I Knit Up A Sweater

 It really shouldn't surprise me that two years after starting a blog, I managed to publish only one, brief introductory post. This is very me. I have half a dozen drafts and more thoughts than I can count, but somehow couldn't get my fingers on the keys. Until now.

You would think that 2020 would have been a great time for me to start writing more. But much like my reading queue, writing took a backseat to fretting about everything else in the world. I also stopped running, and have the daunting task of building myself up to working out again. Not that I have any right to complain. While I had losses last year, I also had the privilege of getting married in a 6 person outdoor ceremony in a beautiful park, in perfect weather. I'll share more about the shawl I made for the wedding later.

One thing I didn't utterly abandon is knitting. I am so grateful I started knitting before things got depressing, as I do not think I would have had the energy to learn something new that wasn't absolutely necessary.

Knitting kept my hands moving when I had nothing else to do, or too many things to do and needed a pause to think. I set goals for myself and sometimes met or exceeded them. I made my husband a hat he loves so much he won't wear it to do outdoor work, even though it's the warmest he has.

My biggest goal for 2020 was to make a sweater. I almost completed it that year but silly mistakes, absurd wrist injuries, and my own inability to do only one project at a time harried me.

Still, I finished it 5 months later, and I'm pretty darn happy with my results. I learned so much from doing this, including finally feeling advice heard from experienced knitters click in my mind. It feels like a whole world has opened up to me.

Here's what I learned:

1. Swatches are for more than gauge: they're also a way to determine the fabric of your garment
2. Read the pattern in advance and mark it up so you always know which number you should be using - I made a silly mistake due to this
   
3. Join your cast on in the round properly: twisting it is easier than you might think
   
4. Don't be afraid to tweak the pattern if you need to. I think I would've gotten a better fit if I'd thought ahead and added some tapering to the design, but I was paranoid that somehow I would mess up the result. I should've realized I don't need to be dogmatic about following the pattern to the letter, even as a novice
5. When knitting to a length, measure regularly: one movie or series binge too many and I had dozens of rows of excess knitting to rip back
6. After ripping back, measure again to be sure you're at the right length. I ripped back just a few rows too many which led to a slightly too short sweater
7. On the bright side that forced me to learn how to fix the issue of a wrong-length bottom-up sweater, by snipping into and ripping out the bottom so I could rework it. It took longer than expected but I successfully got the sweater just right!
8. Running markers are great and made finishing sleeves less anxiety-provoking
9. One or two tiny mistakes are okay and likely not very noticeable post-blocking, and a good recipient won't care at all
10. Take the time to plan out the spacing of stitches you need to pick up, making it sections with stitch markers worked well for me. And use the correct needle size - I ended up with a wider neckline on one sweater than I meant to have, but thankfully it looks fine. 

And most importantly:

It's not that hard! I was so intimidated by the idea of making a larger garment that I was surprised to find it very straightforward and enjoyable. I started a second sweater before even completing the first. I'm actually disappointed that I only have one more sweater-quantity bag of yarn on hand, so I need to focus on smaller projects until I'm ready to start that one. And knitting these smaller pieces will allow me to make room for more yarn.

Overcoming my anxiety and just starting the darn thing was a great decision, and a lesson I should carry over into other creative work... ahem, perhaps even writing.