I Got the Blues, Yes, I got the Bluesssss.....

As usual, it has been a few weeks. I have been busy. Nothing unusual or new. Well, except for knitting projects. And dogs.

Let me introduce my dearest dog, Daisy. DBIL & DSIL brought her over from Chattanooga almost 2 weeks ago. Of course she remembered us and was happy to see us. But when Mary & Richard left she did seem a bit confused. And she hated our tile floors. But she has settled in without much ado at all. She had a couple of accidents in the house until she figured out how to let us know she needed out. She has never bothered the cats(their food or their litter), gotten in the garbage, barked much at all, or tried to sleep with us. We can have her out in the yard and she will run but not run away. She does not dig or chase cars. Sounds wonderful, doesn't it?? Well there are a few things that we did have to work on. She chewed a baby tree in half one day out in the yard. We caught her so she did get properly admonished. And for days she kept trying to get in our face constantly all day long. We solved that in just moments when we figured out how to use the "penny can". She will back off and go lie down as soon as she hears the noise. We have actually only had to use it a few times in one day and seldom since. Now she seems so much more settled especially in the evenings. I am working on training her. She sits, stays and comes pretty well. We just started on "lay" down but at the rate she learns it will be old hat in a day or so. The cats have taken their good old time getting used to it all. Especially old Lexi. But for the first time, tonight, Jack is asleep in a chair in the living room just about a foot from where Daisy is also lying. One of the reasons I wanted Daisy to be ours, was that she was a good walker. Turns out she is not able to go on our walks after all. She is awesome but the other dogs out here distract her too much. There are so many dogs that are not confined to quarters and come out when we pass by. There has never been any aggression between them and Daisy. But she thinks they want to play and it is too hard to drag her on by. So I go by myself and most days I walk further than she could anyway. And both DH and I get her out in the yard for plenty of play time. By the way-the picture of her on the love seat?? It is the only thing we can not break her of. She loves to sleep there at night. So we gave up. And everynight I cover the loveseat with her fleece afghan and she gets up there and sleeps like a rock.

The blues that I got?? They are these beautiful ones that I got when I used the liquid from black beans to dye some yarn. The first dip gave me the blues in the hat. Which will also be a sweater(already on the needles, another gathered pullover). The second dip gave me the lighter blue. I am not sure if it is lighter cause the dye was beginning to exhaust or if it was because the yarn was not superwash(takes color faster and better) or if it was cause I ran out of cream of tartar so I only used alum as a mordant. What ever reason, no matter. I am going to knit and felt some hotpads and the color works very well with my kitchen. The third dip was over an already dyed yellow yarn. I threw it in to get some green and although the pics don't really show it that well, it is a very pretty green. Some folks on my natural dyes Yahoo group say that black bean dye fades fairly fast. But so far the hat has been worn out on all my walks for almost a week. Probably at least 8 hours of direct sunlight and I have not noticed any appreciable fading. So I am going to hope for the best and accept any fading that may come over time.

I have several new knitting projects going. Of course you could tell from above that I am making a new Gathered pullover. In that lovely blue that is the same as the hat. This is DK weight yarn so it will have a bit more body than the same sweater knit in sport weight. And I plan on making several more adjustments in the pattern to make it a bit more perfect. The other project is one that I am doing to use up all the bits of natural dyed yarn I have on hand. No pics yet. Lets just say it is going to be gorgeous. More on that later.

We have finally started making real plans to take our 2 DGD's to Disney World over their spring break. We have our hotel rooms booked and most of our travel plans laid out. We haven't told the girls yet and hopefully we will do that this weekend. I can't wait to hear those happy voices shouting out with joy!!