A Labor & Legacy of Love: Restoring My Grandmother's Blanket

Growing up, one of the most precious items in my house was a pair of scissors with an orange handle and a small pink ribbon tied to one side to make sure it never got lost. A pair of sewing scissors, reserved for the most important projects - a red skirt for my chorus concerts, a fresh design for a summer camp t-shirt, a homemade Dalmatian Halloween costume crafted from white pajamas and black felt. What I didn't know then was that these scissors represented generations of craftsmanship by my mother's family; my great-grandfather was a tailor by trade, and my grandmother, my Oma, still tells me stories of the clothes she made for herself, my mother and my aunts when they grew up and when it was cheaper to buy fabric and patterns than clothes at the store.

I was raised on crafting, art and design. My Oma would teach me to cross-stitch, knit or sew when I stayed at her house and I'd always proudly show off my creations when my parents picked me up. You couldn't look around her house without seeing something that was handmade, from cushions to rugs to decor. It was magical to watch old fabric be cut up and reused, with nothing ever going to waste.

My Oma was even more proud when I took up my own craft, crochet. Using a hook and a ball of yarn to create anything I could imagine immediately captivated me and I spent plenty of afternoons browsing the yarn section at local craft stores, dreaming up my next project. I loved making pillows, scarves, decorations or blankets for family, friends and especially Oma. Nothing made me happier than to see her face light up at my latest project, especially as her declining eyesight made it more difficult to crochet herself. She sees her grandchildren as her legacy and is so proud that one of us is carrying on the textile tradition.

When she moved in with my aunt in late 2020, I moved into her home and gained a craft room of my dreams, complete with a 1960's sewing machine, bundles of yarn and fabric and plenty of unfinished projects. What immediately caught my eye, however, was a dingy, matted blue crocheted blanket made up of multiple sections stitched together. Time and storage had not been kind and the once-beautiful yarn was dull and fraying. The more time I spent cleaning out closets and shifting furniture, the more pieces of this mystery blanket I found. I knew it had been crafted by my Oma, but I didn't know when or why or even fully how. What I knew most of all was that I wanted to restore it.

I had a lot of initial questions when deciding how to tackle something I'd never done before but was fairly certain could be done - deconstruct, clean and reconstruct a blanket that I had not made. I first needed to know if yarn could be washed and a quick search showed me that it would need to be unravelled, wound into skeins and then soaked in warm water before using it to crochet. Unravelling a blanket that was crocheted at least 30 years prior is no easy feat, as its wear and tear had created mats that had to be cut off before even beginning to pull it apart. This was where my Fiskar scissors came in, as the pair I used for yarn was perfectly sharp and narrow enough to work in between the delicate loops without severing the continuous strands of yarn. Countless evenings and months worth of TV shows went into the slow, yet steady trimming and unravelling of a blanket that did not want to come apart. As swathes of yarn were wrapped into skeins, they were soaked in warm water and shampoo and came out their brilliant, former bright teal. Unstable sections of the yarn were cut away with scissors and tied together again, creating a stronger textile that could withstand many years worth of use.The transformation was exceptional and made this labor of love even more worth it.

The skeins of soft, restored yarn were wrapped into balls, ready to be turned back into the blanket they had once been. Getting into a rhythm is one of my favorite parts of crochet, and this simple pattern of double crochets to recreate the original stitches was perfect for it. The blanket came together so beautifully, representing months of work and care to make sure it was restored to its former glory. When it was finally finished, I was so excited to share it with my Oma, who was delighted and shocked to see a blanket she’d last seen in pieces transformed into a luxurious representation of her skills at the peak of her time crocheting. She wanted to know about the whole process and how each step was done, marveling at the ability to renew something worn down by time into a piece that could be enjoyed for another 30 years.

More than just the satisfaction of a completed project, this blanket inspired me to think bigger with my creations and build a legacy of crocheted items like my Oma had done for me. I knew I was passionate about crochet but this project represented a bigger purpose or calling that was waiting for me to find it. The confidence I gained in my abilities from taking this blanket from start to finish gave me the push I needed to speak my dreams into reality and launch my own crochet business. Inspired by the vintage designs of my Oma and driven by my passion for sustainability, Aline’s Crafts & Crochet was born, proudly displaying my Oma’s Dutch name.

Using a bit of second-hand yarn and a lot of creativity, Aline’s Crafts & Crochet features handmade pieces for old souls. Modern motifs paired with classic crochet patterns are stitched together with care, creating tote bags, accessories and more that allow anyone to express their creativity and style through a handmade piece. To reduce waste and over-production, my yarn is pre-owned, which helps save costs and keeps yarn out of landfills or storage units.

The connection this blanket gave me to my Oma reminds me of the artistry that came before me and the value of creating your own goods. While home crafting was long recognized as a societal norm, the efficiency of automation and the rise of fast fashion made way for a disconnect between our style and its creation. My Oma is living proof of this legacy and serves as my inspiration to continue pushing back against the divide between us and our clothes or the idea that textiles are discardable. Crochet is beautiful because it is so much more than a craft, it is an artform and a mode for self-expression, it is blessings woven into each stitch and it is a legacy of pieces that can always be created, unwound and put back together again.