The Class

Well class #1 went very well.  At Barbara's suggestion I cast on 30 stitches ahead of time on each set of needles so we were able to devote the most time possible to getting the knit stitch executed and it worked! 9 children in the class (3, 7 year olds, 3, 9 year olds and 3, 10 year olds) managed to knit a few stitches, by themselves. In a fascinating demonstration of how different people learn differently, two children's hands seemed to "get it" despite the whole thing remaining an apparent mystery to their brains. But the majority had that wonderful moment of...

 "aha!"

 expressed with little exclamations of ...

   "oh! I see!"

"I did it!"

and the most precious...

"I can help someone else for you because I know how to do it now!"

Surprising to me was that they were all very excited at the prospect of  being able to keep the needles - that they were, in fact, their own and that they were real needles.

My favourite part of the whole thing though was the collective sound of them catching their breath as I unveiled the rainbow of beautiful worsted.

When I was asked to teach this class I insisted that I would only do it if we could use good quality wool yarn. If the resulting materials fee was too much then we would have to accept that the community wasn't sufficiently interested to support offering a class. The response of the children confirmed the validity of that decision.

How seriously great is that?

I hope you have a seriously great weekend! I hope to get some FO shots of the High School Mitts with Number One Son and the Darling Daughter Scarf on the DD herself. The baby knit I've jammed into the queue should also see completion.

If you are in North Toronto here's a head's up - the spring issue of Debbie Bliss Knits is in at Passionknit.  apparently they're the first retailer in Canada to get it!

As always...thanks for dropping by today!