8 Amazing Reasons to Start Knitting
I bet the first image that comes to your mind when you hear the word ‘knitting’ is your granny, sitting in a cozy rocking chair and knitting slowly your mittens. It’s a wide-spread preconception, though and you shouldn’t consider knitting as an entertainment for aged people only. I’ve been knitting since kindergarten and I was always fascinated with my mom’s skillful hands and marvelous things they created. People knit for various reasons. Some people knit clothes for their kids, while others do it for the sake of relaxation. Knitting is a very cheap and accessible hobby, and it has plenty of amazing benefits!
1. Better health
Repetitive, rhythmic knitting movements normalize blood pressure, heart work and decrease the level of cortisol, a stress hormone. Knitting has a calming impact on your mind and gives the feeling of fulfillment and satisfaction. The only thing you should pay attention to while knitting is your posture and good lighting. You don’t want to harm your back or sight, do you?
2. Therapy
Knitting can do wonders to your mental state as well. Whether you are anxious about your new project or exams, knitting will help you relax, ignore depressive thoughts for a while and focus on something pleasing. Moreover, knitting can be a good alternative to yoga and meditation. During the process you are highly concentrated, which is very similar to the meditative state. Crafters also use both sides of the brain, which means you boost your potential and creative thinking. A creative activity releases a great amount of dopamine, our natural anti-depressant, that’s why people feel happier and more cheerful after knitting.
3. Eye-hand coordination training
Even if a good eye-hand coordination isn’t specific to your job, you can still apply it to different aspects of life. Your hands and eyes should always stay deft and swift, which can definitely come in handy while looking after kids, cooking or typing. From the neural point of view, eye-hand coordination is an extremely complicated process since every part of the CNS is involved. As a result you have better memory, reaction and efficacy. You can enjoy all these benefits if you knit regularly.
4. It prevents brain ageing
According to recent researches, knitting can considerably retard dementia and fight posttraumatic stress disorder. Our nervous system can process only certain amount of data at a time, that’s why you forget about everything when you’re concentrating on knitting. This simple technique will help you keep sanity for many years.
5. Social interaction
Like any other hobby, knitting is a great way to meet like-minded people and skillful crafters. Attend knitted classes or yarn clubs to share experience and learn new tricks. Internet forums and blogs are another place you may get stuck on. I can spend hours looking for new patterns, attractive models and just inspiration. In spite of being completely non-interactive hobby, knitting can really gather people.
6. Amazing knitted gifts
Perhaps you have noticed that handmade goods are significantly expensive and it’s quite a good business these days. However, you can easily rejoice your friends and kinsfolk with cute knitted things. You don’t necessarily have to be a seasoned knitter in order to make a nice scarf or socks. Handmade gifts are always better than off-the-shelf commercial goods since they are designed for a particular person.
7. Unique design
I was always passionate about beautiful clothes and I used to look for something uncommon and showy. However, with a mass-production of ready-made goods it’s really difficult to find the piece of clothing that you won’t see the next day on your neighbor. Knitting enables me to be a kind of fashion designer and create clothes of my dream. Moreover, I’m always sure that my clothes will fit and look exactly the way I imagine it. I really appreciate when people compliment me on my knitted garment and I can answer something like ‘Thanks, I knitted it myself’! Admiration is guaranteed!
8. Knitted garments last longer
Knitted garments last really longer, of course, if you take care of it properly. For example, I have a gorgeous knitted rucksack that my mom gave me for my 16th birthday and it still looks great. I knitted many sweaters and hats last year and I wear them daily this fall because they look fantastic! Just make sure you don’t use hangers for storing your knitted garments, and wash the knitted garment inside out.
Knitting is an absolutely awesome hobby. It’s a budget-friendly, useful and healthy hobby that will make you and your family happy. Trust me, once you nuzzle your nose into the warm, tender scarf you made by yourself, you will definitely fall in love with knitting forever! So give it a try. Have you ever tried to knit?
