WHY THE SNAIL OF HAPPINESS?

by Jan

So, why are we called The Snail of Happiness? It's a question that we often get asked in the shop, understandably so as it is a bit different from your usual shop names. So, I thought I'd share the story on this, our relaunched, shiny new blog.

The short version

We love slow crafting and The Snail of Happiness is all about enjoying taking small steps to create something that makes us happy.

The long version

At the beginning of 2012, I attended a training course to improve my teaching skills. It was focused on teaching permaculture, but was based on widely applicable 'accelerated learning' techniques. One of the activities was for each of the participants to deliver a short session so that we could get feedback on our technique. I'd been teaching for fifteen years or more, so wanted to do something new rather than simply delivering a class that I'd done before.

In order to challenge myself, I chose to address a topic that can be difficult because it leaves those involved feeling rather depressed: I decided to teach a session on 'spirals of destruction' i.e. how we get ourselves into a vicious circle of negativity by taking small steps in a negative direction. So as not to leave everybody too gloomy I decided, as well, to get the group to think about 'spirals of abundance'... getting into a 'virtuous circle'.

The Snail's original publicity picture from 2012 - this was the header for my old blog

Accelerated learning is not a spectator sport - learners all contribute and are actively involved, collaborating with each other in a social setting and constructing their learning in a relevant context. Trying to accommodate all these features, I decided that I would run a group story-telling session, and that it would be good to have some form of 'talking stick' to pass round when it was each person's turn to speak. And thus the idea of the two snails came to me... The Snail of Happiness for our positive spiral and The Snail of Doom for our negative spiral.

That very first outing for the Snails

To make the session relevant to the context, I started the story with there being two weeks to go before I had to do my teaching session on the course and not knowing what to do.  I passed The Snail of Doom on to the first participant, who told the next (negative step) in the story. We worked our way round the group, moving from 'I couldn't think what to do, so I didn't bother' to 'there was only a week to go, I still hadn't done anything' to 'so I had a drink' to 'and another drink' and eventually to 'and here I am in the session and I still haven't got any ideas, but I do have a hangover'!  We then started from the same origin, but using The Snail of Happiness and describing positive steps and ending with a successful session (in the story and in reality). It's a simple way to illustrate the point that small steps can take you a long way. And it works for any starting point.

In order to run the session, I had to make the snails (two snails that are tactile and mirror images of each other turned out to be impossible to source) and that was when I discovered the art of amigurumi (knitted or crocheted critters). Once made, the snails rather took on a life of their own and I loved the idea of The Snail of Happiness so much that I used the name for a blog that I started writing soon after the course.

Fast forward to 2021 and we decided to open a shop. Well, we couldn't not use the name, could we? It's a business dedicated to slow crafting, which involves many positive steps, whilst also taking small steps to greener creations through the use of preloved and locally made materials and tools. Even our business advisor, who normally would have recommended a much shorter name, thought it was good. Fortunately the shop front is quite wide, so there was space for our signwriter (yes, a real person with paints and brushes as we also support local crafts people) to fit the whole name in.

Snails in socks

Snails with amigurumi cotton

Snails in scrappy pick and mix

Snails in the window

And now, with our new web shop, we're spreading the happiness even further afield. So, there you are, that's the story. Where it will lead next, I wonder?