365 Days- Book I

127. Know-it-all

November 4, 2018

"Write about something you are very knowledgeable about, for example a favorite hobby or passion of yours. "

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I will not claim I am an expert but then it is a hobby that I have a lot of passion for and I do have quite a few products to show off too. It is something I had learnt as a kid and has somehow survived my journey through adulthood and now give me great joy and comfort to indulge in. 

I will not ask you to guess, I am not sure if you would get it - it is crochet ((English: /kroʊˈʃeɪ/ French: [kʁɔʃɛ]) which is a process of creating fabric using yarn and a crochet hook. As my brother once said it is a wondrous process; one single hook, one strand of yarn and you can make it into anything, from a simple belt to gigantic blankets. It is a versatile process for any raw material that can be made into strings (even old t shirts or plastic bags) can be crocheted into a finished product.

A very simple technique, crochet consists of one loop on the hook, at any time, with all the preceding loops 'locked' and when done with fine thread you get lacework. In fact there is a town in Andhra Pradesh, that specialises in thread crochet and its products are known world over as Narsapur lace;  it has the largest concentration of crochet lace artisans in the world with over 1,00,000women home based lace makers located in the two adjoining districts of West and East Godavari.

Crochet is a versatile craft and since it uses only one hook and one loop, it is easier to make large pieces. Another unique factor about this craft is the use of granny squares (which is a misnomer for they can be made in all shapes ) which are individual squares (or rounds or hexagons) of a single design and multiple number of such pieces are joined to make one large shawl or blanket.

And when you crochet with wool, you can make scarves, caps, mittens, boots and sweaters, not to mention baby blankets. I have made so many baby blankets though unfortunately not even one for my nephew (which is because the moment I open my crochet bag, he wants to know what his aunt is doing, maybe this winter I will finally get around to making a blanket or two for him). The best part of about them is that once they grow older, you can simply join the smaller blankets to make a patchwork larger one.

Crochet is not only simply granny squares as above, there are complicated stitches which need a lot of  skill and effort, not to mention the yarn, but the end results are worth it, not less than any artwork. This is on my to do list for ages:

Though I did manage to finish another huge project, I did in thread so it did not turn out to be large enough; someday I shall redo it in wool, it would give me a blanket suitable for a double bet.

In the past few years, a practice called yarn bombing, or the use of knitted or crocheted cloth to modify and beautify one's (usually outdoor) surroundings, emerged in the US and spread worldwide. Yarn bombers sometimes target existing pieces of graffiti for beautification. In 2010, an entity dubbed "the Midnight Knitter" hit West Cape May. Residents awoke to find knit cozies hugging tree branches and sign poles. In September 2015, Grace Brett was named "The World's Oldest Yarn Bomber". She is part of a group of yarn graffiti-artists called the Souter Stormers, who beautify their local town in Scotland. When she is not yarn bombing, she is utilizing her craft by making items for her children and grandchildren.

I simply love crochet, the yarn winding through my fingers, looped around the hook and completed, one stitch at a time, slowly the colours change and patterns emerge - to form blankets and booties, mittens and shawls - each an expression of love from me to the recipient. For me crochet is a way of saying how much they mean to me...

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Word count 800