More than four

Over the last few months, Italian and I have determined that Little Clover is getting old enough to be introduced to some of the small things we share as adults. Since college, Italian and I have used a certain phrase and we believed Little Clover was ready to hear the phrase, "I love you more than four."

The first time we said this to Little Clover, he looked at us as if our heads were spinning. "Four isn't a lot" he responded. It was time to explain to him why four is a lot. Late one night in college, while studying with philosophy majors, someone came up with the theory that four was the answer to everything. This theory basically takes the answer to a question, counts the number of words or letters in the answer, then counts the number of letters in the given number, and continues until you hit the magic number. For example, when explaining this to Little Clover, we asked him what his favorite animal is, to which he replied, a cheetah. The word "cheetah" has 7 letters, "seven" has 5 letters, "five" has 4 letters, and "four" has 4 letters. The answer is four.

Little Clover had little faith, so he started throwing out words and phrases, all of which ended up being narrowed down to four. We were in giggles as we tried to come up with longer and more ludicrous phrases, until we finally concluded that saying "I love you more than 4" really means "I love you more than everything."

He was pretty happy with that explanation, but I'm not really sure it will catch on with him. It may have to remain as just an inside phrase between Italian and I, who have been saying it since we began dating in college, which was a very long time ago. So long ago, we will be celebrating our ten year wedding anniversary this year. Even though we've been married for such a long time, our relationship is not very different than the way it was in college, making my latest WIP, the almost perfect project.

From WIPs

The pattern is Spey Valley from Nancy Bush's Knitting on the Road, significant to me and to Italian for a couple of reasons. Spey Valley in Scotland is one of the homes of fly fishing. Well, it's in the general region of the birth of fly fishing. It is the home of a specific casting method, the Spey cast. Neither Italian nor I can Spey cast, but we both would love to fly fish in the United Kingdom. It's on our list of places to go, and if we ever make it there, these socks will be with me, in the river, while I cast.

The Spey Valley is also known for scotches. I do not drink scotch, Italian does. I buy scotch, Italian doesn't. One could say it is a shared interest.

The best part of these socks, though, is the colorway. It's called Boyfriend, and for some reason, I'm still more comfortable thinking of Italian as my boyfriend rather than my husband, not that there is anything wrong with being a "husband" or a "wife," it's just that Italian to me will always be that guy in my college English classes who was incredibly sweet and cute and who charmed me with his stellar smile. What can I say, he's my best friend, and my boyfriend, before he is anything else.