Ivete called my attention to the Webs anniversary sale and Cascade 220 on sale therein. I bought some of my favorite deep plum and chocolate brown to coordinate with some stash yarn for future felting projects. Buying yarn to "help use stash yarn" is like the lamest form of yarn-buying rationalization.

Knitting into the Mystery was here when I got home from work yesterday, and I started reading it last night. There are a lot of books out there that discuss "why we knit" and the contemplative aspect of knitting, but this is the best I've read yet. I'm not sure I can express this clearly (especially at this early hour) but I can identify with the authors' spiritual focus in a way I can't with some of the other articles I've read. There's a self-absorbed, self-conscious tone to much of the writing about knitting lately - it's all about ME and my emotional and psychological needs and how they are met by knitting and it's so wonderful and I'm so wonderful and knitters are so wonderful and we all get more wonderful every day, and blah, blah blah. I was a bit worried that I would be disappointed in this book, that it would be more of the same oh how wonderful and spiritual I am and it's all about me and I feel so good about myself when I do this and look how spiritual and superior I am because I am in touch with my own very special specialness that permeates a lot of pseudo-spiritual claptrap these days - including a disturbing amount of Christian writing. I totally understand why so many people are turned off on Christianity when I channel surf past some of the televangelists. It's all about What Jesus Does For Me, Me ME! I actually caught a snippet of something the other day in which someone earnestly preached that Jesus is there to help you with your self-esteem issues. Jesus as Dr. Phil. Gag me. Do churches actually preach that crap?

I can't help contrasting this Christian perspective with the "we're here to give to others" messages I hear in just about every homily in my own church - not delivered in a lecturing, hectoring way, and generally with a lot of humor, but they're not all about making you feel Special Just the Way You Are. We're encouraged (reminded, nagged, shoved) to get out and do, to live our faith in practical ways, to let God put us to work to make the world better. If you're all wrapped up in thinking about how very spiritual you are, you're missing the point.

And the spiritual tone of Knitting into the Mystery is along those lines - contemplative prayer is real, the power of prayer is real, and it's about the recipient of the shawl, not your very specialness in making it. God works through your hands for other people and that's how it's supposed to work. The tone of the book is an outwardly focused spirituality, rather than the it's all about how very special it makes me feel narcissistic dreck I've read in other "knitting as a spiritual craft" ruminations. It's expressed beautifully and simply, it's not cloying or sappy. So I like this book. Just my not very humble and badly expressed opinion very early on a workday.

I finished another cat blanket last night, and am on the home stretch on the French Market Bag, ready to start the upper shaping. I'm making it in red Cascade 220, and I think that at this point I'm switching to purple for the top portion of the bag. Perhaps, just perhaps, there will be actual knitting photos by Saturday.