Shameless
December 16th 2009
Who was that person who said she would not take up knitting socks, no, no, no way no how?
It can’t possibly have been me. I deny all knowledge. All former blog posts to the contrary have been hacked.
I had so much planned for Christmas knitting this year that even with cutting back, and then cutting WAY back, it still won’t all be done by Christmas (2 projects to finish before the holidays, 2 after).
And after that I have declared it to be a Year of Selfishness, where I will make things to please myself and not worry about things like deadlines and how many projects I have on the go. Nobody put this pressure on me but me, of course, but now I am deliberately taking it off and saying no, I shall benefit from my knitty madness before I make plans to make six dozen projects for other people.
And OH, THE SOCKS I SHALL MAKE. Socks with my own charted patterns. Socks from books of marvellous sock patterns. Socks that are plain, but knit in deliriously wonderful yarn.
The next project on the needles will be two toe-up rainbow socks, worked on one needle. They sound thrilling and terrifying, and I am hell-bent on using up every little bit of the rainbow yarn (thus the toe-up method).
I was recently in Los Angeles for a voice recording session and my big thrilling outing while I was there was visiting not one, not two, but THREE upscale yarn stores. When I confided in my father that this would be my big thrill while I was there he said,
“Why don’t you take a tour, and see the stars’ houses?”
Because frankly, the stars’ houses don’t interest me, and the yarn does. Because as dull and insipid as it sounds, I get a real charge out of knitting (out of crafting of many kinds actually, but at the moment it’s knitting.) It doesn’t sound like a thrill-a-minute kind of hobby, but it actually can be. Mastering a difficult technique, turning out something beautiful and intricate out of sticks and string – I love it all.
You don’t have to like knitting – it’s not for everyone. But I walked around Santa Monica, and did a yarn tour. I bought myself a really cool sock book, and some incredible yarn, and I was happy as a clam. I don’t feel like I missed out on a thing.