A Mother’s Labor of Love – Kohistani Baby’s Cap

In other places mothers-to-be and grandmas-to-be knit booties and mittens for the expected new arrivals.

In Kohistan they make a cap.

Such amazing work can only be born as a result of deep love!

A glimpse of the tiny cap with embroidery so fine that each stitch wraps around a warp or weft:

The triangles are about 1.5cm tall … and to think that the artist planned checkerboards inside those is so impressive!

Every time I hold the piece to study the work, I cannot help appreciating the amount of labor that has gone into it. The stitches are all executed with equal dedication without any segments that look  like the artist couldn’t wait to finish it or gave up out of boredom and another hand had to complete it.

In our Yoga class in 1991 when my first son was to be born, [much before yoga became a fashionable thing worldwide]-  they taught us attitude and how to perform every mundane act with love from the heart, with a ‘seva’ bhaav and bhakti.  This lady from Kohistan who made this superbly embroidered cap, had probably never even heard of yoga.

But her Bhakti and deep love is evident in the output!

Am fortunate that I have experienced such deep love – in the moments of feeling jaded with rushing about life’s errands – it is those moments relived that rekindle the weary soul!

jm

Feb 2016