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| This is a cross-stitch I completed last year. |
Last week I completed a cross-stitch project I've been working on for some months, a birth cross-stitch for my new nephew. There has been a little delay before I started my next project, another birth cross-stitch for my other sister's baby due in January. I had to consult with her over the design and I've really noticed the gap, my hands feel restless in the evenings when the day's work has been done.
More than that, we've been listening to cricket. Yesterday was the beginning of one of the biggest series the Australian cricket team competes in. It is a trophy called "The Ashes", played for by Australia and England every 18 months or so. It is, in fact, one of the most fiercely contested competitions in the sport.
Now you probably don't immediately connect cricket and cross-stitch, but for me they are intimately connected. You see a cricket match takes a long time to play. This series is five 5-day matches spread over the next two and a half months. I am far too restless a person to just watch cricket non-stop, though I love it. So I've developed the habit of cross-stitching while watching. So the cricket playing on the internet radio yesterday and today made me long for a new project to hold in my hands!
But I started this note wanting to talk about hobbies, not cricket. I started doing cross-stitch for the most unusual reason. It was on the advice of a psychologist! Prior to coming to Japan we had to jump through all sorts of hoops, one was an assessment by a psychologist. One of the recommendations that came out of that assessment was that I take up a hobby that would help me to just be, to slow down a little!
What good advice that has been. I have to admit that when I first started doing it my family (parents and sister) were pretty sceptical. Wendy, slow down? Do handiwork!?! But that was more than 11 years ago now and I'm still stitching.
It has been a great, portable hobby. One that I've been able to keep up with little kids under my feet. One that has been a great stress indicator and reliever. I know, for example, that if I haven't picked up my cross-stitch lately, that I've been doing too much and need to take a night off.
So it is good that I heard from my sister today and I'm able to start on my next project very soon, as soon as I have all the threads. It would be nice to get going before this cricket match is over, but it is more likely to be before the next one starts next Friday.
3 comments:
Everyone needs a hobby to balance out their life. It should be something which has no consequences attached to it. Except perhaps something decorative or useful at odd times. It should also be a hobby which is not co-optable. There is a great pressure today to force everything into some kind of useful cost/benefit mould.
I discovered making latchhook rugs after the kids left home and we were restoring order in the pantry. I wondered about the little tool and all the balls of thick yarn. I also had a book of Roman tile floor designs at the time. So I put the two together and began work on a rug using the leftover bits. Nothing to do with work, nothing to do with satisfying demands of other people, nothing to do with justifying my existence in the world. About 8 months later I had a large rug, which I then gave away. I mght start another one or I might not. Not many activities in our live today give us that kind of freedom.
I totally agree. I've tried for 13 years to get my husband to take up a hobby. Obviously I'm going to have to wait until we retire and have a pantry to fix.
I have a similar connection between cricket and doing 1000 piece jigsaw puzzles, while in the comfort of air conditioning I might add! Nothing else signals summer holidays quite like this ;-)
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