Contests, Randonymity

Ding, dong, the espresso maker…

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…turns on! Woot-woot! All is well. Apparently, my espresso maker wasn’t dead, merely on strike until it was thorougly cleaned and decalcified. *hangs head in shame* Amusingly, I was so freaked out that it didn’t work yesterday morning, I completely forgot that I have a stovetop espresso maker for just such a crisis… Moving right along!

Through the Loops and Olga are having a birthday contest to celebrate that they turn 45 within days of each other. You can leave a comment at one or both blogs, identifying each of them from the baby pictures. Leave your comments by 11:59 pm (PDT? PST? EDT? EST?) on April 14 for your chance to win yarn and chocolate.

In the midst of my groggy day yesterday (even though I did stop for a moosed soy mocha, no toppings, on the way to work), I got fun mail – my Nana Sadie Rose Posy Sock Sack arrived! This is a really cool bag – it’s padded and very sturdy (even somewhat freestanding), with a shoulder strap and pockets inside to anchor a scissors, pencil, needles, etc. It’s about 10″ tall (everything looks small with Chaos in the picture). Looks like there’s plenty of space for a pair of socks-in-progress, along with keys, cellphone, and wallet. Thank you very much, Knitnana – I love it and can’t wait to use it! (You can email Knitnana to get your own Posy Sock sack.)

“Hmm, it isn’t a sock, so I guess I can relax my tuna and catnip rule. After all, there are cats on it.” -C

“*mumble*…pockets…*mumble*” -C

“Ok, ok, I’ll pose nice with the bag…” -C

“Can I go play now?” -C

Contests, Knitting, Project Spectrum, Reading

I was awakened yesterday by…

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…Mayhem chasing her tail on top of me. *oooof* Today started out inauspiciously when my espresso maker gave up the ghost…

Looks like the Yarn Harlot got a not-too-bad picture of me… If you’re looking for the Twin Cities “linkorama” Stephanie mentioned, here you go. Hey, our singing “O Canada” is available on You Tube! And here’s a link to the Strib article about the event.

Jenifer’s having a contest – guess what one-skein project she’s knitting and then share what your favorite one-skein project is (not from any of the one-skein books). Submit your entries by midnight, April 14, and you could win a mysterious prize.

Reading Update
Um, I haven’t apparently done a reading update for a while… Brace yourselves.

Maggie Needs an Alibi, Maggie by the Book, Maggie Without a Clue, and High Heels and Homicide by Kasey Michaels. Maggie Kelly writes mysteries set in Regency England. One day she turns around to discover that her hero, the dashingly handsome Alexandre Blake (the Viscount St. Just) and his amiable sidekick Sterling Balder have come to life and are standing in her living room… These aren’t terribly well written, but they are light and amusing.
Ready or Not? by Chris Manby. Light chicklit about a British radio producer who isn’t sure her fiance is right for her as the wedding approaches.
Out of this World by Jill Shalvis. More light chicklit (although significantly steamier than the previous title – *fans self*) about an LA muralist who inherits a mysterious B&B in remote Alaska.
Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews. Quite possibly inspired or at least influenced by Kim Harrison’s Rachel Morgan series, this book (possibly the first in a series? It has that feel) features magical mercenary Kate Daniels in an alternate future in which tech is in decline and magic ascendent.
Whiskey Sour by J.A. Konrath. Book one in a (so far) short series about insomniac Chicago police lieutenant Jacquelyn “Jack” Daniels. Sufficiently entertaining that I’m reading the second book and have the most recent book queued up. Please note that these are pretty gory at times.

Knitting Update
I finished my Regia Crazy Colors socks yesterday for my first completed Project Spectrum April/May project. Although it was a struggle, I resisted doing the Ms. Matchy Matchy thing.

*sniff sniff sniff* -C

*sigh* “She’s still not making the tuna and catnip socks I requested, May.” -C

“Ok, big kitty, then I won’t even bother to stop and check them out.” -M

Alongs, Contests, Knitting, Project Spectrum, Randonymity

I hope you’re all sitting down… oh wait, you’re at your computers. It should be ok.

34 Comments

Yay, KnittyMama! She actually got a decent picture of me from Wednesday night. 🙂 (Please note that I’ve been updating yesterday’s post with links to people’s pictures and tales as they’re available.)

Twitching about the upcoming Harry Potter book release? Maybe participating in the Hogwarts Sock Swap will help distract you for the next several months. You have until April 30 to join.

You can sign up for Jennie’s Sound Swap until April 11. However, number of participants is limited, so sign up early!

Julia is having a contest a day for the next week. Check in each day to see what the new contest is! Winners will be selected randomly on Friday, April 13.

Question for Those in the Twin Cities
Does anyone know where I could take an ASL class in the area?! The Minneapolis Community Ed class I was signed up for was canceled (even though it still appears on their website). I’m not interested in taking a college level course (even just auditing). Thanks for any leads!

Pet Food
Obsidian Kitten has some great posts about making your own pet food – definitely something to think about in the light of recent events.

Jeanne turned me on to a good blog for tracking the current pet food issue, as well as others that come up.

Knitting Update
Ready for a bit of color shock? I’ve been working on Project Spectrumesque socks that are a bit different than my usual colors, but this week has been so crazy, I haven’t had a chance to blog about them until now. You might’ve seen this first sock in some of the pictures from Wednesday night – it’s a plain stockinette sock, knit from Regia Crazy Colors. This sock has some black and purple in addition to the pink and red, so it isn’t too much of a stretch. (The purple bag with black cats on it was made by Trek!)

“I am much cuter than the kitties on the bag, of course. Oh, Addis – my favorite!” -M

The next sock is quite a bit further outside of my usual color range…

“Addis, Addis, tasty tasy Addis…” -M

That’s Sundara’s sock yarn in Bird of Paradise, the most recent colorway in the Petals Collection. Initially I tried a garter rib, because I wanted to avoid the less stretchy slip stitch rib in the pattern that came with the yarn. However, the garter stitch broke up the colors way too much. Here’s a shot of the sole (stockinette) – imagine this with much, much more color choppiness.

“Are you going to eat that entire Addi, May? Maybe you could save a little nibble for me?” -C

So I conceded that Sundara knew what she was doing, using slip stitches to pull the alternating rounds of color together. I didn’t use the same ribbing as in the pattern; instead, I decided to use R1: *K1, slip 1 (as if to purl), K1, P1*; R2: *K3 P1*. I like it. A lot. And I’ll probably try a variation of this ribbing on other socks in the future – as long as I remember to make my sock heel deeper to compensate for the slight loss in stretchiness.

Festing

“Un-freaking-believable”

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Yup. That pretty much covers it. (Thanks to MC Mary Lou for summing it all up so nicely.) I woke up this morning feeling slightly hungover from all the yarn and knitting and knitters and general excitement of yesterday – good thing I took today off, eh?

But to begin at the beginning… I wandered down to the Yarnery around 3 pm Wednesday to pick up my copy of …Casts Off... I bought some yarn, to show my support for the event, of course. 🙂 Then Amy (Knit Think) picked me up and we went over to Pad Thai Grand Cafe, where we met up with some other knitters. (Please note that in cases in which I am not sure if a particular blogger wants her name “out there,” I have just used the blog name.)

From the left, CursingMama, flat Vicki Knitorious (the photo), Beadslut, Jess of Mikknit, Stephania of Moraie Knitting, Connie (oh, great, you can see my butt in the extreme left of the first picture on Connie’s blog – but you can also see Limedragon, sitting down and wearing a lime sweater), Cynthia, and Amy.

After dinner, we headed over to the William Mitchell Law School Auditorium and were amazed at the crowd of around 400 knitters. I’m going to miss people and I apologize! I saw Christy of Purling Away, Limedragon, a group of bloggers from Woodbury, Renee of A Good Yarn, Louise of Louise Knits, Jeanne (of course!) of k3tog, Kelle of Knits and Giggles, Shelly the Heathen Housewife, Deb of Cashmere Dreams, Knot All That, Susan of TheRaineySisters (she got a great picture of Stephanie’s hysterically funny t-shirt, available here), and KnittyMama (*gasp* I actually got a picture!).

Here’s the traditional picture of the Yarn Harlot taking a picture of knitbloggers taking pictures of her taking a picture…

Stephanie was brilliantly funny – I hurt after laughing that hard for nearly an hour. And then we queued up for the signing. When I reached the front of the line, she started to sign my book and I put down one of my blog cards. She looked at it and said, “Stumbling Over Chaos?! I’m discombobulated! It’s like meeting Batman or something.” Of course, I mostly lost the ability to speak coherently at that point. And let’s just say that I am not photogenic. Not one tiny little bit – why yes, my eyes are closed. And that’s the good picture!

I actually like this blurry picture of me much better:

Many, many thanks to the Yarnery, for organizing this event so well. They had many, many doorprizes (I won one! pictures eventually) and gave each of us a nice canvas tote.

*sniff sniff sniff* “Wow, smells like a lot of fun, Mom!” -M

Contests, Those Cats

Mayhem has eaten my brain

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Heather’s giving away a Project Spectrum pink/green/yellow themed cd – leave a comment about what you like about spring before midnight MDT, April 6, and you could win a copy.

You could also win a Dyson vacuum cleaner from Five Minutes for Mom, but you have act quickly – the contest closes at 1 pm EDT today, April 4!

It snowed last night. It’s snowing right now. Waaaaah!

The pet food recall has expanded a bit. However, neither of the Science Diet dry foods that Chaos eats (w/d and c/d) contain wheat gluten (it’s the m/d that’s being recalled by Hills), and May eats a grain-free food called Innova EVO. For treats, they get Feline Greenies (fortunately, they chew their Greenies and don’t bolt them, so no choking/breathing problems), which don’t contain wheat gluten, either. Thanks to everyone who has inquired! We all appreciate your concern – especially since I don’t watch TV and missed the initial furor. Jeanne’s looking out for me now and making sure I’m up to date. 🙂

Work is still crazy. But I’m done early today for the Yarn Harlot festivities and I’m taking tomorrow off. Woo-hoo!

“Mom’s brain was pretty tasty! But there sure wasn’t much left after work ate most of it Monday and Tuesday.” -M

Contests, Randonymity

Work has eaten my brain

36 Comments

Scout’s having a Project Spectrum contest. You can play along in two different ways: by describing or showing a picture of the preppiest outfit you’ve ever worn, or by writing a Project Spectrum limerick containing the words pink, yellow, and green. Leave your comments by noon, MDT, April 4, and you could win a skein of Scout’s yarn in the Prepster colorway (which is pink, yellow, and green).

Ok. That’s it. That’s all I have. After sitting in front of a computer and working for 16 hours yesterday, I don’t have a lot of brainpower left. I’ll catch up on bloglines later in the week, everyone. I miss you already.

So let’s see what I have in my spare photo folder… Whoops. There’s a picture I took for Tink, who was wondering if Knit a Fantasy Story had any patterns for fairies in it. Yes, indeed it does, Tink, although I’m pretty sure that dandelion isn’t knit.

Oh, look at this! Here’s a picture of Mayhem lying on the floor, underneath the chair rungs. It doesn’t look comfortable to me, either.

“La la la la la la la…” -M

“Mom! I can’t believe you posted that unflattering picture of me!!” *sniff* -M

Hee hee – just wait until she wants to start dating! 😉

See the Sights

What I did with my weekend, or Meet the Peeves

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As I mentioned Friday, the Peeves came to Minneapolis for approximately 24 hours, en route to see more sights and meet more bloggers (Hi CarrieK! Hi La! Hi Laurie! You’ll have fun!!). Meet the notoriously camera shy Peeves:

After we caffeined up, we headed over to Yarnzilla, which was one of Peeve’s must-see Minneapolis destinations.

This may or may not have been because of Yarnzilla’s amazing wall o’ Koigu (they have more in the back – and I think that gap at the right end of the second row from the top is where Peeve had already grabbed a few skeins). Peeve’s love of Koigu is infamous.

More on the great yarn I got at Yarnzilla in a few minutes. We then proceeded into Minneapolis proper to Depth of Field. If you were a game show contestant, wouldn’t you select the prize behind the yarn door? I thought so.

After stopping so the Peeves could have a bagelly lunch, we headed down to Uncle Hugo’s and Uncle Edgar’s, where we discovered a book signing in progress. I picked up the latest (For a Few Demons More) from the lovely and gracious Kim Harrison.

Our next stop was Dreamhaven, where Mr. Peeve purchased a Cthulhu baseball cap, autographed Neil Gaiman goodies, and much, much more.

I was fascinated by the display of awards Neil Gaiman won for his novel American Gods. Sorry about the crappy picture, CV… Top center was his Hugo Award, then from left to right, his Locus Award, SFX Award, Nebula Award, and Stoker Award. Seeing a Hugo and a Nebula in person – wow.

We were all pretty tired after that, so we wandered over to my condo and vegged for a while before venturing back out for some food at Tum Rup Thai. The rest of the evening was spent knitting (Peeve and I), doing laundry (Mr. Peeve), and trying to convince Chaos that just because people aren’t me doesn’t mean they’re bad.

Sunday morning, we stopped for breakfast at the Uptown Diner, then had time to stop at the MSP Airport Post Office so the Peeves could lighten their load a bit before they hopped on another plane. Thanks for stopping in Minneapolis, you two! I had a blast, and my lumpy futon is yours for any future visits! 🙂 Maybe it won’t be raining then – as feared, it rained all weekend. The Peeves claimed to enjoy the rain, since Melbourne is suffering a drought. Well, then, they came to the right place.

So back to the yarn… On the left is a gorgeous skein that Peeve brought me from Australia – it was dyed by the late Marta, so this is a very, very special skein. I hope I can do it justice. Thank you ever so much, Peeve. I am honored.

The next two skeins are from Yarnzilla – they’re One Sheep Hill superwash merino sock yarn (500 yards) and are hand dyed exclusively for Yarnzilla. (This yarn isn’t on their website yet, but should be soon.) Linda, the gracious owner of Yarnzilla, gave Peeve and I each a skein of the colorway in the center! Thank you, Linda!

“Hmm, maybe your skein has that one sheep in it, May. I don’t think mine does.” -C

*sniff sniff sniff* -M

Peeve also bought me a lovely skein of Henry’s Attic Carrera (50 silk/50 merino), which I look forward to dyeing this summer. Thanks again, Peeve! While we were at Depth of Field, I picked up some other yarn for dyeing – in the center are a few balls of sportweight Colorado Yarn from the DoF Sale Loft. The two skeins on the right are Jeannie from Kraemer Yarns (80 superwash/20 nylon, 480 yards), which I hadn’t seen before.

“I will love this skein forever and I will name it Mayhem.” -C

“Wait a minute…” -M

“Hey, cut it out, you two! Unpaw that yarn, Chaos!” -me

Contests, Randonymity, Reading

Ahhh… Friday.

39 Comments

Wendy has started giving away books after she reads them – if you send her an email before noon EDT, April 1, you could be selected to receive her copy of Past Reason Hated by Peter Robinson.

Lorette is celebrating her third blogiversary! Leave a comment about your favorite knitting trick or gadget and you could win some sock yarn. Comments must be left by midnight, April 1.

Reading Update
Innocent in Death by J.D. Robb. The latest Eve Dallas/Roarke (mmm…. Roarke…) mystery is good, but pretty standard fare. I swear, didn’t Born in Death just come out?!!
The Return of Jonah Gray by Heather Cochran. I was expecting this chicklit tale of Sasha, an IRS auditor, to be pretty standard fare, too. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that it had a bit more substance than I expected.

Life Update
Some things I’m looking forward to over the next few days – as part of their World Tour of the US, Peeve and Mr Peeve are coming to Minneapolis tomorrow and they’re staying at Casa de Chaos y Mayhem! Now, if I can just remember to bring along my camera… 😉 Hopefully the flood watch we have going through Saturday night remains just a watch…

Also, next Wednesday, the Yarn Harlot will be speaking in St Paul and signing copies of her new book. Rumor has it that there are 400 knitters who’ve reserved spots, with a waiting list. Should be very crazy indeed!

I’ve had a rough week at work and things will continue on in that fashion at least through the early part of next week. So imagine how finding this in my mailbox yesterday afternoon cheered me up:

“I don’t remember being in the mailbox, but I know I always cheer Mom up!” -M

*snort* “Yeah, that’s what she meant, May… not.” -C

Hmm. I didn’t mean for you to have to imagine quite that much. Let’s try again, shall we?

*sniff sniff* “I will allow you to accept this gift.” -C

Gee, thanks, Chaos. Anyway, Imbrium and I exchanged mix cds – the mix she sent me arrived yesterday, along with two gorgeous skeins of Interlacements Tiny Toes sock yarn in Midnight Blues! (Yes, there’s purple in there – it just didn’t photograph well.) Thank you so much, Imbrium!! Hey, I can’t get to your blog… 🙁

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Alongs, Knitting, Project Spectrum

How many RPMs can Lola run?

48 Comments

I finished binding off my STR Titania RPM socks last night as the credits rolled for Run Lola Run – a perfect finish for March FiberFlix! Plus, this pair of socks is my last project for February-March Project Spectrum.

Check out how much yarn I had left – that’s approximately 7 inches. Yeah, that definitely added to the excitement. To maximize my yarn usage, I knit each sock toe-up from the opposite ends of the ball.

The sock on the right was knit using the RPM pattern as written. For the sock on the left, I reversed the pattern, so the spirals go in opposite directions. The stitch pattern definitely “pops” more on the sock on the right – is it because the spiral goes the same direction as I was knitting? Or??

“Well, since Mom’s done knitting, I’m sure she won’t mind if I steal this little bit of yarn…” -M

“Eating yarn is very dangerous, Mayhem – don’t do it!” -me

This definitely isn’t my favorite STR colorway (it was a sock club selection last year). I’m not sure that teal, burgundy, olive, orange, rust, lavender, and light blue really work together. Interestingly, the yarn in the miniskein keychain that came with this skein is slightly darker and the colors work much better. (Um, yes, I might’ve been trying to calculate how much yarn I could get out of the miniskein, just in case…)

“Hmph. Meanie. You didn’t need to take away that yarn. I shall sulk.” -M

Contests, Those Cats

RIP SRM (This post may not be suitable for those sensitive to sparkly mouse carnage)

61 Comments

Elspeth is having a contest for “WIP It Out” on March 31st. There will be a prize for identifying the movie quote, and another lucky participant will receive one of E’s frogged WIPs.

Cindy is having a contest – leave a comment about any Greek affiliations you may have had in college (or just leave a comment if you were independent and unaffiliated). Comment by 11 pm CDT March 29 and you could win some sock yarn. Although I wasn’t in a sorority, I was in Xi Sigma Pi, the National Forestry Honor Society…

Sallee the Knitnana is having a contest to celebrate a comment milestone. Leave a comment about the Meezer by midnight EDT March 30 and you could win a Nana Sadie Rose sock bag (a new design)!

So perhaps you are wondering about the post title… I think a picture will speak a thousand words.

Yes, that is the skin and skeleton of Chaos’ beloved SRM. If I hadn’t witnessed Chaos demolishing SRM, I would’ve blamed Mayhem, known to be very hard on her toys… Compare the picture above to this picture of SRM, taken in January of 2006:

When asked why he would treat his beloved toy in such a fashion, Chaos didn’t have much to say for himself.

I guess we’re left to find our own answers about this senseless loss of sparkly mouse….

Art journaling, reading, knitting, and cat parenting. It's a wild life.