To Knit or Crochet? The Matter of Hobbies

To knit or crochet: that is the question. Whether ’tis nobler in the body to suffer the stings and sorrows of overstrained rotator cuffs or lay one’s arms against a heap of tangles, and by so doing attain skeins of ease. To doze, to jerk awake, and by waking add to the thousands of stitches yet unmade, ’tis a consummation devoutly to be wished. For who would bear the needles and hooks of time, the patient merit of worthy patterns, the enterprises of great intentions, with fingers flying to unveil hues of resolution? Such are freed to buy more yarn and do the whole thing all over again, but in different colors. Hobbies. You gotta love them, whether they involve standing on a stage reciting William Shakespeare or sitting alone in your garage patiently crafting fishing lures. They refresh your spirit by helping you escape into realms of imagination. Hobbies are good for the soul. Yet they’re not for everyone, especially folks who are working one or more jobs and raising one or more children and/or grandchildren. Those people are lucky if one of their hobbies includes cooking or tidying up. Even if they wanted to take up parasailing or painting, the odds of finding time, energy, and money are slim to none. They need to wait until the children leave home before they can even consider putting their toes into the ponds of leisure time activities. It’s a sad but realistic necessity to leave the above mentioned huge swath of humanity out of the hobby industry for the time being. Their day will come when they find themselves staring at the ceiling, wondering what to do for entertainment, and conclude a round of golf or a trip to the local hobby warehouse is in order. Meanwhile, there are those with unburdened hours who decide today’s the day they want to buy gel pen stress management coloring books. If you google “10 Most Popular Hobbies in the World” you may find this list, in order of favorites: Reading, Traveling, Fishing, Crafts, Television, Bird Watching, Collecting, Music, Gardening, Video Games. Not what you expected, is it? Clearly the authors of this list mingled all age categories. I know 11-year olds who would consider video games, television, and fishing the only relevant topics on the agendas. Bird watching, gardening, and traveling seem like good playmates for the adult and senior camps. Cooking is de rigor for Millennials, with maybe music thrown in. Reading is a category all its own and transcends all age gaps. I found it interesting that crafts rank only number four on this list. It was the first thing I thought of when considering the subject of hobbies. More shocking was seeing crafts as 25th in “Fifty Top Hobbies.” Clearly the people creating these catalogs don’t live in my head. So buckle up; we’re going to forget about all other hobbies and just focus on crafts for the duration. Among the top crafts for 2019 were “Dirty Pouring.” That’s where you buy paints in colors you like and pour them on a canvas or other surface and then mush them around. There’s no telling what will result, but it’s fun and you can still frame it and call it Art. Next comes Paper Flower Making. No, I’m not making this up. Go to your hobby store and look for the components and instruction booklets. No longer do you have to rely upon silk flowers for your home decor or gift wrapping. You can fiddle with paper and scissors and end up with fluff that lasts as long as it takes you to get bored and move onto the next craft. Pyrography. Fear not, it means wood burning. You use special tools that sear wood just enough to etch a pretty pattern but not enough to set the dining room table on fire (unless you don’t pay attention to where you set your hot iron pen). Your output can include wall art, place mats, coasters, trivets, or any number of Western-themed treasures that last longer than paper flowers. Candle Making is an age-old necessity turned into a useful hobby. Again, heat is involved and safety measures are wise, but the output results in endless supplies of hostess gifts and aromatic treasures embedded with sand, pebbles, glass, and other inspiring tidbits that add interest to your unique designs. Candle Making never goes out of style. Origami. What can I say? It combines puzzles, paper folding, and talking to oneself. Origami may be the purest form of action based meditation as far as crafts are concerned. I once attended a wedding where thousands of origami cranes were strung up rather than floral garlands. Just think how many happy hours were dedicated to folding figures of fidelity. Wabi Sabi. Imagine your grandmother’s favorite decorative bowl. Now picture it broken into pieces after you accidentally knocked it off its perch. Agh! What to do? Mix glue with paint that is NOT the same color as the bowl, and cement the pieces together. You’ve just created a new piece of art embracing the aesthetics of impermanence. Wabi Sabi applies to everything from tee shirts to shrines. There are kits that help you learn to craft imperfection and decay. Recycling. As a hobby craft? Why not? The notion is not new. Think of mosaics. Now imagine what you can do with burned out incandescent light bulbs, empty plastic cola bottles, used tires painted and stuffed for outdoor seating—the list is as endless as the mountains of materials we toss into the recycling bin every week. Trust me. It’s a hobby thing now. Calligraphy. Also a not-so-new hobby, it’s gaining interest as the ability to write in cursive is going extinct. Calligraphy is a substitute for gel pen coloring books when it comes to stress relief, or so people claim. (Personally, I think it’s totally stress inducing.) It also has practical applications, such as impressing your friends with thank you notes written with scrolls and flourishes. If they can’t read cursive, they can still enjoy the curlicues. Plants. Yes, growing plants is considered a hobby unless you live on a farm. You’ll need a potting area, potting soil, an aerator, trowels, watering cans, pots, plant stands, macrame pot holders, and saucers to put underneath all your pots to keep water from dripping on your Moroccan rugs, among other things. Oh, and seeds or seedlings. And bug spray, preferably homemade. Growing and maintaining plants as a hobby is a collector's dream come true. Quilting. You can relax. This is the last on the list of hot hobby topics for 2019. All you need is an $800 to $2,600 specialized quilting sewing machine and $300 worth of fabric scraps. Don’t let this deter you. When sewing our own skirts became more expensive than buying full wardrobes, fabric stores went out of business. New shops dedicated to quilting and quilter’s needs quickly took their place. These shops include quilting with buddies, formerly known as quilting bees. Just google it. There’s a shop in your neighborhood where they’ll help you get started. For a price. Now we’ve come full circle. To knit or crochet or both? After I retired and became hobby qualified, I took up knitting again (as opposed to before when I used to make my daughter wear homemade sweaters, much to her chagrin.) This time it strained my left shoulder, so I switched to crocheting, which is more relaxing for me. Both arms really do lay against a heap of yarn. I only use one stitch, the easiest beginner’s basic single crochet. So picture this: I’m slumped in my recliner with a pile of crochet stuff in my lap, arms relaxed, head nodding, the TV entertaining itself until I change the channel to an Indian movie with subtitles. When the action gets too violent or the musicals too stupid, I simply stare at my work in progress. Since I mostly use the same pattern, I don’t have to pay too much attention, just count to eleven over and over again. Eventually, somebody receives a handmade something. At the moment, I’m engaged with blanket number fifty-one. Yes, you read that correctly. Fifty-one afghans and counting, and that doesn’t include the special order dog blanket, nor the twenty-some scarves in requested sports team colors, a few beanies, and one set of coasters. Hobbies. Did I mention they tend to become addictive?