On-Going Project Today: Crocheted Candy Apple Shrug, Lion Brand Yarn
Project Inspiration: Crocheted flower amalgam peices
Soundtrack: Remember My Name, Fame (soundtrack)
“So, you’re going to teach young women to knit, and make them little domestics?”
…This, sadly, was an actual question put to me in college while I was planning my first yarncraft workshop. The workshop itself was a huge success, but his lingering comment from a colleague still bothers me. Hosting my first workshop was a big deal – I felt it was my graduation from novice to beginner… if that makes the amount of sense to you that it does to me. My yarncrafting had been extremely rewarding for me, and for some bozo that had never picked up a skein to claim I had set up a factory for Stepford Stitchers?! Outrageous!!!
Thankfully, this moment was one of those fantastic fusions of the “I know exactly what to say!” moment, and the “My reflex reaction is SO much better than pulling the punch!” moment.
“You never make someone less of an independent by giving them a new skill!” Perfect closing, complete with elevator doors closing on said bozo’s face. My workshop was a huge success – a large, mixed crowd interested in learning the craft that had begun sweeping campus arrived, learned from me and from one another, and I picked up a couple cool tricks too (including the super-handy cast on method I call the Gun-Slinger Cast On, detailed HERE).
The take away message? Craft non-believers are out there. But the more we do, the more we create and the more we enjoy ourselves, the more 2 things happen:
1) They get less and less evidence they have that crafting is for shut ins and campers,
2) The less their opinions matter! If you’re having fun doing something you love [without putting anyone at risk, a disclaimer should read], what does it matter?
