The Glossies

You’re all going to be insanely excited by this, I can tell.

Yesterday, during my lunch break at work, I went out and did something I haven’t done since I was about fourteen: I bought a glossy magazine.

No, really.

Aha.  You see what I did there.  (Well you didn’t honestly think I was interested in leggings and unfathomable pictures of girls with a BMI of seven and no visible evidence of pores, do you?  We clearly don’t understand each other that well.)

Anyway, this is the first time I’ve gone out and bought a magazine since I was young enough for them not to be all about orgasms, lipstick and horoscopes, and I sat in Cafe Nero and read about tubular cast-ons and indecipherable Japanese knitting symbols.  It was exciting.  It’s also the first time I’ve bought a knitting magazine, ever.  My thoughts on this are as follows: every book or magazine of patterns inevitably contains one or more items of utter fug that you can’t quite understand why anyone would want to wear if it were given to them, let alone spend all those hours knitting.  There is also at least one utterly gorgeously cute item that you would happily make five of, and thus exists the eternal paradox of is the cute worth the cost of book/magazine plus association with said fug if anyone catches you with the book.  This issue contains two meh-to-fugly jumpers, an absolutely darling little bundle of attractiveness wearing a cardigan with Scottie dogs on it and an expression of incredulous bemusement, two things I might knit if the right yarn/mood came along, and these:

(Photo shamelessly pilfered from Ravelry cos trust me my photo-taking skills of a Saturday morning are far worse.)

I know what you’re thinking here, several people (his nibs, you are among them): not this colour.  I know you hate this colour.  I hate knitting in this colour; there are some people who can deal with that shade of pink and I am not one of them.  Dark red?  I don’t know.  I just have a real urge to knit this.  Even if it takes about five years.  Also:

One day I will get around to Fair Isle knitting.  I’ll make an Ivy League Vest and wear it for ever.  But in the meantime…

You guys.  I have bought a knitting magazine and now I’m turning into the sort of person who gets excited about DIY and calls it Interior Decorating.  I am so, so sorry to inflict this on you.

On another note, here is a really awful picture of something very exciting.

At present, it is a glove and a bit, unblocked, and a Word document, and a few headaches.  Hopefully by the end of the month it will be a bit less headache, a bit more glove, a few more sizes and a pdf file.  Turns out, I have discovered, I hate writing up patterns.  Things that seem so simple in my head don’t translate very well onto paper.  It also makes me feel very presumptious, and a bit scared, because I know there are knitters out there who are far better at it than I am, and know far more than I do, and have been doing it for far longer.  How can I presume to tell them what to do when I get scared and star-struck at craft shows?  I am so sheltered.   I love it but I feel like any minute now I’m going to get called out.  I feel a bit like a kid with a recorder who’s about to get introduced to a world-standard symphony orchestra.  Oh, self-belief.  How you mock me.