Ennui

2011 has arrived!

I cast on almost immediately for a Hemlock Ring Blanket using some yarn that used to be this:



and then became this:



and is now almost a blanket. The pattern is nice - simple and repetitive, but effective - and was just what I needed the last two days while I've been feeling really sick. (I didn't say anything on the 1st, thinking people would just think I was hungover, but I was really quite sick on the 2nd, so it wasn't but it may have been lack of sleep). Today though, I've struggled with it.

I don't think it's a fault of the pattern - I think the fault lies with me. I find lots of knit stitches boring and this involved four rows of stockinette between each lace row and each round is now about 400 stitches. Lots of stockinette for not much lace - but it looks good for it.

Possibly it's just hitting that sense of ennui that I've had the past few days. I drove back from London where I've spent the Christmas holidays with my family, to Norwich where my house is. I always feel a little down on these days - when I leave my family and the sense of being loved and before everything starts to take my mind off this longing. This time it seems especially potent. I feel completely stuck in a rut - I know exactly how 2011 is going to go because it will be exactly the same as 2010 and 2009 and 2008. Yes, some small differences will change, but in the end nothing will have.

So I'm trying to think of ways to mix some lace into my stockinette. I'm thinking of redecorating for one thing. It may help. It may remain just a thought, a plan, or (I hope) it may become actuality.

And tomorrow I think I will cast on for a very lace-complex shawl.