Up until recently, I was a fairly self-centered blogger. I started my LiveJournal in the middle of 2002, and since then I’ve gathered a collection of various users (real life friends and family as well as online aquaintances) and communities on my “friends list” (for those of you unfamiliar with Livejournal, that’s the list of journals on LJ that I read). And for many years I was content to limit myself to the LiveJournal realm. I rarely ventured out into the “real” blogosphere. But then late last year, mom started emailing me links to various knitting blogs. “Check this out,” she’d say. And I’d read the post she linked me to. Then I’d end up browsing through more of the blog, clicking links on their blogroll, browsing through new blogs. I found myself bookmarking feeds left and right, checking them each night immediately after I was done with my email. It became an obsession. Who’s working on a new project? How’s that sweater that so-and-so was working on for her husband coming along? What new sock yarn has so-and-so dyed up this week? I got hooked.

And the new addiction to reading knitting blogs fostered a whole new focus on knitting in my own life. Reading about the Yarn Harlot’s Madrona trip made me want to go to a fiber arts festival. After reading that, I started googling for festivals in the southeast that mom and I could go to together. Browsing through Hello Yarn had me drooling over all the hand-dyed yarn and made me start thinking about all the yarn I wanted to dye up next. Reading Kay’s newest post over at Mason-Dixon Knitting made me want to knit up scarves for Red Scarf Project.

Every time I read a new entry or stumble on a new blog, I get all these great new inspirations and ideas. It’s gotten to the point where all I think about these days is knitting. Knitting, dyeing, designing. I’ve got so many ideas floating around in the back of my head, there’d never be time to implement even half of them in the course of a year. Unless I’m seriously focused on something like work, every waking minute is spent thinking about this or that project – while I’m watching TV, socializing with friends, trying to fall asleep, and so on and so forth. Knitting is literally taking over my life.

And I’ve been a totally OCD-esque knitter lately, too. I try to be good and be one of those knitters who only has one or, at most, two projects on the needles at any given point. So far I’m failing. As of right now, these are the projects I’ve got going:

• Feather and Fan Scarf — a simple scarf done in feather and fan alternating between Colinette’s Cadenza in colorway Mist and Cashsoft DK in colorwayThunder. — 60% done

  

• Autumn Fingerless Gloves — fingerless gloves made from yarn I dyed myself. I got about 90% done with the second one before I got bored and set it aside to work on something else for a while. That was at Christmas. Have I touched it since? No. And I’ve got two fingers left to do. And they’re only partial fingers. This is just sad.

  

• Eva’s Purple-Finger Gloves — gloves for my friend Eva, who really liked my fingerless gloves. I finished one glove before I had to find something else to do for a bit. It’s still unfinished. I’m such a bad gift-knitter.

  

• Hand-Dyed Socks — A while back I dyed a whole bunch of sock yarn. Little 1-oz hanks in a whole bunch of colorways. And I started making sample socks to see how the new colorways would knit up. It’s addicting, and even a bit freeing, to knit these suckers up, knowing that I only have enough for one sock – no pressure to make its twin! This is what I’ve got so far:

  

  

  And this is what I’ve still got left to knit up from the last batch:

  

There are also numerous design projects I’ve got floating around in my mind – socks, sweaters … And even more patterns picked out for my large stash of yarn… But perhaps that should wait for a later post. The kind people at the coffee shop where I’m sitting are indicating that it’s rather late…