I got interested in machine knitting quite by accident. An ex boyfriend was clearing out his attic, and offered me his ex-wife's knitting machine. I stored it in my own attic (and forgot all about it) until about a year later. In the UK we have fireworks displays on November 5th, and it's the one night of the year you keep your pets inside at night. Fraggle (a very lovable but stupid boy cat of 5 years) didn't come home that night, so to distract myself from the rising panic I dug out the knitting machine and tried to figure out how it all went together. It was without any instructions, and looked like it might receive satellite television if I set it up correctly.

I managed to get it going (kind of), but my first dress was a disaster that was knitted so tight it practically stood up on its own. It was a week before I had chance to put posters up around my street - and it turned out that a neighbour had found a dead cat matching Fraggle's description on her doorstep. It turned out to be the house opposite, and we think he may have been hit by a car - alas, he had very little road sense.

Anyway, with the help of some lovely ladies on rec.crafts. machine-knitting (on the old Usenet forums) I learnt all about sponge bars and rewinding my yarn correctly. I managed to source a copy of the manual and some punchcards and that was it, I was addicted. At first it was to distract me from my grief, but later on I realised I really enjoyed the process. It's not just a case of passing the carriage back and forth a few times and out pops a sweater, it's a lot more involved that that!

Since the first machine (circa 2001) I've traded up and expanded my collection of knitting machines, and I acquired a beautifully restored circular sock machine in 2009. Now I knit a lot (by hand and machine) and a lot of items go to Knit for Peace, a charity that redistributes knitted items to those in need.