Crochet Therapy and Handmade Kindness: Jenny Chapman Shares Her Story

Laura Hansen Breksa: when I can see the end zone, like when the theme from Chariots of Fire starts playing, like I'm almost done with it. That is actually when I go my slowest because I'm just like, ⁓ dear goodness, how much longer is this gonna be? How many more rows can I go? I'm playing yarn chicken with this because I have done that before and I have won several times. Four elements for four purposes. Hook, yarn, skill, and determination become art, service, therapy, and focus. Laura Hansen-Brexa talks with thread artist Jenny Chapman on intent on purpose. Hello, Jenny, and thank you for being on intent on purpose. Hey, I've been looking forward to this. Jenny crochets, and I have seen some of her work. And people I am very close to have received her work as a gift. And we're going to talk about crochet today. And no, it's not just for old ladies. It's a very hip thing. Very hip thing. Especially on Instagram, lots of cool projects. She does lots of cool things. Jenny, how did you know that crochet was something you wanted to spend time on? Because I do believe you spend some time on. I spend quite a bit of time on it actually. So I first learned from my Grammy when I was about 15 or 16 years old. And I picked it up again about 10 years ago, roughly, because I was working a high stress job and I needed something to help calm me down at the end of the day. And that was really what brought it back up again. And I have been making projects pretty much ever since. What's your favorite stitch? I would have to say the double crochet. It's just, takes up a lot of space. It uses up good material. And it is one that is used in a lot of projects. The one stitch that is used in every project that I've ever made, no exceptions asked, is definitely the chain stitch. You cannot do a crochet project without knowing how to do a chain. And that starts them off, right? Yes. It also continues it from one row to the next or one round to the next, depending on what you're making. Now I've seen people crochet bath mats. I've made a couple of those actually. because you don't think of bath mats, you think of a crochet. What's the oddest thing that you've seen made out of crochet? Or one of the most understand things, I guess I should say, that you've made or you've seen made? That is a very good question. So the oddest thing that I think I have ever made was, ironically enough, it is a bath mat. It is sitting right outside of my door, or it's a doormat. rather, I should say. The oddest thing that I think I've ever seen was, ⁓ my goodness, I'm not really sure because I have seen some very out there projects, but I've also seen some that are very cute and wholesome. I have a friend of mine in the same modeling group that I'm with, and she recently crocheted a stuffed Kansas City Chief's ⁓ bear for, I think, her niece or her nephew, and it looks amazing. Thank you. So why do you think crochet is becoming hip or hasn't been hip that I'm just catching on? has not been, it was not hip when I was a kid. I know that, but I always went against what everybody else in my age demographic was doing. little rebel, you rebel. ⁓ absolutely. You know, it's, hmm, I could watch this mindless TV show or I could make something and do something productive while listening to an audio book. I'll take the latter option for 200, please. But, ⁓ I think that part of the reason why it's becoming, it's coming back into the zeitgeist is really the advent of lockdown. If you'll remember, there were a lot of people who just sat at home, didn't really have anything to do. And there were a lot of craft projects that got picked up again and reintroduced into the zeitgeist. And this was one of them. And I knew that, I didn't know that lockdown was gonna happen, but I knew that something like this would come back because if you, once you start to get the hang of it, you start to see that The repetitive motions are very calming and soothing, especially if, like me, you may have ADD or you may be ⁓ somebody who has a little bit of a different wired brain, as I call it, and you need something calming to focus on. So I did teach crochet at Joanne's RIP. I miss that store so much. We have a moment of silence. Let's move on. Yeah. I also spent way more money than I should have when it was going out of business getting all of the yarn for really, really cheap. But that was you that took all the yarn. Sorry. In my defense, in my defense, every single skein that I got already has a project attached to it, even if I have not yet gotten around to making it. All right. That's good. Okay. It's very good for a crafter. The guy who I dated years ago, he was a better crocheter than I am at the time because he knew more techniques than I did. But I would like to think that I have advanced and am a better for it in the grand scheme of things. Now I think it's interesting. Okay, I learned how to crochet when I was 10 and my skills have not improved Because I've not put time into it I'm sure that if I put time into it and what I make are those dish towels because I think they're really cool But I have yet to make one that is square they get smaller They get ⁓ wider, you know because I don't count. Hey, it's laziness on my part, but it is relaxing And it's nice to have something that's finished. Even though I like put the string through the finish. I mean, they're bad. Okay. But they work just as well. But it's the process is fun. I like that cotton one, I'm sugar and cream. I'm at the level I was 40 something years ago when I was 10. So tell me how it feels when you get to a certain level. Where are you going fast and making stuff? Tell me what that feels like, because I don't know. Goodness, I would not call myself an expert by any stretch of the imagination. just, the reason why I say that is because it's really a matter of motivation. Once it's kind of like, once you get into that zone, it's kind of like, okay, I can block everything else out and just go. And the irony is I've always found that when I'm starting a new project, I'm going in that zone. I'm really, really fast. And then about halfway through, like, ⁓ my gosh, this is more annoying than I thought. And when I can see the end zone, like when the theme from Cheerades of Fire starts playing, like I'm almost done with it, that is actually when I go my slowest because I'm just like, ⁓ dear goodness, how much longer is this gonna be? How many more rows can I go? Okay, am I playing yarn chicken with this? Because I have done that before and I have won several times, but I've also lost several times as well. Okay, pause, pause, yarn chicken. Yarn Chicken is when you take a look to see how much yarn you have left and you have to kind of guess as to how much you need to finish your current project and if you currently have enough. Okay. Because you're hoping you don't have enough so you don't have to finish it? No, you're hoping that you do have enough so that you don't have to go out and get more because I have had that happen where I was almost done with a project. and I ran out of yarn and I was not allowed to leave to go get any more for another four hours. It was very, very torturous. Just at the end. Chariots of Fire theme is playing and all of sudden, Granny Smith squares. Yes. Tell me about what you can do. How do they look complicated? Actually, they're not. This is one of the first things that a lot of people learn how to make. I did not learn how to make them until several years after the fact, but they are also you said that you wanted to make more projects that were in an even square. Granny Square is a great way to do that. And I know that on the back of the a couple of the Lily Sugar and Cream labels, they do have granny square patterns on there. So that is something to consider. Right now, I'm actually making a blanket for one of my students that is utilizing several different sizes of granny squares. It's not all the same size. I did that last semester for a different one of my students. These are kids who are in my school's arts and crafts club and who are seniors and gonna be graduating. So they're all getting a unique made one because I don't repeat patterns, but I repeat colors all the time. I mean, I'd have to, otherwise I'd be on the dock. So, all right, what kind of colors you got here? You got a new dye lot for me? Sort of a thing. Yarn and paper bags? Absolutely, yes. Actually, that is pretty much how I used to have to bring in any yarn stash. I used to live down the street from... the Joann's in Metairie and I was living with one of my best friends and she and I are both crafters, but she makes jewelry instead. So we had a rule where if one of us was going to Joann's, the other one had to either A, come with or B, call after about 30 minutes just to make sure that the other person wasn't going crazy overboard. My goodness. There were a lot of calls that were made to me more than anything else. Life is yarn. Yarn is life. I need to put that on a motivational poster. ⁓ man, I think it's wonderful that you love something so much that brings you such joy, peace, excitement. Well, I think that ⁓ anybody who has any sort of hobby or any sort of activity that they enjoy, life is too short to really hide your light under a bushel for lack of a better term there. And if it's something that you enjoy and you're not harming either yourself or somebody else, why wouldn't you share that with other people? Like case in point, Right after I started really getting back into crochet and earnest a few years ago, I started making blankets for the first time. ⁓ one of the previous jobs that I had before I got at my current job, I was in charge of donation requests. And I even asked like, Hey, can I add another donation on top of this? Cause I would vet every single location that would ask for donations. And unless they were you know, horrible people who promoted kicking puppies or something like that. We would always get them a donation and then I would donate something on top of that. It took six months for me to get my entire crafting closet cleaned out of items that I had already made and three months of lockdown to fill it back up again. So that's another thing then donations. But I think we've talked about this before. I wanted to bring it up again. Tell me about selling your work versus giving your work away versus supporting it. Gotcha. So I personally don't sell anything that I make because the time added to there's a there's an actual formula to calculate how much something would go for a retail price. You take the cost of the material and then add it to the amount of time that it took you to make that covers your supplies, your cost of supplies. You multiply that by two that gets you the wholesale value. multiply the wholesale value by two again, and that gives you the retail value. So if you do the math on that, my creations end up being several hundred to a couple thousand dollars each. And I cannot in good conscience charge that much for something. So what I've always done is if I have a friend who is getting married or they're about to have a baby or coworkers, those sorts of things, then I will make something for them that is a unique creation. And I'm still in touch with a lot of the folks who had requested donations in the past and I'll donate to them until basically I dropped. Yeah. So that's the love of the game. It is really, it really is. And it's also a good play, a good way to find them a good home as well, because like this past summer, for instance, I went to the UPS store once a week, just sending out blankets to different people, whether it was to family members who had not yet received one or to different people who had asked for some. I was flying up for my baby niece's baptism at the start of the summer and I had two flight attendants who saw that I was working on a blanket on the plane and they really liked it. I was like, okay, well, do you want this when I'm done? And they looked at me like, wait, what? I'm like, yeah. give me your names and your mailing address and I will mail you one as soon as they are ready. And then they came back to me with a big old bag of snacks while I was working on it. Graving peanuts. ⁓ my gosh, yes. I got all the snacks. It was brilliant. So they both got one over the summer and I also added in a dish towel and a scarf and a couple of other smaller items that I had made that really did need good homes. And I heard back from both of them, they were both very appreciative. I'm like, That's great. I'm so glad you like them. ⁓ that's nice. Now, have you ever worked with those, the itty bitty thin? Yes. You know, you can make bookmarks out of it so thin. Yes. So those are, that's a different kind of material and it is a skill level that is one that kind of intimidates me. I have the material, I have the skill set, but it's also a matter of If I make a mistake on something that's bigger, it's easier to hide. But if I make a mistake in a smaller size, but if you aren't, it is a lot harder to hide because it shows up in a bigger way. And yes, my work is absolutely riddled with mistakes. you, any of you can find them, you get 10 bucks. That's only you I'm talking to right now. But, um, exactly. But it is very intimidating to. Approach work like that because you really do want to get it right the first time and after a while it really becomes a it does become a labor of love in the grand scheme of things that you really do want to put your best effort into and You don't want to hide any mistakes. You want to just Frog it in other words rip part of that out. That's we call it frog cuz you're rip it It's a joke come on guys, but It really is something that is very labor intensive and I am actually a little bit more intimidated by the finer lace work than I am of making a full blown blanket. Grandmother used to make crocheted edges on tablecloths. Those are the ones that actually use up the most materials is the borders and the lacy borders on a lot of different things. Those end up actually using more supplies than the actual item that you made itself. So tell me about, have you used that big, chenille type yarn? Yes, I have. I have used that before. Do like that stuff or do you like the normal? So I like a bunch of different types of material. My main type material that I prefer is size four acrylic yarn. And most yarn purists are just looking at me like, dare you sort of a thing. There are yarn purists? There are, yes, I have met several of them. There are some who will go to different craft fairs, different yarn fairs, well, not yarn fairs, but different locations to get ⁓ yarn from a certain type of animal, whereas acrylic is a synthetic material. So it's not fully ⁓ fur or hair or whatever it is. But I have seen other people make yarn out of the most interesting things. Like have a friend of mine years and years and years ago made yarn out of her dog's hair. She did a drop spindle, which is a very, very old technique where you kind of twist it as you go along. And she was able to, she didn't crochet it. She wove it into a ⁓ mat for her dog to sleep on because it was something that was comforting to him and to the other family dog as well. It was very, very intense. I'm sitting here watching going, wow, I can't do that, but I'm so intrigued. In 1800s, human hair. Yes, I have seen that done before, actually. cool, but a mat with your dog's hair. Yeah, and it's actually something that the material did not go to waste either, because you clean up after the animal and... you you just throw it into the bin. Well, she thought of a really interesting way to recycle that. And I'm sitting here going, okay, you're gonna be on my apocalypse survival team. So speaking recycling, have you ever taken a sweater and taken yarn off of a sweater and reused it? ⁓ that is a skill level that is way above my level. I have made sweaters before. I made a couple of ugly Christmas sweaters that... One of them won best handmade and I'm sitting there going, yeah, you better give me best handmade. No one else handmade their sweaters. So what else is there about it? Tell me anything else that you can think that makes you happy. That is a passion. Well, it's mainly it's the issue of that productivity because I know that there are a lot of folks who they need that structure. They need that sense of accomplishment of, okay, I can check this off of a to-do list. And, know, I feel like I've accomplished something. So when you make a patch, like what I just finished making a few minutes ago. It's not only, you know, a patch in a blanket, but hang on, I just finished sewing this yesterday. This is going to, this is the first row that I made using that patch. And this is going to be a blanket in the next couple of months here. It's also gives you that sense of accomplishment, that sense of, hey, I achieved something. I did something, you know, important. And it's not just, you know, sitting on in front of a screen and just scrolling mindlessly or playing a game on your phone or your tablet or anything like that. You can actually physically see and touch the end product of what you made and know that, ⁓ this is going to be something that's useful. This is something that's going to help make somebody's life a little bit easier, whether it's a dish towel or a scarf or a hat or a blanket or even a stuffed or a stuffed animal. You know, that's sort of a thing. And it's really bringing that that sense of usefulness back, which I think that a lot of people really do need in their lives. They need that sense of, I'm doing something important. I'm doing something that matters. If it doesn't matter to anybody else, it matters to me. And this item that I'm making is eventually going to find a good home and be useful to somebody else. And if it wasn't, it would still be worth it? Absolutely. Yes. ⁓ I've kept, I've made hundreds of items at this point in my life and I've kept two of them. One of them is the doormat right outside my door and the other one is a hat that I made. I used to have a laundry hamper about hip high off the ground, just full of hats, scarves, shawls and other smaller items that I had made. Well, one evening I was headed out to a Mardi Gras parade. It was freezing cold and I just grabbed the hat that was sitting on top of it and I put it on my head and it has been with me ever since. because I'm like, ⁓ I'm not gonna give this away to anybody else, because it's already been on my head, you know, it's already got, I've got my scent on it, that sort of a thing. But every other item from that laundry bin found a good home, whether it was donated or gifted to somebody. The hat is now part of your identity, your style. it is part of it. You go to anywhere where there's a cold climate where I'm at and you look for a a sea foam green crocheted hat, that would be me. That's you. I love it. ⁓ I remember I was gonna ask you. So you said your books on tape. What are you listening to? What books do you like? ⁓ my goodness. ⁓ how much longer you got? ⁓ I have a to be read list of at least 500 books at this point. I have a- books. So a book on tape and a quilt. mean a crocheted item. Yes. the time. Very much so. Blanket to how much books? ⁓ ⁓ my goodness. It depends on the length of the book and it also depends on how fast I'm listening to it. So the library changed their format a couple of years ago, which means I can no longer just download a book and keep it on my iPod for several years at a time. So what I do now is I check out a book and then I listen to it on double speed so that can get through it all the faster. It makes my life so much easier. I'm in the middle of reading a book or listening to a book called ⁓ gosh, the name itself escapes me, but it was the basis of a mini series on Netflix about ⁓ one of the, ⁓ there was a cult that was really abusive to its members a number of years ago. And so it's that person's account of how she escaped and how she, you know, got some of her family members out. That's sort of a thing. And so it's really interesting to hear it from her point of view, because she was in the documentary, but she was only one part in the bigger picture of the whole thing. If get a little closer. Do you crochet faster if it's exciting? Actually, I think that I slow down because at some points I'll just be like, wait, wait, what happened? Whoa, I gotta, gotta sit, I gotta like lock in and listen to this. What? Oh my gosh. Now I overheard or a bird told me that you love movies. Yes, I am a huge movie fan. If I'm not listening to an audio book while I'm crafting, I will either have a movie. or a TV show in the background playing. So it's relaxing. get to learn something, experience something at the same time. Yes, very much so. And it's also going back to that sense of accomplishment, that sense of, you know, adding worth to yourself, you know, just by, just based on your small actions, such as, you know, putting one stitch in front of the other. Cause like case in point, one of the projects that I'm doing this year is I call it a year long project because it's a patchwork that has 357 patches. So I'm doing one patch a day for the full year. And then the last few days of the year, I'm sewing all of them together. So it'll be over next Christmas break where I'm just gonna like lock in and be like, I'm sewing, leave me alone. That's really cool. That's really cool challenge. It is. And it's something to look forward to. So you've mentioned students and now you've mentioned kids Christmas break. So that leads me to believe what you're a teacher. Yes. And what do you teach? So I teach high school English at the moment and I'm enjoying it far more than I thought I would in the grand scheme of things. Really? Yeah, I taught middle school for three years and then I left for a decade because it really, needed a break. I needed a change of pace. And then I ended up working in the entertainment industry for the entirety of that 10 years. Worked on films. I worked on ⁓ several different, I worked for the opera, did several opera productions. I don't sing. They paid me to keep my mouth shut. You don't want me to sing. I sound like the seagull from The Little Mermaid on a good day. do you find any of your theater experience ⁓ and you said theater experience or entertainment experience, which word did you use? ⁓ Well, technically both. grew up in the theater. So the stages ⁓ The stage was my first ever love. I love being on stage. I love working backstage, doing the business side, everything that goes with it. So how has that helped you or hasn't helped you in the classroom? ⁓ definitely, because getting up there in front of people, you have to have those same public speaking skills that you would need to perform. But the difference is, rather than doing for theater, which is, you know, the big booming voice, you have to do it for film where you have to bring it down a little bit. You have to lower your voice a little bit because the lower you talk, the less they're going to talk because they have to listen to what you're saying. clue. So what's Shakespeare like in your classrooms? Oh my gosh. I don't actually get to do a unit on Shakespeare with the two. They're wasting that. I know. I'm so sad about that. I am so sad, but The trade off is for my juniors, I get to do a unit on the crucible, which is my favorite unit to do with them. I love working with them on the crucible because after a while they're like, hey, this character is kind of me. Yeah, I know. Just wait, just wait. Wait a minute, did she just, yeah, she did. Dude, she's like a me. She's exactly like a high school mean girl. You are correct. then, well, wait a minute, this guy's a bit of a creep. Yeah, he's totally a creep too. Sort of thing. And that's with my juniors. With my sophomores, get the last unit that I get to do with them is Antigone, which was actually one of my favorite units when I went through high school. That was one of my favorites. ⁓ And so they don't know this, but their last major test is they're going to have to get up and perform a scene from Antigone. And I had a student last year, her first language is Mandarin, and she was always very quiet, very soft spoken, didn't speak very, very loudly. And she said, you know, I'm really nervous about doing this. said, I said you had to get up and perform, but I never said in what language. So she got up and did the whole thing, her whole part in Mandarin. Yeah. And everybody was like, wow. ⁓ huh. I don't know what you're saying. You could be reading off a recipe for noodles, but you were my favorite person in the whole scene. Like, yes. She got it. I do the Chapman Awards after the, it's kind of like the Oscars. She won best actress. That's pretty cool. That's pretty cool. So I want to know more about that relationship with your grandma. Did it strengthen it with her teaching you something? she love crochet or was it just a skill she needed to pass on? It was a skill she needed to pass on because she didn't learn until after my gramps retired and they moved to the Houston area. And she got involved because I think it was a local women's group that taught her. And my understanding is that she has several, she made several blankets before she passed away. And I think that one of my uncles has them. And so she taught me, she also taught me how to do a needle point. And I ended up making a couple hundred ⁓ coasters that I think all found good homes. But that was really the start of the crafting thing. I'd learned how to sew initially when I was five years old from my mom, because my Grammy never learned how to sew. She couldn't even sew a button onto a shirt or a hem of thing, a pair of pants or anything like that. But she could crochet and she taught me because she saw that I have that creative bug. have that need to create, that need to be useful and to make something useful for somebody else. And to her credit, she kept every single cross stitch needle point and embroidery thing that I ever made to the point where... Yeah, well, when she passed away, she still had a couple of them framed. And my sister actually took one of them because it was a cross-stitch thing of a cat and she loves cats. And I'm like, yeah, that's fine. You can have it. I'm okay with that. And all the other ones found homes as well. So I'm like, okay, good. So do you think you yourself as a creative, you're very generous? I mean, obviously it kind of excludes from you this generosity. Do you feel that is what most creatives you meet and work with, especially in the industry you've just left, or do you feel that's more for a few of you? That's a very good question, actually. When it comes to somebody who creates something physical, whether it is a piece of art or clothing or something fiber arts like what I do, I really do think that they are a little bit more generous with their creations in terms of finding them good homes, making sure that ⁓ they're put to good use. Now, as for the entertainment industry, for people who are just in front of the cameras or behind the cameras, it really does depend on the individual. It depends on what their main motive is. Like if they show up at a charity event, are they there because they care about that charity or are they there because they just want to save face? Because they want to make themselves look good to their fans and to potential casting directors, those sorts of things. And it's really easy to tell when somebody is coming at it from a place of genuine ⁓ interest in the piece itself, in the art itself, because it's really about how they interact with people who can do nothing for them. I read in a book somewhere years ago, if you want to know what somebody is really like, look at how they treat their inferiors, not their equals and not their superiors, because that says volumes about them. You should treat the janitor with the same respect that you would treat the CEO. Yeah, or the waiter. always look for... Yeah, exactly. ⁓ hair, it's crazy. So vain, look at this. ⁓ How you treat a waiter really mattered. Yeah, definitely. Do you doors for people? That kind of a thing. I can see what you're talking about. The character. Right. Yeah, and it really does speak to somebody whether you say, like I was raised in a military house over I was raised to say, yes, ma'am, no, ma'am, yes, sir, no, sir. You got your teeth knocked out your mouth basically. ⁓ It also really says something if you call somebody Miss so-and-so or Mr. so-and-so when you address them because that show that also shows a sign of respect as well So it really it does show it starts from the bottom and it does work its way up from there Now you're living in Louisiana now, but you not so Talks further and so and you just said your military half and did you move around and where are you from originally? So I grew up in Texas, I grew up in the Houston area and neither one of my parents were in the military, but both of my grandfathers were. My maternal grandfather was US Navy and my paternal grandfather was USAF. and my maternal grandparents, my mom's parents lived about 45 minutes away from where I grew up. And so we were very lucky that we were able to see them as often as we did. In fact, I remember one year, I think I was in fifth grade, we saw my grandparents like every single week because every Monday they would come and pick us up and they would take us to their place. We'd get our homework done, go have fun for a couple of hours before my mom drove over and picked us up and then brought us back home. So there was that and ⁓ my gramps was my rock. He was my anchor for the first year that I was teaching. He was the one who would say, nope, you're gonna get up. and you're going to and he was Catholic till the day he died, but he still would swear every now and then. You're like, you're going to get those little ⁓ inserts wherever here and you're going to show them who's boss sort of a thing. ⁓ Actually, that was my favorite Christmas present from this year. He and I took a picture when I graduated from high school and I had that picture when I was in my college apartment and I thought that I had lost it forever because it got lost in one of the moves and my mom had a framed picture of it and gave it to me for Christmas. And I almost like started crying at that moment because I thought that I had lost that picture. Very sweet. ⁓ my gosh, yeah. My grandpa was my rock. He was ⁓ very, very supportive of everything that I did. You know, always be like, hey, you're going to stand on your own two feet. You're going to be that independent person that I know you can be. And you are not going to be afraid. You're not allowed to be afraid. You could be a little bit scared, but you cannot give in to that. That's sort of a thing. When you're teaching you. This one you're teaching junior high. That was when I was teaching middle school. Yeah, he's like, go get on up to us because your gramps love you. He was the Mickey to my Rocky Balboa as it were. You would need it. ⁓ I needed it. I needed it when I was at that first school that I was at. That one was a tough year. So you don't have that Southern accent? No, I was actually trained from a very young age to speak without an accent of any kind except for regular mid American accent where you can't tell where I'm from. Now it does occasionally slip out like if I if I was to say Quetta or New Orleans then you'd be able to hear the the bit of the YAT accent in there and I do pick up accents very very quickly that's one of the skills that I kind of learned after doing theater for so long and I remember I was working on it I did a I visited a show in Chicago several, several years ago and I was performing as a Russian and apparently it was, my accent was so convincing that I had several people start speaking to me in Russian. I would go, I am not actually Russian. I don't understand what you just said. ⁓ that's, speaking of language, there must, there's got to be, there has to be speaking of language. And I did teach one year of English. ⁓ What terminology is there for crochet? There must be a world that you speak. Can you get together and just speak crochet-ish? I love that. ⁓ my gosh. You just created a new word that I'm going to have to now tell everybody about. I love this. So a lot of people refer to themselves as fiber artists, whether you knit, whether you crochet, whether you weave or... do something else that involves yarn or fabric. Most people will call themselves fiber artists. There are ⁓ crafts, there's also craft enthusiasts. Forgive how I'm about to describe this. I don't know if you can cut this or not, but a lot of crocheters will jokingly call themselves hookers. But it's only because we use the hook that looks like this, not the other term. I've heard quilters call themselves strippers. Yes, my mom. My mom makes ⁓ quilts. She's done that for years. In fact, when I was a kid, I remember she spent 20 years working on one particular quilt by itself because she does not use a sewing machine. She does everything by hand. I never do what? Even the piecing? Yes, everything. ⁓ wow. So I can remember when I was a kid, she would have small sections of the quilt that she was working on just to work on while she was watching like Law and Order or something like that. And I grew up watching her do that thinking, I'm not gonna be that good, but turns out I've made more blankets than she has at this point in time. Yours are a little quicker. They are, but at the same time, if she were to go and use a sewing machine, she would be way faster than I am. Yeah, she wouldn't be. So what are some of the terminology for stitches? So there's, ⁓ you've heard me use the term frog, like I gotta frog it, cause you gotta rip it all out. dropping a stitch is when, let's say that I'm doing something like that and I make a stitch and then, oh no, the hook just came out of the thing. So that one's easy to fix. If you knit and you drop a stitch, it's much tougher to get that back. I tried knitting before I tried crocheting. I just could not pick it up. It was something that my brain could not process. Now I know people- That noise is irritating. Well, I think that it really depends on what your own personal- preferences. I liken it to the differences between skiing and snowboarding. You're using the same parts of your body, but you have to use them in different capacities. Like I've been skiing since I was 11 years old. You put me on a pair of skis on a mountain. I know exactly what I'm doing. You put me on a snowboard. You're going to have to also include knee pads, a butt pad, elbow pads, another helmet on top of the one that I'm already wearing and just a whole bunch of cushions because I'm coming back with a couple of bruises. That's funny. Language of its own. It is and it's really one its own. It really is and it's one where ⁓ I've had some people who would say, yeah, I got about this like XT hours in or XT rows in. realized I did the whole thing wrong. I had to frog the whole thing and I'm sitting there going, ooh, because that's happened to me before. The first time that I ever crocheted something following a pattern that like a printed pattern, I got about maybe this far into about three or four hours worth. realized I did the whole thing wrong and I had to frog the whole thing. That happened not once, not twice, but five times on my first blanket project where I followed a pattern. I finished it, I gave it to my dad for Christmas and it sits on the back of his armchair at the house. Have you ever just let the mistakes lay? I have. Some of the times I have and I have caught myself, especially with that first one, the one that I gave to my dad, I found a couple of errors in it after I had already given it to him, like several years after the fact, I started going, ooh, I'm not pointing that out to them. I'm not saying anything. And there's also been a couple of times where I've gotten to the point where I'm almost done with the project, realized I did the whole thing wrong and I had to frog the whole thing. ⁓ I was not happy about that. But because it was a bulkier sized yarn, it was easier for me to get the whole thing out and then catch up to where I was up to that point in time. That's sort of a thing. and really just go from there. It's going to be trial and error more than anything else. And just trying to, you know, have fun with the process more than anything. as a great way to live life. exactly. Artists and creatives don't need to just hang out in a small room or and just do their thing. People get out, there's guilds and there's groups. People who have the same shame hobbies, don't have shame hobbies, have the same hobbies and enjoy each other's company and can talk in language and... can learn from each other. think that's one of the greatest things about having a passion is finding other people who have the same passion and learn from Very much so. Yeah. And I think that it's a really good thing because you meet people who are either better than you or who could benefit from your expertise. And it always benefits you to help somebody else out. And it also gives you that sense of satisfaction. But also somebody else is in that group who's better than you. Like, OK, well, how would I do this? Like, oh, oh, that's awesome. You know what you're doing better than I do. Great. Let's go ahead and do that. I can remember a few years ago there was a group on Meetup called the Tipsy Knitters and what they would do is they would bring their knitting projects to a bar and they would just sit there and knit for a couple of hours and I brought myself along and I crocheted, can I join you? They're like, yeah, come on over. And I found out that my mom had had a very similar experience when I was a baby and at daycare she would go and. there was a group at the library called ⁓ Yarn It, Darn It, I think was their name. And so she would go and quilt with them and forgive the language, but she called it a stitching bitch. Because you just, they would just bring their whatever they were working on and just craft and talk. It was really that chance for that fellowship, that sense of community. While you're doing something and not staring at each other. Right. So you can really say some things that need to be said. Yeah, exactly. ⁓ I had another question for you. ⁓ so I've had some pretty passionate people have passions, that's what the show is about. And I have found that people who have passions are not afraid to say they're not experts. And they learn from others. And I think that is a very cool thread. Because if you're passionate about something and you want to live it, you want to learn. Exactly. And I don't know who the people are that out there do do something and are thinking they're already the best. But think it's fascinating that I've had the guests I have are willing to learn. I think it's a great thing. Yeah, and I think that if you are willing to say that you're the best at something, that that automatically does not make you the best at something because the person who is the number one absolute most best in the world isn't bragging about it. That's true. That's true. It's like I'm so humble, aren't I? Right. It's like, as soon as you say that, you just brought attention to that. Therefore, it negates the humility that you were trying to practice. Yes, that's very true. So before we end, what else do you want to tell me about yourself crocheting, teaching, whatever? Oh my gosh. this was heard from the world's top mountain. Okay. Well, my biggest thing is I make a lot of blankets every year and every year they need to find good homes. So if any of your listeners are interested in getting a blanket for free, have them send me an email with the subject line, blanket needed. And I will send them a custom made one, no questions asked sort of a thing. It's JW Chapman spelled C-H-A-P as in Peter, M-A-N 86 at gmail.com. Send me what it is that you need, whether it's a baby blanket or a blanket for somebody's graduation. ⁓ I make only one American flag blanket per year, and it always goes to someone who is going into the military. The one that I made last year went to my eldest godson because he's going into the unit, the US Air Force. And the one from this year is going to one of my students from last year who's graduating this year and is going into the army. So if you've got anybody who is going into the military of any kind, you let me know. It doesn't matter what branch, it's Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Navy SEALs, doesn't matter, let me know, because you will get an American-themed one, because the one for this year is going to be a Betsy Ross flag. Thank you very much for speaking with me today. It's been a delight. Yeah, it's been great talking to you too. Joann is dear Joann's, your aisles have met their fate. Till eight through fabric bolts and ribbon rolls through glitter for grandmas and a husband somewhere there. You gave us yarn and rainbow heaps and buttons by the pound. Every August, fake pumpkins are stacked six feet off the ground. And Christmas decor came in June before the pool was warm, while skeletons and wreath displays achieved their final form. glue guns burned our fingertips sequins covered every shoe and every pine cone centerpiece shed berries by the queue farewell to cricut vinyl felt fleece and floral foam two candles no one needed but still somehow brought home the scrapbook moms are weeping the cashiers softly sigh while one last bead rolls down the aisle to say it's goodbye so raise your bent embroidery thread and bows from seasons past after all glitter coupons and fake snow were never built to last