When I asked my tutor group to list their hat preferences back in the spring, a depressingly large number of them requested a particular colour for the bobble. "UGH!" was my instant thought, "I am NOT making pom poms!" Memories of those pieces of cardboard came back to me: the pain of cutting a circle out of the middle of some circles; trying to force the ball of yarn through the centre of the circles; getting bored and thus ending up with a floppy bobble.
Friends at knit group suggested a pom pom maker but I remained dismissive; however, it slowly dawned on me that it couldn't possibly be as painful as it was when I was a child. I watched a video on YouTube of a woman making a pom pom using a Clover pom pom maker and it seemed like a doddle; the video was 14 minutes long and for lots of that she was just chattering on, so I decided to give it a go.
I think it's fair to say it was a success. I managed to knit a whole hat and do the pom pom in under two hours this morning at knit group; the rest of the pom poms were put together whilst catching up on Educating the East End this afternoon. Very quick and very satisfying.
In between trying to catch up on work and feeling guilty for watching TV and not catching up on work, I like to knit, bake, read, wii and practise my teacher glare in the mirror.