A bit of all sorts ...

How and when did you begin knitting/crocheting? Was it a skill passed down through generations of your family, or something you learned from Knitting For Dummies? What or who made you pick up the needles/hook for the first time? Was it the celebrity knitting ‘trend’ or your great aunt Hilda?
 TAGGING CODE: knitcroblo1

This is not really the sort of thing I like doing - I tend to shy away from the madding crowd. But I hoped it would give me the kick up the derriere I need to post more regularly so here goes, in brief.

My much loved and much missed nan, and my lovely mum both taught me to knit, when I was too young to remmeber! They were both creative: sewing, knitting and crochet (although I don't think my mum ever did any crochet), and I remember being fascinated by my mum doing that twisty wool ties using the door handle, for my baby sister's loopy hat (so I must have been 4).
My little chubby hands (both adjectives still apply) would get all hot and bothered, and my knitting would get tighter and more and more squeaky, until mum would take it from me and knit a few rows at the speed of light to loosen it up again. I suspect she did this to save her sanity when the nails-down-blackboard irritation of the squeak became too much ...

I doubt this picture is anywhere near a true representation of me. Someone throwing it and having a paddy is probably more like it. Nothing much has changed.

God only knows what I must have knit - I suspect misshapen, grubby 'things' to cover assorted dolls and teddies.

I can't remember not knitting really - I certainly knit when I was at college, insanely large mohair things that shed everywhere at college (I was an art student mohicaned punk, York in the 80s), and I remember a rather 'special' loosely knit monstrosity / jumper / dress / tent that we used to burn holes in and reknot in the pub.

In my defence we were drunk a lot.

I idolised Toyah when I was young, so imagine this armed with needles and wool. I was the only polite punk in York - I simply could not for the life of me burp.

I knit a lot for my daughter, so that's going back 23 years, and have my nan's and my mum's needles. And now I get to knit mostly for me, although my daughter absolutely loves getting anything hand made, as do my friends.

And on a completely different note, and a bit late.
It was St George's day on Friday, the patron saint of England. He of dragon defeating wit and wisdom.

So Leeds was full of these:
My favourite was the drunken one, with his drunken friends, trying to pick a fight with an equally drunken fally down man. Lots of squaring up and puffing out of chests (I was over the road at the bus stop, doing that 'I am not really watching your faux fight' thing), but my favourite thing was the knight's fake chainmail leggings kept drooping right down to the floor and he kept trying to pull them up without falling over. Tough work being a knight.
There was a group of them sitting in the window of Akbars Indian restaurant, scoffing their tea - now that definitely made me grin when I went past on the bus.

It's true some days, you just couldn't make it up ...