I spent a lot on yarn for a sweater the other day. About $100 to be exact. I usually end up spending more on yarn than I would if I bought the finished product in a store (I’m actually very cheap when it comes to buying clothes), and I’m not including my labour in it at all. Then why do I do it?
Therapy. MY life is full of all the stresses of being a student, and all the stresses of working in a theatre. It’s hard. I don’t have a lot of free time. What free time I do have, I want to relax. But it’s gotten to the point where I feel like a useless slug if I just sit and watch TV, so I knit and watch, and feel good about myself.
Knitting itself, without the TV is a good way to relieve stress, it’s nice, repetitive, and depending what I’m working on, easy.
It gives me a sense of accomplishment. Not just when I finish, but when I get to a certain important row, or finish a pattern repeat, or weave in all the ends so far (I love the way that feels, it makes it all look so neat!).
Bragging rights. I get to wear fabulous things out and have people ask me where I got them, and I can say I made it myself. I like that little moment of ‘Wow!’ from other people. I’m not an actor so I don’t get that every night from my adoring public, but then again I don’t need to hound for it. Just every now and then is nice.
That $100 of yarn is going to last me a very long time. That’s practically a year’s worth of yoga/shrink-substitute. I have so little time, projects last ages, and if in my mind I split up what I paid over the months it took to actually finish, it isn’t a lot per month. I just spent it all in one big whack. Rogue took me 8 months (with breaks, all my projects that are more than a scarf end up with large non-knitting breaks) and cost me about $70 in yarn. Less than $10/month is pretty good for a hobby of any sort.

The sweater I’m making is the Huntingdon Castle Pullover from the Fall Interweave Knits, in Katia Dream (aka Marks & Kattens Dream) in deep red for the main colour, and a very very light sandy beige for the pattern. I thought white would just be too Christmas-y. It is the softest stuff, and was on sale, so I’m getting very expensive wool for a slightly less expensive price.

Therefore, my yarn purchases are justified.

My LYS is having their anniversary sale, 20% off all regular priced yarns. I went in (even though I have about 5 million school things I should be doing) and wandered. Even if I didn’t have school things to do, I should be knitting stuff for the craft fair. But one has to take time for oneself, right? Of course right.
I ended up chosing a wool for the Huntingdon Castle Pullover from the Fall Interweave Knits. I bought one ball to swatch, and put the rest of that colour on hold. It is a lovely rusty red, and I think I’ll use a pale tan for the Fair Isle bit. I swatched just now, and it works perfectly. It’ll be my first Fair Isle, some might say I shouldn’t try that in a whole sweater, but then Rogue was my first sweater and my second cabled project.
I’m going to go back Tuesday and pick up the rest of the yarn. whee!

I love this scene in Fiddler. The great drunken dance-off. It kinda reminds me of the dance scene in West Side Story.

Oh, and to anyone out there: If you aren’t watching the new program Lost you’re missing out on the best thing on TV right now.

Well, I was working on a wristwarmer in Lion Brand Homespun. I left it for a moment, and look what happened: