Living With Mistakes {Yarn Along}

I was almost done with the sweater on our drive home when I saw it, way back at the beginning of the joining from the yoke. Right there in the front, cabled the wrong way. I stopped and felt it flood over me. Defeat.

The blundered twist was at least four hours of work back. I couldn't live with it. Could I?

This is Rosie's special sweater. Frogged from various patterns a few times until I found the perfect one (Antler on Ravelry here). Knit in a semisolid from Mosaic Moon called "Rosebud," I'd been looking up rosewood buttons for the front. I'd already tried it on her before beginning the button band and knew it would be the perfect fit. How I missed the glaring mistake then, I have no idea. Once seen, I can't seem to not see it.

So the question stood. Could I live with it? Right there in front, cabled incorrectly? Could I stomach ripping back four hours of work after frogging so much before? I couldn't decide. So I left it in the project bag. I stopped looking up buttons. I drifted back into the "not knitting" fog I had been in before getting excited about this project.

I've been thinking about mistakes lately. The kind that are completely unintentional. The kind that knock the wind out of you unexpectedly. How we respond and live with the mistakes we all make all the time. Do we stop trying? What if there's no going back? Is there  way to move forward, carrying it with us?

I think so. I ask a few friends and they tell me - leave it. Yes, right there in front. Imperfect and flawed, just like the Mama who made it, because isn't that what parenting is like? A work of love, riddled with missteps yet still somehow beautiful and warm despite.

I pull it out of the work bag. Time to finish what I started.

(Linking up with Ginny today!)


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