Today, after my mom and I had run a bazillion errands, I was finally able to finish the hot red “put a spot on it” pocket purse.

Here is one view of the completed bag:

and here is another:

I think the spots are the “quois” of that “je ne sais quois” that I try to put into everything I make.

I don’t understand the mechanism by which I am inspired to include (or exclude) any given element of my work, but in this case, I know the source: Robert Lopshire’s classic Put Me in the Zoo:

I loved this book as a child, and as a parent, I loved reading it to my children and would dredge up any excuse I could think of to read it to them.

For those readers unfamiliar with the story, the central character is an animal of undetermined species whose most unique feature is his spots, the color, location, shape, and number of which can be changed, and it is those spots that inspired me.

With the pocket purse done, I was ready to return to my efforts to make what I believe is the world’s first Tetrisghan.

I had thought that I had worked out all of the details of the project and that all that was left was to crochet the 552 squares needed to bring my vision to fruition, but in working with Red Heart Super Saver hot red for my mom’s pocket purse, doubts about my choice of Red Heart Super Saver cherry red for the “Z” tetrimino began to take root, and to quell (or confirm) those doubts I decided to make a “Z” in the hot red.

Here is a photo of the two Z’s with the cherry red atop the hot red:

Seeing them next to each other, it was clear to me that the hot red was the one that would work better for this project, then using the tretriminos I had crocheted so far, I tried various arrangements of the letters/tetriminos at hand.

There was the word “zoo,” in honor of Robert Lopshire’s book:

the adjective “its” (there is no apostrophe in Tetris, so the contraction “it’s” was not possible)

“Lots” which is how many squares I have left to make for this project:

which is not to be confused with “Lost” which is no doubt how I will feel at some point during the process of making the Tetrisghan:

and finally the acronym “LOL” which is much faster to type out than to crochet, but which I think looks pretty cool in crocheted tetriminos:

This project should keep me busy for much of April, and if I don’t stay focused could spill into May, but I am looking forward to seeing just exactly how this all ends up fitting together.