Sock Yarn Shawls & Inspiration

This shawl was created in 2014 with a pattern from knitsimple: 33 knit Shawls by SoHo Publishing Co. It's a collection that ranks the projects on complexity with a scale of 1 to 4, which means that with one book the beginner can progress through each project and eventually tackle the "experienced" category.

The advantage of knitting shawls is there are no complicated edges, like the armholes or neck edging of a garment, to navigate. The simplicity of the shawl shape focuses your attention on the pattern itself, (and sometimes it requires a lot of attention to get lacy patterns right.)

It's been a while since I've posted a knitting project. So, as I was collecting my thoughts to write, I googled quotes on knitting for a little inspiration and ran across this one from writer/knitter Stephanie Pearl-McPhee:

Every ball or skein of yarn holds something inside it, and the great mystery of what that might be is almost spiritual. 

Gears started turning and I remembered a recent conversation about a woman who had passed on, leaving bins and boxes filled with yarn worth thousands of dollars... so many "mysteries" waiting to be realized.

My thoughts turned to my own "stash" of supplies which includes an ever-growing collection of fabrics that I've had to sort by color, pattern size, themes, etc., just to bring some sense of order to the sewing room. And that's just the quilting cottons! Clothing fabrics and yarns are stored separately.

Then I remembered Michelangelo's famous quote:

Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it.

It suddenly occurred to me that it doesn’t really matter what medium you work in; it’s all about ideas. The materials used are just a means to express yourself. 

Each length of fabric and skein of yarn in my collection represents a vision I had for its use. At some point a fabric caught my eye or a yarn texture called to me, I envisioned a project in its completed form, and so I brought it home. But the collection multiplies and threatens to overwhelm our storage spaces when the ideas come quicker than our execution of them. 

There's a time for both: a time for generating ideas, and a time for following through on that inspiration. Right now I think I'm in for a long stretch of the later,... and I should be getting back to work!