Songs my Mother taught me #3

Here we go around a juniper bush is a Christmas feast song where the children are singing about laundry. So do we do when we wash our cloths, rinse our cloths, hand up our cloths, roll our cloth, iron our cloth, wash our floor and go to church and home again.
Laundry was supposed to be done Monday morning, or late Sunday evening really. My mother was constant about keeping the Sunday holy, but before bedtime Sunday night she would put very dirty clothes to soaking the night over, likewise the whitewash to cook the night over. Next day she would scrub by hand every single item and put them over in rinse tanks, 3 at least, before hanging it out to dry in open air. 

 My mother had two children in 15 months and an endless row of diapers.
There was no folding, there were stretching, rolling and ironing. 
Except for wool of course.
My mother taught me how to handle wool. Later on when we too had washing machine and dry tumbler, she would never, ever put wool in a machine. Even the bought wool under wear was washed by hand. Why??

 Till her last year at home my mother preferred drying under open air to tumbler. She fell, of course, but that did not stop her.

Wool is both strong and delicate at the same time. If you wash it in say, warm water and rinse it in cold water, which will happen in a machine, it will inevitably shrink. Wool must be washed and rinsed in the same lukewarm temperature.
If you shrub, rub or centrifugate a wool jumper it will shrink, get knotty and out of shape.

Outside the home where I grew up in my red sweater.

After you have gently crushed and squeezed the wool garment, clean in mild, liquid soap or shampoo,rinse it at least three times in water of the same temperature. Never use fabric softener, but you may need a teaspoon of 7% vinegar if you are afraid the colors will bleed.
Then find a bath towel, lay e,t,c, the pullover on  the towel, fold and roll it hard till its about dry. Especially jumpers should be dried lying. If you hang them, they tend to go out of shape. When dry, you may steam iron gently with a cloth between the iron and the jumper.
Some yearn says the are mashinewashable, believe me, they are not. Some machines claim to have a wool program. Believe me, it doesn't work.
How can I be so persistent? Because I didn't listen to my mother and ruined beautiful, home knitted garments.
Even at the home where my mother spent her last months they managed to ruin a beautiful, bought 500 dollars jacket of wool and silk. In a machine.
I've chosen to illustrate my point by showing a red jumper my mother knitted to me when I was two years old.

Mr. Nisse likes reading. Like me he's fond of John Cowart's books. And the sweater is still red. 

I used it till I grew out of it, then I passed it to toddler Serina and some years thereafter the youlenisse (Santa Claus Norwegian style) was dressed up in the same sweater.
He's still going strong. the jumper had 60 years jubilee this winter.

Since the jumper is red I also sign this up for Ruby Tuesday 2. 

 Photo and poem © 2012 by Magical Mystical Teacher

Knitting Socks, a crash course

My Mom still thinks knitting socks is a sport for sissies.
I, on the other hand, haven't knitted socks since 5th grade.
No, that's a lie. When I went to nursery school and didn't have much money I knitted striped leftover yarn socks for the whole family.

Here's a crash course for beginners.
1. You need 5 double pointed knitting needles. 12 stitches on four needles, 48 in all, plus one extra to fold over the first needle to make a ring.
The rib is made by knitting 2 ordinary stitches and 2 purled
till the rib is as long as you like it.

My mother is holding the wool tread over her index finger.
This is the easiest and fastest way to knit. I have seen on videos that the Americans let the tread hang loose and use their right hand to cast the tread under or over the needle.
That is also a possibility.

2. The heel. Take half the stitches, 24, and put them on one needle.
Knit forwards and back, one row plain stitches and one row purled, so that the knitted fabric becomes "stockinette". Begin with plain stitches on the outside of the stocking. Repeat these two rows till the heel is as longs as your own heel. Then cast off two and two stitches together, begin with # 12 and #13 till you don't have any stitches left on the needle.
This is the easiest, but not necessarily the prettiest way to make a heel.
3. Knitting the foot.
Use one needle and pick up 12 stitches on the left side of the heel and the forth needle to pick up 12 stitches of the right side of the heel. Now you have 48 stitches and four needles again. Knit plain stitches till the work is as long as you want it. Preferably till it reaches the pinky toe.
As you can see this casting off leaves a distinct seam under the heel.
4. Casting off the sock. Knit every forth stitch together for a round, then knit 2 plain rounds. Knit every third stitch together for the forth round. Knit three plain rounds. Knit every second stitch together and two plain rounds. Then knit two and two together till there's no masks but one left. Cut off and pull the tread through the last mask.
You are watching my mother making a pair of socks for a dear friend of mine.

This casting off is called a round casting, opposite the casting off for mittens, which is callled pointed casting off.
Good luck and please let me know if you understood my oh, so plain recipe.
Here's an American You Tube version that actually may be easier to understand.