Knit One, Purl None

I think I see it! The knitting booty! Dropped stitch marks the spot! Okay, hopefully my injection of humor will get better as this blog goes on. Onto the knitting results:

There's been some scarf knitting in my past, maybe five or more years ago, but they were always scarves that looked like that <<. And, I'd love to move past that!

So here I am looking through the "Learn How Book" and I have to say I think the illustrator might have used a little creative flair with the illustrations - I mean, maybe they didn't exactly read the instructions while they were drawing. They just went off of memories of grandma knitting in her rocker.

I remembered the knitting motions a little though and got my way through the regular old knit stitch. When I got to the purl stitch though, I just got stuck - I think I understood how to do it but each time I'd try to do a row of purling, after a row of knitting, the loops would just be too tight to manage. In fact, the picture you're seeing shows that little piece of knitting about to bite the dust. I think I might have to resort to YouTube-ing it and check back.

Also, does anyone have any tips on regulating your stitch size? I'm not sure if you're supposed to stay kind of loose from the needle or if you want to stay relatively close to its gauge. Any beginner tips that changed your knitting for the (much) better?

Finally, have you ever gotten a numb thumb from knitting? I'm beginning to think these knitting needles were recycled from a past life as poison darts.