Sandy Koufax Sweater

Here's an oldie but a goodie from way back in 1994 (or was it 1996?). Anyhow, it's from sometime during the mid-nineties. I saw a tattoo at the Y on some guys arm that was a big ole star 'o Dave. I just thought it was damn cool, and especially ballsy given the prohibition Jewish cemeteries have on tattoos. Jewish grandparents don't like them much either. Anyways, I had recently gone to Germany, and had done some Holocaust tourism, and was thinking about being Jewish or looking Jewish or being marked as a Jew in some way. The first thing I thought through was the back, which was this big star. I wanted a really bright blue and after I picked out the yarn, I noticed it was Dodger Blue. So I played off that by using the Dodger logo on the front. My initials are LAA, and, at the time, I didn't make anything that wasn't personalized... so I snuck a second "A" in near the left hip. Because it was a Dodger sweater, I wanted to give props to Sandy Koufax, a Jewish pitcher who didn't play on the sabbath. He played in NY, not LA, but Dodgers are Dodgers. I'm not a sports fan at all.

Soon after I made this sweater, the whole OJ Simpson thing went down and his number was also 32. I don't think anyone was confused but for about 5 minutes I felt a little uncomfortable walking around with OJ's # on my arm.

This sweater was handknit using a vintage Candide raglan pattern. I twisted every stitch so there are no floats in the star. What a pain in the ass! The yarn is Kid 'n Ewe. I got it at Wildfiber. The silver buttons show the Norwegian god of snow on a pair of skis. They were found in a Swedish knitting store in Aspen, Colorado.