Back to school

It is that time of year again! It's back to school season and the air is changing. You can tell fall is upon us because of the cooler mornings and the cooler wind during the day. But we still have lots of warm sunny days ahead of us for sure!

As a child every new school year brought hope, excitement and dread all at the same time. You got new clothes, new school supplies and you couldn't wait to wear your new gear! Then the first day of school jitters come and you get on the bus and get to school and start seeing friends you haven't seen all summer and then you get anxious about who's in your class, who your teachers are, and if you're gonna have time to do the things you like doing the most.

My 13 year old daughter is preparing to go into the 8th grade. Her senior year of middle school and her first year of middle school in the English program. She decided not to go into French immersion again this year as she was not enjoying it. I really wish she would have stuck to French but I am not going to push her into something she isn't enjoying. I know she can learn how to speak French other than being in French immersion but my hopes were a little dashed when she came to me and asked me to put her into English.

I want to be there for my daughter. I want her to be able to come to me with anything. But being a teenage girl once also made me realize that she isn't going to come to me with everything. So I tell her she can still come to me with anything. And I know that she believes me when I tell her. I also want her to achieve more than I ever did in school and in life. And I tell her that. Being honest with her and encouraging her is the best thing I know I can do for her. And pray for her too :)

As this school year begins my prayer for my daughter is that she will learn lots, build dreams and goals for life, and remember her Mama loves her and always will. I want her to know that I am proud of her achievements and know she can achieve anything she puts her mind to. And I think that all Mama's can agree with me when I say I pray that she doesn't make the same mistakes I made at her age, that I can teach her from my experiences and that she will trust me when she needs help. Mama's girl isn't so little anymore but she will always be my baby girl!

My anxiety and my knitting

Life at times can be very hard. Especially in someone with extreme anxiety. I've always been a worrier but sometimes things can really get me down. There are just things in life that I cannot change and my mind doesn't think I should leave things be when really I need to let things be.

Today is one of those hard days. Its one of those days were I don't even want to get out of bed. I've tried twice already to get up and moving but I have ended right back under the covers. My mind won't slow down and let me relax. My body is aching and tired. And I crave sleep when it won't come.

Prayer has been one of the best answers to my predicaments, but my mind wanders after a while. And when you don't see God answering your prayers right away or even days after you start praying for a miracle you can easily start slipping into depression. God is good, he will always be there for me but he hasn't promised I would have sun shiny days everyday. So he handed me knitting needles.

When times get tough I can always keep my hands busy even if my mind won't cooperate. I can knit a dishcloth and not even have to think about what I am doing. As my body has a lot of aches and pains due to depression and anxiety I can even knit in bed. I had put my needles away last year for a few months due to neck strain and pain but found that it made my depression worse. So with my doctors permission in the new year I picked up my needles again and it has helped me through a lot of things I've been going through in life. 

The one thing I heard so much last year when I was going through a lot and had to put my needles down was "You may never knit again, you may have to give it up for good." Well I don't think hearing those words helped at all. Its like asking a writer never to write again. Or a baker never to bake again. Or even a singer to never sing again! If it was life threatening and I would die from knitting I would totally understand, but when you only have so many artistic outlets that help you cope it's like taking your oxygen away. Taking the one thing you love doing the most and saying you have to give it up to make others happy. 

So I continue to knit. Because I love it, and because it helps me. Sometimes its just better to follow your gut and not listen to the ones that think you need to be there for them before helping yourself. Cause if you can't help yourself how can you help others? Don't get me wrong, I love helping others. Its a great honor to help others when they need you, but sometimes you're the one that needs the help.  So don't give up. I don't plan on it ;).

Knitting Socks

I LOVE to knit different things. I love the challenge that comes with trying a new pattern, yarn and needles. But my most favorite thing to knit has to be socks. Socks are the one thing that everyone wears, everyone needs, and probably the most liked knitted item to receive as a gift, as I have observed anyway. 

In my observation, socks have been the one item that scares the beginner knitter. I have heard time and time again that the "Turn of the Heal" is something that they probably could never do. I had heard that so much when I was a beginner knitter that I went years before I decided that I would try to knit socks. I would look at a knitted pair of socks and cringe trying to think of how the knitter actually turned the heal. 

Then I decided just to look at a pattern for a basic sock. I mean, I had already been knitting mittens for years and could add a thumb how hard could it be to turn a heal right? THEN I realized something. I could read knitting patterns!! Smart I know!! If I could read a knitting pattern for mittens I could probably read a knitting pattern for basic socks :) So I did! I did it step by step. I went round to round, row by row until I actually finished a sock! Mind you my first socks toe is grafted sideways but my husband still wears them with pride :) 

It gave me a lot of confidence to knit socks. And also I had something I could knit for the "Boys" in my family for Christmas, the ones who wouldn't wear my hats and scarfs. But the one thing that was the most important for me about accomplishing socks is that I could turn the heal!! 

I taught a group of 3 girls back in May of this year how to knit in one of my knitting classes at the shop I teach at. They caught on fast and had done a dishcloth, and had a scarf and a hat started before the 3 classes were done. During the middle class the girls wanted to continue with another class after the beginner class was finished and they decided that they wanted to learn how to knit socks. I jumped at the chance to teach them socks as I didn't want these beginner knitters to be scared of knitting socks. So for the month of June in 4 Friday morning classes I taught these 3 girls how to knit a sock. We started at the cuff and worked our way down to the toe. We finished 1 sock by the end of the class!

The confidence in these girls after accomplishing a sock had just put a permanent smile on my face that day. They actually had made a sock! I keep in touch with the girls and they finished there second sock AND started more :) I am so proud of them! And I am so glad that they jumped right into socks and never looked back! I hope that all beginner knitters can look at socks as a great project to learn and that it doesn't have to be scary :) Cause they really are not that scary to knit!

Hobbies and Daughters

My daughter is my world. To me she is the sun that shines everyday even when it rains. To me, and I may be partial, She is the most beautiful 13 year old I have ever laid eyes on. She stole my heart 13 years ago when I first laid eyes on her and never gave it back :) She is smart, funny, and has a whole personality of her own. Sometimes I just don't believe that she actually came from me!

From the beginning she always was a happy girl. She is an only child and has always gotten all of our attention from the beginning. As an only child I guess I have always thought she would follow my footsteps in life, So I encouraged her to like things on her own and not because I liked them. And I found that I didn't have to push very hard for her to like things different than me :)

My daughter's hobbies include drawing, molding with clay, and a lot of iPod play time. She absolutely loves to draw and can draw better than anyone I have ever known. She's been drawing since she was little and it is one thing she continues to do while she has given so many other hobbies up. I can't draw, so watching her draw is so fascinating to me. 

While her hobbies differ from mine, I always have tried to get her to learn to knit. She asked me a few years back to teach her, so I did, but she just didn't stick with it. I would find a half used ball of yarn knotted with a few uneven rows of knitting on needles on the floor of her room. Of course as a Mom I would remove them from her room more for safety precaution than seeing the sad state of a great ball of yarn. 

In a way I wish she would have stuck with knitting. As a Mom I guess I just would love to have a hobby that I could do with my daughter. But then again maybe she wants me to learn how to play mind craft on her iPod so that I could play that with her. So for now I will not push her to do any hobby of mine that she doesn't want to do :) We may not have a lot in common but she still is the love of my life and her happiness means the most to me.

Maybe some day she will pick up knitting again :) Maybe she will pick it up after I'm gone just like how I started knitting again after my Grandmother taught me. Or maybe she will never pick up knitting needles again and always think of knitting as an "old person's" Hobby as she tells me :) Either way knitting will be in her life and she will always have warm socks and mittens to wear!

Knitting For Christmas

For the first time in years my dreams have started to come true. I'm knitting for a living. Actually I'm trying to knit for a living. I have started to work on that dream. I teach some knitting classes and have made a few new knitters in the past year. I absolutely LOVE the looks on my students faces when they have started a project and it starts to look like something. To make others goals come true has been very rewarding.

My grandmother taught me how to knit when I was a little girl. I cannot remember how old I was but I remember wanting to learn the popcorn stitch because she was making a baby sweater for one of my cousins babies and it was so beautiful. Though I was a kid I remember how hard it was to achieve that stitch and had made some barbie blankets because they were small and easy to make.

As most kids do, they give up on things early and so did I. But I did remember how to cast on and cast off and knit and purl when I picked up my needles again as an adult. Some things I guess take time to grow. I was afraid I couldn't make the things that my grandmother had made so I gave up young, but now I can make the things I watched my grandmother make when I was a child and I am so glad that her teaching me how to knit is one of my favorite memories ever. Its one of those memories I will always cherish because they were with her.

So along with teaching some knitting classes I have been knitting projects for friends who like what I have made. I made at least 3 Olaf's from the Disney movie Frozen and I have made things from hippo's to dishcloths and other things. I have turned down orders for things also because I don't have a lot of time these days. I really, really, really want to make all the things I have been asked to make, but because I still have to work for an hourly wage it doesn't give me a lot of time, and I really need to get a start on my Christmas knitting.

Knitting for Christmas is my most favorite knitting projects to make. For years that's all I made, Christmas presents. I made them to save money of course but also because I knew that they would not receive a present like the present I was giving them. Home made has always been my favorite gifts. My grandmothers neighbor had always knitted us children mittens for Christmas every year and she still continues in her 80's to make our children mittens every year. It was a tradition that I wanted to start also and have made my daughter something knitted every year since I started knitting again. I cannot wait to knit my grandchildren mittens every year!

I absolutely want to continue with my knitting for a living and hope that it will grow into my own little business some day, but I will always need to have the time to knit for Christmas. I would love to hear about your goals as a crafter and what traditions you have started or would like to start :) Like knitting for Christmas!

Dreams

Friday night I had a dream that I was at a party and I was arguing with my husband that I had to go to sleep cause I had to work at 11 am on Saturday. When I woke up I actually said "Phew, I did get some sleep".

Its funny how dreams can affect us sometimes. I felt tired all day Saturday because I felt like I actually partied all night Friday night and went to work on no sleep. Though I got 9 hours of sleep Friday night. I wonder if my brain actually slept, or actually partied all night?

Sometimes I hate waking up because I have visited my Grandmother who has been gone for 11 years now, and its like she never left. Sometimes I am so glad I woke up because in my dreams I started smoking again even though I haven't smoked in over 13 years. Sometimes you achieve goals that you are working on in life and sometimes you fail in your dreams. But in the morning its always just a dream and reality comes knocking and you need to forget or move past the dream you had.

I often find that dreams can make for some great comedy relief too. One time I woke up to my alarm and turned it off and rolled over and faced my husband who hadn't woken up from it. I looked at his face and all the sudden he said "Roar". I asked him "what are you doing?" and he answered, "I'm roaring" and started laughing as he started to wake up and realized what he was saying. He was growling at a coyote that had come into the back yard of our home. I smile every time I think about it :)

My friends have told me how they have woke themselves up laughing at there dreams but when they wake up they can't remember what was so funny. Sometimes we laugh in our dreams and when we are awake we don't find what was so funny in our dreams funny anymore. Which sometimes makes us laugh anyways.

My favorite dreams are of when I am in the house I grew up in as a child, or with family and friends I haven't been with in a long time. Those dreams take you down memory lane and help you not forget where you have come from and how far you have come also. Nightmares rarely are remembered in the future, in mine anyways, and even though they are scary at the time, they fade in memory and are always gone once you wake up. I have never held on to memories of my scary dreams and don't dwell on them. Id rather remember the good ones anyway :)

Some of the best dreams I have ever had where when I was wide awake. These are the dreams you can control. The dreams you actually make yourself and can change them if you want to. I find they make life better. Even if you don't fulfill some of your dreams you have made them and that's what makes you. Your dreams. They can give you hope. They can give you a reason to move on when you don't think you can. And sometimes they are an escape from the hard times. No matter what happens in life you will always have your dreams. Ones you make and ones you can't control, but either way, they can always make you smile :)

Glitter Nail Polish

Things in life can be so frustrating, like taking off glitter nail polish. You try and try and try, but the end results are that you end up scraping it off with a nail file or letting it wear off by itself. As pretty as it is in the beginning it still ends up blotched all over your nails and fingertips, a glittery colorful mess. And the sad thing about it, is that any girl who has used glitter nail polish has used it more than once because of the beginning results. Its pretty, its sparkles, it shows a little about our personalities and we never think of the end when its beautiful in the beginning.

So I try to think of some situations in life like glitter nail polish, its beautiful, sparkles, and makes you smile :). Even though sometimes the end result is ugly. And sometimes you think that maybe, just maybe this time it will be different and it will all come off easily. So you try again. Nothing wrong with trying again. Cause every situation is different, er....every nail polish is different. But taking off glitter nail polish is always going to be hard. Sometimes its worth the hard work in the end just to have that beautiful beginning.

Then again sometimes its just fun experimenting with different colors and sparkles. Sometimes you just jump in and get your nails wet knowing the end could be messy, but who cares, it was fun and no one got hurt. But sometimes it does hurt. Your fingertips are sore from all the scrubbing and dyed purple or green and don't match anything you want to wear. Then it's another lesson learned and you can think about changing the brand or color. Oh and remember not to do that again.

And sometimes you feel like you're going to have to call in the army to get it off. Though in reality you can't really call the army to get your nail polish taken off, in a lot of situations you can call your friends and family for help in life. And that's the best part! Cause you do have help! My family and friends are like calling in the army, they have always been there for me. They pray for me, talk with me, and in some situations get there nails wet too. And they also tell me what colors and brands not to use if they have went down that road before I did. And I can tell them to stay away from some too. Cause in the end that's what helps us through life and makes us smile :) even in the hard, messy endings.

I really like glitter nail polish. I think I will continue using it once and a while to give a little sparkle now and then :)

In the beginning I started knitting to make sure everyone had a Christmas present that year since the year before I didn't buy for anyone but my daughter as money was tight. I  made everyone a hat and scarf set all in different colors of course, and everyone loved them. Not sure if they loved them because they were home made or because they got something that year.

I wasn't working and it became a way to pass time also. Where I lived didn't allow me a lot of options on baby sitting or work, so I stayed home with my daughter till I could move back into the city. I took my knitting with me, though I set it aside for a while as I started working again.

I really missed it when I started working. I brought it to work with me a couple times but was embarrassed to knit in public at the time so I stopped as I wasn't working on it anyway. I worked on it when I watched my favorite TV show "House" once a week at that point but started to get bored of scarfs and hats.

My mother in law taught me how to knit mittens then, and the small project helped immensely as it didn't take as long to knit a pair of mittens as it took to knit a scarf. Though I remember forgetting to add thumbs a few times when watching "House" on TV and having to rip them apart.

Then a couple years after starting to knit I decided that I was brave enough to make my own sweater. Since I never knit anything for myself at the time and was afraid it would be a disaster I chose to make it for myself. I went to Zellers and bought $40 worth of variegated pink and purpleish yarn and started my journey. Knitting for myself and knitting a big project actually helped me to be brave and start knitting in public. Everyone who seen me knitting it loved it and would compliment me on what a good job I was doing. I actually felt I had a skill all of my own. I could do something all by myself.

Not sure why I felt I couldn't do things on my own before then, maybe I was just looking for something that was all my own.  Not that I couldn't do things on my own, I guess I wasn't following the crowd at the time. Chose a hobby that I could do alone, on my own, and feel good about it.

9 years later I am still in love with the art, and YES it is an art. One that has helped me in ways no one could imagine. Has helped me with my self esteem. Helped me cope with stress and anxiety, helped me get through the hard times when I couldn't concentrate on reading or focusing on the TV for an escape, it has even helped me think through some of the toughest decisions of my life. My prayer for all of you who reads this is that you find an art that helps you create, be yourself, and help you in ways you could never imagined. Sometimes I think knitting has saved my life, silly as it sounds, I don't know what I would do without it!