I recently sent Jackie a set of interchangeable circular knitting needles. This is just a terrible gift to give someone. Terrible. Do you love a knitter? Don't do this. A person's preference in knitting needles is an intimate and wildly personal thing and you'd be hard pressed to find a pair of knitters who will agree on what the perfect needles are for any given project. Some people like sharp needles, some people like blunt. Different people like different sorts of material - wood, bamboo, brass, aluminum, nickel, chrome. A knitter may like a brand of needle when they are fixed circulars but hate the joins for the interchangeable circulars. And what they like may change wildly depending on whether they're knitting socks or, say, a sweater. Or on the material they're knitting. Unless you know exactly what your knitter likes, you should never try to surprise them with needles. Never, ever, ever.
I did it anyway.
But! I have an explanation for my foolish and reckless behaviour! See back when I first started knitting, I bought a set of Knitter's Pride Dreamz interchangeable needles - which are colourful wooden things - and sat back to wait for them to arrive, content that with one good purchase I was never going to need to buy needles ever again. (I'll wait while all you knitters laugh hysterically. I was a sweet, sweet summer child.) Alright, while I was waiting for my Dreamz I got itchy, wanting to start all the projects I'd lined up in my Ravelry queue. and it turned out a local yarn store was going out of business so before I knew it... I had bought two pair of circular needles and a pile of yarn. Only at the time I didn't realize how different needles can be so I'd just bought needles that the store had in a size and colour that I liked. Not liking a lot of colour, this meant I walked out with two Addi Turbo knitting needles which were brass needles with nickel plating and a very flexible blue (there's that blue fetish showing again) cord. I didn't realize at the time that I'd accidentally bought some of the more expensive needles in the world or that this would doom me forever.
See, the Addi Turbos are very, very slippery needles and also a little blunt and I spent two weeks knitting feverishly on them. When my wooden Dreamz needles arrived I quickly tried them out and discovered a couple things. First, they're really sticky. Wood has more "grip" to it than ultra slippery nickel plating. This can be good for some kinds of knitting but I'm a tight knitter and going from the Addi Turbos to the Dreamz felt like trying to knit in quick sand. Second, I'm also what's called a "pusher". It's this terrible habit where you use your finger to push against the needle while you slide more stitches forward. This wasn't a problem with my blunt Addi Turbo needles but the Dreamz needles were sharp enough to *hurt*. It's a terrible habit and I need to break it but dang... those needles broke my heart. I really wanted to love them.
Eventually I discovered the Addi Turbo Clicks - a set of staggeringly expensive (I'll wait while you laugh again) interchangeable needles with the blunt, slippery Addi Turbo feel I'd grown to love and a particularly clever spring join system (upside, it doesn't come undone while knitting. Downside, it can be obnoxious to get the join lined up, especially if your eyes aren't as young as they used to be). After a lot of agonizing I bought them and proceeded to be deliriously happy with my purchase. I'm not saying I sleep with them cuddled in my arms... but the Theo cat is suddenly sleeping at the foot of the bed and is wearing a distinctly disgruntled face.
While comparing toys with Jackie over Christmas, I discovered that she uses a set of Boye interchangeable circular needles which... uh... are the subject of some controversy in the knitting world. They have their pros and cons.
They are inexpensive, aluminum needles which are colour coded by size. The best thing they have going for them is they go all the way down to 2.5 mm (US 2) needle size in the default purchase case. A lot of interchangeable sets only go down to a US size 4 or maybe 3 because they are limited by the size of the join mechanism. So that's a major plus for the Boyes. On the downside the cables are really stiff, the needles often unscrew themselves in the middle of your knitting, and on the really small sizes the cable can be larger than the needle itself making for some very awkward knitting. So those are some major negatives for the Boyes.
Jackie had mentioned an interest in learning to knit with the Magic Loop technique (which I'd stumbled into by accident when I owned one circular needle that was about 8 inches too long for my bag) and the stiff cable of the Boyes doesn't lend itself well to that. Though I'm told you can do some creative DIY stuff to use your beloved Boye needles for Magic Loop - including making your own cords. Crazy.
So when I found someone online who wanted to trade two sets of Knit Picks Options needles for a set of wooden needles, I went to do some research. The Knit Picks Options are very similar to my beloved Addi Turbos in that they are brass needles with a very slippery nickel plating, but they have sharper tips and use a screw join. They're also compatible with Knitter's Pride cords allowing you to sort of pick and mix your accessories. So I decided to go for it and traded my Dreamz for the two identical sets of needles and set one to my lovely stepmother Jackie. Even though it's a terrible, terrible idea to give someone knitting needles... if she didn't like them I would happily take them back and cuddle them until they felt better. I also sent her an Addi Sock Rocket on a 60in cord in her favourite sock knitting size. I'll gush about the Sock Rockets some other time but they are my absolute favourites and the long flexible cord means you can do two at a time socks, which I knew Jackie wanted to try. And again, if she didn't like it - I'd take it back! Clever girl, no?
There was a brief moment of hysteria when I found out Jackie is allergic to nickel. But it turns out her fingers are tough enough that she can use the needles without problems. If you have allergies though, your mileage may vary - some people are fine and some people get itching and swelling and all sorts of problems. She's raved about the sock rockets and after decades of aluminum dpns announced that she's never doing socks any other way again.
... It doesn't look like I'm going to get those Options needles back either. :P
No comments:
Post a Comment