(A disclaimer: my apologies for the awful photos. My head is exploding from sinus pressure and there isn't any good lighting to be found, anyway.)
I don't like the multi-directional pull that I feel when I am working on more than one project - I feel as though I'm overcommitted and always behind...meaning, I would be done with this scarf already if I hadn't started that pair of socks, how much progress could I have made on this sweater if I didn't work on that hat for a while, blah blah.
With that said, I have a confession: I have been working on one project, on and off, for 2 years. This project has been cast aside for many smaller projects. I have NOT been monogamous to this project. It's been in and out of 'hibernation' - meaning, in one of those plastic square sacks that sheet sets come in - since October of 2006 or thereabouts.
It's a blanket, made from a bunch of different yarns. I love it! I like the design, I like the mix of textures and the colors, I like that it is intended to be my special blanket, made out of my own love for myself. Back when I was nursing a broken heart, I needed something like this project to work on every day, to encourage myself and work love and healing into every stitch. Original estimations indicated that I would finish it right around the time I expected my broken heart to be mended.
It's a blanket, made from a bunch of different yarns. I love it! I like the design, I like the mix of textures and the colors, I like that it is intended to be my special blanket, made out of my own love for myself. Back when I was nursing a broken heart, I needed something like this project to work on every day, to encourage myself and work love and healing into every stitch. Original estimations indicated that I would finish it right around the time I expected my broken heart to be mended.
So much for that!
I am in the process of deciding what my strategy for finishing this project should be. I can put the pedal to the metal and vow not to work on anything else until I've finished it, and work on it steadily for the next couple of months, or I can continue to take up smaller projects while I finish it, thereby dragging the process out even longer. Now that it's so big, it's not really portable, which is another factor, because when I'm not knitting on the go, I feel like I'm wasting time.
I have dealt with an inordinate amount of guilt over not finishing this afghan. But it's just so big! And it's been two years, and judging from my yarn supply, I'm only barely more than halfway done! Working on this blanket, though enjoyable, feels like I'm going 35 in a 65 zone (right lane, of course) and everyone is zipping right on by.
I am in the process of deciding what my strategy for finishing this project should be. I can put the pedal to the metal and vow not to work on anything else until I've finished it, and work on it steadily for the next couple of months, or I can continue to take up smaller projects while I finish it, thereby dragging the process out even longer. Now that it's so big, it's not really portable, which is another factor, because when I'm not knitting on the go, I feel like I'm wasting time.
And so, I deliberate. And in the meantime, I knit.
Do you ever feel unfinished-project guilt?
Not that I know the first thing about knitting, but I say go full bore on the quilt.
ReplyDeletefull bore - great phrase! there'll be an update on it in the next week or so, probably.
ReplyDelete