pixiecrinkle | When did the obsession start? Thinking out loud...

I think this is really quite funny, but I realized recently I have no idea when I learned to knit.

I know I taught myself, I know I used both Knitting for Dummies and I Can't Believe I'm Knitting, but I couldn't recall when this was. I just went back in my lj archive to try to figure it out. It seems I've actually been knitting longer than I've been on lj. Not what I expected.

The earliest actual mention of knitting I could find in my journal was in July 2003, when I taught my friend STS to knit because he wanted to make a blanket for his sister's baby. I then mentioned holiday knitting, but I can't recall what I would have been knitting. The next mention of an actual project is in March 04, when I started my cousin's wedding afghan. That was my first big project, so I'm not that surprised by that.

What I am surprised by is the one piece of information that leads me to believe I actually started knitting before 2003. I recall making my ex, D., a godawful openwork throw out of double-stranded Lion Brand homespun on size 50 needles for Christmas one year. D. and I broke up in July 2002, and I can recall knitting on flights to go see him before 9/11, and I know I learned to knit in the summer, so I must have taught myself during the summer of 2001. That's a full year at least before I've been telling people.

Actually, just writing that down, I think that's right, because I got one in-person lesson in casting on from my grandma, and that was when my grandparents and parents came up for my birthday and to see my new apartment, which would have been August of 2001.

Here I've been telling people I've been knitting for nearly 3 years, and it's actually over 4. Now, granted, I pretty much stopped the entire time I was going to Franklin, which was during 2002-2003, so I guess it's like 3 years spread out over the course of almost 5.

I wish I could find the photo of the first hat I made to get the timestamp off of it. That would help me date this stuff. My mom also recently unearthed a hat from her closet, which was hilarious, because I have absolutely no recollection of ever having made the hat, yet it's obvious I did. That's what spurred me to make her birthday hat this year, because the other one was absolutely unwearable.

It's weird how much my short-term memory just likes to dump. I blame the aspartame (3.5 weeks since I went cold turkey on that!)