Brought To You By Facebook...

I decided to start a blog so I would have a place to ramble on about my knitting, my design work and anything else fiber related. All of my Facebook Friends have families of their owns, political opinions, and sports teams they love to show their support for. Some of them, like me, play with yarn. (We're pretty serious about our yarn time). Just a couple things today...

A Facebook Friend of mine, Beth, has lately been posting each day the things she is thankful for. Yesterday her post was about her eldest daughter. It was a sweet and honorable tribute written by a very proud Mama. I couldn't help but to comment on it regardless of the fact that Beth and I went to High School together almost 25 years ago and probably would not still be in touch if not for Facebook . I never had children and therefore knew very little of the things she wrote about however, being a daughter, I know just how tight the bonds between mother and daughter can be. I share such a bond with my own mother. It was a very nice post in the middle of another day filled with uncertainty about the world we live in. She responded to me that she was sorry (that I did not have children) and that she would be more sensitive to things like that when writing. She explained all her posts were about her family and thanked me for keeping her as a friend. I think she was afraid that because I did not have the same kind of family I would somehow be offended by the things she wrote. I quickly wrote her back again. I explained that even though I do not have children, I have my yarn and my art. And even though I don't have the same kind of family I do indeed have family that I am just as close to...and not all of them I am related to! I have had the blessing of choosing many of those whom I call family. Even though we are different we are the same. What makes us tick is the same...our families, our passions about life, what we do, what we love and what we choose to put back out into the world to make it a better place. This is what makes us all the same. So Beth, thank you for reminding me of this. Thank you for your wonderful and thoughtful posts about your family. I love reading them while I knit!

 On the heels of the above and also via Facebook (its a digital age folks, lets face it), I came across an article that again reminded me of just how fortunate I am to belong to such a loving, caring and giving fiber community. Many of these people have become the family I wrote of above. This article was about a woman named Susan Cottrell living in London, Ontario and a loss which was replaced by the kindness of a stranger living in Ft. Collins, Colorado. Mrs. Cottrell, an avid knitter, had been spending her days in Toronto General Hospital by her husbands side as he underwent a double lung transplant. Susan was comforted by a shawl she knit in shades of blues with over 1,500 beads knitted into it as she spent her time next to her husband during his recovery. One evening she put the shawl in a Ziploc bag and placed it on the windowsill for her return the next day. When she arrived, her shawl was missing. Gone. According to the article in the Toronto Star, flyers were placed around the hospital in hopes to recover the missing shawl. Unfortunately, the shawl was never found and never turned in. Enter Katrina King of Fort Collins, Colorado. She read about the loss of this shawl on Facebook in a post from the Toronto Star and took it upon herself to do something about it. She knit a beaded shawl and sent it to the Star to be forwarded to Susan Cottrell in place of hers which had been stolen from the hospital. The folks at the Star sent the gift to 'Ewe Knit' where Susan teaches a knitting class once a week. Such a touching and moving story, the full article can be read here.

My community of fiber friends and family are irreplaceable. If you go back and read my first blog post, its as if my life began when I started to knit. It wasn't just knitting to me and it never has been. It is an outlet for my creative side and allows me to put beauty out into an often ugly world and know that I have made it just a little better than how I found it. That is important to me. Much in the way that it is important to my friend Beth to raise good, solid, mindful, polite, intelligent and socially aware children. That is her contribution to the world. To Katrina King of Fort Collins, Colorado...thank you for being an example of the way we all strive to be in our lives, no matter what road we have taken.

To Beth, I continue to look forward to reading your posts! To Katrina....well played. Very well played...

Comments

  1. Lovely entry. I can so relate!
    I'm so glad I found your blog.
    XOXO, Donna

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much Donna! I hope you stick with me :-)

      Claudia

      Delete
  2. Oh thank you Claudia for a very touching post. We are all members of the "sisterhood of the sticks and string" as I like to call it. I have already sent my thank you note to Katrina. Expressing my appreciation was the least I can do. One day I will have an opportunity of paying this forward.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Susan, I'm not sure where I would be without the Sisterhood Of The Sticks And String...as my very first post reads, its as if my life began when I started to knit. I am so happy that this Sisterhood helped make you whole again and I'm so happy to be a part of it! I hope you stick with me and my blog :-)

      Claudia

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular Posts