Small Gifts

I continue to knit. To knit and knit and knit and KNIT.

You see, I have wanted to make something for everyone in my family for Christmas this year, so I have a veritable shit-ton (yes, that is a technical term) of things to finish in the increasingly SHORT time left before the holidays. Eeee!

Even among the panic though, I am comforted by the run of yarn through my fingers. The easy snick-snick the needles make when I'm purling or knitting a stitch. The softness of the finished product as it drops down onto my lap, growing ever longer and longer until I cast off and fold up the giftie into its wee box. :)

It's really not that much of a gift when you look at it. It's a small item. And you could actually buy one at a store without even thinking. This is the attitude I got from my Mom when I told her of my plan. To be exact she said "Oh, that's IT? You aren't getting them anything else?"

Um.

No.

We don't really NEED a darn thing in my family. We are all well off enough to have all the geegaws we could ever want. What I want to give my family this year is tiny bits of me - of my gratitude for them. I want them to remember that I sat and ran my hands over every inch of fiber that went into their item, that I picked it out just for them when I got the yarn, that I put love and warmth and joy and happy into every stitch for them.

Sometimes, this life makes it so easy to forget that love doesn't always come with a high price tag and an opulent presentation. Sometimes it comes in the form of a small box filled with wool that has been knotted in a precise fashion to form a small object that someone made just for you and you alone.



“Every gift which is given, even though is be small, is in reality great, if it is given with affection”

-Pindar