The summer that Sam, my oldest, was 12, both she and I were about to hit something we’d never had to face before, me in my mothering and she in the land of classmates: the trauma of middle school. I wanted her to go into it having something to be unique and cool with, for her to be able to do something nobody else she knew could; with her permission, I signed us both up for lessons in handspinning, with a few dyeing lessons too in the six-week summer course taught by Karen Brayton-McFall of the now-gone Rug and Yarn Hut.
There was another mother/12-year-old daughter pair in that class. And that is how we met Gigi and Jasmin, nowadays the Knitmore Girls of podcast fame. Gigi later helped test-knit a pattern for my book; Jasmin has been exceedingly generous with her sock knitting, and both of them with their friendship.
Gigi’s in the hospital right now and I am waiting for the word.  I don’t dare visit, not with the last of the bug going on. (I had fun yesterday, but I overdid it.) I am adding in my prayers with her family’s and hoping for her to get back to normal quickly.
By the way, I mentioned my sister-in-law here recently. When they got the results of her surgery and biopsy, the doctors told her, if you’re going to get breast cancer, you want this kind of breast cancer. If you’re going to find it, you want to find it at this stage. They told her it was the best news it could have been.
Okay, now, Gigi, your turn. We’re with you.
p.s. Gigi, this one’s for you. (Don’t miss it.) Enjoy. And if it doesn’t work (hah!), we’ll sneak some ice cream into your room some other way.