Where my stitches at?

So I had an absolutely brilliant topic to write about this week, but then I forgot it. Instead, I shall tell you about my knitting because I've been doing it a lot through my spring break and I'm really excited about it, and hopefully it turns out as good as whatever my other brilliant idea was.

I started knitting after I got my acceptance letter from my top choice college. I thought it would be a good way to relax after all the stress of the previous 3.5 years of high school and months of college applications, while still allowing me to be productive. My mom had done a bit of knitting in the past, so she taught me the basic knit stitch. Then I, like every other beginning knitter, made a scarf. It started out small, and I made a lot of mistakes. There were many times in the beginning when I would accidentally add stitches onto my work, and my scarf kept getting wider and wider.

After restarting a couple times, I finally got the hang of it. And then I was knitting all the time. I had several movie parties with friends over the break, and I knitted through all of them. After countless movies, Glee episodes, and Doctor Who episodes, I had a scarf that was probably about six feet long and thick enough to be a blanket. It's pretty much the coziest thing I own, and I am ridiculously proud of it.

Then I started working on a hat for my mom. However, the pattern I had required me to learn some new stitches and my mom was out of town, so I had to learn from the internet. If it weren't for knittinghelp.com, I probably never would have finished it. I also found knitting forums full of helpful people who were able to give me advice when I had no idea of what I was doing. Even with all of the amazing resources out there, I still struggled like a newb. About half of the stitches I made were wrong and it became a confusing labyrinth of yarn. Eventually I got the hang of it, but at that point I realized that some parts were such messes that they were just going to be random holes and knots and I would just have to deal. Eventually I finished that hat and it looked quite nice, as long as you ignore the mysteries at the bottom.

And then I went on to knit a pair of mittens. By that point, I'd gotten good enough that the only problem was that they were quite a bit too big for my little sister's tiny hands. SUCCESS! And now I'm working on fingerless gloves for a friend with a really neat spiraling pattern. I really like these gloves because even though they're a more complicated pattern, I don't have to knit fingers, which is quite nice. And now I'm so happy because I actually know what I'm doing and I think it shows. So I guess this all goes to show that practice really does make perfect. Also, the internet is an extremely helpful resource.

Anyway, my recomendation for this week is Flight of the Conchords. The show is hilarious and fantastic. It's two New Zealanders who are in a band that writes comedy songs, and they've moved to NYC to try and become popular. However, their agent is terrible and they only have one crazy fan. My summary probably sounds terrible, but it really is hilarious. If you can't watch the show, I suggest you at least listen to the songs. I've been listening to them all week, and they are pretty much all amazing.