Wednesday, February 20, 2008

My Knitting Resume

My knitting CV is actually pretty empty.
I remember my mum learnt knitting when I was in primary school. She learnt it from the neighbours. She successfully made two scarves - one for me, one for my sister, and one more vest for my sister. During the course, I remember she said, 'I will never do that again!' and she kept her words.
I remember she has stashed a bag of 8 red balls of something in the cupboard for a couple of years and threw those away when we moved to a bigger apartment.
My mum is not very crafty.
In fact, she just can't seem to stick in one hobby for more than a few weeks.
But I did watch her knit and learnt just by watching over she shoulders.
I made my first scarf when I was 10, it was a scout project. The lady leader taught all the girls how to knit a scarf. It was back then before gender equality thing, so the girls learn how to knit and the boys learn how to fix an engine or something, I just recall they gathered up looking at a lump of black thing with grease.
I don't know why but it was like I KNEW how to knit all along. Without really listening to the instruction, I just started up like a turbo engine. I guess I knew how to knit since the beginning, just by watching my not-so-crafty-mum knitted.
I finished my scout project, then didn't knit for a few years.
Then I was 15 and the Home Economics class taught knitting, the same story again, I just turbo-knitted a scarf and handed in for the grade, and that's all.
I never thought of learning more about knitting or knit more. I don't know why. Maybe I do, since my mum is not very crafty and despite (or maybe out of jealousy) the women who are, she kept referring everything that related to craftiness and creativity as useless or waste of time.
I did buy some yarn when I was freshman in college, I wanted to knit a scarf for my boyfriend back then. Never advanced more than 10 rows. Afterall, there were so many other things to do in college than to knit. Sports, clubbing, making new friends, travelling, just to name a few.
Then I moved to Paris, my mum sent me the yarn which was supposed to be for that scarf and that 10 rows of knitting. I looked at it and laughed and threw it to the back of the closet.
5 years passed, I moved again, to Dublin, further and further away from my birth place. I found that bag of yarn and that 10 rows of knitting while packing up. I was alone in Dublin for a few months, waiting for my fiance to join me from Paris. I got nothing to do, I frogged that 10 rows of knitting, decided to knit my man something for Christmas. History repeated itself, the scarf finished in a few days.
This time, it is different. I called my man and asked 'I kinda like knitting, but I finished the scarf already, what else can I do?' He said, 'make something for my aunt for Christmas, maybe she will like it and it is cold in her house.'
So I started searching pattern on the internet and realize there is such a 'planet' of knitting community out there, I got hooked, purchased my first knitting book, my first set interchangeable needles, casted on a few different projects, and have been knitting, crocheting every day ever since...

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