The Pains of Being a Self Taught Knitter: Back to Basics

Today I learned how to knit garter stitch.

No, I am not kidding. Garter stitch.

Apparently, I've been knitting backwards (or continental, or eastern uncrossed, or so I've been told) for the past 4 years, which somehow lead me to twist stitches without realizing it. I knit with the left 'leg' of the stitch to the front of the needle. Most knitting books (at least the ones I've seen) show the right leg in front. It's no wonder I've been so mixed up! I had a breakthrough when I realized that I was twisting my stitches in the round, fine. I could handle that information -- I hadn't knit that many things in the round up to that point. But for the past 4 years I've been knitting garter...wrong??

I've always hated knitting garter -- it's painful and slow. Now I know why. I figured it out when I went to weave in ends on a garter border...and, waiiit a minute...those aren't supposed to look like that... (I've clearly also just recently learned how to correctly weave in ends.)

I also learned how to do a proper, right leaning decrease - k2tog. For me, the actions to get the slanted decreases are reversed. I already figured out that ssk meant I could just 'knit 2 together,' but today I learned that k2tog does not mean I can just shove my needle into the stitches from the opposite direction. I actually have to slip, slip, knit. I'd already deciphered some of the knitting code to match the way I knit (ex - tbl means to twist the stitch, even though I have to do it through the front), but k2tog!?!

Yeah. Still not over it. The wine is helping.