My earliest memory of doing needlework goes back over 40 years to when I was ten or eleven years old. That summer my mother taught me how to crochet. I don't recall asking her to teach me or even showing any particular interest in crocheting. One evening, though, under the yellowish glow of the living room lamp, I found myself sitting next to her, with a cool metal J crochet hook in my hand and a ball of yarn snuggled next to my thigh.

Mom taught me two things: how to crochet a chain and how to do the single crochet stitch. From there it was a simple leap to connecting the chain to make a circle, and then doing the single crochet stitch in each link of the chain, and then in each single crochet, around and around. She showed me I needed to put an extra stitch in now and then, else the circle would remain tight and the middle would round up, making the whole piece look like some kind of wooly sombrero. If I put in too many extra stitches, my piece would develop a ruffled effect.

I think Mom's notion was that I could crochet little round doily-like mats out of yarn. Even at that age I was ambitious and pragmatic, and I decided a rug would be more satisfying. Never mind that old leftover sweater yarn was poor material for rug making; I set to it with that thick hook in my child-small hand, becoming more adept as I stitched round after round, ripping out my stitches if my rug became sombrero-like or ruffly. When I ran out of yarn, I haunted my mother's "rag bag" (her stash of bits and pieces of fabric and other goods) until I found a new shank of this and that. I didn't worry too much about whether colors matched. The point was to make my crocheted round as big as I could manage.

At last I'd come to the end of the salvaged yarn, or else the round would become too big to handle easily (usually about 2-1/2 feet across), and I'd pull the yarn through the final loop and study my finished rug. Then, with no other material I could work with and wanting to experience the soothing activity of crocheting once again, I'd unravel the rug, rolling the yarn into a single large ball, and start my rug anew. I probably re-made that rug five times that summer.

I don't know when I abandoned my first attempt at crocheting. Maybe schoolwork intervened, or maybe I got too hot with that fuzzy rug in my lap by August. I put aside the crochet hook and didn't pick it up again for about ten years. But a seed was sown that summer. I rediscovered the soothing pleasure of crocheting; and while it didn't make me feel like a kid with the ease of summer at my disposal, it did make me feel good. That's probably why I've stayed with it all these years.

--Nancy

I'll be blogging regularly in the Cross-Stitch + Needle Arts section. Stop by!