Little things III : Bushcrafters

[TheProff]

Bushcrafter: Outdoor enthusiast, typically male but not exclusively having mid life crisis or second childhood keeping some of the older woodland arts & crafts alive. Things like custom carved crochet hooks for arthritic hands, chunky fulled wool (felt) slippers to name just some of the things they make for fun. Coincidentally they are also amongst the few souls who will gladly gather & prepare you nettle tea whose anti-inflamatory properties are highly regarded.

As for me well yes I am one and yes I do knit & whittle, sadly I am somewhat of a peasant and use jute garden twine. Warm but a bit itchy..

[kohai OA Ambassador]

I love that you posted this.

For those who don't know, or haven't read my profile, I suffer badly with having 'below zero temp' hands and feet (a symptom of Raynauds disease/syndrome).

TheProff has long made my hands and feet being so icy cold a long standing joke. Definitely not that hahaha type of joke, but where he's said joked saying how he was going to contact NASA and get me some form of heat filled jump-suit!

However, since neither of us feels NASA would oblige, TheProff actually knitted me a pair of soft wool booties that come just above my ankles! He got a piece of card and drew what resembled the outline of my foot, covered my foot in cling film (for our friends in the USA, that's also known as saran wrap), then covered it in sticky tape (the tough kind used in packing large parcels). The cling film, or saran wrap, is used primarily to stop the tape sticking to my foot. What TheProff was doing, was making a type of cast, a mold of my foot so now not only did he have the height and length with something stiff (the card), he has the cast to get the circumference of it too, where the arch was etc.

Apart from learning from scratch purely from watching YouTube videos, the only other difficult parts were getting the correct size knitting needles for the wool or yarn being used, and the final measurements of my ankles.

The ankles and feet, as some on here may have experienced with certain conditions, can swell, so he had to make sure they'd fit me both when my feet were swollen, and at normal size, without being too baggy and thus result in me flopping around in them.

The plus side to these little marvels?

Not only are they the only things we've come across in literally years of searching and trying different things that will manage to keep my ice cold feet warm, but as soon as they do go baggy, I can put them on a slightly hotter wash than normal and they shrink back to the correct size

The only down side, and reason why I haven't posted a photo of them yet, a word of warning: please remember if you have a white or black pet, don't knit in the opposite colour to your pet. (We had a pure white dog, my booties are mostly black! Its a nightmare trying to get white dog hair out of them.) Believe me when I say, it takes more than just a warm hot wash, sticky tape or a lint roller to get pet hair out of woollen slippers/booties..

But if like me you suffer with icy cold feet, these is definitely an idea worth considering.

While yes, the same effect will work for hands, wearing them around the house if you're going to the bathroom, washing a cup, picking small objects up or reading (trying to turn pages while wearing them), they aren't practical, but for times when you're sat with family/partner etc, or watching tv then yes, if you're brave enough, or know someone who is, who will make these for you,definitely recommending these too! 👌