What I Learned From the Ladies at Craft Club

God has been impressing upon me lately about the importance of multigenerational learning. I think He especially wants all of us to grasp the importance of learning and gleaning wisdom from people older, wiser, and more experienced than us. I think this is extremely important for upcoming generations. (I’ll talk more on this in future posts.) My mom and I were just discussing this concept not long ago, and we started talking about how much I’ve benefitted from something as simple as the Craft Club at our church.

Several years ago I decided to get involved at the Craft Club at my church. To be completely honest with you, I have NO IDEA why!! I am NOT crafty. At all. Not even a little. My mom, Jacki, and my sister, Shawna are the highly talented, crafty people in our family. Maybe I was just excited about Christmas (that, however, IS TOTALLY me!), and the Craft Club was making Christmas decorations for the church and for our Christmas Train event. I figured as long as they didn’t put me on sewing and they showed me what to do I’d be fine.

I think I benefited more than they did!

Well, I really think they got the raw end of the deal, but I had a GREAT time! Except for maybe scalding my hands one too many times with a hot glue gun. I’m sure they never ceased to be amazed at how long it took me to complete a project. Those ladies, especially my mom, ran circles around me with embroidery too. I think my mom finished 4 embroidery pictures in the amount of time it took me to complete one. They can’t say I didn’t warn them though! Honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised if some of my projects were lovingly “redone” or repurposed after I left! Ha!

Even if they didn’t get as much benefit from me, I sure will treasure the amount of wisdom, love, patience, empathy, fun, and knowledge (and I could go on) that I gained from my time with all of the amazing ladies that I worked with there. I will never forget some of the life lessons and multigenerational friends that I acquired over the years in Craft Club.

A sponge soaking up wisdom

I often say that I love being around older people and listening to them because I just feel like a sponge soaking up all of their wisdom. At the Craft Club we had women of all ages. However, we did tend to have a larger number of more “mature” women. Typically, we went to Craft Club during the daytime so it was really convenient for retired women. Each and every lady that I encountered there had a different lesson to teach me. Every lesson was taught from conversations, acts of service, stories & testimonies, their lifestyles and examples, advice given and some hands-on training.

• Tammy, the queen of all things crafty and decorative, taught me that crafting can be fun. She also taught me about recovery from difficult family situations, how to be a strong leader, how to be flexible, and how to deeply love and appreciate the people around you.
• Toni taught me how to embroider, how to have faith in some of life’s toughest circumstances, and I learned a lot about farming, gardening, and hunting from her too!
• Emely taught me about enjoying life, tough love, setting healthy boundaries, not enabling other people and how to speak up for what you believe.
• LaDonna taught me about genuinely loving everyone around you, the gift of serving others in a variety of capacities, and she taught me what a blessing yummy treats are for people even if she couldn’t eat them herself.
• Judy taught me about devotion to family, loving people through tough times and showing kindness through random acts even outside of Craft Club.
• Dianne taught me how you can still push through obstacles to do the things you love and how to rely on others for help.
• Kiku taught me about hospitality, how to serve without expecting anything in return, and she gave me some pretty cool stuff to use in my classes too!
• Verna taught me about loving on unlovable people and how you can make a difference even with some of the roughest, toughest ones out there.
• Connie taught me about confidence, classic cars and a little about farming too.
• “Fancy” Nancy taught me about getting out of your spiritual comfort zone and seeing how the Holy Spirit is working when you don’t even know it.
• My mom (of course I have a lifetime of lessons from her!) taught me how to use your God-given gifts to have fun and be a blessing to others at the same time. She also taught me to take time out to do the things that you enjoy. Oh…she also helped fix quite a few of my crafty fails…so I guess I learned problem-solving and perseverance from her too! 😉

Let the older teacher the younger…

All of the ladies taught me that there’s no age limit on having fun, playing pranks, and telling jokes. Each of the women taught me the value of friends of any and all ages. Collectively, they taught me how to be a better wife, mom, friend, and woman of God. Every lady I encountered, in some form or fashion, mentored and discipled me. They ALL taught me, by example, the true meaning of Titus 2:4-5.

“These older women must train the younger women to love their husbands and their children, to live wisely and be pure, to work in their homes, to do good, and to be submissive to their husbands. Then they will not bring shame on the word of God.” Titus 2:4-5 (NLT)

We worked, served, laughed, loved, and even on occasion cried together. My life is forever changed for the better because of the ladies at Craft Club. I will forever be grateful for each of them! They truly were Proverbs 31 women!

Have you had “Craft Club” type people in your life? 

Take Some Practical Steps to Get Some “Craft Club” Experiences and Life Lessons:

• Go join your own “craft club”. It doesn’t necessarily need to be a craft club per se, but find a way or a place where you can work, chat, serve, or play with people of all generations. Purpose to learn multigenerational lessons. Especially make an effort to meet and form relationships with people older, wiser, and more experienced than you.
• Realize the treasure of wisdom and perspective that you are exposed and privy to with multigenerational people. Pick their brains! Ask for their advice. Get them to share stories. Watch from them. Learn from their examples. Share your own experiences, and get their feedback.
• Realize the value of friends of ALL ages. Don’t take your elders for granted, and don’t discount people who are younger than you. You can learn lessons from both sides.
• Pay it forward. You are probably in a position to mentor and disciple people younger than you too. Don’t ignore the younger generations. They need us…now more than ever in such a fallen world. They need Jesus—the REAL Jesus, and we can introduce them to him.

What “Craft Club” or multigenerational lessons have you experienced and learned? Tell us about it by leaving a comment below.

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If you know anyone that could benefit from this, please pay it forward!  Share this post via the sharing links below.  “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God.” 2 Corinthians 1:3-4 (NIV)