Zen and the Art of Knitting
I think I have reached a new level of zen in knitting. The latest project I have been working on, a diamond pattern blouse from Vintage Knits, had to be frogged (read completely ripped [ribbit] out and started anew). I had initially thought I could modify the pattern to be in the round. However, the area that would have been the side seams ended up looking quite ugly. Of course, I could not see that this was so until I had about 9″ of the blouse done. In the past, if I had had this much of a project done (at least 50%), I would have seriously debated ripping the whole thing out and starting over. I think the difference this time was two fold. First, the yarn I am using is GGH Tajmahal. It is a merino/cashmere/silk blend, and yes it cost a pretty penny. So there was a part of me that wanted to do the yarn justice. It is such a beautiful soft yarn, it deserves to be knit into something beautiful. Secondly, it struck me that the fun is in the knitting, so if I spend more time on the garment, I get more pleasure out of the yarn. Of course it is nice when you are wearing something you made and some compliments it, but it doesn’t compare to the pleasure of actually knitting it up. This, I think is a new level of zen knitting for me. In the past it has always been about the end product and not about the journey leading to that end result. Perhaps I have evolved slightly as a knitter.
The first bit after I had frogged the project.
Here you can start to see some of the diamond pattern.
P.S. Thank you Hulu for having all eight season of StarGate SG-1 available right now. It has made for great fun while knitting this project. I think I will always associated this project with that show. I am currently on season 3. Hopefully, there are enough episodes left to get me through the rest of my project.