Thing 3 is still sick enough to require a bit of my attention, and the littlest Thing is still an in-arms babe much of the time. I'm generally okay with all of this, really I am, but it doesn't do much for my concentration.
This "concentration" isn't much to start with, if history has anything to show about the present. Let me tell you a little story. About a year ago, I figured that I could start early and knit slipper socks for my sister and her wonderful husband for Christmas. (We'll call him "Sven.") I found a pattern I liked, knit my sister's up, and began on his. I knew they had to be larger than hers, but I didn't know how large. I couldn't ask him for his measurements, because then he'd know I was knitting socks for him. I didn't think I could just wing it, but I didn't know what to do.
So I asked my sister to estimate his size, and she asked if I needed measurements. "Yeah, that would be good," I said, "Can you measure his feet while he's asleep?" "I could undress him while he's asleep," she said, which struck me then, and continues to strike me now, as pretty funny stuff.
Measurements in hand, I created the first sock. Wonderful! Then, somehow, life intervened. Months went by, months. Finally, some time in November, I picked up needles and knit this:
Nice, huh? But I didn't remember how many stitches I'd grafted together on the tip of the toe of the other sock. Was it 12? 8? I set off to find it and compare. Not hard, right? Except, the Other Sock was nowhere to be found. Look, I'm pretty disorganized (anyone who can knit a "pair" of socks that takes nine months isn't completely on top of her game), but I only had three children when I knit the first sock. And my knitting stays in one general place unless it's actively being worked on, and that sock wasn't there. I think I probably put it away "for Christmas," feeling all ahead of myself. Only I forgot to tell myself where I was stashing completed gifts. We tore the house apart. No sock.
Since I took that picture today, I can confidently say that having another baby and moving house didnt' magically cause wherever that sock was/is hiding to disgorge it. I still believe, in the face of all evidence, that it's somewhere in this house. And I'm not grafting that toe until I find it.
Why do I believe, in the face of all evidence, that the sock still exists and is in the new house? I could say it's because I don't want to knit another one. And there is probably some truth to that. But it's more along the lines of similar incidents resolving themselves.
I haven't knitted the Jaywalker socks; I haven't done more than three inches of the green Aran for my daughter (and those three I ripped out); and I really haven't knit on the orange vest. (Dainty Bess awaits the Olympics to start). At first, I didn't knit on the orange vest because I didn't want to mess it up -- I'm not going to outgrow it, there's no completion date hanging over it, it can wait.
Then I didn't knit on it because I couldn't find it. I looked in the knitting basket by my bed, in my carry-along knitting bag, in the diaper bag I usually don't carry, in the car, in the yarn room. . . no vest. I asked my kids. No vest. [This means nothing. They routinely say they don't have something when they do, or they didn't touch it when they did, or that they haven't seen it when it's in their rooms. But I had to ask.]
Instead of panicking, I just knit (and ripped, and so on) on my other two
Yeah. I don't know what it was doing there, either.
*Both my friend and the wonderful authoress of the pattern helped me work out why I was not able to knit the Jaywalker pattern. Suffice it to say, the problem's not in the pattern, just this operator.
1 comment:
I can't wait to see the vest, that's why you have to get it done!
Post a Comment