Monday, January 12, 2009

How fearless are you?

My friend, The Spinning Hand, calls me a fearless knitter. The name came about because I've only been knitting for a little over a year and there's very little I won't try. I've already tackled a sweater, socks, lacework, circs and DPNs, and even designing my own pattern... There's pretty much two reasons I'm "fearless" in her eyes:

1) I don't know any better... I have a really bad habit of not reading directions all the way through... as in, I think a recipe looks good, so I decide that's what's for dinner. And it's not until I have water boiling on the stove and chopped vegetables all over the counter that I realize that it calls for an ingredient I don't have (and occasionally, have never heard of). In the case of knitting, I see a pattern, I really like the picture. I glance over the instructions, thinking they don't look so bad.... I cast on and I'm doing just fine... then, all of a sudden... what the heck does that mean???!?!? Yup... I come to an instruction that I don't even know the meaning of, let alone how to do it... (but of course I never learn my lesson)

and the reason I never learn my lesson brings us to:

2) There are no consequences. A couple key pieces of information about my friend, The Spinning Hand: Not only is she a fellow knitter, in her spare time, she's a knitting teacher. Oh, and at her day job, she sits two desks away from me. All it takes is a free cup of coffee over lunch to get her to give up the goods on whatever I don't know how to do.

But I'm finally being honest with myself that even with the moral support and the stupidity, there are things that I'm even afraid to try... and I covet these patterns so much... I even have the yarn to make these patterns... I've bought the needles... the pattern is ready and waiting... but I'm afraid to start.

So here it is, my confession of not-so-fearlessness... I am deathly afraid of cables... I love them so much... but I can't bring myself to cast on a cable pattern... so come on, make me feel better... tell me about your own personal crafting paralysis... what creative endeavors stop you in your tracks?

OR...

even better, what used to... and how did you overcome it??

3 comments:

  1. cables are easy! trust me, they are. i could show you one of these days (especially if i ever do not work late on a monday and can make the meetup. a great cable learning project is the irish hiking scarf. endless cables, but very pretty. i've made two if you want to check my ravelry projects. :-)

    athena

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  2. ME TOO! I am deathly afraid of trying cables. I don't consider myself a scaredy knitter, but cables totally intimidate me.

    To be honest, before I was a knitter, knitting was actually my big crafty hangup! I was a crocheter, and a pretty good one, and I had tried knitting once, and it was a disaster. For about two years after that failed attempt, I was so hung up on the idea that I could just never knit. To get through it, I just sat down one day when I was sick and didn't leave the couch until I had a reliable garter sitich. Everything just seemed to fall into place after that.

    Now the next crafty hangup I've got to tackle is using sewing patterns. All that crinkly paper just terrifies me! haha

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  3. I was an avid cross-stitcher before I became a knittin' fiend. Hours and hours of work at 14 stitches to an inch.
    So lace knitting shouldn't intimidate me, but it does. I am less patient, perhaps - I need a finished product more quickly. I admire those women who produce gossamery shawls.

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