Almost

Soon, the buds are telling me, soon. This morning I noticed that the maple branches are beginning to turn red at the tips, and I had to wait for a flock of turkeys to cross Noyac Road. Before long, yellow daffodils will burst open, brown will be replaced by green, and the turkeys will be leading their poults.

Soon.

I hope you have a lovely weekend — eat lots of chocolate, and hug your families!

Overtaken

You know how it is — you're surfing Ravelry, maybe cleaning things up a bit. You come across a pattern you added to your queue a couple of years ago. You click on it, then go take a look at what else the designer has listed. Just casually, you know. Then there it is: the next thing you want to knit.

The pattern is Zephyr Cove by Romi Hill, part of the "Home is Where the Heart Is" collection of small shawls. I wanted to use the same colors she used in the sample — green and blue — so I went into my stash and came up with several possibilities. None of the combinations seemed to be what I wanted, until this: one of my favorite yarns, Brooklyn Tweed LOFT. The green is "Artifact" and the blue is "Old World."

I've been overtaken by a new project, one with a delightful little leaf at the beginning. I think I know how this day is going to go.

In order

I collect bits of knitting things in these books. They are where I write down project notes and design ideas. The pale purple one is where I wrote down all my ideas and little dots and dashes for the Falling Waters shawl. The dark blue one contains notes for my Hickory socks. The big one is where I'm writing my ideas for some new designs. And the little book on the top of the pile has been with me for years and years, ever since I needed a place to write down the formulas for the weaving I used to do.

No matter how often I turn to the Internet for information, or look something up in The Principles of Knitting, I usually end up looking in these books, too. I'm sure I wrote that down, or didn't I use this stitch once before, or for the life of me I can't remember how to Kitchener. It's all scribbled somewhere, in organized disarray — my knitting brain!

Where do you park your knitting brain?

At hand

Knitters have all kinds of tricks. We have ways we like to do things, little rituals that make the time we spend knitting work for us. We have tools that suit us, and we become so used to them that we think we can't knit without them.

One of the things I can't do without is my little toolkit-on-a-keychain. It's not fancy, but it's portable. Over the years I've fine-tuned it until it holds just about everything I need while I'm knitting (except scissors and a tapestry needle). There's a a tape measure, a needle sizer, miscellaneous stitch markers, a rescue crochet hook, a rubber thing to tighten interchangeable needles, and just in case, a little tag with my parents' 1961 Virginia license plate number on it. I never know when I might need the number of that big blue Ford station wagon.

Do you have a little knitting tool kit?

Whatever it wants

There are tiny sprouts of mint leaves in the garden, and I saw an osprey on its nest. Spring must be here somewhere. But today's sky at Long Beach was heavy and dull, as if it is still winter. Even the wind gave up — on my way past the first time, the water was choppy, with little whitecaps hurrying across the surface. Fifteen minutes later, I stopped to see this: calm water, so calm that I could see the bottom yards and yards out.

Back home in the warm house, it's been a good day for quiet. Rosemary is sleeping, and I'm finishing some knitting. There's tea, and Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell are here to sing to me. It can snow if it wants, or rain, or whatever. This is the place to be!

Permission

I could feel it building, deep inside, and in my shoulders. It began to keep me from taking deep breaths. I know myself well, and I saw where I was going.

"I'm on the verge of being too hard on myself," I told a friend. The response: "Give yourself permission to dream. You're right where you're supposed to be."

That's the best advice I could ever ask for.

So today, among the housekeeping and knitting and coming and going, there will be dreaming. I have permission.

Perfectly lovely

It's only taken me a year to finish this Hitchhiker scarf. Simple as it is, it took so long because it kept being pushed aside for other, more "urgent" projects. It's on its way to my sister Sarah (the quilter), and I hope she'll put it aside for next winter, since it wasn't finished in time for this one.

What keeps me from finishing perfectly lovely projects? Distraction, or too many ideas, or deadlines? Sometimes.

It doesn't really matter. Making stitches with beautiful yarn matters. Wrapping my sister in a scarf matters. Discovering the next thing I want to knit matters.

What keeps you from finishing your perfectly lovely projects? What a silly question.

Hitchhiker Scarf, madelinetosh tosh merino light 

Balancing

I am very sure that this moment is about balance. I haven't lost it, not at all. I am in balance, like this day—the first day of Spring.

Because it is a beautiful day (cold and windy, but bright) I'll be able to photograph a project I've designed and plan to publish on Ravelry. And I'll be able to go to Long Beach and take a walk by the water. And then, I'll be able to come home and work on my resumé (and a couple of Great White Bale spreadsheets) in the afternoon sun. All this, because my life really is as it is meant to be.

Being at home

I've been spending almost all of my time at home, for weeks now. First, there was the move that the bookstore was making, and there wasn't going to be a place for me to work until things were settled in the new space, so I brought my office home. That fit the timing for the surgery I was going to have, which meant that I'd need to be home to recuperate.

The surgery (repair to scar tissue left from previous surgeries) went well, but the work did not. I was working on our website as usual, but while I was, the bookstore was making some hard decisions. The website was eliminated, and so was my job.

Losing my job is a subject for another time. What I'm thinking about today is how much I love my home, my tiny space, my little calm place. It was remade by my sister Sarah when she came to be with me for the surgery, and on the final day, just a few hours before she had to leave, we took pictures of the amazing transformation. My mother's dresser, her little overnight case on top; my knitting spot on the couch, the new television. There's much more that you can't see in one photograph.

And there in the middle: the beautiful, beautiful quilt Sarah made for me, which she put the finishing touches on while I was sleeping.

There's no place like home, is there?

Rethinking

Sometimes a knitter has to face facts. Not every project—no matter how well-advised, well-planned, or well-executed—is meant to be. My two skeins of Solitude Wool Border Leicester were well on their way to becoming Weld, but I made so many mistakes along the way (my own fault, not the pattern's) that I quit while I was behind and cast on Dovetail instead.

I love it. It's big and warm and beautiful. It was a joy to knit, and it was just the sort of knitting I've needed. I'm happy that I changed my mind, and I'll knit Weld again, but this Dovetail was meant to be.

What do you do when your knitting is going wrong?

Start fresh

A new notebook, a trusty pen. On with the day. This one is spiral, small, simple. It can be tossed into my bag, or lie open on my desk.

It's not my journal; its purpose is utilitarian. It's where I will park my thoughts and needs and bits of knitting brainstorms, just for the time being. I'm a serious iCal user, and I love my any.DO app, too. But there's always something that needs jotting, isn't there?

Do you have a notebook?

Tiny anchors

There are rituals in knitting. At least there are rituals for me. Small ones — a bit of magic, a little thought, some small comfort. It's the same and different for all of us.

One of mine is the stitch marker. Which tiny anchor will I choose as I begin to knit? If it will serve to signal the beginning of a round, then it must be the right one, the perfect thing to catch my eye as I come to it, then slip it from left needle to right as I move around the circle. It is where I begin and end a piece of the pattern, where I stop to check the instructions or the chart. It is where I hurry to if I'm excited, or what I look longingly at if I'm slogging across hundreds of stitches.

If I need markers to help me count or space the pattern, then I have dozens to choose from. But that first one, the one for the beginning, must be chosen with care. It might have sentiment attached, or it might be practical. It might just "go" with the yarn. But I always choose it carefully, because even small rituals matter. Even tiny anchors have a place.

Do you have a favorite stitch marker, or a small knitting ritual?