My Knitting Olympics – Part One

As I expect the whole knitting world knows, the Knitting Olympics are upon us. Started by the Yarn Harlot, the intention is that you knit something during the Winter Olympics, casting on (roughly) during the opening ceremony as the flame is lit, and completing your project before it is extinguished. The intention is that this should be a personal challenge. A mammoth sweater – or an elephant, such as Ysolda’s Elijah, perhaps – or a complex lace pattern or anything else that you wouldn’t normally attempt in a month of Sundays.

There are ravelympics too, the upstart alternative with teams and multiple events. The How Many Times Can You Frog A Forest Canopy in Seventeen Days and Reknit it Biathlon. The Silky Speed Knitter Clapotis. The Aran Mogul Freestyle Sweater. It makes my head spin faster than the Kerrs ice dancing to Linkin Park.

So I’m with the Harlot, and I signed up for the regular KO event and hoped that it wouldn’t K me O in the process.

I have opted for socks. Yes, I have knitted socks before, lots of times, so not much new there, but the next two weeks are going to be pretty busy, so actually knitting anything at all will be a bit of a challenge. And in the spirit of the occasion I decided to learn different techniques along the way.

I dyed my yarn, a sort of berry-ice-cream-ish colour and I took it with me to a knitting thing on Saturday. I met an interesting and eclectic group of women who were knitting everything from sweaters to Swedish style lace curtains to hats from local alpaca. I managed to leave the house without swift and ball-winder, so the preliminary warm up was to convert the skein into a ball by improvising with one of my Nana’s fat wooden needles.

Freestyle ball-winding. Not the neatest of balls I grant you, but semi-ball shaped, so I surely get a few points for effort.

Flushed with success, I moved onto the pattern. Now, I don’t really knit pattern. I am one of those knitters who enjoys acres of stocking stitch, untroubled by the need for bobbles, cables or other fancies. But this is the Knitting Olympics, and I am supposed to be doing the Citius, Altius, Fortius thing, so it seemed that something more than stocking stitch was called for (although I do wonder how many knitters are doing this in reverse and are embarking on a simple stocking stitch project to prove to themselves that they don’t need a pattern to keep them motivated).

I have opted to knit the Embossed Leaves Socks from the Interweave book “Favorite Socks”. These socks are not for me, they are for my sister-in-law who lives in Boston, USA. I just hope she approves!

The second event in my Games is a K1P1 longtail style cast on. I managed it at the third attempt with some assistance from Jane, and then promptly knitted into the purls and purled into the knits. I frogged.

I twisted my fingers like a true artiste a second time… and somehow managed to do the same thing again.

We paused for an excellent lunch and I considered my options. Jane brought out the meringues.

Mmmm. I do like a meringue.

Not just any meringues.

Bitter chocolate meringues.

Fortified, I looked at the pattern, and decided to take the long view. There isn’t much difference between a rib cast on and an ordinary cast on, and these are socks which will go under trousers not opera gloves to be worn at the red carpet entrance to George Clooney’s next premiere. I do know how to do it now and I have been able to tick off a second new skill, even if my subsequent abilities leave something to be desired so I cast on with a normal longtail and began the rib.

I’ll show you how I’m getting on with it tomorrow.