I am teaching myself how to knit. So far so good, and my son is looking forward to his new scarf soon. Somehow knitting seems to complement dulcimers, ocarinas, and whistles.
Robin
YES, IT DOES!! I love knitted things, especially knitted instrument cases. 
One of my friend’s dad held all kinds of titles and certificates in knitting.
I asked my friend to show me how to knit, but I was told that she DOESN’T knit–she crochets. Apparently there is a big difference my ignorant self didn’t know about. 
At any rate, I’m yet to learn. I’d love to, though…
My daughter knits, and is actually quite good at it. She makes doll clothes, sweaters (for regular sized people rather than dolls 
), hats, scarves, mittens, socks…you name it. One of these days I’m going to have her show me how to do it too.
And yes, there is a huge difference between knitting and crocheting. I’m not sure about the whole thing, but I do know that with knitting you use at least 2 needles, while with crocheting, you use one hook. And the end result is also very different.
I think knitting is a pretty neat thing. I like to knit when I’m listening to CD’s. I’m working on a pair of socks and something has gone wrong so I have to deal with a problem which I can’t do when I’m listening to CD’s. Maybe tomorrow I’ll get it all straightened out and get back to my little knitting, CD listening routine. Good luck on your scarf! I’m sure your son will love it.
A woman in my lab is currently begining crochet and showed me a little of it. It will probably be the next thing to try, after knitting. I went into a yarn shop in town the other day, it had been there a year and I didn’t know it was there! Anyways, she said business is really good because knitting is “really big” right now.
Izz, that’s pretty cool that your daughter is so good at knitting. My daughter is learning with me, and is pretty enthusiastic. You need to have your daughter teach you, it’s not hard. The big thing I’ve learned so far is to stitch the yarn about 10 times looser than my natural inclination. That has helped a lot! I think that’s why it’s therapeutic, you have to let go of the tension or you won’t be able to get the needle through the yarn! 
Robin
my mom knits - I crochet. I can do “straight” knitting, but never learned how to do anything fancy, or increase or decrease stitches. I can do most of the fancy things in crochet. In fact, I made hats and scarves for a bunch of people for Christmas presents last year.
I love some of the yarns that are out there now. I DON’T like some of the prices, however…
We’re looking forward to the new dulcimer cozies and ocarina warmers and whistle covers.
I was hoping Spittin_in_the_wind might knit me a whistle…
…or a Cranberry (but in a different colour)
-You say crocheto, I say knitahto.. 
OK, that was funny. 
In college, I knitted a couple of sweaters. Since then I have started a project or two which have foundered as a result of the complicated patterns I seemed determined to pick. The problem is, live gets too complicated to have to keep changing counts, and keep track of it.
A nice scarf, where you do the same thing the whole way, would be the way to go.
Well, you hit on nearly all my current crafts and hobbies: whistles ocarinas (got a new one at Disney World last week!) dulcimers (guilty of not tuning my dulcimer in 6 months…maybe this evening) and knitting.
For me, specifically, lace knitting. I taught myself knitting and been at it for about 2 years now, and I’m currently in the middle of Peacock Feathers Shawl I LOVE doing lace.
My first (any only!) other large project was the Irish Diamonds Shawl. Details can be seen at here along with a few other items.
And Cranberry: knitting is done with two straight needles. Crochet is done with one hooked needle. There is also a combined form, but I don’t know much about that. There are good books out there to teach you how, or nearly any yarn store would be delighted to get people started.
Wow, that’s impressive!!
Robin
Those lacy shawls and scarves are lovely. I think I 'd like to knit a lacy scarf sometime. The instructions I’ve read for shawls looked like the construction is sort of weird----are they triangles first or something? It seemed like there was something that sounded tricky about getting them all in one piece.
What is it called when you’re psychologically addicted to knitting (like WhOA)? My friend the other day went to Walmart where they were having a sale on a bunch of their yarns and bought $50 of yarn, which turned out to be about 4 whole bags full of yarn. I thought this was obsessive and suggested rehab, but I got smacked.
I think it would be KnOA…
Robin
I’m working on a 15 foot long scarf at the moment.
I made one of those. Peach and cream stripes. I realized early on that no matter what, it was going to roll itself up into a long woolen tube. Probably operator error. No amount of blocking could persuade it to be flat. I wore it once. I suppose I should just accept its tube-ness, close the long side, and use it for pipe insulation, or something.
I’m sure it is not error on your part. It is the stitch pattern, the particular stitch. Just as an example, if you knit something in stockinette stitch—like what a plain sweater looks like from the outside—if you just knit that stitch it will roll up from side to side. There is just something about the innate pulling of that stitch that makes it do that. So if one were to make a scarf using that stitch you’d have to knit some border stitches to keep it from curling up. And you are right, no amount of blocking would change that. You might be able even now to add a border, like of garter stitch somehow or even crochet a border that might help. I don’t know what other stitches would cause that to happen, but I think it would show up in your swatch and then you would know that you need to have a border to keep the piece flat. I’m no expert—just some thoughts there.
Thank you, Cynth… you guessed correctly, it’s all done in stockinette stitch. It was the first and last thing I ever knitted, and I just made it up, without using a pattern, so it serves me right. I was in denial about the rolling-up phenomenon until I was about 4 feet into it, and by then I was committed to it. You know how that goes.
After that, I switched to crochet, which works better for me. I’m still intimidated by the idea of making clothing that way… lack the concentration and patience to do much in the way of stitch-counting, but I can handle straight line patterns… so it’s afghans. Oodles o’ afghans.