Knitting A Sock 5 Times

My girlfriend is always asking me how I have time for everything?  I usually make some joke about it, but today I'm going to let her in on my little knitting secret...

I knit everywhere.  A few stitches here, a few stitches there, it all adds up.

So here is a day-in-the-life of my knitting time.

Bright and early, it's the morning train.  My knitting projects are portable - even the big ones will fit in pieces into ziplock bags.  The project, needles, a small bag of accessories (tape measure, stitch markers, etc.) and the pattern are all in the ziplock bag.  I use the freezer bags because they hold up better when the knitting needles poke through them.

This is a pair of socks I've been working on.  Technically I have knit this sock about 4 times because I have to keep ripping out my mistakes!  But I knew going into this project that it would be "a learning experience" that, as my mother would say, will only make me a better knitter once I have completed it.

Total train knitting time is just about 2 hours.

Now on to the bus.  Notice how the sock is about the same size?  Yup - I made a huge mistake and had to rip it back.  sigh.  That's okay though - it's a learning experience.  Total knitting time on the bus is 40 minutes.

Luckily for my knitting, but unluckily for me, I had to take the afternoon and spend quality time at the DMV.  It went pretty fast though.  Total knitting time: 1 1/2 hours.  (Trust me, that's fast for a DMV in the city.)

Of course I got out of the DMV just in time to miss the train for home, so now I have 2 hours of waiting to do.  Sitting in the lobby of the train station knitting time: 1 1/2 hours.

Now the train is going to be here soon, so I go up to the platform to wait for it.  They said it would only be delayed by a few minutes.  Total train platform knitting time: 45 minutes.

Finally I'm back on the train and headed home.  I've made real progress on turning the heel on my sock.  From here on out it should just be straight-forward plain knitting and I'm on a local train, so plenty of time for that.  Total knitting time: 2 hours 15 minutes.

So in this one day just by grabbing the minutes here and there, I've managed to rack up a grand total of 8 hours and 40 minutes of knitting time!  If I hadn't been knitting, I would have been just waiting.  Knitting was much more fun.

I have to say that I made an effort to use every minute of time to knit.  Usually I toss in some work, reading, a nap (or 2), some chit-chat with my train buddies.  But today I made sure those needles were in my hands just so I could see how much knitting I could do in the course of a day.

Then I got home and realized that I put the heel in backwards.  Don't ask me how that happened because I really don't know.  I couldn't do it again if I tried.  All I know is that the heel turned up into my instep - like a little "U" instead of the lovely "L" it was supposed to be.  Maybe because I missed my morning nap or got so frazzled at the DMV?

Whatever the reason, I ended up ripping out 8 hours and 40 minutes of knitting (part of which was already ripped out at the start of this day anyway, so it's now ripped out twice).

So, knitting a sock 5 times...I'd better be such a better knitter once I'm done.