If you would like to purchase any of the items mentioned in the post below, simply click on the links to be taken to michaels.com. Direct product information and links are provided below.
I was out of town last week taking care of some personal family issues and on a whim headed out to Michaels to get something to do for myself. I absolutely love craft stores and Michaels is definitely one of my favorites. My mom got me into crafting from a very young age constantly taking me out to pick up supplies, projects and took me to classes during summer breaks. I don’t consider myself an expert or all that talented, but I enjoy doing it.
On this particular trip, I ended up picking up a book to teach myself how to crochet along with some yarn and a hook. My mom taught me to knit at a young age and I’ve been doing it for years (though am very guilty of almost never finishing anything – it’s the Gemini in me). I’ve tried teaching myself to crochet in the past with no luck, but I was feeling ambitious. Long story short, I started doing it and brought it home with me.
The next evening when I was practicing at home, my little three year old girl asked me what it was and said “can you show me how?”. Being a very tiny little peanut with minimal dexterity and only just turned three, I figured it would be easier to start with knitting and I promised her we’d go shopping the next day for supplies and I’d show her how to knit.
So off to our local Michaels we went….
Michaels has been a long-time favorite craft store with their convenient locations, versatile inventory and friendly staff. I always found shopping there to be a very pleasant experience. With my little girl in tow, we made a b-line for the yarn section.
After some careful browsing of the aisles, we came home with the few things we needed to get started:
For knitting needles, I went with bamboo as that’s my typical preference for knitting. I went with 9″ long needles in a 10mm size so the stitches would be nice and large and easier for her to manipulate:
I still wasn’t sure if my three year old was quite ready to really understand how to knit and be able to even do any of it unassisted, but I am a very firm believer in “it’s never too early”. She was interested and asked for it, so I complied. I decided to start with a little finger knitting figuring that would be easier than working the needles. We got started and I guided her through the process.
We managed to get through a few rows together, but stopped pretty quickly as she found the process uncomfortable and didn’t want to continue. As I said, I had a feeling it was going to go this way.
If you’re interested in finger knitting or showing your own little ones, I found this helpful video to get a quick refresher on how to finger knit (it’s been way too many years since I had done that):
After trying the finger knitting, she was very insistent about wanting to use the needles, so we gave that a try as well. She did fairly and we did it mostly together with me helping guide her fingers and show her how to work them. For a first try, it was amazing. I was really proud of her ambition and effort and I’m hoping she’ll be interested in trying again to keep practicing. It’s such a great skill and hobby to have and this will help her a great deal with her developing fine motor and dexterity as she gets older. With this first attempt, she lost interest very quickly and we didn’t get very far. She seems to have inherited my perfectionism (for good or ill) and gets frustrated extremely quickly when she can’t do something perfect at the first attempt. I’m definitely going to encourage her to try again at some point and introduce other needle and yarn crafts as well. I absolutely love having this little girl and the more excuses I have to share my interests and hobbies with her the better!
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