What was the yarn that inspired you to pick up a crochet hook for the first time?
For me, it was a skein of beautiful handspun wool that I found 10 years ago on a visit to Orcas Island. It's pink with flecks of other colors, and has a beautiful texture, slightly irregular in thickness. I didn't do any yarn sports at that time, but I had to have it because it was so beautiful. I thought I might just hang it on the wall so I could look at it and touch it sometimes. Ha! Tried weaving (part of the skein went into stripes on a blanket), but the equipment takes up so much space! And time got shorter, but I still wanted to play with yarn! It turns out it is a lot easier to pick up and put down and pick up a crochet project. Progress gets made even if I only have five minutes at a time.
My avatar on this site is actually a drawing of my maternal grandmother in 1925 or so (from a photo taken about 25 miles from where I live now). She taught me to crochet when I was a teenager, but I wasn't very good at it. However, there must have been enough muscle-memory that making crochet stitches was a lot easier than knitting when I picked up that beautiful yarn again! I still can't (don't, won't) knit, really; why bother?!
She and my other grandmother both did beautiful thread crochet. In later years when her sight was not so good, she made dozens (hundreds?) of potholders from whatever on-sale acrylic my grandfather would bring home from Bartell's Drugstore. When he found some two-tone blue-green that we liked, he bought out the supply, and more than 20 years later, I still have five or six skeins of it. All of my relatives, and many of my mom's friends around the world (she was a travel agent) still use grama's potholders, and when I started crocheting again a few years ago, I was able to make my own. After all, they're the best! what would I do for potholders if grama's wore out?
In the non-crochet side of life: after a detour to New England, I'm back home in the Puget Sound area with my husband and two hilarious cats. I edit nonfiction for a living; my husband makes furniture and has just started a woodworking school.
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About Teresa
About Me:
I'm a 3rd generation Pacific NW native. The picture is my maternal grandmother in 1925 or so; she taught me to crochet about 40 years ago. After an accidental detour to New England for more years than I like to count, I'm now happily settled back home near Puget Sound along with my husband and two hilarious cats. I edit nonfiction for a living; my husband makes furniture and has just started a woodworking school.
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I'm backward, it's the patterns that inspire me to go out and find some wool/cotton/acrylic/silk/etc. Not that I don't feel the allure of lovely skeins that won't fit the project I have in mind, but mostly it's pattern first, yarn second.
My most recent crochet project, I think, was a tea cozy. Damn, but they work! Tea ends up tasting like steeped alfalfa if it's kept too warm, but a pot and a cozy does a grand job. I had the exact yarn in mind for the project, had to sub, but it was project first, yarn second.
PS - Your husband's furniture is beautiful. I envy you both living in Pt. Townsend.
Pauline, thanks for your note! I think I need to make a tea cozy. Too right about oversteeped tea (is that what they call "stewed" tea?) My husband is English and we do like that afternoon pick-me-up, but usually make do with Safeway teabags -- don't tell his mother!
So how did you make your tea cozy; what pattern, what yarn?
Thanks!
For me it wasn't really a yarn or a pattern that inspired me to crochet -- ok, maybe it was yarn ...
I taught myself to knit first and was really slow at it. But I was determined to knit and not crochet, since my Mom crocheted and I wanted to be different than her (can you tell I'm a difficult child?). I taught myself to knit and then my brother got a new couch and I saw a yarn (sadly, Lion Brand Homespun *yurk*) that would make a gorgeous blanket for this new couch. I knew I couldn't knit it, else he'd have a new couch by the time I finished!
I taught myself to crochet and made him a blanket as my first project. The blanket is a great conversation piece because it has "wings" on the one end where my gauge was much sloppier and then as I grew more experienced it slimmed down a big. I say that the wings are actually shoulder wraps. ;)
I love it, everyone who comes over gravitates toward it and wants to take it home. The yarn was awful to work with and I refuse to use it again but it is beautiful.
The tea cozy pattern is from http://crochetroo.blogspot.com/2006/05/scallop-tea-cosy-instructions.htm...
I wanted a variegated yarn so each petal would be a different color, but didn't find it. I'd brought my little chihuahua with me, and the yarn shop owner made such a fuss over her that it was hard to prowl to see what was available! That's my excuse, and I'm sticking with it!
Hiya, such a sweet yarn story there... I can definitely relate. (I'll get the yarn before I even get the idea :P I'm almost ashamed how much yarn I own... almost.)
I started with knitting. It was a rainy weekend about 3 years ago and I didn't know what to do but I always had this need to create with my hands. I had seen a very cool friend of mine knit a funky striped scarf, and I was so impressed that she coud make that! I decided I could do it too, and why not right now!
So I put on my rain boots and went to Zellers to get some cheapo yarn and needles. I came back home, Googled 'learn to knit' and watched some videos (www.knittinghelp.com).
For a time I brought my needles in the metro or the bus, but it's very hard to knit with someone sitting right next to you (pokey pokey!). So I looked into crochet... and I fell in love. It's sculpture! It's forgiving! Tiny! It can be undone easily! It can be put away in your handbag in a second!
And now I often wonder... who invented crochet? and all those stitches? It's genius. :P
Love your tale of learning to knit on a rainy weekend. Isn't it AMAZING how the Internet feeds our need to do things with our hands! I have had several start-stops with my crochet, and it really only got up to escape velocity when I started to get patterns and ideas off the web ("web" -- hah! "net" -- hah! they borrowed these words for abstract arrangements of electrons from what we do with STRING!!).
I'm resisting, mostly, buying yarn off the Web -- it is just too luscious to see and feel yarn in an actual yarn shop. Plus, I want my LYS to stay in business so I can keep getting that instant gratification! However, it was pretty exciting once when the UPS guy delivered a box from Lion Brand. I had ordered yarn and a pattern for a sweater for my little niece and it turned out great: (my first garment from a pattern, and luckily I finished before she outgrew it!).
PZANG! that is so so so cute!
Hardcore? Hardcore is for babies. I'm HOOKCORE!
Hmmm... I was five. I'm not sure the yarn was much of a consideration. I just wanted to do what my mother was doing! Later, it was crochet thread that peaked my interest to pick it up again.
~ Mini
I learned to crochet (by which I mean that I learned the slip stitch) when I was eight. It wasn't until my older sister learned how to knit a few years ago that I really figured crochet out. I was jealous of all of the cool things my sister was knitting and I was determined to out do her with my crochet. What pushed me over the top was a really gorgeous blanket my sister made. I went out and bought exactly the same kind of yarn and made my own blanket. It's amazing what a little sibling rivalry can do for a person.