Beginning

A little intro on how my crafting carrier has begun.

Hi, I'm Natalia Pleshko. The knit and crochet pattern designer behind Natalia_yarncraft.

I was born in Russia (if we go exactly, in USSR). My home town is Chelyabinsk, a pretty big city in South Ural Mountains region.

I was born and raised in a time when the main word about any possible goods that you may need in your life was ‘deficit’. Many times, it wasn’t possible just to go to the store and for example, buy clothing. And girls beginning young age was introduced to many crafts to make their own, in particular, sewing.

Since 4th grade, we had sewing classes for girls in school. I remember even right now, what was our first real project after small practicing pieces on how to do different stitches, we made an apron. Some white and orange striped piece with 2 pockets. It also was an introduction to how to use a sewing machine, but a lot of work was done by hand. We had a great teacher and I liked what we were doing and learned a lot.

But the real “sewing school” for me was when Burda Style magazine with great patterns and step by step instructions was introduced to the USSR market (Burda website shows it was in 1987) and my mom began to buy those magazines pretty regularly, if I remember correctly 1988 was one of the firsts. Since then begun my passion for sewing, and it last for many years. As a teenage girl, I started to make my own clothing, and at the time as I graduated from school, I had many pieces in my wardrobe made by me. During my study (totally not related to any craft) in university, I had the majority of my wardrobe made by me. I had a big collection of patterns and used several of them multiple times. I made pretty much everything: tops, shirts, blouses, dresses, vests, shorts, pants, jackets, coats, hats, you name it...

I wish I have pictures of all the pieces I made. But back then, nobody was thinking to take pictures of what they make.

So and what about knitting and crocheting, you may ask.

My mom knows how to knit and she did show me how to knit, I don’t remember when exactly, probably around age 9-10, I don’t recall that I did knit much then. But mom knits what we called “grandma style” and in nowadays terms it is a combination continental style when the purl stitch is made the way so it makes the knit stitch on the other side with back leg in front, so you need to knit it through the back loop.

My mom knew that the “proper” way to knit existed, which means knit stitch should be with the front leg in first, and she sign me up for the knitting class. It was 3 months course and the day of the first lesson on February 7th, 1991 I count as a starting point of my knitting journey. It wasn’t easy at the beginning. But I learned a lot during that time.

What was included in the course? I can tell you exactly because I do still have the notebook with all the lessons.

Of course, we learned how to cast on (longtail cast on to be precise) and bind off, how to knit and purl continental style. We practice many stitch patterns from different categories: knit-purl, lace, cables, ribs, texture, and some colorwork.

We learned how to do socks, mittens, different types of hats, scarves, skirts. It wasn’t real size pieces, more like a doll size, but it was the practice of each element needed in a particular item.

A big part of the course was how to draw a pattern (schematic) and what kind of measurements you need to include so you can make a project for a needed size. Of course gauge! And what do you need to know about garment parts: how to do different necklines, or collars, armholes, bust darts, sleeves. How to calculate top down raglans. It was a lot of information and it is my solid foundation for all the creativity that came after.

Looks like this intro turns out not so little. But I do have what to add to the story. Stay tuned for the next part...

Part 2 is here.