Dear Geraldine,

Every December, I make the same New Year’s resolution: This year, Harold will finally get his jumper.
And every year—every single year—I fail.

I begin with such optimism. I choose the yarn (a cheerful Aran tweed), I print out the pattern (a handsome fisherman’s cable), and I cast on with the zeal of a woman possessed. Then January ends… and February wobbles… and by March the needles have stopped clicking entirely. By April, it’s too warm to pretend I’ll ever finish, so I quietly tuck the poor, half-formed creature into a tote bag and hide it under the stairs behind the hoover.

Harold, bless him, pretends he’s forgotten. I suspect he has three decades’ worth of abandoned ribbing, sleeves, and tension squares living rent-free down there.

I’m writing to you because I don’t want to fail again. I love my husband, and I genuinely want him to have this blessed jumper. But soon after the early enthusiasm fades, a fog of dread rolls in. I don’t know if it’s fear of making a mistake or simply the curse of moss stitch.

Can you help?

Yours all a tangle,
Knotty

My dear Knotty,

Ordinarily, I’d roll up my sleeves, adjust my spectacles, and dispense a paragraph or two of sage advice. But your dilemma touches on a subject that—tragically—lies far beyond my talents. I was exiled from the Welston Yarn Bombers after an incident involving a lamppost, a ball of variegated DK, and what Dorothy Higgins still refers to as “a structural hazard.”

Fortunately, Welston has someone far better qualified.

I’ve handed your letter to Tandy Sweetcroft, veteran Yarn Bomber, collector of patterns dating back to Queen Victoria’s reign, and a woman who once knitted an entire bicycle cosy during a long layover at Schiphol Airport.

Brace yourself.
Tandy does not do half-measures.

Over to her…

+++

Dearest Knotty,

Oh, my poor lamb! I felt your letter quiver with despair the moment Geraldine passed it across. Sit yourself down, fetch a cuppa, and listen carefully, because I am about to save your marriage, your sanity, and most certainly your tension and gauge.

First:
You are not cursed.
You are simply pattern-promiscuous—a tragic but common condition wherein a knitter courts a project far beyond January’s emotional bandwidth.

A fisherman’s cable for a New Year’s resolution? My love, that is hubris in yarn form.

Here is what you will do:

1. Choose a pattern you could knit during a mild earthquake.
   No cables. No bobbles. No steeking unless you enjoy living dangerously.
2. Knit the sleeves first.
   This prevents the annual Spring Abandonment. Once the sleeves are done, momentum alone will drag you through the body.
3. Establish a daily ritual.
   Ten minutes every morning. Before chores. Even before Harold.
   Ten minutes a day equals one finished jumper by the equinox. I have charts.
   (Colour-coded, naturally.)
4. Never hide an unfinished project.
   Shame thrives in darkness. Keep the bag somewhere visible: on the coffee table or atop the fruit bowl.
   (I do this with all my WIPs. I have a very large fruit bowl.)
5. Tell Harold.
   Say, “This is your year,” and mean it!

Finally, remember this: knitting is not about speed. It is about devotion stitched one loop at a time. When Harold wears that jumper, he won’t see your January panic or your March fatigue; he’ll feel the warmth you worked into every stitch.

And if—if!—you need reinforcements, I hold a weekly “Finishers’ Circle” in my front room. Bring your needles. Bring your despair. I’ll soon sort you out.

Yours in yarn and righteous discipline,

Tandy Sweetcroft