Whoever said money can't buy happiness never went on a yarn crawl
This past Saturday, I went with my knitting and crochet group on a yarn crawl to a nearby city. What's a yarn crawl, you ask? Well, it's like a pub crawl, where you visit a series of pubs (or yarn shops), one right after the other, sampling the wares (and fondling merino superwash at $35/hank) along the way. We had been looking forward to this for weeks, and the day did not disappoint.
I am not looking forward to getting the bills. But I did pick up some beautiful swag.
We hit three shops and lunch during the day, and made brief detours to two different cupcake places. Having to specify which cupcakes you're eating means it had to have been a good day.
The nice thing was that it made me feel so normal. I wasn't "Carrie the Girl with the ED." I was "Carrie the Crocheter" or "Carrie who has to fondle all the yarn." Or even just "Carrie." It was a nice change from my day to day life where the ED stuff is front and center. Yes, I have a fulfilling career and good hobbies and friends and family, but the ED, food, and recovery occupy a lot of my thoughts. Just for a few hours, I got to pretend I was normal like everyone else.
That was nice.
The irony is that I had to put so much work into recovery until I could actually get to this point. Not all that long ago, I wouldn't have gone because I would have had to navigate lunch and it would have interrupted my exercise routine. Then add the whole "spending money on myself" thing, and it would have been a disaster. So after placing all of my other obligations to the side (or at least demoting them on my to do list) and really doing all of the hard, seemingly unrewarding recovery work, I finally got to experience normalcy. Or the closest thing to it when your yarn bill for one day may very well have hit the triple digits.
I have to remind myself: I'm not destitute. I deserve good things. I can handle stressful situations. I will be okay.
It was a lovely day, and I know that all of the bills will have been worth it to feel like I'm part of the world again.
9 comments:
You're absolutely right- you deserve to have some fun and spend some money now and again. Good for you. :)
get out of my head...
These experiences where we can enjoy hobbies genuinely and ED has no part of it, is absolutely amazing :) I am so glad you had a good time!
Scott
The reason I have reached out to you is because of the nature of your blog. I love that you have a blog about motherhood! I myself am a mother to a quirky little 6 year old, Lily. She is my only child, and my whole world (I’m sure you know the feeling!)
The very beginning of Lily’s life was a little more turbulent than I would have hoped for. When Lily was just 31/2 months old, I was diagnosed with Mesothelioma; a type of cancer that kills 90-95% of those who have it. As I’m sure you can imagine, the first thing that came to mind when I was diagnosed was my baby girl and how I wasn’t going to be able to watch her grow up.
After all that, I’m still here 6 years later and cancer free! I'd like to turn my pain into purpose and become someone that other parents can look to for guidance, inspiration, and hope in situations like my own. I contacted you because I feel that your website would be an excellent place for me to share my story. Your visitors are the exact type of people I'm trying to reach out to; these are all the types of people who could gain something from my story.
Would you consider putting link to my blog on your site as a resource for your readers? Or, if there are other ideas you have about ways we could work together, I’d love to hear them! I hope you are interested. :)
If you'd like, check out my blog: http://www.mesothelioma.com/blog/authors/heather/
It details the struggles I went through as a new mom diagnosed with cancer.
Thanks so much for your time. I look forward to hearing from you soon!
Best,
Heather
I don't know about you but crocheting helped me tremedously in my recovery. Especially when I was inpatient it kept my sanity and I was able to share my skill and teach many others. And yes...it's wonderful to be able to go out and just "be"
Good for you, Carrie! You deserve everything good that comes your way! I'm glad you've come far enough in recovery that you could go on this trip with your group. And isn't a wonderful thing to feel normal? I'm proud of you!
Now,it may be just a taste of "normalcy"; some time from now, these experiences will be so normal that you'll never think of posting about them.So wonderful to hear about your day!
Hope the cupcakes were equally enjoyable!
Now,it may be just a taste of "normalcy"; some time from now, these experiences will be so normal that you'll never think of posting about them.So wonderful to hear about your day!
Hope the cupcakes were equally enjoyable!
I say AMEN to yarn crawls and shop hops and pub crawls and any combination therein. If you heard my presentation Friday morning, Carrie, you know I believe in the power of yarn. It's way cheaper than therapy too, no matter how much you spend, and you end up with something lovely to pet. Yarn on!
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