There’s a painting hanging in the cellar hallway in my mom’s house that I didn’t remember ever having seen before. I asked her, “Who painted that picture of the young woman knitting? That could be you, in a wicker chair that could be on the porch in Milford?” She said, “Oh, I think Mimi did that.” So I’m pretty sure it is her.
My mom, painted by my aunt, probably in the late ’30s:
Last year when we visited my mom we read the memoirs my aunt recently wrote about working for the USO in hospitals in Europe around the end of WWII, doing sketches of hundreds of wounded GIs for them to send home.
How wonderful ! Did your mom teach you to knit or did you pick it up later as one of your many crafts ?
She did teach me, probably just the knit stitch, when I was about 6. I didn’t really learn then; I just remember making a little strip probably in garter stitch. I specifically remember she didn’t teach me to cast on at that time. Mostly I picked it up a little about 35 years ago, then didn’t do anything more for another 33 years, and really learned 2 years ago.
When we visited my mom in 2005 she showed us a videotape of an elementary school kid interviewing her for a history report about WWII. (Among other things) she was telling the kid, “During the war everyone wanted to knit things for the soldiers, but not everyone could knit well. I would help people who were having trouble and fix things that had gone wrong.”
I learned to knit from my godmother when I was about 7. I was a quiet and shy child and I think she taught me so I would have something to do while everyone else was running around and carrying on. Anyway,I have this vision of a red woolen ruffle. In retrospect I was probably picking up stitches and increasing a whole bunch, but I thought it was wonderful.