A few months ago I was getting overwhelmed with all the bags and stashes of yarn that was taking over my apartment after downsizing from a two story home with a basement and moving into my home here with one bedroom. The yarn could not be purged from the move and I did have a craft room dedicated to the storage of my hobbies. My yarn and stuff was set up like a store for this Virgo 60+ years of knitting. My grandmother who came from Bristol, England taught me at age five along with her favorite game of Chinese checkers. We had high tea every day and would sit and knit together. My solution was to take the small coat closet in the living room that I wasn’t using that much and put some wire freestanding shelves inside. The cubes make a perfect storage and I can shop easily in my very own “cotton closet” as I call it since that yarn doesn’t need special care. I use pretty vases and containers on flat surfaces to store my knitting needles so they are art décor rather than having another storage thing that hides from me when I need a particular size of needles. All art or special care yarn are safely tucked in tissue and shrunk in those amazing bag that can slide under a bed or be tossed on a high shelf.
My favorite thing to knit has to be dish/wash cloths because they are awesome to try out new stitches and it’s a quick reward. I absolutely hate to do swatches for big projects so this ends up being something useful and most times very pretty. As most knitters I always have several projects in the works and stashed in the car, different rooms of my house and in my purse. Love the little take along projects for those times you are waiting in line or in an office and are bored. Each stitch counts and those rows do really add up.
Did you know that knitting could heal more than the soul? Recently I checked in with my physician and she was very scolding to me since I hadn’t been to see her in months and she was treating me for high blood pressure. She couldn’t understand why my blood pressure was normal since it hadn’t been that way in 20+ years. I explained that I am in a good place – mind and body. Told her about my lovely home here at The Preserve and that I had picked up my knitting needles again along with getting together with friends frequently to “sit & knit” She was shocked but as a knitter herself she realized that knitting is much like holding a purring kitten since it is all about rhythm and tension in your fingers. There is not a day that goes by that I don’t get in a few hours of knitting especially before going to bed.
I have recently retired, not by choice, but learning to love it. Gives me time to do the things I like to do most (knit with friends, lunch with the girls, shop for yarn, knit some more with friends, sleep in, spoil GingerSue) grins! My only pet is my little Dachshund “GingerSue”. She is called a Tweeny because she is between a miniature and Standard. When I got her, she was only a few weeks old and the color of a Golden Lab hence called a Wheaten. Yes “GingerSue” is very spoiled and soooo deserves it. She is a great support system and Best Friend. The reason I bring her up in this blog is (1) she demands attention (2) she thinks she knows everything about yarn and my knitting. If she is tired of me working the needles she simply sits on my project yarn or walks off with the ball into the other room. If I am picking out yarn for a new project, I ask what skein I should use and she understands and bumps it to me with her nose or picks it up out of the basket.
Wouldn’t it be fun to get together here on the property on those cold, snowy days for a sit and stitch? It doesn’t have to be just knitting but any kind of hand stitch work and we could share books, conversation and ideas. We have lost a lot of wonderful yarn shops but still have some amazing eye candy shopping available and close by.
Check out Ravelry for amazing patterns and ideas on all sorts of things – it’s free: http://www.ravelry.com/
My favorite thing to knit has to be dish/wash cloths because they are awesome to try out new stitches and it’s a quick reward. I absolutely hate to do swatches for big projects so this ends up being something useful and most times very pretty. As most knitters I always have several projects in the works and stashed in the car, different rooms of my house and in my purse. Love the little take along projects for those times you are waiting in line or in an office and are bored. Each stitch counts and those rows do really add up.
Did you know that knitting could heal more than the soul? Recently I checked in with my physician and she was very scolding to me since I hadn’t been to see her in months and she was treating me for high blood pressure. She couldn’t understand why my blood pressure was normal since it hadn’t been that way in 20+ years. I explained that I am in a good place – mind and body. Told her about my lovely home here at The Preserve and that I had picked up my knitting needles again along with getting together with friends frequently to “sit & knit” She was shocked but as a knitter herself she realized that knitting is much like holding a purring kitten since it is all about rhythm and tension in your fingers. There is not a day that goes by that I don’t get in a few hours of knitting especially before going to bed.
I have recently retired, not by choice, but learning to love it. Gives me time to do the things I like to do most (knit with friends, lunch with the girls, shop for yarn, knit some more with friends, sleep in, spoil GingerSue) grins! My only pet is my little Dachshund “GingerSue”. She is called a Tweeny because she is between a miniature and Standard. When I got her, she was only a few weeks old and the color of a Golden Lab hence called a Wheaten. Yes “GingerSue” is very spoiled and soooo deserves it. She is a great support system and Best Friend. The reason I bring her up in this blog is (1) she demands attention (2) she thinks she knows everything about yarn and my knitting. If she is tired of me working the needles she simply sits on my project yarn or walks off with the ball into the other room. If I am picking out yarn for a new project, I ask what skein I should use and she understands and bumps it to me with her nose or picks it up out of the basket.
Wouldn’t it be fun to get together here on the property on those cold, snowy days for a sit and stitch? It doesn’t have to be just knitting but any kind of hand stitch work and we could share books, conversation and ideas. We have lost a lot of wonderful yarn shops but still have some amazing eye candy shopping available and close by.
Check out Ravelry for amazing patterns and ideas on all sorts of things – it’s free: http://www.ravelry.com/
Happy Knitting,
Joanne B.
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