All in the Family

There's a glimmer of hope for the possibility of the existence of a knitting gene. Today, at the biennial Weaver-Armstrong family reunion, I found a relative who knits!

This is Debbie Tasker Major of Colorado. We are second cousins -- we share a set of great-grandparents. Our grandmothers were sisters.

During the reunion, we always have a silent auction of crafts and other homemade (mostly) items to help pay for the barbecue and the hall. This year's selection included everything from Texas history books that mentioned our family, to my Aunt June's delicious fig preserves (for which I was outbid) to baby blankets, to handsewn handbags. However, this year, my eye was caught by a hand-knitted and felted bag. I didn't recognize the name, but made a note to keep my eye open. Just before lunch, I saw the unmistakable hand motions of knitting from across the room, and made a note to chat later.

After things slowed down in the afternoon, I finally got to introduce myself. Debbie was working on a patchwork blanket that she is doing as a knit-along with a friend. Every time one of them knits a square, they knit two of the same pattern. Then, at the end, they'll have the same squares to stitch together to make a blanket. And although they are using the same squares and the same yarn color scheme, they can stitch the squares together however they want. I think this is a great idea. They're using Jan Eaton's 200 Knitted Blocks for the patterns. Some neat stuff in there.

We talked about how we got started knitting and chit-chatted about yarns and needles. So while I didn't knit on World Wide Knit in Public Day, I did get to talk about knitting in public today -- and with a newly-discovered relative. Thanks, Debbie -- I had a great time visiting with you today.

And now to think of a project to knit for the 2010 reunion!....