I await the arrival of my new assortment of knitting magazines similar to the crack addict pacing a dark alley waiting for his next score (at least that's how I imagine it from TV). Anticipation builds, excitement mounts, then the sudden euphoria when slowly savoring each page. Clipping out ads and ideas for holiday gifts for fellow knitters.Reading reviews for new products that almost make me feel the softness of the yarn being described between my fingers. Then in the full throes of my knitting magazine, shall we say experience, I reach the patterns. The very heart of the periodical and I suddenly just casually flip through. I admire them, ooh and aah over them and once in a great while cut a pattern out. The reality is that I have a project stash that could not be completed in the average human 's lifespan.
One thing is glaringly apparent when reading knit blogs, magazines, and books, these people knit everyday. Without exception. I don't know how they plan weddings or even find spouses for that matter. They have a passion! I love to create from knitting. But I love pizza also, so what kind of judge am I? The things I do everyday are limited to feeding the cat (so she doesn't attack me in my sleep), making the bed, and eating. There might be a couple more but even though I strive for it, knitting isn't on the list. I don't lack the want or the passion. I lack the time and attention span.
I have worked effectively for long hours at my job but am attention span challenged when it come to my craft. When I peruse the pages of lovely models wearing knitting designs I admire, I just touch the page longingly. However, I will most likely never make them. As a legitimate knitting book and magazine hoarder I want to change that. Towards this end I propose a radical shift in our international pattern rating system.
These patterns all use the typical easy , intermediate, or difficult stitch ratings currently. I don't find those ratings particularly useful as once you master knit, purl, casting on and off, everything is just a variation thereof. With the detailed instructions now given and some perseverance, quite a bit of perseverance, and maybe a stop off at the local knit shop, any of us could make even the most difficult pattern eventually. If we didn't have to cook dinner, do the laundry, put on make up, clean the house, attend to friendships, take kids to school, earn a living to pay for more yarn and sometimes food. So my plan would be to rate all patterns by attention span and hours per day required for completion prior to my own lifespan being exceeded.
For example a straightforward ribbed scarf might be for the easily distracted and require zero uninterrupted time with an estimated daily knit requirement of 40 minutes. That's a pattern I could commit to even during the busiest of times.
Follow this up with a pattern that mixes both the zombie like knitting of a scarf with a mix of slightly detailed pattern interspersed. It would require one and a half hours a day of semi interrupted time to complete. That means even though your spouse has now asked where you keep paper towels for the 978Th time this year during your project, you could still finish it with only a small time commitment.
For those quite involved projects, let's just be honest. It might say this sweater will require a diamond ring as you will be married to it forsaking all others for 3 hours a day of uninterrupted time until Spring, of next year.
It could revolutionize the industry! It could spawn a renewed commitment to our art from harried housewives, knitting frustrated wanna bees, and just us regular knitters all over the world. And more importantly to me, I could continue to indulge my knitting magazine habit with a renewed gusto knowing I might be able to commit, on a probational basis, to a pattern for one of the wonderful designs therein.
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