Pouf: "A love story"

Happy Valentine's Day LoLovies!

Believe it or not, this project started 17 years ago.

Picture me, an 18 year old high school graduate sitting on my bed in a post-communist Slovak apartment building's ground floor room with two needles in my hands, among skeins of wool of the colors of the rainbow. The radio in the background is playing "Give me One Reason" by Tracy Chapman, Sheryl Crow's "If it makes you happy" and Celine Dion's "Because You Loved Me". I just returned from a trip of my life, from the United States. During the 2 months of working at a summer camp I've pocketed memories and friendships to last a lifetime.  Add 5 crazy weeks full of adventure of criss-crossing this vast country; traveling by Greyhound to San Francisco; living on bagels and 25 cents cup-o-noodle soups and a hippie bus trip back to New York through the national parks and cities of the southern states. That's an experience that has been hard to replicate ever since.

But back to the sweater ... as an arts and crafts counsellor at the camp, I met this long, blond hair grungy guy. He was a tie-dye specialist and I taught macrame. He liked me and I liked him. After the summer, he was about to start his last year of high school, I just got a job at a local high school to teach English (I was going to be only a temporary solution to my wander lust).

But back to the guy ... I was in love with him ... I knew that I wasn't going to marry him and that we were not going to be together because of all the circumstances and oh pleaaaseee! He was 17, I was 21! Every fact was telling me, that I would never see him again. So, I decided that I was going to be with him even without being with him. While feelings can be temporary, objects are permanent (mostly). And so, I create. It is and has been a healing process for me for sadness and a way to create attachment to a person that I may loose. I am most creative when I am motivated by fear .. go figure! (Needles to say, LoLo will have two storage rooms full of "stuff" I made for them .. :)

Back to the sweater ... I made it the way my guy liked it (at that time) :) ... Colorful and crazy and XXXXL. I packed it in a beautiful Christmas box (he is Jewish) and sent it away to New Jersey.

Life (faith?) often works in strange ways ...
I am married to my tie-dye guy and we have LoLo .... and now a sweater POUF! ...

This what you do .... cut the neck and the sleeves of the sweater creating a tube. You may want to sew below the cut line before you chop up the sweater, so the knitting doesn't unravel. 

Once you are done just gather one side of the tube.

Start filling the "sack" with anything you don't want :) (Or anything you want for future but have nowhere to put it at the moment :) Cheap pillows work well, but make sure you put something heavier to the bottom. Old jeans or towels work well. Once you filled up your pouf, take fiber fill and stuff the sides so your pouf is symmetrical and round.

Remember that your stuffing will flatten out with time, so make sure to fill it well.

Gather the top and voila!!! I wanted to sew buttons in the middle, but realized they would not be comfortable. Instead, I cut out a round piece from my old jeans and used that in place of a button.
I filled these also a little with fiber.

LoLo love the pouf! They jump on it, roll it from room to room and fight over it! 

The entire project took about an hour and now we've got this amazing piece of living memory to jump on. It is so special. Every time I see LoLo fighting over it, or using it giant snowball,
I have to pinch myself how life turned out. 

Thank you Geoffrey! Happy Valentine's Day! I love you all! 

Happy Valentine's Day LoLoVie readers! Spread the love and make some sweater pillows!
And remember .. if you want to keep a love interest, just knit him/her a sweater!

xoxoxo
LV