Wednesday, October 04, 2006

Happy late blogiversary to me!

Yesterday was my very first blogiversary...and I totally missed it! To celebrate, I thought I'd republish my very first post about how I learned to knit. Enjoy ;0)

{Hello World, October 3rd, 2005}

My mother was one of 24 chidren. Yup! No really! My grand-parents were farmers in rural Quebec and being good Catholics in the 1930s and '40s had a child every year they could. My grand-father passed away when I was 3, but my grand-mother lived to be 84 years old.

She spent the long Quebec winters in Rimouski with one of my uncles and his wife but in the summer she would pack her bags, her knitting needles and her yarn and travel down the St-Lawrence River to Montreal where she would visit with all her children and grand-children and great-grand-children. She would spend about a week at each of her childrens' homes and knit mittens and socks and slippers for everyone in that family and then moved on.

During one of those visits, she taught me to "tricoter a l'endroit" (knit) and "tricoter a l'envers" (purl) with some scrap yarns. (Did I mention she was french? In fact my whole family is...I'm the anomaly. More on that later, but now back to my knitting debut. ) My grandma would watch me knit and every once in a while, she would have to put down her mittens in progress and try to figure out where I went wrong. Somehow, I always ended up with too many stitches (which is weird because now I always seem to be loosing stitches!). Anyway, I would make a little square, get bored and go draw or play house instead.

My grandmother passed when I was a teen and it wasn't until my early twenties that I got the knitting bug from a Martha Stewart Baby magazine. I got myself some needles and cotton yarn and knit the garter stitch baby sweater. It was pretty much a bunch of rectangles seamed together into a buttonless cardigan but it looked pretty good. I made one for my nephew and put the needles away for another couple of years. I was working full-time and finishing my bachelor's degree on a full-time basis as well and just didn't have time for knitting. Textbooks occupied my commuting time.

I got married last year and moved to a new house in the suburbs. One of the implications was a 1h30 minute train ride each way to and from work and since I graduated and don't have any more required reading...I picked up one of Debbie Bliss' learn to knit books and the rest is history. The addiction began. I was encouraged by all the knitting blogs out there and now that I am at home on maternity leave with my 3 month old son, I have both the time to knit and a growing model for all those very cute and very quick knit baby sweaters and booties.

So expect to see a lot of baby knits 'cause he's always growing out of something...

Cheers!

{The continuation}

Of course Julian is now 15 months old and history is about to repeat itself as I am expecting my second child...so expect to see more baby knits in the future too ;0)

One of the things that really solidified my knitting career was that the week after our wedding, Stephen's job took him to Indiannapolis Mondays through Thursdays for 6 months! Here I was in a new house on an undeveloped street (basically, the woods!) far, far away from anything without cable or satellite which left me incredibly bored in the evenings!

Knitting really helped me get through this time. It was fun. It busied my commute and my evenings. And I keep such a good memory of that time even though I was seperated from my newlywed. All those nights spent bundled up on Stephen's side of the bed, wearing his woolies, listening to AM talk radio on our clock radio and trying to figure out different knitting techniques while I waited for our nightly call.

That's when knitting became more than a past-time for me. It became a part of who I am. So I'll always be a little grateful for those long lonely months ;0)

19 comments:

  1. Anonymous8:59 a.m.

    hihi, u inspired me to think about taking up knitting again. i learnt once when I was a teen and my mom was actually pulled in by me but became much much better at me doing sweaters and vests and such for me. Now we've both forgotten how! I'll be scouting around for a place to pick it up again, though we hardly need knitted things, even for kids, cos the weather here's so hot hot hot!

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  2. Wow, what a great story thanks for sharing.

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  3. Don't you love how you can put so many memories into those stitches?! Happy blogiversary!

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  4. Happy blogiversary! I missed mine, too, back whenever it was. Thanks for sharing the lovely story

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  5. Happy Blogiversary! What a nice story.

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  6. Happy Blogiversary! What a nice story.

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  7. One of 24??!!!!? Dear God! Let's write a book with the collected stories of how people have learned to knit. What do you say?

    Loved your post. You always put so much love into whatever you're blogging about. Seems like you really love what you do (knitting, parenting, "wife-ing")...that's why you're successful at it. What a blessing!

    Keep up the good work...you only have 22 more children to go!

    love,
    r

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  8. Anonymous8:51 p.m.

    lovely lovely post, anny. happiest of blogiversaries to you. hope you are feeling great, enjoying julian and your husband as much as you can, and looking forward to the adventures and wonderful times yet to come. miss you!
    xoxo
    ~j

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  9. Rimouski, eh? My parents are from Gaspe-one is French/Irish, the other is English to the core-they both got jobs in Baie Comeau, where they met and fell in love- and raised three girls! (But dad only had 15 brothers and sisters- and Mom was an only child!)

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  10. Anonymous11:03 a.m.

    I love the look of your bog.
    I am re-doing mine and taking note and completing all the ones I think are cute , helpful and different .
    You did a great job here !
    you go girl !!!!


    www.blackpurls.typepad.com

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  11. Happy Blogiversary!

    (still working on your markers...don't worry, I won't forget you)

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  12. Nice to hear someone's history. Espeically about "how or why I knit" ... I started out crocheting with my Great-grandmother. Nice memories & it sure sounds like yours are really nice also! Happy knitting.

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  13. Anonymous10:31 p.m.

    Anny, what a great story. My mum is the youngest of 9, which I thought was amazing, but 24? Holy cow. I haven't said CONGRATULATIONS on the newest expected arrival, so I am saying it now. All the best for a healthy pregnancy and delivery. I have enjoyed your posts and miss them when you don't, but understand that you have a lot on your plate now. Some more pics of the super cute jujube are always welcome though. What a sweetie.

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  14. I've been off line for a bit, and just want to say "CONGRATS" for both the baby news and the bloggerversiary!!! How fantastic!

    Thanks for reposting the first post, I really enjoyed reading it!

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  15. Happy Blogiversary!! Can't wait to see all the cute baby items you'll be making for baby #2!

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  16. Happy Blogiversary! Great story about your grandmother. 24 kids is an amazing number. What a woman!

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  17. Happy blogiversary!! And congrats on the baby. I keep meaning to de-lurk to say that! I hope you're feeling well. Can you imagine doing this 24 times??? That's 20 years of being pregnant. Ick.

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  18. Hey! Where are you?

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  19. Hey, I've missed you. Hope all is well and you're just too, too busy to blog.

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