Wednesday, June 4, 2008

To Knit or Read about Knitting? THAT is my question!

So my friend and fellow knitter, Margaret, gave me The Friday Night Knitting Club last week. This book has seriously cut into my knitting time. LOL

I am so drawn into the story that I have put some knitting projects on the back burner. Now I've cast on my 2nd sock for my Bob Marley's Grandma's Socks. I love them! I love having funky socks, but let's face it. It is already in the upper 90s in Houston. Big wool socks are down right comical here. So I'm using some of my Knit Picks Felici in Atmosphere to create these awesome socks. The yarn makes me think of faded blue jeans and Texas skies.

Another upside to ankle socks is that I can get a pair out of one 50 gram ball of yarn. Now what to do with all of those pieces of balls of sock yarn. I think some seriously funky socks may be in my future. :)

I guess to many people, knitting socks on dpns looks like spinning a spider web. They look at my project and ask, "What are you making?" I guess that I thought about double points that way before I actually tried them. If you knit tightly, then it's no problem. I guess the best secret is to cast on in a way that makes it easy to get started. I use the long tail cast-on with pretty much all of my socks so that the first row is already knit during the cast-on process. It doesn't mess up my ribbing or what ever patter. Just look! Can you tell? (Really, if you can, I don't want to hear about it. My glasses are not that good I tell you!)

I did learn something about myself today that kind of cracks me up. I'm an "East" personality. I was in a workshop today for work, and we were describing what kind of leader we are. Well I'm a big picture kind of girl. (Ahem. See note above about details! LOL) Stereotypically, one might be tempted to peg me as a details oriented person b/c after all, I am a physicist. However, this must be why I like theoretical physics best as compared to computational physics. I see the big picture. Actually I see many big pictures all at the same time. How confusing is that? Sometimes I let the details slide by, but if they're important enough, I'll get back to them. Back to what I learned... I really am annoyed by people who are too quick to act (although they can be my mindless minions any day!), and I am also annoyed by those who get their feelings hurt too easily. The detail oriented people are who I like to delegate my tasks to if I can stand to do it. See, I really do have a hard time delegating because I'm... well... My name is KnittingNerd, and I'm a perfectionist. There! I said it! Are you happy now?

It's not that I'm stuck on myself... I just usually put a lot of thought and effort into what I do, so it's usually a pretty good thing. I'm accustomed to winning intellectual challenges, and I am very competitive. So, forgive me. It's who I am. :) However, I do make a conscientious effort to be open to others' suggestions and ideas. Also, I can admit when I am wrong. The whole "what kinds of leader are you" thing today just made me more aware of the dynamics of such a group of diverse people. I think I'll do the same activity with my department when the new academic year begins. But for now, it's back to knitting... or reading about knitting... or knitting...

ARGHHHHH!!!

Posted by Picasa