knitting sickness

I think there is such a thing... knitting sickness. My mind is overtaken with all things knitting related. I obsess about patterns, yarns, my projects, my stash, books, blogs, yadda yadda. I get so caught up with it that I don't realize how it's affecting other areas of my life. For example... I used to have other hobbies! Shock! I used to read books and not just listen to audio books so I could accomodate my knitting. I used to scrapbook. I used to do other crafty things. I even have a sewing machine that is a year old that I've never used. It's another hobby that would require teaching myself a whole new set of skills. It just takes too much time from knitting.

Whoa man. This isn't good. Is it? Most of the time it seems like a healthy obsession. I am knitting for my family. I knit for charity. I knit things for myself that make me happy. Those are all good things and I don't deny it. But I miss reading. I miss scrapbooking. I miss other outlets of my life. I go through this every few months. I put away everything related to knitting for a short while. It seems that in order not to get crazed about my knitting I have to banish it from my life.

What I need to find is some middle ground.

I need to get disciplined.

I need to not set such crazy deadlines on myself to get something finished.

I need a change of pace. I need to dig the rest of my life out from under all of this yarn.

I'm only half kidding.

When I taught myself how to knit, I was embracing the idea of learning something new. Taking the time to learn new things, read instructions, broaden my crafty horizons. All that seems to be squelched. It feels easier to stick with what I know. Something I'm already good at.

Time seems so limited as it is. Two kids. Husband. Life. There isn't much time left for hobbies. So I stick with what I know so I can actually see progress. Spreading myself between numerous hobbies seems like having too many projects on the needles and never seeing much progress.

Do you ever feel like this? Maybe you have it all figured out. I don't know. Am I the only one?