Small furry knitting monster problems

#1

When I’m knitting I get a couple of problems and I’m wondering if other people have the same issues and how they deal with them.

The problem surrounds knitting monsters - you know, small, furry, big ears, long tails, always know more than they let on…

When I’m happily knitting away, a knitting monster will stick its claws under my kneecaps and pulls hard trying to eat the yarn.

When that one is dealt with, I’ll be there again knitting quietly, when another knitting monster will be trying (and succeeding) to get its foot long teeth around the end of the needles.

Occasionally, I’ll be knitting in one colour yarn, and when I look down, there’ll be black or tabby coloured yard poking through, lift up the work and what do I find? Yet another knitting monster.

Then theres the times when the knitting monsters tails take on a life of their own and swat about at my needles and face.

One serious problem with the knitting monsters, was when I wasn’t concentrating properly and a small ginger and white one hijacked my needle and ran into the next room trailing yarn everywhere.

Has anyone else got issues with these monsters?
How do you deal with the furry little critters?

HELP!!!

#2

I have one little black and white knitting monster. She is adorable and unfortunately all I can do is laugh when she plays tricks like that!

#3

I have four:

One likes to lay behind me on the couch when I knit, but doesn’t mess with what I’m doing as long as I’m using regular yarn; when I crack out the crochet thread, then she thinks its fun.

My tortie beast is pretty well behaved, and she likes to lay on my lap – actually, I think she likes to lay on whatever I’m making more than my lap.
She’s right there trying to lay on it if I’m working on something on the big side like sweaters or afghans; something long like a scarf will do, too.

My third was never really interested in my knitting until this weekend. I’m working on a ribbon top, and somehow (hm, I wonder how) it slipped off the needles. She unravelled part of it (thought the ribbon was fun to play with) and then proceeded to chew said ribbon to bits. I had to redo about 1/3 of the back. Not happy.

My fourth cat is a yarn snob; if it’s wool, angora, silk or another animal-ish origin it belongs to her. She’ll try to steal the ball right out of my hands, and won’t even attempt to be sneaky about it. She couldn’t care less about acrylics, cottons, bamboo, etc. It’s kind of handy because if I lose a ball band, she can usually give me some hint to the fiber content. :stuck_out_tongue:

I don’t really do anything to handle them. With the exception of the ribbon yarn incident, it’s usually funny.

#4

My monster has been trained-- thank goodness. If you look at my avatar- he’s an orange tiger beastie. He just loves to sit and watch- unless I’m winding yarn, then he paws at it, no worse. I just get a cold nose in the elbow once in a while, which is annoying, but survivable :slight_smile:

#5

Two words: water bottle

#6

Shouldn’t that be water pistol? :stuck_out_tongue:

#7

Bottle might be better - one of mine (a stray who now lives mostly on my foot) is terrified of drinks bottles - all I need to do is pick one up a cm of the table and he’s off - leaving claws behind somewhere in my leg!

#8

:teehee: My two monsters aren’t too bad. The youngest does attempt to bother occasionally, but for the most part just distracting her works pretty well. I don’t do waterbottles/waterguns in my house because of the hard floors. It makes them slippery if you forget to clean up or miss a spot. Besides I dont’ want to get up from what I’m doing when I’d have to repeatedly clean up after squirting. And also… monster baby likes water. :doh:

You may have to close the closet doors to keep monsters out…or in as the case may be. :teehee:

#9

:roflhard: I couldn’t really use water - they’d cry at me.

today I’ve resorted to babying Oscar to sleep on my lap and trying to knit silently so not to wake him!

Maybe thats the way - Knitting needle silencers!

:roflhard:

#10

I’ve got a dog…she doesn’t appear to be interested in my yarn. :teehee:

#11

lol, My furry monster has opened the drawers I’ve kept the yarn in… Needless to say, I now have to have plastic tubs that seal to keep her out. She loves yarn… any yarn… and will swipe it and run with it at a moments notice. She enjoys chewing on the end of what ever needle I’m using. When I’m using circ’s she goes nuts, lol She just can’t find the end and will invade my lap and project trying to find the end, lol.

After 2 years of NO!, etc, she is better. I did wrap her a small ball of yarn around a ping pong ball. Glueing the ends so she couldn’t unwrap it.

I have 2 or 3 of these, (depending on how good she hides them) and when she really drives me nuts I’ll show her one and let her try to play with it then throw it.

All I can suggest is love, a little firm talk and to accept that cat hair adds a new dimension to any project, lol

:teehee:

#12

My little monster ran away… :verysad:

#13

Mine dosn’t really care much about yarn (actually the dog is a far worse culprit there), but she will bully her way through whatever I am doing to get close to me. When i sit down to knit, within a couple minutes she will be on my lap, and then pawing my hand, and then doing that thing where they run the edge of their gums along your hand to try to get your attention, and then finally she’ll just burrow under whatever I am working on and stretch out. She does usually like to use the yarn ball as a pillow though, lol.

#14

Mine either. Then she discovered that my dpns taste much better than those mangy sticks outside. Now I catch her on the coffee table trying to drag them away!!!

#15

I have three furry monsters and 1 puppy monster. Out of the three only one likes to play with the yarn. She is my oldest. She likes to “floss” her teeth occassionally. If I poke her too many times (just to bug her), she will try and chew on my needle ends.

I have yet to try and knit with my puppy. She is a terrier… need I say more. :teehee:

#16

When I’m in my chair, I invariably have to spend 5-10 minutes with “territory” play. No, not my shoulder, no, not my project…relax in my lap and then the yarn has to go over her back or she bats it until it is there…I guess if the yarn is moving she knows I’m alive!!! Between my Masey and my down blanket I could sit there forever!!!

#17

Gideon used to be really bad… now he just kinda curls up on my lap or right beside me… he used to chew my yarn in half… I’d be knitting away and then come to a wet soggy end… with him sitting there still chewing on the other half :ick: and he would chew on my bamboo dpns if I left them out… or chase my ball across the room and under this and that so it was like a maze to find the ball… or if I forgot and left something down for a minute I’d come back to just a frogged tangled mess… :rofl: I use a spray bottle to keep him from running outside so I started to use that… now if he is feeling his cheerio’s he might try something but he pretty much leaves it alone now… :teehee: