Knitember 2025 Knitting Problems and Self Doubt About Knitting
Hi everyone! I know it’s been weeks since I last posted, but I’ve been struggling with my current knitting projects. I thought I would be able to write posts this month about my knitting projects, (In honor of Knitember) but everything went wrong. As of this post, I’ve figured out what went wrong and why. Even though I know what happened, I’m pretty frustrated by what happened.
The first problem I had was with the knitting patterns I used. I wanted to make myself some new clothes and accessories for winter. I decided to start by knitting a new beanie. I found a pattern I wanted to use and began to knit it. Sadly, it was meant for wet blocking and I didn’t want to wet block my them. I wanted to have a machine washable beanie, not something that I don’t need to hand wash. When I realized this, I began to work on redesigning the pattern to be larger and will not need to be wet blocked.
The second problem I had was actually creating the pattern. I had to test them, then start from scratch again because the sizing was wrong. I tried to find already existing knitting patterns, but I couldn’t find any for the type of yarn I was using without wet blocking first.
The third problem was the yarn I was using. There were two type of yarn I wanted to use to make two different beanies: cotton and wool. The cotton yarn is pretty good and durable, but the ribbed knit I created using it wouldn’t actually work like a normal ribbed knit. This gave me fits, so I decided to use a wool yarn I owned to make the beanie. That’s when I realized this yarn would give me problems, except these problems were not knitting related.
It is a much better yarn than the cotton I was using. The ribbed knit sits and acts the way I want it to, the color is really pretty, and, even though it is thinner than the cotton yarn, it knits up really well. The problem is my sensitive skin. I’m not allergic to wool, but I am sensitive to them. Especially if they are not washed a certain way, contain certain chemicals to preserve the yarn, or contains leftover dye. Fortunately, this wool is supposed to be machine washable. I think with the help of my washing machine on delicate cycle I can get the yarn clean.
Even though I will be able to wash the beanie, I still need to knit it… and that’s the problem. The working with the yarn caused major allergic reactions on my finger tips and my hands. The only way I was able to work with the yarn is by wearing gloves while I knit. I’m not going to lie, I’m pretty frustrated by constantly wearing gloves to knit.
After all the set backs, and the re-realization that I am never going to grow out of my sensitive skin problems like my doctors used to think I would, made me really upset and frustrated. I even considered more times than not about quitting knitting altogether. If I can’t find yarn that isn’t going to irritate my skin and knit the way I wanted it to, why bother knitting? I decided to keep trying knitting patterns and different yarns with different fiber contents. So far I figured out the beanie pattern and it is coming together really nicely. I also found other patterns for other types of hats I wanted to knit that don’t use wet blocking. Even though I’m not giving up on knitting, this whole entire experience has played on my insecurities about my allergies and sensitive skin a little too much. I’m already struggling with my worries and fears about exposing myself to something I didn’t know would give me an allergic reaction. Yet, this is why I started knitting in the first place. I wanted sweaters and winter accessories made out of yarns I am not allergic to. I’m skilled enough to create them and even create and re create patterns to suit the yarn I use, yet I still wonder if I’m knitting things correctly.
That’s all for now. Thank you for reading.
