Step Into My Thimble

As of 3:57 p.m. Chicago time, the last Secret Pal match was sent out.

Due to various things like server delays and whatnot, give yourselves a few hours to get them if you haven’t already. Check those filters. Check all your email accounts in case you forgot which one you signed up with. Then give us both two days off to enjoy our weekends, then write to me about it on Monday! OK, thanks.

My sister and her husband will be here so I doubt I’ll be doing much computering anyway. Lots to see in the Big City.

P.S. Who searched my site over 10 times for ‘narrative “the spider and the fly by simon schuster’ ?? Kiddo, I know you’re an AOL user by your IP address. Want to talk about effective keyword searching strategies sometime?

Today is the day I make the Secret Pal matches!

I’m getting to KIP early to start sorting it all out. Then comes the fun of writing an email to each one of you individually. I’ll do my best to have all that finished by the end of the day Friday.

Some other good news…I know who’s going to organize Secret Pal 3. It’s just a matter of time before I can share!

I’m also very close to getting the front of Agatha done. Then I can sew the pieces together and start on the crochet. I hope there will be time for this at KIP tonight!

P.S. Who searched my site for “wiccan dress pattern”?

Happy Monday to you.

I made the Watergate Cake with Cover-Up Frosting this weekend. With all that cool whip/pudding frosting, it was a bit gloppy, and we didn’t think about actually sampling it until it was about 10:30 last night. Too late to eat before bed, so we haven’t tried it yet!

It’s filed in the recipe category of “Terrifyingly Artificial Foods Which Are Secretly Craved Due to a 1970s Church Potluck Upbringing.” I’ll let you know how it tastes later, with pictures and all.

Secret Pal 2 News

Everyone, you are all so nice! Thanks for your patience as we make this gigantic thing work.

Signups are officially closed. I have a final total of 158 wonderful, friendly participants. We have started getting people into the web ring, a batch at a time. The ring is just for people who have already signed up, so if you didn’t sign up by email by the deadline of last Friday (7/23), please don’t join the ring.

If you did join the ring, but you haven’t seen your site show up on the list yet, it’s because you have a code problem. There are 14 of you in the queue at present. Most likely you forgot to change both instances of ***SITEID*** to the actual site number assigned to you in Ringsurf. Please fix these for me, okay? Thanks.

Regarding Secret Pal 3 I am not planning to organize another one of these. It’s no comment on the current one in any way; it’s just a lot of work. I’ve already received emails from people asking to be put in a queue for the third one. But I can’t collect another list, or I’ll never even do any of my own knitting, never mind organizing this SP! If you are interested in managing Secret Pal 3, please let me know soon so I can channel the requests to you. I’ll share all my notes and whatnot on how to organize it too.

Also, somewhere out there is one very kind person who has offered to be *my* secret pal this time, asking for nothing in exchange. Another blogger has informed me of your existence. Whoever you are, thanks in advance!

Since we love Greek food, and Penzeys Spices has a new Greek seasoning blend, we decided to grill some chicken tonight. So tasty…lemony and oregano-y.

A little peek:

Click for big.

Yummy summer food, despite the weird coldness of Chicago today!

Hey look!

If it has a finished neckline, it must be off the needles. It is!

But it still needs one armpit Kitchenered and a bunch of ends sewn in. I can probably wear it Saturday night! Yahoo!!

Oh, you want to see the whole thing?