Tuesday, June 11, 2013

Finishing What Was Started a Generation Ago



Those of you who read this blog may know that I've become obsessed in the past few months with needlework, that is, knitting and crochet. It's become one of my favorite hobbies, surpassing a few I've had in the past. Lately, I've been working on at least one project at one time; sometimes two and sometimes even three. It's something fun I like to do, relaxing, and I've even found a community of fellow knitters and crocheters on the internet. Finding people who have this similar interest is really awesome because it's not that fun if you're just doing it by yourself.

I knit more than I crochet. I've been slowly learning crochet techniques, but it's a slow process. I know the three basic crochet stitches, but I can do more with knitting. If you were to ask me which one I liked more, I will still tell you knitting, but it's becoming more of a tie now. You can do a lot with both; I've been incorporating both crocheting in knitting in some of my pieces recently and it's actually pretty cool how you can do that.

Last weekend, I caved and decided to buy a bag of what looked to be a bag of yarn in white and brown shades. I have a lot of yarn in many different colors, mostly acrylic, but I didn't have too much of whites or browns so it was justifiable in that regard.


When I opened the bag, there was a piece of yellowed paper with a pattern. I had seen the paper in the bag when I bought it but I thought nothing of it. I wasn't planning on using the pattern anyway; I had other things in mind for the yarn I was buying.

However, when I read the pattern, I couldn't help but stare in shock. The pattern, which looked like it had been typed on a typewriter instead of a computer, had a name, place, and date on the top. It said:

“Indian Afghan from Glenda Hartnick, Bushnell, Fla. 2/78”

Of course, the '78 is 1978. So I got pretty excited at that point. The paper was almost 40 years old! Intrigued, I looked at the yarn label, which looked pretty old. The label said, “Phildar Pegase 206,” and on the other side stated that the yarn was made in France. When I got home, I did a quick search of the yarn on the internet. Phildar, which I'd never heard of before, is indeed an exclusive French brand. How it got to the states in the late 70s, I'm not sure. What confirmed my suspicions that the “Pegase 206” was indeed out of date was the fact that I couldn't find that specific brand anywhere. I also saw skeins of “Pegase 206” on sites like Etsy and Ebay going for about $25-30.

What convinced me the most about the fact that the yarn and the pattern were connected is that the original colors for the pattern were black, red, grey, and white. However, the person who owned the yarn and the pattern wrote the colors brown, rust, beige, and off-white next to the original colors in cursive—the same exact colors that were in the bag. The person who originally owned the yarn had also started dividing the yarn into smaller skeins for the pattern, as the pattern is crocheted row by row, each row worked separately across with a fringe at the end.

When I get the correct hook for the pattern, I'll start working on the afghan.Whoever originally owned the yarn and pattern over 30 years ago never got the opportunity to finish what they wanted to start. I really wish I could get the whole story behind this, but I know I never will. I do know that the amount of satisfaction that I will feel when I finish this afghan that this person never got to finish will be paramount.

I am giving away the said pattern to anyone who wants to have it; after all, I wasn't the one who wrote it so I feel that everyone should enjoy it. It's actually quite simple. I am not much of a crocheter but I understand the pattern so it's something a beginner could accomplish easily.

I'll probably write another post soon about knitting or crocheting, or possibly farming, as I have a summer farming job that is shaping up to be quite interesting.

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