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PamelaA3
Gabber Extraordinaire
USA
476 Posts |
 Posted - 08/03/2006 : 4:00:16 PM
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I went out on the net and reviewed a oouple of sites. It seems that 8 to 15 % is thought to be left-handed, another site says 10%. More younger people are left-handed now than used to be. Males are much more likely to be left-handed than women and left-handed people are more artistic, creative and genius.
Take Care,
Pam |
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Zari
Chatty Knitter
133 Posts |
Posted - 08/03/2006 : 7:37:18 PM
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| Really? I had always heard that women were more likely to be lefties. Go figure :) |
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sfgrandma
Chatty Knitter
USA
150 Posts |
Posted - 08/03/2006 : 10:09:05 PM
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I'm left-handed and knit (Continental style) that way, though a couple of months ago my 7 year old granddaughter wanted me to teach her to knit and I made the adjustment so I could teach her as a right-handed knitter. It would take me months to adjust if I were doing something more serious than teaching the knit stitch.
For lace and other patterns using k2tog and ssk, I just reverse the instructions. Actually, it's easier to read a chart because I know I have to do a ssk if the slant is to the right. I don't worry about cables, though; I just let them twist in the opposite direction unless there's a specific design reason to switch. |
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gwtreece
Permanent Resident
USA
7254 Posts |
Posted - 08/04/2006 : 06:04:46 AM
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Wow, I'm creative and a genius. Who would have dunk it? As for more people being left handed, I think more people are allowing children to choose which hand they want to use than in the past. There was a time when schools forced children to become right handed. My aunt was forced to change (she was raised by my grandma) and my grandpa refused to let my dad be changed.
Wanda
My Blog
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SisterTheresa
New Pal
USA
24 Posts |
Posted - 08/04/2006 : 12:32:05 PM
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I'm a lefty and taught myself to knit with the stitches going from right needle to left. It boggles my mind sometimes trying to figure out whether I am twisting stitches, etc. But I'm getting to understand the principles pretty well, and can usually adjust patterns how I need to. I'm planning on starting a simple project soon (stockinette stitch scarf in novelty yarn) to experiment with all the various ways of making stitches, and see if I can get good at knitting the right handed way. I think that would be a helpful skill to have.
BTW, my husband and I are both left handed, and 4 of our 5 children are.
Theresa
primary knitter for James and 6 little sprouts
Moriah, Samuel, Toby, Elsie, Peter, and Little Engine due Oct. 31 |
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leftpaw
Warming Up
USA
95 Posts |
Posted - 08/04/2006 : 4:49:53 PM
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Theresa, I think that twisting stitches is probably one of the most common problems for new lefty knitters. If you think of each stitch on the needle as an upper case Omega, or an upside down letter U, you want to make sure that when you knit (or purl) a stitch the legs of the stitch are open and are not crossed on the right needle. If you look at a knit stitch on the right needle, before it has been worked, the left leg should be in the back of the needle, the right leg in the front of the needle and it should really look like and upside down U.
There was another topic posted today where someone provided a link to her blog and it has short videos of how to knit and purl without twisting stitches and those might be helpful for you to look at to make sure you aren't twisting your stitches. The important thing to keep in mind is that you want to make sure that you are always knitting and purling into an open stitch - no crossed legs on that Omega! But, there's more than one way to wrap the yarn around the needle to achieve that - I actually wrap differently depending on whether I'm knitting something straight or knitting something in the round - but I always make sure that I'm knitting / purling into an open, uncrossed stitch. |
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Queen Knitsalot
Permanent Resident
USA
1331 Posts |
Posted - 08/05/2006 : 04:38:13 AM
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I always new I was a genius but no one else would listen when I told them. At last, confirmation!! HaHa world, look out now---especially my 15 year old "adult" son who thinks his mother grew up in the dark ages and knows nothing!!!
suzanne
"The most wasted day in all our lives is the day on which we have not laughed"--I wish I knew |
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Sam Kleinman
New Pal
USA
7 Posts |
Posted - 08/05/2006 : 7:31:22 PM
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I'm a leftie threw and threw, and while I've adapted to doing some right handed behaviors (mostly in relation to dancing,) I do almost everything with my left hand.
I was taught to knit by a right handed continetnal knitter, who had previously taught several lefties to knit right hand style on the "knitting usess both hands and so it doesn't matter which hand is domininat" philosphy, which I can respect up until a point, but that has it's limits.
I suppose this story starts much earlier. My mother taught me to crochet when I was five or so, I picked it up maybe a half dozen times durring my childhood, and at one of the latter points (when my mother and I were crocheting a very simple afgan together over a holiday, we recognized that I crochet backwords. Not only did I "go in the other dirrection, but I went in the "back" of sittches, rather than the more customary front of stitches. So we piece together that either I picked this up on my own in the interum between episodes of crocheting, or I simply mirrored what my mom did becasue I was sitting across from her when I learned. I also picked up wierd things which were figments of an untrained crochet mind, that my mom didn't teach me. Like a really strange double crochet, that I've since come to learn is called "extended single crochet" but no matter...
In anycase, when I tought myself to knit, holding the yarn in the other hand (from my crocheting days) seemed awkward. After a few rows of knitting like my teacher told me, I turned the work around and did it my way, and haven't really looked back. She looked at what I was doing and said something like "well you're getting knitted fabric out of it" but I don't have a clue about what your doing" and I seemed to have fun so that's all well and good.
The one thing is that I can't share knitting projects with anyone (unless they want to purl a lot as I knit almost everyhting in the round).
I've since learned how to knit the other way, as it is helful in knitting the heels of socks, and enterlac, as well as helping people. I tend to throw when knitting "back" and "pick"/continental when knitting my normal way, so I don't have to move the yarn from hand to hand.
I've worked in yarn stores a bit, so this ability to switch off has come in handy, it is, also one of the main reasons, I think, that I've been able to "get" knitting as well as I have: because I had to figure everything out for myself, and there aren't really people who knit like me to help me along the way.
And while we're at it, I have a question: where did this notion that so called "backwards" knitters can't follow pattterns? it all works out if you really just follow the pattern and don't think that you're knitting backwords. I must admit that I read charts "backwords," ie in the dirrection I'm knitting rather than the dirrection everyone else knits in, but this is only logical. and it works out. Never had a problem with it.
Anyone else?
Sam Kleinman
Knitting Savant(?)
Tealart.com
http://www.tealart.com and http://www.tealart.com/knitting/ |
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steff13
Chatty Knitter
USA
348 Posts |
Posted - 08/05/2006 : 9:49:34 PM
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I am a lefty, but I knit the right-handed way. I don't know any other knitters, and when I wanted to learn, I did so from a book. I actually am glad I knit this way - my right hand was largely useless before I started knitting. I type really well, but that was about the only thing my right hand could do. I still am not sure how right-handed people could possibly write - I can't even seem to manipulate my fingers to hold the pen properly in that hand. 
Oh, and the most recent study, I think, by Prof. Chris McManus found that 13% of the population is left-handed.
I have a blog! http://steff13.blogspot.com/ |
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crowingram
New Pal
USA
47 Posts |
Posted - 08/07/2006 : 07:31:01 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by Sam Kleinman
...She looked at what I was doing and said something like "well you're getting knitted fabric out of it" but I don't have a clue about what your doing" and I seemed to have fun so that's all well and good...
...And while we're at it, I have a question: where did this notion that so called "backwards" knitters can't follow pattterns? it all works out if you really just follow the pattern and don't think that you're knitting backwords. I must admit that I read charts "backwords," ie in the dirrection I'm knitting rather than the dirrection everyone else knits in, but this is only logical. and it works out. Never had a problem with it.
Anyone else?
Sam Kleinman
Knitting Savant(?)
I've got to chime in with Sam. As an instructor, I have run into more than one person for whom I have very little to offer other than, "Wow! Great fabric."
I guess I am the token right-hander in the group, but one of the reasons that I wanted to check out what was going on here was that I, too, have learned to knit in both directions 1) for showing people in front of me what a stitch is supposed to look like being knit, 2) because I do TONS of swatching and constantly flipping the fabric gets annoying (to me, anyway), 3) because I AM an instructor and hated the idea that someone might come to me asking for help for whom I'd have little, and 4) because I am Der Ubergeek and just had to see how it was done. The first time that I figured out how to work a ssp knitting from left to right, I whooped loud enough to scare the dogs.
I'm also intrigued by Sam's comment that "it all works out." Empathically, I want to say he's right, but there's something that's making the geek in the back of my head (as if that's his ONLY terrain) itch. Sam, are you knitting stockinette fabric that faces away from you or toward you as you're knitting it?
Matt.
Forget Rock City! See Crowing Ram
http://crowingram.threadbearfiberarts.com |
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jpr54_
New Pal
34 Posts |
Posted - 08/07/2006 : 11:28:29 AM
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I knit left hand--with twisted stitches
I don't feel comfortable knitting right hand |
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CPAknit
Seriously Hooked
USA
737 Posts |
Posted - 08/08/2006 : 11:23:22 AM
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I must be really rare - Left Handed and a Redhead! (well- my hair used to be red until I had 3 children and 2 husbands and it went gray!)
I knit right handed and crochet left handed. There are a few things in life I do right handed, I swing the golf club and the bat right handed.
I agree that left handed people are very adaptable, we have to be to get along in life!
But this can also cause problems- after years of working with right handed scissors, I spent a fortune on left handed dressmaker shears- I can't use them, I am always looking on the wrong side of the scissors for the cutting line. Oh, Well!!!
Thanks for the separate forum, Clara! - You know how to make everyone feel special!
Cindy
http://cpaknit.typepad.com/can_a_cpa_be_a_knitter_ca/ |
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Sam Kleinman
New Pal
USA
7 Posts |
Posted - 08/10/2006 : 08:48:37 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by crowingram
I'm also intrigued by Sam's comment that "it all works out." Empathically, I want to say he's right, but there's something that's making the geek in the back of my head (as if that's his ONLY terrain) itch. Sam, are you knitting stockinette fabric that faces away from you or toward you as you're knitting it?
Matt.
Forget Rock City! See Crowing Ram
http://crowingram.threadbearfiberarts.com
I knit with stickinette fabric facing me while I'm knitting it.
My "it all works out" comment, could varry well be assisted by the fact that I am also a huge dork about this stuff, and may be adjusting patterns preconciously.
Sam Kleinman
Knitting Savant(?)
Tealart.com
http://www.tealart.com and http://www.tealart.com/knitting/ |
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Sam Kleinman
New Pal
USA
7 Posts |
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leftpaw
Warming Up
USA
95 Posts |
Posted - 08/10/2006 : 8:41:35 PM
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These are a few things that have come up for me Sam - I've been knitting for a pretty long time and it wasn't until about a year ago that I realized that if you are reading a pattern that is written out you can follow the decreases as written but if you're following a chart you should reverse the decreases. I have always read charts from left to right, which seems to make sense to me anyway since that's how we read!
A couple of years ago I made a brioche hat and it took me a good hour to figure out the brioche stitch - I can't remember what was different about the way I did it and the way the instructions said to do it (I've got it written down some where...)
The question on my mind lately is this - I've only recently begun to knit socks, so far I've knitted two individual socks (not a pair - though I've cast on for the second sock in a pair). When I knit the first sock it was from a pattern for first-time-sock-knitters so everything was spelled out clearly, with photos. It was clear from the pictures that when shaping the gusset I had to reverse the directions for needle 1 and needle 3 (so instead of needle one being on the left, needle two on top and needle three on the right it was needle 3 on the left, needle two on top and needle 1 on the right). When I finished the sock it looked good and the shaping of the gusset was right. So, when I knit my second sock from a different pattern I did the same thing - I reversed the shaping of the gusset and that time it looked really odd! So, now the question in my mind is why did it work to reverse the shaping in the first pattern but not the second? It makes no sense to me. If there are any experienced left-handed sock knitters out there let me know what you generally do. |
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Sam Kleinman
New Pal
USA
7 Posts |
Posted - 08/11/2006 : 07:32:21 AM
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so here's my trick for directionality in decreasing, and I've tested it on my mother so it should work for both handed people.
Let's under stand that there are really two ways to decrease (k2tog and k2tog tbl, ssk is a varient on the second to prevent the stitches from twisting as is "s1 k1 psso," though the latter isn't a attractive.) to get these two decreases when you place your needle into the two stitches, the tip of your needles is pointing either right or left. that's the dirrection that the decrease will slant.
k2tog slants the decrease toward the working needle, if you knit "backwards" left handed this is left, if you knit right handed "normal" this is right. becasue when you go to take the two stitches you bring the working needle arround in front and back to take the two stitches.
k2tog tbl (or ssk) you slide your needle, in the oppisite dirrection through the back loops of the stitches, and the point of your working needle is toward the other needle (right if you're a "backwords" left handed knitter, and left if you knit in the "traditional" right handed style.)
In socks the gusset decreases should be pointing *away* from the instep, and toward the sole/bottom of the sock. Use whatever decrease you need to at whichever gusset there is to get this to happen.
When following a lace/open work chart, ignore the key, and look at the dirrection that the slash/symbol for the decrease is going:
if you see / and you knit "backwords" do a k2tog tbl (in lace, no one can ever see the twisted nature of the stitch, and it's ever so much more fast) becasue to k2tog tbl your needle would point in ---> that dirrection. if you knit the other way, (right handed, "trad" style) to get your needle to point ---> that way you have to do a standard k2tog.
if you see \ it's a k2tog (for backwords left handed knitters) becauses your needle points that <---- way when completing that particular stitch.
as for double decreases, I'm heavily partial to "sl2tog k1 p2sso" as it universally produces a centered, non directional double decrease, which works surprisingly well there are directional doubled decreases which you would approch in the same way. there's k3tog, which slants whichever way your needle points, and the same dirrection that your k2tog slants, there's SSSK which works as you expect it, there's k3tog tbl, there's also various methods of decreasing one stitch using a normal ssk or k2tog, and then psso the decrease, which is pretty common; here dirrectionality is determined by which side the slipped stitch is on the stich being passed over. It will slant toward the stitch being passed over.
I've never done a brioche stitch, I must admit,so I'm not much help to you there, and I haven't tried to follow written patterns for pattern stitches in a long time--I'm mostly doing fair isle these days--so I don't know... My gut says, unless you're trying to create something that you'd have to read (words, letters, binary code, etc) if you're follow a pattern to the letter (ha!), the wrost thing that can happen is that you have a mirrored garment. For instance, cables which twisted "in" toward the center pannel of a sweater, or perhaps one of Sally Melville's asymetrical jackets/cardigans in the Knit/Purl Stitchs might be reversed, with a longer bit on the right, rather than left side. But thankfully most things are symetrical, and people don't burn sweaters for having cables twist in the wrong dirrection (as long as they're both wrong, it doesn't matter much).
The one place to pay particular attention is making button holes in a sweater, that might require some fudgeing, lest they end up on the wrong sidebut I'm not sure about that one, again, do some testing for yourself.
Hope this helps...
Cheers,
sam
Sam Kleinman
Knitting Savant(?)
Tealart.com
http://www.tealart.com and http://www.tealart.com/knitting/ |
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shataidow
New Pal
7 Posts |
Posted - 08/13/2006 : 12:27:15 PM
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i'm left handed and taught myself to knit english style from a book that showed both right and left hand knitting. i had only been knitting a week when i found the websight that shows videos of continental style and since i knew it would be a headache to revise patterns for lefthand knitting, i learned that method. it was much easier to knit continental style right handed than it was for me to knit english left handed.
i recently have been trying combined knitting and am amazed at the difference in looks of my stitches, so i may swith to combined. i have been knitting less than a yr so am still learning. nila |
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diamondgirl
Chatty Knitter
USA
194 Posts |
Posted - 08/19/2006 : 7:26:57 PM
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I am left-handed, and my right-handed mother taught me right-handed knitting when I was very little. I couldn't make it work, and had to sit the right needle on my hip to hold it still. Mom figured when my hands got bigger, she could correct me. 25 years later I still knit funny. Perhaps I should hang around in here and get some tips.
Third Generation Craft Ho |
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millsgrad
Gabber Extraordinaire
USA
479 Posts |
Posted - 08/21/2006 : 12:39:44 PM
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I had to wait all weekend to post on here because I didn't have a user name! I am a left handed combined knitter as well and I've actually stumbled upon some problems with patterns particularly socks. I think if I had tried to knit socks earlier in my 'knitting career,' I would've been so frustrated and would've just given up. After the first pair that I knit which were frogged many times! I noticed what the stitches did and I was able to figure it out but I felt as though why should I have to try to tweak a pattern to my way of knitting? Not only am a left handed knitter but I also knit combined..talk about a double-edged sword! I'm just glad this sub-forum was created and I've found other lefties!
rhoda
http://g-girl-knittingadventures.blogspot.com
quote:
Originally posted by Dejhia
I'm another left handed knitter. I really confuse people when I knit at my knitting group 'cuase I'm a left handed combined knitter.
I tend to not have to many problems with patterns. I do have to think about any sort of slanted decreases and such. So what if my cables go the other way from what the pattern says.
~ heather
www.dejhia.blogspot.com
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Blue Turtle
New Pal
USA
8 Posts |
Posted - 08/23/2006 : 12:19:28 PM
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[quote]Originally posted by Sam Kleinman
so here's my trick for directionality in decreasing, and I've tested it on my mother so it should work for both handed people.
Let's under stand that there are really two ways to decrease (k2tog and k2tog tbl, ssk is a varient on the second to prevent the stitches from twisting as is "s1 k1 psso," though the latter isn't a attractive.) to get these two decreases when you place your needle into the two stitches, the tip of your needles is pointing either right or left. that's the dirrection that the decrease will slant.
[quote]
WOW! Thanks Sam! You seem to have a really good understanding of all this stuff! I am a self taught left handed knitter. I knit from right to left and hold my yarn in my right hand and "pick" with my left needle. I also knit into the back (leg away from me) of the loops. I thought I was "Normal" until a few months ago when I took a sock class. I had made socks on my own before and ended up with a sock, But when the instructor saw me knit, she exclamed you knit wrong! I finnished the class and in the process learned (on my own) that I was twisting purl stiches and my decreases slanted the oposet way. I fixed my purls and now switch ssk for k2tog and vice virsa. All better, right? Well not exactly. I just started a cabled sweater, and much to my surprise had to compleatly re-right the pattern. Days of frustration later[crazy], I had it fixed. Next up Lace, I think it is comming out right, But I can't tell! I don't have any knitters to show it too and no cameara to post on-line! I have considered learning to knit left to right but it seems too daunting for me at this point. I think knitting should be fun and relaxing, so, knit how ever you like. However when I can't follow a pattern and be shore it will come out correctly, I whish I just knit like a "normal" person.
Shoot for the moon, even if you miss you'll land among the stars (with a cool pair of socks!) |
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left handed knitters?
