Five Reasons to be an Everyday Knitter

Everyday I need needles in hand and yarn running through my fingers. It eases the stress in my shoulders and comforts my overloaded brain. I crave this time. A day without knitting, well, I can’t imagine it, I’d probably be in a coma. There are many good reasons to pick up my woolies and enjoy.5. Knitting is more fun than laundry.Few folks love doing the laundry. Clean clothes—yes. Getting them ironed and back in the closet—no. I am no exception. When I’m being a good girl I use knitting as my reward for getting a load of laundry done. Unfortunately sometimes I’m a bad girl and I use knitting to avoid doing the next load altogether. Happily most hand-knits have to be hand washed so there is lots of drying time for me to settle in and work on my current knitting project.4. Knitting keeps my hands out of the cookie jar.Every night we watch tv. Which means every night I could sit and fill up with popcorn, cookies or ice cream. It must be a Pavlovian Response: if the TV is on I’ve got to keep my hands busy. So better to knit then stuff myself with snacks, right? It’s hard to do both at the same time. Although “M & M’s melt in your mouth not in your hand!” They break all the rules and are easy to eat while knitting. Guess I’d better find a more complicated pattern to keep me busy.3. Knitting is a process with visible progress.Coming to the end of the row, the end of the pattern repeat, the end of a color change, the end of the project. I love getting there. Slipping each stitch from the left needle to the right creates a rhythm like counting rosary beads. Yards of scarves, inches of cables, rows of stockinette all those stitches add up. I see accomplishment. Some days a few knitted rows seem to be the only tangible thing I did. It puts a smile on my face to see progress, to know something got done today.2. Knitting keeps me connected to family and friends.Each project has an end user. I like to think of that person while I knit. I spend time praying for my sister as I knit her a sweater or my cousin when I make a pair of socks, or my brother-in-law as I’m making a hat. Even working on charity sweaters I am thinking of children I’ll never meet in countries I’ll never visit. I feel connected to everyone who I send a hand-knit creation. But it doesn’t stop there, I feel connected to the knitting community while I work my rows.1. Knitting is the best quiet time I know.Knitting is often my first thought in the morning. What WIP (work in progress) will I tackle today? I start each day with knitting—literally. I’ve tried other forms of quiet time but I found my mind wandered. So now I try to get out of bed, slip on my sweats, and before the rest of the house is up I knit and pray. The rhythm of knitting focuses my thoughts and I start my day in peace.