Doing Hard Things

I was reading something recently (I can't remember what it was--a book? a magazine? a blog post?) in which a mother told her child whenever (he? she? they?) struggled with something, "You can do hard things."

A few months ago, when I first picked up a crochet hook, to try to make little rock cozies, having only ever crocheted a hat, it was hard.

I had always thought of crochet as knitting's easy kid sister, but I found not only my yarn twisting up in tangles, but my brain, too. Knitting I understood--you put a row of loops on a needle, as wide as you want your finished product, and add loops to the loops until it is as long as you want your finished product. You can increase or decrease, join to make a round, but it's easy to see that what's below the needles is what you've already finished, and the blank space above the needles is what you have left to do. It's all very, ahem, linear. Also, I grew up in the home of a knitter, and though I didn't teach myself to knit until after I'd moved away, I had seen sweaters and socks and hats and mittens grow on knitting needles my whole life.

Meanwhile crochet (at least what I was trying to do with it) went around in a circle, and there was no needle marking clearly, this is where I am, that down there is where I have been, up there is where I need to go. And the directions were confusing (why did single crochet involve two steps, double crochet three, triple crochet four? Eventually I figured out that the first step was just creating a loop, not actually making a stitch). I started and discarded. Started and discarded. The whole time, I felt my dendrites growing, my synapses snapping, my myelin sheaths thickening. I figured out hook gauges (the number goes up as the size goes down) and yarn gauges (ditto). I finally found the right sized hook (it had to be bought in a package of ten) to go with the right sized thread (#12 perle cotton). I tried different sets of directions that explained things differently (and more clearly, for my brain).

I tried and tried again, and finally figured it out (I still have to look things up--like half a double crochet--and I can't just wing it, making up my own pattern as I go along, but then again I can't do that with knitting, either).

I think I've successfully staved off at least a year or two of Alzheimer's disease with the mental effort I put into it (take that, Sudoku!). And now, when my kids struggle with something that is challenging--drawing or spelling or piano or baseball--I can tell them honestly, "You can do hard things. And it will feel so good when you do."

(More stones here, here, here, and here)

Weekend Things--Reentry

We had a quiet weekend, getting back into the swing of a normal life. Shuttling kids to friends. A walk in the woods for the first time in a very long while.Journaling while E smashed ice with a pole.Catching snowflakes.A rare moment of brotherly love. 

A bit of progress on M's neverending quilt.And a couple more rocks.The first one I made while watching Jeeves and Wooster DVDs with Milo and the second during Downton Abbey and Sherlock.Two of my mentors to whom I gave rocks from the last batch saw the most lovely metaphors for writing in them––about putting unlike things (rock and lace) together, how the lace bends around the rock, how it looks impossible to do, but it's not. I wish I could remember only a fraction of what they said. By contrast, I was showing the finished rocks to a crafty friend at work when one of her coworkers walked by and said, "Crocheted rocks? Now that's proof that someone has too much time on their hands!" This is why I much prefer the company of imaginative people.

Weekend Things, Inhale

The only word for this past weekend is "blustery." The wind blew and it blew and it blew, bringing with it lots of cold, Arctic air. The wind, combined with me feeling a bit under the weather myself, made for a good weekend to stay inside and take care of indoorsy things.

I did make myself get out for just a bit each day, taking a short walk and finally planting the garlic (not a moment too soon). Last winter, the leaf mulch I put down blew away before we got snow cover. This time, I weighted it down with a few pieces of wood.

I also finally put the ol' punkin-heads to rest in the compost pile. It's sort of sad that Jack-o-lanterns only live for a night, so I like to let them extend their stay on my front step (though this year they might have over-extended by just skoch). 

It was nice to take a weekend to take care of very un-wordy things, after sending off a draft of my thesis to my mentor last Wednesday. While there was plenty I could have been doing (working on my presentation, writing a speech, designing a website, starting on a couple of essays I've been toying with), I rather reveled in not doing anything related to writing. I like the idea of artistic endeavors as a kind of breathing--with productivity as the exhale, and rest, inspiration, and refueling as the inhale. 

I think we need both, exhale and inhale. And after talking to my mentor on Sunday (seven out of nine endings need rewriting!), I have plenty of exhaling coming my way this week.

In the meantime, I did some catching up on housework that I'd neglected the previous weekend (how come it is never done?).

And sent the boys out in the wind to try to prevent the seven p.m. pillow fights that seem to break out when not enough fresh air and exercise has been had. M built a newspaper water bomb that exploded a bit on takeoff.

I also knit up the body of the first of E's mittens (during two more episodes of Ripper Street). I hope to do the second this weekend, and finish the thumbs. I love how the olive yarn looks with the Noro.

And I finally, finally finished one crocheted rock. I gave up on using the wool--it kept splitting, and in places was too thick--and switched to pearl cotton. I also bought the correct-sized crochet hook--I had been using a 10 when the pattern calls for a 9, and crochet hooks, unlike knitting needles, get smaller as the number goes up, so 10 was really tiny. But craft store doesn't carry single hooks in size 9, and I had to buy a package of six hooks in order to even get one (which explains why I hadn't bought it in the first place). I also realized that I should be using number 12 pearl cotton (not 8, which is what I used on the rock below). It's much, much finer, but only comes in very plain colors. I bought one skein of ecru, as well as some brightly colored embroidery floss. I'm going to see if a single strand of floss will work. I don't know why I'm so weirdly obsessed with figuring out how to do this right (I think I'm just indignant that it should be so damn hard!). 

Meanwhile, M, about whom I just said two weeks ago, "He has no interest in cooking," decided to make an apple pie. I helped out with the crust and peeling, and the general moral support (have you ever noticed kids just like you to be right there next to them while they do things?).

Sunday night, before he cut into it, he said, "You can come take a picture of it now if you want, Mom." (And C said, "You're almost as bad as your mother.").

When he looked at the pictures, he said, "Are you going to put that on your blog?" But of course!

Trying Something New

Last December, when my sister visited me, she crocheted a bunch of beach stones for me. My original plan had been for us to crochet them together, but it turns out that a couple of weeks before Christmas is not the ideal time for me to take up a new hobby.

I picked up a few stones off of the beach on Great Blasket Island and decided that now, finally, I would learn to crochet and cover them with lace. I did once crochet a hat for C, but I never really understood what was happening. Knitting I get––stitch by stitch, row by row––but crochet can do all kinds of crazy circular things that make my head spin. This past weekend, though, I finally got out my (tiny, tiny) crochet hook, a brand new skein of lace-weight yarn, and a photocopied sheet of crochet stitches. After many, many false starts, I finally put together something that sort of resembled the pattern, and I began to understand what was happening––or should be happening––beneath my fingers. I hope to get it figured out soon––I think these would make great gifts (who wouldn't want a lace-covered rock?). I just need a little more time, patience, and some decent task lighting (and maybe one of those giant magnifying glasses old people use for reading).