A gift in return
Tuesday March 09th 2010, 11:25 pm
Filed under: Friends,Knitting a Gift

There was a women’s social and a dinner at church tonight. Chocolate torte #3 has been dispensed with.  But before I left, Richard was reminiscing with a chuckle over the time when someone at another potluck there had asked, in a bit of indignation, “Who assigned the Hydes SALAD!? I was looking forward to that torte!”

When the typecast fits, bake it.

So there I was.  Brian’s grandma took me aside and told me–I wasn’t sure if she said it was all of them or just the one–but at least one grandchild, then, went to bed last night with their hat firmly kept on their head and in the morning, there it stayed.

She couldn’t begin to know how much that meant to me and that she’d told me.  Moments like that keep me knitting.

Meantime, I finished the shawl for the nurse fighting cancer this afternoon, rinsed it and laid it out to dry in the round.  It’s always so magical, that moment when a glob of random yarn loops transforms into its glorious self and you step back and actually, finally, after all those hours, get to see.  It was such a sense of accomplishment, and its purpose so close to who I am and why I do what I do that, even though I tried, I could not get myself to settle on any new ball of yarn to start something else.  Not yet.

It felt so strange to walk out the door with no knitting project.  I mentioned that to Nicholas’s mom at the dinner.

She looked at me and smiled. “It’s okay to rest between projects.” I think she’s right–but note that I had to think about it awhile first.

Okay, that’s long enough.  I’m home.  Cast on!


9 Comments so far
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I know what you mean about needing to cast onto needles the next project right away. It’s almost as though I’m afraid I might lose the bug to knit ever again, LOL! Like THAT would happen….

Comment by Jody M 03.10.10 @ 3:57 am

The Hydes and salad just don’t seem to go together….geesh!!!

I can just envision that child with his hat on while sleeping! Absolutely precious!!!

Comment by Joansie 03.10.10 @ 5:54 am

Warm moments, and not just because of the child sleeping with a hat on his head. hihihi

I’m blocking my Water Turtles shawl today. I hope it comes out as well as I hope. I am encouraged by this post, though. 🙂

Comment by Suzanne in Mtl 03.10.10 @ 6:32 am

there is no bigger compliment as hearing how much one’s knitting means to someone else. As much as I love to knit for myself, I’m far down the list of favourite recipients – family, friends and charity knitting are just right.
And salad? Puh-leeze….

Comment by Sandra 03.10.10 @ 8:44 am

It’s okay to rest for all kinds of reasons…

Comment by Channon 03.10.10 @ 8:55 am

Yes, you may -probably should – rest between projects. Of course that might only be 10 seconds, or minutes.

I do know what you mean about the satisfaction one derives from a job well done – for someone else. It’s why I send out greeting cards, and why I enjoy doing all the computer work for the park magazine. I like to make the pages look neat and clean even if no one else notices.

Bit of humor –
“I shot an arrow into the air…”
Darn, I, lose more arrows that way!

Comment by Don Meyer 03.10.10 @ 12:30 pm

I know what you mean about being uncomfortable in that space between project. I almost always have multiple projects going, so it is rare to have none in the works. When it happens, I feel completely unraveled!

Comment by twinsetellen 03.10.10 @ 4:48 pm

Wearing them to bed!! That’s as good as an OScar :-}

Comment by Diana Troldahl 03.13.10 @ 12:40 pm

Now, I doubt very much that the man wore my hat to bed, but…

I did decide I really needed to knit for Grant, and I made a hat based on colors that made me think of a song of his, and chose a pattern that would be manly, and reflect his interest in cars. (Textured diagonal swath of ribbing that made me think of what his hair would do, if he happened to be driving a convertible on a fine spring day.)

It wasn’t at all difficult to figure out where to mail the package, so I sent it off just after my birthday and tried to forget about it, and not expect anything in return.

This past Friday, I had the loveliest thank you note from him, and one of the things he said was he knew the box contained a hat even before he opened it and, as soon as he opened it, the hat went directly on to his head. He loved it. Pronounced the diagonal rib “foxy.” 🙂

He is playing another concert within driving distance of my home at the end of the month, and I’m going. I daren’t hope he’ll be wearing the hat then, but who knows? Maybe he will.

I have my tickets in hand already. Very thankful I did not have to wait another twenty years to see him again.

I’m going to the show armed with a tape measure, too, and will see if I can persuade him to let me take the specs on his feet. 😉

If he’s not a sock person, then there may be more hats in his future. In most every recent You Tube video I’ve seen, he is sporting some kind of interesting headgear, anything from a basic wool felt beret to a sparkly bandana.

One of my next random acts of knitting is a beaded, hand-dyed silk/cashmere scarf I have stashed away for my supervisor at work. Her birthday is in April, and she has no idea. It’s one of those Morning Surf scarves, like was featured in Spin-Off awhile back. Those are sooooo satisfying to make. They are fast, and they look like a million bucks after a light blocking.

Comment by Paula Warner 03.15.10 @ 4:14 pm



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