What Inspired the Thunderclouds Pullover? January 14, 2021 03:00

Thunderstorm season has passed us by here in the northeastern United States making room for the insulating winter snow, but I remember the day in November when this pattern was released by Biscotte Yarns.

It seemed appropriate that rain was downpouring from the cloudy grey sky as I drank my coffee on our newly renovated sunporch I heard rumbles flowing overhead from the north to the south.

As I'm writing this, I'm amazed that I haven't written about this sweater before now—January—two months later. This sweater has some meaning behind it, and while I don't often open up about my personal inner life, I'm feeling nudged to do so about this. Because… well, there's enough superficial surface-oriented stuff in this world. We're humans, we have emotions and sometimes things mean things to us. It's not all just about how pretty something is on the surface. Not always, anyway.

The Thundercloud Pullover is a gorgeous sweater, but it's creation is motivated by something deeper than what you can see.

But, before I get into what this sweater means to me—and in case you're not interested in reading about that—I wanted to tell you that this video goes over the bottom-up seamless raglan construction of this sweater. And that this blog post isn't going to be about that.

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You can get the Thundercloud Pullover pattern (in English and/or French), and learn all the details here. It's designed using Biscotte's Hagrid yarn in the Gris Gris color.

Now, go ahead and keep reading if you're curious about what inspired this design.

There is something about nature, and it's seasonal cycles, weather, etc… that I can feel. It's a feeling of interconnectedness, relationship, and cooperation. As if the larger parts of the world around us are alive, aware and more conscious than it seems when we're busy going about our human lives.

To me, thunderstorms feel cleansing, powerful and protective. The air freshens as the earth is rinsed and the sky is charged with negative ions (which are actually beneficial to living beings). When I allow myself to really be still with the feelings a thunderstorm inspires, it's internally cleansing. It washes away that which I no longer need, I feel more alive and surrounded by such a strong feeling of safety that my internal walls can crumble to allow vulnerability emotionally. Safety isn't really the right word—it's more like being held, or surrounded... like in a freshly laundered fuzzy blanket. I find it comforting, and I'm grateful for this gift from the sky.

The stitch patterns, yarn and color for this sweater were all mindfully chosen during a meditative process in which I opened up to the thunderstorm and felt it—felt the things I previously described—and imagined what they would manifest as in sweater form. The creation of this design is intended to contain within it all the feelings experienced during a thunderstorm. Putting words to feelings is never adequate. You'd just have to knit the sweater (in Biscotte's Hagrid, in Gris Gris of course) to find out...

Not only that, but relationships thrive with communication and a balanced give and take exchange. And, supposing there is consciousness in thunderstorms, it would be respectful of me to offer a gift in exchange for what I've received.

I've described above what I receive personally from the thunderstorm. And the creation of this sweater and pattern is something I've put time and energy into as an offering to all that a thunderstorm is in exchange for the gifts that I receive from it.

I began this post mentioning that the day this pattern was released into the world, the sky opened up and poured its gift down upon my lawn, during an unseasonably warm day last November. Maybe I'm stretching to make something more of that correlation than there really is, but on that day I felt like the storm was saying "Thank you".