Life's a Stitch

Poor Gracee Mae was stung by a bee right above her left eye. I grew up with a schnauzer and a retired Naval officer Dad. Now there’s a combination. My dad taught the dog to salute. The will make sense, I promise. Gracee tired herself out saluting today, actually swatting at her sting for a good portion of the day. Poor girl managed to nap.

The guys disturbed a bee’s nest while excavating for their adult Lego project, the Allen block retaining wall around our house. Chuck keeps adding to the design and I’m beginning to shift from thinking of it as the big Lego project to construction of the Great Wall. Yesterday they moved a boulder using a series of pipes to roll it away. I now have insight as to how the pyramids were built.

I’m nearing completion of Mari’s poncho, a quick and easy project. These photos don’t do it any justice. Can wait to get it off the needles:

Caryl’s kerchief is blocking. This was an overall good project. I really enjoyed the beading part however fiddly. A one skein wonder, this is. An impressive gift at a reasonable price. There will be more in my future.

Afterthoughts: next time I would knit the last row in a size larger needle. I didn’t get the winged effect that is pictured in the pattern and I think part of that is due to the tight bind off row. Even with a size larger needle, with the beading, it is really tight. I don’t know if I’ve ever knitted something without “what would I do differently next time” afterthoughts.

After this first Koigu experience I am getting excited about the prospect of Charlotte #2. I will do this one larger, on larger needles, and will bead the edge instead of using fringe. It’s time consuming but oh so elegant.

It’s a typical Pacific Northwest day. Hey Sandy, look at my sky! It’s like this from October through June, mostly. Boy, dog and I just did our trail walk. Boy on bike, dog faithfully following. See soggy dog:

When I was a child my favourite book was about Scuppers the sailor dog (by Margaret Wise Brown). I think there is a similarity.

This kind of day calls for comfort food. Here’s my recipe for the best ever comfort pot roast:
Two or four lbs of round roast, rubbed with garlic and browned in oil. For each two pounds, mix together one packet of Lipton Onion Soup mix and a jar of junior apricot baby food. Place roast in dutch oven, and cover with “sauce.” Cover and cook in 325 degree oven for two hours (for 2lb roast) or 2.5 hours for 4lb roast. It makes its own beautiful gravy. Serve with steamed veggies and potatoes.
As they say in the real estate world: this is not a drive by. It may sound weird, but turns out incredibly well. We’re finishing with rice pudding; comfort times two.

Have to complete the day with comfort knitting. Mari’s Poncho is coming along. It will be perfect for days like today when she’s stuck with cafeteria food instead of comfort food.

I’m having fun. I try not to take on things that aren’t fun or cause undue stress. Blogging has been a very positive experience. Like other things in my life I’ve had to make sacrifices to keep it manageable. As a person who has some training in design it was a step backwards to go with a template style blog service. But with full time work, health, and life in general, it’s an easy way to accomplish a goal I’ve had for a while. Thanks to all who are reading; I’ve met wonderful people.

This blog is about knitting, so here is a progress shot. This project is a pleasure. Once again, Caryl’s kerchief:

We’ve just had another power outage and the house is full of blinky electronics. Just as it came on my phone rang and it was Jo-Anne, from Four Seasons Knitting in Toronto, with her personal picks of colours in Koigu for my Christmas knitting projects. That was a treat.

Chuck and I were reminiscing today about some of our more recent exciting times. The subject of his finger’s close encounter with the band saw came up. He says, “I didn’t hear your reaction when the kids came in to tell you that you needed to take me to emergency. Did you say ‘Just a minute, I have to finish this row?’ ” If I had heard this conversation elsewhere I would have thought someone was feeling neglected, however, this is his sense of humour and we both got a good laugh.

I’m searching for a yarn and I don’t have a name for it or know its content. I saw it once but didn’t have a project in mind. Now I do. Can anyone help me out? It looks like it has tiny balls of snow on it. This is like going into a book store and asking for a book without a title or author. Help?

My orchid has bloomed! In the garden my thumb is purple, however, I have had success with orchids in-doors. This is my Dancing Lady Orchid (Yellow Oncidium). It took three years to get it to bloom a second time, but now it’s into its fourth bloom. I’ve discovered the right combination of once per week watering, Shultz liquid plant food and a south-west exposure.

That yellow will look pretty with my progress on Caryl’s kerchief:

Bryant just came home from a school dance. Times have changed. Dance tickets are $7. There’s a cop at the door with a breathalyser. Bryant says girls sneak in alcohol in zip lock bags in their bras. Actually, his school is pretty tame.

Some things haven’t changed – the boys still smell good. Today it’s Axe instead of English Leather. I’ve loved having teens; a stage of life I thought I’d dread. It’s not over yet…

You’ve dropped a stitch. Panic or calm? Depends upon the behaviour of your yarn. I used to panic immediately, but now I know there are some yarns whose stitches will patiently wait for you to get back to them for picking up. Brown Sheep’s Lambs Pride worsted is a pleasure in that regard. Also Briggs and Little, as one of my knitting instructors said referring to B&L, “those stitches will stand at attention and wait for you to pick them up.” I’ve just started a Caryn’s Kerchief (from Foxyknits), made from Koigu KPPM. It’s my first Koigu experience and now I know what the fuss is all about. It is so well behaved, and good-looking, too:

Then there are those yarns that jump off the needles and run all the way home before you can even catch your breath. Some of those drapy, liquidy synthetics. Take one of those stitches off the needle and it melts before your very eyes. The combination of those with slippery Addi needles equals two steps forward and one step back.

I cannot get that song out of my head. It is an earworm par excellence. The clock made it home in one piece. It was actually taken apart and arrived in 20 boxes. It’s ticking and chiming at home in its third country in 147 years. Amazing. Even our resident Swiss miss commented that it seems a new family member ” ‘as arreeved.”

Progress on Mari’s poncho; it looks like a grey blob. A comfy grey blob:

Knit night was last night. While I was plugging away on Mari’s poncho something glimmery caught my eye. It was the GGH Fee I had seen in WA last year and have regretted not buying. It was the exact ice blue with silver that I’ve lusted for, four feet away from me. And now it lives in my house, happily ever after. Do I get too much pleasure from this? Of course the comment from my unenlightened resident boys was “It looks like it has dried blobs of glue in it.”

Oh well, I have a bored complainy boy here. My favourite saying is “Children who know how to read can never be bored.” What a mommy comment. Truthfully, he needs to go out, just like the dog, and get some exercise, so off we go…

I am home alone. This does not happen often. I’ve taken a day off here and there to rest up and try to get this heart beating to the sound of a recognizable drummer.

Bryant and Chuck are off to the States to accept delivery of a very special object. When Chuck was a small boy he accompanied his father to the train station, hours away, to pick up an antique grandfather clock. In his youth his father did chores for two elderly sisters in Denmark who eventually left him the clock. His dad told Chuck that the clock would be his someday. Today is the day. Chuck is taking Bryant to the truck depot to repeat history. This bit of family history is important because we live so far apart from anybody remotely related. This will be quite an adventure with the customs stuff at the border.

Making the decision to live far away from home has come with many consequences. We never had family members to help out with babysitting, the kids grew up without the company of cousins, we don’t run into classmates and childhood friends, all the objects of our youth were left behind… This has made me a terrible hoarder, especially when it comes to my children’s keepsakes. Home alone, nobody to attend to, I should be clearing through my piles of stuff. I can live with task oriented clutter but my closet is ridiculous. So instead I have accomplished some serious knitting, working on three UFO’s. I just put in a load of laundry to ease the guilt.

The continuation of Mari’s poncho:

That’s not the right picture – I deleted it by mistake – it has a few more inches on it.

Today’s rant – cell phone contracts. I am halfway through a three year cell phone contract. My phone has died. I didn’t buy an extended warranty because, except for cars, I don’t believe they are worth it. I accept the fact that I must pay for a new phone but I’m having a hard time accepting paying the charge for switching the account to the new phone. They get you coming and going. Our phone company is Telus. So, I went to buy the new phone with the $199 price tag and was told it would cost $249 because of the service charge. I explained that Telus told me I could transfer the account on-line for $10. He refused to sell me the phone at the advertised rate because I refused to pay $49 extra to have them set it up. He told me that I could buy the same Telus phone at a different store for $199, but that if he sold it to me his boss would deduct $149 from his pay cheque. He actually followed me back to my office (in the same building) trying to convince me to buy that phone. Bizarro customer service. Someone get me my knitting. Here is Bryant’s version (easier to read if you click on it):

Mari’s poncho to date:

Yes, that is anotoher “Very Harlot Poncho” from Yarn Harlot. I love that pattern.

Finally the autumn view from our deck – that’s the mist rising from the Capilano River:

Sometime a quickie knit is just so darn satisfying. An entire shawl in weekend, a poncho in five evenings… That’s exactly the case with my Trendsetter Dune shawl. I knit it twice in a satisfying amount of time. Truthfully it was almost three times – it was originally the Bias stole pattern that came with my Fiesta LaBoheme. That’s the one I stopped at scarf size because I thought it was looking baby blanketish. The second effort was the same pattern with Estelle Watercolors held together with Eros. The colour was still too pastel and one of my co-workers bought it from me. Third time’s a charm – here it is, the original bias stole shawl pattern completed in Trendsetter Dune. Complete in a week of evening knitting:

Second daughter was home for the long weekend. I was so pleased when she asked me to knit her a poncho. At first, her choice in yarn didn’t thrill me, but it’s knitting up nicely. I thought it looked reminiscent of my childhood dog, a schnauzer. Who can complain about $16.99 Cdn for a poncho that will be practically indestructo. Washability is important in dorm life.