Knit Until it Hurts

This was a productive week for me. I managed to work all week, no sick days. I finished the 1st of my Victorian Lace socks from the KAL. I made it all the way around the 3rd corner on my shawl and last but not least I started a baby sweater out of the new yarn I bought at the new yarn store in Norman. I was on call this weekend which gave me extra time with nothing to do so I knit and knit and knit. But lately anytime I sit down to knit my shoulders and neck seize up on me almost right away and I can only knit for a few minutes. I am starting to beleive that it has to do with holding my upper arms, neck and shoulders to still and tight so I am making a concerted effort to stay loose and move around alot while I am actively knitting. With my shawl it isn't to hard since I have to stop after each row and move the marker on the graph since the pattern is so complicated. But when I am doing mindless knitting I have to make myself stop and roll my shoulders and relax my neck every couple of rows.

The yarn I am making the baby sweater out of is one I have been dying to get to use for some time. It is Colinette Jitterbug hand dyed especially for socks. It is Merino Superwash and it has the nicest feel to the yarn. I bought 2 colorways to put togeather in one sweater. The main color is a deep blue with lots of other blues and a nice maroon running thru. It is not going to stripe out but just be a random placement of color thruout the blue. The contrasting color is a very subtle hand dyed maroon and really brings out the little bit of maroon in the main yarn. I am making "Devin" out of Knitty which is a little V neck cardigan with the fronts being the main color with the button band and the hem out of the contrasting color. The sleeves are the main color and the back is the contrasting color with either a band or block of the main color knit in by intarsia. Then I plan on making a hat out of whatever yarn I have left. It will be really cute on a little boy. I plan on giving this set to the Peds ICU doc who is having a baby later this fall.

I talked to the granddaughters today and they had gotten their PJ's in the mail this week. They both said they fit and that they liked them. I would love to think I could get pictures of them wearing them but DD & DSIL have not been coming thru on that front.

It is still raining almost every day. And they predict it to continue most of the week. The garden is hanging in there mostly because my garden beds are raised and drain well. Now the grass in my yard is another story. I should have planted rice instead!!

I finished reading the entire series Outlander this weekend. I did enjoy it but the last few chapters of the last book seemed rushed. Almost like she was not writing another volume. But my best friend swears she is so I have to trust her. Meanwhile I will lie low on the reading until Harry comes out. But that didn't stop me from buying a book anyway. I bought a book I will use for my CQ(when I get back to it). It is called the "Beaded Garden". It has some very nice free form beaded flowers that can be used for jewerly or to embellish my crazy quilts.

So this is the scoop for the week. Hopefully this time next weekend will see my shawl on the blocking board, my second Victorian lace sock started, one of the fronts to the baby sweater done, my skirt finished and maybe even worn. Anything else will be gravy, if only my neck and shoulders will hold out.......

Lord-Are you sending an Arc?

It has rained all week and I may be starting to mold!! Actually I managed to catch a virus this week and spent the better part of 3 days with a hellish sore throat and a killer headache. So I did not get much knitting in. I did manage to turn corner #3 on the shawl and I also turned the heel on the Victorian Lace sock. But I did not ever get any pics so maybe next week.

Despite the lack of sun my cherry tomatos are finally starting to ripen. Once the sun comes out this week we should be able to pick them by the bowlful. No new peppers have set due to the dreary weather. The herbs love it tho and I have used quite a bit of basil, thyme and oregano. The flowers are all bright and perky especially my Dahlia's. Its been awhile since I attempted to grow these but I will from now on.

This week was Maddie's birthday. She turned 8 years old this week. But the story is not what she got as gifts but with what she gave as a gift. She decided to have her beautiful long hair cut off and given to Locks of Love in memory of a relative that had passed this week due to cancer. It must have taken a lot of courage to have then make that first cut but as always she still looked beautiful.

I did get a bit of reading done due to the monster cold. I am about 2/3 of the way thru book 6. The beginning of the war for Indepenence is looming and Jamie has had to make his true intentions known-to fight for independence. There is a lot of story to still evolve in the last few chapters of this book. I will miss the Frasier's when I finish up-Harry will have to hurry up and fill the void.........

All Quiet on the Western Front

Ah-Life is beautiful when all is calm and quiet. Lots of time to knit, sew, sleep, eat.... I did all of these over the weekend probably to excess. I did get a fair bit of knitting done on my shawl and can happily say I have overcome the problems I was having last week with the border. In fact I have finished rounding the corner after the first long side. And it looks good!! I did not get any pics made tho but promise to get some next weekend after I turn the 2nd corner and have the entire end done. I started the Victorian Lace socks on my KAL. I have about 3" done on the cuff and they look like they will fit OK. I am making them out of a brown tweedy ball of Trekking XXL that I bought at Christmas in a yarn shop in Jacksonville NC. It was one of those default purchases although this store almost didn't even warrent buying anything at all. But now I think I really like the yarn although brown wouldn't be my first choice for lacy socks. But sometimes you just gotta start a pair of socks and you use what ya got!! So far there are no new techniques involved, top down, heel flap but the toes are short row and I will attempt to do what the pattern calls for. I noticed many of the posters on the KAL gave up and did the more traditional toes.

And now for the activity going on in my sewing room!! I received my fabric from eQuilter.com for Maddie's PJ's. The color choices were exactly like what I saw on the computer monitor so I was happy about that. I got the fabric washed and cut out Saturday night. Sunday I made the top and it went perfectly. I cut out the pants and heres where things got sticky!! I planned on making one leg green polka dots and the other leg yellow polka dots. But somehow I cut it out so that from the front each leg is the different color but from the back it is the opposite. So each leg is 2 different colors. Not a big deal but why of why can I not think these things thru more and get it right? I tried, I honestly did but it always seems to backfire on me. I am sure Maddie will love them anyway. Hopefully I will get hers done next weekend and off to them in the mail.

DH has gotten me into watching a show he has on CD called "Dexter" It was originally a Showtime series about a serial killer who kills serial killers!! What a concept!! But except for the short times when I have to close my eyes to the violence it is a great show. It is so well written and very very quirky. And the violence is not in your face at all. I have only watched 3 episodes but will be watching more soon.

I have been so patiently waiting for my tomatos to ripen and finally I am seeing a little bit of pinky orange in the cherry tomatos. But darn if something is not trying to eat them before me. So I sprayed with an organice pesticide and hopefully I will have some to eat come next weekend when I get home. I picked 3 real nice anaheim peppers yesterday and will be making some black bean soup next Saturday to use them up.

Well thats it for the week. Not too exciting I know but you never know what tomorrow will bring. Hopefully as much peace and happiness as I had this prior week......

Knit in haste-Rip in leisure!!

Where is it said that if I knit something I will have to rip it out? Over and over sometimes. I can't remember a single project where I just knit from start to finish even when closely following a pattern. So what did I rip this week? Well my shawl for one. I had to rip out all the edging I had already done. And then take out 8 repeats from the main body. Why you ask did I have to do something so drastic. For one I was still going to run out of yarn before I was finished so it necessitated making a major adjustment. Second of all I did not match the border stitches as well to the edge stitches of the body so the corners were coming out all crazy. Now I am back into the border, carefully checking each repeat to make sure I am matching 1 to 1 and headed for the corner. I will still have to do some adjusting because I only took out 1/2 of a border repeats worth of rows instead of a whole repeat like I would have liked. But time will tell if this was the last frog stitching I will have to do on this project-God I hope so!!

I will also be taking out my toe up socks. I just do not like the pattern I chose and the socks were going to be so short on my legs. So the yarn will become the body of a baby sweater once I buy some matching solid yarn to go with it and some sweet baby girl will be the recipient of a beautiful sweater set.

I managed to get a whole pair of pj's done for Katie although I did not get Maddie's done. I ended up without enough fabric so I went on line and looked for some more of the same fabric. None was to be found so I started with a fresh slate and ordered some to be here by next weekend. Then I can whip up Maddies and send them off to the girls.

The weather has been ever so rainy and the back yard is a swamp. But the garden is all in raised beds so they are plenty dry and doing well. I can not beleive how many green tomatos are on the vines but none of them are the slightest bit red yet. I have to usable green peppers but they look so pretty I hate to harvest them yet!! I had to buy a 3rd kind of basil to put in since I am using quite a bit each weekend that just 2 plants could not keep up. Next year I will start with at least 4 kinds. The butterflies have been everywhere and I have gotten a few decent pics of them. I bought a new digital SLR camera book this week to get some more insight on taking better pics but so far I have not put out that magic picture yet!!

I finished book 5 of the "Outlander' series and I am onto book 6. At this point Roger has decided that they are there in the past to stay and Brianna may be trying to have another child. I will be sad to have this series end but Diana Gabaldon is supposedly writing another sequel but I have no idea of how far out it is. Of course Harry is right around the corner to satiate my reading adventure spirit!!