This has been the norm for my bedroom for the last several days:

I’m washing and reblocking all of the handknits I wore this winter. Then I will carefully wrap each one in tissue paper and store them in a bin until next fall.

Wow, right? I’m so responsible and I take such good care of my things! Responsible Adult Award goes to Staci!

Not really. I have to learn most of my lessons the hard way, and this was no exception. I learned this latest lesson from…

MOTHRA.

I left my handknits folded in my closet last summer, and when I pulled them out in the fall, I saw that MOTHRA had made a snack of one of my socks.

Never again! I’m storing everything in bins this year. Mothra can go back to Godzilla and leave my wool alone.

This project has started me on another project. As I’m choosing the handknits to wash, I’m also creating a pile of stuff I didn’t wear this winter. I plan to unravel and reknit each one into something else. I’ve already started this project, in fact.

This is my 28thirty, a totally cute sweater that I never wore. The proportions ended up being wrong on me, I guess.

Rrrrrip! That sweater is gone. Now I have a new sweater I will actually wear.

Do I look unsure of myself here? Maybe it’s because I’ve abandoned my photo project and I hadn’t taken a self-portrait in over three months.

Next up for unraveling: Ivy. Again, a totally cute sweater that I will never wear. This yarn is too nice to go to waste.

Just popping in to show you how messy my house is…

Messiness of my house aside, I’m excited to announce that we’re shooting more knitting videos. Lots more short technique videos, and at least three more full lesson series – including toe-up socks and magic loop socks. Now that we’ve worked out the kinks and we’re old hats at this, everything is going so smoothly and quickly. (Except when production was halted for two days while I was sick.)

Parker is working like a madman to edit the videos soon after they’re shot, so I should be able to start posting them soon.

A big POO ON YOU to the United States Postal Service…

I knit this dog sweater to custom fit a handsome Basenji in Houston named Strider. His human, Lorelei, commissioned it back when the temperatures were below freezing. I knit it up and sent it off in a Priority Mail box on February 9. Here we are, March 5, and Lorelei has not received the sweater.

I’ve been around and around with the Post Office on this for the last three weeks. They finally told me this week that they can do NOTHING. Poof. It’s gone. I am now knitting a second sweater for Strider, and you can bet that I will pay the extra few bucks for delivery confirmation.

I don’t want to end on a negative vibe, so here’s a sneak peek at a new sweater design I edited/knit for my friend Snowden –

Snowden is working through sweater math for all of the sizes, and should be ready to release the pattern soon. I’ll keep you posted.

The last several pairs of socks I’ve made have involved row counters, charts, notes, cable needles, and Advil. I took a giant step back from all of that and made some socks that didn’t require thinking or anti-inflammatories.

Before I show you, let’s get Tippy out of the way. Tippy MOVE IT.

Here we go. These socks were knit with Aslan Trends Santa Fe sock yarn in Alaska Blue. The plies of this yarn are really tightly twisted, which gives clear definition to each stitch. And I love the colorway, which made it a pleasure to work with.

I used a standard, simple toe-up sock pattern, which means that I used every last inch of yarn with no leftovers. I knit them in a 2×2 rib for a super-stretchy, snug fit. The 2×2 rib is so mindless that these socks made awesome Netflix Knitting. And, I went up a needle size from what I normally use, so they knit up in no time.

Tippy, please.

As you can imagine, I cast-on to make an identical pair within minutes of finishing the second sock. I’m using Three Irish Girls sock yarn for these…some yarn that I used to start a pair of socks almost two years ago, but decided to rip out because they were too tight.

To end this post, I’ll show you where Tippy is right this moment. He’s in my mini photo studio, which I used as a makeshift softbox to light up these photos on this gray, rainy day. I think it’s probably still warm in there from the lights, but he’s a weirdo, anyway. Cute, but weird.

For more of Tippy’s weird cuteness, jump over to the Basenji Rescue blog where today I introduced the world to the Senji-Clean™ Advanced Dishwashing System.