Tail of newt, toe of frog, and eyeballs
Lots and lots of eyeballs!
I love Halloween. I love the atmosphere around it. I love seeing the neighbourhood kids dressed up in their costumes while they go around for trick or treat. I don’t dress up myself but I enjoy seeing other people’s costumes. Maybe it’s because I grew up in Europe where Halloween isn’t so much of a thing. At least when I was a kid. It was something we saw on tv but never participated in ourselves.
But now that I live in Canada, I get to experience it in person! Not so much for the first few years though as we were living in an apartment building. And trick-or-treaters in an apartment building are pretty much nonexistent.
So when we bought our townhouse a few years ago, I was really excited about having a front door. Finally we would have trick-or-treaters!
And every year, I try to do a little something extra besides handing out the obligatory candy. Not much. Just a little something special.
Our first Halloween at our house was during the height of the pandemic and so my husband and I concocted a sort of covered slide. We would put the candy in at the top and the kids would hold their buckets at the bottom of the slide so the candy could fall in. Very fun and very covid safe as we could stay 6 ft apart.
The slide was covered, so the kids wouldn’t know which candy they would get until it fell into their bucket. And we thought it would be fun to every once in while startle a kid by having a fake paper spider fall into their bucket instead of candy. The joke was on us though, as most kids seemed more enthusiastic about getting a fake spider than another piece of candy!
So the year after, I got more fake spiders and included them in our dish we use for handing out candy. Kids could take a spider as well as candy if they wanted to. And those spiders disappeared quickly!
But last year, I wanted to come up with something else. I was done with the fake spiders. A newsletter by Mary Jane Mucklestone gave me the perfect idea: knitted eyeballs! She shared her free pattern in this newsletter and these eyeballs were glorious! I made my first one about ten days before Halloween and I couldn’t stop after.
For the next ten days, I knitted so many eyeballs! I used dollar-store yarn for the white and black of the eyes and some of my leftover yarn to make the irises in all kinds of colours. A bloody red iris was a particular favourite of mine (and everyone else I showed them to).
They were great! But I couldn’t stop. I kept on thinking I had to make more and more and more so that all the kids in our neighbourhood could bring home an eyeball. I made at least 40 eyeballs in the end. Some days, I made too many in one go and my hands cramped up from holding the small double-pointed needles. But it was so much fun.
They were such a big hit on Halloween! Every kid took one and I ran out pretty quickly. I’m not sure if they kept their eyeballs after Halloween but I know of at least one that was downgraded or upgraded (depending on your affiliations) to a cat toy!
As I massaged my cramped-up hands on Halloween night, I made myself a promise that I wouldn’t do that again. I knitted too many eyeballs in too short an amount of time. If I want to knit eyeballs again next year, I told myself, I should start this November and knit one eyeball a week to be ready for next Halloween. So it wouldn’t be so intense again. So I wouldn’t finish work early again just to knit another eyeball before lunch.
I didn’t start last November . . . I haven’t knit a single eyeball since October 31 last year. So no knitted eyeballs this year at my door. And I don’t know if I’ll have a little something extra to hand out this Halloween. Maybe I’ll buy something this year. Some fake spiders, perhaps?
Because I need to keep my promise and not make something (or 40 somethings) in just a few days’ time. Halloween is this week so I am too late. But oh, are my fingers itching to make something! To browse Ravelry for some scary Halloween things to knit!
Nope, can’t do. Not until November 1. Then I can start looking for a cute and scary pattern to knit for next year’s Halloween . . . And pretend that long-term planning is a skill I have.
Tot de volgende keer,
Evi
