gift knitting and repetitive strain relief

As we furiously head for this familiar deadline, we can get hurt! Don’t we all know that knitting can hurt???

I've been hurt knitting, I’ve been hurt playing the drums, I've been hurt opening a window—all of which made me unable to knit. (It's only when I cannot knit that I consider myself truly hurt. When I broke a leg--and had every excuse to just sit and knit—I wasn't hurtin' much.)

Here's what I have learned over a 50+ year of injuries.

• Avoid repetitive strain injuries by not doing a fine-motor activity for more than 20 minutes.
• Because 20 minutes can pass so very quickly (while knitting, while on the computer, probably not both at the same time but some of us are very talented!), set an egg timer for 20 minutes and across the room. When it rings, stop what you are doing!!! (Maybe an egg timer would be a good gift for a knitter?)
• Take a one-minute break. During that break, move and stretch.
• If you do have a repetitive strain injury, get help as soon as possible.

The best help I've received is ART (active release techniques) therapy. I regret that I can't say how I originally heard about ART, but I can say that it has saved me and others. You can go online to read about it and find a provider. (When I started, I think it was harder to find: seems to have become the preferred method for chiropractors now?) But here's what my experience has been.

I got tendonitis from playing the drums. This is normally a troublesome and chronic injury, but ART had me back on track within 10 days. However, what follows is a much better story and recommendation for ART.

Some time later I injured a rotator cuff opening a window.  I couldn't use my right arm to even turn on the radio in my car. My therapist said You are left-handed for a week. If I have to put your right arm into a sling, I will. (He probably thought I would stop knitting if he threatened me like that. Little did he know that I could knit in a sling!) And then he worked on me.

Typical ART involves the therapist doing deep tissue massage while twisting your body through that area. (You can read on the ART website for a better explanation of what's being done.) It can hurt a little during the process, but you feel immediate relief when it stops!

I did what I was told (not using my right arm and going for regular therapy with him) and, sure enough, within a week I was perfectly recovered. (Please remember that mine was not the chronic injury. I was incapacitated, to be sure, but the injury was probably not severe and certainly the same as someone who has struggled with this injury over time--like a baseball player.)

Many months later I was at a STITCHES event, at lunch with my friend Peggy, and I asked how she was doing. She told me she had been suffering with a rotater cuff injury. Imagine my shock when she said It was 6 weeks ago, and I've been lifting weights like my therpist says, but it's not working.

So I repeated my experience. She said she would look up ART, and she did. A year later she told me that even though it was an hour-and-a-half drive (she does live in the middle of nowhere), she was so grateful she had done so. It had cured her shoulder and helped her with other nagging injuries, and she couldn't recommend it more.

I told this story at a class in Michigan, and a woman—an athlete, in fact—said that ART had saved her from a chronic knee problem. My friend Susanna had the same knee problem, went to an ART therapist after hearing this, and we are now running 10K’s together!

We all know what can happen to us at this time of year. While you knit those gifts for everyone else, consider giving yourself the gift of a healing therapy!

a holiday gift for a knitter!

Some time ago a lovely yarn shop owner from a lovely shop (Joan Janes from Little Red Mitten in St Thomas ON) gave me the gift of a GLEENER--a sweater de-piller. (De-piller is probably not actually a work except to a knitter who knows precisely what is implied.) It took me a long time to need and use it . . . until today . . .

 . . . when I was up at 6am to prepare for my hosting of a craft and chat group. I wanted the sweaters that I wanted to show to look perfect--but they had pills that needed removing. And not just pills: a general fluffiness thing was happening that made a really new sweater look old, sad, and worn.

So, nothing to lose, let's try the GLEENER. My electric sweater shaver was okay, and I could use it as a fall back position if this little gadget didn't work. But the electric sweater shaver was only good for pills. Maybe this thing would work against that general fluffiness.

OMG!!!!! Amazing! My sweaters look new! Revitalized! Fabulous! I thought Every knitter needs one of these! And every knitter needs to give one of these to every knitter she knows!

But how to get one? And what did they cost?

So I googled GLEENER . . . and there it was . . . only $19.95!!! How can this be?!?! Something so wonderful for 20 bucks?!?

I also thought I remembered Joan saying that the product was Canadian. Would it be available in the US? Sure enough, there was an American flag on the buy now page.

Let me just continue to share my enthusiasm around the sheer genius of this thing! It has three blades (for 3 different fabrics). I found myself using the middle blade on my fluffy pilly merino sweater. And then it has a velvet lint brush that must be used to give the garment an as-new finish!

I cannot buy one for every knitter I know,  but I can get the word out. (I actually thought It would be wrong for me not to tell every knitter I know!) I do not know the owner/developer (nor have any affiliation whatsover with this company), but this is a wonderful thing and she has a wonderful story. I hope you will go to her website and check it out: www.gleener.com.

BTW, after reading her story, I scrolled to the bottom of the page to read about the name of the product. And OMG yet again! It was named after a painting that was my favourite when I was in university: Millet's The Gleaners. The beauty of these women bending to their task made me weep the first time I saw it.

I really am beyond excited to tell you about this product! Please give it a consideration if, like me, you buy and knit with lovely merino wool and then watch it become fluffy and pilly. (There's that word again. My spell check keeps underlining it. Just goes to show that spell check wasn't developed by a knitter!)

PS It isn't just me who thinks this is fabulous: go to about.com and read their 5 star review of the ultimate fuzz remover: http://housewares.about.com/od/sewinglaundry/fr/Gleener-Ultimate-Fuzz-Remover-Review.htm

why we deserve respect

Recent posts have discussed why we don’t get the respect we deserve. Everyone knows the stereotypes: I hope we can overcome them. But it bears asking why we deserve to be considered differently? Why do we deserve respect?

So, let’s put aside all the stuff we already know--

• the health benefits
• that it is an old an honourable activity
• that it clothes us and our families (and that the ability to knit with wool—with its properties of warmth retention—was considered essential in the fight against infant mortality)
• that a gift of knitting is of spectacular value—given the money we spend on yarn and the hours we spend in the making

--and look at this from another perspective.

How we spend our leisure time is recession-proof and could be seen as essential to economic recovery.

In tough times, people may give up the new car, the home reno, the new bedroom set. But they do not give up playing golf, reading books, going to movies, spending money on yarn. Nor should they!

On Feb 19, I wrote about research done on happiness—that people below a basic income level were less happy but that people above that basic level were no happier. In other words, once we are comfortable, more money does not make us happier. But then the recession of 2008 hit . . . which drove the researchers back into the field. And what they found was that—at first—people’s levels of happiness went down with their incomes . . . until some measure of recovery . . . and then people's levels of happiness went up . . . until, even though their incomes and job security were lower than before, they were happier than they had been before the recession hit.

The researchers assumed something they called the adaptation principle: when times are tough, we find out how resilient we are, we find out who we can count on, we find out what really matters. In other words, we find out what makes us happy.

And here’s what I think. What we do in our leisure time is what makes us happy! Obviously, at the top of the list is spending time with those we love. But when it comes to spending money, leisure dollars might be spent on a book, a movie, a golf trip, a new electronic gadget to manage family photos.None of these seem to have suffered since the recession.

Or we spend money on yarn! And consider that when we knitters spend money, it goes into small, locally-owned businesses! Isn’t that precisely what the experts say is essential to economic recovery?!?!

I consider it my duty to spend money in every yarn shop I visit! And what knitter can visit a yarn shop without doing the same? Knowing that we are 38,000 million strong, knowing how much it costs to make a sweater, go ahead and do the math to imagine the dollars we put into the economy!!!

So in addition to all the other wonderful things we wonderful knitters do, that’s why we deserve respect!

getting the respect we deserve, part three

Ahh, I am refreshed and restored (Knitting will do that!), and ready to finish my rant!

Misconception #4: We knit incomprehensible stuff of questionable value.

People who don’t knit don’t understand why we’d spend 2 days knitting a pair of socks or 3 months knitting a lace shawl. They don’t see the difference between what we do and what comes off a machine in China. The comment Why would you knit that when you could buy it? comes to mind.

One reason is purely for the advantages of knitting as process. We knit stuff we could buy because it feels good to knit. And it’s good for us too! Here are some of its health benefits:

• keeping us calm,
• lowering our blood pressure,
• stimulating the immune system,
• slowing dementia,
• preventing depressing
• not to mention the pure joy of spending time in the optimistic, receptive, perpetually happy right brain.

But in addition to all this good stuff, there is the quality of what we produce. Does this person-who-does-not-knit know that no more than 1/7^th of the finished price of something can be spent on materials? So what does that say about the quality of materials in store-bought items?

Solution Tell her what you spend on yarn . . . again! (I know you already did that a few days ago, but it bears repeating.) Do the math together. Then ask her if, on any given day, she could use any of knitting’s health benefits. Then let her try on a pair of your socks, while you wrap your hand-knit shawl around her and tell her that knitting is the constant comfort of a perpetual hug . . . and then give her one! 

Misconception #5: We are old and inactive.

Yes, we know about granny in her rocker. With all due respect to those who are grandmothers (I am one) and who like their rocking chairs (I have one), that stereotype ain’t us! The growth of knitting (to upwards of 38 million in the US) could not reach these numbers with only the addition of the elderly. Baby boomers, young women, and teenagers have joined us.

As for being inactive, knitting’s demographic is generally female, with the bulk of us between 18 and 64. So take any cross-section of intelligent, well-educated women with enough disposable income to knit, and you’ll find a level of fitness that mirrors the population in general. Knitters run marathons, do yoga, and lift weights in the same proportion of the general population. We even have Knit and Ski trips!

Solution Knit as you wait for your yoga class? Knit around the fire, après ski? Wear something hand-knit to the gym? Run with knitting needles? Knit in public wearing tall boots and a short leather skirt? Not really sure what more to do about this one? Any ideas?

Misconception #6: We are boring and not very involved

The image of a woman knitting is beautifully solitary, and we know the blissful state she’s in. But that does not mean that she would not readily engage in intelligent conversation if approached. There are craft and chat (stitch and bitch) groups where women (Yes, believe it!) knit and talk at the same time!!! With great enthusiasm and on all manner of topics!

In addition, knitters are fabulous listeners! We (human beings) are generally better listeners if engaged in a repetitive motion. Why? Because most of us are primarily kinesthetic + visual, not—as we might think—primarily auditory. So for us to listen, we need to engage both the visual and the kinesthetic, which knitting does.

Solution Pull out your knitting at every opportunity! At the same time, engage in intelligent conversation with someone. Show how Pythagorean Theorem relates to your knitting. No, wait, scratch that! Share the names of favourite celebrities—offering how many of them knit. Discuss the places you’ve both been over the past year or the books you’ve both read. Make some outrageously well-informed comment about global economics. Discuss the business plan for your next entrepreneurial venture. In other words, Tell ‘em who you are!

I guess that's the bottom line: we gotta tell them who we are, because they don't know, and they should.

getting the respect we deserve, part two

Part one in this series posited that knitting does not get the respect it deserves because men don’t do it. But there has to be more than that. Given the health benefits of knitting, given its addictive draw, given how much we rave about the craft we love, there must be more to say.

Okay, let’s start by acknowledging the uninformed ignorance (in the politest sense of that word) of the non-knitting public. They don’t know the health benefits, they don’t know its addictive draw, they don’t get (or care) why we rave. And they don’t have the intellectual curiosity to find out. So they relegate us to a stereotype readily to memory: someone, probably female, probably elderly, probably at home in her rocker, knitting because she has nothing better to do.

I could give a host of uncomplimentary quotes that relate to this stereotype. We all have some. Instead, can we drill down to understand it and find solutions? Are there misconceptions about knitting (perhaps with some basis in fact) that we can understand and override?

Misconception #1: We don’t knit what people want

There was some survey done about the #1 dreaded Christmas present, and the answer was a hand-knit sweater. I don’t think this result is anywhere near the reality but is, instead, the result of one long-ago scarring event where a child was given a hand-knit sweater rather than a Red-Ryder Bee-Bee gun or self-wetting doll.

To be honest, I bear some responsibility in this because I have done it. Have not we all?  And I had a woman in class admit the following: she wanted to knit a sweater for her son and asked what he wanted; when he said a red, crew-neck pullover, she said If you want a red, crew-neck pullover, then you just go buy one!

Solution Knit what they want! If the person for whom you knit wears the perpetual gray hooded sweatshirt, knit him a gray hooded sweatshirt. No, it won’t wholly engage your knitting brain, but he’ll wear it day in and day out.

Misconception #2: We don’t know how to knit things that fit

Is there truth to this? Yes. Not to the extent of the recurring joke of the sweater with one sleeve a foot longer than the other. But yes, it is true. For many reasons, we have lost the skill of making things fit. And knitting patterns contribute by not noting where and how to change the pattern and make it fit. 

I know a woman who knit my Gray Cardigan and followed the pattern where it said a) shorten or lengthen for finished length here and b) widen or narrow for shoulder width here. The result was exquisite. The first time she wore it, someone said I love our sweater. It looks hand-knit but then I realized it couldn’t be because it fits you too well!

To be fair, a lot of the clothing we buy doesn't fit us all that well either. But what we make is perceived as even more ill-fitting. So people look at what we've knit and think Why would I want to do that?—make something whose sleeves are too big or too long or whose shoulders droop???

Not so long ago, fit and drafting classes did not fill. But this is changing. There is growing demand for these classes so we can make our knitting dollars work appropriately. Having said that, I recently taught for a guild who eschewed those classes, saying Our members don’t care if their knitting fits.

Solution Care! Don’t be satisfied with ill-fitting results! Rip and re-knit until you get something that works. Take a class that teaches this material. And before knitting anything, check its measurements against something in your closet of similar style.

Misconception #3: Knitting is cheaper than buying

Here’s a huge misconception of knitting--held from 50 years ago—that we knit something because it’s cheaper than buying. So someone sees us knitting a pair of socks and says Don't you know you can buy those?

If we are perceived as spending time making something we could buy in seconds, then we clearly have nothing better to do with our time. And what is our responsibility in this? Some of us hide what we spend on yarn!

Solution Tell people what you spend on yarn! Explain how this expenditure is essential to economic recovery! Instead of spending $80 on 3 sweaters made in China, we put money into a small local business to knit the one sweater we will wear.

I feel the propulsion of a rant! Clearly, there is more to say. But I need the calming influence of my knitting to lower my blood pressure and help marshal my thoughts before continuing.

getting the respect we deserve, part one

 

Why doesn't knitting get the respect it deserves?

Firstly, we might consider why it deserves respect? (We know the answer to that, but others don't, so let's just do a tally here.)

• It clothes us.
• It keeps us calm.
• It lowers blood pressure and stimulates the immune system.                                             
• It slows dementia and prevents depression.
• It encourages math skills, hand-eye coordination, and the ability to focus.
• It is recession-proof in its support of locally-owned businesses.   
• Its traditions express and contribute to our culture (especially relevant if culture is given Brian Eno's definition of the making of something we don't have to make).
• It feeds the innate human need to create for those we love: the hand makes what the heart needs to express.

We could go on, and we could elaborate, but let us move on to the question of why folks who don't knit don't get this? Why do they ask Why would you make that when you could buy it? Why do they, therefore, see what we do as a waste of time? What would they prefer us to be doing?

Despite the fact that we spend a lot of money and derive a lot of benefit, why are we relegated to the stereotype of a non-active, elderly, usually female, person-without-anything-better-to-do.

A woman in an interview recently asked me if I thought this was changing, and I responded "Not quickly enough." She wondered what would make it change? When will knitting get the respect it deserves?

There are lots of answers to this, but my immediate answer was The men need to do it.

When an activity is associated with only one sex, and isn't tagged to a huge amount of money, it doesn't get a lot of respect. And, yes, this most often happens when the activity is female. Nursing and child-care readily come to mind. Never mind that they are essential human activities that add inestimable value to our world! The world respects the jobs that are higher-paying and shared by both men and women.

 But it can work in reverse: I, for example, don't give stock car racing much respect.

We all make judgments about how people spend their time, don't we? What are yours?

costing our knits

So, this happens a lot: someone sees you knitting and pays what she thinks is the ultimate compliment: “You could SELL those!”

I've had this happen more times than I can mention. And what fun it is to not leave it at that, to find out what they're really saying / thinking / asking . . . .

With further conversation over the, let's say, socks, I'll ask "How nice! And what do you think I could sell them for?"

Rarely is the answer more than $10!!! So then I launch upon my public education campaign, in which I tell them a] the cost of the yarn (usually $20 or more) and b] the hours a pair of socks takes (no fewer than 16). They blanche . . . and of course wonder why anyone would knit socks when she could just go buy a pair!!!???

So what's the fair market price for something hand knit?

Here's the first way to figure this:

• materials + labour (at $10/hr) = XX dollars.

But how many hours does it take to make something? We may not know, so we could cost our knits the way the market does:

• cost of materials X 7 = XX dollars.

That’s right! In the commercial world, no more than 1/7 of the final price can be paid out in materials.

So what does that make our hand-knit sweaters worth? And is it any wonder the sweaters we find in stores—no matter how wonderful they look—are inferior products. The knitting is sloppy, the tails aren't well secured, the seams are not well-done, and the yarns feel really yucky (tired cottons, wool with some harsh coating on it,  some multi-fibre material with an all-round coarseness to which we would never give consideration in a yarn shop).

But if these equations don't work for you, here’s some advice—given by Larry Smith, one of Canada's top economists and a lovely man who has great fondness for knitting and knitters.

• Never sell yourself too cheaply.

Sometimes we offer to do so because we feel honoured by the request. But I have learned that before we set that first price, we should ask ourselves “How am I going to feel getting paid only this amount when I make the third, fourth, seventeenth one?”

Larry also said it would be better to give something away to a charity fundraiser than to sell it too cheaply. This is a way to honour our craft, and do something wonderful for our community, without setting a price.

My favourite story is from my hero--Kathryn Alexander. Kathryn used to sell pairs of entrelac socks for $200. People would frame them. She then thought “If they’re going to frame them, I should charge more.” The price went up to $300. But then she thought “If they’re going to frame them, they don’t need two.” So she made only one, and charged $400!

Figuring cost + labour, or using the market’s standard, or taking Larry's advice, or thinking like Kathryn all make sense to me as a way to override the terrible assumptions out there:

• that knitting is cheaper than buying,
• that money is the only currency,
• that we should be honoured when someone offers to buy something at some ridiculous price,
• that if we're knitting we clearly have nothing more worthy to do with our time.

You may never offer to sell your work, but you could have this conversation the next time someone pays you that ultimate compliment!