I'm Drea. I'm Meg. I'm Tina. And I'm Jess. And this is Pardon My Stash.
Welcome to Pardon My Stash, a podcast about knitting with fiber arts and how awesome it is.
Before we delve into this week's topics, let's hear what we're working on now, Meg. Well,
this is a tentative dive into what I'm hoping is going to be my Rheinbeck top, not sweater.
I am knitting Sun Drop by Laura Ehler of Fog Bound Knits. It is a short sleeve sweater top.
I went back and forth on a lot of different choices. I ended up on this one. It's the first
time I'm knitting a raglan top, which is kind of fun. Yeah. And I am knitting it out of Dragon
Hoard yarn. They're gnome tweed fingering in the colorway fairy yule tree. It is a blue-green tweed.
Nice. So it is right now I have, I'm just working on the kind of the yoke and we'll see where it
goes. I am hoping that it comes out okay. I'm still plugging away on the Kemi Shaw by Isabel Kramer.
In jeans. Faded jeans. Jeans. Silver Moon Fiber Arts fingering weight in jeans. In jeans.
Gina. I am still working on my swatches for my master gauge sheet. So I have gotten the
fingering weight swatch done. I have gotten the DK swatch complete and I am currently working on the
worsted swatch. So I did the fingering weight in a size two needle. I did the DK weight in a size
seven needle and I did the, I'm doing the worsted in a size nine on purpose because I like my stuff
to be a little bit airy, especially the, I don't know why, but I like my little stuff not to be as
tight. So I kind of like how it came out. It's like, it's still fitted, but it's not incredibly
tight. Whereas like this too is a little tight. I might redo the two. We'll see. It does look good.
They both look amazing. So I realized I had a bulky weight skein from Critical Hit and I am going to
wind that up with my Swift, my fancy Swift that's been getting a lot of traction on the social
medias right now. It's a squirrel cage Swift and it is amazing and I love it and it's phenomenal.
And I will wind that one up and I will do a swatch of that one as well because I realized that the
bulky that I have on my gauge sheet is discontinued and that doesn't make any sense to have. So I'm
going to swap the Lion Brand with, since I'm sticking with Critical Hit for everything else,
I'll do Critical Hit for the bulky and then the super bulky I'll keep in the hometown because
that's a pretty relatively popular and available yarn. Jess, what are you working on? I'm kind of
between projects right now because I mean, I finished the I Am Dragon 2 call. I have to
block it, but I need time because it's a steam block and that takes a while and I haven't been
able to find a chunk of time to do that in yet. So that's waiting for that. But otherwise there's
a couple days left before I can start the make-along project. So I don't want to start that yet. So
right now I am cast on a crochet project and I had seen like on sale dice bags that look like
potion bottles and I really liked making mini potion bottles. So I'm going to try and make a
big dice bag potion bottle. So we'll see and I may lose interest in a couple days, but
that's fair. But that again, that is my current in between projects. We're gonna mess around
with this and see what happens. Yeah, I have to also come up with a make-along project, but I
really you had mentioned that someone is doing this like octopus one. Oh my gosh. Now I want to be
like super ambitious and do the octopus one, but I know I won't finish it. I know I won't. I
absolutely know I won't. Knitter know thyself. I will not finish that. I will start and I will
be like I made a terrible decision. You're funny. So also it looks like it's in fingering weight.
So not about that life. Not about that life. Not about that life. But speaking of the make-along,
if you want to learn more about that, you can check out our how to get involved page on our website.
Signups are going until April 1st and that will be our cast on day for that and it'll go all the
way to September 1st. And by the end of that, if you've done the signups and have submitted your
project pictures, progress pics, and finished project picture, you'll get sent out like some
fun promo codes and whatnot for different things in our shop and from our creators here. So have a
look at that. If you want to see pictures of the current projects that we have just been talking
about or get more information about Part in My Stash in general, check out our website at
partinmystash.com for info, pics, patterns, yarns, and all that good stuff.
Mystery Box, Mystery Box, What's Inside the Mystery Box?
Hey, Mystery Box time. So the thing that I have decided that I wanted to look up and get into
and talk about today is increase stitches and decrease stitches because I think someone brought
it up a while ago and I actually did start looking into it and then I got distracted and then I came
back to it. Then I got distracted, but I decided today was the day.
We're going to learn about it. Let's do it. I'm ready.
Increase and decrease. There are actually a lot more ways to increase and decrease than I thought
there were and I wrote down some, but they get really intense. So what I actually did is I took
down the links to the blog post of a woman that put together a list and their thing is called
Nimble Needles, but the links will be on the blog. So you can look that up later. So what I'm going
to do is go over some of my favorite ways to do it and if all of y'all want to chime in with your
favorite ways to do them and then some of the other more well-known ones and then maybe throw
in there some of the ones that I looked at. I was like, I did not know that that was a thing
and that is really cool. But when you get down to basics, the main ones I think you see as far as
increasing go, you get your yarn over, your make one, and then your make one left and make one right,
and then kind of throw it in there. I don't see it as often, but it might depend on the patterns
you look at. You'll get your knit front and backs. That's my favorite. I like the knit front and back.
I love knit front and back. It's so easy. It's easy, but I don't like the stitch that comes out of it.
But you don't need to remember which way you got to twist it left or right. It's always the same.
When you're working with bulkier yarns, it looks funky. I don't like it. This is true.
Fair. This is true. Fair. See, I mean, that doesn't sound like a problem for me because I don't work
with bulkier yarns. No, if you work with a fingering or a DK or lace or whatever like
Dreia loves, you will definitely not see the knit front and back. You won't. There's this little bar.
Lace yarn over is kind of your big one for lace. That's because you get your eyelet out of your
yarn over. So a lot of lace patterns need that. My favorite is actually make one left or right.
I like doing those. I tend to forget which way is which before I start. But as soon as I look, I
remember it for usually the rest of it, so long as I don't put it down for an extended period of time.
I always have to make a note on my pattern which way to make it. Which way to go. Like either front
or back. Yeah. Yep. Same. Every time. Yep. There's also the make one stitch, which a lot of people
default it to the make one left stitch. But when I read it in here, they said the one difference
they do is usually when you make one left, like and I don't, I knit through the back loop of that
stitch that I make. For make one, they said you're supposed to knit through the front of it instead
and it makes it a more centered stitch rather than as much of a leaning. Yeah, because if you don't
do the twist for the right, then there's no right. Yeah. So that's how they kind of differentiate
that. I usually just default it to the make one left though. So I'm personally a fan of the left
and right lifted increase. Yep. Which is the least obvious in my opinion. Oh yeah. It doesn't,
you don't really see it. It's, you can't do a make one left or right on the end of a
pattern because you use the bars to do those. Yeah, that's fair. But the lifted one, yeah,
you can, you can kind of do that from anywhere. So that does make that one a better option.
They said another one that's almost invisible is a knit left loop, which I had never heard of before
and I've heard of that. Yeah, and I looked up how to do that and it's basically, it's like you do it
through the leg of a stitch. And again, the links are going to be on there because it's hard to
explain it without the pictures. And it's a very good post because they have the pictures and they
have video attachments too, which is kind of neat if you want to give them a try. But they did show
a picture of like the project to use with that. And it is a pretty, a pretty invisible stitch.
It's actually, it does like look pretty good. Knit front and back is one of your,
one of your staples as well. And they also did, you could like knit,
because it, it creates a bar. I guess it creates another bar when you do the knit front and back.
They actually had a way to get rid of that bar. And that is you knit through the front,
but then you slip the back and that you don't knit the back. So you don't get that extra bar.
And I never thought of doing that, but it makes sense because you still get the same number of
stitches. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Only issue and they, and they bring it up. The only issue is that you
do want to make sure you're not kind of stacking all of those. Yeah. That's the other issue with
that. But a lot of the time you've got to be careful of stacking your increases and decreases
anyway. Otherwise you'll kind of get a very, if you want it invisible, because you'll get a,
it'll be obvious. You'll start to see them if you're stacking them up. So that was, that was,
I thought that was kind of interesting that you could kind of get rid of that, that extra bar
in there. Same with short rows. If you like, that's why people don't stack short rows either,
because it's, it'll be really, really obvious. Yeah. And there were a couple more in there.
Like there's the, the backward loop increase and okay. Wait, hold on, hold on. Is that really an
increase or is that somebody just going, okay, you know what? I forgot a stitch. No, because
you're doing one of the legs. Again, I was like looking at both of them and I was like, these are
actually really interesting. No, the backward loop, isn't it? Like, don't you do a backward loop to
cast on for an armpit? That's a backwards loop cast on. Yeah. Oh, okay. Sorry. I was, I thought
you were talking, sorry. I forgot we're talking increases, decreases, continuous increases.
We're talking increases, decreases, continue. No, no. Yeah. I mean, I'm doing the increases,
decreases within not like casting on, which is also a thing you can do, casting on within the project,
which both of my dragon shawls needed that. So, but that account is like a separate kind of additional
cast on and not the increase decrease. So I didn't even look at stuff that did that. And another one
that I actually have used, usually only in shawls is the make two. And they usually do that somewhat
like in the center of a shawl, because it makes a pretty obvious, which it can be very pretty if you
if you do it right, but it is definitely not an invisible stitch. So, and these are just like,
I don't know, what was that? Like six or seven different types. There was like a list.
Oh, sure. So many other ones. And so it was really interesting. So if you're like trying to make
patterns or looking for like a stitch that might work better, they also had had ones where like,
I didn't even realize there were different leanings of these stitches. They had how you would like
change a left leaning increase to a right leaning increase, which was interesting if you kind of,
you know, you're trying to make it even on either side of the project. So I was like,
it was a really cool read. So if that's something people are interested in, and you know, it doesn't,
it, you know, you're looking at your project, it's like, okay, it just tells me to do a random
increase. And I want to choose the best one, like you could take a look and see if any of those work
for you. decreases, it didn't seem like there are as many options, I feel like doing the decreases,
but there are still way more than I thought there would be. Like, there's, there's, there's
there's my favorites, again, are the knit two together or the slip slip knit. Those are the two
I usually go to the nice reliable together to come on. There's a pearl two together. That's three.
There is because I think pearl two together is left leaning, I'm pretty sure they do have a way
to do a right leaning, which I didn't know was a thing. And I kind of wish I knew before because
that that was another thing in my in the dragon projects where I was like, I feel like there could
be another leaning stitch here. And I didn't know it at the time. But so that was that was kind of
interesting. Um, I'm a big fan of the, the double decrease center double center double, I like the
center double decrease. Um, that's that is that one is really nice. Even if you see it, it kind of
it blends well. Yeah, there's also like the slip knit Passover slip slip knit, you know, there's
that that one is and and those those were the five I was familiar with, with looking at this this list
of decreases, there are a ton of other ones, there are a few where I was looking at, and I have no
idea how they even discovered them because it seems so complicated. But then the picture of it
looked really nice. So I could see why they would want to do that. At the same time. All right,
you knit, then you sacrifice your firstborn. You have to do this between the bar and you have to
hold the needle so close together because if you breathe wrong, all your stuff will fall off. But
it looks great. And at the same time, I'm like, I think I would just do a pearl two together there
because I would not have the patience. So those are different ones that we knew about. And then
again, we'll post a whole list of other ones you can look into and see if you like any of them.
Who knows you may find one you never knew existed that ends up working out fantastic for you.
There is like a couple to with brioche. brioche has its own.
They had a couple in there for brioche. I don't do brioche so it was like reading Latin for me.
Yeah, so with the barks and the burps, because that's what it really is. With the barks and the
burps, you can increase and decrease. And it's honestly this like it's the same as a basic knit
together and a basic make one left, make one right. The difference is that you have to deal
with two strands. That's really it. So there's like an extra step. But like, for the most part,
for the most part, it's the same motion. So it's just it's just understanding the extra step in
between that you have to deal with. So if you see that if you see like, like literally, it says brk
or brp, that's brioche. So just if you're not doing brioche, just like ignore that.
Honestly, in a lot of patterns, you can kind of if one turns out to be too hard, you can usually
substitute depending on how complicated pattern it is. Sometimes a different look just does not
turn out right. But but yeah, I feel like it's one of those things. See if you can learn the new
stitch if they call for it. Otherwise, like do what's comfortable. Yeah, there's definitely say
like right and wrong. But it's really there really isn't. Like it's just it's just a different way.
It's going to look so once you've done it. So if you're trying to like Jess said, if you're trying
to go for a certain type of look, then yeah, you got to stick with that stitch. But if you really
don't care, like for especially with like hats and stuff that are like solids, then you're just
like whatever. Just plus I really love the way a incrementally decreasing top of a beanie looks
with a bunch of knit togethers. It's just so cute that you get these little like curves.
A little swirl. I love the swirl. It looks really nice in the design. Like it really does.
All right. And for this week's topic, we're going to talk about how to deal with negativity
about your craft from others or from yourself. If you get that kind of, you know, nasty little
voice in your head every once in a while telling you that, you know, you should stop or you should
stop or your stuff sucks or any of that. And how do you deal with that when those days or those
periods of time crop up? I definitely have those moments generally after I make a mistake.
When it goes in time out.
When it goes in time out. And I mean, Jess watches me every time I screw up, I joke about how I go
through literally the five stages of grief every time I screw up a project. And it's just really
bad. Like.
What's the five stages? I always forget. It's wait, what the first is what?
There's denial, anger, bargaining, despair, and then acceptance.
So you're bargaining with it. Like, listen.
What I'm getting is usually, Jess, can you please fix this?
Can you speak to her fixing this?
Can you figure out what I did wrong?
No, literally every time I make like a bad mistake, I'm like, I'm going to fix this.
I'm going to fix this bad mistake. I generally that's that's literally exactly like first, I'm
like, no, that's not so bad. And I just keep knitting. And then I start getting mad at myself.
I'm like, you're so stupid. How did you do? How did you screw that up?
Then I asked Jess to look at it. And then I like usually go into the pits of despair of like,
oh my God, I have to go back. I got a frog, all this. And then I just, you know,
put on my big girl pants and do it. So I really do hit all five.
Sometimes the bargaining is for me. And it's me going, just let me look at it.
Just let me look at it real quick. Maybe I can figure it out.
As I'm like, no, it's going in the trash.
I don't go through that many stages. I think I just get to, well, that's wrong.
And then usually that's followed with do I have the energy to deal with this today?
Most of the time the answer is no. And then I'll just pick it up again another day.
And I actually don't think that I've ever gotten down on myself about being a bad knitter or
like being a bad crafter or not being good enough.
I feel like that speaking from that kind of social media perspective is really easy to get that way,
especially like I literally just posted a reel about that today about how people see my yarn.
And if you're not like a fiber artist, they're literally like, holy.
And I'm like, yeah, like that's my, and they're like, wow, that's all yours.
And I'm like, yeah. And that's not even all of it.
Yeah. And they're like, wow.
But like, I feel like if somebody had like, I don't know, a stamp collection or like something
more innocuous that like you could put in a book and like put away, it doesn't take as much space.
Like, I feel like, yeah, the stash kind of takes up a lot of space.
Yeah. So I don't know. I feel like sometimes I get down about that sometimes, but then I laugh
because I'm just like, well, you know, this is my hobby. This is what I'm going to do.
And I think that this is pretty timely because my coworker was talking about this and I've noticed
that it's a lot more common to receive a lot of negativity from people outside of yourself
and even from within the knitting community.
One of my coworkers just recently started taking knitting classes at a community center.
And her first class, she had such a negative experience.
She almost didn't pick up the needles again.
Well, that was a terrible teacher.
Yeah. She told me about it. She was very negative. She was very harsh.
She had a lot of first time knitters who had never held needles before.
She was just hyper critical, not very helpful.
And the only thing that she really had to say about it was, well, knitting's not for everybody.
Which it's a lie. Knitting is for everybody because
when everybody starts knitting, you suck. Everybody sucks. Everybody sucks when they start
because you don't have the muscle memory.
Anytime you start doing anything, you suck at it.
Yeah. Exactly.
That's just human nature.
Yeah. But I also think that the end goal for going to a teacher and taking a class should be
that you want people to continue the craft when they leave the class.
Right. One would think.
And it makes me really sad that there are people in the knitting community
that are not very supportive of new knitters and new crafters.
Well, and there's also that idea of like, I think some people who have been in the community
for a very long time, like we're talking like 15, 20, 30, whatever years,
will look at someone who's been doing it for 30 days with that lens and not,
and they'll look at a 30 day knitter with that lens of a 30 year knitter and go like,
well, you're using terrible yarn, though I would never use those needles.
And like your posture is poor and like your technique is crap and blah, blah, blah, blah.
And like, I, and I say that because like I've been to some knitting groups where like they're doing that.
Like, there's one, there's one way to be like, if you see someone like starting, right.
And they're like making a mistake that you made when you started.
And you're just like, hey, listen, when I started, I also you like used to crouch like,
like Gollum in Lord of the Rings.
I love that you were using Lord of the Rings references appropriately.
Just for you.
It makes me so happy.
I'm just doing it for you.
So you just, just crouching and like, you know, like my precious, like a little gremlin,
yeah.
And then, you know, like, no, you got to like sit back so that you can do this for the long term
and like relax your shoulders and like, you know, like I can understand doing that.
And then I, and then the, but like to go into that judgment route is so weird to me because it's like,
like you said, like you want people to continue.
Yeah.
And I don't see it as competitive, like, because some people do that, go that route too.
You know, there's, there's, I think there is a lot of, of competitiveness where there doesn't need
to be. And I don't think that's just specifically to, to knitting or to the fiber arts.
I think that's in everything is that you, you sometimes do get people who are insecure and they
feel that others, you know, if, if others take up the craft that they are encroaching on their
space and it's ridiculous because there's room for everybody in, in everything.
I mean, somebody else becoming a knitter doesn't take anything away from you becoming a knitter,
but there are.
Absolutely.
People who have that very insecure mindset of, well, this is my thing, mine, you know, like Gollum,
just mine and they, you know, they can get really judgmental or passive aggressive.
And that can really be a turnoff, especially to somebody who is new and also insecure thinking,
you know, oh, well, if I'm not doing it well, then this must be a turnoff.
Then this must not be for me when really it's just, you haven't been doing it very long and
nobody's perfect on the first shot.
Also, as far as I'm concerned, I don't care how long you've been working on a craft.
I don't care how long you've been knitting, painting, crocheting, weaving, spinning,
you name it. I don't care. If you're working on a craft, you're always learning.
Oh, absolutely.
You're all still learning.
Oh, I, yeah, that is another thing that kind of grinds my ears too, is the idea that someone who
is new at it couldn't necessarily be amazing at it. Like I remember there was this, there was a
college student, she had been knitting two or three years and she was phenomenal, like doing,
doing like stuff that I wasn't even doing and I had been already in it for a decade at that point.
Like just, just totally blowing my mind with like her color choices and blah, blah,
and at no point did I sit there and go, well, push off. No, instead I sat there and I went,
okay, like you obviously learned that quickly. So can you please teach me your ways?
Like that's like exactly my mindset instead of being like this, you know, judge, judge, judge,
competition, competition, competition, because at the end of the day, like we all knit the same
stitches, right? But somehow it all comes out differently. Like I, there are certain people
like on social media and stuff and even our stuff, I can look and I know it's Jess's, I can look and
it's Meg's, I can look and I know it's yours. Like everybody has kind of their own expressive way
of how they pick colors, how they pick patterns, how they like do their things. So you can look at
a painting and know that it's a decor or something. Yeah. Well, that's how it should be looked at
in general is that art, that artistry. I think people forget about the art part of fiber art.
Like they just think about the fiber. They don't think about the art. There's art. It is art.
Yeah. So like I can understand how someone like you, who does phenomenal sketching and drawing
could then translate that into the fiber world because it's the same idea. It's the same creative
aspect. It's just a different medium. Yeah. I think that's why Jess is so like 8,000 crafts
that she can do because it's, you know, cause it's, it is, it's that same creative mindset
is definitely there. So, and everybody's got a different way of looking at it for sure.
Which is why I don't think that anybody should be putting someone else down or even yourself down.
And it makes me sad. A lot of times there's a lot of negativity in, in just crafting in general.
I have noticed that a lot of times the negativity will come from people that consider themselves
more practical and they consider arts or hobbies that are making you a mint as a waste of time.
And again, that a lot is a more reflection on them because they are,
how can you find joy in something if all you are ever doing is searching for the thing to make you
money? Like, you need to take a break and just do something for your own self. It's the capitalists.
It's the capitalists. They're here. They're here. A lot of pieces. It's like, you see that. And it
is from people that are just deeply rooted in this, like, oh, it's all about the hustle. And
it's like, okay, but this is a different type of hustle. Like, this is a, I need to get some mental
cash here. I need some more spoons and this is how I get them.
Yeah, it's definitely, like we've brought up hustle a couple of times in the last few episodes.
And I think it's, there is a very distinct difference between people who approach life
as something to receive and people who approach life as something to take, if that makes sense.
So like people who are approaching it to take, they're like, I want to take as much money as I
can. It's about the game. It's about the game. Yeah. It's about how much can I get? I want to
get it, get it, get it. And I want to get money. I want to get, I want to get, I want the accolades.
I want the fame and the fortune. I want the houses and the blah. And then there's like the people who
want to receive from life, which is different from getting things. It is like when you want to
appreciate the things around you, it is when you want to, the way that you get energy is not from
achieving these materialistic goals, but finding enlightenment in various different ways of
expressing yourself. Like it's not about anybody else. It is about you experiencing life and
receiving what life and ultimately destiny has for you. Put that on a mug.
I know I'm so winded. I can't, I can never get concise.
The mug should just be like the TLDR, live your life.
Live your life. Find your joy.
Find your joy.
There it is. Now we need a find your joy with TLDR on top of it.
In tiny, tiny print and then on the other side in big, big TLDR.
Oh my gosh. All right, I'm on it.
But it does it, that it perpetuates throughout your whole life. Cause it will perpetuate the way
that you handle your career. It will perpetuate the way that you view politics. It'll perpetuate
the way that you view other people because that whatever that is, it's almost like a core value.
Like what do you value out of life? And I think, and I say that being as somebody who I feel like
for a large part of my life, I was definitely in the materialistic side. My goal was I'm going to
make this much money a year. I'm going to have this kind of house. I'm going to have this, this,
this, and I thought that that would give me happiness, but then I got all those things.
It just gives you stuff. And then I was like, oh, I'm not happy. Why am I not happy? I felt secure.
I felt, you know, that's great. You know, you feel like secure, like you, you did great at your job,
but, but then like you look back and you go like, what did I, what did I receive though? Like my
soul, my soul was empty. So it was like, okay, all right, that's enough of that. And I, now it's like,
nope, I'm not going to do that. Now, now I'm like shifting that mindset to like, how could I like,
just receive what life is going to give me rather than like demand what I need.
By giving back to new knitters and hyping them up when they're feeling down about themselves.
Dude, I already told your friend, like, or I told you to tell your friend that like, if they need
part of my stash to do some like actual knitting for like treats and yarn. Yeah. And I say that
offering me Andrea, because I didn't speak to Megadress about this. If they need to offer,
you know, I will, I will work for delicious sweet treats, a savory meal and or fiber.
Well, if you would like a happy ending to that particular story, my coworker submitted honest
feedback to where she was taking the classes and the subsequent class the following week was
actually much better. Oh, that's good. Same person. Same person.
Yeah. Oh, well, that's good. They grew. Yeah, that's good. That's good. Or they had a good talking
to either way. Honestly, that is a sign of a good teacher that is willing to take criticism and grow
from it instead of pushing back. I think negativity in any kind of arts is not helpful,
whether it's like self negativity or outside negativity. Sometimes I think it does help you
grow, but you shouldn't have to grow in spite of something you should just grow because you want to.
No, and that's true. And that's the ideal. But I do feel like in a way you kind of can't avoid it.
I am my worst critic. I am my own critic. It's it is it is terrible. And I know I'm super hard on
myself and I will look at something be like this is god awful. I can't show this to anyone. They
say this is god awful. I can't show this to anyone. Like, I enjoy doing it, but I don't want to show
anybody because it's terrible. And a lot of times in those cases, it's like I'll kind of put it away.
And if I come back to it, sometimes I'll be like, Oh, actually, okay, I do kind of like this now
that I've had some time. So that's a big thing. They always tell you step away from your work for
a little bit and then look back at it because you won't see as many of the flaws right away.
But sometimes I still see the flaws. And sometimes it's just one of those things where it's like,
take a chance show people that you trust at the very least because even getting most of the time,
like I would say so long as they're like, you know, good friends and all that, they'll at least give
you positives about it. So you can feel a little better that way. constructive feedback,
to show the feedback is good. Be careful about just posting it anywhere because you will get
trolls even if it is amazing, you will always find people being like, I could do that in my sleep.
You always got to be careful of that and take stuff like that with a grain of salt. Um,
a big thing and it's like, is if you have like the imposter syndrome thing that I do do a lot too.
And then to a degree, I like to embrace that and be like, yeah, but I'm a good damn imposter.
No one's gonna catch me. No one knows. No one knows that I have no idea what the
**** I'm doing. Nobody knows. I'm awesome. I also have a little bit of imposter syndrome sometimes.
Like sometimes I'll look at projects that I have obviously made and I'm like, I didn't do that.
I can't, I can't make a sweater. I can't do that. That's not mine. Well, see, not even that. Mine is
like, this is ****. I don't know why people are saying this is good. They're wrong. Oh, no, I never
do that. Um, I am the sound bite that is like, look at this. This came from my hands. Like that's me
afterwards. Yeah. It's the pre the before that talks you out of doing it in the first place.
That's what the imposter. Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes I'll tell myself that I can't do that and then
I'll do it and then I'll be like hella proud of myself and impressed. I am my biggest fan.
We all know that. You know what? It's good though. If nothing else, I am my own hype man. Okay.
I'll hype you every time. I think we all will. So I've, I've actually struggled a lot. Um,
and a big part of that has always been, um, you know, just what, what I discovered
last year was obsessive compulsive disorder, um, and perfectionism. If I can't do it exactly right,
then I shouldn't be doing it in the first place. And I know, you know, in the back of my head,
I know that that is wrong and I have a very easy time telling other people that that is wrong,
but I struggle with myself a lot. If I, if I feel that I cannot do it exactly the way that it should
be done, my brain is just firing off over and over again. You should not be doing this. This,
you're not good at it. Um, and that has been a huge straw in, in my entire knitting experience
to fight past the, the voice that tells me that if I'm not perfect, I shouldn't do it. It's taken me
a long time to get to where I'm at now where I do try new things and I, I do, you know, embrace
making mistakes and, and ripping back. And honestly, last year it was kind of that, you know,
we all laughed about it when I was working on dark academia and I made a mistake, um, in the sweater,
the single stitch that was the single stitch. Um, and you know, three years ago, that single stitch
would have sent me just completely spiraling and I would have put it into a bag and I would never
have taken it out again. And I just kind of laughed and was like, womp, womp. All right, time to get
a crochet hook and go back 13 rows of color work. Um, and it took me like 10 minutes and I was
honestly really proud of myself that I, I did that because I did feel like there's some, some
conscious personal growth there that instead of kind of spiraling down and being like, you suck,
I can't believe you did that. Like how dare you make a very common mistake of using the wrong color.
Um, but like I said, the five stages of grief, um, I go through all of them with my knitting. So, um,
you know, as much as I hate the idea and I would hate it in other people, um, but I've kind of had
to try to learn to live with it in myself and try to kind of work past it and focus on all of the
things that I can do and all that I have done that tells me that, you know what, I am a pretty good
knitter and I've done a lot of really good things and one little mistake or even one big mistake,
one project ending mistake does not negate all of those things that I have done that we all make
mistakes in the great scheme of everything. They don't matter. That's not the sum of all of our parts.
I'm clapping because I think that's really good personal growth.
I'm, you know, I'm working on it. I'm a work in progress. I think we all are to an extent and
we're, you know, even if, if you are somebody that has great confidence in your art and good for you,
like that is wonderful. Um, we are all growing every single day and if you are already a person
that is super confident in your craft and your art, um, then you are like way ahead of the game and
you're just going to keep getting better and that's, that's spectacular. Last thing I want to add
is I have always grown up with my father saying, I may not always be right, but I am never wrong.
I have always translated that to everything is you may make a ton of mistakes, but so long as you
take something away from that and learn from it, then it is a learning experience and not a full
mistake. As long as you take something away from it, you are gaining something out of that experience.
It's no mistakes. Only happy little trees. Happy little trees. Happy accidents, happy accidents.
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