Mossy Cottage Knits

Ltos and Lots of Tpyos

This, Dear Readers, is how much I enjoy writing this blog: I went to the eye doctor this morning and had to have Those Drops put in. You know, the kind that make your eyeballs feel as if someone has painted them over with a thin layer of cement? And now I can’t see a frickin’ thing, much less my monitor. But still, I must write, I must post—the only difference being that today I can’t be held responsible for any typos.

Ah, much better. Just zoomed my Word screen up to 300%. Now all the letters look like THIS.

Knitting Knews
One of my favorite phrases is “it’s like herding kittens.” Seriously a milk-snort-worthy phrase. However, I’ve noticed it becomes a lot less funny when it applies to your life, especially your knitting.

I have what feels like a million little unfinished projects going on right now—which is completely out of keeping with my “knitting karma” and is making me feel truly twitchy—and I’m not satisfied with any of them. So last night I realized the only thing to do was to “return to my roots” and knit some socks, so now I’m halfway through the first of a pair of blue and yellow socks for a co-worker’s newborn. And now the twitchiness and anxiety is gone. I think I shall name these the "Calgon Socks."

In the meantime, I’ve been closely and amusedly watching the contest going on at Yarn Harlot. Stephanie has asked her readers to decide for her what she should knit with two truly scrumptious skeins of Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Sock(“Aslan” colorway, I think; a variegated yarn in browns, tans, grays and buttercream). I suggested the newly-posted-at-the-time Dublin Bay pattern, some other readers suggested some other great patterns, and now we’re just waitin’ around to see which way the wind blows. Many thanks to the Dear Readers who voted for Dublin Bay! (Oh, and the rest of you? No ballot stuffing.)

I have posted a second free pattern, the Alhambra Socks. I have sold this pattern on www.sockpatterns.com for the last year or so but last week when I posted Dublin Bay I discovered it was so much more rewarding and fun to just give the patterns away that I pulled Alhambra from there and posted it here. That, and I was starting to realize I would never retire on the $1.50 I made for each pattern sold. (Okay, okay, that’s a lie. If you sell only one pattern a month, it’s true you make only $1.50 because of the one-time-per-month fee you're charged for posting your pattern there and the administrative costs that are taken out. However, the more patterns you sell, the more money you make. Why, I’m still dining out on the $8 I made a few months ago.)

If you’ve never been there, I really encourage you to visit sockpatterns.com. It has lots of fun patterns like the King Tut Socks, Spring Dreams and Persephone’s Dream. If you’re interested in having one of your patterns sold through there, the woman who manages the site is friendly, helpful and organized. And it’s the perfect, passive-aggressive way to convince your ego that one of your patterns is good enough to sell.

Gardening Gossip
Tomorrow, Flower World!! As I said in one of my comments, we are taking The Truck* because The Mysterious K has declared that she is going to buy Trees, lots of Trees. Oy vay.

A big thanks and a small “argh” to new Dear Reader Beth who said that last year she planted 17 indigo plants and dyed about 1,200 yards of lace weight yarn. Ack! I’ve only planted six plants! Well, I’ll be sure to post a picture of my sad one-foot strand of dyed yarn when I’m done. (Actually, if my calculations are correct (1200 x 17 x 6), with my six measly plants I should still be able to dye 423.52941176470588235294117647059 yards.)

*Thanks to a family tradition, I am compelled to name all of our vehicles. The Truck’s name is “Baby Huey” because, persona-wise, I think it looks big, white and not particularly bright. TMK on the other hand, who thinks it’s big, white and cool, wanted to name it Luke after Luke Skywalker because the truck reminded her of a Storm Trooper—although why she didn’t want to just name it “Storm Trooper,” I don’t know. Not only that, but she wanted everyone to pronounce it "Luuuuuuuuuuuke," and say it with a deep, Darth Vaderish voice. In fact, I think every time we mentioned the truck she wanted us to say the whole phrase, "Luuuuuuuuke, I am your fathah," again, in the deep voice. But it don't make no nevermind because guess who won the name game.

Posted by Ryan at April 16, 2004 11:55 AM