National Hobby Month

Did you know that January is National Hobby Month?

Nope? Neither did I.

I've been a longtime crafter. I learned to knit at five and didn't make anything but a mess, but when I

Mirabilia - The Kiss
One of the many cross stitch projects
I'm working on.

was eighteen I picked up those needles and remembered everything. I was soon knitting and designing my own sweaters. Well, not exactly designing. Taking patterns and changing them so that the end result was unrecognizable and completely mine.

I taught myself to crochet soon after and then I discovered cross stitch.

That was the death knell for knitting and crochet It didn't help that I had a little one who decided to cut holes in a heavily cabled sweater I was making. She survived.

I became very good at cross stitch and was even paid to do it. DON'T DO THIS. There was one piece I did on 40 count over one thread. It was awful and I hated it and in the end all those hours and hours and hours and never ending hours and mind numbing hours of work gave me two hundred bucks.

You can't make money doing cross stitch. You make it by designing patterns or selling supplies. The hours required are too great. And for me it wasn't enough to do simple cross stitch. I had to learn the beading and the specialty stitches and hardanger which is cutting holes in fabric which can lead to hard anger.

Current knitting project.
Mine is in variegated
blues and greens.

This past year I took up knitting and crocheting again. I no longer had little ones to cut holes in sweaters (she cut holes in one of my cross stitch projects too and it wasn't hardanger. Yes, she survived.)

My yarn supply was fed by a part time job at a local craft store. Now just like my cross stitch (about twenty projects on the go) I have several yarn projects. happening.

Yarn takes up way more space than embroidery floss.

Knitting has changed a lot since my early days. Now I have interchangable wooden needles and there's techniques like entralac and new ways to cast on and bind off and knitting entire garments in one piece and top down sweaters and two socks at a time and...

It's a little overwhelming.

I've also just aquired a small table loom. It's so easy I'm told. Just setting it up has taken me days and days and I haven't even started making anything yet.

Included in my to do list - learning to quilt, learning to bead, scrapbooking (okay maybe not) and a desire but no talent to paint like Donna Dewberry.

The nice thing about crafting is that it doesn't require anyone else. It's not like another favorite hobby of mine, acting, that does need other people. In fact other people have to let you into their group and give you something to do. It requires initiations and the willingness to look like a fool in front of strangers and the distinct possibility that you will fall on your face. I love it.

I also have more books than I can read. I have started collecting Christmas movies. I collect favorite TV shows. My children tell me to turn down my music.

Hey, if it wasn't for the loud music I would be the stereotypical grandma. Except I rarely bake cookies and I don't have a rocking chair.

From 2002: The Adventures of a Cross Stitched Driver

A few weeks ago I went away on a retreat.

I know, this can give images of people sitting around with their legs crossed and going “Ohm” over and over. Or having breakdowns in front of total strangers over the fact that they didn’t get the bike they wanted when they were six. Or going into hypnotic states and talking about past lives when they were Cleopatra and Attila the Hun.

My retreat was none of this. It was a stitching retreat. A full weekend of doing needlework and chatting with other women who like to do needlework. No children, no husbands, no workouts or diets, no housework, TV or computers.

Now I know, some of you have your eyes glazed over and are going “that sounds as exciting as watching the snail Olympics.”

For others of you, just the idea of getting away from husbands and children would be enough to send you into glorious fits of ecstacy similar to the feelings you get when you finally give yourself permission to have a D.Q Pecan Mudslide after several months of eating nothing but broccoli and cabbage soup.

It was a retreat with eight women, out in the middle of nowhere (okay, Pigeon Lake) in a house to ourselves. We were all responsible for one meal, which was already planned and bought, and clean up at the end of the weekend.

I started out happily on my journey. My car loaded up with needlework and snacks. My computer would not download the map that was sent to me, but someone said it was not hard to find, just follow the road signs, and it was at Pigeon Lake so how hard could it be?

I have no sense of direction. And when it comes to asking for directions, I am a man. I admit it. I will not ask for directions. Never say lost, because all roads lead to somewhere, and never ask for directions because I’ll never be able to follow them anyway. Several hours later, still driving around in the middle of nowhere, I finally realized that the roads I was on led to nowhere. I was lost. Completely and utterly lost. Never get out of here lost. I would be found one day, withered away from starvation (and it would take a long time to wither me away) my hands clutched to an empty snickers wrapper, and frozen from the cold.

Fortunately I had my cell.

And more fortunately my friends called me. Good thing too, because I didn’t have their number. After several attempts to get me going the right way, my friends decided that a rescue mission was in order. So they put on their black clothes with stocking caps, grabbed an emergency bag (for stitchers this would have embroidery floss, a needle, a piece of lovely fabric and a chart) and set out in an unmarked van.

This experience has taught me two things: one, it is a good idea to keep the cell phone recharged, and two, in spite of what everyone says about cell phones and driving, I don’t want to make it illegal, because it was a great comfort being able to drive around with the phone up to my ear as someone was talking to me If it becomes illegal how else are people supposed to find their way? I can just see hordes of drivers meandering all over desperately searching for a familiar sign.

“Okay, we’re coming up to a blinking red stop sign.” I hear in the phone.
“I’m near a blinking red stop sign!” I replied as I flashed my lights. “Is that you that just passed me by?”
“We’re turning around.” With joy I watched a van turn around and drive by me. I followed, relieved to finally be rescued. But just as I was going merrily on my way a woman stepped in front of my car and flagged me down.

She asked me for directions.

Which I might have given to her (“go home before you get sucked into an eternal black hole and never be heard from again”} if I hadn’t been so worried about losing my rescuers.

It occurred to me as I followed the van through twists and turns and several wrong directionless moves, that I hadn’t actually seen who was in the van, and I might be following a mass murderer.

Especially when a sign appeared that said “cemetery” with a direction arrow, and they turned TOWARDS the cemetery.


I had a great weekend. Good food, good friends, and good stitching. Better than the snail Olympics. If anyone wants to stitch with me, give me a shout. I’ll be sure to bring my cell and oh yeah, a map.

Cross Stitch, Quilting, Knitting, Sewing, Craft, UFO Rotation = Procrastination

I am supposed to be studying for my Art History exam. Instead I'm blogging about something I did last week when I was supposed to be writing essays and my take home exams. Because that's what I do, anything except what I'm supposed to.

See my title. Designed to appeal to the masses. Some of you may ask "what the heck is that?" So for the uninformed let me explain.

Cross Stitch - a needleart that entails putting little x's on fabric to make a picture. You wouldn't think something so basic, so simple, would be so fascinating, but it's like painting with thread.

UFO - this has nothing to do with little green men, ET, being beamed up by Scottie, or a call for medication. It means Unfinished Object.

Rotation - a system for finishing UFO's.

So now we have that clear I have a confession to make. I have 15 of those cross stitch UFO's. What's more, some of them are older than some of my children, and my youngest is 11.

So after doing a google search I've designed a UFO that I think might work. And for those of you with your own stash of UFO's you can give this a try. No, this is not going to solve the world's problems, this is so I don't have to study.

1. Find all your UFO's and works in progress. This might mean looking under the bed, in closets, in your wheat barrels, in abandoned purses and under the kitchen sink.

2. Look them all over. Do you want to finish that cross stitch picture of an all black puppy for great aunt Mabel even though Great Aunt Mabel is gone now and your eyes go buggy with all those shades of black and you never were a dog person? Is that jacket with peacocks all over it and humongous shoulder pads still something you're going to want to wear when you do finish it? How many crocheted washcloths do you still need? Weed out the stuff you don't like anymore. Give it away, throw it away or take it apart and reuse the materials. It's okay. It's no longer worth your time. You are not a failure. Let it go. We all have projects we were initially excited about but grew to dread.

3. Make sure all your projects are in bags with the materials.

4. Make a list of all your projects. Try to organize your list according to what you want (or need) to finish first. If you have an extra big project you might want to put it near the bottom of your list. You'll see why in a minute. Try to vary your list so you don't have the same type of thing all in a row.

5. Here's where the rotation part comes in. The number one item on your list is your focus piece. Work 10 hours on your number one and then work 10 hours on your number 2 piece. Then go back and work another 10 hours on your number one piece, then work 10 hours on your number three piece. Do you see where I'm going on this? Work down your list in 10 hour increments alternating with your focus piece.

6. Eventually you will get the number 1 piece finished (because you are working on it more than on anything else). You might even get another piece on your list finished. That's great. When number one piece is finished then your number two piece is your focus piece and you continue through your rotation alternating with your new focus piece. If you happen to finish one of your other pieces you can then go back to your focus piece for 10 hours and then continue with your rotation.

7. Now here comes the fun part. Once you go through your rotation - you can start something new. What! I know, you're trying to get things finished, not start new things, but lets face it, the reason we have UFO's is because we're starters not finishers and if we can't look forward to starting something new we just might suddenly go crazy and start a whole whack of new things as a form of rebellion. Besides this is supposed to be enjoyable. I bet you have a huge stack of things you've been wanting to start. So, you get to start a new one - but only at the end of your rotation.

8. When you've rotated through everything and added a new project (if you wish), then start over again from the top.

You can see why I suggested that big projects be put at the end of your list. You need to have some finishes and you won't if you get bogged down at the beginning with a big piece. Eventually it will be your focus piece but you'll already have put in a lot of hours on it.

So that's what I did with precious time last week. And now I'm blogging about it when I could blog about all the answers for world peace, saving the planet, and answering the great unanswerable question "Why do people like Charlie Sheen get to make millions doing fun stuff and I (who has never yet served time in prison, an addiction facility, spent time with prostitute) don't?"