Tuesday, August 02, 2005

Thank Heaven for Little Girls

An exact and unabridged transcript of a conversation that took place this morning on the train, between a little girl (aged five or six) and me. I was knitting Baby Scarf I.

Little Girl: Boys don't knit!

Me: They do so!

Little Girl: Oh! Okay!

Then she smiled at me and went back to reading The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies.

We have here an example of a child who is not only reasonable, but well-read. I hope she is allowed extra ice cream with dinner tonight.

Baby Scarf I

Baby Scarf I, 70% Complete


Above, over the shoulder of the comely Martha, is the baby scarf. It doubles as a swatch for Susan's scarf (meant to go with her toque), which I started and then frogged after realizing the check pattern was not working for me. It seemed a bad idea to keep knitting and frogging the same pricey alpaca until the design worked, so I switched over to less expensive test yarn.

This is 100% baby-proof acrylic and will go to the same little girls who are getting the bunny and bear hats. There's not much to this "design," I grant you, but for a newbie who has only played with simple knit-purl ribbing before it's strawberries and cream.

The border is dot stitch and the center is zigzag ribbing, both from that nice Barbara Walker's A Treasury of Knitting Patterns. We love Mrs. Walker at our house and wish very much we could invite her over for supper.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

And I think the scarf will look splendid when washed and dressed to "even things out".

Last I'd heard, Walker was alive and well at her home in Florida. She had a huge collection of Barbie and Ken dolls for which she'd knitted outfits; it was featured on the back cover of an issue of Threads magazine. Come to think of it, I'd also heard (while at Knitting Camp in '98) that she was selling it off, so perhaps she has relocated to smaller living quarters.

Anonymous said...

I love the pattern of the baby scarf. You do such a nice job. Can't wait to see Sue's when you get it done.

goblinbox said...

You. Are. So. Cute.

Anonymous said...

Twinkletoes says boys can spin, too. But only if their mothers say it's okay.

Susan said...

What a lovely exchange with that charming young girl on the train! There is hope yet for the future. While in Lake Placid, Maureen and I had a charming conversation with two lovely children. Their parents were less lovely, as this conversation occured while Maureen and I were eating dinner. The parents were several tables down, and didn't think it odd that their kiddos were interupting the meals of others to chat (about sharks and spiders, mind you). Mom and dad didn't give us a chance to say "it's ok," or conversely to shoot them thankful looks for disentangling us from their progeny. Good thing the kids were cute and sweet.(BTW, I like that baby scarf pattern very much!)

Anonymous said...

Loved the conversation!!!

Anonymous said...

this post makes me want to watch Gigi with Leslie Caron, Louis Jourdan, and Maurice Chevalier again.