Foraged
I have it on good authority that taking a walk in the woods with me is, um, let’s say “challenging.” For you see, I am naturally inclined to wander. To meander. To stray from the path at the slightest provocation to investigate the mossy tree stump or lichen-covered stone wall or nifty rock or shiny feather or glossy acorn or, on more than one occasion, the faintly menacing yet still strangely appealing mushrooms that magically appeared since last I passed this way.
Now, I (usually) manage to (more or less) restrain myself and don’t (often) pick them. But oh, oh it takes more self control than I prefer to exercise. Which is why it should surprise absolutely no one that I eventually gave in and knit myself a whole pile of these little delights.
Alas, much as with their real-life counterparts, I must recommend that you not eat them. But, other than that, you can be as unrestrained as you’d like. I fully support knitting a whole collection of them and tucking them somewhere unexpected. You never know when someone distractible will be walking by to delight in them!
Toasted
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There comes a point in every knitter’s life (cough, or at least in this knitter’s life, cough) where everything is awful. None of your projects are making your brain do the happy thing. Absolutely everyone in your life is astonishingly annoying (yourself included). The whole world feels like it’s on fire. And you can’t do a damn thing about any of it.
When this day comes upon you, I highly recommend taking a moment to knit something absolutely absurd. The tinier and more nonsensical, the better. You want something you can complete in one sitting and that you can then strategically deploy in such a way as to make someone else’s day significantly weirder.
It helps. I don’t know why, but it really, really, really does. I promise.
And I’m pretty sure knitted marshmallows are the perfect project for this task. You can make one of the tiny ones in less than an hour with just a few yards of yarn. And they’re tiny enough and amusing enough that I suspect you’ll find no end of ways to sneak them into someone else’s day (tuck them in someone’s favorite mug? hide them on top of the emergency chocolate bar stash? put a pile of them next to the hot cocoa?).
I know they made my day better. I very much hope they’ll do the same for you.
Preserves
Look, I cannot explain the appeal. Either you look at these, struggle to contain a tiny gasp of delight, and run to your scraps bin to find the perfect strawberry colors. Or you...don't. And I get it! They will not be everyone's cup of tea!
But if you have my kind of brain, the kind of brain that often finds itself going "hmm, I wonder what would happen if..." and then you give it a try and then a few hours later you're holding a tiny little treasure in your hands and marveling at what you made, then I think you might absolutely adore these. I know I do!
Plus they'll never, ever, ever go furry in the back of your refrigerator (admittedly, more likely to happen to spinach than to strawberries, but somehow I still mess that up sometimes). Maybe if I make enough of them, I'll earn amnesty for whatever horror show is happening in my produce drawer right now. Or maybe, just maybe, they'll inspire me to make something delicious the next time the berries look good at the market.
Peached
These? These actually came into being in the fall of 2019 when the (cough, first, cough) impeachment of everyone’s least favorite felon was underway, and I felt the need for something soft that I could squeeze. Or throw against a wall. Or stab full of pins. The intervening years have brought no end of things to be mad about, and the current round of elections has brought even more.
And sometimes that rage turns into stitches. And calls to your representatives. And donations to abortion funds. And reminders to your friends and family to check on their voter registration. And attendance at your local school board meetings. And all those other things that feel tiny and insignificant on their own, but that add up when you do them over and over and over again. Rather like stitches.
And yes, yes of course, you can absolutely make these just because they’re cute and you want a perfect little peach (or apple) for some completely non-ragey reason. And I could write something here that extols their virtues and makes you want to knit them. Maybe that’s even what I should do.
But what I’m going to do is remind you that good things can happen when you turn your rage into action. Because right now, I think we all need that more than we need someone waxing poetic about a knitted peach. So figure out what you’re mad about, and find one tiny thing to do about it. You’ll feel better after. Because you’re a knitter, and knitters know that tiny things, done over and over, add up to something big.
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