Darn ING

While reading all the egg cartons on shelves across several counties, I concluded that there truly is a lot of interest in eggs. There are good eggs and not so good eggs, eggs with little red stamps on them to proclaim their superiority and the ones that came from very far and didn't crack a shell.If you are a good egg or a bad egg it may refer to your character and eggheads are supposedly very smart.

However, the most extraordinary, [see the lights shining on top of it's little halo?] Egg will never spoil and will never be offered for a breakfast special. It is in fact, a simple little thing called a Darning Egg. This handy dandy item has been used for longer than I can remember to save a perfectly good, if little holey sock from the trash.

This is no small thing and when my mother, gave me the coveted sewing basket, with it's collection of cotton threads to accomplish this feet...I mean feat, I was pretty needy. The best feet wear socks without their pinky toes or a big heel poking through.

I grew up watching my mother mend things. With the soft glow of lamplight at her shoulder, and me curled up tight next to her, all warm and cozy.  She would examine holes, trim the threads into a neat shape, insert a wooden egg with it's handy...handle and weave a neat patch. It's so much harder than it sounds, as the perfect darned spot is undetectable to eye or feel.

My patience couldn't match hers, as I would just pull the spot together and knot it which makes you feel like there is a perpetual coin in your shoe. That's no way to use your egg to it's best advantage...because it is round and shapely.

My mother darned until there was nothing left to darn, stopping entirely when I got married and she gave me the darned egg. Nobody curled next to me while I tried to save a sock and the light was never quite right. The most frustrating thing was to have the basket sit waiting so long, the drier would eat the mate to the sock leaving it pairless.

An egg is not a pear, although a darning egg makes good sense when a pair is saved.**Wink**

Gratefully,

Mary