Felt Up in Eagle River

HA! I knew the title would get SOMEONE's attention! It's not what you think though... it's another post about knitting.

I FINALLY finished my first knitting project. I made a felted tote called a Booga Bag. I didn't stab anyone even once while I was making the bag. No sheep were harmed during the making of the bag, and neither were any children, my wonderful fiancee, our dogs, cats, or myself. We did catch a squirrel in the live trap on the deck that froze and died before we could move it, but that has nothing to do with the bag.

I'm not totally digging the bag. I'll take a picture and post it when I get home. There's nothing wrong with it, if you ask everyone else. Probably the fact that I'm a perfectionist control freak is blurring my enjoyment of my very first completed knitted project. I don't like the color, the size, the shape, or the top of the bag. I like the handles (which is funny because it's the one part of the bag I really thought I'd dislike the most when I was knitting them up).

Right now, we have zero snow on the ground. That's right folks, zero snow. All the snow that fell 2 weeks ago was followed by a week of rain that melted it all. Now, our neighborhood looks like fall again, but without the fall foliage, more dismal, muddy and the sun sets at 4:30 pm. I love winter, but I'm not liking this at all. The lack of snow and warmer weather is providing me the opportunity to clean the hot tub on the deck and get it going. I cleaned 1/3 of it the other day, and I'll finish it tonight if it's not too cold out. The weather may be clear, but the odd phenomenon of clear weather in Alaska is also that on the clearer winter days, the temperature is freezing. The clouds of dismal snowy days keeps the warmth in and the temperatures up.

I'm rambling, but I was wondering... I read that the aurora borealis is shifting to the west and in 50 years the center of the aurora will be over Siberia and not over the Arctic Circle. How much of "global warming" has to do with the orbital rotation of the earth and the fact that it changes and the location of the poles change? I'm going to have to read some and research it.

I'm off to start another bag. I wouldn't have admitted it a few months ago, but knitting is kind of addicting (don't tell the longtime knitters I cussed out for saying the same thing to me months ago that I said that). I still like crocheting better, but having another hobby that keeps my hands busy is a good thing.

Knitting Insanity

I'm a crocheter. I say that with pride. I've been crocheting since my grandmother taught me how when I was seven. It was probably the only "girlie" thing I did as a child. While other girls were playing dress-up with the Barbie dolls they'd receive as gifts from their parents and grandparents, I was using them to play catch with my dog in the backyard. I was far more interested in seeing the "war wounds" of missing feet, mangled heads and ripped off arms that were caused by my dog than seeing my Barbies sporting the latest fashion in plastic Malibu Barbie sports vehicles. My Barbies didn't have feet to wear shoes, and after my dog choked on one of the shoes that weren't being worn by my Barbie, my grandmother decided that it was time to teach me to crochet. I think she believed that if she taught me how to make Barbie clothing that I would treat my dolls better and that they wouldn't be used as substitute rawhide chews for my dog. She was wrong. Though I loved to crochet them outfits, I much more prefered crocheting them burial shrouds. After grandma realized that, she started getting me small metal race cars instead. But, I kept my love of crocheting.

Crocheting relaxes me. I love to watch the hook dip in and out, up and down, around and around. I love seeing the finished product of my effort, whether it's a hat, a scarf, an afghan or anything else. I rarely keep the items I make, I usually give them away, or sell them. I love crocheting so much, that I thought I'd try knitting. It looked relaxing too, and the stitches look different from crocheting. I thought it would be a way to share my love of yarn art with the gals at the office who knit and not crochet. After knitting for about two weeks now, I'm ready for therapy!

Knitting drives me batty. I'm in the process of making my first piece, a felted bag. The pattern looked easy enough: Cast on 70 stitches, knit one row, pearl one row, continue for 16 stitches, then change color and knit one row, pearl one row in an alternating color, then return to the *. Repeat till piece reaches about 160 rows. Easy, right? Sure, till I drop a stitch. The perfectionist that I am can't accept a dropped stitch, so I've removed all the stitches from my knitting needles and attempted to unravel the piece then place all the stitches back on the needles. I've done that about three or four times, just enough to drive me nuts and leave me cursing under my breath. When people ask me what I'm making, I tell them I'm making a garbage can liner! They think it's a joke, but they don't know how serious I am. Oh, then I get to listen to the "experienced" knitters tell me that it gets easier with time the more knitting you do. Uhhhhhh, sure. I may just take their word for it.

I had these grandious ideas of knitting afghans, bags, hats, gloves, scarves... I had grandious ideas of gorgeous items that I'd knitted myself keeping me warm this winter. Ahhhh, dreams. Then, yesterday, someone told me about recycling wool sweaters to make felted items. I think it's some kind of cruel joke! If I would have known I could recycle a sweater to make a purse, that I wouldn't have had to go through the patience testing unraveling process I have been, that I could have gone to the thrift store and spent 8 dollars on a used wool sweater instead of 4.99 a skein for yarn, I would have jumped on that in a heartbeat! It's still crafty, it's creative, it's EASY!

My pride and determinination won't let me just toss the item I'm working on in the trash on my way out the door to the thrift store to purchase a wool sweater, so I'll finish the bag I'm working on. It's going to cost me more than I had first anticipated (with the cost of counseling sessions thrown added... so, tell me more about your obsessive/compulsive need to control your environment and your refusal to allow yourself to make mistakes... blah, blah, blah psychobabble), but I think it will be worth it. I'm not saying the bag itself will make it worth it, but I will be able to say that I finished something, whether I ever start another knitting project again. It's also given me much more respect for crocheting and my ability there. Maybe I can't be good at everything, maybe I don't have the patience to be good at everything. Maybe it's my purpose in life to recycle? I do know that I'm probably not going to knit a pair of socks that requires 4 needles to create when I feel like causing bodily damage to "experienced" knitters with the two needles I'm already using when they start in about how addicting knitting is and how relaxing it is. If I had access to four needles, oh, the damage I would do.

Hello, my name is Cristine, and I'm a crocheter.