Who would have thought that a metal hook, a skein of yarn, a pattern could make such a difference to someone’s life? It’s true, that hook, yarn and printed out pattern saved me from falling deep into depression.

The year 2013 took my health, my occupation and my independence.

I was trapped within the four walls I lived in, pain and exhaustion ruled every waking moment and took a good hold on sleeping time to.

I had lost life as I knew it and depression was starting to take a good old hold.

I had nothing I called my own, my health was the ruling factor, the weather determined how I would manage to tackle the days and everyday stress would bring on the worst flares.

I felt extremely useless and a burden to my family. Life was painful, dull, frustrating, I needed just a little something for me, to show all wasn’t lost and that I was still capable of achieving something, anything, I needed a purpose.

As a wee girl, my mum had made me a crochet granny square blanket, full of every colour in the rainbow. I loved it, truly I did. It had won a huge piece of my heart. The colours brightened rainy days, glimmered in the sunshine as we would have teddybear picnics on her. But mostly it warmed my soul, this gift from my mum that was so much more than yarn, it was love, warmth and tenderness, the love only a mum could give her child.

Over the years as I grow through adolescence, becoming an adult, the blanket was lost, but I never forgot about how wonderful it was, how it made me feel and the comfort it had given me.

And still does. It gave me strength to pull my socks up and get on with life no matter how hard, how different it had become. I knew what I wanted to do, more so what I needed to do.

I need to give back a little of what my blanket had given me, I needed to learn to crochet.

I brought some yarn and hooks, watched YouTube videos and I taught myself to chain stitch. In all honesty I was rather useless, I couldn’t get my brain to store the information it needed to even begin to make anything that resembled a granny square. After a lesson from my mother in law, who’s a whizz with a hook, more hours spent on YouTube, failure after failure I finally cracked it.

I can’t explain how I felt in that moment, I don’t totally understand the feelings that ran through me, all I can say is, I turned a page and I found a purpose, a reason to get out of bed when the pain and exhaustion was to much to bare.

That skein of yarn and metal hook, in its own little way had saved me.

The feeling of making the first stitch to the last stitch can’t be explained but with every stitch I make, love, life, hopes, dreams, determination, memories all entwine into the blanket that I have created for that one special person that will receive a gift. A gift that is so much more than a blanket, a cushion or what ever else I have made.

It’s a gift made solely out of love, it’s a piece of my heart and soul.

It’s hours upon hours of my time, my life that I chose to give to them.

It’s my way of giving that feeling that my mum had given me all those years ago, a truly wonderful feeling.

If only one person finds a little warmth or comfort, I’ll be more than happy that I fought my daily battles to give them a feeling that everyone deserves to at least one in their lifetime.

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