Ot STUPID questions about my work

Around here some of the standard stupid questions are:

Its so hot, why are you knitting that now? (because if I wait to start it when its cold out and i really want to wear it, i won't have it finished until next summer)

Its so hot, why on earth are you using wool to make that (big bulky winter) sweater? (Hm. its a winter sweater. I should make it from fine bedspread cotton, perhaps?)

Why do you make your own yarn? You can get cooler stuff at Walmart without the effort. (sure, and i can contribute to the demise of my local yarn shop in the process, not to mention buy nasty acrylic that looks exactly the same as the stuff everybody else is using. I'm not a sheep)

Did you have to kill the sheep to get its wool? (sure kid, and where do the next years' sheep come from once we've killed all of last years' sheep for their wool? logic excercise here...)

How many different colors can grow on one sheep? (dunno, i haven't really ever counted the number of hairs on a sheep but i imagine that's how many colors there could be)

Do they [the sheep] drink the dye by themselves or do you have to put a hose down their throats? (ugh)

And my all time favorite, when I'm out somewhere trying to sell my handknts: I can buy that at Walmart. (trot on over and see if you can find THIS hat in THESE colors made with yarn of THIS quality and with this workmanship. then come back and see me)

Reply to the list as I do not publish an email address to USENET. This practice has cut my spam by more than 95%. Of course, I did have to abandon a perfectly good email account...

Oh my gawd. STUPID is alot more "polite" a word than I'd use... more like assinine! With the emphasis on ass! Like Don always says, he can be a carpenter all his life, but no one will call him a craftsman, yet, if he (ahem, this is HIS wording) 'screwed' (I had to be more polite than he) a pig, he'd be a pig-screwer (again, being POLITE) the rest of his life. Now that I mucked it up with all my parenthesis, ... here:

I can be a carpenter all my life, but no one would call me a craftsman. But if I fuXXed a pig, I'd be a pig-fuXXer all my life.

Noreen

I rotfl, Wooly! Noreen

Thank you Wooly that was HILarious ,,,, can i forward it to a friend of mine ??? mirjam

Oh Crap! Some people just NEVER get it!!!!!!! And they never will!!! But Mirjam, there are so many more who appreciate your work!!!!!!!! So don't be down-hearted!!! Hugs, Maggie

I have always thought that people who make dumb or rude comments are most likely jealous. (or maybe I just like to think so) I figure that they wish they could do it, or wish they had the time to, etc. Either that or they are just plain mean. I would never think of being critical to people I don't know.

I think us crafters, no matter what type of craft, understand eachother's need to create and keep busy. Some people just don't get it and never will.

Diane

Gemini

Send it along :)

On Wed, 06 Jul 2005 04:10:04 GMT, snipped-for-privacy@actcom.co.il (Mirjam Bruck-Cohen) spewed forth :

Reply to the list as I do not publish an email address to USENET. This practice has cut my spam by more than 95%. Of course, I did have to abandon a perfectly good email account...

Bah Gem, that's one of my pat responses for the "why make your own" crowd, not the folks who use it. Learn to spin and you too can make your own marvelous wool yarns :) Matthew can make you a spindle and I'm sure we can come up with some wool...

Reply to the list as I do not publish an email address to USENET. This practice has cut my spam by more than 95%. Of course, I did have to abandon a perfectly good email account...

X-No-Archive: yes "Wooly" wrote >

Just goes to show how far removed many people are from the natural world.

I hear you and I agree. Unfortunately, too many people don't see the quality, they only see the price.

Eimear

Well in that case (that it's directed at those with the stupid comments), I don't blame you. :o)

Thank you for the suggestion and the offer, but considering that my fingers have been getting progressively stiffer while knitting and crocheting (and last night while I was winding some variegated yarn I came across into a ball... I couldn't even finish doing it last night and will attempt to finish it tonight while watching TV), I doubt that I could stand to hold the wool long enough to spin it. It was a nice thought though, and something I wouldn't have minded learning to do when I was a teen, but didn't know anyone with that knowledge then.

I still haven't taught myself to macrame' yet, even though I got a few books a couple of years back. That is next on my agenda to learn... after I manage to finish sorting through the stuff upstairs and try to set up at least one corner of it for my yarn crafts. Macrame' is something that I have long wished I had gotten my Dad to teach me years ago, but when you're a teen you don't really want to admit needing your parents to teach you things... then when I was no longer a teen, I kind of forgot about it... until it was too late and my Dad was gone. :o/ So... eventually I do want to learn (teach myself with the books, I hope) so that I can finally say that I know how to do something that I saw my dad doing.

Gem

Gem - macrame is very easy, as long as you have a few pictures showing the various knots. I taught myself years ago just from a book of designs. Haven't done it in years, but still have many of the plant hangers I made. I think I even know where my supplies and booklets are hiding (smile)

Shelagh

Encouraging words.... thank you, Shelagh! :o) Yes, the books I have also have pictures in them showing the knots too. I just never found the time to get started after gathering up the books that I've had for many years along with a few from St Vincent de Paul and a couple that a newsgroup friend sent me (she's away at the moment but if she's reading she'll know who I mean). I even came across one that is a *childs* instruction book, so I think I SHOULD be able to pick up a few early knots from that one before progressing further. LOL However, I have to FIND where I stored the books before I can even think about starting... plus, like I said, I really should try to get more stuff done in the upstairs room before taking on a new project otherwise nothing will get done. hehehe

Besides... once I have room upstairs there is a really nice large dowel across the closet door that I could likely use to start learning to macrame' on. I can just set up a chair in front of the closet door, prop one of the instruction books on a stand beside it, and away I go. Or at least that's the thought for it. ;o)

Gem

Genuine ignorance leads to that one. Sadly, so few people have ever watched any of the educational tv, let alone seen a sheep, that they don't know the difference between shearing and skinning.

I think I've seen sheep with at least three colors, maybe four, what with various shades of brown through white.

Somebody's seen pet birds that had their color changed by colored feed.

Standard answer: "No, you can't."

Though Stephanie Pearl McPhee's answer is pretty good, too: even if the yarn is the same (because she's using acrylic for a very specific person) and the pattern is identical, the fact she's making it by hand makes it a much better sweater. And certain people get Walmart junk for Christmas, if anything.

=Tamar

Someone actually asked that?!? Sheesh!

At the last Sheep & Wool Fest here in Md, my husband (who's very good at deadpan teasing) asked the elderly guy selling some...I believe it was Uruguayan yarn in gorgeous brilliant colors whether the sheep came that way, and the guy instantly said, "Sure, man, we just drop a little LSD in their feed."

LOL And his name was.... Chong (from Cheech & Chong, and That 70's Show), right? Sounds like an old hippie! ;o)

Gemini

LOL.......oh Mirjam, I can just picture this conversation..Some people see a needleand thread and immediately think you must be doing something they ''''know''''' about....well at least now they know one thing.....they don't know at all...lol

Cher x