Yarnification

I finished the hat last night—woohoo! The one drawback to that pattern is that it’s hard on my fingers for some reason (the only pattern I’ve ever used that gives me calluses!), maybe because it uses a smaller hook than the yarn really calls for in order to make such a dense fabric. I solved that problem by wrapping half-inch wide bandage tape around my fingers in the spots that were getting rubbed wrong. That and some moisturizer and all is well now. Here’s the finished product:

A while back I mentioned a pouch I’d done one night when I was itching to do something small. Last night I finally got around to taking a picture of it:

At the time I had no idea what I was going to do with it, but I think I’ve decided that I’m going to keep Crash’s collar in it. Crash was my bestest buddy, and he died last winter. This is him (please do not look at the part of the photo that has me in it because I look perfectly awful. Also my thighs are not that big anymore. I thought about cropping myself out of the picture, but that would’ve left a giant thigh in there behind Crash, which probably would’ve been worse.) He usually was much shaggier than that, though; he’d just been to the groomer to get sheared for the summer when this picture was taken.

Anyway, I’ve hung onto his collar, but it’s just sitting on a shelf next to my bed. I think I’m going to coil it up and keep it in the little pouch.

Last night Don and I went to the movies and then to the mall. I hit JoAnn’s to see if they had any yarn on sale. They didn’t, but all the Leisure Arts crochet and knit books & leaflets were on sale, so I picked up a copy of Easy Rugs to Crochet for $4.20. We’re planning on ripping out our wall-to-wall carpeting at home and just living with whatever condition the hardwood floors are in (my guess from what I’ve seen when we’re replaced some carpet in the past is iffy but livable) because we hate, hate, hate carpeting (carpeting, allergies, and multiple furry critters aren’t a good mix in my book—our house is hell on vacuum cleaners) but aren’t in a position to be refinishing floors at this point. Of course this means we’ll need about a hundred thousand throw rugs all over the place, and there are some really nice ones in that booklet. I’ve also got a couple that I printed out from the web a year or two ago that look good. I’m figuring that after the holidays are done with I’ll a rug-making fiend.