knitting

I was just checking out how people get to this site, and a couple have come from Yarn Harlot. Maybe if you're one of them you're surprised to find yourself here, since I don't have anything (much) to say about knitting. But I link to her site because it's so well-written, and because I laugh when I read it, and because I knit her poncho (though I didn't fringe it, because I used this really fuzzy yarn, and fringe seemed like overkill).

So, anyway, I thought I would write briefly about knitting. I am currently engaged in three projects: socks and two scarves. Yes, this is the level of my knitting expertise. In a past life (before I had children) I made a few things that actually required some shaping. They were intended to be sweaters for actual human beings, though all three of them came out shorter and wider than the actual human beings for whom they were intended. One of those human beings was me, and I still have my sweater in a closet. One was my mother, and hers came closest to fitting, and she wore it for a while. Maybe she even still does! The other was my (now) husband, who was then a boyfriend. He gallantly wore his blue cotton orangutan-sweater a few times and only recently asked if my feelings would be hurt if he got rid of it. What a sport!

But the lesson I took from this was to go back to knitting things in which the size didn't matter. So: ponchos, scarves, and the like. The socks are a stretch, really. (See below.) But I'm soldiering on, hoping that the one I finish next will be roughly the same size and shape as the one I already finished.

My point? I like the feel of knitting, of making something, of paying attention to directions and having them (mostly) turn out right. Much of what I do in my everyday life doesn't work that way--there are no directions, or the directions are inadequate or misleading, and my labor is either not recognized or has an effect that can't be measured or could always have been more. So I accept my imperfections in knitting because at least I have a product (I think it's like cooking for me in this way--near-instant gratification, a product that others appreciate, and a limited exercise of creativity).

One day I may learn to do cables. And maybe I'll even try to shape something again one of these days. But in the meantime I'm pretty satisfied with what I'm doing. But read Yarn Harlot if you actually want to find out something about knitting!