sophie, modified

Is there any end to the fun things you can do with Julie Anderson's wonderful Sophie pattern?

I've taken various colors of my homespun & handdyed wool and am making a funky Sophie. I wanted to incorporate a two-color pattern, so I browsed through Barbara Walker's A Second Treasury of Knitting Patterns and settled upon the Maze pattern, a 32 row multiple of 14 stitches plus 2. The pattern calls for two colors, so I used the Raspberry brain-wool (hehehe, Margene!) and some natural white. I love the way it turned out! As I type this I am dyeing a hank in Gaywool Cedar which will add another stripe, then the bag will be finished in black. I'm going to use the same tab-method to attach handles as I used on my last Sophie. I can't wait to get this finished and see how it felts up.

My entries have been a bit uninspired lately, as I've been preoccupied with the teenage boy goings on around here. There was an incident this April between Michael and a gang member at his high school, and the gang kid has been charged with battery. Today is a juvenile evidentiary hearing, and we're all a bit on edge. It's not that it bothers Michael to tell the truth about what happened that day at school, but these gangs are notorious for retailiation. In speaking with the county sheriff who brought the subpeona for Michael to my house, I mentioned this concern. He didn't ease my mind. Instead, he expressed that he would be worried about it, too. GREAT. These kids and their mentality enrage me. Within the last year or so there has been a major increase in drive-by shootings and other gang/drug related violence in our once-small town. It's sad, disheartening, and damn scary. Wish us luck today--maybe the cedar wool will be dry in time to knit some of the anxiety away...