Sam Watson spent more than three decades directing highway construction and maintenance crews across northern Ontario. The work was rugged, loud, and fast-paced, a world of survey stakes, asphalt, and gruff voices where precision and endurance mattered most.
But retirement arrived with an unexpected plot twist: a back injury that forced Sam to slow down just when she thought she could finally speed off on new adventures. Stuck at home and scrolling through social media, she stumbled across Crochetree, a community devoted to exquisitely detailed crochet dolls, and discovered a creative spark she didn’t know she still possessed. What began as a diversion during recovery has grown into a joyful calling, reconnecting her with a long family lineage of textile artistry and, as she puts it, helping her “learn to be a girl again.”
Sam Watson’s Story—told in her own words
"I retired last May, eager for road trips and wide-open days. On the very first weekend, though, I threw my back out, and suddenly the world shrank to my living-room sofa. I read stacks of books, doom-scrolled more than I’d admit aloud, and tried to ignore the nagging thought that my grand retirement plan had derailed before it left the station.
Then Crochetree flashed across my feed.
The dolls were breathtaking, nothing like the granny-square afghans I’d grown up seeing. Their faces had expression, their clothes draped like couture, and the colors were so rich they practically hummed on the screen. Right away I felt that unmistakable tug: I want to make one.
Textile art runs in my blood. My grandmothers, aunties, and my mum could all coax beauty out of yarn and fabric; apparently I absorbed the knack by osmosis. I’ve tinkered with sewing, machine embroidery, and a little amigurumi, but blankets never called to me and most patterns left me cold. Crochetree’s dolls were different, stories waiting to be born stitch by stitch.
While my first yarn kit shipped, I couldn’t wait. I dug into my stash and crocheted a “practice Brenda.” She hardly resembled the elegant original, but she taught me the rhythm of the pattern: the tiny, deliberate increases that shape a cheek, the invisible decreases that pinch a smile. Crochetree patterns read like letters from a friend: detailed, encouraging, and somehow knowing when you might panic and need a nudge.
Since then I’ve birthed Brendas, Freyas, Pearls, and mischievous Finleys. In my mind they wander forests together, chase rainbows, and swap secrets with elf-twins Nathalie and Noah. Princess Genevieve and Arthur wait in the queue, their yarn piled neatly in the “future adventures” basket beside my chair. I’ve even sketched out a “city girls” saga for Valentina, Hazel, and Louise, right after I work through the seven looming piles of yarn that make my living room look like a candy shop.
Every doll teaches me patience (some body parts get frogged eight times—don’t ask), and every doll reminds me that imperfection is just a prelude to the next creation. I gift most of them to my three-year-old great-niece, hoping she’ll invent her own tales and maybe inherit the family’s creative gene. Watching her tiny hands march a Brenda across the carpet is pure magic.
People who knew me from the highways sometimes raise an eyebrow: You build bridges and crochet fairies? I tell them retirement is my chance “to learn to be a girl again,” though the truth is I’m learning to be an artist: something softer, maybe, but no less sturdy. My mornings now start with coffee and a scroll through the Crochetree group, admiring the global gallery of souls sprung from hooks and imagination. It feels like stepping into a room filled only with women (a first for me) and realizing I belong.
If my slipped disk hadn’t stopped me in my tracks, I’d never have met these yarn-spirited friends or discovered that color theory thrills me as much as concrete specs once did. Everything happens for a reason, right? My back is healing, but I’m still happily housebound by choice sometimes, lost in loops that turn string into stories.
So here’s my advice, from one hook-wielder to another: keep going. Build another doll. Hone your craft until your fingertips twitch with muscle memory and your imagination sparks before the kettle boils. The world can always use more beauty, one handmade soul at a time.
With love (and a little lint of merino still clinging to my sweater),
Sam Watson
Sudbury, Ontario, Canada
xo"
