A Trip Down Memory Lane - A Knitter’s Beginning

Let me close my eyes and go back in time…

I remember I was about seven when I first held a pair of knitting needles and a crochet hook. Actually, I learned to crochet from one of my cousins first, then I learned to knit later. I was and still am a very curious soul when it comes to creating "stuff" by hand. I saw my cousin working on this beautiful ivory lace table runner and asked her how she could make something like that using only thread and something that looked like a hook; a seven year-old asking a very “seven year-old like” question. She asked me if I would like to learn and I said "yes" in a heartbeat... After spending an afternoon with her at the age of seven, I really got the hang of the pattern and started my very own project.  I never finished it, but I still to this day have that piece of my very first project tucked safely away in my treasure trunk.

About a year later, I found a pair of knitting needles around the house and asked my mom what those were for. She showed me that they were for knitting and I asked, "what's knitting?"  She then asked if I wanted her to knit me something, as if she, too, had forgotten all about her knitting needles until I asked her about them. She took me to go buy this bright red yarn and told me that she was going to knit me a pair of mittens. For days, I contentedly watched my mom's fast moving hands work their magic over my red mittens with huge cables running down the middle of it! They were so warm and bright... I wore them everywhere I went. But unlike my cousin, my mom never asked me if I wanted to learn how to knit and I don't remember asking her to teach me, either. I do remember playing around with her needles and yarn on my own...

Another year has gone by...  and I somehow learned to cast on and was able to knit and purl fairly well.  My very first project was this long piece with alternating knit and purl pattern which now that I think back could have been a scarf???  Who knows???  I was just a little girl…

Fast forward a few decades…

I am still knitting… and I know that knitting is one thing I will never stop doing as long as I am breathing.