As a child, I LOVED knitting. I tortured my aunt and my mum to teach me. If they were knitting, I was rooting around their bags for the small left overs and a pair of short needles. But you know how some things that you didn't get to do/have in childhood kind of stick with you? Well, for me French knitting is one of those things. I always found the knitting dolly a mysterious, intriguing item but for some reason I never had one and consequently, I've never tried French knitting until now. When this wee hooji flashed up in a marketing email recently, I'd hit BUY before I knew it.
So it arrived and well, the mysteries of French knitting were revealed in rather a short time. Perhaps I'd built this up to be something of an anti-climax?
But, fear not! Thrifty, scrap conscious me hit upon a plan. I've got lots of small ends of yarn from crochet projects and wondered what would happen if I French knit them all together randomly, and then use the resulting knitted tube as a chunky yarn in its own right for some kind of scrappy crochet throw or floor rug or something. Maybe that would work?
Of course, as my new "yarn" is growing, I can't resist a wee play with my rather large crochet hook - 15mm.
Just a few more stitches ...
Of course, it'll take a lot of this new tube yarn to make anything, so I may be a while. Come back in about 8 years and see the first couple of crocheted rounds ;-)
So now I just have a couple of questions. Why is it called French Knitting? Do the French have a particular penchant for these yarn tubes? And what did/do people actually do with the tubular knitting that results? Anyone know?
Sarah x
When I was a child it was all about the length you ended up with. I don't think anyone actually made anything - but it kept us out of our mums' hair!
ReplyDeleteI don't know why it was called French Knitting. I can remember having small nails hammered into the top of a wooden cotton reel to use as the 'dolly'. One thing we made was stitching it into a spiraled circle and using it to stand the tea pot on- not sure what else we made but I loved seeing that length grow.
ReplyDeleteI did not know it was called French knitting. I would crochet it in a circular piece to use as a rug or table topper or placemat or coaster. We got to play with it as kids before we could manage knitting.
ReplyDeleteLove that chunky hook! Can't answer your questions sadly, but the effect is similar to Zpaghetti yarn (made from recycled tshirts!). xo
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