Right Place Right Time

I love cables, and I love how they flow across the fingerless mitt pattern that used to be available on Chavi's Mashpits blog (Original URL: mashpitsknits.blogspot.com/2007/09/cabled-fingerless-mittens.html.)

The pattern was pulled from the website shortly after the first time I made it. I contacted Chavi to find out if it would go back up or what had happened and received a very short response that the pattern would not be reposted but no explanation as to why. It's still my favorite fingerless mitt pattern, so I consider myself lucky for having gotten to it before it disappeared.

During my mom's visit this winter, she fell in love with the design, too. Her right hand, especially, gets very cold since the stroke. After testing out my pair one chilly afternoon, she became fixated on the idea of making a pair for herself. I agreed to let her use the pattern, and we picked up some yarn to match a necklet she's currently working on.

But if I sent Mom off to work these out for herself, it would be sometime during next year's visit before she got them done. So I asked if I could knit them up for her before she left, and four days later they were done. She's happy with them, and I love the way you can lose yourself in the design.

Pattern: Chavi's Fingerless Mittens
Started: January 9, 2011

Completed: January 12, 2011
Materials: Cascade 220 Wool
Needles: US 6 / 4.0 mm

Short Row Heels Have A Place...

... and apparently that place is on any and all socks knit for my mother's feet.

Until this winter, I hadn't knit a short-row heel for at least 4 years. I understand the economies of time involved in short-row versus heel-flap socks. I just don't understand why anyone devoting their time to making hand-knit socks would want to put their creative efforts into a machine-style heel, especially when heel flaps have such luxurious extra cushion and the variations of beautiful stitches and stitch combinations in the heel-flap/gusset construction are so much more aesthetically pleasing.

My mother presented a convincing reason: short-row heels stay on her feet better. Post stroke, her right foot has been largely numb and doesn't function as it did before. The change to her foot is not only functional, it's also visible. It looks rounder and less toned -- almost in the same way as a baby or toddler's foot.

One of the things I prize most about hand-knit socks is their customized and, therefore, more comfortable fit. Given my mother's needs, I had no choice but to set aside my personal aesthetic and kinesthetic feelings about sock heels... and I did so happily.

Mom provided the yarn from her stash. Last year my sister and I had added up all the yarn Mom's collected in the last four years or so since she started knitting again, calculated it by the amount of time it takes her to complete a pair of socks, and determined that she could knit for 15 years solid before depleting her stash. Something had to be done!

So before her winter visit this year, I offered to knit up some socks for her from her stash yarn. I asked her to bring some from the lighter fingering weight options, figuring this would reduce her burden even greater because I would not only reduce stash stress but also take on a greater number of total gauge stitches per inch required by her stash choices. I'd rather leave her with yarn that works up more quickly with fewer stitches per inch rather than yarn that knits up at a gauge of 7.5 stitches/inch or greater. If she were working 9 stitches/inch, I think it would take her 18 months or more to complete a single pair!

We spent a good amount of time contemplating stitch patterns. She wanted a pretty, all-over pattern that hugs her foot and leg. It's also important to her that the socks keep her feet warmer and not be too airy. We ruled out lace or slip-stitch patterns. And based upon the yarn she had brought, I also ruled out cables. We settled on the lovely little twin rib stitch, which I placed on the leg and top of the foot.

The socks worked up quickly, and not only because she prefers a 7-inch leg height (as compared to my preference for a 9- or 10-inch leg height on my own socks). The twin rib is a very simple, 2-row, 6-stitch pattern that flows easily over the needles -- and the yarn flowed equally easily. I spent just a week on them, knitting only a couple hours each evening.

Ironically, my efforts made it possible for her to add another new sock yarn to her stash during her visit -- a gorgeous single-ply wool hand-dyed by Lollipop Cabin, a local dyer in Snohomish. How could I refuse her? She also added another skein to her stash for a pair of fingerless mitts like the ones I knit several years ago.

Not to be accused of moving her one step forward just to let her take two steps back, I've now taken on the project of knitting up the fingerless mitts for her before she leaves Thursday morning.

I've also spent the last week working to teach her how to knit short-row heels. She's determined to be able to do this herself rather than rely on me or my sister to work the heels. It took us 5 days to get her through the first heel -- and I'm pretty sure I unknit more stitches than she knit -- but she finally did it! And she's made good progress on the second heel all by herself, with no help from me other than to confirm that she's on the right track.

How wonderful for her! (And I can return to my personal heel-flap/gusset bliss.)

Project: Twin Rib Holiday 2011 Socks for Mom

Pattern: Mash-Up Magic Toe-Up Socks (pattern by me). Freely available here on Aesthetic Entanglementz (in pictorial or conventional pattern forms) or on Ravelry.

Primary Stitch Count 64. Modified for short-row heel.

Started: December 26, 2010

Completed: January 1, 2011

Materials: Regia Bamboo Color, 2 skeins, colorway 1065 (pink variegated)

Needles: US 2 - 2.75 mm

In Praise Of Her Triumph

This sock,

To you and I, perhaps, a simple exercise,

To her, a labour of love. My mother's right hand, once dominant, now dormant

In its new place -- even now nearly 18 years since the aneurysm and strokes -- as second to the left.

Time once was she lulled me to sleep with quicksilver clicking and sliding of needles, yarn dancing in her hands.

Gifts for herself and others all but flew from her tips.

Today, each stitch a miracle of patience and perseverance.

The woman who dared once more to live, to walk, to speak, to drive, to fight for independence...

The woman who dared not dream of gardening, of grandchildren, of quilting, of knitting...

All these, now, she enjoys,

And with her we celebrate.

We praise her triumph daily.

How could we have predicted the extraordinary work she would do to retrain her left hand, befriend that sinister side, as she determined to knit again, one-handed, nearly fifteen years after the insult? Then on from dishcloth to scarf to sock, and not one but two at a time?

Hers is a simple faith and patience

That each stitch can be made, each technique mastered,

In its time.

Which is saying a lot.

For her time moves more slowly now,

And socks that once would have been the whim of a week now occupy the steady ticking of a year.

But oh, what a glorious year:

Each stitch, each day, a blessing without equal!

Pattern: Mash-Up Magic Toe-Up Socks (MUMTUs) by Zhenya Lavy. Ravelers get it here. Or find it with a full pictorial on Aesthetic Entanglementz.

Modified for a short-row heel.
Started: January 1, 2010, on Orcas Island in the San Juans (WA)

Progress: New Orleans (LA) and Mentor (OH)
Completed: December 17, 2010, in Lake Forest Park (WA)
Materials: Crystal Palace Yarns' Mini Moochi, Green/Purple 103, 2 skeins
Needles: US 2 (40" circular)

Urchin on the Couch! / Dear Mom:

I made you a hat, but I just can't give it to you.

Instead, the Urchin On The Couch is going to my own little urchin on the couch.


Pattern: Urchin by Ysolda Teague
Started: April 21, 2008
Completed: April 22, 2008
Materials: My Handspun "Mom's Couch," 84 yards
Needles: US 11 / 8.0 mm

This pattern knits up super-quick, but I'm not sure I'd attribute that solely to its ease. Unless you're the type to write down rows while you work—which I'm only inclined to do on complicated Arans—there's a certain intellectual drive required for this pattern in order to keep counts going in your head. With such short rows, it seemed wrong to constantly pick up a pencil to make little tic marks. Bad enough that I was flipping needles so frequently. I probably should have tried knitting backwards to avoid some of these irritations, but truth-be-told, I quickly assessed that I just wanted it done.

Further evidence of my desire to finish as quickly as possible: I originally set out to work this project Continental (I'm a longtime thrower—which you know since you taught me how to knit—and I'm dying to get picky with it!). I even started the hat that way, and I was getting more comfortable with Continental style when my urge to get this pattern done quickly surpassed my desire for the learning experience.

As I envisioned this project, Urchin seemed the perfect match for this handspun, named for you. It doesn't require a lot of yardage (although it did use up every little bit I had), and it's designed to celebrate thick-thin yarns (a category for which this, my second-ever attempt at drop spindling, certainly qualifies).


Please believe me when I say I had every intention of giving the hat to you. After all, you are the "Mom" of the eponymous couch fame. But when I pulled the hat off the needles and tried it on my head, I went, "Ugh!" It looked absolutely horrible on me and should never again grace the head of a self-respecting adult.

The problem had less to do with the pattern and more to do with the color-striping effect. You see, all those nifty, vertical short rows that give this hat its interesting construction are fine knit up with solid-color yarn. But for anything that will stripe, the short rows look dreadful. You end up with weird poolings in odd, unflattering places on your head.


So, I'm sorry, Mom. The Hat That Would Have Been Yours would not have looked good on you at all. But on C, whose head is a smaller circumference, it can be a little more floppy and slouchy and, therefore, becomes more tolerable. Of course, this kid can wear paper bags and still look smashing.

C's thrilled because "Mommy made me something, FINALLY!" (Surprise!) She wore it all day at school and has set out an outfit that matches it again for tomorrow. So some good has come from it all!

We can probably chalk this experience up to good karma. Remember that for Christmas last year I sent you The Hat That Would Have Been Mine: the Kool Kool[river]haas, the third and final fling of my love affair with Jared's Koolhaas. Well before I had that one off the needles, I knew it looked like it belonged to you!




Now that's a good-looking hat for Mom! (Thanks, B, for sending the pictures!)