I decided that it’s time for an “It Bugs Me” post again. It has been awhile. And what made me think of it? Last night as I was sitting there shredding envelope after envelope of credit card offers, it came to me. “This bugs me.” When you have a family of four, two family-owned businesses, and two college-aged kids, the credit card offers that arrive every day are annoying. What a complete waste of time and money. (Particularly annoying are the ones that contain a piece of bubble wrap to make it feel more substantial like something fun is in there, the ones that contain a fake ticket to “the destination of your choice”, and the ones that have a piece of heavy cardboard in there. I did find a dollar bill in one of them. That was unique.) Credit card offers. They bug me. (And that photo was as close as I could find to a “bug” around here, which is probably a very good thing.)

It also bugs me that I’m having so much fun knitting scarves and there are only so many you can wear. And it really does need to be pretty cool to wear them. You can wear socks on most days (except the very hottest) but you can only wear merino scarves when it’s cool. I finished the Noro Silk Garden Worsted scarf (colorway 282) in a modified Chevron-type pattern and I really like how it turned out. (Knitting with Noro is always an adventure because of the way the colors play out.) I mixed a few different patterns together and came up with my own version: cast on 36 stitches, knit a row, and then start in on this pattern and work on it as long as you want it, ending with a knit row. (I used 2 1/2 skeins for this):
Row 1: K2tog (x 3), K f&b (x 6), K2tog (x 6), K f&b (x 6), K2tog (x 3)
Row 2: Purl Row 3: Knit Row 4: Purl
K2tog = knit two stitches together as one. K f&B = Knit into the front of the stitch and then knit into the back of the same stitch, then pop the stitch off of the left needle.

And speaking of projects completed, here is the Creatively Dyed Seacell Roving that I spun up. This was a colorway from her first roving order here called Forest Path. (We put up more fun new roving colors from Dianne this week.) The roving didn’t bug me – it spun up like a dream. What bugs me is that I feel like I’m doing a good job while I’m spinning it, getting nice even yarn most all of the time. However, when I ply it and look at the finished results, it doesn’t look anywhere near even. I guess I just need to keep practicing. (Actually, given the quantity of very cool roving here, that is not going to be a hardship.)

Another thing that really bugs me is that this is Cassie’s last week at The Loopy Ewe. Cassie is in college and we hired her for the summer (so that the regular Elves could be a little more flexible with their summer schedules.) Cassie is getting married in a week and so her time here is about over. She has been a huge help and we’re going to miss her. We had a Going Away/Good Luck with the Wedding party for her here today, which was fun! (We’re sending her off with one of those gorgeous Atenti bags – the one that she has had her eye on all summer long.) But it bugs me that we’re losing her, albeit to a good cause! (Knitting Daughter has already laid claim to Cassie’s job next summer.)

Let’s end this post on a positive note! Something that makes me happy – our Second Anniversary “Loopified” Sock Kit! These will go up sometime soon (but not today – we’re not ready yet) and we’re happy to show you the photo of what’s in there! We had Jana at Hand Maiden dye up a special colorway on her Casbah yarn base that we call “Loopified” – the red and black are very “Loopy” colors, and of course the pewter color is in there because of Loopy Kisses, which is also part of being fully “Loopified”. We love how it turned out! Then Debbie O’Neill took the sample skein that Jana had sent and developed a cool pattern out of if, which she calls Halema ‘uma ‘u Socks (which is the name of a volcano, since the colorway reminded her of glowing embers.) To round out the kit, we have a Loopy Ewe Coffee Mug (I love the size and shape of this one), a Loopy Ewe enamel pin (for all of you who keep asking us for these), and two Loopified tattoos (for those of us who are too chicken to get the real thing like Lynda did. And like the others of you who have already emailed for permission to get a real Loopy tattoo, are planning to.) A couple of things to note about the kit – we are limiting it to one per person for now. Also, this has to ship as its own order, since we had to pack it in a certain size cube in order to fully protect the mug. (International orders – we will pack the mugs the VERY best that we can in the international padded envelopes, but we just can’t guarantee them because …. well, we’ve seen some of the things that happen to orders going that far afield. Please order at your own risk.) :-)

So, those are the things that bug me (and make me happy) today. What bugs you lately?

Sheri Friday’spostwillbeaSecondAnniversaryContestPostwithWollmeise&otherprizes.
Don’tmissit!