Knitting

I come from knitters. My mom knitted, her sister knitted, someone before them knitted, though I can't say who, but someone taught them somewhere along the line. I don't recall my Grandma knitting, in fact what I recall of her involves egg sandwiches and these little licorices with colorful sugar layers and of course the sugar cube but all that is for another post. I'm just positive there were other knitters before me because my family came from Norway the cradle of knitting.

I am a knitter. It's a gene I suppose. A recessive gene however, because to the best of my knowledge my oldest sister never knitted and I know for a fact that my sister Linda does not knit now, nor does she rage with a burning desire to jump on the pointy sticks and whip up a scarf or hat. That's what I'm for. I'm the knitter.

Lately, I've been knitting a lot. By a lot I mean at least a few hours a day, when I'm stressed and when I am waiting. So, a lot of knitting. The more stress; the more knitting.I relax and get lost in the looping of beautiful yarns of linen, angora, merino and alpaca. Moving them from one needle to the other is down right Zen. I am fascinated by the process of making fabric and the idea of socks, mittens, scarves and soap holders. I find knitting stitches here, purling them there, forming cables and lace to be very satisfying.

Knitting is therapy. Even the act of "unknitting" (ripping out for you less civilized folk) is therapeutic. Pulling a needle out of all the stitches, grabbing the leading end and giving it a tug is thrilling in an "oh my god" sort of way.  You need to trust yourself explicitly to "unkint". You have to give yourself over to self-confidence, something you may be unaccustomed to in your non-knitting life. After all it's just a couple of sticks and yarn. How bad could it be? You always have the option of unknitting the whole thing, winding it back on your ball and starting over.

Oh that all of life was like this.

So, I'm knitting a sweater right now. Not just any sweater but an Aran knit sweater. Think, Irish Fisherman's sweater. It's full of cables going this way and that, leaving this twisted side and going over to that twisted side and forming honeycombs and braids. I'm test driving a pattern for a local designer. Helping her work out the kinks. How this happened was simple. She burst into the store where I work  (saying burst is showing restraint because Allison has more energy than ANYONE I have ever met including a two year old on a sugar high) she asks, "Karen? Do you like doing cables?"  Well of course I do. "Great, I'm going to bring you my new pattern to edit. All you have to do is knit it and look for things that need correction in the pattern." I'm thinking swell and anticipating a scarf when she shows up several days later with a sweater pattern.

I'm almost done with the right hand side. I have a sample here as a visual aid. Mike was looking at the sample tonight and said, "I was wondering what kind of person would look at that sweater and have the courage to try and knit it?" I quit scribbling out a mistake on the pattern and just stared at him because, well I don't know. I don't think it takes courage. It's a challenge. A challenge where I have some smidgen of control and always a do over. It seems reasonable. I mean if the whole thing doesn't work out everyone gets mittens!

So, there you have it. Even though I think my genes play a big part in the initial knitting part, the reason I am knitting so much is that it's a place I can go to have a little control and a do over if I don't get it right the first time and if all else fails I can make something else work out and everyone is happy. It makes my hands and my mind busy and the multi-tasking of it all keeps me present and that is exactly where I need to be right now.

Peace

Kareyarn