Why I love to make things by hand

If you’re somewhere that’s deep in snow or cold, you might like to know that spring is coming. It’s arrived to the Central Valley of California, where almond trees are in peak bloom.

Making things by hand has been so good for me. It slows me down when my brain is racing or my thoughts are worried. It’s helped me curb over-consumption because making things fills up that spot in my heart where buying things might have filled me up before.

Making things by hand helps me feel competent and capable. I can look at a knitted fabric my hands have created, with just needles and yarn, and nearly every time, it amazes me that I can do that. I can make a beautiful sweater with a lovely straight line of picked-up stitches at the sleeve cap. I can knit fair isle and create the gorgeous sweater of my junior high school dreams.

Lest you think I make everything by hand, all the time, I don’t.

I live in San Francisco, the second-densest city in the United States, so my life is an urban one, even though what I often share on Instagram are the snippets of life where I’m in the natural (rather than built) world. My life is as normal as can be, with grocery shopping and Zoom calls, queuing for parking, scheduling family stuff, walking the dog. Even my business is full of things that are done more with my brain than my hands: calculating neckline ratios, marketing, thinking about business models, filing taxes.

But, I do make time to work with my hands every single day. It might be writing this newsletter to you. It might be knitting on my current project. It might be tending a houseplant.

Making something by hand, every day, has been a counter-balance, for me, to all the ways the -isms of the world impact my family, or me, or my community, or, frankly, all of us.

The way toward making a good life for you, feeling rooted in community and connected to purpose, might not mean the same things as the choices I make. But then again, we might have this in common. You, like I do, might find solace in knitting, or crocheting, or making something by hand when times are good or when times are hard.

What community also means

I don’t often talk about it, but I have a Community Fund that’s in its sixth year. It’s where I connect makers in my community who have something extra to give with low or limited income makers, makers who are impacted by systemic racism, or makers who are going through a rough patch and could use being nourished by a small indulgence like hand-dyed yarn.

Right now, Julie, Leigh Ann, Jennifer, Camilla, Jane, Stacy, Nancy, Catherine, Laura, T., C., J., D., and Karen have refilled the Community Fund, and if there’s one of you reading this newsletter who is thinking, gosh, I’m going through a rough patch, or damn, the microaggressions have been knocking me down lately, then these folks want to treat you.

I know it can be awkward to dip into a Community Fund, and I’m trying to think of ways to make it less awkward, but in the meantime, truly: this fund is not about me. It’s about all the people in our community who love the idea of paying it forward a little.

With love to all 4,000 of you reading this: What did you make this week? I would love to know!