Oh to be 8 again!!

Another quiet couple of days have gone by. Tuesday after school the girls and I went to the movies to see "Kung Fu Panda". They liked it fine, actually they liked the "Kung Fu Fighting" song at the end the best. Then out to eat and home. Nothing picture worthy at all. Yesterday was the girls last day of school for the year. Maddy got an Academic award signed by Pres Bush. She was really excited about that. It is good the man still has at least a few fans out here in average Joe land.

Today was slated to go to at least one of the more northern beaches. But when we got home the other night there was a party invitation waiting for the girls. The little girl next door was having an end of school party slated for this afternoon. So the beach got rescheduled, no big deal. The invitation said "Large Water Slide" and Pizza so the girls thought that was just cool with them. This morning they wanted to get back to knitting so I got them both started on a very narrow scarf project. Katie is still knitting a bit better than Maddy. Katie is on about row 8 and still has the same 10 stitches to the row she started with. I had to help when she would wrap the yarn around the needle once to many times but she is good about not dropping stitches. She knits quite loose so her scarf will be light and airy. Maddy knits very tight and in an awkward postition but she does understand what she is supposed to be doing which is great. And her 10 stitches have turned into 12 which grandma will not fix. I kind of expect Katie to keep up her project and Maddy to let hers languish. I think Maddy has just not found her craft quite yet.

The girls managed to stay pretty laid back waiting for the party and were actually watching TV when the truck came to set up the water slide. When it was time to put sunscreen on them they didn't understand why they needed it. I know they thought that all they were going to be doing was a silly little slip and slide that they had been playing with all week. So the first time they peeked out their heads their jaws dropped and their eyes got big as saucers. Katie made me hold her hand to walk over but as soon as she got about 10 feet away she dropped my hand, made a dash and said "Bye Grandma" and I haven't been able to tear her away since. They have been playing now for 5 solid hours. Up and down this slide at least a million times. And they are still just as happy and joyful as any child could be. It makes me want to be a kid again to know that feeling of utter fun and frolic!! But honestly I am ready for the rental guy to come take the slide away cause I know I will not have any luck getting these girls to come in for dinner as long as that slide is still sitting there. So guy come already or my 2 girls will be way to tired to go to the beach with dear old grandma tomorrow..

This slide is 20ft high. The party mom said there was actually another higher one-25ft but it had already been rented for the day. Can you imagine how many steps these girls have climbed today on this thing??

So hopefully tomorrow will be a great beach day with a few more pics. Just in case I didn't get enough the other day. And then Saturday will be bowling for Maddy's birthday. And she will be proudly wearing her first pair of hand knit socks to bowl in. She told me the other day that this will be her best birthday ever cause I am here and I am making her socks. OK so she maybe won't be a knitter-but she might possibly be the best granddaughter ever for saying that!!

Topsail and Away

I know I have missed the last few days. But honestly it was just every day life and I can bore you enough with my most exciting days. But today we got the itch to hit the beach so we headed out early with all our gear and headed towards the sunset. Sunset Beach N Carolina that is. But we kind of got sidetracked by some really bad state route signs after we left Wilmington and before we knew it we were back at Topsail Island. Oh well-aren't all beaches alot alike?? We had about had all the time in the car we could stand so we picked the first public access pull off we could find, hauled our chairs, boogie boards, towels and Subway sandwiches up over the dunes. And we were not disappointed. The tide must have just about been at it's highest point when the girls first braved the waves. I can tell you the first time you see your little granddaughters dive into a wave that is way over their heads and come up on the other side it takes your breath away-completely!! They are fearless. The pics I took can not do their deeds justice in any way. They had about an hour of these crashing breakers and then they slowly moderated until even I could keep my feet when they hit us!! We played in the water, dug holes and built sandcastles, looked for shells and did everything but sit down for 4 hrs. When the sunscreen finally started to fail and my legs could no longer keep me up in the most gentle waves it was time to head home. The girls protested of course but were asleep before we left the island. I would love to come spend a few days in one of the amazing beach condo rentals just so I could be able to walk on the beach early in the morning and late at night. Maybe for our anniversary this coming fall. I did manage to finish up the socks I was knitting. The first ones from yarn I dyed myself. So I thought I would whip out a pair for Maddy to wear on her birthday when we go bowling. She is a kid right? And her socks should not have to be that big right? Well wrong. I measured and her feet are barely smaller than mine. She could actually wear the ones I just finished except they are about 1/2" to long. But I am well into the foot of the first sock for her and I probably won't make them all that tall. This yarn is one of the new Opals I bought this week in Wilmington and it is striping out with a very well defined fair isle effect. I have never been lucky enough before to have any yarn really look this fair isle so all I can figure is that with the very slightly fewer stitches I am using it just matches the way the yarn was dyed perfectly. I am going to try a Fleegle heel this time since so many people are talking about how they like the fit and it supposedly has no holes anywhere in the heel like in any wrapped turn method.

The girls just have 3 more days of school and they are so excited about that. Thursday hopefully we will be fully recovered from our sunburns and sore muscles so that we can head back to the beach. I am not sure which one yet but I am sure with the quality of all the beaches here in North Carolina it will be a good one and we will have a great time!! Just don't count on the road signs to get you there!! Awwwww-do we have to come in??

Bribery and other such Grandma stuff

The perfectly behaved granddaughters that I had when I arrived last Saturday have slipped away and have been replaced with 2 very argumentative, grumpy, way too-close-in-age sisters. The walk to school this morning should have been wonderful since the first thing we saw was a cute bunny hopping along next to the path. But quickly Maddie decided she was boss of the conversation and was not going to let Katie have anything to say at all. There was no steering the boat the other way. We were just going to have to weather the storm and be glad that they go to school in separate buildings!!

I got the notion to take a nice long walk after the girls and I parted ways. There is a greenbelt with nature trails close to the school so I chose to make good use of it. The trails were very nice but I sure am glad I doused myself liberally with bug spray before I went out. I saw some great wildlife but never a single other human being. I saw a huge tortoise, big as a dinner plate at least. A really bright little frog, a good sized lizard and the best of all-a Piliated Woodpecker!! These guys are huge!! And the red topknot on their heads looks an awful lot like a punk rocker hairdo. I managed to stay out for 2 hours and came back both exhilarated and exhausted and ready for lunch.

Speaking of lunch. Funny story to tell you. I had some chicken breast cooked that I planned on throwing some taco seasoning mix on and making some kind of mexican chicken wrap. So while the chicken was finishing up I got out some grated cheddar(kind in a bag already grated), some lettuce and sour cream.. I went to get out my tortilla wrap and sit it on the counter to make my concoction. And there was no cheese. Did I forget to get it out-Nope. Did I mislay it somewhere else in the kitchen-Nope. Then I realized Cooper was missing. So I went and found him under his mommies bed where he goes when he is in trouble and there he was with the cheese. I never saw him snatch it but I sure caught him red-handed!! I rescued the bag with only a little damage so I could use the cheese left in the bag. Cooper knew he was in trouble and hid out for about an hour. And I didn't even yell at him-he just knew!!

Katie's group at school put on their musical. Katie spoke her part loud and clear. But even more important was the fact that she wore stuff to school she normally would have hated. She had to wear denim on the bottom and a plain white top. We could find neither in her wardrobe so she had to borrow from Maddie. In fact she tried on several of Maddy's things and almost decided on a skirt but passed it up cause it was a bit too loose in the tummy. Is our little tomboy learning it is not so bad to be just a little bit girly? Well when out shopping tonight she actually had a couple of skirts she said she liked but they were out of her size.

I was really hoping that when I picked the girls up from school that they would be in better spirits. Katie was fine but Maddy was just being a butt-head picking on her sister. I threatened to turn around and take them home with no shopping. They barely improved but at the first store we stopped at they had Webkinz and promised if Grandma bought them each one they would be good for life. They really know how to lay it on don't they!! So I made them a deal. Do the rest of our shopping and stop back in for the Webkinz if they stayed well behaved. And they did. Both girls tried on outfits and both picked their fav for Grandma to buy. Nothing fancy, just t-shirts and pants each. Then dinner at Golden Corral. They ate plenty but I do not think one real veggie made it on their plates or in their tummys!!

Brooke comes home tomorrow for 2 days so I had to get the house picked up a bit so she is not overwhelmed when she walks in. She says she has a lot of studying to do when she is here but hopefully we can find a little bit of time to do something. And then hopefully the girls and I will go really hit a beach this weekend, boogie boards, bathing suits and all.

Ordinary Day

We all need one of those once in awhile. Just slow, laid back and no demands. Well except to get to Maddy's school by 1 to see her in a little play that her class was putting on.

We started out this morning by chasing one of the dogs pretty much all over the neighborhood. Maddy kind of on purpose let Cooper out the front door about 10 minutes before we should have left to walk to school. And of course he ran off and did not want to come back. It is amazing how fast a grandchild can help you remember how lousy your parenting skills were. I was frustrated with Cooper and ended up frustrated with Maddy too. And she, being the tender hearted kid that she is, cried enough to break my heart. I thought back to the millions of times I would have done the same thing with her mommy and her uncle and just expected them to take it. But when it is your grandchild you feel bad that you hurt their feelings. Kind of makes you want to be able to go back and re-raise your kids. Well maybe not, but an apology might be in order..

Then I opted for a nice walk on some of the paths thru the nearby neighborhoods. The paths are nice, flat and shady and look very innocent. But in actuality they are a hot bed of tick activity and I managed to bring home about 7 or 8. 4 were very attached and the tics had already feasted well in just the few minutes it took me to get home. So anymore walking will involve alot more bug repellent and a shower as soon as I get home.

Maddy's play was short but very cute. It was about the human body, mostly about how the body protects itself from things that can make you sick. Maddy played a virus and did her part very well. She sang out nicely and did all her gestures that went with the part. She is kind of a ham unless I am the one holding the camera.

We went and bought a few groceries and made dinner. They did eat my cheeseburgers, salad and ice cream. Tomorrow they want to go to Golden Corral-yuck..........but we will go if that is what they really want.

Then Katie started drawing dinosaurs on the front driveway. And then dinosaur skeletons!! I am really glad a few of these pics turned out well. Such a memory of 2 of her favorite things at once, dinosaurs and drawing!!

I am so tired I can hardly keep my eyes open so I am not going to fight nature and go crawl in bed with the 2 dogs.

Wilmington

Today was slated for yarn shopping. Now Jacksonville has like 3 great quilt stores but no real yarn shop. What's up with that? So I googled and found a yarn shop over in Wilmington which according to DSIL was 45 minutes away thru post. I wrote down all the directions cause I did not have access to a printer and I took my maps and headed out. It took a full hr just to get to Wilmington and an extra 30 minutes to navigate the last 5 miles. According to my on-line directions I had to turn 3 times on 3 different streets to get there. But in acuality all 3 streets were just one that changed names every time it took a little bend. But I did get there so all was good. Now the shop "The Quarter Stitch" was small but pleasant and the owner was very very nice. But the selection was kind of on the slim side for me. But then again I am pretty demanding of my yarn shops!! I did bring home 3 new balls of Opal sock yarn in the self patterning style cause I have not managed to learn to dye like that myself. I will be using them for the afghan and the left overs maybe will go into socks.

I stopped at a great grocery store called "Fresh Market" and bought some lunch stuff to take to the beach. This grocery store is like a gourmet healthy food market and I could have spent a lot more time and money in there if I had not wanted to spend a little time at the beach on the way home. But I grabbed and went on to Top Sail island which was between Wilmington and Camp Lejeune. This area is much more touristy than the beach here on base but that is to be expected. Still the beach was very nice. It is right out on the ocean instead of the bay like Onslow is so the waves were a bit bigger and the shells were different. I picked up a few new treasures, ate my lunch and headed on back to pick up the girls on schedule. I wouldn't mind getting back there again but am not sure if I want to do that this weekend or head to another part of the coast.

The girls did wake up a little grouchy this morning but it passed quite quickly. They actually asked to walk to school and on the way they saw a great turtle. Which got them going on a long winded "what if I had a turtle as a pet" story. They came up with ideas like a house with an inside pool filled with turtles, feeding the turtle bugs they find and bring home, ect. I kept trying to tell them how hard it was to take wild animals and make them pets but you know-sometimes kids just gotta imagine this stuff and grown ups should probably just shut up and enjoy the stories.

I did find out that even the best little girls in the world, ones who do their homework and chores without fussing, do well in school, gentle with animals and kind to people can still have their foibles. With Maddy & Kate it is food. They just are too picky. When I ask them what they want made for dinner all Katie can say is mashed potatos and all Maddy wants is salad!! I asked them what their mommy would make them for dinner and it was chicken nuggets and fries. But of course when I did make that they found reasons to not like them. Chicken was in strips not nuggets and Maddy had a headache. Oh well-I did not let them snack so maybe if they are a bit hungry tonight they will eat better tomorrow. I probably should take them to the commissary and let them pick out their own food and maybe then they will eat!!

Right now I sure wish I had a scanner. Katie the artist drew the best picture of animals in the rainforest this morning before school. She has quite the eye for detail. Her birds really look like the ones she intended them to be. I am going to ask her if this picture can come home with me to be for grandpa.

Maddy feels pretty good about herself right now as she got an invite to a summer program for really academically gifted kids. Now she probably won't get to go since it is clear across the state and quite expensive but she knew it was an honor to get the invitation. Yesterday in the car she kept spouting facts about things at us and I kept thinking she was a little bit too much like Cliff on Cheers!!

Not sure what I am doing tomorrow except for going to Maddy's school to see her play at 1p.m. Maybe go Lichen hunting in the woods tomorrow morning and in town shopping after that. They do have a Target, Barnes & Noble & Dick's sporting goods. All stores we don't have back home so it will be fun for me. And tonight I will hopefully get a good night's sleep without sharing the bed with 2 large furry dogs!!

Beach and more Beach..

Day 2 dawned overcast and cool due to a ferocious rain storm that came in last night. Perfect beach day for me!! So I dropped the girls off at school and headed out to see how easy it would be to go to the local military beach. The bridge to the beach is being maintenenced and so you have to park and ride a bus, take a ferry and ride a little tram to get to the beach itself. But in reality, you can just park and walk to the ferry and then walk from the ferry to the middle of the beach in just a ffew minutes. So I planned on spending maybe an hour walking on the beach?? Well 3 hrs later and 2 pockets full of beach treasures I just had to say I was done and head back for lunch. Besides I promised the girls to take them to the same beach after school which was just in 2 short hrs. So I quick like a bunny ate some lunch, packed some dinner, played with the dogs, folded some laundry and headed back to pick up the girls. I did get them to walk to the ferry stop but after riding the ferry they just had to also ride the little tram all the way to the north end of the beach. The tide was a bit high so beachcombing was not as good as in the morning but I did still glean some great orange irredescent shells and a lot of sharks teeth. But no sand dollars darn it!!

So everything so far is going well except Maddy is not going to sleep right now and will probably be hell on wheels in the morning. Even more than me!! I haven't gotten lost even once, the dogs have not pottied in the house, the car is acting fairly nicely and the girls haven't seemed to miss their parents. I just keep wondering when the honeymoon will be over and the fun will begin!! See you all tomorrow...

Day 1 of Bliss!!

Granddaughters in Paradise-Day 1!!

Well I arrived in North Carolina without too much of a hitch. I got in quite late so my little darlings were fast asleep in their beds and I figured I would not get to see them til morning. But while brushing my teeth, DSIL woke the girls up and they hid in my bedroom til I walked in. I was not expecting their sweet giggle but when I heard it my eyes welled up and my heart just about exploded. So we got in a few quick hugs and sent them back off to bed til morning.

I am going to try and post at least a bit every day while I am here. DSIL actually suggested it so here we go with the memories of day 1.

My daughter had to leave today for her clinicals and DSIL leaves tomorrow for his mission. So today was just a good day to stay close to home and get a feel for the lay of the land so to speak. Katie always wakes up early so by 6:30 she came into great me with a big smile. Maddy is more like me and wakes up a little bit slower but I still got a big smile from her too. Almost immediately Katie asked me if I brought her knitting with me. I had remembered to stick her special needles in my bag, but dummy me forgot about any yarn. So I got out my current sock project and my afghan for her to see. Well she decided she could just knit on one of those projects. I am thinking-no way-gauge and needles way to small for tiny hands. But I would be wrong!! After a short refresher lesson Katie was happily knittin on Audry II and doing very very well. And all day long she has asked to keep at it a row at a time. She truely understands the process and rarely makes any mistake. I have had to help her a bit when she splits the yarn with the needle or drops a stitch off but that is about it. These pics of her are so precious and even if she does not become a lifelong knitter I will always have these as a reminder of Grandma teaching Katie to knit. But like the rest of us-resistence is futile and she will be a knitter extraordinaire!!

Now these are some active girls and we had to go take a walk down to the bay. We took the 2 dogs and headed down a path thru the woods and in just a few minutes came to an opening in the trees and there was a very pretty tiny beach that we could scramble down to with just a little effort. These was tons of gorgeous driftwood, all silvery and smooth, perfect for climbing and sitting on. In the water there were lots of bitty fish and some fairly large crabs that Katie was "kind of scared" of. The dogs ran themselves ragged chasing the frisbee out into the water. And despite liberal applications of bug repellent we were constantly finding ticks crawling all over us. Yeachhhhhhh!!! Katie found a large frog with all 4 limbs amputated and was fascinated to find that it still appeared to be alive. I am not sure how true this is but it made her feel better to hear that frogs can keep moving for awhile after they are dead due to their primative nervous system.

This afternoon after a quick tour of the important aspects of Camp Lejuene, DSIL went golfing and left me with the girls and the car. So we jumped in with both feet and ventured out to the commissary. It wasn't too far, I did not get lost or break the car so hopefully tomorrow I can start gettin a little braver and head out to the beach during the school day. But for now Spongebob Square Pants is getting just a little bit too much of the attention that is supposed to be all mine so I will go and hopefully see you all tomorrow...

Off to the Beach!!

I thought I would just pop in for a moment and visit before I hop on the plane and jet across the country. Bring you all up to date on the exciting life I live here in Oklahoma-yeah right!!

The flooring is all done thru out the entire house. It looks very very nice although I would hate to be the one living here with the light carpet. But they say that is what everybody wants so that is what we went with. The tile I do like. It does show dirt but it is easy to sweep and mop and keep looking nice. I have had to spend a bit on time down on my hands and knees sealing the grout but it should help keep it looking nicer in the long run. So far we have not had a lot of buyers come to look at the house which makes me sad. So I am asking everybody to send a few good vibes are way so the house will sell fast. Just remember all my crafty stuff is already in Tennessee and it is going to be hell if I have to be apart from it for too long. Oh-and it would be nice to actually have some furniture!!

I have gotten a little knitting done this week. Last week I took a day and did some yarn dyeing with the Jacquard dyes. I did 3 very nice little skeins for Audry II and for the first time I dyed an entire 100g skein to make a pair of socks. I hemmed and hawed about the colors and style I would use and in the end I just started throwing the color on that I had leftover from dyeing the mini skeins. I threw the skein into a disposable aluminum foil pan and visually divided the skein into thirds. I used a nice chocolate for one third, green for another and medium blue for the third. But I had never dyed a big thick skein before and underestimated how much dye it would take. So I ended up with lots of white still showing. And no more mixed up dye in those 3 colors. So what to do, what to do...So I started grabbing colors that were already mixed up and similar to those 3. On the white spots in the brown section I threw on some burgandy, on the green I threw on chartruese and on the blue I threw on some dark teal and some much lighter blue. And I squished, and I squished until it seemed like all the yarn was dyed. But I lifted the yarn out of the pan and saw a bit more white showing underneath. So I squished some more since I was really out of dye at that point. By this time I figured I was just going to have mud but what could I do? Eventually I got rid of all the white I could see, stuck it in a microwave steamer bag and stuck it in the microwave. I zapped it long enough to set the color and hoped for the best. After a rinse and dry session it really didn't look to bad. The 3 main color sections didn't overmix to badly and although there were still a few really almost naked spots they were very short sections and I figured they would blend in. I twisted it up into a nice skein and thought-pretty nice!! But of course I had to reskein and get a better pic. That made it even nicer. I was pretty excited and pleased. Well then I just was dying to know how it would knit up so I grabbed needles and set forth to find out. 3 days later I had a very nice sock that is quite pleasing to the eye. The main colors kind of spiral in stripes around the sock with the secondary colors giving it a little excitement. I really expected the sock to appear more brown or blue since that is what showed the most as it was being dyed and skeined. But knit up they are much more of a green to my eye which is fine. I have no real green socks in my drawer. And these are the first for me to be knitted toe-up with short row toes and heels. I thought what the heck-give it a try and guess what-I like!!! The fit is just perfect for my heel, much better than a gusset heel flap sock. This first sock I tried several different ways to do short rows and both could stand some improvement but they are wearable. I tried a third way to do short rows when I started sock #2 and that is going to be my method from now on. I found that Japanese short rows work best for me and is a very easy method in my opinion. I will post more about that in the future since this was supposed to be a short post today!!

Is it possible that Audry II has stopped talking to me?? I have not knit but 2 squares on her in the last week. She is packed to go to North Carolina tho so maybe I will be able to hear her better in the peace and quiet of the beach!! I am sure she will look awesome wrapped around the 2 most beautiful granddaughters in the entire world. And I plan on dragging her along to a few yarn shops to be showed off and admired.

I hope everyone who reads this(all 3 or so of you!!) has as great of a next 2 weeks as I will. You will get to see plenty of posts, plenty of pics and plenty of bragging as I journal this awesome adventure in grandma land. So as I leave to double check the luggage one last time, you all get back to your knitting and I will see you later..

A few Projects

As you can see some of us are still getting alot of rest!! Next time I need surgery I want to convalesce for 6 weeks. Ken did see the doctor last week and everything is fine but he still didn't completely remove his lifting restrictions. He can lift anything under 10 lbs and apparently even his fingers are over 10lbs. Get it? He isn't lifting a finger around the house??? Actually that is not completely true but what good is a husband if a wife can't poke fun at him once in awhile.

This of course is the reason why I have not blogged much lately. Once this sign is in your yard you are obligated to keep the entire house clean enough to eat off every surface. And most of you know from your own experience of being a crafter that we are not very tidy people and usually don't give a flip what you think of our housekeeping skills. We would much rather you drool over our sweaters, socks and quilts then to admire how shiny our tile is, or how clean the rugs are today. But in order to sell a house that has a lot of built in downfalls such as paneling and ugly kitchen cabinets, you just have to keep it looking "first date" quality. So now every weekend we pick a big project and put our all into it. This last weekend Ken stripped the wall paper off the dining room walls and texturized and painted. I chose to spend my weekend in the kitchen with our horrible cabinets. I washed them, oh heck, I scrubbed them with wood cleaner, then used scratch cover on the entire surface of each one. I then went back and used a wood refurbisher to bring back some of the lost luster. That meant going up and down a ladder about 20 times an hour. By Sunday my legs and back were aching and would barely hold me up. So I finally had to say "Good Enough" and let it go. And I want to go on record as saying-If the guys who built are cabinets call themselves carpenters than may GOD strike them down!!!!

I have made just a little time for the fiber in my life. That just has to happen or I lose all sense of reality. No really..I start to hallucinate and babble in tongues if I am away from yarn for too long. But I pick and choose my projects carefully in these lean times to get the most out of the time I have. So this week I decided I needed to finish up the socks I am knitting for a friend. These are my very first toe up socks so I am doubly proud of the finished project. I struggled a bit with the new techniques on my first sock and if you look close there are a few very tiny differences on the 2nd where I tried something a bit different. But now I need to make a new pair right away to reinforce the new skills I have picked up. But these will go out in the mail shortly to their new feet and I am sure she will love them and never notice my flaws. The pattern is Firestarters from Yarnissima made in Plymouth "Happy Feet". I am not so in love with the yarn and won't buy again. The red bled like crazy in the blocking wash and I can only hope they are done bleeding now or my friend will have some crazy red feet. But it is soft and lofty yarn so it knits up quickly when you are in a hurry.

Now usually if I have not blogged in 3 weeks I would have another 100 squares of Audry to show you. But this time I have only gotten about 2/3 of that amount. I have just had to slow down a bit to do other things. I am so close to being done that I would love to just push thru and be finished but it will happen and hopefully soon. Just not at this time. But I have gotten some yarn dyeing in. Just bits here and there but what I have done has been exciting and ground breaking for me. Because you ask?? Cause I did the dyeing with natural dyes right out of my own backyard. I kept reading on Ravelry about others who did their dyeing with the natural materials and I thought what the heck. 2 of the most mentioned dyes came from marigolds and Hollyhocks both of which were blooming nicely in my garden. And black hollyhocks seemed to be a favorite of many a dyer which I just happen to have. So I read up a bit, went and picked my materials and got started. My first attempt ended up being the marigolds. I ended up using a "sun tea" kind of method where I stuffed a quart canning jar with the marigolds, poured boiling water over and put it in the back window of my car for a few days. Several sources said I should need about 1/4 lb of flowers to dye the amount of wool I had and I was a bit short of that. So finally out of impatience I went ahead and strained the liquour off and set out to dye the wool I had. I had to pre-mordant the fiber with Alum & Cream of Tartar which took about an hour. Then I let the fiber cool just a little and threw it in to the pot of warming dye liquid. It immediately turned a brilliant yellow!! It seems I had way more than enough dye to do the job. So I grabbed another 100g of mordanted fiber and threw it in. It came out just a tad bit less yellow but even more gorgeous. I actually still had some dye in the pot but chose to throw it out since there was no more fiber ready to dye!! After washing, rinsing and drying it is just beautiful. All 150g of sock weight of it!! Next was the black hollyhock. I put it through the same process but only dyed about 25g. With a premordant of Alum/Cream of Tartar and a post wash with ammonia it came out a gorgeous sagey green. I am going to try the black hollyhock again in the next day or so with a premordant of only the alum to see the difference. Black HH is supposed to be one that has many varieties of dye depending on the mordant and post wash process. I have had some failures tho. I read that dandelion roots gave a great magenta-well not mine!! There was no color at all. Maybe cause I stole the dandelions from the neighbors yard? Or I have cursed them so much over the years that the dandelion fairies wou;dn't smile on me? I don't know but I have moved on. Petunias were funny things. When I first put them into the boiling water I got the most lovely teal-from pink petunias!! But later the liquour was pink and when dyed it was just a pale yellow. Such much work and I could have gotten that from the leftover marigold dye!! Tomato leaves were supposed to do blue according to one website-not.. But oh well-my tomatoes do need their leaves afterall!! And if it really had done a blue I probably would have had naked tomato plants!! I am not sure what I will do with what I have dyed but the 100g of marigold will be going to a good friend of mine to whom I am paying a visit next week in OKC-so you know who you are!!

In just a little over a week I will be in North Carolina and hugging some beautiful granddaughters to peices. So I am sure my next post will be from there as long as the internet access thing works out to my advantage. There will be lots of knitting time, long walks on the beach and after school time with the girls. Over the weekend we will be going to the Outer Banks area, exact spot to be determined once I am there. And I am sure to get in some good shopping. There are 2 good quilt stores in the town they live in and at least one yarn store about 60 miles away. So everyone take care until I see you again and go get some knitting done-ya hear!!

Audry II @ 500!!

I love Dutch Iris. Or as some call it, The Florist Iris. It grows from a bulb instead of a tuber, blooms only once each year and does much better in cut flower bouquets. The bulbs usually only make it a couple of years here in Oklahoma before needing to be replaced. I have not done that in the last few years so I am down to only a few blooming this year. But these beauties surprised me. I looked out one morning and saw them blooming out of the grass, where we had removed a flower bed last fall. I just had to run out and cut them all to bring into the house. At first they were all the gorgeous deep royal blue you see in the background with just the bright yellow just on the falls. The 2nd flower out of the buds a few days later looked completely different!! All the yellow tiger striping appeared out of nowhere!! I don't remember these doing this last year but then again I was working all the time and could have just missed it. I will absolutely be planting alot more of these mysterious Dutch Iris in the future and watching for the magical transformation to happen again.

This was another week with DH home again and stifling my creativity!! He is completely better after the surgery although he still can't completely rotate his neck fully yet. But he is going back to work tomorrow-Yippee!!!! Cartwheels!! Victory Dance!!! I would love to say I am going to get back to yarn dyeing, maximum knitting and lots of good long walks. But alas if we ever hope to get moved the packing must get done. And now we have a deadline to meet. We have a shipper coming on the 12th to take away almost all of the remaining stuff in the house. We will be left with just what we absolutely need to exist for however long it takes to sell the house. So for the next week I have to be a packing fool and the fun stuff will have to be done in wee amounts as I can steal the time during the day. As soon as the movers get the stuff out of here then I have to deal with all the floors in the house being replaced. I guess I just take my lonely wing chair and move it from spot to spot as they work and just stay out of their way!! The real estate agent that we plan on using gave us a list of things that need done to help sell the house. And a lot of it is cosmetic stuff that I also have to do cause DH swears he still can't lift a paint brush!! I have to strip the dining room wallpaper, pull all the ivy that is attached to the outside of the house off, trim the honeysuckle, rub scratch cover over all our woodwork(there is lots) and then use a varnish/sealer, and a few things I am probably forgetting. But does it sound like fun? NO Does it sound like I will get much knitting done? NO Does it sound like we will finally be actually moving? YES YES YES!!

Now for the little bit of knitting I did get done this week. I managed to get both shoulders knit on the aran cardigan but they are going to be ripped back out this week so I can tweak the very start of the saddle just a bit. It is just too wide across the saddle and the angle is too pointy. I spent one evening on each saddle so it is not a huge investment in time to get it right. I have had it on and the body fits amazing, so I want the rest to look as good as possible. I will also have to shorten the sleeves a bit but I have read several tutorials and am confident I can do it easily. Then just prepping the steaks, cutting them and knitting on the buttonband!!

I did start a pair of toe-up socks with some Plymouth "Happy Feet". It is a fuller yarn than I usually knit with so I can work with 60 stitches on size 2's and it is going pretty fast. No pics yet but maybe next week when I am past the first heel.

Now I did manage to keep up pretty well with Audry II. She has now passed the 500 mark. Which means I have used 1000grams of yarn or over 10 pairs of socks worth!!! Oh my-and I am just a tad over half way done!!! But she got to go out visiting again this weekend and got her 500 picture taken in several different locations. By the time she gets to 600 we ought to be in North Carolina, visiting the DGD's and she will get that picture taken there. Maybe at the beach, draped around the beautiful granddaughters, keeping them warm from the chilly ocean breezes!! And last but not least-I got my progressive round robin challenge blocks back. Oh my, they are just lovely. I may not have mentioned that the fabric I sent around was all Civil War repos but I gave everyone freedom to do whatever type of blocks they chose. And they all did choose very well indeed!! I love the way other people can look at your fabric and use it in a way you would have not thought of, or maybe were not brave enought to. There are several blocks where the maker used fabric for the background that I would not have imagined. But now it is going to make this project sing!! I am so sorry I do not have the time to put these blocks together until after we are moved but they are going to the top of my priority list. These pics are ones I have stolen from my DQF's blog. She got to go to the retreat where they officially unveiled everybody's projects and got these pictures there. I have been lazy and have not gotten my blocks back out to take a pic so hopefully she will not be mad that I slurped from her!!! I am pretty sure that I will not be getting back to blogging on a regular schedule any time soon. It is just to crazy with the move and I am not getting alot of anything done that you guys would be interested in. But I will try not to go too long so you all forget me!! Until next time-keep up the knitting. Remember-we must stimulate the economy by buying yarn!!