A stitch in time… requires patience
Hailing from an over-achieving family background has its own pitfalls. I hais from a family of women with extremely talented fingers. Be it their embroideries or tatting or crochets or knitted scarves, these women put others to shame. And ofcourse the world and family expected me to have the same talent running through me!
Grandmother now in her late 60’s still makes it a point to keep herself busy by doing hand embroidery for my dresses. Her biggest worry being her failing eyesight. Mom in spite of working finds embroidery relaxing. Legend has it that, she started designing boutique-worthy sarees by the time she was in class 8 and this was much before times of Manmandirs and Varshidi’s and in the small town of Trichy. So me, the lucky one grew up with designer wear, lovely salwars, amazing sarees and classy tops all designed and lovingly stitched by mom or grandmother.
And for the longest time, mom and grandmother patiently tried to nudge me into cross-stitch kits, and knitting needles. After the necessary SUPW (aka soup) classes in school I never bothered to touch a needle again in life. But I did pick up some sophisticated terms like knit, purl, double crochets and 5mm hooks which I used generously in conversations to make me sound like an extremely talented person just like grandmother and mom. But the truth is I am more open to critiquing and suggesting changes to designs. Sitting at a spot, knit and stitch is not my game. The gene has somehow skipped me.
A few weeks ago, in an attempt to develop some skills and kill time I decided to crochet. Thinking back the decision sure was not an impulsive one like most of my other decisions. I thought long and hard about it before starting my Google search. Crocheting seemed like a good starting point just coz I remembered how to do the basic chain stitch while all I remembered about knitting was the two big needles and the funny “knit and purl” terms.
I found the best beginner crochet books (according to http://www.about.com/) were “Crocheting in plain English” and “Getting Started Crochet”. After a quick search in the library catalog I had both books in hand. I spent a couple of days looking and admiring the books. Getting Started Crochet was clearly a better book to look at with tons of color pictures and thin just like picture books from childhood. And that was my book of choice.
Then came the tough job of choosing a design, the simplest scarf design seemed to be a good starting point (and ofcourse a scarf is sure a good accessory to have for the cold winters! selfish Iam). A trip to the neighborhood Joanns and I was the proud owner of lovely blue and purple yarn (I was already planning about buying the perfect sweater to go with the scarf she was yet to crochet) and a few crochet hooks.
The first day was a mess, my fingers were not moving the way I wanted them to and slowly I got a hang of it. And then the usual boredom stuck. For the ever-restless and impatient me, the scarf could not easily be done. Repeating the same stitches over and over every evening was getting to much of a routine and I hate anything routine. But this time around I was not planning to give up. I hung on there and finally after 4 weeks and numerous one-on-one talks of self-motivation with herself, the scarf is done.
Do I feel a pride? Not really. Probably because I knows it is not a masterpiece. But it is the first one so it is special. I am sure mom and grandmother are happy that this gal has a bit of patience to hang on and finish on a project she started. Not just happy but relieved too. They cannot imagine they brought up their gal with no patience and no interest in embroidery.
And it definitely is not going to be my first and last crochet masterpiece. The new design is selected for the next one from me! I am hitting JoAnns again for new yarn and off we go again!
Pooh!
March 19, 2008 at 12:33 pmThanks everyone!
Homecooked
March 19, 2008 at 1:54 amHey congrats.DO post a pic of the your masterpiece 🙂 I am planning on crocheting something right after finishing my cake decorating classes…nevermind the crossstitch which is lying incomplete in the suitcase 🙂
Anonymous
March 15, 2008 at 3:30 amgood good good…………
amma
arpana.murthy
March 14, 2008 at 7:13 pmVini ..u are so down to earth… and I adore u taking out time for making something useful and creative..most importantly I liked the way you think about ur mom and grandma.. and appreciate your effort to make them happy.Keep the good work up and post pics of ur creations.. Nice hobby 🙂