Drumroll, Please?

Nicole, the Lady at Lunamoth with the "Socks of Hideousness" contest, has found her winner: Michelle, who picked #117. And she has also found my winner for the consolation prize, consisting of the pea soup yarn and a copy of Nicole's sock pattern: Dawn, whose mother has perennially cold feet in the winter. Dawn, I think I need to send you a copy of my brother Dan's pattern for felted boot socks as well. Some of the farmers in my family swear by them, and my grandmother wore a pair during her last years. And they're fast to make up, which sounds like it will make your life easier.

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Meanwhile, the puppy is continuing her efforts to win over Dorian, the older cat (who continues to be apathetically disgusted with her). Rick likes to whisper little subliminal suggestions into her ear while he's petting her: "Luna, eat the gray cat." He's joking, of course - but either she was trying to groom Dorian cat-style yesterday, or she was experimenting with how he might taste.

He finally tagged her on the ear, which discouraged her for 90 seconds or so.

Work, Play, and Karma

Work on the Spring Forward socks continue. And I'm making progress - the first sock is done, but for sewing up the tip of the toe, and I'm bringing it to knitting group Tuesday night to optimize the chances of that going well. I've finished the ribbing on the second sock, and am half-way through the first repeat.

I'm pushing on; maybe I'll even finish it one of these days. But those size 0 needles were just driving me nuts after a while, especially since I took it to visit some knitting buddies on Sunday afternoon and only had the cheap reading glasses with me that bother my nose. In the end, I just had to tuck it away and bust out some instant gratification:

This is a squiggle shawl with mohair-wannabe and some creepy crawly chennile, both from my stash, on my largest circular needle (which is about 19, I think). I don't know who it's for or why I'm making it, but it will be about 34" wide by 60" long, and I finished the first 10" or so in less than an hour. It's easy, mindless, free (not only is it 100% stash sourced, but I think the yarns are left-overs from previous projects), and at this scale I barely need eyes, much less reading glasses.

And remember the pea soup yarn? Lunamoth has set up a give-away on her website for the Yarn Treehouse "Socks of Hideousness" which she made with her supply of the same stuff. (Turns out it's not quite the same. Mine is mint sliding into lavendar; hers is olive sliding into tangerine. But still . . . ) It seemed pretty obvious to me from the response she's had so far that there are people out in the world who like this kind of thing; so we're teaming up to offer my own "yarn of hideousness" and a copy of her "socks of hideousness" pattern as a consolation prize. It seems only right to send this yarn back out into the world to find someone who will love it for what it is.