I'm Too Crafty for my Pants

My grandma (dad's mom) was a crafty lady. That is, she knew how to knit, crochet, quilt, sew, and the like. She also gardened and played the organ, but neither of those really count as "being crafty." She tried to teach me how to crochet when I was a kid, but it didn't take. That first row of crocheting into the chain is brutal for me now, and as a 10-year-old?

When I had my first deployment in 2005, I learned that there was very limited Interweb in "the desert." I set about figuring out something to do to occupy my time. Since I'm not a binge-drinker or chain-smoker, nor am I a gym rat, I had little in common with the other 90% of the people in my unit. I did, however, have a roommate who was a knitter, and she encouraged me to get a simple pair of needles and some cheap yarn and just go bananas with it.

So there I was, knitting wrist-warmers in the desert, but it gave me something to do in my Interweb-free existence. I knitted some wrist-warmers and a kerchief that deployment, and when I went back home (to England in the middle of the winter), I continued to knit scarves and hats and other things like that.

I didn't seriously knit for a while, and when I moved to Salt Lake City, I took up crocheting. I crocheted a lot of hats - because it is SO much easier to crochet a hat than it is to knit one - and a baby blanket or two or three. I also made the Engelberts, an alien, and Yoyo the Bunny.

I got bored with yarn crafts, so I grabbed an embroidery needle and some thread and I've picked up cross-stitch. It's fun, but time-consuming. Along with the cross-stitch, I decided to learn how to use the sewing machine I've had in a box for two years now.

Birthday present for Jake's mom.

Birthday present for Camille's cousin.

I went through a bunch of my old clothes today and made a toss pile. But instead of taking them to DI like I usually do, I'm going to cut them up and practice making stuff. Right now, a little quilt for Camille. It's components right now are a Napoleon Dynamite shirt, a Teen Girl Squad shirt, and one with this owl on it:

Let's see how it turns out!