Tiny Joys
I am always so relieved to return home after work. Home is a sanctuary where my life becomes mine again. Work is OK, has purpose, can be rewarding, can be frustrating. I know I make a tiny difference in the world, in the lives of people. But I still cherish my time. It's ALL mine.

Knitting and Nature
Today, because I have a new knitting project started, I was excited to get back home to work on it. I thought about returning to it now and then between meetings and phone calls. I imagined the color and feel of the yarn. The yarn was a Christmas gift. Wool in a beautiful purple color, with specks of other colors here and there. It came from a sheep farm somewhere here in the northeast US, where it was spun and hand-dyed. Now and then, I find tiny specks of hay in the wool. I like that. Not so terribly removed from its origins. It feels sturdy and knits easily. While I am knitting, I imagine billowing, blustery snow, swirling around outside my home, drifting in the driveway. I am clearing snow off my car to leave for work in the morning. I can feel the woolen mittens protecting my hands from the cold and snow. My hands are warm. I feel deep satisfaction in knowing that I knitted these mittens. The coming of winter is a certainty. The warmth of real woolen mittens is a sure thing, something you can count on. Creating them makes me feel I am close to the land, a real survival skill. Knowing that I can create such mittens, something not many people can do, feels good. While I make them, I think about the sheep who gave us the wool. I can appreciate what it takes to raise that sheep, shear the wool, wash and prepare the wool fibre for spinning. Having dabbled just a bit with drop spindle spinning, I do admire those who spin so evenly. The wool was hand dyed, a beautiful color, the color of heather in the field. None of these images is far from the countryside where the yarn was born. All that, in the making of one pair of woolen mittens.




Who Inspires Me
My mittens are a small project. It's a mitered mitten pattern from Elizabeth Zimmerman's Knitter's Almanac; the pattern is the one for May. Elizabeth Zimmerman's spirit lives in me and thousands of other knitters. Hers was, and continues to be, a spirit of confidence and creativity, unafraid to cast off (no pun there) whatever "rules" of knitting might limit the knitter. I recently chatted with a knitting colleague at work. We were talking about our current knitting projects. She was venturing into making her first sweater. I told her about the sweater I was making, knit in the round, with cables, for my daughter. When I told her it would be a cardigan because I would cut it down the middle and add rows of garter stitches for the front, she audibly GASPED! I had to chuckle. I did the same thing when I read EZ's love of knitting in the round regardless of if she knit a pullover or a cardigan. If you are a knitter, Elizabeth Zimmerman is a must-read! Look for Knitting Without Tears, Knitter's Almanac or Knitting Around.

On my mittens, I will bravely snip a stitch and unravel in both directions, then pick up 15 stitches on three double pointed needles, and knit a thumb on the mitten. That's EZ's way of doing things. I want to be like her. Brave, creative, and unencumbered by these knitting taboos!