I'm not sure if there's already a post like this...

[bethintx1]

When I was nine, my cousin showed me how to make a granny square so I could make a baby blanket for my older sister who was pregnant. When I was 13 I was staying with my aunt while my parents were out of town. She taught me how to read patterns, and do the other stitches. I have never looked back! I even had a couple of patterns published while in High school and college. I taught myself how to knit using a book. I learned even more stitches watching Knitty Gritty on TV during the last few years.

[Pyroteca]

I too come from a long line of crafty women. My great-grandmother crocheted, creating at least three beautiful thread bedspreads. When I was 8, my mom taught me how to knit. I did pretty well, but it did not hold my interest.

 

When I was 12, a friend's mother was crocheting her an afghan, and when I asked she agreed to teach me how to crochet. The first thing I made was a small granny square afghan. Unfortunately, the only real stitch that I learned was the double crochet and chain stitch.

 

Years later, when I moved in with my husband, he noticed my afghans that I had made and brought with me, and said how much he liked them. He encouraged me to buy a book and teach myself how to do other stitches and more complicated patterns. I haven't looked back since. He has been so amazingly supportive of my craft, even going so far as to buy me yarn for different occasions because he loves the things that I make.

 

My latest accomplishment was learning to knit socks on double-pointed needles from a book. I am now on my third pair of socks.

 

It is nice because I have since learned that almost all of the women in my family were crafty, and I am just keeping up a long tradition.

[Trinket]

When I was a young child, I recall having found some yarn, crochet hooks, and knitting needles in the bottom of a box in my grandmother's bedroom closet. I forget why I was looking there, but I do remember that I liked the yarn, and I wanted to knit like I saw them do on TV. Though, I had never seen either my mother or my grandmother crocheting or knitting. A couple years after that discovery, my mother did end up knitting some things. They were a pair of useless baby booties (as there were no infants in our family and none would arrive any time soon) and a beret in colors I didn't like for me. I didn't care for the colors (it was left over baby yarn), but my mom had made that hat for me, so I wore it anyway.

 

As a child, it never crossed my mind to ask my mother or grandmother to teach me those crafts, so I never did learn. And after the couple little things my mom knit, I never saw any of the hooks, yarn, or needles again.

 

Some two decades or so later, my mother got a wild hair when she found out there was a crocheting club at our local library. She'd never learned to crochet, but she wanted to, so she went there. I didn't go at first. She did finally convince me to go, though I thought I wasn't interested in it at the time.

 

The "instructor" gave me an H hook and some scrap yarn, showed me once how to make a chain, and then walked away. By the time she'd come back a few minutes later, I had a 10 foot long chain and was asking if I could move on. For some reason, the "instructor" didn't want to show me anything beyond a chain that day. But one of the other crocheters there saw that I was frustrated in my limitation, so she let me borrow her pattern book, which had instructions for various stitches in the front of it. I looked onto the book and had taught myself single and double crochet by the end of the meeting. The next week I came back wearing a beret similar to the one my mom had made me when I was just a girl... except it was in the colors I preferred.

 

And then, as if it were crack, I was fully addicted with a huge stash of yarn and patterns and I'm ALWAYS working on something.

[ScoobyDoo0811]

Wow!!! Some great stories here. My grandmother and all her sisters were crocheters. As a child I spent many hours watching my grandmother and great aunts crochet. And they crocheted everything!!!! At the age of 7, my grandmother finally taught me. My mom and her two sisters could crochet also but only done so off and on through the 70's and early 80's, and mainly made sweaters and other wearables for themselves and all the kids . After I learned all the stitches, I would crochet off and on. I would take it in spells. Then in Jr High School we had to crochet a scarf in Home Ec class and I breezed through mine in a day and helped some of the other girls who were just learning. In my high school years I lived with my dad and step-mother. My step-mom can crochet and knit but doesn't do it regularly, but between her and my dad's sister (also a crocheter), got me motivated to crochet again. I then took a very long hiatus again after having my two children and getting involved in a bunch of other crafts. I have been actively crocheting again for the past 10 years or so. I am very glad that I picked it back up mainly because I enjoy it and because my aunt (mom's youngest sister) just passed away a few months ago, and she had started a blanket for her grandson that she didn't get to finish. My cousin asked me if I would finish it and I did. All that needed to be done was a border. It gave me so much joy to be able to finish that blanket. Now that I have started back full swing, I don't think I will ever put my hooks down. I still go thru spells of not crocheting but only for a day or two, not years and years at a time like in the past.

[irishrose]

There are a few "crafty" women in my huge family, but I don't think anyone crochets. I actually learned from a boyfriend when I was 20. He started helping me make an afghan for my parents, but we broke up before it was finished. My MIL and my neighbor crochet, so I decided to pick it up again just recently (about 10 years later). I was very excited when my three-year-old saw the hat I made for my sister and decided she wanted one too! I let her pick out the color, and she loves the hat I made for her. Since I'm the only one in my family who crochets, I pray that my little one will ask me to teach her one day, and she will keep it going! Plus it will be so much fun crocheting with her and seeing what she can accomplish with some yarn and a hook!!