Hooks and Fire

We all know the old knit versus crochet war - knitters don't crochet and crochesters don't knit. People always ask - which do you think is better? knit or crochet?

I grew up with the crochet versus knit. My mother crocheted and my aunt knit. I crochet because that's what my mother taught me. It suited her personality - no rules - you make what you feel like and if in the middle of it you want to change it, you can.

My aunt, my mother's sister, was the knitter. She made beautiful Mary Maxin sweaters - not a stitch out of place and they wore beautifully. She made me a beautiful black sweater with turquoise and yellow snowflakes when I was 8. Gorgeous!

I knitted and crocheted for awhile when I was an early teen. I still have the garter stitch scarf that I knitted out of Wintuk yarn in pajama blue. I still have the garnet colored afghan that I crocheted in double crochet stitch.

It's back - my marriage of crochet and knit. When I was a teen, I never got past the garter stitch. Impatient, the crochet went faster than the knitting so I gravitated to crocheting. My mother could help me, my aunt didn't live close enough to encourage me on. Crochet it was - it fit the rebel, unpredictable self I was at that age.

Lately, I've been enamoured of stockinette stitch. It looks so lovely, like weaving. So I decided I had to learn how to do it. I went off to the bookstore and bought a learn to knit visually book (I'll talk about that in another post). It worked. I figured out how to do stockinette.

Here's my very first effort - in Metro yarn. I crocheted a shell edging because the short scarf needed something.

Some might think I'm a traitor - but I think it goes right along with the free spirits who crochet - I want to be free to do whichever I please. Aunt Alice would be proud!