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2026-01-23 21:41![[syndicated profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/feed.png)
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yarn_harlot_feedThe kettle has just boiled and I’ve made myself a cup of tea. It is frigid outside. Absolutely bonkers cold and it’s only going to get colder and more snow is coming. (There is already rather a lot.) Each morning as I leave to “walk to work” I’ve been grabbing my skates from their hook by the front door and they hang over my shoulder cheerfully swaying as I walk a few minutes to an outdoor rink in a local park and have a few turns on the ice before heading back home. If this sounds ridiculously romantic, well it is – especially if you can ignore that I am an absolute crap skater, though practice can only help.
(Last week Elliot and I went for a skate and he’s just learning so spends as much time falling down as he does gliding around. After a little while he said “Wow Grammy you are such a good skater!” and then promptly fell down again. I can honestly say that nobody has ever, ever said that about my skating before and I highly recommend taking a young learner with you if you struggle with your self-esteem. I do not recommend taking them more than a few times though because by next week he’s going to be better than me for sure.)
Today was cold enough that I didn’t take my skates, I couldn’t imagine the minutes without mittens putting on and tying them up and I just went for my walk. I always listen to audiobooks as I walk (or clean, it’s the only way I can bribe myself into doing it) but today I didn’t because I wanted to think without interruption. I walked along, bundled in knits top to bottom (and saw several people wearing leg warmers and thought about knitting some but I think I will wait and see if that urge is still there when it’s not -25 since I have never wanted them before) and thought long and hard about what I wanted to write today.
Today is my Twenty-second Blogiversary and that means that 22 years ago I sat down and wrote and posted my very first blog entry and the minute I did that I stepped through the door it cracked open and nothing has been the same since. I tell you some version of that every year on this day and I always look for a different way to say it, and that’s what I was thinking about as I walked. It was still what I was thinking about when I came home and knitted a little bit, and made some soup for lunch.
(These are my Self-Imposed Sock Club socks for January- I tried to take them outside so the light would really show off the colours but there was nowhere that wasn’t too %^&^%ing snowy so I put them on the spare bed. Enjoy. Yarn is Indigodragonfly in Spoken Four, last years Bike Rally fundraising yarn, and the pattern is Defying Gravity and it is very fun.)
In the end I decided to tell you about something that happened not too long ago. I was at an event with lots of other knitters and we were knitting and chatting the way we do, and the way only knitters can. (Everyone else takes it so personally when you’re reading a chart, I’m listening to you for crying out loud.) The topic of The Blog came up and someone said they really love The Blog and someone else said “Well, sure but the blog is dead.” Now – before you get your back up on my behalf (I love that about you) there is no need. A big part of me can agree with them. For sure this space isn’t what it was. Like all things there is change and I get it. Gone are the days that I posted five times a week. I hear them, I respect that and I didn’t say anything or feel hurt. I did start thinking though, because while that little piece of me could see their point, a larger part of me wanted to push back hard because in my heart, that feels like a ridiculous statement.
It stayed with me, and I’ve reflected on it often. (Don’t worry it wasn’t that long ago, I’m not consumed.) I can’t tell you how desperately I feel like The Blog is not dead – is it just wishful thinking – something I’m holding onto because I’m not great at letting things go? This is one of my best and worst traits, so I always consider it. I’m GREAT at holding on by my very fingernails and this has both caused me loss and saved things that were important. Was this just my point of view? It wasn’t until I started to write about this that I realized the answer.
As I wrote that this person had said the blog was dead, I noticed a detail. Do you? When I wrote it as I heard them, I typed “the blog”. When I wrote about my feelings that it was still here, I hit that shift key. The Blog. I have written before about what the family and I call you – you are The Blog. We’ll ask ourselves what The Blog would think, or wonder if The Blog would like something. Around these parts The Blog isn’t software, memory, words and pictures. The Blog is me writing to you. Your comments coming back to me – connections made here and in real life. It’s me working on something you made me interested in, it’s you trying a technique I wrote about in 2017. It’s me having a snapshot of you in my mind because I’ve built it out of a collage made of your hundreds of comments over the years. It’s you knowing that Amanda can play the violin – or how this family fared during the pandemic. It’s me understanding what you love because I love it too – it’s you knowing Charlotte’s name. It is you introducing yourself to me in another town and me not really knowing who you are until you tell me your email address or username – and then in that moment having you bloom into the person I know from this town, that you’re a neighbour in The Blog. I’ve seen your socks.
I guess I think too that The Blog isn’t dead because at least once a week I get an email from someone who is reading the whole thing- from beginning to end and they want me to know that they really had their scene scrambled when their mum died too – or that it was helpful to read things I wrote about being a young mother – and that the things I wrote about the value of parenting made them feel better about how absolutely trashed the house their happy kids are playing in. Or they write and tell me something they thought about when they were reading about one of my multitude of insecurities because they thought I might feel less insecure when I read it. (They are usually right.)
A little while ago someone who reads this blog and leaves comments sent me an email and thanked me for a recipe I put here years ago. It was great that she wrote because it just so happened that I was finishing a book she had recommended in a comment.
Another yarn break – I’m knitting Craghill. I think it’s pretty gorgeous.
Essentially – I have never thought of The Blog as something that just I do. We are woven together in this place, knit into one fabric, use whatever textile metaphor you’d like to this is twenty-two years of books and recipes and patterns and bad socks and good sweaters and baby blankets and together we are The Blog, and you just don’t feel dead to me at all. As a matter of fact, I think we’ll be just fine.
Much love, and thank you for everything. Meet you here soon.
Stephanie
PS: This year I’ll ride my 15th Bike Rally. To be honest it was a harder decision this year but in the end the world could use all the good acts it can get. It has become tradition to kick off my fundraising on my blogiversary, so here we are. It’s also become tradition for your donations to be the number of years we’re celebrating here, or some multiple – 22, 44, 66… that way the fundraising staff processing them is super bewildered, especially when the explaination is simply “That’s the knitters.” The link to my page is here if you’re so inclined, and it’s also a great day to recognize Ken, the patron saint of The Blog, since he’s the one who gave it to me in the first place. His Bike Rally link is here.
2026-01-23 00:00dinosaur_comics_feed
dinosaur_comics_feed| archive - contact - sexy exciting merchandise - search - about |
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January 23rd, 2026: Me and JASON LOO (!) are putting on a SPECIAL EVENT with the Hamilton Public Library where we'll be discussing COMICS and WRITING and will sign all your books too! It's on January 29th, 7pm, at the Westdale Branch - hope to see you there! – Ryan | ||
2026-01-21 00:00dinosaur_comics_feed
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| ← previous | January 21st, 2026 | next |
January 21st, 2026: Me and JASON LOO (!) are putting on a SPECIAL EVENT with the Hamilton Public Library where we'll be discussing COMICS and WRITING and will sign all your books too! It's on January 29th, 7pm, at the Westdale Branch - hope to see you there! – Ryan | ||
2026-01-19 00:00dinosaur_comics_feed
dinosaur_comics_feed| archive - contact - sexy exciting merchandise - search - about |
| ← previous | January 19th, 2026 | next |
January 19th, 2026: Me and JASON LOO (!) are putting on a SPECIAL EVENT with the Hamilton Public Library where we'll be discussing COMICS and WRITING and will sign all your books too! It's on January 29th, 7pm, at the Westdale Branch - hope to see you there! – Ryan | ||
2026-01-18 22:03questionable_content_feed
questionable_content_feed
is that an org chart in your pants or are you just happy to see me
2026-01-15 21:49questionable_content_feed
questionable_content_feed
I think Hannelore is about 28 in comic time now but I also reserve the right to change this if/when it becomes necessary or I feel like it
2026-01-15 21:52yarn_harlot_feed
yarn_harlot_feedI think by now we’ve all seen a version of that meme, the one where a person says “oh, wow- what a long week it’s been” and someone else says “Sharon, it’s Monday.” That right there, that exact thing is how I feel about the winter right now. Winter has never been my favourite, which is a terribly sad thing for a Canadian but I’ve worked really hard over the years on coming up with some ways to feel better, to like it better – I don’t think I’m ever going to be the sort of person who looks out a window as the first autumn leaves flutter from the trees and joyfully exclaims OH WOW it’s almost winter, but I did think I was getting a grip. I have Winter Systems
, I’ve found a winter sport I like – I have become an okayish skiier to be sure and that does make it feel like there’s a reason for winter. I’ve learned that I need to get outside in the winter, to let whatever meagre light there is shine on me, a few years ago I started walking to and from work in the winter, even though I work at home. I get up, have my coffee and then dress and go around the block back to the house and start work. I go the other way when I’m done at my desk and at least that gives me a sense of rhythm and a little bit of outside time. I lean into candles and twinkle lights and try to embrace the idea of a season of rest and renewal, preparing for the hustle of summer. I walk in the snow. I go to the gym and run on treadmills and ride inside bikes and I lift heavy things. I knit heaps. I read a lot, and up until the last few years I write a lot too.
Enter this winter which is slowly kicking my systems into a frozen demoralized heap. Hold on, I’m snow washing some woollies and it’s time to bring it in before it’s dark. (See? It’s not like I don’t try to make the most of it.) Do you know about snow washing? Essentially you just put your woollies in the snow and you can put snow on them or, if you time it right you can just let nature do that part. Leave it there for a little bit, then go back out, rub a little snow around on them, give them a proper shake and bring them inside. They’ll be fresh, clean(er), smell good and you’ll have given at least one day of the (*&^%^Ying winter a reason for existing.
it hasn’t helped that this winter is particularly dark (both metaphorically and meteorologically) So few sunny days, some weird rainy days that are worse than snow, the news is terrible every time I look at it, that miserable rain was mixed in with frigid days that are too cold to do anything really, or days like today that are snowy and paralyzing. It seems to me that this winter I get up and it’s dark, the hours pass gloomily while I turn on lights and make tea and then before you know it the night is coming and though it’s only 4:30 or so it feels like the day is shot. Hibernating has never made more sense but it’s not doing much for my mood.
A few days ago I woke up and it was too dark to do anything (again, here I write both meteorologically and metaphorically) and I finally decided to do something about it. I immediately went for a walk (two, I walked to and from “work”) and have everyday since. I grabbed some delicious knitting I’ve been meaning to get to and keep putting off – The Craghill Shawl, using some (sadly discontinued) Weld from Hudson and West. It is squishy and gorgeous and giving me a lot of happiness right now, the yarn equivalent of eating a bowl of oatmeal and that gold colour is like a ray of sunshine.
We made a ski date (sort of) and though we don’t have a ton of cash, I have not ruled out taking all my aeroplan points and getting the *&^% out of here. (Realistically there’s too much going on here to do that but it is a really great fantasy that is working for me.) I doubled down on planning meals we like, I went for a walk again. I texted a friend. I made my favourite tea – the one I’ve been hoarding for … when? Can’t imagine what I was saving it for if it’s not now. I tuned my wheels on St. Distaff’s day (the 7th January) and got something yummy on that too.
I cleaned a drawer. I trashed the book I was reading that I didn’t like. I made sure my daily vitamin has enough D in it. I decided to order some yarn and I ate an orange.
I wrote to you.
In short- I decided that I’m not going to wait for this winter to get brighter, I’m turning the lights on myself. Did I miss anything that might help?
2026-01-14 00:00dinosaur_comics_feed
dinosaur_comics_feed| archive - contact - sexy exciting merchandise - search - about |
| ← previous | January 14th, 2026 | next |
January 14th, 2026: Me and JASON LOO (!) are putting on a SPECIAL EVENT with the Hamilton Public Library where we'll be discussing COMICS and WRITING and will sign all your books too! It's on January 29th, 7pm, at the Westdale Branch - hope to see you there! – Ryan | ||
