Probably a silly question, but

Hello, knitters! I’m new to knitting–absolutely clueless-- and I’ve found the videos here really helpful. I am having a problem, though, and I can’t decide whether it’s something every new knitter experiences and works through, or whether there’s something wrong with my thread/needle choices, or whether I’m just doing it wrong.

After casting on, is that first row of stitches normally very difficult? It seems like my casting-on is too tight, and I’ve loosened it a bit. But it’s still not really working-- my stitches are very LOOSE on the second needle, often fall off, and look generally WRONG. I started with #9 plastic needles because that’s what a friend recommended, but I wonder if those traditional metal ones would be easier.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated! Thanks, Poppy

Sorry, guys-- it is amazing how you can mess with something for days and not be able to figure it out, but the MOMENT you go back to it after posting a silly post on a message board, it suddenly becomes clear. I was misunderstanding the “off jumps jack” part and not pushing that stitch off the needle with the casting-on. Once I had pushed Jack off that pier a couple of times, all my problems solved themselves.

I’m not sure ‘OffJumpsJack’ who posts here would be amused. On the other hand, he’s got a good sense of humor… :lol:

Oh, dear-- my apologies, OffJumpsJack, if you read this.

Don’t worry about it, I was just making a funny. He’d think it was funny too.

Now I can’t get this vision of a line of Jack’s jumping off a pier into the ocean out of my mind…

Haha! Offjumpsjack has a great sense of humor so he’d love it! :lol:

There is a ‘demo of a small project’ video that helps a lot of people, too.
http://www.knittinghelp.com/videos/knitting-tips