Knitting Endeavors.

I recently spent a Saturday with my mammar; a lovely, funny, strong-willed and patient lady, not strictly related to me, but one of my grandma's all the same, and the one I see most often. Now, on this particular day she wasn't very well- dizzy and couldn't walk very far- so we decided we'd have some fun which didn't involve much moving around. I've recently been wanting to learn how to knit, and I knew that my mammar is very good knitter, so suggested she taught me- she agreed and I brought some knitting supplies with me to her house. We got to and she showed me first how to cast-on. After trying to knit my first cast-on stitch for a good 20 minutes, my mammar- controlled and measured- suggested I watch her once again. She'd already accumulated 36 cast-on stitches though and was running out of room on her needle. At any rate, I watched once again, huffed and tried to pull the piece of wool through with my right needle. It came through!! Absolutely ecstatic, I slipped it onto my left needle, and proceeded to knit 4 more cast-on stitches, identical to the first. On the 6th, I became stuck once again and the charade repeated itself once more. All was going well!
I then learnt how to knit and purl, catching on pretty quickly after that initial 45 minutes.
Now, my mammar said, you started with 24 stitches, just count how many you have, you've probably dropped a few, beginners often drop a few on their first square!
I had 42 stitches.
Oh, right! I though it looked like a few more than 24... wait, you've picked up 18 stitches? How?!  She exclaimed. Honestly I was about as confused as she was. Anyway, I continued my messy, inconsistent attempt at stocking stitch, ending up with a funny looking Mr Tickle (The Mr Man) sort of shape. I cast off with super-mam's help, and sat looking at my squiggly piece of knitting. We then spent another 5 minutes coming up with ideas of what it was. We settled on pencil warmer...
Yesterday afternoon I had a second wind for knitting and set to work casting on with a nice little 24. I thought I'd be adventurous and follow a pattern this time, having now knitted three squares, with no desire of making a patchwork blanket. The pattern said to change colors and so I followed the instructions on how to do so. It was a bit fiddly but I managed it. Then came the twist; so far on my knitting endeavors, I had only produced pieces of stocking stitch (knit a row, purl a row etc); the pattern said k2p2- knit 2 stitches, purl 2 stitches. I thought I was doing really well, reversing my knits and purls at the end of each row. Then I looked at it on my 6th row. I had a big, messy ball of knots. Not brilliantly sure how I'd managed this I counted my stitches. From starting with that neat 2 dozen, I'd doubled every time I'd purled. With no idea how to correct myself, I unraveled the piece and started again. Half an hour passed and I found myself unraveling the same knotty mess for the third time... I was stuck between a ball of wool and a hard place (insert gory scene from 127 Hours here). I gave up.
Then later last night I realized my mistakes! I once again began to cast on, and soon had finished my first row of k2p2 and was about to start my second when disaster struck! Alas, I had been- yet again- making both of my rookie mistakes. I once again unraveled and sat in an angry state, sipping tea and stocking stitch-ing a phone cover for a friend. She probably won't think much of the knitting, but she'll know I put hard effort and sleepless nights into the crappy, over-sized, elecro-sock I present her with.

That's about it for my knitting skills, if anyone knows how to knit and wants to help me out, I won't say no: just drop a comment and I will excitedly reply with too much time on my hands.