Kiss My Knits!

With “Talk Like a Pirate Day” coming up on Sept 19th, the ladies need a little something to show their swashbuckling style! While perusing Linda Medley’s site (and drooling over the color bookplates for Castle Waiting that are now available) I noticed she’s got a cafepress store with this little gem of a pirate shirt in it. I love it!

And may I say how fantastic it is that Castle Waiting sold out of its first printing? Once again, I am part of an obscure fandom overlooked by its proper large audience. At least Linda Medley is publishing a monthly Castle Waiting comic again, which thrills me no end.

With the book going into a second printing – will this be the niche gem that breaks into the mainstream? Nah, probably not. But still, I’ll continue to hope. Prepare to be boarded, middle America! Yarrrrr!

I went to the Books-a-Million last night for the weekly Stitch ‘n’ Bitch. I usually get there a good hour after everyone else because of the kiddo’s bedtime, but last night I was actually early! When I arrived, there were three ladies knitting in the cafe area. I walked up and asked if a seat very near them, facing them, was taken, and they said no. So I plopped my purse down and said I’d get some coffee and be right back.

Apparently, this is the whispered conversation that took place among them while I was getting coffee.

“Do you know her?”
“No. Do you?”
“I’ve never seen her before in my life.”

So I came back with my coffee and said, “Hi! I don’t think I’ve seen you before. What’s your name?”

“Um… Brenda.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Brenda! I’m (me)!”

At which point they were all looking at each other and I started to twig to the fact that something was weird. I had just figured that since I usually come late, maybe these were people who arrived early and left before I got there. Turns out they weren’t there for the S’n’B, they just happened to be hanging out after work together and knitting. I’m sure it was very relaxing until this crazy lady barged into their personal space, dumped out her belongings, and then came back to demand to know who they were. To their credit, they were just going to be polite and roll with it.

Oops.

Fortunately, I explained about our weekly meeting and we all instantly went into knitter-mode, asking about each others’ current projects and settling in comfortably. We all had a good laugh at the coincidence and misunderstanding. After about ten minutes, arrived. I was glad of that, because it proved that there was a meeting and I wasn’t some random knitting stalker. Apparently those ladies usually come on Thursday, and we always come on Wednesday. Many more people arrived to snicker at me (okay, I had it coming), and we got along together famously. So they’re going to try to make it on Wednesday from now on.

So, moment of awkwardness turns into new knitting pals made. Yay for being bold and weird!

Because I arrived early and stayed late, I had time to finish the shell of a cotton Jayne hat and whip this baby up. Noro keeps changing their $(#)*@ dye lots quite dramatically, which means that older offerings on wearwithstyle like this one need to be updated as that colorway is no longer being made, as far as I know. Also, that particular hat went up when the site originally went live, and was kind of a placeholder with no pricing or ordering info on it.

I often consider contacting anatomyofaskirt‘s website designer, aeolidia, just because http://www.anatomyofaskirt.com/ looks so fabulous. Then I remind myself that I’ve always got a couple of weeks of orders stacked up, so it’s not like the site design is hurting business. Changing isn’t a top priority.

My to-do list is a mile long, so I’m off for now!


Next on the needles: California, Ontario, and New Jersey!

Looking over a rasha’hhsograth referring to a q’zhalata on a wedding sheet, I was reminded again of why I really do want to make that Encyclopedia Elanthica I keep talking about. I wonder what good software for an encyclopedia-type database would be. I suppose there’s always wiki, but there’s got to be another option out there.

The rasha’hhsograth design – translated as “handflower” for those who don’t speak S’Kra – was a nice design, but I did have to delve into my notes a bit to be sure I was making the correct calls. I’m glad I did – I found the records of a wedding couple from 2001. Their wedding process had not been going well, but Tinsie, God bless her, kept plugging away with them while I kept an eye on the situation. By the time it was all over, the couple was really pleased with how it turned out, to the point that they wrote a very nice thank you note to Simutronics HQ. It made me smile to read it again. Tinsie had the ability to keep her cool and look for creative solutions that would make everybody happy. She always made those around her feel lighter in spirit.

Miss you, sweetie.

It’s been a very lovey-dovey day here at home today. Our daughter declared that today is “Kiss Day” and everybody’s getting lots and lots of kisses. She even made me a Kiss Day card, with a picture of a kissing mouth on the front. Inside, it reads. “Dear Mom. It’s Kiss Day. Love, Emily.” (And yes, she put the appropriate apostrophe in “it’s.”)

Her: Do you know what tomorrow is?
Me: No, what?
Her: It’s hug day! Even at school!

Pretty sweet, but we have to be sure she’s not randomly hugging people in the halls at school. I’ll happily take those extra hugs. 🙂

Today, my husband took our daughter to the public indoor pool across the street. There was a scuba class going on, and my daughter was quite wary of the divers. Finally, the class was over and they got out of the pool and started changing out of their wetsuits. My daughter stared, fascinated.

Her: “They’re turning into real people!”

Hee hee!

…or how I learned to stop worrying and love the snakes.

On the list of things I thought I’d never say, “I’m knitting a golf club cozy” ranks up there with “I’m voting Bush.” Nonetheless, I’m knitting a golf club cozy. Charlotte Yarn, my fabulous local yarn store, is knitting covers for the American Red Cross’s annual golf tournament, and they’re looking for volunteers to help them out. So, in the words of the WWI slogan, I’ll knit my bit.


Boo’s first day of second grade went reasonably well, although she refused to eat any lunch. This has been a recurring problem. I don’t know if it’s that her sandwich gets smushed in the baggie or that it’s so incredibly loud and overwhelming that she just can’t think about eating. Lord knows the times I’ve visited the cafeteria it’s been utter chaos. I’m going to get her a hard-sided case for her sandwich. Also, her teacher wrote me with a suggestion today, that since she has ‘resource center’ right after lunch, she can snack there if she doesn’t eat any lunch. Her resource teacher is fine with this.

I read somewhere recently that one of life’s little pleasures is to use a knife to carve your initials into the top of a fresh jar of peanut butter before you use it. I’d never heard of this before, but sure enough, it does bring a smile to my face. Is this a strange little quirk, or one of those things I’m the last to know? Do you play with your food too? Regardless, I share my little moment of day-brightening with you, in hopes that you’ll smile too.

Hey, , I found a shirt for you! Gotta order by August 31st, so act fast!

Only one day of summer left before school starts, so I’ve put Emily to work doing all the house cleaning. After the dishes, she’ll be re-shingling the roof.

The meeting with the teacher went well. I like her, she seems very competent. She’s got a background in special ed, so that’ll be helpful. Several of Emily’s friends from kindergarten and first grade will be in her classroom too, including her very best friend. Her teacher and I talked about strategies, and I think we’re both on the same page. I’m feeling pretty good about this.

Jayne hat orders continue to come in, and seem to have picked up slightly now that the weather’s cooling off. I seem to be getting ahead of my estimated delivery time, which is good. It’ll get better once I’ve got the mornings to knit instead of cramming it all in at night. That’ll give me a chance to make some of the things that I’ve promised other people. Including one item which I’ve decided not to follow a pattern on, but just to wing instead. We’ll see how that goes. Jayne hats on the needles for Illinois, California, and California again.


Likewise, for Fall, DR weddings are picking back up as people go back to school, and Team Wedding has some projects we’ve been able to work on. That’s always good.

Had good fun at the Stitch’n’Bitch at Books a Million last night. I had my first coffee in about a month (I get one raspberry mocha at the weekly Stitch’n’Bitch) and wound up staying up way too late. Well, at least I finished another Jayne hat and another set of repeats on Branching out.

Last night, prostiturtle brought up the post with all the alcohol stories in the comments, and it once again proved a popular topic of conversation. Another popular topic was pet loyalty. To which I will add my story!

Once, before we were married, I stayed the night with my future husband at his house (sorry, Mom and Dad!) when he was living not too far up the street. I got up in the middle of the night and fumbled for my shirt in the dark and started to put it on. I remembered that I didn’t put it on, but my husband reminds me otherwise, and he’s right: I had just gotten it over my head when I noticed it was wet. And smelled funny. What the… Holy crap! The cat had come into the room and peed on my shirt! May I just say: EWWWWWWWW!

Of course, I guess she was right to be jealous, I did wind up stealin’ her man! Ha! Take that, you stupid possessive cat!

Have you ever had a pet act possessive, jealous, or just plain weird toward someone in your life?

School starts on Friday, but I got a call from my daughter’s upcoming second grade teacher yesterday morning. She said that she had been talking to Emily’s teacher from last year about her, and heard how sometimes she does better if she’s more familiar with her surroundings. So she invited us up to the classroom this morning to look around and get acquainted before the craziness of the open house tonight. We’ll be going up shortly.

I thought that was so nice! It’s reassuring to know that Emily’s teacher is already thinking of things that can help her succeed. It feels good to know that her teacher is really in her corner. It makes me much more hopeful for this school year!

Reading a story in about a girl who thought she was sober but wasn’t made me think of my first alcoholic drink. So here we go!

In high school, I wasn’t really a party girl. I’ve always been introverted, so even when I went out with friends, that just wasn’t my thing. I didn’t have a drink until I was 21, not really seeing the point. I still don’t drink, as a rule – maybe once a year, tops. Maybe not even that. I’ve got nothing against it, it’s just not my thing.

One evening, when I was 21, I was sitting in my dorm room and suddenly, out of the blue, I thought, “eh, what the hell.” So I called some friends and said, “you know, I think I want to go have a drink.” Seeing the possibilities, they all, to a person, said, “Wait, really? Are you serious? OH MY GOD I’LL BE RIGHT THERE!”

So they took me out to a bar, and because I had no experience with liquor, they were able to ply me with pretty strong drinks and tell me they were really very low-alcohol. I really don’t like the taste of booze, so I didn’t get as blitzed as I could have. Man, that Long Island Iced Tea tasted like battery acid! To this day, I go for the girly drinks on those rare occasions when I do have a bit.

Turns out I’m a happy, huggy, peppy drunk! I love everyone! And when the end of the night was rolling around, I said, “now, am I really okay?” “Suuuure,” they said. “Great! I’ll just walk on home.” And I stood up and swayed.

And that’s when they started laughing hysterically, and I knew my friends had been using me for their own twisted amusement. Eh, I can’t blame them. It was college, and it was cheap entertainment.

And that’s the story of my first drink.

Do you have any alcohol-related stories to share?