Dear Store Owner:
When I went into your shop today and asked about crochet items, I was sneered at by one of your employees who told me there was nothing there for me. I know it wasn’t you because no store owner would be crazy enough to turn away money in this or any economy.
I am bringing this to your attention because I feel certain that as a savvy business owner you would want all potential customers to be made welcome, and if I don’t share my experience with you, you won’t have the opportunity to fix it. So I will be back in your store in a month or so to give you a chance to rectify the bad impression you made. Shame on you if you make the same mistake twice, because neither I nor any of my crocheting friends will give you the opportunity to do it a third time.
Sincerely,
A Crocheter
The flip side of this is to make sure, when you see a growing selection of crochet items in your local store or someone goes out of their way to help you, that you leave a little of your hard-earned cash behind—and again tell them why.
Dear Store Owner:
So many independent yarn shops are not crochet-friendly that I wanted to tell you I was delighted by the excellent service I received today. I am happy to note that you are now carrying the newest crochet magazines. I want to let you know that I will buy the ones I don’t subscribe to already from you instead of the ginormous chain store, because I know my purchases make a difference.
See you soon,
A Crocheter
And then do it—support the shops that support your craft.
Complaining to one another is not going to change the ways of the fiber world but getting out there and making ourselves more visible might. If there aren’t any crochet lessons where you live, teach some. Wear your crochet with pride, and if someone confuses it with knitting, explain politely that it’s crocheted and what the difference is. If someone presumes that you only crochet because you haven’t learned to knit yet, tell that person that crocheting is your needlecraft of choice and you are quite happy with it—you crochet out of love for the form, not lack of knowledge or skill. Rioting is not the answer (although wouldn’t it be fun? A crochet riot? I can’t imagine!), but speaking up is. There are so many of us that eventually, people will have to listen.
Ten Things Crocheters Would Like to Say to the Rest of the World, but Most Times Are Far Too Polite To
“Oh, you can’t crochet with that.” Yes, in fact I can crochet with that. If it’s long and stringy, I can crochet with it. Hell, if I was desperate enough, spaghetti squash would look like a good substitute for yarn. Please stop telling me that yarn is only to knit with; it isn’t. Although there are certain yarns I wouldn’t want to crochet with, that’s not because I can’t but because I choose not to.
“I thought only grandmothers crochet.” Anyone can crochet—there is no minimum age requirement. I hope I am still crocheting when I am a grandmother. But last I heard, you don’t get assigned a hook and some yarn the minute one of your children gives birth (although it would be cool if we did!). There is no correlation between crochet and procreation. Unless, perhaps, you crochet sexy lingerie, but that is a whole different conversation.
“Oh, you are crocheting… do you want to learn to knit?’ I do knit, but it is not a higher life form or something for a crocheter to aspire to. It’s a different form of working with fiber. Neither is inherently better or worse; they are just different. But implying to me that I am too stupid to knit is eventually going to get me to do a little more than imply that you were too stupid to internalize the good manners I am sure your mother thought she taught you.
“Oh my goodness, I would never have time to do something like that.” I do not have more than the requisite twenty-four hours in my day, either, I just choose to do a little bit more with them. I won’t take shots at your sitcom habit, and you can stop assuming that my house is a mess and my dog unfed because I like to crochet in my free time. Well, my house is a mess, but I am pretty sure that even if I didn’t crochet, it would still be messy. And if I don’t feed the dog, she sits on the yarn until I do.
“You are crocheting for charity? Wouldn’t it be better to write a check?” In the words of the Beatles, money can’t buy me love. I do not give my work to others because I think it is subpar. I crochet for others whom I think need the tactile comfort a crocheted item can bring. You can’t cuddle twenty-five dollars, sleep under it, or wrap it around you and know that even if times are a bit bleak right now, someone, somewhere, wanted you to know that you were not alone. There are certainly times when a charitable donation is better made as cash, but I am not going to stop crocheting blankets for Project Linus any time soon, either. I put the best of my talents to use when I crochet for others—I am not giving it away because it’s awful, I am giving it away because I think it’s the right thing to do.
“What are you knitting?” I am not knitting; I am crocheting. And I truly don’t mind if you don’t know the difference—I may not know much about your obsessive hobbies, either. But when I say it’s crocheting, please don’t tell me, “Same thing.” They’re not. Separate but equal, but not the same. And if you don’t want to know anything at all about it, why did you ask what I was knitting in the first place?
“You can buy that dishcloth/baby blanket/scarf-and-hat set at Wal-Mart. Why would you waste time and money making it?” I could buy a hat at Wal-Mart but I can’t buy this hat at Wal-Mart. This hat is exactly the color, shape, fiber content, and style that I want. It is unique because it is handmade. And not only will I have a good time wearing it or giving it away, but I also had a great time making it. The one at Wal-Mart might be a bit cheaper but cheap isn’t always the most important thing.
“That’s way too expensive” in response to a crocheted item offered for sale at a market. May I direct you to a nearby Wal-Mart? Several people have told me just today that you can get really cheap dishcloths/baby blankets/scarf-and-hat sets there.
“You can’t make cables/fitted garments/socks with crochet.” Maybe you can’t, but I certainly can. Want to see?
“Wow, that’s really cool!” Want to learn? I can teach you—come sit here by me. Mwa ha ha ha ha ha …
Crochet Needs a Good PR Agency
There are those people, even in the yarn industry, who look down on crochet—they say crocheters are cheap; don’t read, make ugly home decor items and boxy, ill-fitting garments, all of which are made out of granny squares; and are trapped in the outdated past. Some of these thoughts are stereotypes, maybe with a very slight basis in reality, and some are just horse puckie. In thinking about things, I realized that crochet doesn’t need to change what it is to get more respect, but that we as its practitioners merely need to put a better spin on things. We don’t need anything but some good PR. Herewith, my answers to the naysayers—feel free to adapt them for your own personal use.
Crocheters are cheap. You say cheap—I say thrifty. And when did thrift become a sin instead of a virtue? If your project is going to require, conservatively, thirty million yards of yarn, does it make sense to spend a dollar a yard? No matter what your income, no one in the world is going to feel comfortable lying on the couch with the dog and a small leaky child or two cuddled under an afghan whose material cost would feed a family of four for a month, including dinner out once a week. And comfort is key—we crocheters want to wrap up the world in our crocheted hugs, one person at a time. We don’t want to be upset when something is used hard. We prefer to feel jubilation that we chose just the right combination of beauty and utility. Hardworking crochet needs hardworking yarn, and lots of it.
And for the odd project that requires less than a million yards, we will happily hit the LYS. It isn’t that we have an aversion to pricier yarns, but that we merely like to go yarn shopping without having to arrange for a second mortgage ahead of time. Cheap? Nah, smart shoppers.
Crocheters make ugly things. Although crocheters might make certain styles of ugly things more than other crafters (I have to
own up to the toilet paper covers and the bed dolls right now and get it over with—sorry, if you love them, but neither are objects of high style no matter how beautifully executed), we certainly don’t have the corner on the shameful craft project market. You want to mock the ’70s? Anyone remember macramé plant hangers that dripped from every ceiling? Or how the people who made a hobby out of burning brightly colored candles in chianti bottles until they had a wax sculpture that took up half the living room? Let’s talk about woodburning as home decor rather than a Scouting project. Ugly craft projects abound—and they aren’t all crocheted.
Crocheters don’t read. Seriously, there are books on knitting history, books of knitting humor, books on the knitting lifestyle, and books and books and books of knitting patterns. What do we have? Um, this book you’re reading and about a thousand leaflets. It isn’t that I won’t read about crocheting; it’s that there haven’t been all that many books available to me that piqued my interest. It’s the conundrum of craft publishing. Are there no crochet books because they don’t sell, or do crochet books not sell because there aren’t enough good-quality ones published? And please don’t show me the alleged bicraftual books that advertise themselves as “110 Fill-in-the-Blanks to Knit and Crochet.” Of the 110 patterns, 108 of those will be for knitting and only two will be crochet, and one of those two will be ugly. There isn’t a crafter in the land who will pay $24.99 for just one pattern, any pattern.
The real reason I think this particular hobbyhorse got started is that so many of the crocheters I have met learned to crochet without learning to read patterns first. Crocheters as a group tend to be very visual. I don’t know many knitters that can avoid the siren song of a cool knitting book even if they have just started knitting, whereas I know many crocheters who have been crocheting for years without ever cracking a book—especially if they love to make afghans. I could make a dozen afghans off the top of my head with stitches that I already know and don’t really need a book to tell me how to do it. It’s the nature of crochet.
A corollary of this “crocheters don’t read” myth is that crocheters copy patterns. As in make copies of bought patterns to pass to their friends, thus ensuring that the friends don’t go buy the pattern themselves and meaning the publisher, and by extension, the author/designer don’t get paid. I don’t know that crocheters are any more likely to do this than knitters or if they are just getting tarred with the “cheap” brush again. I do know that if one more person tries to sell me a crochet design that is the same granny square jacket that has been published since 1968 I am going to scream. I do not need to buy a pattern to make a granny square—I have been making them since 1968, myself. Show me something beautiful and innovative, and I will buy it.
Crocheted fabric doesn’t drape. Crochet by its very nature has a structural quality—that is one of its best features. Of course, if you make a jacket out of single crochet with a giant hook and yarn the thickness of rope, you will get a sturdy garment with no drape at all. In fact, the boxier patterns out there might serve as storm shelters that stand up on their own if the circumstances demand it. However, use a smaller hook, some DK-weight natural fiber, and an open stitch, and you can wind up with a diaphanous piece of wonderful that clings in all the right places.
Granny squares are the (square) root of all evil. Despite the great amount of time I spend weeding through antique and vintage crochet patterns (pretending it is work instead of procrastination), I haven’t quite figured out when the granny square first came about, and if it was called a granny square at that time.
Granny squares are wonderful things—portable, customizable, and the perfect building blocks for items that are square or rectangular. I think the problem came about when the granny migrated from afghans to sweaters—some boxy sweaters are not a bad thing, but millions of them are a bit boring from a fashion standpoint. This does not mean that making granny squares is a bad thing, but that their use should be confined to appropriate projects.
Crochet does not have the history that knitting has. Crochet might or might not have a long and distinguished history, but I don’t know because what we don’t have is a definitive crochet history book. Most likely, modern crochet didn’t get codified until sometime between 1835 and 1845, which makes it an infant in the world history of needle arts. Many early crocheters were imitating the much more expensive and time-consuming craft of making point lace. Thread lace, which went on to turn into dress fronts, lingerie trim, and doilies, eventually migrated into yarn crochet for both home decor items and warm garments such as a sweater. Crochet may not have been around for thousands of years, but because of the large numbers of crocheters on planet Earth, it has developed new branches and forms almost nonstop. The thing about crochet’s history or lack thereof is that I don’t think most of it has happened yet—the things we do today will inspire the crocheters of the future.
Only old ladies crochet. Actually this last accusation tends to be thrown at both knitters and crocheters by those who aren’t capable of doing either. Generally, I just raise my eyebrows at this one and point out that I do not consider myself old. I can’t wait until I reach the age where I can just whack the ill-spoken lout with my cane and get away with it.
Crocheting has some real benefits to those of any age—it keeps the mind as well as the fingers agile, and being part of a like-minded community can combat loneliness and stress at any age. When I am an old woman I may not wear purple, but I will definitely crochet with it and any other color I can get my hands on. Hell, I might even relent and make a toilet paper cover; you just never know.
Granny Gets a Makeover
Why is it that the mainstream media can’t resist taking shots at Granny? Every time crocheting gets labeled cool or trendy, someone somewhere, who I am sure thinks that he or she is being very clever and original, says, “This is not your grandmother’s crochet!” Like that’s a good thing. One of the things I like about crochet is that my mother did it, and my grandmother probably did, too. I personally don’t want to disengage from Granny but to take her work and move forward from it.
And what do we as crocheters have named in Granny’s name? The granny square. The poor granny square gets mocked from time to time, particularly in reference to some of those boxy, clunky, garment styles from the 1970s.
Granny squares don’t need to be changed, but I think they need a little PR. Some clever designers have taken to referring to any sort of repeatable unit, including granny squares, as “motifs.” This is a great idea—let the art of the pattern speak for itself without any knee-jerk negative connotations drawn from the name. I probably wouldn’t look twice at a pattern called Granny Square Poncho but I would be intrigued by a Square Motif Wrap.
So I propose a new nomenclature … instead of being a granny square, a particular motif could be called, I don’t know … Jenny or Tiffany … or Kate. Jenny could be hip and trendy, whereas Granny might be a little old fashioned. Tiffany could be lightweight and drapey, whereas Granny might be a little stiff in the joints. Kate could be sunny and warm without being a mélange of too-bright colors like Granny was in her hippie days. It’s the same great square, but a new name that doesn’t carry the negative connotations of the past.
I Am Not a Hooker
I don’t want to be a wet blanket who takes all the fun out of wordplay, but I have to say, the whole “crocheters are hookers” thing makes me a little nuts. In my own personal opinion (and you may certainly disagree), crochet gets little enough respect in the world at large without calling its practitioners the same name as those who ply their trade at the world’s oldest profession.
Why is it that crocheters have to be called anything other than crocheters? Is it the dicey spelling? Is it supposed to make us more palatable to the noncrocheting world? Are there any cutesy names for knitters that I am missing? At the risk of sounding like a bad Seinfeld parody, what’s up with that?
One yarny magazine for which I wrote wanted to avoid the whole hooker issue an
d referred to crocheters throughout as loopers. Loopers? That brings up pot holders for me but, okay, at least it doesn’t have a preexisting negative connotation.
Sometimes a group needs to fight for their label in the interest of self-respect. When I worked on costumes in the entertainment industry, I always identified myself as a tailor or a stitcher. But that had a spelling reason. Think for a minute, how do you spell the word meaning one who sews, which is pronounced soh-er? Sewer. How do spell that underground morass filled with waste water, which is pronounced soo-er? See? I want to be confused with a dank underground cesspool even less than I want to be confused with a lady of the evening.
The problem with words that identify a person with one craft or another, is they aren’t real helpful for those of us who are multicraftual. Does identifying a person as a crocheter or a knitter (or a spinner or a quilter) mean that they do just that craft and no others? That seems a little limiting to me. That single-craft identifier can lead one trippingly down the primrose path to stereotyping as well—it’s easy to make a generalization about a small group if that group is identified as “other.” And now I sound like a bad sociology professor instead of a stand-up parodist—sorry about that.
There are a lot of terms describing a practitioner of the world’s oldest profession—lady of the evening, streetwalker, escort, hooker—because polite society does not want to come out and say “prostitute,” which is what one is talking about. The less descriptive terms make the job more palatable in conversation.
Hooked for Life Page 9