Say it loud! Say it proud!

The Yarn Harlot declared that April 1st should be the day that knitters behave... well... inexplicable. And by that, she meant for knitters to partake in a photo scavenger hunt to commemorate the launch of her new book. And let me tell you, it was good.

Miss Hell and I (along with Joyce and Zoe) tramped through the cold, windy (with sometimes sunny) streets of Hogtown and had a blast doing it. Here is a sampling of the photos I took. These are my favourite. I won't submit you to all my photos. Unless you ask, of course. (You want to see them? I'm flattered! Please click here. I'll be honest. It's not ALL of them. Some weren't really worth uploading. Although it's questionable as to whether some that I did upload are.)

A neighborhood sign... mixed in with a little ass-kissing! Not really but we thought it was a perfect find.

We were a ballsy group, let me tell you. When we couldn't find a cop on the street so we walked into the 52nd Division police station and asked if one of the officers would like to help us with a photo scavenger hunt. The three that were there kind of blinked back at us but this guy volunteered and was such a sweetie. Big thanks to the 52nd Division!

We decided to go into City Hall to find an employee to photograph. When the woman at the info desk declined, Michelle asked if (Mayor) David Miller was in because "he's worth big points." She pointed us to the stairs and said that he was located on the 2nd floor.

Up the stairs we went. I did say we were ballsy, right?

There was a group of journalists outside his office. Since we weren't sure what the deal was Michelle decided to go into the reception area and ask to see if he was available. Not surprisingly, he wasn't. But his Secretary/Admin/Reception person made it sound like he would have done it if he "wasn't jammed with meetings." Being a good sport, he posed with our socks. He was truly the nicest person, gushing about each sock and telling us a story about a pair of socks someone he knew received from Germany.

At the ROM's Crystal... the T-Rex is through the window but you can't see it in my picture (but you could in real life). I didn't give myself the 3 points since it couldn't be seen but I love this photos because you can see Michelle and I.

Here's more of my favorites:

1. with street meat, 2. with the nicest TTC driver, 3. at Canadian Tire, 4. at Honest Ed's

Created with fd's Flickr Toys.

After our feet couldn't handle the strain of walking we hobbled over to the Isabel Bader Theatre for the main event. The evening started with a small set from Skydiggers and then ended with Stephanie doing what she does best - bringing knitters together and making them laugh!

As an extra bonus, there were prizes for the scavenger hunt! Michelle and I were sure that there was going to be some rabid Harlot fan who took the whole entire day to go to every location. What surprised us was that we were the rabid ones. Not only are we ballsy but we're clearly competitive too. Michelle and I were tied for points out of all the knitters with 70+. I only came in second because my sock was shorter than Michelle's (really). For my efforts I got a beautiful book called "Kristin Knits" by Kristin Nicholas. I can't stop thinking about the Navajo inspired afghan! First prize was a $100 gift certificate to Lettuce Knit. Go, Michelle! First prize couldn't have gone to a nicer person. No, seriously. I mean that.

I mean, watch yer back, Miss Hell. Bwahahahahahaha!

Just kidding! She created the most awesome map that I think was the key to our success. She and I are heading over to LK this afternoon to do a little retail therapy. Let's hope there is some STR left!

If you are totally blown away by the photo sampling above you can check out the whole set here. While you're at it you should check out Michelle's set and her blog post. And if you're really crazy than you can check out the flickr pool that Rachel H set up to house ALL the sock photos taken by hundreds of knitters.

Many thanks to Stephanie, Rachel H, Jayme (the Wonder Publicist), Skydiggers and the staff at the Isable Bader Theatre. It was a great book launch!!

One Crazy Monkey down!

Remember photo P1060022.JPG that I posted about on the 28th?

Well, the ankle was seriously too tight. I took the advice of those who gave it and decided that I was fooling myself into thinking that it was only a wee bit tight. Because "wee" doesn't even come close to how tight it was. It was "hella" tight. Like "vein poppin' on my forehead" tight. Like "need to work on my upper arm strength" tight.

So I ripped. All the way past the heel flap. It was sad, as I was pretty much at the ribbing for the cuff. That's okay because I would have either ripped the socks after the third or fourth wearing or I would have just kept them in a drawer due to the fear level of ripping them if I wore them.

Thankfully ripping also gave me the chance to fix the aesthetic issues I had with my lack of eye of partridge in places and now my heel looks loverly. In the end, I added an extra 4 rounds to the heel gusset (total of 64 stitches instead of 60) to give me a much better fit without overly altering the pattern. Yea!

I'm back!

Did you miss me? Or are you wondering who this person is who barely posts? Are you even reading this anymore? (Bueller? Bueller?)

Anyhoo, I have to say that the trip was awesome. I spend quality time with a friend in need, ate amazing food (natch!) and soaked up the sun when I could. I even came back with the slightest of tans. (Go me!)

Yes, that is a fried chicken sandwich. I'm drooling just thinking about it. Of course, I didn't take a picture of my favorite SF food, the burrito. But trust me when I say I enjoyed a few. If I'm stumped as why my pants no longer fit maybe you can remind me of that fact.

Unfortunately I had very little time for knitting, but I'm not asking for a pity party. I did have something like 10+ hours waiting in airports/airplanes, so I did get a little time for my favorite craft.

Behold, it looks like a sock!

Although don't look too closely at my heel. I was trying to multi task and my eye of partridge looks like normal knitting in a spot or two. Also the heel is really tight. I can get it on my foot but not without a little bit of a struggle. I'm trying to decide if I should rip it out or not.

Any thoughts?