My grandmother would sit in her rocking chair and knit while she watched the afternoon soap operas.  She loved Another World and despised Iris Carrington. Â
 Nanny would become so engrossed with the plot she would not bother to match the yarn. When one ball of yarn ended, she would reach into her knitting bag and pull out the next. Sight unseen. Regardless of colour.  She was a great knitter and her mittens were always a site to behold.  The cuff could be pink, the thumb yellow, the bottom orange and to round off the top, green. But what I liked the best about my nanny’s mitten, were the strings.   She would knit a cord of yarn which was attached to one mitten at each end. This string went through your coat sleeves.  When you took off a mitten, it simply dangled at the end of your sleeves. You never had to worry about losing one.  I have been unable to keep a pair of mittens through a winter since my grandmother passed away 22 years ago.
While visiting my 90 year old neighbour recently, I reminisced about my nanny’s mittens.  Winnie volunteered to knit me a pair.  She is having a very difficult time though just pulling the next ball of yarn out of the bag, and the strings are causing her a bit of concern.    Winnie never had children.  With 72 first grandchildren, Nanny was just a knitting machine.