Making A Life

Life is short and I am reminded of this everyday.  A child in my son’s preschool class last year lost her dad. Her father was a member of the Canadian military and died on leave on the way home to see his family.  I can’t think of anything worse for a child than to lose a parent.

As I was making the Christmas Sock monkeys (on a Saturday night after most of a bottle of wine) I got to thinking that if the socks had meaning the monkey would be more than just a decoration.  My mind went on a bit of a spiral and I ended up thinking about the family from Sasha’s class that lost their dad & husband.

Before I sound like a complete nutter, we see this family everywhere, our kids are the same age, they go to school together, our youngest go to a play group together and our kids have swimming lessons together. So in the school yard bright and early Monday morning I approached the mom.  I told her that I was thinking about them on the weekend and I explained my idea about turning her late husbands socks into sock monkeys for her kids.  It was a slightly awkward conversation  because I was asking for her late husbands socks and I have no idea how that conversation can be anything but awkward, but she brought me the socks a couple of days later.

When I started working on the sock monkeys I was in tears because one of the socks had pink paint on the toe and heel which I later confirmed came from painting their daughter’s room.  As I worked on these monkeys I thought about my own family and how I can’t imagine the pain of this family and the strength of the mom.  It’s my hope that these monkeys bring them a little joy even for a minute.

For a pattern and tutorial to make sock monkeys please visit Craftpassion.com.