Being Knit Worthy

My Mother is no longer knit worthy. There, I've said it.
As a knitter, there comes a time where the muggles... and some squib knitters will covet your next wooly creation for one of two reasons. The first being that you have no need for the seemingly endless amount of garments and things you knit... which in their eyes can only be for you and not those who commission your work. to these people you merely do it for the fun of it, and while this may be true to some extent, that sixty dollars really helps! while the second type is for the attention they would get for your creations. showing it off at church to your tacky friends and bragging about how my son knits all my creations custom for me.
My first projects for my mother were minor things. A tacky fun fur scarf in 2004, a hat, and a pair of worsted weight socks -all of which she never wore. For mothers day of 2014 I decided that the blue shawl I was knitting for during chemo would make a nicer gift, even though this black linebacker would have rocked a blue shawl over his leather jacket, I did the right thing and gave it off to mom. On mothers day she looked at it, gave a half smile then put it back in the bag. I haven't seen the bag again until November of the same year when my aunt was helping her pull her winter purses out of storage and happened upon it in the same bag, with the same pink tissue paper. My aunt, who is much more crafty and art minded took one look at it and gasped so loud we swore she would burst... and she did!
"Who made you this wonderful shawl?" she gasped. My mother looked up and mentioned that I did and turned back to her Korean drama. "well seeing as you never wear the knitted goods he makes, I will just take it off your hands". No sooner had she said that my mother snapped back, "NO, it's mine. I was planning on wearing it to church." And she did, after almost forgetting it that morning and forcing me to run back to her room to find it.
What happened that evening, was a strange change. She beamed about the compliments and the inquiries of the fine lace shawl. clearly the envy of each lady who came by. My work was adored by the ladies of the church who all craved a creation of their own.
What I wasn't prepared for was the months of entitlement arguments I had with her about who's shawls they were. often time they ended with "you can make another one, right?"

Knitters and the muggles who love what we do understand the time and effort that hours of work can produce. However, the unworthy like my mother fail to grasp this mere concept. the more gauche cousin will always brag to the family about stealing my work and has on occasion tried to snatch it from me... until a nasty run in with a rogue blocking pin landed her with a lesson to never forget. (To be fair, she shouldn't have tried to steal it while it was still on the blocking board-oops!)