For kelkyag‘s Prompt.

It began when Hill Decima Insero was pregnant.

Pregnancy was neither a forbidden nor a mandatory activity (It created more workers, but took productivity from the pregnant worker), and thus the small sub-category of activities labeled “nesting” were also neither forbidden nor mandatory.

Allen Prima Super Insero had learned to knit long ago, from a grandmother who had learned even longer ago. Crafts were another neither forbidden nor mandatory activity, as long as the supplies came out of your allowance (they filled the free-time recreation slot, assisted in morale, but did not directly benefit productivity), so, on their sustenance pauses, over the course of weeks, Allen Prima took Hill Decima aside and showed her how to knit, starting with a tiny yellow beanie.

Decima took to the activity, finding it a pleasant change from planting tiny seeds, and was soon accessing the old hard-copy archives to learn more about the craft, accessing her supply allowance for yarn, and finding scraps from the planting fields to craft into needles. Hill Primus was wrapped in knitting from head to toe for the first years of his life, much intriguing the crèche workers.

When Phillips Sexta Insero Minor found she was pregnant a year later, Decima took it on herself to teach the younger woman how to knit, and passed on to her her first pair of knitting needles, which had belonged to Allen Prima’s grandmother. A year later, when Martinez Septus Insero Major learned that his partner was pregnant, they both taught him.

The fourth year, they lobbied the Bureau of Days to make Learn to Knit an official holiday for the Planting division. It was early in the season, when the time could be spared, they argued, and, despite its categorization, it taught hand-eye coordination and produced things which were one, usable, two, beautiful (That being a morale-booster), and three, could often use otherwise junked materials.

It wasn’t their well-lain-out arguments that won them their new holiday (Martinex Septimus’ partner worked in the Bureau of Food and knew how to write reports that would be read and noted), as much as it was that the accompanied the petition with four things: a new hat for Smith Prima Super Diem’s young child, a skein of the softest yarn, a pair of handmade needles, and Allen Prima, to teach them the skill.

On the first official celebration of Learn to Knit day, they had attendees from every department in the complex. To seal the deal, Allen Prima arranged their labor to make a blanket for Johnson Secondus, Super-Super, who ran the department which ran the entire arcology.

By the third year, Johnson Secondus draped in handknits, the holiday was arcology-wide. By the seventh year, it had spread to nearby arcs.

“Worldwide is only a matter of time,” Allen Prima murmured. “Seven, eight, nine… there.” She worked placidly around on her newest project, a toque for Caesar Prima Caesara.

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