So it’s come to this, has it? Days become weeks become months become YEARS and you realize that you have no business (none whatsoever) calling yourself a blogging knitter. Or a writer. They say you can’t do it all, and I’m here to say, thank goodness. (And asking myself why I fought it for so long.) Doing it all is impossible. Trying to do it all is just so terribly disappointing. Quitting sugar, knitting 52 pairs of socks in one calendar year, attempting to run a successful bricks-and-mortar AND a webshop 100% by myself….I like to think of these flat-out failures more as crucial steps on the path to enlightenment.
Pass the M & Ms, will you?
The older I get (mid-30s are the best, amiright?!?) the more I realize that being honest with myself is just the smartest thing to be. Do I change? Yeah, I guess, but not markedly and even then, not as fast as I’d like.
I’m going to try to write more. And better. As it turns out, the more you write, the better it gets. That you’ll never get good if you don’t get after it. And the easiest way for me to start writing is with a list.
So.
Top 5 Things I’m Loving Right Now:
1. Fall. I’ve been talking about it non-stop on Instagram. There are 146 pictures of leaves on my phone right now. I’ve got two days off in a row this weekend, which means that I’m planning on making pumpkin curry soup, crockpot applesauce and at least three different types of pumpkin sweet breads.
2. Reading. Just for me, just for fun. Currently reading The Stockholm Octavo by Karen Engelmann (which I received as a monthly selection of this amazing book club, waaaaay back in 2012) and it is the best book I’ve read in a long time. I spent a goodly amount of time reading this summer, too, (for me) and plowed through The Road by Cormac McCarthy, another book I can’t remember right now (so good, obvs) and sped through A Million Little Pieces by James Frey in just three days, something I haven’t done in years. Reading before bed–whether it’s for 10 minutes or an hour–is now one of the best parts of my day. I can’t believe how out of practice I am.
3. Instagram. Because it’s totally normal to suspend any kind of real work for several hours a day while scrolling through thousands of pictures of people who you’ve never met, clucking admiration for their well-curated lives under your breath and then holding yourself to the standards of strangers. It’s so beautiful, I just can’t stop.
4. Hanging out with a toddler. This is a half-truth. Some days I am so filled with love for this tiny human, I watch her hop-waltz in the kitchen to Lana Del Ray’s cover of Once Upon a Dream and sob over the beauty of it all while washing dishes. (This actually happened on Wednesday.)
Some days I throw temper tantrums that would rival any two-year-old’s because MAMA JUST NEEDS FIVE MINUTES TO HERSELF. (I’m sure I don’t need to tell you how much chocolate I’m consuming. In private. Because I just don’t feel like sharing everything all. The. TIME.)
5. Lavender essential oil. For reasons I’m sure you can surmise, my blood pressure has been a little, ahem, high lately. (See number 4.) I’ve added essential oils to daily health and well-being (another story for another time) and lavender is a heavy hitter–an oil I incorporate into basically every hour of my life. Today, I had to explain myself to Ken the cashier when I brought a miniature bottle of vodka up to the counter at the grocery store at 12:30 p.m. for (I promise!) a DIY linen spray.
And of course, there’s knitting. Glorious, wonderful, life-giving knitting. I’ve got so many projects cast on, I’ve purposefully lost count. (Hint: it’s at least 35. No exaggeration whatsoever.)
I plan to transition the old blog over here throughout the next several months (or in one big conversion to WP, as a particular service tells me can be done with one tiny payment of $49, hahahaha), but if you’re interested in reading the major fails of someone who has yet to quit sugar, casts on more projects than she ever plans on finishing and loves swimming like hipsters love their kombucha, my entire blog archives (dating back to 2007, wheeeeee!) can be found at:
http://www.woolandhoney.typepad.com/