Starting with Square One & Pinhole Cast-ons

We're starting 2024 with a make-a-long of knit and crochet squares as part of our monthly club, 
Tour of the Season.  When designing our Tour of the Season project for knitting I spent a lot of time thinking about how blanket squares are constructed — how different stitches yield different sizes and wondered about the ease of assembly with all these squares.  Ultimately I decided I liked the look of a center-out square. There's no top, there's no bottom, just perfect symmetry.  However, in order to achieve that look, it either means knitting from the outside in, or the inside out.  And in order to have the most amount of texture & stitch pattern options, it was best to knit from the inside out.  And this meant using something like the pinhole cast-on. . .this meant fidgety.

To be honest, I don't like fidgety knitting. I don't like *really* challenging stitches or tiny needles. I have intentionally avoided projects that require picking up lots of stitches or complicated colorwork — even if I loved the look of the finished garment.  But the square really wanted symmetry.  I had to do this for the square.

So I came home from work one night and sat down to start my square — my darling is making dinner and I'm chatting with him, meanwhile texting with my kids — and I ended up trying this cast-on for an hour and a half, pulling it out each time.  Fidgety!

The next morning, I was home alone and the house was quiet.  I watched this  slow-mo video from VeryPink Knits and got it and the first try. So lesson learned — don't be tired and distracted when doing something fidgety!  A really helpful thing she says in the video is "all the action happens right here."  That section of yarn is really the only section of yarn that you're picking up with your needle.  That's when it all clicked!



Now is my pinhole cast on perfect?  Absolutely not!  Is it still fidgety for the first few rounds?  Yes!  But is it pretty and satisfying when done?  Yes!

So here we have our first square, which will be the building block for the 11 other squares we will be making this year.

Some tips for other non-fidgety knitters:
1.  peace and quiet while learning something new — no audio book, no tv, no distractions
2.  don't try to learn when tired — a friend told me he has a "no crafting after 9 pm" rule as it always ends in tears
3.  working over a flat surface, like a table, helps your needles stay vertical instead of getting all twisted up.
4.  once you have enough rounds, mark the start of the round with a locking marker

This first block of our knit-a-long blanket is "First Dance" and is included in with a club membership. And don't worry if you're starting late — this club will continue throughout 2024 and all squares will be available to subscribers.