Sometimes when I’m knitting, I realize there must’ve been another woman before me, long ago in time, working the exact same stitches on her own pair of wooden needles.
It feels sweet, trying to imagine who she was, how she too must’ve had a basket full of yarn and a familiar place she always sat to work. I wonder if she was as messy as I am, hundreds of loose ends unwoven and scraps scattered everywhere. Do you think she had a pile of unfinished work? Endless swatches of knit and crochet that she has no idea what to do with?
Fiber work is as old as time, not even historians can determine just how old knitting and crochet really is. Thousands of years now we’ve always had busy hands, working on cozy garments and goods for our homes or loved ones. Prior to the modern age, knitting and crochet was often a large necessity for home life, and was a major resource for the income of women who couldn’t work a job and have careers like we do now. Times were a lot different, and knitting was a major tool for our unspoken history.
Information on learning was oftentimes just mothers passing their skills onto their daughters, granddaughters, and friends. As history grew, writing books became an obvious source of information, and eventually, just about anyone could knit if they wished thanks to growing internet culture and social media as well.
Today, the community has grown tremendously with young people taking on fiber work as both a fun hobby and potential income source as a small business. (aka what I’ve been doing!) History always repeats itself, and seeing a modern revival of feminine crafts has been a very heartwarming experience for me personally.
We have so many resources at our fingertips now, from pinterest to youtube and simple google searches.
I taught myself entirely when I started my first venture into crochet. I decided to try and start something new for the year of 2022, and randomly asked my mom one night if she thinks I should go for it. I wasn’t even sure if was something I’d like, but with pure excitement on her face, my mother looked at me and said, “Wait. right. here.”
Turns out she had an entire bin of old yarn, a few crochet hooks, three surprisingly large knitting looms, a few unfinished projects, and a lotof old pattern magazines from the late 80s- untouched ever since. She had her own little adventure with crochet once too! She told me she couldn’t really remember much at all how to do it, but she’d love for me to keep what she had and use it myself to try and learn.
To put it lightly, I kinda think that moment changed the trajectory of my life for forever.
From then on, I spent every single night before bed trying to learn how to make my very first chain, my first single crochet, and whatever the hell “sc, hdc, dc” even meant. (The abbreviations used to terrify me. Took me months to finally start connecting dots and memorizing the differences LOL.) My nose would be so deep in my laptop, headphones on blast listening to some random lady of my choice on youtube explain the basics until nearly 4am.
Again… almost every night. It was a disgustingly fantastic new addiction at my finger tips that felt so attainable despite being so confusing at first.
It’s been well over an entire year since then, and I’ve watched my work grow and change constantly. I love looking at my old work, as well as the many good-notes pages I have on my iPad full of future ideas and projects I wish to attain. Not only has fiber work become a hobby for me, it’s genuinely my joy and I view it as a career within itself. Creating, designing, physically doing it all myself is what brings me happiness. I love sharing it, and I’d love for it to one day support me in full.
The many knitters and crocheters before me have always felt the same, and maybe somehow I can pass the love for yarn and creating onto others as well, just like they have for me. It’s truly a lifestyle and culture of its own amongst so much more.
If you’ve never tried it out, but you’re considering it….. maybe this is your sign :)
Happy making besties. I can’t wait to be writing more, giving topics, inspiration and personal tips from my own learning experiences. See you soon!
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