Progress!

Hi everyone, Colleen again.  Elisabeth’s son was airlifted to the Cleveland Clinic yesterday, and the situation is still very critical.  Please keep the good thoughts coming, they really mean a lot to the family.

So the process of starting this shawl for our dear friend has been a comedy of errors.  It was a combination of not knowing the summer hours of the yarn shops, trying to wrangle my kids, and working around Elisabeth’s wool allergy.  Then, of course, our intrepid blogstress threw me a curve ball… pink.  Pink?  Really?  Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE pink (as one glance in my closet will prove).  But I never pegged Elisabeth as a pink shawl kind of girl.  It’s a good thing I asked, since I was totally planning something in a bluish gray.

Anyway, earlier this morning the stars aligned and I was able to make it to the yarn shop when it was actually open.  The kids were informed that good behavior might just result in a trip to McDonald’s (no, I’m not above bribery!).  I poked around for a little while, and then I saw it.  One skein of Luxe Alpaca by Woodstock Yarns.  It was pink- not hot pink, not baby pink, not bubble gum pink, just a nice soft pink.  It was alpaca- 100% alpaca.  It was DK weight, but the Oscilloscope Shawl pattern seems easy enough to extend, and the 660 yards in the skein gives me plenty of room to do that.  So far, so good.  And then I saw one word on the label that completely sealed the deal.  The name of the colorway?  WINE! 

I will be casting on as soon as I post this!

Comfort Knitting

Hi folks, Colleen here!  So I’m sure you can imagine that life in Karma-land has been rather difficult lately.  Elisabeth is doing her best to keep life together for herself and her family, and those of us around her are trying to help however we can.  Friends and neighbors are taking care of groceries, yardwork and the dog.  I, on the other hand, was asked to keep the blog going.  My first reaction was “What the %$&#%&@#% am I going to write about??!!!!”  But almost immediately my brain zeroed in on the idea of comfort knitting.

I have been seeking a lot of comfort from my own knitting, and it hasn’t been working out very well.  I am coming to the end of a Very Big Project (yes, it deserves to be capitalized).  If life were chugging along normally, the VBP would be chugging along as well.  I can almost hear it … “I think I can, I think I can, I think I can”.  But I am finding it difficult to keep my mind focused enough to work on it for more than 15 minutes at a time.  And the last thing I want is for the VBP to be put in time-out because it messed itself up while I wasn’t looking.

So of course I turn to my (way too big) stash of unfinished projects.  But nothing there seems right either.  Some things are too complex, others are too easy.  Some fall into the category of “should” knitting, and somehow that seems a little too much like work for now.  And then there’s always the thought that I planned on finishing the VBP before going back to any of the other projects, so I guess I don’t feel like I’m supposed to be working on any of those anyway.

Then there’s the thing that’s really trying to get on my needles.  In flipping through some old magazines, I came across the Oscilloscope Shawl by Kate Gagnon Osborn.  Yep, my mind keeps going back to it.  Maybe it’s the soft green color the sample was made in (which, oddly enough, is almost the same color as the VBP.  Maybe the softness of the alpaca/ merino/ bamboo blend is calling to me.  Maybe it’s the quick-knit aspect- that finished object is only 400 yards away.  But what I really think makes me want this project on my needles is that I have a friend who REALLY needs a hug right now, and a yarny hug can travel with her much more conveniently than I can.  Granted, Elisabeth’s wool allergy would necessitate the use of a different yarn, but that’s easy enough to handle.

So I guess I’m off to the yarn shop sometime in the very near future (more comfort there!)  My knitting won’t save the world, and it won’t magically heal her son.  But maybe I can find some comfort in the process, and hopefully Elisabeth will find some comfort in the product.  The VBP can wait for now (it’s already overdue anyway!)

What about you?  What types of projects do you turn to when you need to knit a little comfort into your life?  I’d love to hear your ideas!