"Did you make it?"

"No."
"How can you tell?"
"It has side seams."
The Senior Cat looks at me in an even more puzzled way. He has just removed a pullover I have told him is something he most definitely cannot wear "out". It is a "house" one.
"But it is nice and warm."
"Yes, I know. You have others which are just as warm. That's a "h.o.u.s.e" one...and I know I didn't make it because it has side seams and I only knit things like that in the round. It is also the wrong colour to go with your trousers and it has a glue stain there at the bottom."
He sighs. I hand over his  heavy blue cardigan. It is much easier to put on (and off) and it is probably warmer. (It has a zip up the front which means it does not have that "wind gap" feature of so many cardigans.)
The Senior Cat has a number of hand knitted pullovers. Most of them were made by my mother. They were mostly made out of "left overs" and their "house" purpose is obvious. They are striped and the stripes don't match. They are every colour imaginable - one of them even has a pink stripe in it. They are not pretty garments, simply warm garments - or they were. They are getting thin. I have mended them more than once. One of them is on the third set of cuffs. 
And then there is the "vile green" one and the "sort of beige" one.
My mother bought the wool for those from a yarn shop going out of business. It was cheap. She didn't like the colours but she thought they would "do". I remember her knitting the green one because she attempted to put a cable pattern into it - which merely added to the awfulness of it. I had to undo it a number of times and correct the cable before she could go on knitting it. This is why the cable only appears on the front of the garment. Yes, my mother could knit but she did not care for it as a craft. She was impatient and wanted it out of the way. This may be why both garments are in heavy wool.
The "sort of beige" garment has an odd neckline. She ran out of wool and insisted we fudge the result, "Because if it is all one colour he can wear it for best." 
And therein likes the problem. The Senior Cat was told it was "for best". His father may have been  a tailor but the Senior Cat has very little idea about clothes. A pullover "for best" means that it is always "for best" even when you have much better pullovers or cardigans. 
I am going to tie multiple pieces of yarn into the back of the neck and remind him they mean "house". 
And if I needed reminding that he doesn't really notice clothes as I was about to leave the room he said to me,
     "I like the one you have on. Is it new?"
     "No. I made it - about thirty years ago."
We make things that last in this house.