20 down 14 to go

Since about August I have been furiously knitting and crocheting Christmas presents for my family and friends. My husband doesn't really understand the drive to create something for every person we know. I'm not sure if all men are like that but the desire to be able to hand someone a physical gift (or in my case, ship it to them) is so great that I just can't imagine not doing it. Don't get me wrong, I know that I cannot possibly hand make gifts for everyone. Still as my list of projects dwindles somehow I doubt it will ever be finished. That's mostly because as I see myself making progress I get more and more excited that I just might have time to add a few more names.
Luckily most of my crafty craze can be taken care of quite frugally. I've now found all of the random bargain stores that carry yarn and try to avoid the nice yarn stores at all cost lest I long for things like silk and cashmere to knit with. Making small gifts like hats, mittens, gloves, and scarves is so incredibly satisfying. Unlike most things in our lives crafts can be easily controlled, they can be met on our terms, and when all else fails they can be unraveled and begun again. I think this desire to create must be an inherited trait.
My dad was a minister until after I left for college but in most of his spare time (when he had it) I can remember him creating something. He built the first house I remember living in. Then it was an old Thunderbird that he repainted in the back yard. Later it was things like adding paving, and a deck, and a gazebo to our back yard. The list goes on. I remember him commenting once that it was nice to be able to see what he had done at the end of the day. So many of us have jobs that don't give us that intense sense of accomplishment. I'm not saying that what we do doesn't have an impact, it's just not something we can hold in our hand. The other lesson that I learned from watching him was one that took me a while to realize. I never saw my father look at a project and say, no, I don't think I can do that. Sure sometimes he didn't have the right tools or the money but in those cases the project was simply put on a list of "to-do's". But time after time I watched him go to library and get a book or ask someone who had done a similar project how to get started. I'm not saying we never ran into hiccups along the way but there was no fear of trying something new.
I didn't realize that fearlessness was such a gift until I began to knit and one of my friends mentioned how "remarkable" it was that I could make so many things. When she said it, I sort of laughed it off because I am in no way an experienced knitter, but after I thought about it for a while I realized that from the moment I decided I wanted to learn I never considered the thought that I might not be able to. I checked out a book at the library, borrowed needles from a lady at church and got started. Now here I am almost a year and a half later churning out hats, and slippers, and the list goes on.