November 23, 2007

It's time

There's no denying it anymore. Now that I've finished that big sweater, there's absolutely no getting away from the Christmas knitting. I'm proud of myself for stepping away from the crazy place twice this year (I was going to start a sweater for my uncle and begin to spin and knit a vest for my brother) when I realized that it just wasn't possible. There's challenging, which I enjoy, and then there's a set up that's doomed to failure....which I hate.
In years past I would have wildly leapt to the crazy place, and then wondered why it didn't go well for me, but this year, this year I've got it together. This year all I have planned is the following:

One small shawl.
One smallish sweater
One pair adult mittens
Two pairs of children's mittens
Two hats
Four (or maybe five) pairs of socks

And 32 whole days to do it in.

I am noticing now that I might not be as far away from the crazy place as I had hoped, but I since I do think that list is possible... I'm calling in the reserves. Every year when it degenerates into a terrible mess of knitting and rushing and frantic behaviour, I lose my cool and need a schedule to pull it back together. I call the supreme task-master, the mistress of all things scheduled, Our Lady of Being in Charge.... Lene, and I tell her what I need to do, when it needs to be done by, how long it will take. Lene compares that to things like my need to sleep, eat, work, shop, wrap and clean and prepares a somewhat reality based schedule. Then, all I have to do is follow Lene's schedule and everything will be ok. Everything will get done. This system has only failed twice. Once when I failed to do as I was told, and once when I refused to accept that there was way, way more on the list than was humanly possible to accomplish. (I should have known that Lene was seriously trying to tell me something when I looked at the schedule and at 5pm on Christmas eve it said "Warp the time space continuum".)

This year I'm trying a new experiment. I'm going to get Lene to make the schedule BEFORE I start falling apart, and see if the falling apart can be avoided entirely. (This will please Lene a great deal, since MORE CONTROL over the universe is something she enjoys more than is proper for me to say. )

You hear that Lene? I'm putting you in charge of a whole month. Try to control yourself.

Startofpinkshawls2311

I'm starting this though. (Swallowtail Shawl, Interweave Knits, Fall 2006. Yarn is Misti Alpaca Lace 2ply in "CD43" and the beads were a find in a bead shop on Queen West.) I'm excited. I feel like the unmatching-yet-matching beads are a bold move.

Posted by Stephanie at November 23, 2007 11:45 AM