Ad Riven. I read all the novels, too!

The Count of Monte Cristo is what immediately came to my mind also. He is absolutely thorough in his revenge.

Priorities!

Very excited to have the compact comments and swipe down on the image previews!

Hyperion is my favorite of the two, but I don’t think you could go wrong with either. If you are interested in audiobooks there is one for Dune that is very good.

That is some really beautiful yarn. I love that untangling reduces your stress levels. I can’t look at this picture too long or I might have to lie down, lol.

As someone who once put some tortillas on the griddle, turned to the fridge to get cheese, and…walked right out of the room and back to my desk, I 100% agree. I sometimes feel dumb that I am literally setting 1 or 2 minute timers, but it’s better than burning stuff. I don’t always need them, but they are really helpful during times of stress when I’m especially preoccupied with other things.

I hoped someone would do something like this with the lemmy lemming!

Felting hides a multitude of sins - I think it’s a great project for anybody that wants to try it out. The uppers are shaped with short rows and I’ve certainly had to start over after I zone out and lose my place, but even then I can finish the knitting over a couple of evenings in front of the tv.

Another good pattern for a first felting project is Fuzzy Feet. Those would also be a really great way for someone to learn the basics of sock knitting since the stitches are massive.

With both of those projects you have something useful in the end, and it seems to me that objects with some structure to them felt more successfully as well. I swear I saw like 9 million failed Booga Bags back around 2008 when everyone was going wild for felting. It’s a pretty simple pattern, but once felted, a lot ended up comically wide and shallow (probably some user error involved). Or they looked great initially, but after being carried around for a few days they stretched…and stretched…and stretched. I’d love to know how many of them actually got a lot of use after the photo shoot. I distinctly remember some ended up as cat beds.

And yes, my dad is definitely knitworthy. Sometimes my mom is the one to let me know he is trailing little bits of wool behind him everywhere he goes because he doesn’t want me to bother me for new slippers, but it is never a burden.

That’s beautiful!

My most-worn knitting project is Fiber Trends Felted Clogs and no other project is even a close second. The first pair I knit was for my dad for Christmas 2008. Since then I have replaced that pair of slippers maybe 5 or 6 times, after they are too far gone to resole or repair. He works from home and literally wears them all day, every day, although he has stopped wearing them to the mailbox to make them last a little longer.

I’ve also made adjustments over the iterations to see if I can make them more durable:

• Double-soles (so each sole is actually 4 layers instead of two).
• In addition to wet-felting I also needle felted the soles of the most recent pair to make them extra-dense. My dad also has a little needle felting kit of his own so he can keep tiny holes from growing larger. So far it seems to be working, but this reminds me that I should probably check in and see how they are doing.
• Different yarn combinations - I have tried denser yarns to see if they result in something longer-lasting, but keep going back to the Lamb’s Pride because it felts so thoroughly. I have found that if you can still see traces of stitches in the soles, you are likely to get rubbing between the layers and develop holes more quickly.

We have also considered adding a suede sole, but the pre-made don’t really come in the right size and he really likes how they feel as-is. Plus I am always genuinely delighted to knit another pair, knowing that they are appreciated. They knit up quite fast, although the assembly is kind of tedious.

If anyone asks tell them you didn’t say which summer, haha. Looks like that will be a really nice classic top.

My thoughts watching the video you linked: “Okay, split the plies, interesting, less bulky … knots? okay, I guess … SCISSORS??” I can see why that knot method could be more secure than weaving, since cotton doesn’t stick to itself like wool does, but woe to you if your knot comes undone!

A solid + variegated mix for linen stitch would be really lovely. I think I’ve seen this done with a solid black and a very colorful variegated yarn and it gave almost a stained glass effect.

And do what you’re comfortable with, but I’d say if you’re doing cables you’re more advanced than you think :).

I also agree with your mom. It’s really disappointing to spend a lot of time on a complex pattern and have your neat stitching drowned out by the variegation.

One pattern I do really like for variegated yarn is linen stitch. It’s only slightly more complicated than stockinette, but I find that the slipped stitches actually help to enhance the variegation instead of fighting with it. Instead of color streaks you get something closer to confetti or cookie sprinkles.

I’m glad you’ve had better luck with Katchy than I did. I bought it because of a personal recommendation, but it didn’t really work long enough for me to determine if it was better than sticky traps.

Plus I’m the weirdo with a soft spot for moths, so I just generally leave them to fight it out with the spiders :). I cannot handle the fungus gnats flying up my nose, though. It doesn’t seem to matter if there is one fungus gnat or fifty - they all think there’s a party in my nostrils.

A contest would be fun. Maybe we could do seasonal updates.

Me, too. I have always been pretty neutral about Tom Hanks, but now I am wishing he read more audiobooks.

You mentioned pest control in the soil - have you tried mosquito bits? I ended up mixing some in with the soil for a Monstera and I also put a layer over the top and it does seem to make a difference. I do have to combine it with those unsightly yellow sticky traps, though. Between plants and the inverts I keep, my house is full of containers of damp dirt.

In case anyone is thinking about getting a katchy, you can read the reviews, but I give it a thumbs-down. I used it only a few times before fall and it worked okay, but when I pulled it out again in the spring I just get orange error lights and no response when I reached out to them.

On the other hand, banning commercial posts can end up with those “covert ads” - people posting products and then acting coy when asked for the source - “can’t say here, but I’ll send you a DM”, etc.

I bought a book about overthinking this morning… (that is not a covert ad)

I’m pretty cranky about commercial posts, although I do think there’s a big difference between someone who is an active community member sharing a pattern they are selling and someone that just posts when they’ve got something to sell. The sticker post seemed to me to fall into the second camp - posted twice (different but similar usernames), posted across many different communities, etc. Honestly I don’t know how you write rules for that, though - get out the calculator and check ratio of helpful posts to commercial? Sounds like the Reddit minimum karma for posting rules that end up prompting a bunch of generic comments just so people could get their numbers up.

I left an in-person knitting group a while back after it seemed it was just becoming a captive audience for member’s MLM sales, so maybe I’m more sensitive than most. There’s always the block button, though.

Haha, at the very least you could get in some deep lunges while knitting. I should probably add a caveat that the picture applies if you’re knitting in a western style. I think there are some other styles where you sit the stitches in the opposite direction and knit through the back loop. Not to complicate things further!

Maybe it’s just easier to take all the directionals, out of it and say that if knitting the stitch causes him to cross his ankles you know you’ve twisted it :)