Volunteer ‘finishers’ help complete knitting projects started by late loved ones

Annie Gatewood’s mother died of lymphoma. Before she died, the sweaters she had knitted for her grandchildren weighed heavily on her mind.

“She started knitting and she got three before she was diagnosed,” she said As it happens hosted by Nil Köksal. “He died six months later.”

Around the time Gatewood was thinking about completing his mother’s labor of love, a friend asked him to become a project prototype for a new non-profit he was starting, the Loose Ends Project.

The project, co-created with longtime friend Masey Kaplan, is looking for volunteers around the world to continue knitting projects started by loved ones who died before they were completed.

According to Loose Ends Project websiteThe goal is to keep “loved ones close by completing projects that have been left behind.”

Gatewood, who is from Harpswell, Maine, said that’s exactly what he felt when he was paired with a volunteer, or “finisher,” as Loose Ends describes them.

“There was a sense of peace for me,” he said. “I know for a fact that my mother would be happy.”

Loose Ends is a newer venture, which started in September. Headquartered in Portland, Maine, and Seattle, Wash. There is no cost associated with the finisher as the project is done on a voluntary basis.

The project has gathered around 1,000 finishers around the world and is growing as volunteers want to finish what they can’t.

Letting go of his mother’s work

In order for Gatewood to hand over his mother’s sweater, he says it takes trust in him.

“I have to admit it was a bit of a leap of faith — a leap of faith, giving a sweater my mom knitted, to a stranger,” she said.

But experience is also necessary for him to make peace with letting go of his mother’s work.

In that exchange, Gatewood said he got a lot back.

Not only was she given her mother’s now finished sweater, she also met her finisher, Sarah deDoes, who Gatewood said resembles her mother in more ways than one.

In a piece by the Washington Post, Gatewood described deDoes as looking like his mother and even showing some of the same mannerisms. It also doesn’t hurt that both women are of Danish descent.

“It was really special to meet him and to have it done by him,” he said.

‘Everyone’s gone’

Eugenia Opuda was the first volunteer with Loose Ends.

The initiative is special to her – mostly because her own mother, a knitter, died ten years ago. Opuda couldn’t finish some of the things he left behind.

“It’s great to be able to take someone else’s project and see it through to the end,” he said.

Opuda signed up for Loose Ends and said he was contacted by Kaplan the next day.

Then, she was matched with a woman in Portland, Ore., whose mother was undergoing cancer treatment and had started knitting blankets for her three children.

Two blankets were incomplete after her death. Now, Opuda can see the project completed and share updates and progress via email.

“I’ve never met her before, but I think the process of crocheting this thing can really be done in a different way.”

Opuda originally heard about Loose Ends through a local newsletter he subscribed to.

Since he had lost several people in his life, he thought that the organization sounded like a “good initiative.” Being able to help someone who has lost a loved one is something that they can relate to on a deeper level.

“Everybody loses somebody,” he said. “It really doesn’t like fun things.”