Lest you think that I’ve put down my knitting needles for good, I’ll have you know that contrary to the lack of variety exhibited by my recent posts, I’ve still been knitting away just as prodigiously as before. As a matter of fact, I’ve been frequently dabbling in all of my usual crafts… Just not always to great success. Although it may seem that I haven’t even touched my stash of beads in ages, it’s just that I haven’t displayed the disastrous abortions I’ve pushed off the threads. Sometimes the ideas are simply better than their physical manifestations, such as the concept of pressed-flower coasters. In reality, the only redeeming quality about those hideous resin disks was that the design can be mostly covered by the cup meant to rest on top.
The truth is, only a small percentage of my work ever meets the public eye. Out of 50 potential projects, maybe 10 might come out just as I had intended. While this makes for an exhausting process to arrive at any quality finished object, I feel that the struggle is worth it to ensure that the questionable projects are weeded out. All the same, it can be nice to just go by the book and make someone else’s pattern exactly as written every now and then.
Churning out Knitty‘s Argosy was really just a simple exercise to clear my mind of all the craziness that has surrounded me as of late, just going through the motions without straining to “invent” something new. Aside from the fact that I was knitting a scarf in 90 degree weather, it was the perfect interlude between more challenging projects. For some reason, I’m finding that knitting is my form of meditation, a way to relax and escape from the world, more about the process and not the product. In such a demanding world, I think that anyone could appreciate how nice it feels when it really is the effort that counts, even if the end results aren’t exactly blog-worthy.
Everyone fails occasionally, preforms under par, but crafting is my way of putting all of that behind me and moving on, because at the end of the day, I will still have some tangible proof that hey, at least I’m trying. Besides that, sometimes even the meditative knits come out well, just like this one.
