Love Spun Blankets

Both Christopher and I come from very crafty backgrounds. Christopher's Nana, Mother, and two sisters, could easily take on Martha Stewart, with good chances of survival. My dad can turn a single piece of wood into an entire house. My Grammy and my Aunt Peg have thread literally running through their veins. I wasn't born with the craft gene. I mean, I guess I can do some pretty neat things with paper and glue, but my talents stick mostly to my writing.

Blankets.

Lots, and lots, and lots... of blankets.

As we were starting our family, everyone made us blankets. Everyone made us beautiful blankets. No two blankets alike. Traditional blankets, blankets more "our style", lop sided blankets (OK maybe that one was me). Scratchy blankets, soft blankets, itchy blankets, snugly blankets. Blankets.

So here we are, 3 years after the birth of our first child, 7 months after the birth of our second, living in one of the hottest states in the US, with a closet filled, with blankets. We literally have to hold the volcano of fabric with one hand, and quickly throw our body against the closet door to shut it with sweat dripping force, in order to prevent a cotton rimmed eruption. We have, roughly, 44 blankets in our house.

No matter how much we love some of the gifts that have been given to us, and appreciate the time and effort that went into them, its not fair for us to keep them locked up inside a cubby hole, gasping for a cold breath to warm. We have a tendency (and I'm sure its not just us, right) to hang onto things that we don't use, because of their origin. I'd even go as far to say that I'm a gift hoarder. I know I'll never use it, but I love that someone loved me enough to give it to me, so I keep it, and play out a scene in my imagination in which I use the item until its worn and weathered. In reality, I know it will most likely sit in a collapsed box in the garage (not all gifts, I'm making it sound worse than it is), or like the blankets, locked up in the closet. The gift hoarder in me has always been opposed to "re gifting", thinking it was rude and offensive. But now, with a family of 4, I've had to reevaluate my mindset.

What are we going to do with 44 blankets? We're going to go through them, and donate some of them to an excellent cause, so that they can get the love that they so desperately deserve. I'm sorry, friends and family. I know a few people are reading this, maybe with a tinge of anger behind their type focusing eyes, but... really, these blankets need to give warmth, rather than be trapped absorbing it under our neglected watch.

And just to ease the gnawing guilt of my reluctant re gifting, this picture will surely dance flatly behind a glass shield hung on the wall, set neatly in place on top of a nail upstairs between the children's rooms. These blankets came together to make the perfect piece of memorabilia.