It's Only The Beginning

When I was a child my mum used to crochet us scarves for the winter, with little tassels on the ends.  I used to watch her crocheting and beg her to teach me (my dream at that tender age was to one day make my own tassels!).  I vaguely remember her always trying to put me off, but I was persistent and stubborn so one day she taught me how to chain stitch.  She had a little test for me...If I could crochet a chain then unravel it cleanly without the wool getting caught up in itself, she would teach me how to crochet!

What a task!  With great pride I would diligently chain, then try to pull it out.  Time after time it would get caught up in itself and even when I thought I'd finally gotten it, I'd proudly present the chain to my mum and she would pull the end, only for it to always get tangled and stuck.  She refused to teach me the next step in crocheting until I passed that test.

I finally taught myself how to crochet from a couple of craft books that my dad had bought for me (no YouTube back in those days!) and promptly stopped crocheting.  I never did make that scarf with tassels.

I picked up crocheting again in Year 8, making a few shoulder bags with the aim of selling them to friends.  I sold a grand total of 2 and that was the end of my crocheting career.  Throughout high school I dabbled in making the odd crochet lace square or circle but never really finished anything.

After years of being busy with full-time work and other hobbies, I started getting the urge to get back into craft again.  I stumbled across sock monkeys and tried my hand at making some using stripey socks.  I was a bit too ambitious as I had trouble getting my stripes to line up and had problems with my sewing machine's tension wheel.  I managed to finish one, but didn't enjoy the process.  Sewing just wasn't to be my thing. 

Whilst flicking through a Lincraft catalogue (loooove junk mail), I came across a book called "Hello My Name Is Amineko" by Nekoyama.  Nekoyama published her Amineko Life book in Japan in 2005 but it wasn't until 2010 that it was translated and released in English.  This book, for me, was the beginning.....