Knitting

Many people seem so amazed when I knit. Granted, the entire process is a bit amazing. You turn one long string of yarn into a square of cloth and then a garment or blanket. However, the process of actually knitting is one of the effortless and most soothing I have come across in my dealings with Simplicity.

When I was pregnant with The Spicy Barracuda, I wasn't gaining enough weight the first five months. So I was told I didn't get to do much other than lay around and eat. This might sound like a really great referendum to come from the doctor, but it drove me a bit crazy. I was very into exercise before the Barracuda and didn't like the idea of stopping. Eating massive amounts of spaghetti and hot dogs while watching cable TV became my daily routine. It lasted about two weeks. (However, I did become addicted to Judging Amy and Dawson's Creek on cable syndication. Now you all know one of my most embarrassing guilty pleasures!)

When I couldn't take television anymore, I began to look into other outlets and stumbled upon knitting. A friend's mother owned a yarn shop where ladies of all ages sat, talked and knit. It was the perfect solace for my non-exercise frustrations: I could sit and yet still be productively doing something! Moreover, I could talk about motherhood, marriage, relationships, children, and all sorts of other female topics which had begun to bother my emotional, pregnant nerves. The ladies taught me the basics: how to cast on, how to finish off, how to knit, how to purl, and how to combine those two stitches to do ribbing, a stockinette, or garter stitch.

This experience spun a love of knitting and a new found stress relief. I now make it a point to knit regularly and almost every day. Rather than watch a movie at the end of the night or mindlessly turn on the television, I now knit. It helps to sooth my nerves and ad a form of directly productive meditation to my life. From the basics of knit and purl you can do most anything you could want. It takes a bit of patience with yourself and some time to practice, but you are mainly doing the same thing over and over and over.

Knitting also gives me a bit of one on one time with Bell Bell. She adores my knitting. From playing in the yarn to snuggling up on just about any knitted item left by itself she comes hopping (she only has three legs) from the corners of the house to either nuzzle in close or leap out ferociously showing the yarn just how scared it should be.

The place for knitting in our Simplicity hasn't really shown itself quite yet. So much of this last year has been devoted to food knowledge. The growth, storage, and acquisition of our families meals has taken so much time there hasn't been room for much else. But, these last few months both Jules and I have noticed an definite turning point in our food storage as purchasing has gone down and stockpiling gone up. August is nearing its end and canning season is winding down. As such knitting is becoming a much more prevalent aspect of my day to day routine.

This next year, it is my hope to complete a knitted blanket for Jule's and my bed, replace our dish scrubbers with dishtowels, replace our dish-drying towels, and create not only hand towels but also washcloths for the bathroom. We will see if that is even remotely reasonable.

I'm not venturing into clothing yet, just nice square things which don't require turning, or knitting two together, or increasing and decreasing stitches. But, who knows, by the end of this year I might be whipping out socks in a frenzy of stitches!