New and New Projects!

This time I would like to post about a particular matter that for sometime would make me feel a bit "bad", but after reading an article at the latest Spring '09 issue from Interweave Knits I now feel absolutely relieved and finally understood!

I wonder if anyone has read the following article on page 18: "Start as Many New Projects as You Can" by Vicki Square, but I think it is fabulous.

You see, for years I was haunted and many times disturbed about how fast and easy I would start new projects that I would take sometime to work on but eventually would finish. I was even nicknamed "Leonarda" because Messer Leonardo Da Vinci would always start and sketch new ideas and projects but would hardly finish them. I remember carrying my then initial enthusiasm for a new project as far as buying the yarn but would not attempt to start working on it because I needed to "discipline myself" and finish right away any knitting or crochet project I would have started. Yes, I have finished most of my started projects but within the years I realized that the inital enthusiasm for a not started particular project had washed away with time and it was sad to discover, years later, such yarn waiting its turn and just a sad reminder in my stash.

Before I read the article above I always regreted not starting projects while I was still excited by them as I know I would have finish them sooner or later. I mean, who cares about when you finish them, right? For me knitting and crochet are for relaxing.

If any of you has felt the way I have I hope you are able to read the article because it is not at all to prompt you into knitting or crocheting carelessly or starting new projects randomly, it actually focuses on that initial feeling for a particular project and actually question if any of the works in progress that you have around will eventually be worn, used, enjoyed or not at all. So as to keep them around, transform or discard them.

This last idea of putting current unfinished projects into perspective helped me transform an initial idea into a finished project: a granny square crocheted sweater that I don't think I would have liked to wear as I think I was starting to look like a big blanket; so it is now a cheerful little bag that I will definately use. As a designer I know that not all the initial ideas for a project end up exactly as first projected, they can transform into other, and why not, better things.

Although I liked the idea of having such sweater now I don't regret at all what it ended up becoming as I did not supress my initial enthusiasm. This is what counts!

With the above in mind I don't need to tell you that like the bursting Spring, I am having a lot of fun starting new projects! Check them out:

Freedom! :)