It ain't your grandma's knitting.

The poor unfortunates who come into contact with me for any significant period of time soon find out that knitting has a culture all its own. And that culture isn't what you might expect from the stereotypes of knitters the big culture clings to. There are still grandmothers knitting scratchy things out of crappy acrylic, and there are still pregnant women knitting tiny booties and caps, but they're not the bulk of the knitting community.

How can you tell that knitters aren't as mild and sweet as Muggles think? Look at what they're knitting.

There are patterns out there that would make your grandma blush. Heck, some of them make me blush. Thongs, bras, pasties, and willy warmers are just the beginning. Today, for some reason, I keep running across patterns representing the male anatomy. Dishcloths. Purses. Chapstick cozies. Stuffed models. (British/Anglophile readers: you know what I meant.) Pillows with male bits poking out. I am deadly serious. I swear, I'm not looking for them.

And not only are there patterns, people actually make these things. Cruising through the finished objects at Ravelry, I just keep stumbling over them. The things are everywhere, apparently making up something like 2% of projects- which doesn't seem like much, unless you browse a few hundred patterns at a time.

As my poor Muggle housemate says every time I tell him about the exploits of assembled knitters, knitters have their own culture. It's weird. And this time, I can join him in saying, "I don't get it."