April 21, 2004
A Poopy...oops, I Mean "Kooky," Kraft
I am so pleased to present the first Kooky Kraft from a Dear Reader!
The story starts here, where, under “The Poop Scoop,” Marcia regales us with a story about returning a neighbor's wave with the same hand in which she is carrying a large bag of fresh dog poo and somehow managing to hit herself in the head with said bag—only to discover that the neighbor wasn’t waving to her at all. The story is a total hoot; worth a read.
In response, Dear Reader Robbyn designed, knit and posted the pattern for the aforementioned Kooky Kraft, a knitted dog poo bag (with her patented "smell well" feature), which you can read about here.
This all reminds me of the time when my brother, who was living in New Yawk at the time, picked up a bag of kitty litter detritus as he headed out the door to work, fully intending to deposit the bag in the outdoor garbage bin. Only he forgot, and found himself on a speeding subway train, attaché case in one hand, odoriferous bag of cat poo in the other. And guess which hand he had to use to straphang since the attaché case was too heavy? The bag was eventually deposited in a garbage can somewhere on Wall Street.
But lest you worry about my brother's delicate sensibilities, this is the same brother who bought as a present for my sister a "Dust Buster" or something of a similar ilk and, for illustrative purposes, sent along with the package a little Zip-lock bag of some of the things she could expect to pick up with her spiffy new hand vacuum. I will leave what was inside the plastic bag to your imagination.
Knitting Knews
I am truly afeard. Somehow I have gotten it into my head that now that I pretty much have the hang of two-handed stranded knitting, that I'm qualified to knit Baby Norgi . Which is why last night I found myself knitting a baby sweater using size 0 needles (for non-knitters, this is about the same diameter as—what would be a good example, Dear Readers? How about angel hair pasta?). It didn’t help that I had just finished some work on the felted clogs using size 13s (again, for non-knitters, this is about the same diameter as a lady's pinky finger). I’m surprised my head didn’t explode.
Even at this early stage (row 2, in fact), I don’t know how far I’ll get on the Norgi because it doesn’t promise much in the way of instant, or even delayed, or even delayed-until-the-last-speck-of-life-on-earth-is-extinguished, gratification. At 198 stitches to a round on size 0 needles, trust me, you don’t see speedy progress.
I have decided, however, to leave out the trees and reindeer. Anyone remember this entry about the different things that give me, The Mysterious K, and our Dear Readers the creeps? Well, you can add to that list knitted reindeer figures. I have absolutely no idea why. And now I'm thinking, if that weird revelation doesn't scare off some readers, I don't know what will...
My favorite event of the month tonight—Guild! Tonight is the Fiber Frenzy where members can bring and sell fiber, yarn, patterns or knitting supplies from their stash. Last year I bought some beautiful merino, which is still burning a hole in my cedar chest and rates high on the Guilt Meter, so I doubt I'll participate in the high finance side of things but, no matter—that just means I have more time to get into mischief with my knitting cohorts.
Garden Gossip
TMK continues to assimilate all her new plants and shrubs into her yard, although it was a little too cold last night for a real tour of the garden to appreciate all of her handiwork. I did think, however, that you—whether you are a gardener in awe of the colors of nature or a knitter in need of some color inspiration for your next project—would appreciate this picture.
No need to adjust your monitors. That is indeed an eyeball-searingly bright chartreuse overlapping with an outrageously loud pink (a lime-mound spirea and “Hino Crimson” azalea, respectively). And collectively, let's just agree to ignore the little white weed on the left. (I think it's the weed equivalent of those annoying people who stand behind roving reporters, wave, yell "Hi, Mom!" and make "devil horns" behind the reporter's head.)
Posted by Ryan at April 21, 2004 10:53 AMBeautiful! And - that's not a weed! It's a lovely sweet woodruff plant, spreading through the shady regions as it's supposed to do. Now please go and give it a nice compliment.
Posted by: Fran on April 21, 2004 11:18 AMFran, how did I know you would be the first to appreciate the picture? And, yes, you eagle eye, you, it MIGHT be sweet woodruff--my all-time favorite ground cover, by the way; LOVE that sweet smell--since the azalea and spirea do happen to be surrounded by sweet woodruff--or it might be this other really annoying weed which looks like sweet woodruff and has a similar small white flower. Either way, it's white, it disrupts the green-y, pink-y purity of the picture, and it must be punished!
Posted by: Ryan on April 21, 2004 11:24 AMglorious garden pic- i think i've seen that the pink/green combo is the 'new black' or the 'new yoga'- i'm sure everyone knows what i mean-
size 0 needles = kitten whiskers (okay, so it's a kitten with hefty whiskers)
anything smaller = frog hair
i've found the smaller the needle the more frequent and the more annoying the resulting puncture wounds- the really larger needles are rather like railroad ties though- of course with the large needles if anyone criticizes your work you can always pound them severely around the head and ears with your knitting club-
and now a word about dublin bay- sock #1 finished and lovely- started sock #2 last night in what i thought was the 2nd skein of the same zimba top yarn- it's about half done and i kept thinking it looked just a bit different but put it down to poor lighting and failing eyesight- finally got finished sock out to compare them and found i had used a skein of a slightly different color (one is lavendar and one is lilac- both lovely posies but not same at all!)- i do have 2 skeins of each of the colors so the question now is do i continue and then make a pair of the alhambra socks using 2 different colors and start a trend or do i do the frog thing? i could be the eccentric sock lady of east texas-
stay happy-
Posted by: barb in texas on April 21, 2004 11:41 AMOMG - I have joined Ryan's Kooky Kraft Annals! I have arrived! LOL!
That baby Norgi and those teeny needles! Woman, you're braver than I'll ever be. I bet it'll be cute as the dickens, too! But I don't understand the reindeer thing - do Dasher and Dancer creep you out too?
The garden photo is just gorgeous - beautiful juxtaposition of color and the color is amazing. (contented sigh). While we were driving around yesterdy, I was admiring the forsythia blooming like sunshine, in many of the yards we passed. Just lovely :)
Posted by: Robbyn on April 21, 2004 12:04 PMYou KNEW I would not be able to resist telling the following pet poop story to your Dear Readers! How about the time...while living in New Yawk, you were taking bag of dirty kitty litter down in the elevator to the basement trash cans. A man held you up in the elevator, demanding you give him what you had. So you handed the bag to him and he ran off. Who was chuckling then??? For years we had ourselves a good hardeeharhar over that one--except for the being held up part.
Love you,
c.
And now, for the reveal: "Cata," Dear Readers, is Big Sister. Yep, the one who tried to make the cabbage cake. And that's her real name (which reminds me--I'll have to tell you all the "Cowa" story sometime, but not today). But, let me set the record straight: I was going IN to the building, and I was carrying a fresh, new, just-purchased-from-the-pet-store cat litter box. But from that point on, the story is true: I DID hand the mugger the litter box to hold while I fished around for all of my valuables. Which was actually pretty damn funny and played a big part in my getting over the incident. Mind you, everyone, this was at gunpoint in very close quarters. No fun. One of the many reasons I left New York. (And let the record show that before I knew he "only" wanted to rob me, I jumped the dude. Seriously. But he was very strong and shoved me to the back of the elevator. Which was when I handed him the kitty litter box. Revenge? I'll let you decide.)
And drat! I knew someone would ask me to explain the reindeer thing. It's not reindeer, per se, Robbyn, because Dasher and Dancer are A-OK, in my book. It's specifically knit and cross-stitch reindeer. Or maybe it's any knitted or cross-stitched figures. I think what I don't like is the angular, harsh, pixelated look. It just somehow rubs my karma the wrong way.
Posted by: Ryan on April 21, 2004 01:27 PMOk, Ryan, I am so with you on the reindeer thing. Love cute fluffy ones. HATE knitted and/or cross-stitched ones. It's the legs. They aren't supposed to bend that way. It's just wrong. They all look like they owed money to "Guido the Wrench" and his boys and got behind on payments, ya know?
Anywho, have a blast at Guild and love the garden photo. Your TMK is a whizbang gardener!!
E-hugs from Texas to all.
Posted by: Angie in Tx. on April 21, 2004 02:31 PMAngie, now I'm extra glad you joined our little online family since you are absolootlyootly right--it's the legs! In fact, I went back to the Norgi pattern to check your theory and, sure enough, those reindeer DO look as if they got worked over by Guido the Wrench. I mean, there's double-jointed and then there's just basically smashed to freakish bits. Euuuuuwwwww.
Posted by: Ryan on April 21, 2004 03:11 PMYour comments are half the fun, seriously. I'm deciding what to take to New York. Now I just have to decide: Feline Pine or Super Scoop?
Posted by: Rachael on April 21, 2004 04:00 PMI know I'm practically a Fair Isle two-handed knitting virgin, having only started one fair isle sweater (although I've done scads of 2-handed stranding on socks) but that Baby Norgi might not be a great project to begin a fair isle career with. It strikes me that since it uses small needles (which is ok, really) the combination of short bursts of two-handed extremely interesting knitting is combined with acres (it will seem like that once you're partway done) of plain stockinette with small needles. The fair isle fun (and yes, it IS fun) is the all-two-handed, all-the-time knitting and watching the pattern emerge. Once you've mastered it, that's all you want to do. Could you put more fair isle patterning in the Baby Norgi to spice things up a bit, maybe?
See you at Guild tonight. I'm bringing my checkbook...Mary
I forgot to compliment TMK on the absolutely fabulous picture--that chartreuse green is my alltime favorite color and even though Pink isn't, the combination is drop-dead gorgeous. I'm still a very, very, very new novice at gardening and color selection and I'm in awe of this combination. I must get some of that green stuff...Mary
Posted by: Mary on April 21, 2004 04:15 PMMary, with regard to the Norgi, you exactly voiced all the same concerns that have been racing around in my head. The good news is, though, it's all stockinette. I can just keep racing around and around in a circle until I'm bored stupid--or dizzy, whichever comes first-- and then put it away for a year without having to worry too much about remembering where I was in the middle of a complicated stitch repeat.
Glad you liked the photo. While I was the one who actually took it, I'm painfully aware that it would just be a photo of some dry brown dirt if it weren't for TMK's gardening skills!
i like making devil's horns behind people's heads in photos }:-<
Posted by: vanessa on April 22, 2004 03:01 AMVanessa's a weed! Vanessa's a weed!
Sorry, couldn't resist :-)
Posted by: sheila on April 22, 2004 05:57 PM