I got a phone call two days ago – did I happen to have three pairs of socks for sale (one for a man who wears size 9 shoes)? My answer was “Yes” and “No”.

A month ago I went through my stash of socks and put names on all but one pair – my Christmas gifts: one to the woman who cuts my hair, one pair for my massage therapist, one for the gal who does my nails… and a few pair as gifts for friends. So “Yes” I had socks in the stash but they were already allocated. And “No” I didn’t have any to fit a man’s size 9 foot.

So what do you do? These are for sale – same price as last year $50/pair. So I took the undesignated pair, removed the toes, added 10 rows to the foot, then reknit the toes – an evening’s work for each sock. That solved the problem of a pair large enough for a man.

Lengthened socks

I went through the designated socks – decided I probably had enough time to actually knit another one and a half pair of socks between now and Christmas – so she can have two of those; three pair of socks in all.

I’m set to deliver them today. The payment is a “payment forward” – she will send it directly to an endowment fund at our local children’s hospital to support their Child Life program. I’ve been building that endowment for almost 25 years with my annual contributions plus donations like this one. It’s not a huge endowment (although it keeps growing) but it does provide books and supplies for the children who participate in the program while they’re in hospital.

So that’s my good deed for today.