Knit and Crochet Blog Week - Day 3 and 4

Nope, I did not fall off the earth again or drop the ball. I simply had a very busy day yesterday and barely made it to the computer - hence two days of Knitting and Crochet Blog week are scrunched together in one.

Yesterday's subject was this:

One Great Knitter
Write about a knitter whose work (whether because of project choice, photography, styling, scale of projects, stash, etc) you enjoy. If they have an enjoyable blog, you might find it a good opportunity to send a smile their way.

And boy is that a hard one for me to answer. I have taken workshops with Beth Brown-Reinsel, Candace Eisner Strick, Cat Bordhi, Melissa Leapman, Nancy Bush, Norah Gaughan, and Lucy Neatby. Every time I came home from one of these workshops, I was completely smitten with the skill of these women, their control of the needles, their design sense, inventiveness, ability to teach and pass on what they know, their knowledge of the history of Knitting AND current trends.

If I had to pick, I probably learned the most from Lucy Neatby. There simply is not a single knitting issue the woman cannot solve, not a single thing she can't design, write out, and knit. While we were at the workshop, which was about double knitting, she was making an astonishing double knit blanket. There were on display some double knit mittens complete with thumb shaping and everything a mitten needs to have - except it was completely reversible. Or how about these reversible socks?? Do they not blow one's mind?

Every time I think of these possibilities, I feel like I am reaching the end of my capabilities.

I absolutely LOVE love love Norah Gaughan's designs, especially the more timeless ones in her book Knitting Nature, and the early booklets she designed for Berroco. They are different, but not unattainable. They look at the body and how to knit for it in a completely different way. Norah approaches design from utterly different angles, turning pieces sideways and slanty, upside down even, and yet they always cover the figure in this flattering way...

Anyway here I am getting lost in design reverie.

Please do tell me who your favorite knitter, designer, or knitblogger is that keeps your interest over and over again.

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Today's topic is:

A New Skill
Is there a skill related to your hobby that you hope to learn one day? Maybe you’re a crocheter who’d also like to knit? Maybe you’d like to learn to knit continental, knit backwards, try cables or attempt stranded colourwork.

This may sound utterly silly to you, but somehow I would really like to be able to read crochet patterns.
I learned how to crochet when I was in grade school, and I learned the basic stitches. (I even made my mother a filet crochet table cloth when I was a teenager).) My hands still know what to do, and I know the basic terminology -- in German!

With knitting, I made the transition so well that I now write knitting patterns in English; I can decipher charts pretty easily. Crochet language has always eluded me - it may as well be Chinese or Arabic. Single crochet is not single, double is treble where I come from - or is it the other way around? It's not even that I want to suddenly make a ton of things in crochet, but it sure would be nice if I could even produce a decent granny square. Yes, I think I would have fun with that...sigh.

Maybe one of these days a knowledgeabe friend could be persuaded to teach me. Just beware, I might be muttering things under my breath...and you won't understand a single word.