A Tight-Knit Community

Bonnie Blumberg has always known her mother was creative and kind. When she was growing up in the ’60s and ’70s, her mom, Janice Goldstein, always volunteered to sew costumes for the class plays. And not just her daughter’s costume: Goldstein would make them for the entire class, sewing and knitting into the wee hours. Goldstein’s dedication to her craft was something Blumberg took as a given.

Then came the 40 ministrokes.

And the three massive strokes.

In 2017, Goldstein lost the use of the right side of her body and began using a wheelchair. Two years ago, Blumberg, a senior lecturer in the math department at University of Houston Downtown, sold her mother’s place in favour of something smaller. While packing up, she found three knit sweaters in various stages of construction. She knew exactly who they were intended for: The first, a blue-and-white garment, was for her mother; the second, all purple, was for Blumberg; and the third, a cardigan coming to life from a homespun pattern, was for Blumberg’s daughter.

She brought them to a local knitting store to be finished. The employees there, in turn, put her in contact with another shop, where a worker asked her: “Have you ever heard of Loose Ends?” Blumberg, who never took to crafting like her mother, hadn’t.

Loose Ends, she would learn, is an organisation that matches people who have unfinished work from loved ones, who have either passed or become incapacitated, with crafters in their area who can finish quilting, knitting and other projects, all at no charge. Founded about two years ago, the non-profit boasts almost 30,000 volunteer ‘finishers’ who have taken over about 3,500 projects since its launch.Blumberg contacted Loose Ends, and they linked her up with a nearby finisher, Anna Minmier, to take over Goldstein’s work.

Now in her evenings—and below the frame of her camera during work teleconferences—Minmier’s fingers dance a waltz she has memorized so perfectly in the 20 years since she took up knitting as a precocious nine-year-old.

Her efforts, Blumberg says, are an act of altruism that she can never repay.

“All I could do when I met Anna was give her a big hug,” Blumberg says, tearing up. “It’s unbelievable how special this project is. I would have spent a fortune to get this done.”

Minmier spent months finishing the sweaters, and says she’s happy to have a part in what she sees as a beautiful story that binds generations.

The project reminds her of her own family: Her grandmother was a knitter as well, until her arthritis made it hard to complete those delicate waltz-like movements.

She stumbled upon the Loose Ends project when a knitter she follows on Instagram mentioned she had signed up to be a finisher.

“Honestly, it feels a little selfish,” Minmier says, laughing. “I get to do my hobby, and I didn’t have to pay for any of the supplies.”

It’s also an opportunity for her to work with patterns she never would have picked for herself, stretching her skill set and keeping her mind as sharp as her needles.

With every flick of her needles, the project pushes closer to completion. Minmier will miss it, though she’s looking forward to that moment when Blumberg can hold and hug the memories that her mom, who passed away in September of last year, started to knit into existence.

That, says Loose Ends co-founder Jennifer Simonic, is the beauty and the value in the organisation.

“It’s not just being nice,” Simonic says. “It’s making sure people have these tangible objects that you can hug when you’re missing a person. That’s a big deal.”

From Houston Landing (24 July 2024). With Permission.

For more stories like these, click here.