Two years ago when Christmas 2016 was wrapping up, I had no way to look into the future and see the changes that would come. As I went about my holiday, I did not know that 2016 was going to be a sort of fulcrum in my life — one of those moments when you cross a line that you didn’t know you were crossing that results in a definite before and after in your life that you can only see in retrospect.

I had received a Pocket Daily Planner for Christmas, and for January 1, 2017, I had written the following:

We had planned a new year family vacation to New Mexico unaware that I actually had family in New Mexico. As we boarded the plane that would take us to Houston where we would then catch a plane that would take us to Santa Fe, we did not know that when Christmas 2018 rolled around we would be celebrating holidays with family that we did not know existed and had not yet met.

But that is exactly what happened, and because we have spent the last year or so getting to know each other, when we got together to celebrate and exchange gifts, my cousin and his wife had gotten me this:

I can’t say how thrilled I am to have relations who understand that a crocheteuse can never have too many hooks, and while I spent much of the holiday visiting with family, I felt it was only proper to honor the gift and give this new set of hooks a whirl.

I had been experimenting with the 7.0 mm and 8.0 mm hooks on a mohair and wool bulky weight yarn that I have been meaning to do something with, but those experiments were experimental, and as with many experimental crochet projects, it led to frogging.

But I wanted to get something done with the hooks, so I went to my current “go to” bag of crochet remnants and found this:

After weaving in and trimming the ends, I got out the yellow Craft Smart value yarn that I have been using for the main color of the Gingerbread House tissue box crochet cozy along with the 4.5 mm hook (6th from the left with the green handle) in my new collection, and got to work.

The hook is comfortable and in short order I had a newly completed five-inch rehabbed crochet Christmas square for Project Amigo:

I honestly don’t know if the events of this year’s holiday that seem unremarkable to me now will lead to some other moments and hereto unforeseen change in my personal cosmos, but either way, I will persist in moving forward one stitch at a time with my new hooks.

And if you want to know more about how I came to learn about my “new” relations, here are two additional blog posts that shed light on the events that have transpired.

Another kind of knot to untangle, and All roads lead to Albuquerque.