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ENTITY shares why you should pick up a knitting hobby.

As a child my favorite thing to do was watch my great-aunt knit and crochet. She could do all kinds of cool things with her hands, but turning yarn into complicated designs within a blanket or baby clothes was mind boggling to me. How was this woman able to take piles of yarn and weave them all into multicolored patterns before my eyes? My great-aunt taught me to knit and crochet, but I stopped doing them for a long time. Once I started college, however, I returned to these activities as a way to pass time and to save money.

I picked up knitting and crocheting again because I was a poor college kid who still wanted to give cool gifts to my friends and family for the holidays. At that time, I wanted people to think of me as the resourceful and creative woman who made socks for everyone in her family in time for Christmas. The cool girl who brought her latest sweater project with her to appointments and to casually pass the time. The experienced yarn connoisseur who knew all the craft lingo and all the best sources for supplies and inspiration. And I wanted all this to happen within the same year that I picked up knitting and crocheting again. That didn’t happen, unfortunately. But I was able to find a hobby that helped me decompress after a long day at school or work. And once I finished my first project (a knitted and very lopsided scarf) the pride I felt for that ugly thing fueled me through finishing more projects and learning new techniques.

I didn’t know this when I started, but there are plenty of health benefits to knitting and crocheting. For many, these simple acts are calming and act as a sort of meditation once you find a groove. These crafts have also been known to help people quit smoking and treat disorders like anorexia nervosa because they make the mind focus on the repetition of the task. And done the correct way, needlework has also helped people whose hands suffer from arthritis. Aside from this, finishing projects also gives a great boost of confidence when you need it.

So if you do decide to pick up knitting and/or crocheting do yourself a favor and START SIMPLE. Don’t just jump headfirst into making your own sweater (or socks for the whole family). Needlework requires exact movements which require practice on your end. Go to any craft store and buy cheap needles to start. You don’t need to splurge on the luxurious brands until you get used to doing the deed and you figure out the specific things you want in your needles. For knitting, however, I do recommend buying longer needles rather than short ones. They’ll feel awkward at first, but at least you won’t spend most of your time in the beginning trying to keep your project on the needle. As for the yarn, I would buy a reliable brand for a good price. I usually go with Lion Brand or Red Heart because regular craft stores have them for a good price and I know they’ll survive all the tugging and knotting.

To help save you some heartbreak in the future don’t pull off too much yarn while you work. Just don’t. Even if you think the amount you’re pulling off the skein (ball of yarn) isn’t that much, it gets knotted very quickly nevertheless.

Lastly, start with mastering the simple knots and working from there. I immediately tried for the broomstick lace stitch when I started crocheting and I didn’t even know how to do a basic double crochet. For crocheting, master the chain stitch and single and double crochet first. For knitting, know how to knit and purl stitch in your sleep before moving forward. And for both of these activities you’re going to need to learn the slip knot. There are plenty of different ways to do the slip knot and all the other stitches online, so choose the techniques that work for you.

Hopefully learning these two hobbies will be as enjoyable as they were for me. Just remember to be proud of anything you do in the beginning because finishing a whole project is always the hardest part of getting into needlework. And everything will look lopsided or ugly to you in the beginning. Just keep practicing and soon you’ll have a creative and cheap way to give gifts  and possibly make some side money by selling your creations.

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