M. turns three on Monday. How time flies! Of course, she’s quite the little girl these days, instead of a toddler.

When I was in California a few weeks ago, I was sitting on the couch knitting fingerless gloves for my sisters. M asked me: “Yiyi [“auntie” in Chinese] what are you sewing?” 

Me: “I’m not sewing, I’m knitting. In sewing you use just one tiny needle, in knitting you use these bigger needles, see?” 

Her: “Yiyi, what are you knee-ting?”

Me: “I’m knitting gloves for Xiao Ayi [“little aunt,” what M calls my youngest sister]. Remember I knit you a dress last year?”

Her: “Ya.”

Me: “Would you like me to knit you something this year?”

Her: “Yiyi, can you kneet me a teddy bear?”

Me: “Okay, M, I’ll think about it!”

M suffers from the misfortune of being born just two weeks after Christmas. This means that by the time her birthday rolls around, many of us have not recovered from present-shopping fatigue. Of course, when I’m getting her Christmas presents, I don’t choose which one of two or three presents might be best for Christmas, and which would be good for her birthday. I get them all for her for Christmas. One thing at which I’m absolutely, positively terrible is waiting to give people presents once I’ve acquired them. It almost killed me to hide a sweater I’d purchased for Joe for several months until Christmas one year.

So when it came time to figure out what to get her for her birthday, knowing that she’d just been inundated with toys for Christmas, I was rather at a loss. Then I remembered her sweet and random request. How did she know that teddy bears could even be knit? If you’d asked me a few years ago, I’d say they couldn’t. But obviously they were knit at some point back in the day, before machines and make-a-bear chain stores took over. I remembered a pattern I’d seen in Joelle Hoversen’s excellent book Last Minute Knitted Gifts. 

It was Sunday evening, and I’d have to mail her present out by Tuesday for it to make it to California in time for this weekend, when she’s having her birthday party. I raided my small stash of yarn for some suitable materials. Last year, I’d started making cool gloves for Joe; they have a little flap for your thumb so that you can just have your thumbs out to text or use your touch screen phone. I’d started making them as a surprise for Joe. Making something that’s supposed to fit someone, well, like a glove, is difficult if you can’t measure them. Suffice it to say that I miscalculated and ended up with fingers that were too stubby and an arm that looked more like one the length of a dishwashing glove. It was comical. So I decided to steal the yarn from that failed project for this bear.

It worked out beautifully! The teddy bear is oh-so-soft and cuddly. If you look closely at its left cheek, you can see a little dimple I accidentally created when weaving in the yarn ends. I talk a bit more about making this project on my ravelry account.

All that remain of Joe’s gloves are the poor little dismembered fingers. So sad.