Thus, here’s a tiny list of some things that might make your relationship with Mom more fraught than usual:1)

1) Fen-Phen: You’re not only letting mom know she’s a fatty. You’re showing how big your heart is by potentially letting hers explode! Fun facts: Fenfluramine was marketed by American Home Products (later known as Wyeth) as Pondimin, but was shown to cause potentially fatal pulmonary hypertension and heart valve problems, which eventually led to its withdrawal and legal damages of over $13 billion.

2) Komodo Dragon: Sure, Mom’s a huge Game of Thrones fan. Dragons are cool. But perhaps she doesn’t want to cuddle up with the largest living species of lizard, weighing in at an impressive 150 lbs. and a stunning length of up to 10 feet. These big fellas love to eat deer, but also have a sweet tooth for carrion and their own young. They’ve also been known to attack humans in the area of West Manggarai Regency where they live in Indonesia. Mother of dragons, indeed.

3) Mommy Dearest: Does Mom love roses–but hates to get her hands dirty?  Has she invested the family’s nest egg in eyebrow pencil futures? Does she love beautiful dresses–but definitely frowns on wire hangers? Nothing says “You’ve ruined me and I’ll be paying huge therapy bills for the rest of my life” than this classic film.

4) Fifty Shades of Grey: This badly-written page-turner has been dubbed “Mommy Porn.” Judging by the sales, lots of gals love to dive between its covers. But even if it’ll afford Mom a good time, can you afford never her in the eye again?

Or, you could ditch the above, play it awesome and get Mom she’d really like: hand-dyed yarn, a set of interchangeable needles, or an inspiring and crafty book. You could make Mom forever-thankful, impressed and excited…or live a life of eternal regret. Totally up to you.

What else happens in spring? Well, sure, there’s taxes. There’s my birt-day (or as I call it “Ye Olden Name Day”). But more importantly, it’s an entire season of CUTE. It cannot be denied.

To celebrate the Season of Cute, I bring you four cute craftable cutenesses:

1) This anerable kidden, WEARING A PAIR OF PINK BUMMY JAMMIES AND SLIPPERS. Does it seem like I’m shouting? That’s because I am. BUNNY SLIPPERS ON A KITTEN! This is from Sue Stratford’s new book of Cats and Kittens. I also love the other kittens that have nommable toes.

2)This knitted German Shepard, from Knit Your Own Dog. This reminds me of Heidi, my loverly doggela (that’s Yiddish for dog, or at least it’s what passed for yiddish in our house). Heidi was the sweetest ever. So sweet she happily greeted the burglers that broke into our house who then went on to steal our TV and Betamax. Sigh. I miss you Heidi.

3)This knitted turtle, from Knit and Purl Pets. I don’t like the idea of having a real turtle, because I think it might snap off my hand and suck the marrow out of my fingerbones. But a knitted turtle seems pretty safe to me.

4) The cutest of all: a knitted sweet zombie, with detachable brains, lungs and heart. What could be a sweeter friend for a child than his or her very own undead companion? They could roam the deserted cities together, skeletal fingers entwined, hunting for brains. You know it’s spring when you start to see Zombies dotting the hillside!

How are you greeting spring? Just in case zombies aren’t cute enough for you, we do still have Knitmare on Elm Street for even cuter inspiration!

It’s been what? A month? More? I don’t even know anymore. All I know is that I’m desperately feather-dusting my chandalier (which I do have) and measuring the place settings within 1/16th of an inch on my formal dining table (which I don’t have). Frances the Cat has taken to giving me Appalled Carson looks. Or is that just what I perceive in my muddled reality?

Anyway, as the DA DT’s get ever stronger–and as the actors are dropping like flies–this cannot be true, Miss O’Brian!–I’ve tried to soothe my shattered soul with some DA-worthy knitting.

First off, from the most recent Jane Austin Knits special mag, we have the Jane Austin reticule. I knit it in a loverly slightly variegated grey, which to my mind is much more DA than JA. I have no use for such a fancy reticule, except perhaps as a combo phone/tampon holder. I went WAY overboard here and am planning on lining it with a chartreuse satin that I bought at Britex. I was mesmerized by the salesman who told me, “If you’ve knitted something as lovely as you say, you have no choice but to go with the best.” THE BEST…THE BEST…THEBESTBESTBESTBEST….

All I can say is the Dowager Countess would totally approve:

The second is the Everdeen Beanie from Weekend Hats.

I got a sample of Cascade’s new Sunseeker cotton sparkle yarn, and decided to go full on Flapper 1920′s. As Lady Mary says, “After all, grandmama, it IS 1920.”

In the meantime, I’m diving into both the miniseries and book of “Parade’s End.” Maybe after I’ll have PE DT’s.

How are you recovering from Lack-of-Downtonitis?

Before I started making socks, I was all like “Ew! Why? You can buy them cheaper. And it seems so hard.” Like many a knitter before me, I avoided them for a long time.

But then I started making socks, and I became part of the Not-So-Secret-Sock-Society. Once you truly enter, you are hooked. Here’s why:

1) You now have a great use for all those awesome crazily-dyed yarns. Sure, I might not wear a self-splotching day-glo sweater (or would I? Hm.), but I’d absolutely wear it on my feet. Anything goes on the foots, I say!
2) You get to try out a new technique on a small scale. I’ve never knit a plain sock yet. I always do something that keeps my interest and challenges me.
3) They fit better. Yes, they are thicker than your average store-bought bear. But they’re custom to your feet. It’s like couture pour one’s peds!
4) They feel better. Now granted, this may be entirely a psychological thing. But I slip them on, and they hug my footsies like candy kisses, if candy kisses could hug. I think this is because of the “I made them!” Which is totally legit.
5) They’re a small, portable, quick-to-finish project.

Howsomever, I sometimes suffer from 2nd sock syndrome. Experts in the field say that a great way to overcome this is to cast on for the 2nd sock as soon as you’re done with the first. Which works. But lo, there is a second way…

Knit two different patterns out of the same yarn! Why not? You have two feet, you want to stay challenged, and la! Two patterns. Also, I rarely give socks as gifts, because I don’t feel they’re appreciated as much as I appreciate them. Especially to non-knitters. I learned this the hard way, by knitting a magnificent pair for my brother, who then rejected them as being “too thick,” even though he lives in chilly Boston. He is definitely NOT in the club.

It also allows me to experience two different patterns and be able to tell you guys about the joys/pitfalls.

Here’s the story of these socks. I fell deeply, deeply in love with Out of Step’s Calaveras colorway, which is, yes, splotches of super day-glo on a white background. I saw that yarn and said, Put that on ma feet! But, I also wanted to make the most of the yarn without doing a plain jane sock. Needed something where the color wouldn’t get lost in the pattern. To me, that means an interesting variation of stockinette or long color floats.

I also fell in love with the new book Sock Report at the same time. And two socks in it: the Blomster and Cambium. Both have yarn floats.

Knit Blomster first (it’s the one with the little starburst pattern). Mostly stockinette, with little parts where you pick up and knit the sock floats. One thing not mentioned in the pattern is that to fully get the “daisy” effect, you need to drop the stitch, let it hang there in front of your work (don’t worry, it didn’t unravel for me) knit your two or three stockinette stitches, then pick up that lower stitch when it comes time. I realize this makes no sense. Come see me at the store and I’ll explain it. This was the less successful of the socks. I think it would benefit from having a color mix in a darker color. The stars just didn’t show up as much with the main white background of the yarn.

Knit Cambium for my second sock. This pattern has three errata in it, one fairly major: there’s no explanation of LT and RT, which form the major part of this pattern. It’s just left twist and right twist, but go to the errata on Ravelry to get the explanation.

Of the two socks, I way prefer Cambium–though it was a lot more work. It’s awesome in the Calaveras colorway. Looks like little gummy worms winding their way down the sock. Fits great.

Anyhoozles, I might do this for all socks from now on. This might be a little weird to some folks. But then again, I’ve fallen off the weird chart so long ago I don’t even recognize what weird looks like anymore.

Sock on, sisters and brothers!

This is an extremely easy pattern which plays with directional knitting. I’m loving, loving, loving easy, peasy stockinette, and seeing how these two colors work so well together. I’m basically just doing random striping till I hit the stitch count called for at the armhole (150, btb). I’m weaving in ends as I go so this doesn’t become a total knit-mare of flailing ends when I finish that will no doubt keep me from seaming everything up.

One of the reasons I didn’t want to do the Lattice Cardigan is because it’s on size 2 needles, which is a long road to hoe for a sweater. Ironically, I’m doing this one on 3′s and it’s going so fast I can’t even believe it. I decided to do the size 40 and knit on 3′s instead of 2′s as called to make it just a wee larger. Gauge was slightly off, but enough that I think 3′s will be okay. I gauged, as I do for any sweater, but also I’m sort of hoping for the best.

Me loves this so much I can’t even stand it. I think it would be muy gorgeous in any of the zauberball colors. Hot pink stripes, anyone, or the lovely brown/cream mix?

Anyhoozles, what are you guys working on? In a couple days I’ll be writing about my new idea to overcome 2nd sock syndrome. Just because you have two feet (if you’re lucky) doesn’t mean they have to be dressed exactly the same.