Want a Creative Kid? Teach ’em to Knit!

As the mom of a toddler and a creative person myself, I’m always looking for ways to encourage creativity in my little one. So when I saw a link to a story on Huffington Post about tips for fostering creativity in children, I clicked on it and was happy to find one of the suggestions from author Ken Rabow was to teach kids to knit or crochet.

This is huge these days with kids in their teens and twenties. There are knitting raves and flashmob knitting — it’s just a great thing that’s being re-invented. Yarn-bombing around telephone poles. Knitting cellphone covers, wine bottle covers, dog coats and more. This ain’t your Granny’s knitting!

Leaving aside the fact that I hate the phrase “not your grandma’s knitting” and the fact that just because it’s cool isn’t the only reason to do it, I do agree with him. Making your own things out of string is really amazing, creative and empowering for young and old alike, and it’s a great skill to teach kids (which we actually just talked about the other day).

Did you learn to knit when you were a kid? Do you think you’re more creative now because of it? Spill it!

Next Pattern:

Stitch dictionaries are a fun way to learn new-to-you knitting stitch patterns or to take a deep dive into a particular technique. Debbie Tomkies offers 100 cable stitch designs and thoughts on how to incorporate them into projects in her Cable Knitting Stitch Dictionary.

Each stitch pattern is shown in a large swatch photo and with written and charted instructions. Any special stitches are included on the page. The stitches are rated on a difficulty scale of 1 to 3, and the pattern notes also indicate how many extra stitches you should add to a project if you’re going to work this cable (since cables pull the fabric closer together you need to compensate for that) as well as how many stitches and rows are in the repeat if you want to design a project yourself.

The cables are arranged into sections: classic cables, combinations, all-over panels, creative cables, motifs and panels and cabled edges and borders.

It’s fun to flip through the designs to think about projects you can add a single cable or two to or make with an allover cabled design. Or you could make swatches of different cables and sew them together into a pillow cover or a throw.

At the back of the book there’s a section on general cable knitting techniques, reading charts, working swatches and avoiding errors (though it mentions working the wrong number of rows between cable turns, it doesn’t share how to count rows between cables to avoid this mistake).

It also talks about how to design your own cables, combine cables in a project, choose the right yarn and needles and determine how many more stitches you need to cast on when working cables instead of stockinette stitch. There’s also a glossary of symbols and abbreviations you may find in cable knitting and other patterns.

The book provides a good overview of things you can do with cables, as well as some fun things you might not have tried like infinity cables and horizontal cables. It’s a great book for a designer who likes to work with cables or a knitter who wants to play with different stitches in their projects.

About the book: 176 pages, paperback, 100 stitch patterns. Published 2024 by David & Charles. Suggested retail price $26.99.

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