Hi. My name is Froggie. I am an avid golfer and I am really good at it. I started playing golf at an early age. I was only four years old when I dug up holes in the back yard and made a golf course. I was a standout high school golfer and went to college on a golf scholarship. Though I no longer play competitively, I still maintain a scratch handicap and play golf just about everyday. So what does this have to do with knitting?
Quite a lot actually. You see, my wife who is smart, talented, and good at everything she does took up golf when we got married so that we could enjoy the wonderful game of golf together. In an amazingly short period of time, she progressed from a beginner golfer that would score well above 100 to a highly skilled player that finishes a round of golf fairly close to par. And now, my wife who is an avid knitter suggested that since she took up golf in order to spend time and play golf with me that I should take up knitting in order to spend time and knit with her.
After unsucessfully arguing the fine nuances and point of view that a wife learning to play golf for her husband and a husband learning to knit for her wife are two completely different kinds of undertakings altogther and an apples to oranges comparison that holds no water, I decided on my own without any kind of spousal pressure or ultimatums to take up knitting. Hmm, so there.
Well, I have been at this knitting for a while and it has become clear to me that there is a lot more to knitting than I could have ever imagined and learning to knit is a lot harder than learning to play golf. So you see, I was right afterall, a wife learning to play golf for her husband and a husband learning to knit for her wife are not the same things and absolutely, definitely, beyond a shadow of doubt not an appples to oranges comparison.
Alas, I cannot be accused of not being a good sport. I am still at it and I hope to one day become as good at knitting as my wife has become at golf.
Having said that, it would be remiss of me to not point out the many challenges that a loving husband of an avid knitter faces when doing his best to learn to knit. Yes, it is nice to have a wife that knits so well. It is like having a knitting coach on hand that can teach me how to make slip knots, cast on and bind off, knit and purl, increase and decrease, and most importantly be on hand to pick up drop stitches for me.
Though I think I am making good progress with it all, I can’t help but notice how perturbed my wife has become and how impatient she now is with me. She gives me looks of disappointment when I struggle with yarn tension, makes snide comments when I don’t understand the instructions in the knitting book she gave me, and calls me names as she sees me frogging, a knitting term that means ripping out stitches to undo knitting and fix mistakes or completely start the project over and knit it from scratch.
Hence, my name, Froggie.
So, as I continue to learn to knit I will be chronicling my adventures. For those new to knitting, I hope you find these chronicles to be helpful in your skill development. For those that are helping or teaching beginners how to knit, I hope my experiences learning to knit will provide you with a view of things from a different side of the needle so that you can become a better, more pleasant teacher. And for all others, I hope you find these chronicles to be a fun, enjoyable read.