movin' on up

Poor little Spherey. He was just born yesterday and already, he seems to be in way over his head here at Bits of Knits. Besides cramming for finals ( he's quite the prodigy, less than 24 hours old and already in grad school!), Mom's been cracking the whip to get him to write her 40 page paper for her. Ever the obedient scholar, he obliges, always with a smile on his face. Between school projects, he even tends to the children of the manor, who mysteriously morph into demented Kikaida monsters, a.k.a. BossiER and StinkiER, during the countdown to finals week. He knows that their sweet smiles are actually their ultra deception/distraction superpower and remains unfazed by their attempts to infiltrate as he reigns them in with his twisted charm. When not occupied with his superhero duties, he attempts to conjure up recipes for boiled eggs that don't involve mayonnaise or dry mustard, but is all too easily distracted by the sweet siren song of shortbread cookies and tea, much like his mom. In spite of his foibles, Spherey's quite a cultured fellow who appreciates fine craftsmanship, like this beautiful postcard from his mom's Project Spectrum Postcard Swap partner, Stephanie. He wistfully admires the beautifully embossed flowers and vibrant colors (Thank you so much, Steph- I love it!) and daydreams of a better life. "It's funny," he muses, "It's like I'm trapped in a box." And then reality rudely awakens him as he remembers that he IS, indeed, in a box, in the midst of the packing job from hell! He sighs with the realization that even superheroes need to know when to cry uncle, and so he does, ever so quietly, in a shroud of packing peanuts. As much as he dreams of sitting at the computer connecting with his intergalactic fiberly roots, he is deterred by the merciless packing gods.

Yes, friends, the Bits of Knits household is embarking on a new chapter in our lives... in two weeks, we'll be moving to a new home! Not to worry, this has nothing to do with the dirgeful post of several weeks back. This has been in the works for quite a while, and while we're all really excited about the move, the prospect of packing and moving during finals is a little daunting. I know I invoke the "blogger hiatus" clause more than is reasonably prudent, so what's one more infraction right? ;-) I hate to do it again, but I think I'm going to need to take a one month break from posting and commenting while we ride out finals and settle into the new place. While I still love blogreading, lurking may become the order of the day until we're all settled in. I'm so sorry- I feel terrible that I've gotten so behind on reading and commenting. I'll miss you guys, but I'm looking forward to seeing you again in a month. Take care, everyone and please send poor Spherey good packing peanut vibes! :-)

public service announcement

First of all, thank you so much for all of your sweet and encouraging comments and emails this past week! I can't tell you how much your good wishes and positive thoughts mean to me. I am overwhelmed by all the love out there in knit blogland and am so grateful for your friendship and support. You guys truly are the best!! Things are much better now and I have all of you to thank for that! Your good vibes made it priority mail all the way to the islands and made a world of difference. I know I've been MIA, but I anticipate being back with a little more regularity now. Unfortunately, my online time may be curtailed due to a different craziness of a more mundane variety, known as the end-of-the-semester crunch, but I still hope to be able to pop in from time to time.

Yes, there is knitting to be had in this post, but it comes in the form of a PSA: Knitting violence is wrong. My friends, it is with a heavy heart that I must confess to you that I am a former perpetrator of knitting violence. My name is Chris, and I am an abusive knitter. My story, unfortunately, is not all that uncommon; perhaps you might even recognize yourself in my woeful tale. Like every abuser before me, I blamed the victim. %$&*@%* I mean, Beautiful Sampler Stole- it was all her fault. We got off to a less than stellar start with the invisible cast-on. The splitty hairiness of the alpaca during K2tog added to the friction, and unable to decipher the elusive directions in Row 6, I found myself increasingly on edge. After the second frogging of the night, I completely lost it. In a fit of complete and utter knitterly rage, I flew my size 2 Inox circs and Alpaca Cloud across the room and screamed sailorly potty-mouth obscenities, the likes of which you've never heard. Novel combinations of adverbs, adjectives and nouns that have yet to find their way into our modern lexicon. I could see the fear in Mr. W's eyes when I grabbed the disavowed circs by the cord and proceeded to hurl the needles against the wall again. and again. and again. Looking at the limp remains of frogged alpaca, gnarled in my sweaty, clenched fists, I realized that I... I had a problem. Surely, no knitting deserves this kind of abuse! Luckily, remorse set in and redemption was found on the KAL page in the form of collective wisdom and Row 6 help. Though I'm now 1 repeat away from finishing the central panel, I recognize that I'm still at risk for future violent behavior, especially with the impending border panels looming in my future. Knowledge is power and awareness is key; "Stop hitting the knitting!" has become my ardent mantra during these trying times.

I realize that March went out like a lion while I was AWOL, but I don't want to let another moment pass without sharing the beautiful postcard I received last month from my wonderful Project Spectrum Postcard Swap partner, Leah. She's such a sweetheart- she even enclosed yummy chocolate (which, unfortunately, never stood a fighting chance of making it to the photo shoot) with her card. Thank you so much, Leah!!I absolutely love the card- the vellum envelope, beaded lettering and dimensional paper crafting are just gorgeous and it has been such a pleasure getting to know you this past month.

Finally, I thought I'd end with some gratuitous Bossy and Stinky pics from an early Egg Hunt this past weekend at The Waikiki Aquarium. Bossy was a little miffed about why the eggs weren't hidden and instead, just dumped onto the grass like chicken feed. Thanks to some quick and resourceful finagling on my part, I was able to explain that the Easter Bunny has to hire people to help him, especially in the week preceeding Easter, since he's obviously gearing up for The Big Egg Hiding Day. Luckily, this resonated with 4 year old logic and Bossy was ultimately stoked to "find" his eggs. I worry for Stinky, though. Her ability to "smile and show me your egg at the same time" doesn't bode too well for her simultaneously chewing gum and walking in the future!

radio silence

I'm still alive, but haven't really had the chance to get on the computer since Wednesday night as I've been tending to some personal matters. I won't bore you with the gory details, but I do want to take a moment to apologize. I'm so sorry... I know that I owe many of you comments and emails, and I don't want you to think that I'm ignoring you. Please forgive me for the delay- I promise to get around to returning emails and blog reading just as soon as everything gets resolved- hopefully by Wednesday or Thursday at the latest. Looking forward to making the rounds and seeing what all of you have been up to in a few days!! Thanks, again and take care!