And Now for Something a Little Different!

You may recall a few posts ago I mentioned that my younger sister Donna had made a special request for a Christmas gift last year.  She's a bit of a golfer (in fact, everyone in the family is but me!) and wanted some hand knit golf club covers.

I could tell from the brief conversations we had on the topic that she did not want understated golf club covers - she wanted golf club covers that would get a bit of attention.

Naturally, I put off seriously thinking about the project until December. On my last shopping trip with my Mom we spent some time in the yarn aisle at Walmart and after a bit of waffling I decided that dog shaped covers would hit the spot - much to Ma's amusement.  I can imagine her reaction to the finished objects.

I didn't start the covers until January when armed with a few skeins of Red Heart Super Saver and just my wits(!) I set out knitting.  I had a few false starts with the shaping - but eventually had what I thought looked like a dog's head.  My other sister and father were less convinced -- until I added the ears.

Donna was monitoring progress closely and then had another bright idea -- one of the covers should be modelled on her dog Sally.   (Photo below - she doesn't always wear glasses.)

This was a real challenge - I am not a knitting portrait artist!  I made a few attempts which were frogged before finally settling on using four strands of grey kid silk for the grey bits of Sally's fur. In a bit of serendipity I found a skein of the kid silk haze in a side pocket of my luggage left over from last year's Christmas knitting for Kail.

I was almost done - but didn't know what I was going to do for ears and the nose.  Unfortunately craft supplies weren't readily available and the things I could find didn't do the job.

I was going to bring the covers back here to London for finishing - but Donna was concerned she'd never see them again (she knows me well) and took them home with her for the final touches.

The dogs made their debut on her recent golf trip to Cuba where I have no doubt they improved her golf game immeasurably!!