Sweet Temptation

 

I received a lovely package in the mail today, from KnitPicks. Sock yarn, sock blockers, a yardage counter, and a darning egg. 

This yardage counter is great. It is mechanical, not even battery operated, so it didn't cost too much.

Isn't that neat? I have always wanted a yardage counter, but I didn't want to spend a lot of money. I got the KnitPicks catalogue in the mail a few days ago, and the counter jumped right out at me. So did the darning egg. And I'd been wanting sock blockers. And as I was paging through the catalogue, the sock yarn in the middle, the greeny-purply skein, literally leaped off the page at me! Literally! It wrapped its tentacles around me--okay, now I'm exaggerating. But it did catch my eye. 

I filled my shopping cart with the darning egg, sock blockers, 1 skein of yarn, and the yardage counter ... and that was where the trouble began. Because I saw, written above the shopping cart icon, these fateful words: 

$8.77 more and you qualify for free shipping!

Really? Free shipping? FREE shipping? So, guess what I did. I spent another hour browsing the webpage, trying to spend $9. Thus the extra two skeins of yarn. They get me with that every time. I suspect even if it said another $435 and you qualify for free shipping! I would still convince myself that it would be a bargain to get free shipping. 

I am sorely tempted to start in on that skein of yarn, the lovely purply-green one. Even though it's Tour de Fleece, even though I have three WIPS, even though I have one sore thumb and a slice on the other (Yes, Melissa, next time I'll believe you when you tell me the mandoline is sharp and I ought to use the safety holder), I still want to cast SOMETHING on with that lovely yarn! It's practically shouting to be a lovely Autumn wrap of some sort. I'm trying to resist, but it isn't easy.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Side Note: Yesterday, my friends' 2 month old baby was formally baptized into the Orthodox Church of America, in a lovely fourteen hour ceremony. 

Just kidding. It was only an hour. It was a Greek Orthodox Church, so it was an ancient ceremony ... casting out the devil, spitting at the devil, full body immersion (not the face), and the priest, godmother, and candle-bearer (Melissa, what is the formal name for M.'s role in the ceremony?) dancing triumphantly around the silver Baptismal font afterward. William Henry, after baptism, was put into a lovely white suit and we all went to dinner at an Ethiopian restaurant in Baltimore City. I don't think that's necessarily part of the ancient tradition, but the restaurant was nearby and we like to eat with our fingers every now and then ;-)

Other news: High yield in the garden!

This was a hard picture to take, because Edgar Allen Poe Cat decided that the green fringe around the sunflower was meant to be eaten. I had to take the sunflower head away from him three times. He's a funny kitty, he will eat any plant (except African Violets, phew). If I put lavender in a vase, he pulls it out and eats it. I sprout grass for him all the time ... he likes his weed, he really does.

Happy spinning/knitting/gardening!