Sissy Plum Gets A Shrug

Design: Retro Redux Shrug by Mercedes Tarasovich-Clark
Yarn: Malabrigo Worsted, Stone Chat, 2 skeins
Needle: US #8, US #9, US #10, US #10.5
Started: April 12, 2008
Finished: April 23, 2008

Quite a number of years ago, in another land and another time, sis and I lived in the same town. As it so happens, we were also dating men who were close friends. We ended up spending lots of time together... at the beach, in town, all around. We were all madly in love. We all had fun. It was delightful. I adored him. He adored me. He took good care of me. He was older than I; he opened my eyes. Much of my aesthetic today was somehow influenced by him. To this day, I am grateful we met and fell in love. In so many ways, I grew up during our time together.

But I digress. I was going to tell how sis got the name Sissy Plum. Back in that other land, that other time, I used to frequent a women's clothing boutique called The Plum. I was such a regular there, my sis got to calling me Plum. One day her beau and I were joking around and one thing led to another, as these things do, and voila, we became known as Plum and Sissy Plum.

So in March I had a wild hair and decided to knit up a shrug for her. I have the Lace Style book, and was really itching to make the Retro Redux Shrug. A quick search on Ravelry and I knew I had the yarn for it. This is Malabrigo Worsted, the color is #173 - Stone Chat. So this meant it would be a stash busting exercise as well.

While I knit this I got commentary from the family: "She won't like it." "She'll never wear it, you're wasting your time." Undaunted I pressed on. As I was knitting, I'll admit to a bit of fretting...thinking maybe they're right.

But in the meantime, the project was knitting up beautiful. I didn't make any modifications. The lace pattern was really easy to remember. I was liking how the sizing is accomplished through the change in needle size. That appealed to me and gave me ideas for the future. As usual I had a tough time picking up the right number of stitches in an evenly spaced manner. I don't know why this is so difficult for me, but it usually requires at least three attempts to get it right. Every time I have to do it. On every project. UGH.

Sissy Plum lives on the West Coast now. But she comes in to visit several times a year. She came in this past weekend, despite a really nasty case of bronchitis. She was pretty sick it had us worried. As soon as we pulled up from the airport, I reached for the shrug. It's been waiting on the dining room table since mid-April. And she LOVED it. She loves the colors, says it goes well with her wardrobe palette. Says she can definitely get some use out of this item. I was really thrilled. I knew it all along!!

I leave you with some images of Sissy Plum and her new shrug.