Monday, June 4, 2012

The Gentle Art of Knitting

When I heard/read that Jane Brocket was coming out with a knitting book, I got pretty excited. The Gentle Art of Domesticity keeps a prominent place on my livingroom bookshelf and gives me that boost I need when the house needs a little TLC.


The Gentle Art of Knitting was released in England a few months ago. I considered buying it sight unseen, but then I read some negative reader reviews of it and scratched it off my list. The complaints were that the knitting projects were too basic and not very revolutionary. (Those are my words/impressions of the reviews.) I buy very few knitting books, and only buy them for reference .


Though I'd resolved not to buy the book, I was thrilled to find a copy of it at our local library on the new titles shelf.


I spent a pleasant hour or two reading through it, sipping tea, during one of the many drenching rain storms of May. Is there anything revolutionary in the book? Why, yes, there is. As the reader reviewers noted, there aren't any patterns in here that will put Brooklyn Tweed out of business anytime soon, but what Brocket's book does brilliantly is remind knitters to focus on the process, not the product. As someone who frequently gets impatient to finish a sweater or can't wait to start some complicated cabled shawl, I appreciate this message. As soon as I put the book down, I cast on 37 stitches of red cotton and knit a simple garter stitch dishcloth. Then, I knit another, this time striping at random places with blue cotton.



It's the kind of knitting book I like to have when my handwork is giving me fits and I need to be reminded why I knit ... to create beautiful objects with care, to bond with friends (who knit), and to relax and enjoy the hours rather than wasting them idly in front of the computer or television set.


I do think I'll be getting a copy for my own bookshelf. The library's version was from England. Unlike British cookbooks, I like British knitting books to be "Americanized" with our needle sizes and dimensions in inches rather than centimeters, so I'm hoping they'll come out with a Yank version soon.


While on the domestic subject, I was futzing around the Web yesterday and found this video about how to properly fold a t-shirt, hosted by none other than Anthea Turner:




When I wasn't ironing and folding my extensive t-shirt collection, I was watching the Jubilee procession on the Thames, broadcast over CNN. My goodness, the British must be thrilled to have Piers Morgan off their island. The man DOES NOT SHUT UP. He interrupted every guest, including India Hicks, who was attempting to tell the audience what it was like to be in Princess Diana's wedding party. Morgan kept butting in with his own memories of the day, none of which were as remotely exciting as being Princess Diana's bridesmaid. I wanted to throttle him. So I ended up turning the tv off, and downed a glass of lemon barley water in honor of the Queen.

And how was your Jubilee weekend?

2 comments:

  1. I am sorry your coverage of the Diamond Jubilee was so awful you had to turn it off. How disappointing!

    I watched several hours of the coverage, and was so impressed with the Queen and Prince Phillip as they stood for all that time while going down the Thames. She is a remarkable woman!

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  2. I did manage to fill in the gaps via the Internet, so all was not lost, Kristie. I too admire the Queen and was sorry to hear that Prince Phillip fell ill afterwards. (btw, I loved your blog post about the Jubilee and becoming the queen's subject. Very eloquent.)

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