We spent a couple of days with Aunty Pam in Pune. For those of you who don't know Aunty Pam, she is Viveck's only surviving aunt, 90 years old, and still an amazing needle woman. She is crocheting a blanket for Viveck and me at the moment!!! Anyway, she said she had been making pot holders with all the bits of wool that she had, and gave me a few!
They are beautiful!
She had a bag full of them and said she had been using up her wool scraps! It brought home to me the fact that as a generation today, we have forgotten how to save and not waste, how to make do with whatever we have. A lot of the bits of wool used here was also recycled wool, and of course all the tiny bits that get left over from the huge amount of crochet and knitting she has done over the years. I remember Granny, Aunty Pam's mother, teaching me how to unravel and refresh old wool! You had to unravel the wool into hanks. Then it had to be soaked in a solution of mild detergent and washed. In the last rinse a cap full of liquid glycerin was added and the wool left to soak for a while. Granny said this added the oil back into the wool. Once the wool was dried, it did have a lot of its 'bounce' back. A lesson well learnt. So many memories!!!
She had a bag full of them and said she had been using up her wool scraps! It brought home to me the fact that as a generation today, we have forgotten how to save and not waste, how to make do with whatever we have. A lot of the bits of wool used here was also recycled wool, and of course all the tiny bits that get left over from the huge amount of crochet and knitting she has done over the years. I remember Granny, Aunty Pam's mother, teaching me how to unravel and refresh old wool! You had to unravel the wool into hanks. Then it had to be soaked in a solution of mild detergent and washed. In the last rinse a cap full of liquid glycerin was added and the wool left to soak for a while. Granny said this added the oil back into the wool. Once the wool was dried, it did have a lot of its 'bounce' back. A lesson well learnt. So many memories!!!
Lovely! The 'modern' look of those squares is quite something else! Yes, that was a generation that really lived by the tenet of 'no waste'.
ReplyDeleteThose doilies are so pretty. I hope I have her zest if live that long!
ReplyDeleteThose doilies are beautiful! And you are so right about not wasting things. Thank you for the glycerin tip :)
ReplyDeletehow lovely they are. we used to wash used wool in genteel - i remember loving how full of fresh-smelling wool our home would be, and some real 'bonding' time while winding the wool that my mother would hold out over her hands/wrists :)
ReplyDeleteLovely! the doily patterns are so much like the geometric motifs I am learning here....
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