That’s what we all have stuffed into closets and corners isn’t it? For some of us just the UFOs might constitute a lifetime of knitting. But today we celebrate a lifetime of knitting–and completion.
My mother Jane learned to knit when she was about 8. That was 81 years ago. She learned to knit because she really wanted to, and has stories about getting knitting knowledge as a child. Her mother, my grandmother, was a master seamstress and did other needlework associated with sewing, but she didn’t knit or crochet, and Jane is left handed. Anyway, she embarked on a knitting career. She knit the dresses of the 30s and 40s, did argyle socks (I can remember her knitting socks for my father), neckties, lots of children’s sweaters, Barbie(tm) clothes, cardigans. It was only after I left home that she got at all adventurous in her knitting, and after I became a knitwear designer, she learned things from me that hadn’t even entered her knitting thought processes before. But Jane finishes things. While I have projects that sometimes sit for a couple of years or more, she finishes.
The past couple of years every project is going to be her last. She has neurological problems that make her hands ache and arthritis has twisted her fingers. But she got it in her head to knit a beret for someone who complained of a cold head. She requested a pattern of mine she had enjoyed making and got the yarn she wanted. The center bobble decoration was troublesome because of the juggling required at a point when there are few stitches to keep those dpns from being unruly, but I think it was pretty smooth sailing after that. She handed over the hat the other day for blocking.
She also requested yarn for her next project.
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