Knitting Circle

A year ago my grandmother, Martha, gave me her collection of knitting magazines.   They are a trip to flip through, yet I have not attempted to make anything from them yet.  I was looking for inspiration this weekend and may have found it in a hooded mohair pullover - "it's too dashing to save just for skiing"!

This is by way of an introduction to another gift from my grandmother: the hand -knit wool jumper she made for herself in the 60's.  It's been in my closet for a few years, but it has never seem to be the right time to wear it.  This week, as the temperature dropped into the single digits, I thought, "It's now or never."

When my grandmother knit the jumper, she was just a little younger than I am now.  She and my grandfather were raising their five children on the east coast and in less than a year the family would move to California. 

It's startling to think of my grandmother as a mother.  I mean, she always been my grandma, but of course to become a grandma, she had to be a mother first.  She's been where I am now, through the joys and the  struggles.  And in her quite moments, she knit.  A half century may separate our days, but some things stay the same.