Interesting. Is this material covered in any of her books, or can you point me to a website or other source? Would you feel comfortable giving a rundown on how speed up your knitting? I’d be very interested.
I’ve been knitting for about 30 years and I almost never watch what I’m doing unless it’s something like intarsia (pictures) or a really fussy lace.
Sometimes, if I’ve really been into a movie or something I’ll actully over-knit what I’m making - that is, the back of my sweater will wind up 26 inches long (instead of 24) and I’ll have to back knit to where the shaping was supposed to start.
Anyhow, it took a lot more than two weeks for me to be able to do that. I teach a knitting class and always insist that people start with a scarf. The first scarves are henious; however, by the end of the scarf, every person’s knitting (tension) has improved to the point where they could actually make something wearable.
I haven’t seen it in any of her books, though some of what we talked about her been there, mainly some of the history of knitting (which is where the speed comes in, in the past they had to be fast to make any kind of money at it whereas we don’t need to be fast at all). The first thing she had us do was a time test to see how fast we knit.
One thing she had us do was try several different ways of knitting and explained how different ways work better for different patterns. For example, continental (or picking) is better for straight knitting, basically garter stitch, because it is not easy to purl in it. She then showed us the easiest way to purl in picking, which is to do the Norwegian Purl (second to last video). Another interesting thing she showed us is how the Peruvian’s purl, with the yarn tensioned around the neck and pulled around the needle with your thumb… it’s really easy and comes in REAL handy when you have several hundred purls to do for a shawl…
The main thing she showed us was how the fastest knitters in the world knit, which she called lever knitting, and is what she does (she knits 88 stitches per minute btw, I don’t knit anywhere near that). She showed us this video of Miriam Tegels (note the knitters in the background, that’s how you can tell the video isn’t sped up!). She also mentioned how most people knit today is a result of people no longer needing to knit for money, starting about the Victorian times… you hold your needles and yarn just so like you are ready for tea and are all ladylike, instead of a long needle stuck in the armpit.
It was a really fascinating (and funny!) class and I would do it all over again, but I doubt I could summarize it very well. The above is just the high points.
You can see Stephanie knitting here it’s not really fast, but she’s not even looking at it which is what I found the most fascinating, and is what the OP was asking about.
Flutterby - Thanks for all that, especially the Norwegian purl video! I am making a shawl right now with tons of purling, and I will be teaching myself that technique.
Oddly, I ended up starting another pair of socks last night, and the pattern was easy enough that I found myself chatting and watching TV, and only having to really look a couple of times a round. That has never happened to me before, and reminded me of this thread.
I guess with me when I saw the two elderly ladies do the knitting with such ease, well I guess it’s one of those things that looks so much easier than it is.