Peacefully Knitting

Yesterday was a glorious day of knitting and watching the newest version of Anne Bronte’s “Tenant of Wildfell Hall”.   Before long I had almost a quarter of my reader’s wrap knitted and used one skein of yarn.  I was totally relaxed without a care in the world.   I just wanted to sit on the couch and knit, nothing else.  To me, knitting and enjoying period movies, especially those produced from two of my all time favorite authors, Jane Austen and the Bronte Sisters, is a wonderful way to spend a Saturday while my husband is at work.   I have the new BBC version of Sense and Sensibility sitting next to the TV waiting to be watched, but have to wait on my hubby as he likes these movies as much as me.  My husband still finds it fascinating that I can knit and watch a movie at the same time.  He told me it was impossible to know what was going on if I was concentrating on knitting.  Now every knitter out there knows that to be highly untrue – that we can knit and watch a movie at the same time.

There is something about watching these movies that make you wonder what it would have been like to live during a time of simplicity, graciousness and happiness.  I know that people during that period had hard lives, but they didn’t have the stress of the world weighting down upon their shoulders.  Modern conveniences are wonderful, but there is a part of me that longs for simple times, times when you visited with a neighbor, sat by the fire and knitted or embroidered, times when you were outside in the garden enjoying the bounties of your labor.  Ahh knitting… it makes you ponder of times past, times present and the future.  

For any of you that love period movies, I highly recommend the following for a lovely and peaceful day of knitting.  From Jane Austen:   “Sense and Sensibility”, “Emma”, “Mansfield Park”, “Persuasion” and “North Anger Abby”.  From the Bronte Sisters:  ”Jane Eyre”, “Wuthering Heights” and the “Tenant of Wildfell Hall”.  From other period writers: “The Woman in White”,  “The Turn of the Screw”, “Bleak House” and “Room With a View”.  There’s too many more to list – so  “Happy Knitting and Happy Movie Watching!