kidknitting

Some surprising things happened this week. I feel like the chronology should be important, but I honestly can't recall which came first.

One) My NumberOneSon, who is 12, reported that he was involved in an argument at school that pitted knitting against football. One of his female classmates contended that knitting was far better than football, and one of his male classmates claimed the opposite. He sided with his female classmate, to her astonishment, and defended knitting by praising its portability, noting that you can knit in a bank, in the car, or even in the stands watching football. His Dad told me I had better give that kid a doughnut, and I promptly agreed! (this in itself is surprising, because his Dad's so vehemently against hydrogenated oils, so why would he suggest a doughnut, of all things???) Naturally then NumberOneDaughter started saying that knitting was wonderful, so now I owe both children a doughnut. Mmmmm.

Two) #1Son was fidgeting, as usual, so I picked up some knitting that just happened to be in the living room, a purple cotton dishcloth on size 8 bamboo straight needles, and handed them to him. He's learned to knit a few other times in his life, so I just needed to refresh his memory and he was off and running. He said, "If I'm going to take this to school, it won't be purple!" I was going... who said you're taking it to school? I found him some cotton yarn and the needles he made 4 years ago following the directions in Kids Knitting. We even sanded the needles a little more, then rubbed them with oil to make them a little smoother, and he started knitting his own project. He wanted a bookmark, but I'm not sure what it will end up being. The funny thing is he was knitting with some kitchen cotton that was blue and white, and it wound up pooling so perfectly that the left vertical half of the project is white and the right half is blue. The first night, I had him counting his stitches after every row, and when he added stitches or dropped stitches, I'd fix it for him. The next night, he picked it up when I wasn't around and knit several inches further on it, and figured out for himself how to fix his problems. He's increased by one stitch, but that's not too bad. He took it to school today, and then on to the sleepover, so I haven't heard if he actually knit at school. I don't quite get why he was determined to take his knitting to school.

Oh, and while he was knitting, he told me he was doing a lot better now that he wasn't trying to use that stupid poem. The poem is also from Kids Knitting, and I didn't think it was stupid! Could it just be that he's 4 years older? eh?