For those of you who know me, you may see the irony of Deb Graf, knitting OR crocheting ANYTHING! I have never had patience for “fiddly work” nor am I a perfectionist. But, thankfully, we all change inside and find new interests as our lives change. When Tim and I made the decision to travel full time, several of my hobbies needed to be put aside. My main passions have been making and teaching music. I taught 24 years and played for nearly 50 . My other passions are reading, the arts, SongWorks, hiking, cats, technology, friends and traveling.
We sold everything including my piano, all my music, and my trombones, which for any music teacher is tough. But there is no place for these items on a plane when you are traveling with 3 duffel bags. My life now consists of what can I carry that is minimal weight and space so we can make the 40-50 lb weight limit on each bag.
As you can see from the photo above, I found a store in Seoul, Korea with supplies. People just smile at me when I walk in and I smile back. I either gesture with my fingers that I would just like to look around or show them a picture of what I need on my phone. Do you know how hard it is to find a darning needle in South Korea when one doesn’t know the language nor where a store like this might be found?
It was really interesting searching for a fabric shop in South Korea. If you search in English for “button”, “yarn” or “sewing” shops on google you are out of luck. Of course, I researched the Korean names for these items and a few more showed up, but mainly, google maps is not widely used in these countries. Thankfully they have other applications that work better such as Kakao maps. Once we installed these on our phones, navigation became easier.
In Seoul, South Korea I found a fabric warehouse in a 7 story building, each floor with a different fabric. I found the yarn floor and wanted to buy everything! I restrained myself knowing we had 3 bags to travel and they were already full.
Some knit and crochet dish rags…obviously much more practice is needed. Smile! I didn’t know how to tie in ends and things kept unraveling. Blocking, what’s that?! Yikes!
Youtube is a big help while learning new stitches and techniques, but where we have traveled there is often limited internet or bandwidth. That is when I experimented! I learned I needed to push through mistakes and not fix every tiny missed stitch or I never finished anything. I ripped out so many projects initially that people around me made comments such as, “didn’t I just see that piece nearly finished?” I wasn’t able to figure out how to fix it, so continually started over.
Fun purple dish rag
Fortunately Tim and I enjoy the challenge of finding what we need as we enter each new country. Think about not knowing the language, having to learn navigation such as reading bus and subway lines, finding apps that work in each country to help one navigate, and being bombarded with foreign words, warnings and signs as you walk down a street. Sometimes just finding a bite to eat and getting back home is enough to tire us out! Smile.
My friend Yesul and her family kindly accepted some knit goods.
Yesul, kindly modeling her gift. Thanks Yesul!
Cable knit hat from above
Brioche stitch on the scarf. I love how soft this stitch is.
Due to weight restrictions on the plane so many of these projects I’ve chosen to give to our house guests. They are very appreciative and surprised when I leave knitted dish rags and pot holders behind.
Taiwan scarf in a heavy, velour yarn. It was really warm!
In Taiwan I was able to finish my first crochet, cotton sweater for myself. I must have torn this apart 5 times and made 5-6 trips to the yarn store.
Hat for a friend
