I will be the first to admit that I’m not exactly what you’d call a “social knitter.” I don’t have a regular knitting group, I do most of my knitting while I’m on public transit (with the exception of really complicated patterns that need a lot of my time and attention and therefore can’t really be pulled out and put away on a whim the way that simple things like, say, socks can)… and well, I never quite understood the idea of a knitalong.
Nevermind that last fall I tried to join the group knitting Mystery Stole 4… it was a good theory but really fell apart in practice. I think the project is still hibernating in a drawer somewhere, stuck solidly near the beginning of chart 3… on the first half.
But, when Cookie A published Sock Innovation and a couple of knitting groups popped up around it on Ravelry it suddenly seemed like a good idea to join one of them. Because, after all, here were a bunch of people, who just like me, were going to race out and buy this book and knit… most, if not all of the patterns in it. And not just the patterns in the book. These were people who, also just like me, were going to be pretty shameless in their love for Cookie’s patterns and knit sock after sock by the same designer.
I joined a group and merrily cast on for Glynis, the first pattern of the book and the first pattern for the group… which has all sorts of fancy rules and fancy prizes. I knit away, and at 8 minutes to midnight on May 31, I cast off my first socks for the KAL. Unfortunately, a jetlagged, life-fogged brain failed to remember the part of the rule that said that to count for the month’s prize eligibility, one had to post a picture in the Finished Object thread before midnight.
I was heartbroken. Really, really, cursing-my-computer-and-stupidity heartbroken. I had, from my own error in misremembering the rules, disqualified my self from the month’s prize drawing, and the big prize drawing from finishing every pattern in the book and… well, basically all the parts of the competition except the consolation round. Suffice it to say that I felt frustrated. (No, I’m not actually very competitive, except for that part where I really am… why do you ask?)
Then I realized something. If I let myself think just a little bit outside the box, I should have been relieved to disqualify myself from the uber prize as quickly as I could. After all, this freed me to participate in other Cookie A knitalongs. It freed me to not knit patterns I wasn’t interested in knitting. It took SO MUCH PRESSURE away. And I had an epiphany that knitalongs are NOT about the prizes. Not even for competitive people like me. They’re about knitting something you like with people you also like. The competition part, and the chance for a prize, is really just a bonus.
I’m spending June finishing up the Marlene D.s (in the beautiful beautiful Wollmeise 100% sock yarn, color La Digitessa yarn that I had hanging about in the stash) that I started in February (and subsequently frogged and started again in April) and I’m thinking I’ll cast on a pair of Nebulas (rav link) to participate in another knitalong, which I undoubtedly won’t finish before the end of the month. In the event that I do happen to come close to finishing, this time I’ll remember that it doesn’t count as finshed until the picture has been posted and maybe, hopefully, plan my time a little better (or cut myself a little more slack on the race to the finish!)
In the mean time, I’ll be taking pictures and posting pictures and reveling in the pure, simple joy of making and wearing my own wonderful, soft, colorful handknit socks. I might also delight in the fact that I have really small feet, so sock knitting goes really fast. I have a sneaking suspicion that I’d be less inclined to knit such things if I had say, Size 11 feet instead of the cute little size 6’s that I’m blessed/cursed with.
Pretty Little Purls 