This is me, knitting Continental style. Yes - Continental style and I can do it easily and without much thought.
I have been a serious knitter since my teens - a lot of years, I was taught by Mum who is also a serious knitter. However she left me to find my own way of 'throwing' she does it in a neat, looping way with the yarn wound round her fingers, I do it with a maximum of hand and arm movement, not elegant but I can get up a decent head of steam and what I lack in speed I make up for in hours spent.
To date I never managed to sort out Continental - it kind of made sense because I can also crochet. The breakthrough was the workshop with Alice Starmore on Fairisle knitting - she showed me how she holds yarn in the left hand when doing two colour work with a colour in each hand. She said to hold it close to the needle so the yarn is 'just there'.
I've overdone the knitting recently - I blame a new box set of 'The West Wing' and my right arm and shoulder have started aching a bit too much so today I have concentrated on the Continental and - bingo - its fallen into place.
I'm doing it with chunky on size 6.5mm but the tension is the same as when I throw which is great because I had read that some people get a looser gauge with Continental. One of the drawbacks for me is the awkwardness of purling - even Meg Swansen says her purl isn't the best, but these days I do the majority of my knitting in the round so not so much of a problem.
In case you can't tell, I'm a bit chuffed (as they say in Yorkshire).
