Knitting a shawl

I have a tendency to jump right into the deep end when I start something new. I know, big shocker there. You only centered a newsletter around that whole personality quirk, Carin.

Right, so years and years and years ago my mom taught me how to knit. Over the years I went about forgetting 90% of what she taught me.

2017 I had to pick it up to knit a pussy hat for a march that I went on. So I started knitting again. After the hat I started pockets for an advent calendar that I came up with. After about half a pocket I stopped and began forgetting everything again.

2021 I had a crazy idea and decided to knit rainbow email hats for my coworkers, which was fun and had the added benefit of keeping me knitting for a while longer as I’ve continued to knit them as our team has grown. I’m actually a few behind now.

Despite all this knitting, both of the above patterns were 90% knitting and purling. So pretty simple and not much to learn.

Enter 2022: My local knitting store was closing. I did what any good knitter would do in this case and bought a bunch of yarn with no real project in mind. Specifically, this yarn:

Which sat in my knitting bag and stared at me for about a year accusing me of not using it. Stupid judg-y yarn.

I finally folded under the pressure from the yarn and I found this pattern. Which is just so pretty. And of course I wasn’t paying attention to the “Skill Level: Experienced” because I found it when I searched for beginner patterns. In fact I just realized that it is an experienced pattern.

This pattern has yarn overs and knitting right to lefts and slipping and knitting and so many fancy stitches that I had to look up. YouTube is a fracking godsend for new knitters.

Long story short, I cast on about 4 times and took it out 3 times. I completely messed up somewhere around the 4th row that last time and, here’s the kicker, I JUST KEPT GOING.

My mom told me something years and years ago and I don’t think she meant for it to stick with me but it did.

“Only you notice the mistakes.”

Now, I don’t think she’s talking about big things like putting salt in a recipe instead of sugar or forgetting to update a personalization tag. But the little things, like messing up one row of stitches in a scarf that is going to be over 40” long? Those little things that you beat yourself up over? Naw, only you are going to notice those ones. Unless you point them out to people.

So don’t let one messed up row stop you. Keep going until you finish the damn thing. Then, if it was really bad, don’t show anyone. Or do. Just call it a Jayne project.

Fly or flop?

Flop. Now, here me out. It’s only a flop because I started this newsletter in APRIL and I have knitted exactly 0 stitches since then. So I am fully reserving my right to declare this a fly in like 2 years when I actually finish the shawl. But until I actually finish it, I’m declaring this a massive flop.

Til next month; take chances, make mistakes, get messy!
Carin

I went to Salesforce Connections last week and got to see Dan Levy and so I’m just pass his wisdom along to you…

“Write the script. If you finish and don’t like it, throw it out. But now you have the experience of writing a script and the next time it will be easier.”

Just replace “Write the script.” with “Do the thing.” and remember that you’ve got this.

So, June just started. I’ve only finished two books so far this month: Waybound by Will Wight (the last book of the Cradle series) and Where Oceans Burn by Casey L. Bond. I’m about halfway through both Where Skies Fall by Casey L. Bond (the 2nd in the duology) and Chameleon by William X. Kienzle. And Kat Scratch Fever is next on the docket. As long as I continue to read faster than I knit, I should get all three done by the end of the month, maybe another one after that depending on what life throws at me.

Follow along as I devour books this year

Like the newsletter? Have ideas? Wanna share a story about something you dove into recently or something you're reading? Reply and let me know! I'm always up for new things to try or new books to read.

If you’re getting this, I’m going to assume you got the welcome email and you kind of know what you signed up for. And if you don’t, that’s OK too, because I’m not 100% sure what I’m doing either. That’s kind of the point. 🤪

If this isn't for you, feel free to unsubscribe below.