Nursing My Own Self Today

Today I am not so rushed... Me dear old dad is feeling a whole lot better today. The doctor came to see him last night after the clinic closed for the evening and drained fluid from his knee. Then he gave him a shot of Corticosteroid. His knee is much improved today and he has even been able to get up and walk a little. We are worried about him losing his balance after being so unwell for the last few days because he is so shaky, but I am picking up a walker for him from the clinic so that he can get around ok until he regains his strength.  Nursing Pops for the last few days has meant really buggering up my schedule for the MSP. I am not complaining just worrying a little. I will have to work really hard to get back on track. It makes me anxious. Still I felt that I owed myself a little down time today and so I have been knitting this morning. I have finally gotten the opportunity to put my feet up and knit on those silk socks. I am using a pattern from Knitting Traditions from Interweave Press. It is a men's sock pattern but I have a feeling that they will be a very small men's size. Remember I am using silk hankies to make these and the silk is pulled out to a certain size before knitting. I am a little worried that the silk will not stand up to wear and tear so this is an experiment of sorts. I will probably double the thickness in the heal and ball of the foot just to help add strength. But silk is one of the strongest natural fibres and I am hoping that it will be ok and these socks will not wear out too quickly. We will see. If this first pair fits me then I may wear them myself and do a little test to see how long a pair of silk socks will last.

Here let me show you how knitting with silk hankies works....

First of all, I bought a stack of silk hankies.

Each silk hankie looks like this... so you can just imagine how many silk hankies are in the stack. Hundreds and hundreds of silk worms have worked really hard to produce these silk hankies because each silk hankie is one cocoon, but the cocoon has been boiled in a solution to take the stiffness out and then the worm is removed and then the cocoon is stretched out on a frame in a square shape... thus silk hankie because it resembles a silk hankie.

Then I poked a hole in the centre of the silk hankie with my finger and began to pull.

 

The silk hankie will stretch and begin to produce a long circular bundle of silk filaments.

When it is stretched enough I break the bundle of filaments and wind them on to a toilet paper roll.

Then you pick your pattern... in this case it was a men's merino sock pattern by Nancy Bush.... only mine are not merino...

I then cast on the stitches and began knitting. There's the wee filament with which I am working...

When you run out of one hankie you stretch out another and overlap them by about 6 inches works best. Then you just carry on knitting.... and the nice thing is there are no ends to darn in.... I like that!

Here's what they look like so far....

I think they are going to be lovely... don't you?!

As far as I'm concerned a pair of silk socks is a good way to nurse myself.... even if I'm only knitting them... and not wearing them yet!

I will have to put them down soon as I do have to go to Pop's house and look in on him and make sure all is going well. But I will look forward to coming home again this evening and getting back to this easy and relaxing project.... it's a really nice way to nurse yourself.... for tomorrow I will be back at the MSP.... if all goes well with Pops.