The importance of the right tool was made abundantly clear to me as I began to knit a pair of fingerless gloves. I prefer using bamboo needles for knitting. I like that they feel warm and light in my hand. Some people swear by metal needles because they can knit so quickly with them. But my experience is different. They actually slow me down because I don't like how they feel. For these gloves I designed a pattern to use some fine alpaca yarn. I chose size 1 needles so that the resulting fabric would be dense, but not overly so. I was ready to start, but couldn't find my needles (turns out I was using them to knit a sock). I began the gloves using metal needles. I was not having fun. The needles were cold, hard, and too long for this project, making them hard to balance. It not only changed my speed, it affected my stitch tension. I changed needles as soon as possible. Here is a picture of the gloves so far (I don't know why the picture is rotated):
On the completed glove I can see where I changed to bamboo needles. Even though the needles are the same size, the stitches are not. The second glove, knit with bamboo needles from the beginning, is a much more consistent fabric.
So, the lesson for today: The quality of my work is not just due to my skill or lack thereof. It is also a product of the tools I use. The right tool for the task is not just a factor of the quality of the tool, but also how the tool fits the user. If you are having trouble with a project that you think should be going better, perhaps the problem isn't you. Maybe it's the tool.
