“Aw! In the name of the Wee Man! Your thrapple is out!”

This was the cry of my wee Glasgow mammy* when I came through her door one day, when the wind was blowing and the air was chilly.

I hadn’t heard the phrase before, so the first time she said it I checked to make sure I hadn’t had some dreadful wardrobe malfunction.

“Naw!”, she proclaimed,  pointing at my chest area.

“Your thrapple. It’s bare naked!

I realised it was my décolleté she was pointing at – where my coat was open at the neck.

“The wind’ll get right in there! – you need to get your thrapple covered”

Thrapple has always been a favourite word ever since and I usually champion year round scarf/shawl wear in the interests of keeping ‘thrappled’.

Upon doing a little googling I discovered that the word was commonly used in Scotland to mean gullet or windpipe and one would wet or fill their thrapple accordingly, however one could also be ‘thrappled’ in an act of violence too! I guess also it could be used as a unit of measure too, according to the Ettrick Shepherd, James Hogg (1831) anyway.

“Do you ken the big village of Balmaquhapple?…

…T’is steeped with iniquity up to the thrapple!”

I like that! Instead of saying I have had something “up to here” *indicates place on body where I’ve had it up to* I am going to say I’ve had it up to my thrapple…or a thrapple-full!

Anyway…recently I was playing about with some yarn and was trying to think of some one skein projects for Christmas presents. The idea of a little thrapple warmer was a bit too cosy to resist.

 

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I used Artesano British Chunky in Forest – a delightfully robust and bouncy yarn, which I will be talking about in a later blog and also Sheepfold Suffolk and Jacob Marl DK, which I used doubled to get gauge. The sheepsfold yarn is such a yummy sheepy yarn and I just love the knitted fabric it makes – I can see me using this again and again (and at £2.95 it is an amazing price!)

The pattern is a really quick knit, it is reversible and I added a bit of texture and interest by dropping stitches.

I hope you are all managing to keep your thrapples warm…it’s cooled down quite a bit hasn’t it?

Thrappled

P.S.  oh! I wanted to bring you one of my giveaways before I head off on holiday for a few days, but due to time constraints it is not going to happen, but another one – dare I say, even better – will be winging its way to you very soon! Watch this space around the 1st!

*(not my biological one. actually my best china’s mum. But I call her Mammy too!)