 |
| The colour isnt showing well but it's a lovely sage green. |
We had a message today from my brother in law to tell us that our niece is expecting a baby. It's wonderful news, and it will make him a grandad for the first time. The last baby born in our family was our little one and they turned four recently.
I still have some cream, white, and lemon yarn that I inherited from my mother in law, so I'm going to knit some things for the new baby, providing a link back to their great grandma.
I've still got the blanket above on the needles. It was started long ago, so I'll finish it and then make a start on some other things, using patterns I knitted for my own children, some from a pattern book my mother in law gave me. She didn't knit for my daughters because I could do it.
Links to the past, even if she was never very nice to me or my sisters in law.
Heck, I'm not sure she even liked J very much. He went to visit her when she was hospitalised once. She was suffering from cognitive decline by then and obviously thought he was one of her other sons as she talked about J. In her words, J had never been one of them and had never fitted in.
Poor J. My heart broke for him. He is the best of men. Kind. Loving. Steadfast. Supportive. He's like that despite her, not because of her.
He never took any trouble to her door. He met me, got engaged, got married, had children, worked hard, bought a house, moved to a good area, brought up our daughters, saw them through school, college and uni.
Neither of us were blessed where our mothers are concerned.
But I'll knit up her yarn and gift the items to our lovely niece.
My MIL was the same, she never had a good word to say about anyone in her family apart from her precious sons.
ReplyDeleteMy mother in law wasn't nice to any of us daughters in law, but was particularly nasty about me. She hated me before she even met me... I was 16 and she was in her 50s. My crime? Living in the most affluent area of town, rather than the council estate my husband and his family lived on. She even had a go at me on my wedding day, and my brother in law has told me that at one point she wasn't going to attend the wedding and forbade him and his twin brother from attending. Tbh, I wished she had stayed away!
DeleteMy late mother in law was fine, however she lived 300 miles away from us, so obviously never got close to our 3 children. However, I've got 2 daughters in law and a son in law and I try to be the best I can. We've never fallen out and I hope they like me. Mother in laws are loved or hated.
ReplyDeleteMy mother in law only ever visited at Christmas and on the girls' birthdays, and my husband had to go to collect her and drop her home afterwards. Strangely enough, she was quite capable of catching the bus that stopped at the end of our road en route to visit people in hospital. She had no interest in my children, despite my husband visiting every 2 weeks for all of their childhood. I tried for years, but she was still offhand and rude, so I gave up and stopped visiting. It took longer for the scales to fall from his eyes.
DeleteLike you, I've done my utmost to be the best MIL that I can be. I've never had a crossed word with either of them, and one of them has lived here with us for several years with my daughter and the little one. He's grateful for the support, something he has never had from his own parents.
The gift is still from you. Yes, a connection, but the labor of love is all you.
ReplyDeleteYes it will be, and our niece is aware of what her grandmother was like, which helps. I'm hoping to have a large parcel of hand knitted items for her by the time baby arrives.
DeleteWhat a beautiful gift!
ReplyDeleteI hope it will be. I think I'll cast on little things like bootees and hats first to get me back in the swing of things.
Delete