How do you stay creative when life is busy?
As a younger knitter, I used to crave complexity. Allover lace; intricate cables; innovative construction methods. Fields of stockinette? I’ll pass.
I still love complex patterns. There’s nothing more thrilling than learning clever new techniques, trying fun stitch patterns, or manipulating fabric into (essentially) wearable sculpture.
Lately, I haven’t had the brain cells for thrills.
Some seasons of life have breathing room built in; others don’t. Good things and hard things and just plain things crowd in pell-mell and forget to leave standing room. It’s easy for those times to zap my creative energy, and if all I have on the needles is fancy-shmancy projects, I’m not going to knit at all.
This summer, I’m thankful for stockinette.
The last few weeks I haven’t touched anything more complex than advanced beginner knits. In the past, I would have been bored out of my mind and probably creatively unfulfilled. But, in the words of Aragorn, that is not this day. It’s making me realize that creative fulfillment isn’t an objective quantity; nor is it measurable by skill level or anything of that snobby kind. In less hectic seasons, stretching my skills was creatively fulfilling. In this one, the quiet act of forming one simple stitch at a time is enough.
I’m choosing to take delight in the way hand-dyed colors play across a simple backdrop. In the glorious neatness of a three-needle bindoff. In the fun of digging through my stash and finally using that yarn I got on clearance a while back. I’m being forced to notice the things about my craft that I tend to take for granted, because I don’t have the bandwidth to notice anything else. It’s good for me. And when it’s time to return to the intricacy, maybe I’ll remember to still take joy in these things. More joy can’t be a bad thing.
Patterns are Dunedrifter by Wool & Pine and Wool & Berries by Joji Locatelli.
