I Only Knit Scarves

Today I dragged my armwarmers to work to knit on while I was doing nothing. (It's the Friday before a holiday, NOBODY is here, nobody is calling... dead. At least I can be productive, even if it's not-work-productive.)
I sat and knit. I should note that this is the first project I've ever done on DPNs - it's the first project I've ever done on them because I HATE working with DPNs. Before, I started something, got irritated, frogged it, and devised a way to knit the same thing on straight needles instead. Well, this is also the first time I've ever done cables, and I don't know enough about them to feel confident that if I converted the pattern and worked on straights instead that the effect would be 100% the same. (At this point, I'm pretty sure it would have been, but whatever.)

So, here I sit, DPNs in hand, cable needle at my side, armwarmers growing in length as I knit away. Okay - granted, with the DPNs, it looks intimidating, like it's maybe really hard. Co-workers kept coming up and going "Ohhh, are you knitting? *I* knit! Well, I only knit scarves..." Another says "I can only knit scarves... oh! And washcloths!"


Now, wait a minute here. Before I learned how to knit I couldn't even make a scarf. I was really proud of myself when I finally learned how to knit. And, well, admittedly... I learned to knit because I wanted to knit scarves. Yarn is, generally, cheaper than buying a scarf in the store (not counting when Old Navy has their big end of season clearance, in which I can pick up a huge garter knit scarf that would have driven me to insanity if I knit it myself for $2.) And, as I've learned a little bit more here and there, I've really had fun designing some quirky little things into my scarves. No, I don't just make garter knit or ribbed scarves, but when you get right down to it, a scarf is still a scarf.

My calorimetry, the last armwarmers I made (on straights, then seamed) and this pair of armwarmers (which I am indeed knitting on DPNs) aside...
I proclaim it, and I proclaim it loud and proud.
I only knit scarves.


Nobody who has learned how to knit should ever put themselves down - even if "all" they do is knit scarves. Because learning to knit can be really frustrating and hard. I know it was for me... probably even more frustrating was that, once I was done, it was SO EASY that I couldn't believe how hard it was to figure out!
So I have nothing but respect for every single person that has ever learned to knit. I just wish that they respected themselves and their talent, too.

SI scarf - Progress Again

Today's Tom Sawyer he gets high on you
And the space he invades he gets by on you

The SI scarf at 50%:






The length of the scarf at 50% was half pattern, half striped. Now I'm on my way back down the other side! There are 28 stripes per side for a total of 56. Still agonizing over the stripes, but at the 50% mark, I counted my stripes, then put that number on my knitting counter (one of those that you change the numbers on by turning a dial.) and started to count DOWN as I knit the same number of stripes on the other side. It's easier this way... now I know what I'm working towards. Before it was just a length goal, not a number of rows or anything. With a concrete number in front of me, it is WAY easier to go "Okay, I'm knitting from 28 to 20 now" and to actually make that goal! Hopefully now I will be able to rip through the rest of the stripes, then get back to the pattern, and... and... FINALLY... finish this thing.



Right now, my only other WIP that's on needles is the Pinky Scarf, which is boring boring BORING garter stitch. I'd like to finish it just to say it's finished... not because I'm particularly excited about the FO. I guess that's kind of a bad thing... but what can you do? I hope to eventually put little flowers on it, like those in Knitty's Nagano Sakura. I'm sure once it's done, I will love it, but it's not an exciting project as is...
And why mess with garter stitch when there are so many other fun, enticing projects in my head?