Knitting Faster

Three days in the making and it hasn't gotten any better for it because I forget half of what I was going to say anyway, but I seriously think I've started to knit faster. I can't really decide if I am happy or sad about this. I can see where this is a bad thing and where this is a good thing.

Say I'm knitting socks. A skein of yarn on average costs US$20. It used to be that I knit a pair of socks in something like an average of 30 hours (or more). So then it only cost me about US$0.67 for each hour of entertainment which is not counting the fact that I have a usable object when finished that further reduces that cost. Now it takes on average about 16 hours. Which is US$1.25 for each hour of entertainment. That's almost twice as expensive! Still such a good deal can hardly be had for any other form of entertainment so this isn't a totally bad thing. It does mean knitting is now much more expensive for me though.

Going the other way, I don't spend enough time with one pattern (sock, scarf, shawl, whatever) to get bored with it. Not that I get bored considering I'm in the middle of the 6th plain sock in a row. But then if I really really like the pattern I'm done with the knitting well before I'm over the pattern and I'll still want to keep going, so I end up knitting 6 plain socks in a row. Which probably will get boring for blog readers as I have very little to say about the pattern by the second pair let alone the third.

I'm sure there was another thing that could be looked at as good and bad as well but for the life of me I can't remember what I was thinking of on Monday! Does anyone else have any thoughts on this?

I learned at first to be a continental knitter but then changed to English. I'm considering going back to continental and relearning it with the thought that I would slow down a bit because I'd have gauge and tension issues at first (most likely?) and therefore would be slower. I think it would be an interesting experiment for whatever amount of time "slow" existed, but I also think that since I "know" how to knit that gauge and tension will work themselves out quickly enough and I'll be right back to this same spot. It would be nice to be really consistent both ways I think.

Since I'm stumped on the for and against issue I guess I'll offer up that I have proof of faster knitting. We'll look at production in the month of June. 16 Days. So far this month I have finished a washcloth (you saw the start of it but will see the finished soon), a pair of fingerless and mostly wrist-less mitts (which you'll probably see in the same post as the washcloth). I've also knitted two and 3/4 pairs of socks. Meaning 5 and a half socks. Half of a sock was knit today in a four hour meeting this morning (minus two rows on the way home when I stopped for a train).

Plus! I've knit two scarves. You haven't seen one of the scarves at all. Partly because its secret knitting and partly because its waiting for blocking because I have proper blocking mats coming to replace the ones that are deteriorated. You've seen one of the scarves started in May (the bright yellow one). Well I frogged that scarf and started over because I couldn't figure out what needle I used. I had a vague remembrance of having changed the needle (so I could use it for the Brea mod - also waiting for blocking). The needle I thought I used, the needle on the knitting, and the needle I indicated on my Ravelry page where not at all the same size. So I just decided to start over. So I recast on a BUNCH of stitches and knit what I thought was about a third of the skein, decided that I wasn't going to have enough yarn for the length I wanted, frogged, recast on again with about 2/3 the number of stitches. I got to the length I wanted just fine. This is what is left.

Anyone have any ideas what to do with the other HALF (actually .54) of the yarn? Its about 250 yards of lightweight fingerling. Apparently I would have had no problems with just finishing that second cast on amount.

For those trying to keep track I have knit somewhere around 2100 yards, something like 1.2 miles of yarn in the last 16 days. I'm floored by that number.