Katie Reed

“When I was trapped in my room, I was looking for any way out. I used the internet as an outlet. Online, I met people from across the world whose cultures I didn’t understand but I wanted to. That feeling was unfamiliar since I didn’t want to do anything back then. Once I breached that whole slump, I wanted to keep learning more,” Natalie Chen (12) said.

Absent-mindedly fiddling with a soft ball of yarn, Natalie Chen (12) muses over what to crochet next. It’s been rather chilly lately, so maybe a beanie would be good for braving the cold? Or perhaps a plush animal to give to a friend?

Once she’s finally decided upon a new project, it’s time to begin: picking up her crochet hooks, she works tirelessly to pull the yarn into intricate chains and stitches. The needle dips and bobs among the sea of thread with every loop, and slowly but surely, what once was an unassuming globe of yarn unfurls into a pretty and practical knit bag. Breathing out a sigh of content, Natalie turns back to her crafting basket, eyes roving over the remaining balls of yarn. Now, what to craft up next?

Natalie first picked up crocheting when she would pass the time during quarantine stitching together miscellaneous trinkets. After a brief hiatus, she resumed her work senior year, branching out to crochet more complex projects such as delicate doilies, small plush keychains and fluffy beanies. Natalie mainly resorts to crocheting to unwind after a tiring day, but she also greatly enjoys giving her homemade pieces to her loved ones.

“With crocheting, you can make gifts and things from scratch and give them to people — it’s the best part,” Natalie said. “I crocheted a ton of these little octopus key chains for my friends and just going around and seeing them wearing them made me happy.”

Annabel Yang (12), one of Natalie’s friends and a recipient of her handiwork, expresses her appreciation and admiration for her friend’s hobby. 

“Recently, she’s picked up crocheting again, and she’s been making cute little things for our friends,” Annabel said. “It’s always enjoyable watching Natalie pursue her different hobbies, but I think crocheting is one of those interests where I saw her passion really blossom. Seeing her dedication to it, from her excitement in starting a new project or the bag of all her crocheting gadgets that she would bring to class every morning, makes me excited about her creations as well.”

Besides crocheting, Natalie engages in a plethora of other hobbies, which she often rotates between throughout the year. Although many of these activities are some sort of form of arts and crafts, she will pursue any other type of recreation as long as it piques her interest.

“I have a million hobbies and I jump between them all the time; it’s just my way of de-stressing,” Natalie said. “I used to really be into piano, guitar, the kalimba, the ukulele, drawing, diamond painting, embroidery. I just like to delve into these different hobbies.”

Close friend Cecilia Yang comments on Natalie’s various creative engagements, emphasizing Natalie’s devotion to these different interests.

“I noticed that she has a lot of different interests, and I feel like whenever she has a current interest, she spends a lot of effort on it,” Cecilia said. “For example, once she was doing a lot of singing; I remember in every single car ride she would be singing.”

One area that fostered Natalie’s curiosity was foreign policy. From language to politics, the intricacies of different cultures around the world intrigued Natalie.

Although there were limited outlets to explore during a time of isolation, Natalie made do with what was readily available. Combining her naturally outgoing personality with a desire to discover new cultures, she found solace in meeting people of other cultures through the internet. 

“When I was trapped in my room, I was looking for any way out,” Natalie said. “I used the internet as an outlet. Online, I met people from across the world whose cultures I didn’t completely understand but I wanted to. That feeling was unfamiliar since I didn’t want to do anything back then. Once I breached that whole slump, I wanted to keep learning more.”

Post-pandemic, Natalie searched for opportunities abroad in the hopes of furthering her work in the field, eventually scoring summer trips overseas to countries such as China, Korea and Costa Rica between 2021 and 2023. Through her journeys, she gained a new sense of understanding of what she wanted to pursue later in life.

“The second I discovered I really wanted to travel and get to learn about other cultures, I looked for opportunities to travel or go into programs,” Natalie said. “From there, my interest became more niche in an academic sense; I went from wanting to just travel and learn about cultures to focusing on politics.”

Natalie’s drive and affinity for socialization immediately stood out to upper school math teacher Caren Furtado. She credits Natalie as a fearless individual and an excellent collaborator, praising her efforts and character.

“Natalie sets an example for everyone else in terms of how you should behave,” Furtado said. “Her work is always neat and organized, she’s very kind and respectful and she’s always helpful to whoever sits next to her in class. She’s just wonderful to have in the classroom, and I just hope that in college, she starts seeing herself as I see her—she deserves to know that she is fabulous, and there aren’t a lot of people like her out there.”

Ultimately, the art of crochet lies in using careful stitches, loops and swirls to build something from nothing, transforming fluffy bundles of yarn or thread into a unique product. Natalie knows this process well and brings her expertise in creating to her social life, literally weaving together separate communities in her life and establishing connections between her friends and family around the globe.

“I want to be remembered as someone who’s really good at bringing people together,” Natalie said. “If I’m ambitious enough, this could be on a huge scale, it could be solving global conflicts and bringing two sides of a war together. But I also want it to be like bringing friends together, bringing my family together, things like that. I want to be a diplomat. I want to be a mediator.”