Monday, July 27, 2009

Projects Galore... and Some Other Things

I came to a decision the other day. Rather than work for hours at a time on Sock Summit, I'm going to work on it for a while, then knit, then work, then knit, etc. That way, I won't burn out on anything. Smart idea, huh?

No.

It's been so long since I've actually had more than one project on the needles (and one of them a shawl, no less), that I'm having way too much fun for it to be legal. And that translates into wanting to do nothing but knit - no work on Sock Summit, no reading, no sleeping, no eating, nothing... other than knitting.

So what the hell am I doing that I'm finding so much fun?

Well, you all know that I have a dear knitting sister (the darling lady who started out as a customer) for whom I knit socks. She started the whole thing off because I was late with her order and put some additional skeins of yarn in her package. Well, she was so blown away that she wanted to knit me some socks. Then I wanted to knit her some socks (the pair that I posted a picture of earlier). Now I have two pairs on the needles for her - the ones you saw a picture of (I had spilled a cup of coffee on them, but luckily found another skein in my stash). The other pair is a surprise, but I will say that they're killer good-looking - a pair of a simple Fair Isle-type made with a solid and a variegated. They're just too cool. Then I have another friend I'm making a very special pair of socks for. She had helped me through a bad time a while ago, so I wanted to thank her. This pair is intricate and will take me a while. They're beaded diagonally on the cuff with about 700 size 8/0 glass seed beads. I've done a pattern with the colors of the beads (there are five colors to match the colors in the yarn) and have to be careful that both socks are identical. That means a lot of Post-It Notes on my pattern. But it's fun stringing them, and I think they'll be gorgeous. Since I know she doesn't read my blog, I can tell you that the yarn is Anne by Schaefer; the color is an ivory with splotches of gold, green, purple, and wine. The beads are the same color except that I also have clear thrown in there. When I'm done with them, I'll post a picture.

As for the shawl, it's for my grandmother. It's a deep wine color with gold running through the yarn. The pattern isn't difficult - it's leaves done in lace - and I think even I can memorize it The yarn is Dream in Color Classy (I think that's what it's called - it's basically Smooshy with the gold metallic). She'll like to have it to throw over her shoulders since she gets cold in the evenings. I'm brining all these projects with me to Sock Summit to work on during my spare time. Ha! I have a feeling that I won't have any spare time, even after the day is over. Let's hope I don't, anyway. Spare time during the day means no sales; spare time at night means that I'm not tired because I wasn't busy during the day. I think it's going to go well, though. Even Hubster is looking forward to it. I know Emma is, too. She has to have a good grooming this week - maybe on Friday - so she's pretty for when she meets all of you who are going. :) Speaking of the M, here's a picture of the human dog.


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Hubster is sick as a dog (not Emma... just in general). I think the stress from the loss of his job finally hit. He went to bed at 9:30 p.m., and I doubt I'll see him any time soon. We have nothing to do tomorrow other than work on the inventory for the Summit, so he'll get a good night's sleep. We're also going to go look at houses for sale around here. I'm a firm believer in some people being able to manifest things (and I know I'm one of them), so I'm going to behave as if we have all the money in the world. I picked out about 10 houses to go see. Hell, I don't even know where we'll end up, but it won't hut a thing to go take a look. I think once he gets some leads, he'll feel much better. He has people working on his behalf at Cisco to bring him back, but we'll see. I think he should start his own company, but it's his career, and I don't want to push him into doing anything.

I had a bit of excitement this morning. It was about 5:00 a.m., and I was sitting in my chair merrily knitting away. It was then that I noticed a rather large bug crawl up the side of the fire pit (we have a big carpeted hole in the TV room in front of a gas wall fireplace where you can sit and knit, read, etc.). Anyway, this thing stopped when it reached the top, raised it's head, and arched it's tail over it's back. Then it hit me like a brick what it was.

A SCORPION.

I damn near shit my jammies. It was a baby, but they can sting just as badly as an adult. I couldn't believe it. We're way above the desert floor, so how on earth did it get up here?

I went running up the stairs as fast as I could and woke Hubster up. I don't think he believed me at first, but down he came armed with ant spray. He rolled the TV out of the way (I had thrown a book at the thing and missed, so it ran under the TV), and there it was. He sprayed the living shit out of it, then slammed a book down on it repeatedly until he was sure it was dead. Then he wrapped it up in paper towels and shoved it down to the bottom of the garbage can. Since Emma is now eating creatures and has always eaten bugs, he didn't want her to get it. I'm now creeping around the house because I'm terrified of them. In all the years he lived in Phoenix/Mesa/Tempe/Scottsdale, he's never seen one in a house or in the wild. I think he was ready to shit, too. They're evil-looking fuckers. Now I'm curled up in my chair keeping vigilant watch over the room lest another one comes creeping in.

In other yarn news, Laura of Drooling Over Yarn is knitting a pair of sockies for me. She's so sweet!! She's also a fast and excellent knitter, so I know they'll come soon. I plan on showing them off and letting everyone know who made them and what the yarn is. I have the privilege of showing off many of the contest entries for Ravelry in my booth, and hers is one of them. I've already made it clear that I'm purchasing it for myself. She dyes the most exquisite yarn. If you haven't seen her work, don't hesitate to go to my store or over to Etsy. I've felt like such a failure with the shop this past year - bad sales, no interest, spending every spare cent I have on advertising, etc., and not having anybody come look - that Sock Summit is my last chance to do right by all the artists who put their trust in me. I've still got boxes of work which some artists want back, and I want to get them mailed out, but there's money problems, the usual health problems, blah blah blah. Most of the artists have been very kind and understanding, although a few of them have been downright nasty. I guess I can't blame them, but when I'm accused of being a thief, that's crossing the line. I'm really hiding. Blow me.

One last thing - we may have a nibble on the bike! A man called last week and is very interested in coming to see it. He was coming Friday, but after he was about five hours late, I'm afraid I left a rather nasty voice mail message. Come to find out, someone in his family died. I felt about five inches tall. I'm writing him a letter apologizing for being such an ass. Since we're leaving a week from today (!?!!?!?!?!), I'm going to try and get him to come by later this week. That would be so wonderful to sell it before we leave. Then I can go shopping at the Summit!! Uh... I mean... we can save the money. Yeah... that's the ticket.

Off to go wind some yarn so I can cast on for another project. All I have to do is find the yarn I want. Unfortunately, it's right where the scorpion crawled out from.

It may have to wait until Hubster gets up

2 comments:

Bezzie said...

Awww...Emma's so damn cute!!!

And yikes scorpions. You always think they're bigger than they are, but they're really very tiny and easy to miss. FREAKY!

Laura Neal said...

Thank you for the compliments on my work, it makes me so happy that someone loves my yarn besides me!
Emma is hilarious! She is just kickin back on that couch!
I don't do scorpions, either. We have them here and I haven't seen one, yet. The fire ants kill anything around here.
I hope you sell completely out of all the yarns for Sock Summit. :)