My name is Cindy and I am a knittyholic

I was so excited about starting a blog, but I have been stressed about posting. The Big Bag Swap and KAL was an easy post because I was answering questions. Now the time has come for me to tell you a little bit about me and my life. The title is The Life of a Knittyholic. I guess I'll start by telling you a little bit about my life now.

I started knitting four years ago when I was going through my divorce. My best friend at the time, insisted that knitting would be a therapeutic outlet and would help relieve stress. It's important to note that she had never knitted and was easily as depressed and stressed as I was. I explained to her that I could never afford a $80.00 knitting class, buy supplies and take the time off work to learn. After all...who knits: old ladies sitting on their porches? I was only 39, had four kids and at the prime of my life (according to others, anyway.) It was irrelevant that I was about 10 seconds from a breakdown. That was my secret! Without telling me, Diane paid for the class and then explained that class fees were nonrefundable (a little fib I learned later.) I won't bore you with how much I hated the class and all of the weird projects we did, but I did begin to realize the comfort that knitting provided. After I got through the initial frustration with the fact that I needed two extra hands and a team to help me hold my yarn, I began to get "it." If you are a knitter, you understand the "it." If you don't knit, you may not understand.

For the last four years, I have knitted almost every day. I have just recently begun to challenge my skills though. The therapeutic part for me was the ability to distract myself making easy and mindless projects. I made an uncountable number of scarves, then went to felted bags. I've made a Lopi sweater, and taken several classes (socks, felted clogs, mitered shawl, short rows) but they all required following a pattern and concentration. Knitting was an escape at that time, and any effort was too much effort. I became the felted bag queen. I began to fill storage tubs with completed bags. I used different yarn and different patterns to mix things but they all did remain in the "mindless knitting" category.

My knitting world opened up about a year ago when I was sitting at my favorite local coffee house, Jitters, and another lady came up and sat down to knit. We started talking about knitting (it was very obvious that she had traveled WAY beyond the mindless knitting phase,) and she mentioned that she was a teacher at our LYS, The Tangled Skein. (*** Thank you Kathy for giving having enough confidence in me to mention me to Roberta***) While we were talking, I told her how cool it would be to work there. I have a full-time job that I love, but I made a joke about her letting me know if the owner of the shop ever needed someone to fill in. Two weeks later a received a phone call from the owner of my LYS asking me if I was serious about working on Saturdays. Of course I was. What kind knitter would I be if I purposely let a chance for yarn pass me by? How could I let this opportunity pass..on the other hand, I was still a novice. I had been knitting several years, but still hadn't forced myself to step outside the box. I was living in the knitting safe zone. I was desperate for the opportunity to work there,but I was also very intimidated. I never once thought that anyone would ever think twice about my joke about working at a yarn store. After all, what did I know about knitting? I had knitted enough to be a bit cocky..but I was also very aware of my limited experience with what I perceived at the time was "real knitting."

Could I be a "real knitter?"