My Latest Obsession

Knitting! Trendy and practical. I've wanted to have a go at knitting for quite some time now, but have been in need of a willing teacher. Luckily, at the weekend, I went home to Bristol to visit the parents and mother (re)taught me. I used to be able to knit (if you can call it that) when I was much, much younger (maybe eight or nine) and I guess it must be like riding a bicycle - you never forget.

Saturday afternoon mother and I went Christmas shopping and, en route, we found ourselves in the John Lewis haberdashery department, where an entire wall is given over to the joy that is wool (or, in proper speak, I believe it is 'yarn'). After nearly 37 years of living with myself, I think I've got to know me quite well and so I purposely chose a skein (not just a lowly 'ball' for me) wherein the colours change every ten yards or so. The reason being that if I were to knit a scarf in one plain colour I knew full well that after several rows I'd get bored; but the joy of the ever-changing colour palette is one that will (hopefully) keep me interested til the very end. Plus, it cost £10.65 so I really have to knit the whole thing or that is a fair bit of money to leave languishing in the bottom of the cupboard with other half-finished projects.


Already I am harbouring thoughts of kitting out Delightful Child in handknitted shoes (not v practical though) to go with the handknitted everything else that its grandmothers are churning out at a rate of knots. I have added "wool, needles and patterns" to my birthday/Christmas list, so lets hope this latest obsession lasts a while...

I'm most looking forward to the day that I advance to the upper echelons of knitting and join those who can knit without looking, or in my case staring cross-eyed, at what they are doing - you know the people whose needles are click-clacking away at ten-to-the-dozen whilst watching tv, holding a conversation, etc, etc. Maybe one day.