I'm Crochet-y, Are You?

In the beginning there were leftover chunks of thread which I turned into doilies. I was only about four, so most of these doilies were a 'little' ragged.

As time went by, I turned just about any size thread or yarn into just about anything from baby dresses to afghans to Christmas stockings. If I didn't crochet it, I knitted it, stitched it, needle-pointed it, or afghan-stitched it. Whether in front of a TV, on a bus, or after hours in a motel room, I just didn't stop. I gave stuff away until my family and friends started yelling, "ENOUGH!" But I had to keep doing, you know.

There came a time when I got laid off from my job and had to go to work wherever I could get which turned out to be as a telephone operator. If you've never done it, you can't imagine how stultifying it can be. It's little bursts of doing something stuffed between long, drawn-out periods of waiting — for anything!

After awhile, a lot of operators complained that they would go to sleep if they couldn't do something else while they answered the phones. The management agreed to give it a trial. Oh, glory be!

I tried reading, but I would get too involved in whatever I was reading and would forget to answer the phone. I tried cross-stitch, but that too frequently required two hands. I did knitting but dropped too many stitches while I avoided dropping calls. I was getting very discouraged.

Then I tried crochet. Voilá! It was easy to grab the crochet, thread, and hook in my left hand while I did whatever needed doing with my right hand. It focused my attention on my workstation rather than gazing around the room. My operator efficiency ratings jumped, and I made wonderful things, like baby dresses for granddaughters, the long panels for an afghan, and fancy ruffled doilies. However, again people started yelling; I was making too much!

Finally, I remembered that I had always wanted a lace tablecloth but never had the time to make one or the money to buy one. An aunt had made one, but then it went to another family member. I decided to make a tablecloth, so I started looking for patterns.

I need to go back a bit for this. If a pattern was simple enough to keep in my head, I was ok. But if it needed constant checking to see what came next, it was impossible. Then I hit on Post-It Notes — the most helpful invention for handcrafts that require patterns that was ever invented. Sometimes I would have half-a-dozen different colored Post-Its stuck all over a pattern to keep myself going. Working, though, was different. I just didn't have time to keep looking at the pattern, even when it was thoroughly marked. I was shot down again.

When I was little making those awful tangled messes of doilies, I made them up, because I couldn't really read yet. Thinking I could do that again, I bought a huge ball of string and a crochet hook and started making a doily out of my head. It wouldn't lay flat, so I'd rip it out and start over. It kept me occupied and out of trouble.

Then one day it worked. It was flat. I added pineapples. I bought more thread. The rays going out were working, so I made more rays. The whole thing looked a little boring, so I made more pineapples. I bought more thread. I made pineapples until I couldn't stand pineapples.

The bag in which I was carrying all this seemed a little heavy, so I thought I would see just how big it was. It had been several months, and, while I had pulled a lot out, I'd also done a lot. No wonder it was heavy; it was huge! I laid it out on my table, and it hung over all the way around. Finally I had a lace tablecloth. I just needed to figure out how I was going to finish it.

I had seen an edging pattern that was a little intriguing, but now I couldn't find it. Try as I might, it just wasn't findable. I went to work trying to remember what it looked like. I tested and tried and fussed, but it just wouldn't come. One of my test projects looked really neat, but I couldn't remember how I'd done it. I pulled it out one stitch at a time and wrote it down as I went. It was complex! much too much for doing at work. Besides, management was grumbling that most operators were slowing down and not giving as much service as before.

It took me another two months to put that edging on at home in my spare time, but I love it. I have a new smaller table, and it hangs down further in the back than in the front. It has stains and a few raveling threads. I didn't have time to fix 'joins' between balls of thread, so there are many knots that show. Babies have yanked it, and the new puppy tried to chew it. But I know I'll never have another. Like it? You, too, can make one. You just have to figure out how I did it! :-)))

Georgia's Custom Xstitch
Aurora, CO
Phone: 303-368-7484
http://www.customxstitch.com