How to Sit, Stand and Knit to Relieve Pain

I have been pretty well sidelined from knitting all week after I overdid it on Monday, so it was finally time for me to watch the video that Liat Gat shared about relieving shoulder, neck and back pain for knitters.

The video features Esther Gokhale, developer of the Gokhale Method, which aims to give people posture and movement that’s more natural. She’s known as the Posture Guru of Silicon Valley and has lots of great tips for positioning your shoulders (she’s doing the shoulder roll on Liat in the picture), sitting properly, taking frequent breaks from sitting (she calls for every 15 minutes, which I don’t think many knitters will do, but it would be good for us), stretching when you stand and lengthening the neck to keep us from hunching over our work.

She sells props that help make the training process easier, but just watching the video and doing what you can with what you have might at least make you more mindful of how you sit when you knit and how long you do it.

Do you ever have pain when you knit? I’d love to hear what you do to counteract it.

[Photo via Liat Gat.]

Getting ready for back to school makes me think about pencil crafts, so let’s take a look at some pencil themed knitting patterns!

I recently made a pencil on a circular knitting machine, and it was a fun, quick, easy project that uses little bits of leftover yarn (and if you don’t have yellow you can make it a colored pencil using whatever color’s your favorite). And if you want to make a bigger version check out this pattern from Orange Olive Road on Etsy.

If you want to knit a pencil pillow by hand, check out Sketchy, available on Ravelry from Shana S. Cohen. This one uses worsted weight yarn and has two size options and the choice to make a pencil with an eraser or a colored pencil.

Pencil scarves seem to be the most popular kind of pencil knitting pattern, and there are lot of cute ones. This one from Cosy Craft UK mostly uses garter stitch, with some welts to add texture and what looks like an I-cord edging. It calls for DK weight yarn.

If you want to go all garter stitch try this version from Emsley Co Creations, which uses five colors of DK weight yarn and just a little shaping to make the point of the pencil.

There’s also this fun, mostly stockinette so it looks like it curls a bit, pencil pattern that looks like it’s worked in chunky yarn from Little Knits Studio. This one uses just a little garter stitch and easy shaping for the point.

If you don’t want a pencil scarf, how about some pencil socks? The No. 2 Pencil Socks from The Yarn Enabler are available from Ravelry and use five colors of sock yarn. They feature wide ribs to mimic the texture of a pencil and have options to be worked from the top down or the toe up.

Needs Sharpening by Alexander Walker is a free pattern on Ravelry that uses five colors of sock yarn to make a sort of shortie sock. The little bit of black at the tips of the toes inspired the name. These, too, can be worked in either direction and are available in three sizes.

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