Monday, October 13, 2008

New Pathways in MY BRAIN!!!

A few years ago, I read that when you learn something new, it creates a wrinkle- or a pathway, in your brain. After the class I took with Cat Bordhi on Saturday, I'm feeling the effects cerebral wrinkles. Effects include:

1- An uncontrollable desire to drop everything I'm working on and knit a sock with a new architecture.

2- Daydreaming about knitting during other activities (working, meetings, spinning). Specifically, knitting a brilliant sock in handspun yarn.

3- Using the new sock as a carrot for finishing other tasks (like plying up the singles that have been resting).

4- Admiring the baby sock I did in class with vanity and pride beyond compare:

CB Sock -front

cb sock - side

I'll be honest- when I cast on my Footprint (a brilliant, simple architecture), it was 11PM, and the ONLY reason I didn't cast on something more challenging was because of the late hour. It seems to be going faster than a traditional sock. Since the construction was published in the Twist Collective (as the Houdini Socks), I'll let you explore it yourself.

Here is the process of my socks thus far:

(Two completed footprints, with the stitches picked up.)
houdini socks

(A close-up, so you can see for yourself.)
houdini sock cu

(Snip!)
houdini - first cut

(Opening up the stitches.)
houdini sock - opening

(Ta da!)
houdini sock - open


As far as the class is concerned, I recommend Cat as a teacher ANYTIME. Her background as a schoolteacher gives her the experience to pace the class so that the students absorb the most when they're fresh, and as the day went on, the material seemed to get simpler.

Despite the fact that there were 25(ish) students, all of us got one-on-one attention from Cat, and it seemed like all the students had that "aha!" moment. I haven't felt this smart in AGES!

2 comments:

  1. Oh cool! Especially since you could already outsmart and outbright me any day of the week. Love those socks!

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  2. OMG- The first time I read this I really just scanned through the pictures. Needless-to-say, I had to go back and make sure you hadn't totally lost it! Cool technique. Makes me nervous...

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