Hawaiian trunks # 1

After the Christmas craziness of knitting for what seems half of my entourage, for the past couple of months I have been working on a few projects that I’m keeping preciously for myself. But now it is time for me to realise that the season of friends and family birthdays is soon upon me again. Starting with my baby nephew’s second birthday.

Knitting something for my nephew’s birthday is always a tricky situation. Firstly because I have two nephews, and although it is the youngest we are celebrating soon, I can’t just not knit for the oldest (who’s 7) at the same time. And vice versa.  So, it is not one project I need to think about, but two. What kind of Auntie would I be otherwise?

Secondly, because my sister and her family live on a small island in the middle of the Indian Ocean. They spend Christmas refreshing themselves in a swimming pool, and their winter is as cold as a Scottish summer is hot. Scarves and big woolly hats and jumpers are rather useless over there...

But recently, exploring Ravelry for some other purpose, I came across this pattern of trunk shorts from the book More knitting in the Sun,by Kirsti Potter. It’s perfect! These two boys have their share of light jumpers already, and these shorts are wonderfully fitting for their environment and their lifestyle – running everywhere barefoot.

But I can’t just knit this in one colour, can I? No no no, not me!

Thinking of tropical islands, with sandy beaches and volcanoes (yes, you read that right) and surfers, I choose to give these shorts a Hawaiian look. I want big flowers, bright colours, possibly a sunset and palm trees! Well, I have to make two pairs of shorts, so I have room for experiment...

But let’s start with the obvious Hawaiian shirt design, the big fat flowers. So on Saturday I’ve been looking at drawing a first chart of a hibiscus flower. I simply typed “hibiscus design” in the search engine, looked at the images results and after selecting one I liked, I drew it by hand on my trusty squared Pukka pad. Ah yes, I draw my charts by hand; no tracing paper, where would be the fun in that!

working station

And a draft hibiscus chart was born!

A trial knit is undergoing, and I’m really excited to see how it will turn out! You will, of course, be the first ones to see the result of this experiment; with a picture posted here most likely by the end of the week.