Knitting And Crocheting Blog Week - Day 1

How and when did you begin knitting/crocheting? was it a skill passed down through generations of your family, or something you learned from Knitting For Dummies? What or who made you pick up the needles/hook for the first time? Was it the celebrity knitting ‘trend’ or your great aunt Hilda?
    
My grandma, Grace, taught me to knit when I was about 12.  I started with "footsocks".  She gave me the same Sears Knitting book she'd learned from, and bought the yarn for my first projects.  I still have the sweater she knit for my high school graduation, though it doesn't fit anymore.  I think only one of my aunts (my grandma had 5 daughters and one son) knits -- my mom learned later in life but "it didn't stick".  I have quite a bit of my grandma's knitting tools, and some of her pattern books as well.