Since knitting and crochet are both time intensive, anything I can do to save time or make my time count double is worth the time it takes for me to come up with a system. I watch TV and knit, read and crochet.
When I create swatches for design proposals – specifically for socks, I want to save time. So I do a provisional cast on and cast off, and work the knitting in between as normal.
What this does is twofold – if the design is accepted for a proposal, great. Sometime later down the road I can pull out the swatch and be well on the way to creating a pair of my own, that won’t have to go back to the magazine when I’m done.
If the design isn’t accepted, then I can take the work I’ve already done, and work off of it to finish the sock and make it into a design that I’ll self publish. This way the hours I spend working on a swatch serve double duty – and I’m not left with a swatch that I don’t know what to do with or how to store.
Do you have tricks that save you time? I’d love to hear them, and they don’t have to be just about knitting or crochet. After all, any minute I save in other places, I can put towards creating designs!
