We’re counting down to Valentine’s Day 2015. I think this is one of those “Hallmark” creations that ends up causing a lot of holiday anxiety and expectation.
Holiday Anxiety
About 14 years ago I was sitting on the couch in our rented apartment, knitting on the original version of the Latin Quarter shawl, and I announced to Mitch that I was too exhausted to get a gift for him and that it was causing me a lot of holiday anxiety, so he should not get one for me and I wouldn’t get one for him. I was teaching six or seven classes per week, plus doing retreats, and I was simply at the limits of my energy. Our apartment was too small, with too much stuff.
His reply says a lot: First he asked if I meant it. Then he asked if I really meant that he didn’t have to buy me anything and if he didn’t I wasn’t going to hold it against him. I assured him I didn’t want to try to figure out something to give, that I didn’t want anything, and really, the whole thing just caused me a lot of anxiety. We have gone ahead with that plan every year thereafter. I have never missed getting a Valentine and I have been grateful not to have to participate in that charade (I love Mitch with all my heart, but we share that every day).
Give a Gift that Eases Anxiety
This is a holiday that can make people feel badly–because they don’t get the Valentine gift that they want, or that they don’t have a Valentine in their lives, or because they don’t feel as loved as they want to feel. But it is really not the point and I have a solution. I recommend that you give Bust Your Stash with Jill Wolcott Knits® to yourself (my favorite kind of gift–I alway give just what I want!) or that you specify to someone else that this is exactly the proof of their affection that will make your heart soar for the rest of 2015. Either way you go, this could be a winner. You get what you want and you will get the benefit of this gift as it continues for [nearly] the remainder of 2015.
The outcome is that you will have permission to play with your yarn for 10 months! The Bust Your Stash with Jill Wolcott Knits® program is designed to help you find your Dream Stash. We will look at what you own, what you want to own, how to use it, how to move it on, how to come to terms–whatever they are–that will make you a happy knitter.
You will have the opportunity to have 1 on 1 sessions with me on Skype, you will become part of a small community of knitters taming their stashes, and you will feel the anxiety smooth itself as you create your dream stash.
By the way, it took about 48 hours to knit the Latin Quarter shawl. That includes the entire 12 rows of 151 stitches each that had to be redone because I forgot to cross the cables.
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