i consider myself a pretty adventurous knitter. my projects range from the most basic dishcloth to felted bags to my UFO ubatuba sweater. i love knitting socks and baby blankets. but my most favorite FO is also my most cherished, something i made during a very dark time in my life.
two years ago hubby and i finally got the green light to get pregnant. we had to put our plans for adding to our family on hold for a year while i worked on getting some personal health issues under control. to our surprise, we got lucky on our first month of trying, and we were elated.
our joy turned into sorrow when we learned that our baby, whom i had named "ani", had died at 8 weeks gestation. for some that may seem like an unfortunate minor blip but for us, after a year of waiting and a miscarriage prior to conceiving the boy, the news was devastating. questioned whirled in my head...what if couldn't i get pregnant again?...why couldn't i sustain a pregnancy?...was the boy really our miracle baby, and we should just be grateful to have him? we gave ourselves a deadline. since the boy was turning 5 and we wanted to have a baby before he went to school, we decided that we would keep trying until christmas, and then give up TTC and concentrate on our only child.
we started trying again, except this time month after month would pass without a BFP. on top everything, the anniversary of our first loss, on All Saint's Day, was looming, the EDD of ani on New Year's Day was on the horizon, and i felt more frantic, depressed, and left behind as friends announced their good news of family additions, and i dodged the "when are you going to give the boy a brother or sister" spiel that every know-it-all seemed to give.
during this time i had a prayer shawl group at my church. we made shawls that people could borrow to keep warm in church...and if someone wanted to take one to give to someone in need, that was fine too. i thought, i really could use my own prayer shawl, becos i was hurting and scared and wanted something to wrap around me for those times i just wanted to feel safe.
after reading through books and magazines, searching for my perfect shawl, i decided i would make a clapotis. this scarf/shawl/wrap is one of the most popular and most knitted projects on knitty. clapotis was simple enough to knit, yet the drop stitches added an exciting challenge to the work. i calculated how much yarn i'd need (the original was knit with lorna's laces, but i needed a yarn that would suit my pocketbook), and while at KDO i found the perfect yarn: crystal palace merino 5, in soft purples, blues and greens.
i set out on my shawl. the pattern was meditative and easy to knit. the dropped stitches, normally a fear for most knitters, actually felt liberating as i would drop the stitch then watch it rappel down the fabric. clappy, as i had named my shawl, grew and grew and grew.
on Halloween, i had about 2 feet of clappy left to knit. i really wanted it finished for ASD, so i feverishly knit on it around the clock. i even took it to church and sunday school and pounded it out (mom scolded me for that - she didn't think it was appropriate.) late on november 1, i cast off clappy, wove in my ends, did a quickie block job and wrapped its soft goodness around me.
the boy wearing clappy:
i wore clappy everywhere - to church, to knitting, to the grocery store. i wrapped clappy around me at home when i was watching tv, reading a book, knitting. clappy really did make me happy.
after a while i decided i had to rename clappy. clappy sounded dirty (who wanted to be named after gonorrhea?) so i settled on linus, after the peanuts character, whose security blanket could be anything he wanted it to be. linus was my wrap, scarf, shawl and blanket, and the name really did fit!
november melted into december and ani's EDD was in front of me. the christmas holidays are always my favorite but this year i was dreading them. i felt lonely that instead of welcoming a new baby, my belly and arms were empty. i had looked forward to sending my christmas cards with a picture of the boy holding the baby under the christmas tree (i was certain i would deliver before christmas, as the boy had been 3 weeks early, i had assumed the next baby would be too).
a funny thing happened. christmas eve and day passed and i felt this curious calm. new year's eve and day came and went, and while i felt sad, i also felt very very tired.
a couple days later i tested and found a BFP!
a couple weeks later, my doctor found not one but two tiny heartbeats fluttering inside me. SURPRISE!
and eight months later, after my first ride in an ambulance and during a heavy thunderstorm, william and laura entered this world five weeks early (how did i know that was going to happen?!). and when i tried to sleep through the pain and discomfort of major surgery and the fear and worry for my two precious angels in the NICU, i wrapped linus around me.
on chilly afternoons, curled up on a rocking chair on the front porch, i wait for the boy's bus, his ride home from school. linus keeps me warm, in both a physical and spiritual sense.
about a month ago i decided i would give linus a proper blocking. pinned to the floor, he stretched nearly half the length of the floor in the computer room. he was nearly three times his size.
linus has a couple of pulls. the stitches left from the dropped stitches catch on everything. but i tuck them back, give the fabric a gentle tug, and go about my day.
of all my FOs, linus, clappy, my clapotis, truly makes me happy.
our joy turned into sorrow when we learned that our baby, whom i had named "ani", had died at 8 weeks gestation. for some that may seem like an unfortunate minor blip but for us, after a year of waiting and a miscarriage prior to conceiving the boy, the news was devastating. questioned whirled in my head...what if couldn't i get pregnant again?...why couldn't i sustain a pregnancy?...was the boy really our miracle baby, and we should just be grateful to have him? we gave ourselves a deadline. since the boy was turning 5 and we wanted to have a baby before he went to school, we decided that we would keep trying until christmas, and then give up TTC and concentrate on our only child.
we started trying again, except this time month after month would pass without a BFP. on top everything, the anniversary of our first loss, on All Saint's Day, was looming, the EDD of ani on New Year's Day was on the horizon, and i felt more frantic, depressed, and left behind as friends announced their good news of family additions, and i dodged the "when are you going to give the boy a brother or sister" spiel that every know-it-all seemed to give.
during this time i had a prayer shawl group at my church. we made shawls that people could borrow to keep warm in church...and if someone wanted to take one to give to someone in need, that was fine too. i thought, i really could use my own prayer shawl, becos i was hurting and scared and wanted something to wrap around me for those times i just wanted to feel safe.
after reading through books and magazines, searching for my perfect shawl, i decided i would make a clapotis. this scarf/shawl/wrap is one of the most popular and most knitted projects on knitty. clapotis was simple enough to knit, yet the drop stitches added an exciting challenge to the work. i calculated how much yarn i'd need (the original was knit with lorna's laces, but i needed a yarn that would suit my pocketbook), and while at KDO i found the perfect yarn: crystal palace merino 5, in soft purples, blues and greens.
i set out on my shawl. the pattern was meditative and easy to knit. the dropped stitches, normally a fear for most knitters, actually felt liberating as i would drop the stitch then watch it rappel down the fabric. clappy, as i had named my shawl, grew and grew and grew.
on Halloween, i had about 2 feet of clappy left to knit. i really wanted it finished for ASD, so i feverishly knit on it around the clock. i even took it to church and sunday school and pounded it out (mom scolded me for that - she didn't think it was appropriate.) late on november 1, i cast off clappy, wove in my ends, did a quickie block job and wrapped its soft goodness around me.
the boy wearing clappy:
i wore clappy everywhere - to church, to knitting, to the grocery store. i wrapped clappy around me at home when i was watching tv, reading a book, knitting. clappy really did make me happy.
after a while i decided i had to rename clappy. clappy sounded dirty (who wanted to be named after gonorrhea?) so i settled on linus, after the peanuts character, whose security blanket could be anything he wanted it to be. linus was my wrap, scarf, shawl and blanket, and the name really did fit!
november melted into december and ani's EDD was in front of me. the christmas holidays are always my favorite but this year i was dreading them. i felt lonely that instead of welcoming a new baby, my belly and arms were empty. i had looked forward to sending my christmas cards with a picture of the boy holding the baby under the christmas tree (i was certain i would deliver before christmas, as the boy had been 3 weeks early, i had assumed the next baby would be too).
a funny thing happened. christmas eve and day passed and i felt this curious calm. new year's eve and day came and went, and while i felt sad, i also felt very very tired.
a couple days later i tested and found a BFP!
a couple weeks later, my doctor found not one but two tiny heartbeats fluttering inside me. SURPRISE!
and eight months later, after my first ride in an ambulance and during a heavy thunderstorm, william and laura entered this world five weeks early (how did i know that was going to happen?!). and when i tried to sleep through the pain and discomfort of major surgery and the fear and worry for my two precious angels in the NICU, i wrapped linus around me.
on chilly afternoons, curled up on a rocking chair on the front porch, i wait for the boy's bus, his ride home from school. linus keeps me warm, in both a physical and spiritual sense.
about a month ago i decided i would give linus a proper blocking. pinned to the floor, he stretched nearly half the length of the floor in the computer room. he was nearly three times his size.
linus has a couple of pulls. the stitches left from the dropped stitches catch on everything. but i tuck them back, give the fabric a gentle tug, and go about my day.
of all my FOs, linus, clappy, my clapotis, truly makes me happy.
Wow, what a great post! It's awesome to hear about a knitted item bringing so much comfort. I love the colors of your clapotis, too - very pretty. : ) Thanks for sharing your story.
ReplyDeleteWow, I really love your story - that is one special FO. Thank you for sharing.
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing your story with us. I am glad that Linus has been there to bring you comfy when you needed it. I am knitting a Clapotis now I love it & its very addicting.
ReplyDeleteMaybe one day you will pass Linus down to Laura so she will feel the same since of comfort in life with Linus that you have felt with him.
That was a wonderful story. You do write well.
ReplyDeleteThis was such a touching story. Linus was really an appropriate name for your project. Everyone needs a cozy security blanket kind of thing, even as adults.
ReplyDeletethanks for all of your kind comments. this post was hard to write - but important for me to share as part of my healing.
ReplyDelete