Knitting!...Wait what?

I think I have always been like this.  What does it mean when you get distracted by something totally random and then become obsessed with it?  Crazy?  Maybe.  It happens to me all the time.  For example, I was at a program at my son's elementary school a few weeks ago and this lady in front of me was busily working away at something in her lap.  Of course I had to check it out, because she should have been paying attention to what was going on, but she wasn't, and if she was having fun with something, I wanted in on some of that action!

I think I dodged a few pokes and prods from my wife for not paying attention as well, but it was one of those times where my curiosity got the better of me and I had to figure out what she was doing.  It looked like a scarf!  I mean, she was sitting in the school, knitting a scarf!  But not with needles, it was this circle thing, like a ring, with yarn wrapped around pegs.  She had this tool, like a hook that she was flipping the yarn over the top of the pegs with and then wrapping more yarn.  The scarf itself was hidden in a bag on her lap, but I knew right away what it was.  A present?  Defense against the winter wind?  Something to keep herself from passing out from boredom?  I didn't know, but I knew that I had to find out.

Before I knew it, the program ended and the knitting lady was pushed out of my mind with the hustle and bustle of getting home, having snacks and getting two tired kids to bed.  The seed had been planted of course, it just needed time to germinate.  Last week, I was sitting here at my computer and I remembered that lady.  Google to the rescue! 

Before long I was watching a video of something called Loom Knitting.  There it was, people making hats, scarves, baby blankets, mittens, you name it, on these round or rectangular plastic devices called knitting looms.  Oh man!  Oh man!  I had to figure out how it worked.  I watched a few hours of video and the next day, I took my daughter to a local craft store and bought a circular knitting loom set.

Now listen.  I am a big burly looking guy.  Six feet, two inches tall, 250 pounds of grumble and grouch.  My wife reminds me almost daily that I really need to work on not looking so mean all the time.  I am about as far away from your stereotypical knitter as you can possibly get.  That being said 15 minutes after figuring out how to wrap my cheap yarn around the loom, I was hooked.  I was sitting there in the living room feverishly wrapping yarn around the pegs on the loom, hooking them over and wrapping more.  Muttering things like "not too tight..not too tight!!"  My wife, heaven help her, called me granny a few times and went about her normal business.  She is used to this sort of behavior by now after almost 15 years of dealing with me.

A few days later after a few false starts, I had made two hats and a scarf.  I even drug my family down the yarn aisle at the store, searching for better yarn, higher quality stuff.  I've got plans for a home made knitting loom in my head, made with scrap lumber and nails, with tighter spacing to make a pair of socks.

In other news, I got the garage cleaned out today.  Well, pretty much cleaned out.  If the weather stays nice, I'll be out there working on a few spoons that I need to finish.  If it doesn't, I guess I can always..um..well..heh..do a little knitting.  Happy carving! Or Knitting!  Actually, you know what?  Just go make something with your hands.