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Knitting together

Eileen is teaching support worker, Mike to knit. “Where shall we sit Eileen? You choose. Let’s take the comfy chairs. I’ve got a lot to do, I need help.” 

Mike and Eileen sit down most days for a chat and a knit.  Eileen loves knitting and even though she lives with dementia, she has real patience with Mike who is not very practiced with a needle. She enjoys the banter. Mike’s enlisted her help because he’s on a bit of a mission.

“The thing is, Eileen, I’ve taken an order for another jumper. That’s 97 I’ve got to do now,” says Mike as Eileen giggles.

“You’re going to have to start me off again, Eileen. What is it? Run it past me again? In, over, round, through and off. Come off you little devil – off.”

“Now the lady who wants this jumper is a Mary Poppins fan,” admits Mike. “She wants supercalifragilisticexpialidocious on the front. I’ve got a good price for it. Is that going to be easy?”  Eileen laughs. “I said we could do anything,” Mike joins in. “You said we could do anything.”

Martha comes over. “We’ve got a lot of knitting to do. 97 jumpers,” says Mike.

There’s a lot to chat about.

“What do you think about the colour?”

“That oatmeal is a weird choice.”

“It might make a nice gentleman’s jumper.”

“Maybe it would look better as a coat for Gina the dog? I think you should whip it off and go for pink, but it’s your choice, Madam. What do you think Martha?”

“I think we need a pattern,” says Eileen. “We shouldn’t just be knitting squares. How will that work?”

“We can use these for cuffs,” says Mike. “We can superglue them on and if it all goes wrong, we’ll run for it.”  Eileen raises her eyebrows and laughs.

 Forty minutes, four rows and countless laughs later, Mike makes Eileen and Martha a cup of tea. They put the knitting away. There’ll be more fun as Mike tries again to meet his jumper order tomorrow.
 

Singing for the Brain at the Orchards It’s the end of another Singing for the Brain session at The Orchards dementia care facility and calm falls on the group.		What it means The opportunity to engage in purposeful activity is central to the dementia care service provided at the St Monica Trust.