She works with her hands in delight. - Proverbs 31:13
It’s a new month. I'd really like to look outside to see if all my April showers brought some May flowers.
I'd also like to celebrate Mother's Day in a special way, making it a month-long event and talking about the women in my life.
Starting with Fat Mother.
This was how everyone called Dadee's Mum, maybe because she was squat. (You may remember a reference to her in a 2016 blog.)
Crochet was her happy place.
She could whip up an entire dress or sweater using only an aluminum crochet hook and cotton thread. That was when it struck me that crocheting was a bit like being a magician. You mumbled to yourself and wagged a stick around and no one else had a clue how you did it.
Fat Mother always pulled me into a bear hug, and I liked that I would probably always feel little inside her embrace. Her eyes narrowed into slits when she laughed.
She was normally of very sweet nature. But not when she got waylaid while doing her special kind of needlework project.
Filet crochet.
This was a technique with which you created wonderful pictures, words, and intricate patterns using solid blocks of crochet in combination with open mesh.
I can remember Fat Mother, her jovial face following a filet crochet chart that showed you which blocks to fill in and which blocks to leave open. She was a study in concentration. It looked like she was reading about the evacuation procedures on an aircraft.
Open blocks were made using chain stitches, and solid blocks were filled in with double crochet or extended double crochet stitches.
Every movement was concise and deliberate. It involved, very importantly...
COUNTING.STITCHES.
Any questions asked while she was counting crochet stitches would be answered with louder counting. Heaven forbid that she would lose count. An eavesdropper might have deemed her the 'Daughter of Curses' whenever that happened.
(To be continued)
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