Okay, so unless I have giant needles and giant wool, it takes a decade to make anything!
My question is this…
Do you really have to use thinner wool on thinner needles and how the heck can I speed this up.
Also, does anyone know an easier pattern for sleeves. I keep having expectation vs reality moments when I knit the sleeves. throws needles and cries in corner
Size of needles and yarn depends on what you want to make. Most things can theoretically be made with chunky yarn, just maybe not as finely tailored as you can make things with finer yarns.
As for speeding up, I think continental style can help you, once you get used to it.
I’ve got no advice for sleeves, sadly. I’ve never really made full garments!
The sleeves I made sucked and now the cardigan looks like something out of a horror film, but I was proud of myself for putting a full garment together.
I agree with @Shintoga, Continental knitting style might help you to knit faster. I recently made a short video showing me knitting ribbing with Continental Combined style. You find the video here: https://forum-new.knittinghelp.com/t/how-i-knit-1x1-ribbing-in-continental-combined-style/141035.
As you can see, you do not need to move your hands nor fingers a lot.
That said, while I love Continental Combined style, people have been able to speed knit with most styles including English style. So look around and see what styles you like best!
I prefer to knit sleeves from armpit to cuff. I knit them in the rounds with DPNs. DPNs are just something I like so use whatever needles you like. Before beginning to knit I do a bit of math. From the gauge I calculate how many stitches I want at the cuffs I also calculate how many rows it would take to get long enough sleeves. Then I calculate how often I need to decrease in order to get to the right amount of stitches for the cuffs. It might be something like every 4th or every 5th round I do as tightly as possible SSK followed by K2tog on the backside of the sleeve.
This with tight SSK followed by tight K2tog might be a bit unorthodox (I have not seen it in any ready pattern) but I like the result a lot.
thanks i have been thinking it may be easier to go from top to bottom as it is easier to decrease than increase for me.
I’ve noticed that speed is not so much tied to a particular style, but results from economy of motion, ergonomics, efficiency, and lots of practice. There are knitters who can work quite quickly using any of the well-known methods (by quickly, I mean 2 stitches per second and faster).
If you already knit using “English style,” this video has some great points for working faster/more efficiently: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ox-bEaVaKLs Also, look up Hazel Tindell.
If you knit “continental”, you could take pointers from Miriam Tegels for example: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=S2E-IDIAGGo or also maybe this video: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=v6lDvtK2YmE
Notice even though the styles are different the principals of getting more efficient are basically the same! So it’s good to try out different techniques, but also to know that whatever basic style is most comfortable/enjoyable/practical for you can probably be tweaked to knit much faster with practice. Anyway, these helped me a lot. I also knit continental combined style but I’m still learning and I wouldn’t say i’m particularly fast (some people seem to think i’m quick but i’m certainly not in competitive speed knitting range, i don’t think–I ought to time myself sometime though just for fun…).
Good luck!
I can knit either method, but my go to is English. I’m pretty fast. Speed comes with practice for the most part. How you hold the yarn can make a difference as well.
That said… Using large needles on thinner yarn makes the fabric more open and lacy. If you use needles to small for the yarn weight the fabric will be very dense. There are no rules, but needle size and yarn can affect your gauge so keep that in mind.
I hated doing the sleeves at the end until my mom told me to do them at the same time! I would knit one, then the other. So now I use 2 balls of yarn and do them at the same time. And knitting is slow for me too.
how one earth did you knit two at the same time 
Not to disparage all the amazingly smart knitters, but I don’t understand the need to knit “faster”… Knitting is my way of relaxing… When I try to knit faster I find my jaw and shoulder muscles tense up. As soon as I slow down and enjoy what I’m doing, everything relaxes. So I say go at the speed that keeps you relaxed and don’t focus so much on getting it done quickly… But that’s just my humble opinion… Do what makes you happy. Be well everyone and stay safe…
At the risk of stating the obvious, I did want to clarify that I think there’s an important distinction between forming stitches quickly because you’re making very small and efficient motions, versus forcing yourself to rush by just moving faster. The latter definitely is not relaxing, I’d agree! But i find working toward the former MORE relaxing–at the best of times I kind of get into a flow state where my whole body is relaxed and I feel like I’m just watching the stitches fly and I find it meditative and soothing. (And being able to finish projects faster is also gratifying and empowering for me: even though knitting is still a time-consuming and patient process, I find getting a little faster has given me more freedom as larger or more complex projects begin to seem more accessible.)
But yes, well said! Everyone should do exactly what is enjoyable for them! 
Cheers!
It’s not as hard as it seems. You cast on the stitches for the first sleeve. Then you take your second ball of yarn and cast on the stitches for the 2nd sleeve. Then you just follow the directions but do each row twice. I’m making a sweater with a small ridge in the pattern. Well, I made a mistake and did the ridge 2 times! But I did it on both sleeves so it looks like it’s part of the pattern. So I didn’t rip it out.
If I could see you stitch, I could be of more help; thus:
I switched to continental, even combined continental, about eight years ago…I did speed up and enjoy the rhythm of this style far more that throwing of flicking…and…I can’t stitch any faster than near 27 spm. I can stitch not looking most of the time, too when plain knitting or purling…no faster…and, I’ve tried…keeping a timer near at all times when I feel the urge…LOL!!
Twenty-seven (27) spm is reasonably slow, I think…but, wth? ((: I’ve tried.
Oh, what’s her name, “Tisdale?”, Hazel?..who can reach 118 spm…WTH? I just find that…impossible…LOL!!
So, I’m happy with 27…but, I do observe how-to videos that suggest ‘this is how you stitch faster’…getting no where, it seems.
Oh, I did speed up by not stitching so deep into the stitch…working closer to the tips of the needles…so, I knit and crochet ‘everyday’ and have accepted my speed…what’s the rush?
Anyone, what else can a stitcher do to sped up the process; thanks!
I believe that the 118 spm figure is Miriam Tegels’ official Guinness world record. Hazel has knit as many as 262 in 3 mins in a speed knitting contest, according to this interesting article about her which also has an embedded video of her knitting https://www.interweave.com/article/knitting/worlds-fastest-knitter/. But that doesn’t seem right because 262 in 3 mins was stated to be faster than the Guinness record, but by my calculations is only 87.33 spm (??) so either something was misprinted or I’m totally out of it. either way, though, we’re talking speedy knitting!
Many old-time knitters who knit articles for sale out of necessity were said to be able to make about 3 stitches per second, I’ve heard. But without the crushing pressure of dire poverty driving the craft, I doubt many of us “hobby knitters” of today will ever approach those figures.
Just for fun, I went and timed yesterday myself while working a sleeve in st st: I managed almost a st per second at one point, but adding in needle changes and adjusting sts as I went made the actual working speed about 50% slower: I did a full round of 31 stitches (it was a baby’s sleeve!) in just under 50 seconds, roughly. I wouldn’t work that speed all the time–I definitely pushed it a bit, and if I focus only on speed my tension sometimes gets erratic. But I’m happy with my progress because when I timed myself a while back I could only manage just over 2 seconds per stitch, and my stitches have also gotten a little more even and tension is more consistent.
I’ve been evolving my self-taught style, tweaking as I go when something seems off. The best I can summarize it is that I tension the yarn loosely with the left hand and keep the needles in almost the same angle relative to each other–almost right angles, a little wider especially when purling or knitting into the “back” on the eastern mounted stitches–and just kind of rotate the tips of the needles around each other in such a way as to form the stitches, purl being almost a mirror image of knitting, but with a little more right needle movement. All the while trying to keep the movements as small as I can. I’ve not seen anyone else do it quite the same way in videos but it seems to work ok for me so far… I’ve found keeping the angle of the needles constant (not a lot of scissoring or twisting or wrist motions), and using the left needle’s follow-through movement to assist in pushing the new stitch all the way onto to the barrel of the rh needle (something I took from watching Hazel’s style) are two things that have helped me streamline recently, for whatever it’s worth…
My great-great-aunt btw was said to be an insanely fast and skilled knitter. But unfortunately if anyone ever timed her spm we will never know. She was pretty poor, an emigrant Russian Jew, and I bet she probably learned to knit out of necessity at a very young age and then kept at it her whole life. We do know she knit continental–she may or may not have used the “Russian” or “Eastern” purl technique as I do. Although she died before I was born and I never saw her knit, I like to think I’m honoring her or channeling her in some small way.
Sorry to ramble! I hope this doesn’t read as too “hijacky”… if so I can delete… 
Cheers!
No, you are good.
I have picked up speed. I made a hat in 3 hours and a scarf in nearly 4
That’s a really interesting post, and it’s ok to ramble sometimes! At least it was totally relevant 