blanket · wool · domestic
a small L laid along the edge: a vertical leg, a horizontal arm, a vertical leg. the next leg holds the last arm. the cloth's edge is bound; it cannot fray; it is also, now, decorated.
closed up tight, it becomes buttonhole stitch — the same stitch under its working name. used to ring the cut edge of a hole that wants to be a buttonhole, or the slit in a glove, or anywhere a hem must do two jobs at once. it is the stitch on the wool blanket your grandmother did not throw away.
field-note: the corners turn three legs into one. nobody is shown this; everyone learns it.
running stitch · chain stitch · smocking · ribbon · thimble