11 Inches of Mobius Scarf

There it is: all the progess I've made so far on the (somewhat altered) Mobius Scarf from Arctic Lace. It's not quite 11 inches' worth.

My husband keeps asking me how many man-hours have gone into it (he listens to a lot of cursing when I have to rip back to the life lines) and I tell him he's missing the whole point of knitting: it's not about the product, it's about the process.

I think a lot of people don't get that about knitting. It would be vastly cheaper and more efficient for me to go out and buy a lace scarf but that wouldn't give me the pleasure of making something beautiful with my hands. It also wouldn't keep me entertained through endless innings of Yankees baseball.

Writing is the same sort of thing. I could write faster and more efficiently than I do but then I wouldn't enjoy the process itself. Nor would my books be as good. Good books need time to percolate in my subconscious, for the characters to fill out all their dimensions, and for the plot to thicken. I love spending time with my characters and I don't want to race through to the end because then I have no excuse for hanging out with them anymore.

So this started out being a post about lace knitting and somehow changed completely (just like my books do).

So tell me what knitting is about for you: process or product? Or both?