KCBW

Thanks to Caffeine Girl's blog, I found out about this fun blogging event. Thought I'd give it a whirl.

Here's Monday's topic.

Starting Out

How and when did you begin knitting/crocheting? was it a skill passed down through generations of your family, or something you learned from Knitting For Dummies? What or who made you pick up the needles/hook for the first time? Was it the celebrity knitting ‘trend’ or your great aunt Hilda?




I actually did a little knitting when I was a youngster, something called broomstick lace, which was taught to me by a neighbor lady. I had big plans to make a blanket with mint green and pink acrylic yarn. I don't remember what happened to the many lengths I was able to complete, but as it was acrylic yarn, I'm sure it's around somewhere.



I decided to learn to knit as an adult for a couple of reasons. For one thing, I've always liked to do crafts, doing cross-stitch when I was first married and sewing when my girls were little, but after I started teaching, I stopped crafting as much. When I was 43 years old, I developed high blood pressure and after doing some research, found that knitting had some of the same effects on the brain and blood pressure as meditation. Being somewhat ADHD, I wasn't able to grasp the art of meditation, but chose to knit instead. I spent about nine months reading about knitting and buying little bits and bobs of yarn and needles. Finally a nice yarn store owner made me sit down and knit garter stitch until I got the hang of it. My first scarf was a bit of a mess but I wore it proudly (and the trendy yarn hid most of the mistakes). I had to go back to the store so she could bind it off and cast on for another for me, which she was kind enough to do. True to my obsessive nature, I knit only scarves for almost a year, but I was happy doing it, despite other people's suggestion that I might want to branch out a bit.

Eventually I visited another yarn store, and the owner, Jeanne, had such cute and simple projects displayed that I finally took the leap to making something other than scarves. My first non-scarf project was a ribbon yarn purse, not particularly useful, but very, very pretty. And I've been knitting ever since. I'm less adventurous than a lot of knitters out there (my daughter for example), but the blogging world has been a fabulous source of inspiration, tempting me out of my safety zone. And I have the WIPs to prove it!!