Lockdown months opened doors to many new knitting-unrelated projects, and what an enjoyable experience it has been!! Apart from the daily-15-doggy-rotis project, and the daily cooking-and-cleaning project ( overseen by the canine quartet who contributed encouraging licks and wagging tails to every project), plenty has been happening since March 2020.
On the culinary front, there was “The Mystical Magic of SourDough” project. The plethora of fabulous loaves and buns on social media feeds intrigued me. I wanted to know more about sourdough, and when there was a chance to join this online class, I jumped in. Anita shared her sourdough secrets patiently and clearly, and we now have a new pet at home…”Babli-the-starter”. She needs to be watched, pampered and fed regularly … in return, she has brought pancakes, pita bread, crackers and home made bread into our lives! Home made bread is special and I love it. Babli is an integral part of the kitchen now, with Hema and the knitters learning to make pancakes at home too.
The rhythm and music of prose fascinates me. Words weave their magic around me in books, emails, articles, posts and blogs. The dream of authoring a book, drifts through my day-dreams regularly. Enrolling in an online writing course gave me 6 weeks of a novel experience. Sharing my thoughts and words with a diverse but supportive group, and then listening to the thoughts of people born into different situations than mine, opened up my mind to long ignored home truths….
- I write, but the discipline to be an author gets waylaid by dogs, dreams, days of knitting and foresting and pottering around the house. That book is not happening in this life, and I am OK with that!
- An interesting life, which beats fiction sometimes, is my destiny… but then, there are a billion more, stranger-than-fiction lives unfurling around me, and I am not the only one with some zany stories to share. Listening to others sharing their stories is a talent which I am going to work on!
And then, for the physical fitness side of life, early morning yoga classes have now settled into the daily routine. I have to thank Zoom for bringing online classes to this little hamlet, far from city yoga centres and teachers.
Routinely, before every class, the other participants comment on my charming background scene—two curled up, quiet dogs on the bed, who seem to be totally at peace with their mother and her contortions. By the end of the class, I see that Cheetah has thrown the pillows away, burrowed and busied up the covers, chomped up a potato from the kitchen,and chased a toy or two. No one had noticed all that mad activity through the yoga class, so the appreciative comments still keep coming, and I just smile quietly.
I have been knitting quietly too…Knitting and ripping is closer to the truth. Sport weight merino yarn from my stash of gifts, was just right for this pullover. The pattern, from an old knitting book, had been knitted decades ago, but this time, I used instructions from Elizabeth Zimmerman’s “Knitting without Tears” to knit in the round, try out a saddle shoulder decrease and add a shirt yolk tp the back. I did not heed her instructions about knitting a big swatch, and have paid dearly for that. After the final blocking, I had to shorten the pullover by a good 6 inches, and re-knit the borders. This time, swatch resolutions have been lodged in every stitch of the border!
And now, for the New Project….
Going online with a vengeance!! Now that tourists have vaporised into distant memories and now that the knitters do need every possible help in providing for their families, its time to nudge the world into the world of needlestosaymore.com
Do check us out on Instagram, the Facebook page for Needlestosaymore, and do scroll through the store. We are preparing to share our products and experiences, have a few giveaways and lotteries, begin a newsletter and even prepare for a knitting retreat in the hills.
Join our journey through these unusual and unique days of lockdowns and quiet isolation, and read about the new lessons learnt in taking on challenges.
Never a dull moment of stagnation, never a chance to be placid and self satisfied, never a time when one can say, “I have done it all, I have seen it all”. That’s Life for each of us!!
Staying and working at home has given me new things too. I now have a yoga routine I love – 10 weeks and counting! Enjoy the escapades of Babli! I ought to look into the creative writing classes.