What is PHS?
Project Hopping Syndrome!
Here's how it happens: I was making pretty good progress on my Penguin Pail for the month, and then a picture shows up in my news feed. "Saw this and thought of you" or "If you made this, I would buy it." Then somebody else shares the same picture and tags me. Sometimes the same project will show up three times in a week... then I feel like dropping everything to start that!
So, this week, I've been plugging away at finishing up the Monster Pants I started last week. I'm getting there. Maybe 6 more inches of blue, then the bottom ribbing. I polish off an inch in about 15 minutes, so these could be done in a couple of hours...
But then I'm checking Facebook and I see that somebody tagged me in a comment that says "Elaine could do that." I click through to see.
Oh, Mermaid Tail Lapghan. I've seen something like that, but it was a rather expensive paid pattern with some bad reviews. I clicked through the link... free pattern. Oh, I like. Now I want to drop everything, run to the yarn store and get just the right colors to get started on one!
Then I see that somebody has posted to my page... "You could make this, couldn't you? It's so cute. I think it would be a best-seller!" Oh, yeah, that's cute. Yes, I could make it by just looking at the picture. Yes, I have yarn pulled out and put together in a project bag to get started on one. I figure I can get a leg or two done during time-outs and half-time at today's basketball game.
And then there's my Ravelry queue... when I'm browsing through the wonderful world of free patterns on Ravelry, I'll find something and put it in my queue so I can find it later... I'm up to 38 items in my queue now...
And then I get a Facebook message asking if I could make a Thomas the Tank Engine toy by Easter. Check - free pattern on Ravelry... Okay, add that to the list! And what do you have in terms of gray elephants? Another Ravelry check... oh, dear, so much cuteness!
Another trigger for PHS is going through my yarn stash. I'll probably need to do a little more searching for nice bright colors to finish up the patchwork monkey. The problem is, when I start going through my yarn stash, I see a skein (or two) of yarn and think "That would make a great ___." (could be an owl, teddy bear, giraffe, scarf...) Of course, I can't resist adding that yarn to my pile to take back to my work corner... and another project is started!
That's why I usually have 5 or 6 projects going at once. Right now, I have two. Well, it depends on how you count "projects". If you only count something that is started, I have two. If purchasing the yarn for a specific project and putting that yarn in my corner counts... bump the number up by two more. If putting yarn in a bag with a crochet hook and a pattern counts, bump it up again. If printing a pattern off counts, I'm in trouble...
