I am starting a new blog.... so here goes.
I am a knitter. I am a mom. I am a worrywart. What goes together better than a blog about knitting because I worry a lot? Nothing, so here goes.
I learned how to knit from my grandma when I was like nine or ten but it didn't catch on with me like crochet did. So for most of my teen and younger adult years I crocheted. But when I turned fifty and my dad was dealing with lung cancer, I took up knitting again. Then I found a cute bear pattern from Deborah Norville called Ruby Bear and my knitting exploded. Worrying about my dad, sitting with him in the hospital and at home, I knitted. I even brought my knitting to work so where I was waiting on a computer to load something or printing out church bulletins, I could do something with my hands instead of actively worrying. Mind you I still worried, but at least my hands had something to do and I was not going to pick up smoking.
I found the Ruby Bear pattern at my local hobby store and decided it looked simple enough for me to follow directions. I usually do not follow written directions very well. Up until that point in my life I was not a reader of patterns, especially knit patterns. All those short hand symbols and asterisks and things messed with my brain. I was better if you showed me. But I had no one to show me at this point in my life so I tried. Maybe it was because I turned fifty or maybe because the worry had shoved my brain into some kind of survival mode, but whatever the cause, I was able to understand the directions of this cute bear pattern. so I began and I kept going knitting over one hundred bears in the next few years. I knit through my dad's death, and my mother's grief which overwhelmed my own grief. Knitting was my grief relief. My life was changing as my children were moving out of the house, getting married, my mother's grief was still heavy and she was having health issues. So I continued to knit bears.
I knit bears for ten years. I am not kidding. I had bears coming out of my ears and because they were not perfect bears, I really stink at embroidering eyes and mouths on them, I could not sell them. But they were all friends of mine so I could not take them apart either so they got donated like crazy. I even gave them out to the students in our family's martial arts business until they all had one and an extra one to give to a friend.
Other crafts came and went, but I always went back to knitting bears when I was worrying a lot. But now I was getting interested in other patterns so I attempted a sweater for myself, a cardigan no less! It would fit a small size bear, but I actually did manage to make a cardigan sweater with two similar length sleeves and the placket for buttons, but not the button holes or buttons. I was so thrilled I had finished it. And I wore it though it sagged a lot. I didn't care.
Then I discovered a sock pattern in my Knitting for Dummies bible. Hmmm I was fascinated how you could make socks with all those tiny needles so once again, I scrounged through my old craft box left to me by my grandma and found some old metal knitting double pointed needles. My first attempt was really frustrating because the needles were so slippery the yarn would fall off. I went to my hobby store and lo and behold they had plastic dpns. I bought them and that made all the difference in the world. Suddenly I was whipping out socks. Once again, they were not perfect. But who cared? They were socks and I discovered some 40% alpaca wool blend yarn that made them so warm and cozy! It didn't matter that they were so thick you could not wear them with shoes and if you wore them on anything but carpet you slipped on your behind. I could make socks!! Real socks!! And you better believe my family got tired of receiving an unmatched pair of socks every holiday and in between for several years.
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