stroke width

I don't seem to be able to change my stroke in brush or pencil. It keeps resetting back to basic stroke 1pt/basic/uniform. The only way I seem to be able to go around this problem is to first paint something and then select the stroke and choose the stroke width, etc., but that's too time consuming and very difficult to work. I am using CS 5. "New Art Has Basic Appearance" is unchecked.