because of COVID-19, the world went crazy, tourism has shut down, shops closed, pubs closed, sporting activities closed and all sorts. To begin with, a lot of people were enjoying some free time off, or they were working from home.

With all this free time on our hands, lots of people took up new hobbies, tried new things, decorated, organised and everything in between. I redecorated my bedroom which took about 6 months (we stripped the walls right back and did lots of little bits). But then in November, clumsy me, went and broke my ankle, didn’t I? Which made doing things a lot harder and I got bored quickly.

I had been meaning to try knitting but I wasn’t sure where to start, what I needed and being a little tight on cash I didn’t want to spend on things that I didn’t need so I kept putting it off.

At the beginning of February this year, I told my Aunty that I wanted to try knitting but I didn’t know where to start, what wool to start with, what needles to start with or what a good price was etc. She very kindly told me to leave it with her and she would send me some wool and needles to have a go.

A couple of days later my package arrived, with one pair of needles, 1 50g ball of wool/yarn and a box of a different kind of knitting.

I went straight on to YouTube to find out how to knit, I mean how else do we learn new things these days? I found this video very easy to follow and Sarah (the lovely woman in the video) breaks it down so well!

4 days later I finished my first project. I knitted a little tortoise blanket for my tortoise called Willow.

Don’t get me wrong, it took me a few tries and I had to cut down the wool as I had overworked it and it was all separating and getting hard to work with. That’s the best part with knitting, although it might suck to have to unravel it all, it is super simple and easy to go back to fix mistakes or restart (without wasting the wool/yarn as you can reuse it.

The initial tips that I can share with you are:

• Take it one step at a time (for example, learn how to cast on, then learn knit stitch, then learn purl stitch etc) If you do lots of each one before learning the next one you will be able to do it without thinking when it comes to the next step making it easier to learn the next stitch.

• The next tip is to get yourself a pair of wooden needles, wood doesn’t slip as much as plastic or metal needles which makes it a little harder to drop stitches.

• Pay attention to the first and last stitch of the row (it is easy to add stitches if you are knitting a little loose)

• Be patient with yourself. You don’t have to get it right the first time with everything.

• The last tip for today, start with quite a chunky wool/yarn, it is easier to see and not as fiddly making it easier to learn with.

I have now done a few different projects which I will show you in a later post. The next thing I want to learn is how to cable knit.

If you want more regular updates head over to my Facebook group, and join in. Show me your works of art and we can learn from each other. For now, you beautiful humans. I bid you goodnight.

P.S, I hope you had a lovely Easter Weekend