Lalala…

I sent the Monkey socks off to my pal Rachel at the beginning of the month & she received them a few days later. Yay!

I received my socks from my lovely pal Stephanie right away during my 5th anniversary weekend. I’d actually been meaning to knit Hedera and nearly cast on for them with the yarn I’m currently using for Vinnland. Oh, how I love these. I wore them the day I got them and then wilted at the though of putting them back on during this heat wave of 100+ degree temperatures (around 38 degrees C). As I’ve been sick and in the house the past two days under air conditioning, I thought this was the perfect opportunity to take a quick picture.

Also included in my package were some Buffalo cookie goodies, in keeping with a Cookie theme. The Wooden Nickels? Delicious! I can’t wait until that cookie making bug hits in late autumn so that there will be buffalo shaped cookies everywhere.

On Tuesday, I pulled a squishy package out of my mailbox from Carrie and lost all sense of decorum. In addition to the items I’d requested from her, she tucked in a bit of her Horcrux superwash merino & tencel blend. I thought I’d “practice” on it before attacking my main project in the same blend.

And a little while later, I had this.

Which looked like this after a wash and dry.

Last night that turned into this.

Unfortunately, I’m pretty sure I should have used a smaller needle (the 2’s happened to be staring at me) to make a slightly smaller bootee. I can’t be sure without weighing it (note to self…procure scale), but I’m afraid there isn’t enough to make the second bootee. I’m going to wait and double check before ripping out the first one, but then again, it’s a bootee. It isn’t like it took that much time to make in the first place.

I ended up not using the Chocolate yarn for the Monkey Socks, but instead pulled this Socks That Rock out of stash to give it a go. I did 4 repeats of the pattern for the leg before beginning the heel. This is going to my Sockapalooza pal. I have to admit, this is my favorite side of the sock. The other views don’t quite do it for me. This is my first time working with STR. So far, it’s been a pleasure, but I was a bit disgruntled by a break in one of the plies which forced me to break the whole thing and rejoin the yarn. I don’t think you should ever have to weave in ends partway through a sock if you’re not doing colorwork.

To go off on a non-yarn topic, I have a discussion question for all of you. Do you have problems with your family or friends not accepting/remembering/recalling that you’re married and can’t just do things at the drop of a hat? I want to call it Single Person’s Disease. Is it more rude of me to “put someone on the spot” by asking if my husband’s invited to dinner or should I just turn around and tell him that although the two of us were going to head out together for dinner, I suddenly have other plans that don’t involve him? To put this into perspective, in this instance, the two of us were waiting for hours for that call and became very hungry while in limbo. If I’d know earlier that dinner was a definite and it was to be a girl’s thing, then he wouldn’t have had to wait all that time.

Does this happen to you? Or are you a single person who doesn’t like having to see the spouse/SO of your friend/relative when you go out? And why did it take almost 5 years of being married for it to surface. Actually, it probably just took that long for me to get really fed up with it.

Thank you to everyone who left their wonderful thoughts about Rebecca. I know she appreciates them greatly. She is flying back to DC at noon and is supposed to let me know once she’s back home. I know what it’s like to sit in an ER by yourself and how much it meant to me to have my sister or brother-in-law keep me company.

After dropping her off, I headed home. For some reason, I made a pitstop into The Whole Nine Yarns on the way. I hadn’t been there in ages and just felt this need to squish some yarn. Owner Debie called me over to the counter and I got to be the first person to see the newest yarns. Jenna (I think, sorry if I got the name wrong, but it was definitely a “j” name), who is an instructor at the store, has begun dyeing yarn.

It’s fabulous stuff and as soon as Debie put it into the computer, I bought a skein of Stash Yarn in “Chocolate”. That’s right, it’s called Stash Yarn (Your stash called – it’s lonely). There’s “437 yards of socky goodness” in each $22.50 skein of superwash Merino, more than enough for any sock you might imagine. Me, I’m imagining a pair of Monkey’s. This yarn would be fabulous for something like Pomowhatsit, but I have a “thing” with that pattern right now.

I realized that any bit of significant knitting I’ve done on Pomowhatsit those have been in an ER. I can’t help but shake the feeling that there’s some negative karma associated with them now. Rebecca told me as we sat there that life’s too short to knit something you hate, so I put them away and pulled out yarn (because everyone should have a random ball of sock yarn, just in case) and needles (extra needles, too) and the Spring IK (back up pattern supply is also very important) and began Grumperina’s Roza’s.

While talking to Debi & Dyer Extrordinaire about this yarn, I mentioned how everyone who knits has such an entreprenurial spirit & that I’ve been making stitch markers. This peaked Debi’s interest and since I didn’t have any with me, I pointed her to the blog for photos. Long story short, I’ll be selling markers to Debi wholesale to sell in the store. I’m also working on taking photos of all the markers I have available and will work on putting them up for sale on Etsy. Until I have that ironed out, if you wanted to purchase markers, please send me an email regarding quantity so that I can set them aside for you. The remaining markers will go to Debi at TWNY later this week and I’ll pretty much be focusing on making markers for TWNY for a little while.

The prices on the marker are $5 each and it goes down to $4 each when you purchase four or more markers. Until the Etsy shop is up, I won’t be charging shipping if you email me your request. Markers go out in a padded envelope, First Class Mail with delivery confirmation. Payments will be taken through PayPal. The markers are on jump rings that fit up to a US 9 or US 10.5 depending on the marker. Let me know if you need larger sizes.

I will not be taking any backorders. What you see is what’s available. If there is a particular design/color you’re interested in, feel free to drop me a comment or email. I will do my best to add those to the next batch of markers I make. I suppose I can even set up a mailing list with secret squirrel discounts, like free shipping or…stuff, for the subscribers as a patently obvious gimmick to get you to sign up to the list. If you’d like to be on the list, drop me a comment here or an email to shop(at)nytefalle(dot)com.

I currently have the following stitch markers:

1. Chocolate Donuts - 6 3 left


2. Strawberry Donuts - 4 2 left


3. Chocolate/Vanilla Marble - 5 left


4. Chocolate Eclairs (photo is pre-curing. All donuts have been glazed since) – 12 11 on hand



5. Creme Filled Choco Glazed – 12 on hand



6. Red Velvet Cake Slices - Bekka gets first dibs 5 left


7. Vanilla Donuts - 6 on hand



8. Ladybugs – 24 or more on hand, assorted colors


9. Bees – 12 10 left

I’m mostly using Sculpey polymer clay to create the markers. They come out of the oven with a flat finish and I apply a triple thick clear glaze to the frosting afterward to make it so shiny. I have an idea to more easily mass produce the little coffee cups. If that works out, I’ll divert some of those from TWNY and offer those up with free shipping for a week or two even after the Etsy shop is up. It’s crazy that something I started doing to amuse myself is turning into so much more.