It has been just over 2 weeks, and I still don’t have anything on my needles. I made an attempt at writing up a hat I designed last year, but the charts are complicated and we all know by now that writing down patterns is not usually the thing to get me in a creative mood. (Finishing patterns, on the other hand, has a very satisfying feel to it…I’m looking forward to a couple of those in the near future.)

I cast on a mini practice version of a sweater geometry that I’m currently noodling through, but that was really to give me something to knit at knit night and to keep my hands busy in case I get stranded on a train. More on the sweater later…that’s another full-on process post.

I am in one of those moments in life where one thing is ending and another is about to begin, but I’m not sure what that beginning is or should be. Sometimes, it pays to lean into that pause. As so often happens, my knitting is a reflection of the state of the rest of life.

The practice sweater did help to take the edge off, but between projects (no knitting?!) is not a comfortable place to be. Sometimes, though, it’s important to lie fallow. It’s easy to forget that fallow is not idle, and that downtime is often quite productive. I could rush to cast on just to have something, or I can wait for something compelling to come along. Usually, I would choose the former, in the interests of maintaining rhythm. (My creativity works best in a steady rhythm most of the time.) But sometimes it pays to linger in that downbeat, to just let things settle until they come back of their own accord. Breathe all the way out, and then wait until you must to breathe back in. I am very, very good at committing, but right now is not the time.

Fortunately, I have some spinning to do for a sweater that I may or may not knit (no commitment there!), and that has been keeping my hands occupied while my knitting takes a rest.

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I’m sure I’ll be back at the projects soon enough. Until then, it will be little things that get knit around here.