It's All about the Quilt

Happy Spring all you peeps!! So much is in bloom right now. The yellow dandelions& daffodils, the pink flowering Quince(above), the purple of hyacinths and the white of the dainty Snow Bells and the deep purple/red of the redbuds. If the wind wasn't blowing so freaking hard I might be able to get better pictures. But here in SW Oklahoma, spring means wind so I shoot with the fastest speed my camera will give me and hope for the best.



Although I have gotten my planned knitting done for the week I will not bore you with pics. OK OK, 1 more of Audry just cause I worked so hard to get the shot. I took her out to our local park to show her the prairie dogs. The huge red boulders just seemed like a nice place to show her off and document her current size. Again the wind was not our friend. Every time I would get her smoothed out and get in a good spot to snap the shutter, the wind would get her all riled up and I would miss my opportunity. But finally I managed to get in one or two that look great with the beautiful rocks as contrast. Problem is now Audry is demanding she get out even more and wants to go to the wildlife refuge next week to see if she can have her picture taken with some spring wildlife!!

As I intended, I got my sleeves going on my Aran Cardigan. Did some Googling, found a tutorial that made sense and got both sleeves going at once on magic loop. The best instructions I found were by a guy knitting his first pair of socks on ML. Boy Who Knits must speak my language cause I had no problem following his lead. But as soon as I had everything going on the needles I realized as soon as I started cabling I would have to shift stitches around cause my ml was dividing my cables right in half. So I had to take 1 sleeve back off for a bit. Redistribute the other a little and put the 1st one back on, again fixed to have the magic loop come out between the separate cables. Right now it is a little tight to knit but I think as soon as I start the increases it will be a bit easier. And this way there is no doubt that the sleeves will both be the same size with the decreases matching all the way. I just hope it is worth the extra effort it has taken to get it all set up. By next week I ought to be quite a bit further along and I will let you know then if I grow to like it or have ended up throwing it across the room.



But as my title promises......Knitting does not take center stage this week. On Thursday night, my birthday by the way, my BQF came down from OKC to eat dinner out with me and then go to Scrappies, our stitch group. She doesn't get to come down often cause of gas prices, health issues, weather, you know how it is. But it is not unheard of for her to come and I was just happy to get to see her. We went out to eat at our new Olive Garden and ended up with our meal being free. Of course that was because the food was almost inedible but Carol really tells that one better on her blog so I won't repeat. Then we went downtown to our stitch group meeting. Everyone acted surprised to see Carol and happy to see me there on time for once. We relaxed, compared projects since last meeting and did our usual very casual visiting. Then all of a sudden Carol hands me a bag with what I thought would be a birthday present, say a ball of sock yarn? But what I pulled out almost brought me to tears. The group had made me a quilt top as a farewell gift. Cause of course we were supposed to be moving right now. But it is such pretty piece with everybody signing their block and some posting lovely sentiments about friends and/or quilting. I plan on hand quilting it and even bought the backing fabric today. It is such a bright sunny, happy(as Carol Johnson would say) quilt that I am going to make sure it gets a focal spot in my new sewing room/studio so I can remember my awesome Lawton friends every time I look at it. And for once I don't mind posting a picture I am in. Look how skinny I am!!!! And it wasn't to bad of a hair day either.


This weekend I found out that there is still alot about medicine and illness that I do not know. Very early Sunday morning DH turned over in his sleep and practically laid on me. It woke me up and I asked him what in the heck did he think he was doing. He commented that he was not feeling very well at all. Well tell momma what is bothering you dear.. "I am dizzy, the room is spinning and I'm clammy and feel like throwing up." I assured him that he better get his behind back over on his side of the bed and he was probably coming down with a virus. He did move over and go back to sleep until morning. But when he got up his symptoms were worse and he started to get a little worried. I still thought virus but what do I know? So he goes and googles his symptoms and ends up thinking he has had a stroke. Not likely I state, but who am I anyway compared to the God of all knowledge-Google. But a few seconds later he stumbles and falls which does start to worry me. So he says maybe we should really go to the ER. I throw on some clothes but not fast enough. He starts heaving uncontrollably and he hasn't even had any breakfast. Finally we are both able to get out of the house and on the way to the ER. He doesn't think I am taking him serious enough cause after all-he is having a stroke.... Now don't get me wrong, I was worried but not about a stroke. I was thinking more like brain tumor.....much worse in my mind. When he gets there he manages to continue to show them how sick he is by non-stop dry heaving til they take him back to an exam room.. The very nice and very good doctor examined him, got labs drawn, IV started and CT ordered in no time at all. They dosed him up good with anti-nausea meds and he just went right off to sleep. When the doctor came back and told him that he had Benign Postural Vertigo and what that meant I could see the relief come over him instantly. Then he did look over at me and say-"OK you were right-no stroke!!"
So he ended up taking a lot of anti motion sickness medicine, doing some strange exercises and taking an extra day off work. But he is slowly recovering and hopefully it will be just a one time thing. But at least if it ever happens again he will know what it is and not fall victim to "Google" disorder!!


Hopefully this week will be calmer and I can get a few more things done. I got some more yarn skeined up to dye today and hopefully it can go in the dyepot tomorrow. I bought the backing for the friendship quilt and would like to get it peiced and maybe basted. I aim to have my aran sleeves up to the elbow and of course AudryII is still singing her siren's song every day. I hope all you readers who live a bit further north will start seeing some of the color I bragged about today, if not outside then maybe in some gorgeous new yarn... Maybe I should try to dye yarn that matches all the pretty spring colors that are in my backyard, hmmmmmm do I have enough base colors to make that happen? We will see and maybe show you next week...

You Dye Easter Eggs-I'm Dyeing Yarn!!

One of my favorite signs of spring is the Bradford Pear in bloom. But somehow I never noticed that the smell from the flowers is not the nicest smell in the world. The other day I was out in front where our tree is in it's full glory and I kept smelling a slightly rotten meat smell. I thought maybe something had gotten into the garbage that was really rank. I stuck my head in all my garbage cans and they didn't have any odor to speak of. But on my way back inside I noticed the smell was worst right by the front door. Looking around the only thing different than usual was the tree in full bloom. So I turned my nose that way and sho-nuff, that was it. But the smell only lasts a few days and I still wouldn't trade the sight of Bradford Pear's in bloom. I just won't keep sticking my nose right up the tree. Well unless I decide I have to take close-ups of the flowers!!

The weather was all over the map this week. Everything from 17 degrees one morning last week to a high of the mid 80's a few days later. Luckily we finally got some rain, 1.5" to be exact. It was a nice steady soaking rain that will really start to green things up nicely. Of course the weeds are already greening up and taunting me from the back lawn. I've pulled a few but not much else has been done in the way of gardening.

Knitting is another story tho. I have done my share and then some. Audry II is growing by leaps and bounds. She is up to 211 squares when I took her picture 2 days ago. She is finally as wide as she is going to get so now I just need to keep doing straight rows across til she is tall enough. Which is going to take some time yet-maybe another 4-6 months?


I also have gotten the Aran Cardigan almost to the point where I have to do the sleeves. Maybe another 1/2" of knitting is all I need. I am dragging my feet a bit because before I can do the sleeves I will have to do more math and more spreadsheeting, more planning and probably more cursing to get the sleeves started. But it must be done or I will just have an Aran tube to look at next winter.






But the most fun of the week came when I was finally able to start dyeing yarn. My KnitPicks order came in last Friday but I knew I had to wait until Tuesday to do a thing with it. About the only thing I could do ahead of time was wind the yarn from the skein in came in to a ball. Then I could re-skein it into workable portions for the dyeing process. Finally on Tuesday I got out all my supplies, queued up the best of the dyeing tutorials, drapped the kitchen with plastic and got started. So far I have used 5 totally different methods and have gotten 5 different results with lots and lots of learning as I went. All came out usable and 1 even came out great. But each time I know I can do better on the next batch I try using that method. By the time I am done with this 200g of yarn I ought to be pretty settled in my methods and have it all down to a science. Of course it would be better if I was making notes along the way, but that would be so not me!! And I will pay for it I am sure. But Audry II will eat all my yarn samples and be happy for them. In fact all my hand dyes are knitted into Audry at least once. BTW-I was very impressed with the KnitPicks Bare sock weight yarn. Very inexpensive and held up well to the abuse of dyeing and knitted into my project like a dream

I finally got to the doc this week and he feels a lot of my current symptoms are menopausal related(I could have seen that one coming). So I got put back on HRT, stonger than what I used to take. But he is also very concerned about my thyroid. Says I have every symptom in the book, even ones I did not notice or attibute to anything. So he is doing a more thorough work-up on that than any of the other docs have. I have had the basics run many times and have even had them come back off the charts low and then a month later be normal when they re-run them. So if my thyroid in low then please let it show this time and if not-great. But it would be great to have a few things explained and fixed and thyroid would be a better explanation than alot of other things would be.

Well aside from having a birthday tomorrow and it being the first day of spring to boot, this next week will probably be the same as usual. I am trying to bump my walking up a notch since it is only a little over a month til the marathon(pretty much decided to do) and of course my knitting projects will be what they have been for awhile. I still have over 100g of yarn to dye, lots more ideas of how to dye it and Audry II whispering from the living room, "Feed me....Feed me....."

No Pictures Please!

I thought I would pop in and do a quick blog update for the week. But alas if you were expecting any pics you will be disappointed. I have just not found anything great outdoors to snap, the cats have not been the least bit photogenic and none of my projects have changed enough to warrant being showcased on film. But it has been a good productive week. I got lots of knitting done, watched a few movies, got some great walking time in and last but not least, did a little more packing up.

I have not sat down and watched much on the tube for quite some time. I just get too bored and restless to sit there long enough to get thru anything with any substance. But DH has been downloading movies that have not even left the theater yet. I don't want to know how so that when he gets arrested and hauled off to prison I can claim complete innocence!! It is all on his computer after all-my laptop is completely legal!! But none the less, I did get to watch a great movie, a decent movie and one I did not care for at all. First the didn't care for-Atonement. The cinematography was excellent but it just moved to freaking slow......it probably would be a much better book but now that I have seen the movie why bother. Next would be the decent movie-Enchanted. It starts out as an animated fairy tale but quickly changes to real life characters that are completely out of place in modern New York City. It was not a deep life changing movie but light hearted and great family entertainment. But the movie I really liked was Juno. It is the story of a quirky teen who gets pregnant and has to handle the situation in her own unique way. It does not glorify teen pregnancy in any way but a younger less mature teen might not see that so it probably should be watched with adults in tow. But it was a great movie with eclectic music, lesser known actors and a heartwarming story. Highly recommended by me.

I really did have a good knitting week. I finally got the Aran sweater back on the needles with hopefully enough stitches to go around me comfortably. When I frogged it I was at about row 65(?) and now am back at row 43 so no need to take pics. It really looks just like it did when I took pictures before only a couple of inches more in diameter!! The afghan is still coming along nicely. But at this point another 40 sq's won't show up much in a picture so I won't keep boring everyone with them. I got some great new yarns this last week from a swap partner I matched up with on Ravelry. She sent 15 10g balls of yarn and none of them were things I had here at home. So I have been busy working those into the blankie. The blankie has had a name change tho. The other day while I was out walking I kept thinking I really would rather be home knitting on the afghan. And then a mental picture of the man eating plant in "Little Shop of Horrors" came to mind. And I could hear my afghan saying "FEED ME" "FEED ME". So I immediately had to go home and google the movie to find the name of that plant. So now my afghan has a new name "Audry II" So right now Audry II is on a strict diet of 5 squares a day. Then I knit on the sweater in the evening and if I get enough done I can go back and do 1 or 2 more sq's for Audry. Am I the only person who's knitting speaks to them?

And one more afghan related item. I have decided to buy some Knitpicks Bare yarn in the wool/nylon blend sock weight and a crazy amount of Acid dyes. I am going to play with dying some of my own colorways to use in Audry and trade with fellow blankie maniacs. And if I can handle the smaller amounts of yarn for that I may try and dye enough for some socks. Whats the worst that can happen? Some butt ugly socks I guess!! Well enought for one night and back to the knitting for me........

It's Official-I really have 2 left feet!!

You would not know it from today's weather but spring has roared into Oklahoma. Last week I had one entire plot of daffodils bloom. After snapping a pic I brought them all indoors and they are still blooming despite the temps plunging into the low 30's and the wind blowing in the 40's (mph) that is!! Another few warm days and the Bradford Pear's should all be in billowing white robes. The other day I sat out on the back porch in bare feet and a tank top and came close to having a sunburn, now I need heavy sweaters and thick socks. I guess that's good being that I am a knitter!!

I am now able to reveal pics of the 4 day socks I knit for a dear friend on Weight Watchers. I am still blown away by the fact that I knit them that fast. I do believe I had a little speed boost from above. God knew Gail needed some warm fuzzy soft socks to wear this week while going thru more tests to see if her cancer is hiding any where else in her body.

I have long waited for a great way to take sock pics. First buying a set of sock blockers from a knitting store(not cheap I may add), trying to take pics while the socks are on my own feet(need a gymnastics background for that one) and trying to con someone else into being my model. Who knew that I could buy 2 left feet on ebay for less than 20$? Well they came in after I sent the above socks off to Gail but I threw my most recent handknit pair on and real quick snapped a pic and here is the result. This is exactly what I needed and maybe by the time I get my next pair finished I can have a better background set up and really shoot some quasi-professional shots.

And now for an update on my all consuming project-The Million Square Afghan. I am still totally in love with this piece of knitting. I knit on it everyday, sometimes to the point of insanity. At first I could only do about 4 sq's a day, now I do 6, 8 or even one day, 10!!!! I keep thinking that I will burn out at some point but so far the fire just burns more intensely. And even better? Someone on Ravelry started a group just for this afghan. In just one day there were over 150 members and it has grown alot since then. I set up threads for American swappers and International swappers so maybe we could all add to our variety in our stash. But so far no takers although some have talked about really wanting to do it. But it is a very active group even for Ravelry and so sooner or later I bet I will have some willing to participate. Meanwhile I keep buying yarn like it was going to go away tomorrow!! And I keep knitting like I will need this afghan to ward off this winter's cold!!!

I also got my new photo-editing software (Nikon Capture NX)this week and spent a fair bit of time messing with the options available on it. This is true editing software and not photo manipulation software. I know I have just barely scratched the surface of the learning curve but so far I really like it. There is a book out there that can be purchased to help walk you thru and understand the program in more depth than you can get from the pre-packaged user's manual. So next discount coupon I get on Barnes & Noble will be used for that bit of knowledge. And sometime down the road I will probably still want to get Photoshop Elements but with the rate I buy yarn it will be quite a wait!!

The Saddle Shouldered Aran is currently off the needles and the yarn back in balls. I just need to go in and make some minor adjustments to the spreadsheet and recast on with about 2 more inches of stitches in the body. Plus I want to change the plain knit 2's I used to separate the cable's into 2 stitch cables just to dress it up. Hopefully I will have this back as a current project by next week.

This next week should be a great one. Scrappies meet on thursday night plus this week I get a bonus!! BBF Carol is coming down from the city and we are going to go eat before the meeting. We haven't been face to face for awhile and since we are both homebodies most of the time, this will be a major event for both of us!! I get to pick the restaurant and I have been racking my brain for a few days. Lawton is so well known for it's choice of gourmet places to eat(not) but I have finally come up with an option and just need to let Carol know. Otherwise I will do the usual, knit, walk, clean, pack, ect, ect, and I will be back same time next week to bore you all with the details!!

Itchy Crawly Heebie Jeebies

Is my nose clean enough Ma?

This post won't be as long as usual. I hear lots of sighs of relief in the background so I won't feel the least bit guilty!

I really had a tough week without a lot of sleep. Out of the blue I developed the worst case of Restless Leg syndrome in the world. Oh heck-it was actually Restless Everything syndrome. Every evening when I would start to settle in to get some productive knitting done, I would start itching intensely all over my upper arms. At first I thougt "dry skin" and bought several new moisturizers and applied them liberally, very very liberally. Sometimes 3 or 4 times a day. And still evening came and I itched. Then I realized that it was not a normal itch, it was creepy crawly, almost painful. And then other things started getting crawly like my hair. So next step was to go by special hydrocortisone cream and sleeping pills. I got the brilliant idea that I would slather myself with cream, take some sleeping pills and be knocked out. Wrong answer!! I writhed in bed all night and had a sleeping pill hangover the next day. I already had a doctor's appointment scheduled for March so I knew I just had to figure it out myself or wait til I could see him. So I Googled my symptoms and the one thing I found was a possible over dose of Vitamin B-12. And that was only on 1 website. Most of the others say you can not overdose on B-12. Usually I only take 1 2000mg sublingual B-12 a day which works miracles for me in keeping away cancer sores in my mouth. But when I injure my mouth in some way I take more to help heal the sore before it gets out of hand. And so I had been taking extra. The good thing is B-12 doesn't hang around long so all I had to do is stop taking it for 1 day and the next night? No heebie jeebies or creepy crawlies.....just beautiful peaceful restfull sleep. So lesson learned about the B-12 and I will not up my dose indiscriminately ever again.

I did still manage to get a few things worked on this week. I got a bit done on the afghan but didn't get around to taking any new pics. At this point I probably only need to take pics every

other week or so or else it won't really look any different. I also got some knit on the Aran sweater but again not enough to photograh. I am almost to the underarm and will have to start on the sleeves real soon.

But I did do something pretty cool in my knitting world. It started Tuesday night when I realized I had not knit on any socks for a good while and that needed to be remedied. So I picked up the only sock yarn that I had wound into a ball and cast on my usual 72 stitches and did 2X2 ribbing. I wanted to use some garter stitch so I figured I would knit 6, purl 6 on row 1 and knit the entire row 2, repeating these 2 rows until I got to the foot. I knit a few rows of that the first night and was happy with the result. Now the magic starts the next morning. I always check on my on-line WW friends in the mornings. It had been a few days since one of our good friends had checked in and we were all starting to get worried. And for good reason. She finally confided in us that her doctor suspected that her breast cancer might have spread to her lung as there was a spot there. She was going to need a biopsy. I immediately knew those socks were for her. So I put all other knitting aside and knit pretty constantly until 4 whole days later I had a finished pair of socks. That is with Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock and size 1's!! I have never even come close to finishing 1 sock in that time let alone 2 and probably won't ever do that again. But hopefully she will love having very soft warm socks on her feet while she continues to go thru chemo as unfortunately the biopsy did not come back with the best news. But prayers will continue to fly to her from all of her dear on-line friends.

DH finally got to go to the neurosurgeon this week. And he is going to end up having surgery on the herniated disc in his neck. This is actually good news because the chances are very good that the pain will go away and the strength will come back by having it. The bad news is that he has to wait until April to have it done. He went to the most popular neurosurgeon in town who has a long waiting list and then the guy is going to go have knee surgery before he does DH's!! Darn guy wanting to be able to stand without pain!! And of course the end result is that our move has to be shoved back another 3 months or so now waiting for the surgery and then getting thru the recovery time. So it looks like I will be around SW Oklahoma just a little longer than expected.

Our weather here has been up and down for the last few weeks. But spring is so close we can taste it. My first daffodil should be blooming tomorrow and I have seen robins and cardinals returning to the feeders. This next week I hope to have a bit more done on the afghan and be working on the sleeves to my sweater. I want to do both sleeves at the same time on magic loop so that is something I have not done before. But that is what google is for. Don't you love the computer age when you can just look up about anything and watch a tutorial someone took the time to make just for you? And who knows-I may get another pair of socks on the needles this week since there is still a bunch of sock yarn waiting to be de-stashed!!!! But if I get started right now I can get 2 more afghan squares knit tonight. So off I go and see you all next week..

On a Dare

This pciture is the result of me not keeping my mouth shut!! I was doing some more packing this week and was digging around in the closet for things I would not need any time soon. I got to the dusty back of my hanging clothes and pulled out my hippy wedding dress. It was cheap when I bought it almost 32 years ago and has never been cared for anymore than just being on a hanger and drug from town to town as we moved. I decided to throw it in the washer and see if it would survive, suprisingly it did quite well. I happened to mention to my weight watcher friends that I thought I could actually fit into it after all these years. Well they kind of dared me to do just that and take a picture. So this morning, I donned the dress, set up the camera and staging(sewing interfacing over the window to diffuse lighting) and set out to make a self portrait. It took about 2 hrs since the lighting was still difficult with so much white. I just kept messing with the metering and finally got a few shots. So yes, I can fit into my wedding dress. But will I ever do this again-probably not!!! This dress will now be officially retired and given to my dear granddaughters to play dress up. I am sure I can get a much better picture when they play "wedding"!!

My knitting week was very very good to me. Last week I mentioned that I had to put the Million sq afghan on hold until more yarn came in. I only had to wait until Wednesday but then it came in droves!! I had been checking the mailbox everyday and finding nothing. I was expecting a Knitpicks order and 2 balls I bought on ebay. Then finally while I was out walking Wed afternoon the mailman came thru with my knitpicks order AND....a whole big box of yarn scraps from the Heathen Housewife herself!!!!! I could not beleive how generous she was and with what lovelies. The knitpicks order paled in comparison. Within minutes I had a new block on the needles and I have been cranking them out since. One day I reeled off 9 new squares. I think now I have finally used every yarn HH sent at least once and some twice. And the Knitpicks yarn ended up being quite lovely too. Of course now I am craving even more variety and have 3 more orders coming in. Still have a bit coming from some more friends too.

I am finally cranking on the Saddle Shouldered Aran. I can only knit about 8 rows a night tho. For some reason it makes my arms ache a little more than most projects. It may the extra work involved in the many cables that need to be crossed. But still 8 rows a night will have the project done well before sweater wearing weather rolls around again next fall. It took awhile but the spreadsheet format has started to click with me and the cable repeats are fairly easily memorized. So far I have only found one very tiny mistake, a purl stitch when it should have been a knit. But it is well disguised and I am sure not going to try to fix it. I am working on a fairly short cable circular needle so I can not "try" the body on yet but if anything it will be a little loose. Plus the steek would make it hard to tell. I can always make adjustments when I do the buttonbands to size it up or down just a little.

And for once I actually got some sewing/quilting done. This quilt top is the found one that I speculate could be at least 20 years old. I finished sewing on the last row of blocks, whipped on the border and today got it basted for quilting. Lexi just had to jump in and hog the picture. Crazy Cat.

I hope this next week finds me nearly as productive and accomplished!! There is still a bit of packing to be done although we got a lot more done this weekend. This is finally the week DH gets to go to the surgeon to see if he can get his neck fixed. I had to laugh when Sunday I was thinking about my busy schedule for the week. I plan on going to DH's Dr's appointment with him and I have my stitch group that night. That and the commissary and I was feeling a little pressure of being away from home too much. Think back less than 2 months ago and I would have had to add a 40+ hr work week and 4 hr commute to all of that!!! How I have adjusted to the slow lane!!! My only need for speed is in my needles!!! I will leave you for the week with just a few cute pics of the fuzz buckets. Both of them managed to be very cute and photogenic-much more than their human mommy!!

Christmas Stockings Perhaps?

Don't you envy a cat on a chilly winter's day? They can just curl up in a warm sunny spot on the rug and bask the day away. They can be right in the traffic flow and yet they snooze like a log. The best I can do is reach down and stroke his warm soft fur and tell him how much I love him. And in another bit of cat related news-I am happy to announce that Lexi got her stitches out this week and was declared whole and fit. What I thought was an incisional hernia was actually a seroma( fluid filled pocket) and will gradually disappear over the next week or two. She is feeling her wild oats now that the stitches are gone. I swear she has gone into training for the Daytona 500. She runs around the house and thru her tent at top speeds of catness and just wears me out watching. I tried to get a pic of her this week but she never slows down enough to even use my fancy sports shooting mode.

Well my knitting week has been fun filled and somewhat productive. First of all I finally got the 2nd fuzzy foot off the needles. I took a pic and as fast as I could popped them in the washer. They felted up pretty fast but alas, not very evenly. Just as I suspected in the very dark recesses of my mind, the different sections of fair isle felted differently. And it seemed like the 2nd sock got all the patterns that shrunk more in the round dimension than length. But I went into the project knowing full well I may not get a great end result so how can I pretend to be dissappointed? I kind of think they will make great Christmas stockings for the pets. And of course that led into a new idea for bigger felted Christmas socks for the rest of the family. But not now, not for awhile, maybe not ever!!

Then my 2nd bit of knitting related news. I finally got my pattern for the Saddle Shouldered Aran from SchoolHouse Press. Actually it is really not a pattern just some guidelines and suggestions. And the graph for the cables is handdone by EZ herself and not very easy to read even for a veteren chart knitter as me. So I sat down with graph paper, all my Barbara Walker stitch books and the handout and I planned a sweater with my own cables. I will still follow her body design since it is the reason I even bought the pattern. And the hints included I am sure will help me when I get to the tricky little spots I am sure to run into. Too bad it did not help me get those 212 stitches cast on to a circular needle and get them joined without twisting. I did this twice, got 5 rows knit each time and had to rip out. I was using a long size 7 Addi Turbo circular needle so I could do magic loop. I think that is why I ended up twisting. So I got out an old shorter size 7 circular and cast on and managed to get the join without twisting. Well at least I think. I am not knitting 5 more rows on it tonight if there is any chance in hell that I will have to pull it out. I need a fresh start tomorrow before I even touch the project again. But I do think once I get a little more done that it will be a relatively easy knit and I can have some pics to show next week.

My most cool knitting news has to do with Ravelry. I mentioned starting my Million Sq Afghan last week from a pattern written by the Heathen Housewife on her blog. I got my project entered into Ravelry during the week and never thought anything more about it. Then I got a Ravelry email saying Shelly Kang has added you as a friend!! I was so excited I immediately wrote her back gushing how much I enjoyed her blog and how much fun I was having working on the afghan. She wrote back and actually offered to send me a little package of sock yarn to add to mine. That is so cool and of course I jumped on the offer. I will have yarn from the originator of the project in my project for all time. I just wish I could gotten her some of my yarn to include but she is on the final week of square knitting. I did not get a pic of the afghan this week because I have had to let it rest waiting for more yarn to come in. I have orders in to 2 places and 1 more friend plus Shelly's to come. I hope I get something from that darn postman tomorrow cause I am really dying to get back to knitting on it.

I did mess around in the sewing room this weekend also. I got both my scrap baskets cleaned out and lots of quilt "seeds" cut. DH brought me in a box from the garage he said had fabric in it. One of those things was a little quilt top I must have been working on years and years ago. I just had one more seam to sew in the body of the quilt and the fabric for the borders and back are all there and in perfect shape. So today I sewed the last seam and got ready to cut the borders. I am not sure what I will do with the quilt since it will just be a small baby sized quilt. I just wish I could remember the who, what, where, why and when of that project. My memory is really failing me these days, especially about UFO's. But then again,maybe that is selective memory so I don't feel guilty about the age and number of said UFO'S!!

We had some awesome weather this last weekend, warm, sunny with just a wisp of a breeze. I got great walks in and had plenty of time to knit on the back porch while the cats played on the patio. But today is another story entirely. Windy, cold and misty all day. But even so I saw my first robins of the spring and then later my first Cardinal. So spring can't be to far down the road. So I will be patient, watch the birds from the windows, and bundle up more for my walks. And my comfy porch chair will wait for me when the weather improves a bit.

Finished and on the Feet

As you can probably see, Miss Lexi has had her surgery and has recovered enough to snuggle with her favorite pal. She really looks funny with her belly shaved and her stitches are still in so I wish she had been the cat in front but oh well, they don't care a flip how they look for the camera. Unfortunately I think she had developed an incisional hernia from being to active to soon. We will here the official news when we see the vet Friday to remove the offending stitches. If it is a hernia I am sure there will be another surgery in the near future. I think abandoned kitty's cost to way to much money. But who can put a price on a purr?

This week gave us a real taste of summer. Our highs started going over 70 on Friday and soared about 80 yesterday. I moved my patio furniture around and got to sit out and enjoy the sunshine every afternoon. I did some knitting and some reading while basking in the sun and watching the cats pretend to stalk birds. I even tried to take a nap but I started to worry that the red tailed hawk would come snatch my expensive baby so I grabbed her up and went in. I managed to get several projects finished this week. I completed the Di Ve' felted basket on Saturday and it came out pretty well. It is still a little small but the form is finally what I want. The yarn felted nicely but it used up every bit of yarn I had so the basket ended up being quite expensive for a cat bed. But she loves it and will sleep in it till she outgrows it. And then I will rewash it and use it for more yarn storage.

I finally finished up with the Cable/Rib socks. And as expected I had to use some substitute yarn to finish up with the 2nd toe. Luckily I had used some similar Jitterbug on a baby sweater project so I grabbed that and pushed through. I am quite happy with my design features and someday I will re-knit these with the intent of publishing the pattern. I have the pattern written down and saved in the computer along with notes I made to maybe slightly alter the next pair. They really turned out quite pretty and the difference in the toe yarn is not that noticable at all.

I have had a great time working on my Fair Isle Fuzzy Feet. This is a project I am working on to use up more of my Cascade 220 stash. I knew I wanted my fuzzy feet to be more densely felted than my last pair so I cast on more stitches and used slightly smaller needles than called for in the pattern. And with the additional yarn being carried across the back of the color work these should felt heavily and be very very warm. I am purposely mismatching every thing about the colorwork between the 2 socks. I am not a good colorwork knitter but I figured with the big needles and the felting, my foibles will not be noticable. I have no real idea if these will fit when I am done but I figured they will fit someone, somewhere, somehow. And if they don't fit me I will have a better idea of how many stitches I need to acheive the end result I want. I am working on the heel of my 2nd sock now so they should be done and felted this weekend, ready for a photo debut on my next installment.

And finally I fell in love with a project I found while voting for the Bobby's on Revelry. It is the Sock Yarn Blankie by The Heathen Housewife. I vaguely remember hearing about her project and how people all over were sending her their leftover sock yarn. I should have sent her some of mine but I quickly let the thought escape my mind as so much does. So now I have decided that is what I want to do with my sock yarn(and anybody who wants to send me theirs now that Shelly is done!!). This project is going to be my small take anywhere kind of knitting and will maybe take me forever. I don't have a time line or deadline in mind nor do I know how big I will make it. I have told myself it needs to be at least as big as a wrap I can drag around to keep warm in cold places so we will see if I can get it any bigger. So far I seem to be able to only do 3 sq's a night which is about right for the variety of yarn I have on hand right now. But I got some yarn from a WW buddy today in the mail and my fingers are itching to get some of it in my project.

I am also going to start a new sweater this week. As soon as the postman brings me the pattern from Schoolhouse Press. So I won't talk much about that now and save it for next week.

Well, other than doing alot of walking, packing and cleaning, nothing much is going on with the house and the moving. So I won't bore you all much anymore tonight and I will get back to my knitting. Now get back to yours!!!

The Hussy Kitten

Well-This week, the kitten that was supposed to be too young to go into heat? Well-she's not to young after all. On Friday she started to get just a little more affectionate than usual. But she started doing this weird stretching out pose and then it progressed into-tail straight up, ass in the air and crying for hours. Jack our old neutered male just looked at her like she was crazy. Crazy I tell you!! Of course there is nothing you can do on Friday afternoon but wait til Monday. So as we speak, she is at the vet, in a lonely cage, probably crying her heart out, waiting to be cut on. Well at least she doesn't realize she is going to be cut on. She just thinks Mommy doesn't love her and sent her to kitty jail. Boy am I going to have to make this up to her. But it broke my heart to think that if I hadn't taken her in she probably would have gotten preggers and she is way way to tiny so I am doing what is best for her in the long run.

On to projects: As for knitting. I got the new Cat basket finished this week and lo and behold it is too small for even little Lexi. All the changes I made, made for a better shaped, better looking basket but just a bit too small. So now it is a very nice colorful yarn basket and I will make another one for the kitties. The Cascade 220 is just awesome in felted projects and I can not beleive I ever even stooped so low as to use that old Lion Brand Wool. I am also almost finished with the Cable/Rib socks. Tonight I got down to where the toe decreases start. But I am definitely going to run out of yarn too soon and the toe will be a hybrid. I kind of toyed with the idea of submitting this pattern somewhere but until I knit a pair with just one color that idea is out!! I also started knitting a sweater with some yarn I bought over a year ago. It is Autunno from Di.Ve' in Dragon Flower. I got about 11" knit of the body in the round and called it quits. God it fuzzes and pills even when knitting. I googled the yarn and came up with multiple blogs where knitters complained of the same thing. When you knit something small and it does not get handled much it holds up OK. But when it is really worked with alot it almost felts as you go. And it had some horrible thick and thin spots which just didn't do it for me. So I broke down and ordered some more Cascade 220, enough to do almost any sweater so I won't decide until it arrives. I ordered it from Angelika's yarn store which has the fastest service in the world. Meanwhile I will maybe work on another basket with the dreaded Di.Ve' and see how it goes.

I really got going on some serious sewing this week. I already had a few blocks done for the final round of the progressive round robin. You know the one for the girl I barely know who moved to N Carolina? Well for a girl I barely know-I sure went all out. I already had the N. Carolina Star done with all the "Y" seams, 4 sawtooth blocks and the Tree of Life made with about a gazillion half sq triangles. Then while going thru the bag that all the fabric came in I came across the note she wrote with her basic instructions for the the project. She thought the fabric looked kind of woodsey and maybe trees could be worked in. Well didn't I just strike it lucky with my Tree of Life Block? Then I went thru my orphan block stash and found some very old tree blocks that could be used to fill in around the larger blocks. I kind of thought about doing a few more small tree blocks over the weekend but instead I found a awesome 12" tree pattern in a old QNM and I just had to do it. So now I am done, will do no more, have called it quits, absolutely will not sew another stitch. I am going to package it up and get it back to the last girl in the rotation to put her blocks in and she can send it to Diane to enjoy. And enjoy it I know she will. This project is one I would love to have and I can not wait to see how she puts it all together and quilts it.

I guess I did not take a pic of the Tree of Life block so maybe next week on that one.

I did not get as much housework or packing done this week as I should so I guess I better make up for it this week. I should easily finish the crazy toes socks this week and maybe work on another basket, start a sweater and who knows what else. Did I mention getting 4 new knitting books this week? Well Debbie Bliss's Knitted Teddy Bears and Marianna Kinzel's 2 Lace knitting books have been great buys with lots of inspiration. The 4th book was a new copy of EZ's Knitter's Almanac that I seem to have lost my original. So if anyone finds her give her a good home and use her patterns-please!!

Cat Tested-Cat Approved

It has been a cold and windy week here on the prarie. But I must be feeding the birds well because they stand in line to get to the feeders!! I have been having White Headed Sparrows, Red Winged Blackbirds, Meadowlarks and a few non discript finches. The cats love to sit at the back door and watch the birds, twitching with that special "bird" twitch that cats do. I have to go out no matter how cold it is and fill the feeders and add warm water to the birdbath, often more than once a day. Even tho I enjoy watching them come and go, I wish they would post just a little better for the camera. Or I could maybe spring for a better telephoto lens!!

Last week I mentioned that I was making a Kitty Pi bed for the above kitties. I was using Lion Brand Wool yarn in 2 colors, a blue and a strange green. I followed the directions to the "T" although I chose to make it in the 33 stitch size to allow for fat Jack to have room to climb in. I thought that I had a winner going when Lexi decided to lie on it before I had it anywhere done. But once I finished the knitting and felted it I was so disappointed. The Lion Brand Wool was not the softest yarn while knitting and felted-IT SUCKED!! It was not nearly as soft as my Cascade 220 felted samples, it was a weird fuzzy texture and picked up some sort of white lint that stuck like glue. Then the shape of the basket looked good coming out of the washer and I stuffed it tight with plastic grocery sacks to dry, but it quickly collapsed to almost flat and has stayed there ever since. But Lexi still sleeps in it every night if I put it on her chair so all is not lost. After all kitties aren't too fussy about perfection, are they? But I decided the overall idea was worth giving it another try. So this time I am working in Cascade 220, using up all my scraps. And I am altering the design just a little bit and hoping for a better outcome. Again Lexi is not letting me finish without giving it a test drive, or sleep would be more accurate. I should be able to finish the knitting tomorrow and get it into the washer for felting tomorrow evening. I just need to be able to keep Lexi out of it long enough to put the last bit of knitting into it. By the way-I learned another new skill. I can do an iCord bind-off now and love it. But on the cat basket it is lost in the felting so I will not finish off basket #2 with it. Just a normal bind-off for this one.

I also managed to get Cable/Rib Sock #1 completely done. I am half way down the leg of sock #2. They have turned out really nice although I would change a few little things if I make them again. My only worry is that I will run out of yarn before I am done with the last sock. Oh well, if I do, I will finish with a little bit of some wild crazy Jitterbug yarn leftover from a different project. It would sure make them unique would it!!

I also did some sewing this week, working on blocks for the final stage of the progressive round robin. The blocks I am working on now belong to Diane, Stevenson who is living all the way in N. Carolina. She sent quite a bit of fabric with one peice designated as "focus" fabric and another as "background". Other than that we could do what we wanted. I had blocks from 2 other participants to lend me inspiration so it didn't take me long to get started. I have done 1 fairly complicated block and 4 easy ones so far. I am now working on another very difficult block but should be able to finish up with that tomorrow. So I think I will save the pics to post next week. Meanwhile I will try to stay warm with toasty socks and cozy quilts. It pays to enjoy the fruits of your labors!! Everybody else hang in there-Spring is just around the corner in this part of the country at least!!