The scenario: trying to teach the cast-on stitch and double cast-on stitch to a persistent eleven years old, while in the middle of working on other things.

(You know those situations when you really need to be working on other things, but there’s the matter of that eleven year old?)

The solution: challenge the eleven year old to be creative! She has the hang of the stitches. Tell her to come up with something inventive on her own, just for the fun of it!

It’s the How-to-Get-Rid-of-an-Eleven-Year-Old-and-Feel-Righteous-About-It-Because-You’re-Challenging-Her-Creativity game.

Give her a copy of the printable for the two stitches, and let her at it.

Time passes. She returns. (It’s bound to happen, and we must make allowances for these things!)

She has produced something! You both look at it a bit.

You say, “It’s good! The stitches look great!”

And she says, “I was trying to make fuchsia.”

And you say, “Oh! Yes. Well… yes! I can see that…. Hmmm…. Maybe if we turn it upside-down…”

She says, “No. It’s that green grin. I just can’t get past it. It looks like… LIPS.”

Sometimes, our explorations into a stitch – into “stitch play” as I call it – may not turn out quite as we originally planned, no matter how experienced or inexperienced we are. But with the help of an eleven year old and a fresh set of eyes, you may discover that your stitches can be used in ways you never dreamt!

Cast-on stitch lips.

Who’da thunk it?