Backtracking

Back when I had started this project, I told some friends about my crazy scheme, and one had made a comment about wishing she could make socks, she's never had a pair of hand knit socks. Me, being a good friend (or trying to be) thought it over, and said hey... some people just aren't sock knitters. I clearly am. I should offer to make her a pair, since I'm doing this anyways, right?

I thought about it some more, and decided yes sure. I could give her the pattern list from the book, make her a pair of socks, it'd be win-win. I sent her a message that said I would be willing to make her a pair if she picked up the yarn, just as soon as I finished the custom order I was working on at the time. She answered me back thanking me, but that she actually wanted socks for her grandmother. She was in the hospital dying from brain cancer, and the room was so cold that she always complained her feet were freezing. She was worried by the time I made 2 pairs of socks, her grandmother would already be dead.

So I took a break to whip up a pair of socks for a woman I will never meet. I spent 5 days knitting every chance I had, including while breastfeeding the baby. I chose "lace anklets" from the Purl Bee website, because the pattern was fast and easily memorizable. I am happy to say she got them in time to enjoy them. They were warm but didn't dig into her ankles like other socks, they were nicknamed Mindy's Magic socks. They weren't Cookie A, or intricate, or part of my goal for learning new techniques, but they made someone happy, and at the end of the day, I have to think that it's what matters.