Your invitation to Everyday Knitter

A cosy, creative community where we celebrate all things warm and handmade.

Grab a coffee and let’s chat

Whenever I introduce myself online I always lead with the fact that I’m a knitter - and it’s an important part of my life for sure. I’ve blogged about knitting for over 10 years. I’ve designed and sold knitting patterns for around the same period of time. And I run a vibrant, chatty and engaging Facebook group for knitters.

In short, I’m a Knitter with a capital K. Always with yarn about my person and creative ideas on the brain.

But I’m also a human, interested in so much more than just knitting. Very much like you I suspect. None of us like to be pigeon holed. To be constrained into little boxes or narrowly defined on the basis of our hobby or special interest.

And yet so much of the conventional business advice and social media guru wisdom is focused on niching down. On posting about just one subject and only that subject. Don’t get me wrong, I can talk about yarn until the cows come home. But am - we are - so much more than that.

For many years I worked as a Clinicial Scientist in the NHS until stress and burnout caught up with me and forced a hard stop. I’d defined myself as ‘successful female scientist’ for such a long time. It was my identity and my shield in many ways and learning who I was without that has been a long and quite challenging process (I can’t bring myself to use the word journey in this context).

I’ve learned that I’m much more creative than I thought I was. And that although my version of creativity might look different to other people’s that it’s still valid nevertheless. I have aphantasia - I literally don’t have a minds eye - and so I don’t visualise things in the way that others might. As a result my design process might look very different to other people’s and I rely on the written word and what’s in front of me much more than mental imagery.

That probably goes some way to explain my abiding love of notebooks and the fact that I can never resist a list.

What I love about Substack is how it frees us up to talk about ourselves - the whole of ourselves. If Instagram is the shiny, glossy catwalk of an event where everyone is primped and primed to showcase their ‘best side’, then Substack is the gathering in the kitchen. It’s where the real chat is, where people talk about what matters to them, about what they hold dear, about what gets them out of bed in a morning.

And that’s the kind of energy I want to bring to my online presence in 2024.

If you’d like to join me in my Substack ‘kitchen’ this year you are very welcome indeed. There’s always room for like-minded souls.

Just bring a beverage, knitting is optional and join us for some human conversations about bringing more joy and energy into our everyday.

What to expect.

There’s room for everyone. I write here every week and publish a weekly Friday newsletter with things that have made me smile or caught my eye that week. There’s usually a strong knitting focus, but not always.

Other posts are slightly more random and less yarn based but are generally focused on my ongoing quest for a simpler, slower life. I love spending time in nature, writing and journaling, reading and am slowly developing my skills as a tarot reader - although I tend towards using tarot more as an aid to intuitive journaling than anything else.

Posts behind the paywall, for members of my paid community here tend to be a bit more personal and in-depth than I’d normally share in public as I feel it’s a closer knit community of friends - a much smaller kitchen if you will.

In addition I run a monthly book club for community members where we readalong with a particular book, discussing it as we go. And this month (February) we are experimenting with a fun Penpal Project - remember having a penpal when you were at school? Well, this is an adult version of that. Hopefully a bit more relaxed and without the need for a German vocab book. Signups are closed for this round now but keep an eye out for when I run it again if you are interested.

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