the making of a sock monkey

Found in the attic of my mother some time ago: a pair of vintage red-heeled socks, together with the original instructions for making a sock monkey. They had belonged to my grandmother - to Nana - who had a fondness for making small stuffed critters. For a reason I cannot imagine, she never got around to making this particular one.

Actually, I can imagine why she never made this sock monkey. Believe it or not, I think the only reason I was able to make the sock monkey at this particular point in time is because of my recent experience steeking! I kid you not. I am a knitter - Nana was a knitter (heck, she was the one who taught me) - and most normal knitters can not bring themselves to cut their knitting. The thought alone sends them shrieking from the room.

As a result, the sock monkey socks sat in Nana's stash, unused, for years. (You guessed it: making the sock monkey involves cutting the knitted sock. . . .) Upon her death, the socks eventually came to me (and that was a while ago) and have sat in my stash until just this point in time, where the anticipated arrival of a grandson, coupled with the failure of the world to stop revolving upon the happening of the cutting [oh horror!] of knitting, combined with the love of our daughter-in-law for monkey toys (and our love for her) to push me over the edge and induce me to find and finally make up Nana's vintage sock monkey.

That would make this a present from his great, great grandmother to baby Torre!

If I can pry it away from Luther, that is.