Liberation knitting

Retrospectively, knitting the Spring sweater- though not entirely "without tears"- has been a learning experience and therefore, as such, a good experience . Though I am somewhat satisfied with the result (because I learned a thing or two while making it), I found myself grudgingly plowing through the final sleeve and eventually setting it aside before finishing the collar. By the time I had finished the sleeves, spring had passed and summer had gloriously arrived.

Soon it became way too hot to be holding all that wool in one's lap. Regardless of the weather I had also come to dread the intricacies of the pattern itself. Fast forward a few weeks on sleeve-island and my knitting mojo was all but gone.

Enter Stephen West.

I had been following West for a while now, contemplating whether or not I should join the ranks of his KAls knitters. To this day I have never ventured into knitting one of his patterns. I have read here and there that people have widely-differing opinions on his patterns, as can be expected and as they should. For my part, I found him to be a knitting-lifesaver and a restorative voice in one's knitting journey. His call to embrace knitting as having fun with colors can sometimes feel like a liberation from the self-imposed chains of perfectionism.

Why aspire to knitting perfection in every garment one makes? Why can't we "just say yes", and indulge in the meditative nature of the craft, come what may as a result? Perhaps the whole point is really not to make something you can wear, as it is to be on a knitting path, one that, for some, also takes the shape of spinning or dyeing or creating fiber art. In fact, there may be more to gain from unleashing one's creative juices than from producing a perfectly rendered artifact (despite best efforts, I doubt we would be able to knit our entire wardrobe).

I should have entitled this post "Ode to SW" as this is how grateful I feel to have been swept away from the tentacles of perfectionism!