I looked over my comments and if you have left one for me but it hasn't shown up my apologies. I have tried to keep up with them{good thing I'm not a popular blogger} but the last 2 days garnered 259 comments! Word to spammers: If the first 4 letters of your post are 'http' your banned. Took all of 2 mins to ban and delete them all so if I accidentally ditched yours.... srry.

Cheerios

Socks, well socks, are a different matter. I don't particularly enjoy knitting them. I do greatly appreciate warm tootsies. I grudgingly knit socks because I wear them from early fall to late spring. All those clutter type books would have me keeping my socks and sock yarn stash. But really how many socks does one person need? 8? I vote 8 if you are the sort to wash them once a week. By hand of course.

Being a knitter is not very feng shui. Sure there are the tools of the trade aka needles and a tape measure for the bare bones kit. And one could be Claudia and have zip stash. Still any wardrobe planner esp those into core wardrobes would have one with a turtleneck, an aran, a pullover and cardigan. Wheres the fun in that? So back to the 8 socks. I have finally figured out the real reason people who knit socks constantly continue knitting socks despite churning out well over the necessary 8 per year. Its not:

They love knitting socks~ I refuse to believe the second sock syndrom and going round and round and round in rib or st st is lovable.

They love washing stuff by hand. A sweater can usually get by with a end of season washing[per dame Alice and I agree in general] but socks need to be washed after each wearing or at least within a week of wearing.

Its not even that they, and this may be a sexist women perception, appreciate having to wear a full shoe size larger than if wearing flimsy machine knit socks easily purchasable for half the price at any upscale shop.

Nope the real reason we knit socks is cause of pills. Witness last nights freshly laundered socks they got dusty on my closet shelf:

OK toodles ~ happy knitting

Guess what I got? My birthday present. Ordered from J&S way back on April 7th. Yesterday. And I got so excited that I thought about knitting even if it was 104 degrees heat index of 120. Since we were without electricity and the storms had caused the humidity to create a sauna in my little brick house knitting with wool should have been even less tempting. But....

You Know Your a Knitter When you consider lighting a roaring fire to provide enough light for casting on while sitting in a sauna.

Instead I went out and purchased a rug for my soon to be former living room because I wanted to know the living room looked as good as I thought it could before I moved out of my house. And....

You Know Your a Knitter When you think X sweater's worth of yarn as you write out a check for anything other than said yarn.

There is hope for me yet ;^> What, other than the fact that you actually do knit, tells you you are a Knitter?

Reading: Fast Food Nation. Ewwww It had me pulling out all my old cookbooks from my Veggie days. My children are not happy although they do not mind organic foods. Thay are craving a wee bit more meat tho. Made my favorite rustic hummus. 2c cooked chickpeas mashed with potatoe masher or fork[hence the rustic bit~ one could make a paste out of them by grinding in food processor or blender with a splash of H2O] In seperate bowl combine 1/2 c tahini, 4-5 cloves garlic mashed [chopped here so more rusticness] Add in juice of one lemon and @ 6 T bonzo cooking H2O to a smooth mayo like consistency. I actually have enough of the cooking H2O for a creamy soup instead of mayo thickness. OK add in the mayo/soup stuff to chickpeas. One is instructed to add 1/2 c of chopped parsley but I skip that bit. Salt to taste. Via Julie Jordan. Ate a luscious hummus sandwich by spreading some on a tortilla, sprinkling with chopped tomatoes and rolling it up. Yumm. That and ~ you want my secret to~ falafel were on my plate this week. OK secret bit... I used to work at this small cooperatively owned and run vegetarian restaurant called The Catalpa Tree due to the Catalpa tree on grounds. We used to serve falafel burgers stuffed into pita bread with tahini sauce. I personally am not that fond of Tahini so did the whole mayo, lettuce, tomatoe bit. If you have ever had falafel frying it up in a oiled pan in patty shape absorbs way less grease than making balls and frying in an inch of fat. But thats not the secret bit. Falafel tends to be a heavy dish. Healthy but heavy. For a person, such as myself, who does not care for the tahini which makes it a complete protein beans from falafel and seeds from tahini: take your falafel mix Fantastic Falafel and place in bowl with half to equal the amount of cooked rice. Add water to make shapable patties or balls. Fry in pan or lotsa oil or I suppose one could bake em. The rice and falafel make a complete protein with the added benifit of a less stodgy ball/patty whatever shape you chose. Of course if you are a total cook one can make falafel from scratch and add cooked rice for protein and less stodgyness sake.

News Flash News Flash News Flash.

I have an obscene stash as documented various times over the years I have kept el bloggo. I often feel quite guilty about obscene stash and envy those restrained souls who keep a modest stash. One reason often given for not having a stash is the purely logical odds of a wool shortage being awefully slim. So slim that using the extinction of all sheep as an excuse to spend hard earned $$$s on even more yarn when one has more than one can possibly knit in their lifetime is laughable. A sign of being a true knitting addict with no concept of reality. Or is it? I ordered some J&S on my Birthday: April 7th. Comon I needed a wee pick me up. And not like the hand drawn cards from kidlets are a big nothing but well I wanted a gift. The color I want is still out of stock. Never again will somebody be able to guilt me out of buying yarn.

Hopefully my cam will be back on Tues and I can take pictures of stuff and show them off.

yarny days and knitterly evenings

vibrant blues, greens, and warm browns. No socks with pale colors, neon colors, or a great deal of yellow

Actually come to think of it thats close to what I said. I personally do not mind neons. I think the jays would look good with jeans or chinos which are my usual bottoms. There is blue, green, black, and tan in them. Reminder pic:

Do you think these work? The blue and greens are vibrant but not as vibrant as the last pair~ which bordered on neon tyvm and I consider the tan to be warm. Not flat and icky. Is this cheating? There are 1000's of sock pals out there the odds my recipient will read these words are extreemly slim. I hope. Anyway I think I am gonna try and finish these up and then work on another pair but I want to have these as back up. Cus I really don't feel much like knitting right now and know that there is a very high chance of not finishing a brand spanking new pair.

I am not quite back in the saddle yet when it comes to fibery goodness but I am contemplating the horse. About time too~ work is starting to pile up and I know, from experience, that if I get too much on my plate I make like an ostrich. I tend to keep my work stuff in boxes around my chair and there have been times when I couldn't even get to my chair! And when I did move this box on top of that box to get into chair my mind was so frazzled by the boxes I threw up my hands. Anyway enough of my poor organizational [and housekeeping] skills! Elka opened a box. Woo hoo. And what was in the box? A scarf. A finished! scarf. Needing only to be blocked and mailed. Done blocking and mailing. A picture of the FO:

This is a version of Myrna Stahman's Seaman's Scarf designed for K1C2. The neck ribbing:

The pattern was designed to bring attention to those harmed by Drunk Drivers and originally called for Richesse et Soie. K1C2 no longer carries this yarn but has a lovely new fingering weight called Ambrosia. It really is a wonderful yarn. I don't see the pattern on their website but it is called Kathy's Scarf{ I think } If anybody is anxious to order the pattern for themselves I will look up the official name and number.

Toodles and you know the drill~ yarny days and knitterly evening....

It's my birthday...

Guess what else?

I am getting a divorce. No make that a legal seperation.

I don't owe anybody any apologies for not writing about the joys of becoming a single unemployed mother of 3 wee ones[ages 3-10 for those who don't pay any attention] at the tender age of 41. And I certainly am not gonna ask anybody for forgiveness for not reading or writing or thinking or even doing anything fibery at the moment.

Happy Birthday Me

As you may have gathered I have been spending some time doing knit repair and I have formulated a few rules:

1]Do not ever, ever, ever wear a watch with a buckle closure with a long sleeved sweater. The buckle piece will eventually wear a hole into your cuff*

2] Do not ever, ever, ever wear a belt with buckle closure with your handknit. The buckle piece will eventually wear a hole into your ribbing right round the belly button area

3] Do not ever ever ever carry pens in your sleeve pocket under a cardigan. The part of the pen that hooks over the pocket top will eventually wear a hole into your sweater right round "the girls"

Add these simple rules to your sweater care bag o tricks and you will not spend hours repairing sweaters. At least I am getting paid to do these repairs ;^>

While we are at it~ please, for the love of all that is holy, do not dry clean your knits. I am assuming that you actually use natural fibres. Cotton/linen, sheep/llama/mohair goats/rabbits etc all get rained upon. Really. Silk BTW, especially the high quality reeled silk, is obtained by dropping the cacoon into boiling water and killing the silk worm prior to reeling the fibre. Water will not kill your sweater. Dry cleaning fluids and the extraordinary high heat required by the dry cleaning process will cause your sweater to become brittle. And if you have some overwhelming reason to disregard these rules: make a little yarn bobbin and tack it onto a seam. Preferrably one that doesn't get a lotta friction. So that your washed yarn has faded [dye runoff] along with the garment.

yarny days and knitterly evenings

*one cuff of every sweater I have ever repaired has a teeny tiny hole in it caused by wristbands. I suppose it could be some clasp from a bangle or bracelet but you get the drift. If one always wears a buckle of some sort on their left arm then the left cuff will eventually get a hole. Period

yah so I have been on tenderhooks waiting and waiting and waiting. And it's finally here. Ordered on Thursday, November 20, 2003 8:56 PM per email confirmation and arrived Monday, March 21, 2006 4:05PM. Supposedly 12 are made each year but June's is numbered #301 and she got hers in October of 2003. According to Heidi the waiting list is a piddly 2078 so just hop onto it alread. Mine is figured maple. The tag:

Now to figure out how to do this double drive thingie.....

I have spent the last two weeks thinking about the garden. Seeds have been ordered and started. Soil ammendments stocked up. A guy hired to rototiller it all into the clay stuff which passes for dirt in MO. I spend hours staring at my seedlings dreaming of good organic food. Being a non garderner I asked around for help. I found a gal at my local knit ins who used to garden but now lives in an apartment. She comes and visits every week anyway so I thought tra la la la Urban Girl! would appreciate some sorta community garden. In my back yard. I profit from her experience she profits with food. Works for both of us I think OK I'm teaching her to spin as well but that is fibery and doesn't suit the non fibery post. BTW I am not a good spinner but still I have fiber and drop spindles sitting around and can show her the basics.

Anyway wanted to post and this is the topic near and dear right now. And hello! Royally Repulsed by Ribbing