So it's Tuesday

Ok, so I am not up to much; finishing some last minute gifts for Christmas.
I uploaded a pattern for sale and a freebie on to Ravelry, the freebie is for a pair of slipper socks using Lion brand thick and quick yarn. The pattern calls for size 13 dpn's and you can feasibly make a pair in a day if you are quick, other wise a couple of days.

Here is a picture of one of the slippers, I made these for a nephew. They are so warm and cozy!
I completed a pink scarf as well, however I neglected to take a picture, silly me. 
I am now off to Jo Ann's to acquire more yarn for a couple more pairs of slipper socks for friends at my Thursday craft night.
If my enclosure link works, you will be able to access the pattern for the slipper socks here. 


Happy Stitches to you.

Feeling cold, punky and need motivation

It is winter, I have sweaters to finish and wear THIS YEAR. I am and have been feeling a bit punky (Possibly on the edge of a cold) for the last week and have no motivation; horribly I did not knit one stitch yesterday.
Today I am like the little ant who did not gather up enough sunshine before winter and had to rely on the lazy grasshopper, unfortunately I do not know a lazy grasshopper and need to look elsewhere for the sun and motivation I need.
The weather man did say there may be sun this weekend; I fully intend to take advantage of that when I find it.
For now I seek encouraging words, or perhaps just a "get over it and knit"!
Sinus medication, coffee, protein, now go knit, right.
Go me! Get those stitches going. (lame rot, attempt at a cheer, I was not a cheer leader).




Happy Stitches

Blank check for the president of afghanistan era is OVER!

On November 1st I wrote a commentary on fact checking, writing, talking and meeting with your elected representatives as well as how the President of Afghanistan is on the CIA payroll.
I did write to Amy Klobuchar, I have not yet heard back, however, breaking news on the stations is that the blank check to the Afghan President is done. 
I am elated, I hope that everyone that read this had written to their people and let them know how they felt about this.

Yes, he plans to ramp up temporary troops in Afghanistan, and plan to get them all out. The President is focused on a long term strategy and and solid benchmarks to reach this goal.

This is a refreshing intelligent and focused man, and I really have to say I am grateful after the last 8 years (this is my opinion and everyone is entitled to have thier opinion).

I say Kudos to stopping the Blank check! There is no solid proof that it EVER did us any good!

On the lighter side I am finishing a knitted hat and working on my many other projects.  

Happy Stitches to all

Thanksgiving 2009, more knitting and such

Sadie and I made it to Heidi's for Thanksgiving, actually the day before, we arrived on Wednesday. Blueberry (my niece Tia) was still here and we knitted together for a bit, I showed her how to bind off and she took her knitting to her dad's for Thanksgiving. Blueberry she is the one who called me a couple of weeks ago to ask if I could teach her how to cast on and knit over the phone. Funny girl, I had taught her to knit a couple of years ago, then she lost interest until earlier this year when I taught her mom, Heidi to knit and then started to work with her brother in September.
The problem created by this is that she took her brothers needles and yarn to make her scarf, so, today Blake, Heidi and I went to Mary Loues Yarn and Ewe in Mankato to buy more yarn and needles so he could start a scarf in a bright Blue he picked out, forgoing the cast on lesson, I cast on a few stitches, knit a couple of rows and he is working on his knit stitch. On my last visit I had picked up a pattern and yarn to make felted baby booties, this is the first one, not yet put together or felted.


 





Back tracking to Thanksgiving. Sadie and I drove down to share Thanksgiving in Mankato with family, and if you are wondering about DH, he does not like crowds and high volumes of noise which hurts his ears. Wednesday was bonding time with Heidi and the kids, we ran a couple of errands and then one of my nieces and her family arrived to help with the prep work for Thanksgiving, making salads and such. Thanksgiving was full of families and children. I had many little friends when I opened a bag of chips, and my two year old grand niece was adorable when she would say "bless you" whenever anyone sneezed. They are all adorable, even the ones who cannot seem to stay out of mischief.
A Connor update; he is crawling everywhere, pulling himself up on things, making all the baby gibberish sounds and said his first two words this morning. Connor woke up as my brother in-law was leaving for work, as he walked out of the bedroom door closing it behind him, Connor said "da da" Heidi said he fussed for a minute and then said "ma ma" which was when Heidi went and got him out of the crib.



Today we went to St. Peter to The Tangled Skein, imagine, a yarn shop I had not been to yet, there are a few and this was one. And it is off the main street in St. Peter.
http://www.thetangledskein.com/





 



I was wearing my fair isle sweater, which brought some great compliments. I looked at some adorable patterns and did purchase a couple of skeins Dale of Norway Helio yarn in Red, to make Sadie another little fair isle sweater, they take no time at all to make.

I am making progress on my red cable sweater, the pictures I have at this point are not as far along as I am now, but still here is the picture.














I have quite a bit more completed than what this picture shows. The color in real life is better than it shows here, I am looking forward to wearing it as I have worn the other sweaters I have made.


Today was Knitting Our World Together At a friends house, which I missed because I chose to stay in Mankato and watch little Connor today. He is so good natured and cute! he just ooozez cuteness.


I have dinner in the oven that I need to check (YES, I can cook, I just normally do not) Connor is fed and playing with his feet and now we go to the living room to watch the second half of a movie.


Happy Stitches Everyone!

Knit stories, to share or not to share the stash.

And now for our stitching amusement.
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So it has been interesting for me to hear other knitters talking about their spouses, significant others etc., being into electronics, computers, stereos and radios. Nice complementary hobbies, as they do not usually overlap. Can't complain about all the electronic parts with all that yarn stash hanging around and vise verse.
What happens if the person you live with/companion or husband get into yarn hobbies? Saw this the other day at the Yarn shop, a couple came in, both knitters and both buying yarn; he came in to the marriage with the swift and ball winder. After choosing their new toys (yarn) they were asked if they wanted it in the same bag, no they said they would fight over it when they got home.
Sounds like fun for them, but I have a purpose for all my yarn, it is totally designated, packaged even with the pattern of purpose.
My friend and I giggled over their exchanges and that we do not have to fight over stash! More importantly, they had found their local yarn shop, yes, Linden Hills Yarns.
The woman had mentioned that she wanted to learn cables some day. Jan usually says "I can teach you in five minutes if your slow." These impromptu lessons are if Jan has time and free, meaning no charge. Jan asked her if she had five minutes, sat the woman down with some yarn and taught her to cable. She was thrilled, her husband was happy and all was well. It is a good memory.

The night before last, Sunday night, my almost 16 year old niece called me to see if I could teach her to cast on and knit over the phone, her mom was working and she could not wait. Silly girl! I had taught her a few years ago, but she did not remember and she wanted a new scarf. We went on line, she on her ipod touch and I on my computer, we looked up good you tube videos,she watched and followed all video instructions and by last night (Monday) she had about 12 inches on her scarf. The problem came in when, one of her younger brothers, (who I had purchased the yarn for and was working on teaching to cast on) discovered what she was doing and began a squabble over the yarn, thankfully this was resolved by saying there is more yarn to be had and not to worry, it was not the last skein on the planet. I shudder to think of a world without yarn, what a nightmare that would be.

I guess my point is this, I am thankful I am the solo fiber enthusiast in the house!
and, we all know there are worse things kids could get into these days, so corrupting them with a bit of yarn is not so bad.

I mentioned to my niece that she could make a sweater, she thought socks. That is the other thing that me and the knitting people I know do not do, set limits. Why, when there is so much yarn and so many things to make. I remember meeting one of my knitting friends B.T. for the first time, she came into a knit shop by Nokomis and wanted to learn t knit and wanted to start with a baby sweater, she was planning on having a baby. She did as it turned out, get pregnant before the sweater was finished. A lot of people that do start with scarves we push along quickly, there are no limits, your talents are endless, reach! She used to sit between myself and another knitter saying she was going to glean all of our knitting secrets, because she knew we had a lot of them. This person is a very good knitter and has made s few sweaters, socks and hats for her son.

Have you had those moments when your on the phone with someone talking and you are both knitting or some other hobby? It's kind of bonding. Several years ago I had a friend who cross stitched and we would talk on the phone and cross stitch together. I knit and talk on the phone occasionally with friends. Last night while I was on the phone with my niece we discovered we were both knitting as we talked, it was neat.

I finished my pink cable sweater for the cable challenge a while ago and now I am knitting a Red cable sweater with Cascade Dolce'. I love the wool, alpaca and silk blend. The pattern picture does not do the sweater justice, and the rich wine color is turning out to be fabulous. I cannot wait to wear it! and then finish the umpteen other sweaters I have stash for.

This is my year of the sweaters.

Until nest time, Keep your eyes on what is right and Happy stitches.

Richfields Finest

Nothing says good morning like a mind bending alarm going off, the alarm service speaking to you through the panel, messing up the password and having one of Richfield's finest at your door less than two minutes later.

All I can say is, DH messed up this morning! then I messed up a minute later. A nice gift certificate from Linden Hills Yarn would make it all better.

This morning I was jolted out of a peaceful slumber and RUDELY awakened by The alarm telling me that it was armed and there was an alarm at the back door, before I could get to the panel, the hideous beeeeeeeeeeeeeep went off, the next thing I knew I was standing at the panel and the alarm company was talking through it, saying there had been an alarm and they were checking on it.
(Really? I'm not quite awake enough, was that the horrible sound I heard? Huh.) I said that yeah, DH had forgot to un-arm the door and went through it to go to work. The person on the other end at APX asked me for the password, which I do know, but, yeah, said the wrong dumb word. I did not make it to my cell phone in time for their back up call, after I messed up the password and in less than five minutes from the time the alarm first sounded, I am greeting one of Richfield's finest, who was of course called by the alarm company to check and make sure I was okay.
AAARGGHHH! Yes, me in my nightgown, traffic on the street and greeting the officer at my door. Good morning to me!

The first lesson learned is, of course turn off the alarm. Second, DO NOT mess up the password and then of course there is always the act of waking up looking perfect like they do on TV (ha ha).
I know believe there should be an instant coffee dispenser on the wall by the alarm panel. A few caffeine depth charges would have been nice too.

Now the day is at a close, the panel is completely reset and I I told DH not to touch, I would arm it for tonight! He is more than capable, but after this morning, I really just need to do it myself tonight.

The happy ending to this is that I do feel secure and after a few years of having the system I now know the Richfield Police will be here before I know it if I ever do need them.

In knitting I am working on a cashmere magenta lace crop top and a scarf, which I am going to work on now.

Happy Stitches!

Commentary

In a world with over six billion people, who are all so different in all the ways of diversity and perhaps beyond, it is not to wonder how there can be such conflicts and disparity of emotions and beliefs. What brings us above the rest of the animal kingdom is our ability to reason, negotiate and compromise.

Honestly, there is no easy out in this war, it began years ago and now we need to not only stand in it for the short term, but negotiate and work our way out. In the last two Presidential terms, it was Un-American to do and say a lot of things our founding fathers in their infinite wisdom, stated to be truly American. But history is unfortunately destined t repeat itself if we in our modern day wisdom do not learn from all that has gone before us. Look at every war we have had on this planet, what were they about? What did we learn? What came back to bite later?
To comment on that topic would take a book, not something I will do here!

One thing that is burning in my mind, that is not new to America, but seemed to become more pronounced in the last Presidential term, is the use of propaganda, or maybe some of us just noticed it more?
Did we not learn anything from WWII? How fantastically perfect did the propaganda machine work for the SS and the Third Reich? Look how it helped them to persecute so many groups of people up to and into the real goal of eliminating the Jewish population, it worked very well, millions dead, families ripped apart, horrible atrocities committed and sometimes with the help of the everyday people that had been brainwashed by same said propaganda.

Far too few people really investigate what they see read and hear in all forms of media in our lives. News flash people, News medias can be and are slanted in what they put out. You have to know where you can get accurate information and check it at more than one place.

With all the social networking out there, temperatures and emotions run hot with all the information floating around, and humans, such as we are do feel strongly about what we believe in. I have seen so many causes, using so many forms of media and even the ones we believe the most in can and do get caught up in the propaganda wheel. What most people do not realize is that those causes we add our names to, under the guise of petitions, go nowhere, they continue to circulate and circulate, the scary thing is if addresses are added, hm-mm, the possibilities for criminals there.

If someone sends me a video for a cause, I check out the whole story and all sides, I may believe in blind faith at times, but I do not want to be a victim to it. I will not pass on causes, I delete forward emails without reading; if you want to communicate with me, do not do it with a forward email. Nothing in a forwarded email tells me you are really thinking of me.

Propagating viral emails, videos, etc. is not doing the right thing for your cause, sometimes they are put out by other groups with hidden agendas. Now you are probably thinking I am in to conspiracy theories; let us be clear, I am not a follower of conspiracy theories, however, not all of those theories are far from wrong. Check your facts!

A few places you could go is to
http://www.politico.com/
http://factcheck.com/
and
http://snopes.com/
The first two are the places the professionals go and they are regulated for accuracy the third one debunks urban legends and is quite good as well.

I cannot stress enough, that no matter how much you are for a cause, and a video or some other form of media give you the spin you want, "To thine own self be true" check you facts before passing it on, unless you and you cause prefer to pass on lies.

If you really want to make a difference, regardless of how you and your elected public officials differ politically, you are still their constituent, be that small squeaky wheel in the wilderness! Call their office, set a meeting, be even more squeaky if they do not respond. They work for their constituents and making a solid rational case never hurts. Talk to all of them, go to the town meetings talk in a rational adult manner.

Remember, Rome was not built in a day, nor was any other city or cause worth standing for. If you live in Minnesota and yo do not know who your elected officials are, or how to contact them, hold on to your hats, because the State of Minnesota has a web site.

Here is the home page.

http://www.state.mn.us/portal/mn/jsp/home.do?agency=NorthStar

Here is the legislative district finder page, fill in the information and it will show you who represents you. Talk to these people, they have to know who is in their district and what those individuals believe!

http://www.gis.leg.mn/mapserver/districts/

This morning I found my own bit of information to investigate, why don't you see what you come up with as well.

In a commentary on Meet the Nation, it was said that the president of Afghanistan is on the CIA payroll so he will help us, Is it true? if so, when did it start? What if anything can or should be done about it? And what was the relationship between Binladen and the US in the 70"s

Here is the Commentary from Face the Nation Today.

Watch CBS News Videos Online


I have been writing to elected officials and investigating the truth.
Would this money not be better spent here at home, keeping our roads and schools safe? How about that mounting deficit? Health care? Poverty? Children in our own southern states living in horrid conditions and going hungry due to joblessness.

Do NOT take my word for it, investigate all the things I have said!

I always do my utmost to be truthful and accurate, but I am human.

Presently I am knitting a lace top and a Fair Isle coat, pictures to come when I make more progress and speak of them more.

Bu the way, Keep knitting our worlds together and Happy Stitches.

Procrastinated mending and knitting around

For a while I have been collecting mending and finishing projects, I had been putting off the mending for a while, but then the collection began to haunt me; it seems if I want to wear my fair isle sweater and not have the buttons secure, I would have to touch the collection and sew the ribbon to the button band. So there I was, table set up, sewing machine at the ready and I decided to make it a requisite to finish the mending before I could work on my sweater.
The mending is complete, I am hand stitching the grosgrain ribbon to my sweater, still in progress and I will finish it up today. The next thing is to pull out the knitted purses to line them with fabric for practical use. Yeah, I am making progress and the mending collection no longer taunts me, because it is finished.

Jenny and I have both finished our cable challenge sweaters, I have to say we did a smashing job, all the stars seemed to align and the heavens were with us.










Now Jenny is on to socks and a shawl, and I am working on my Vintage wrap and fair isle jacket. Yeah!
Yes, finishing my sweater was a part of the mending and finishing work I needed to do.

I made a fabulous vegan red lentil and vegetable soup, very good!

I have been of course knitting at Linden Hills and with the Nokomis Knitters and Yesterday was knitting our world together at Linda's, a very lovely time and great conversation.



Happy Stitches!

Runway knits trunk show and buttons

The Karabella, Runway Knits book and trunk show is now at Linden Hills Yarns. There are some cute things, I will be making a great wrap, which almost looks woven. I picked out a sort of frosty green Karabella bulky. This wrap is on size 10 needles so it should go fast.

Linden Hills is a drop off point for hats for the homeless, I should have one finished by this weekend to drop off. If you are interested in knitting hats, you may find information on the Linden Hills forum on Ravelry, or just stop into the store, sit and knit awhile.

Becky's Vintage button show will be at Linden Hills this month, October 23rd and 24th. If you like buttons or have been waiting for Becky to return, then this is your time; go gather buttons!

I have the body of my cable sweater put together, and I am working up the sleeves; I just passed the elbow. I want to quick get some small projects finished as well, so I am looking forward to some completed projects soon. I have a scarf and a pair of socks (on the second one, working the heel). Finish the hat and my sweater.

My next project is the fair isle coat and I may have to start my new wrap as well. Go me!

Happy Stitches everyone.

A visit to Mankato

I am spending time with my sister Heidi this week. The bonding time is fun and I am getting time with baby Connor, he is such a good natured baby, even while teething.
Connor has found his voice, he laughs and giggles while he screams and makes noise, from time to time he makes the baby talk garble.
Connors older sister Kyra is visiting for the weekend, she is two and is learning to talk.
my nieces and nephews are great to hang out with; it is funny how you forget about the teenage drama of youth, until you see it again.
Great bonding time with Heidi, no stress or intensity. It is funny about personalities, some people are just varying degrees of intensity naturally, they are not bad it just tends to stress out introverted types.
I am one of those weird introverts that steps into the extrovert as needed, That and a few other things about my personality keep some people from really understanding me, but, Heidi gets me!

I finished Connors sweater, here are the pictures.










He is adorable in it! now I need to get back to my cable sweater.

Happy stitches everyone!

All on a Saturday and before

Okay, so yesterday SB and I went to Rochester to check out the sale at Kristen's Knits, 25% off yarns and patterns. I found a great yarn to make the Faery Ring Cardigan, by Mary Scott Huff.
http://shop.maryscotthuff.com/product.sc?productId=2&categoryId=2
This is her picture of the sweater.













I am making this in a wine color, should be lovely. I scored on a Namaste Cali Zuma in eggplant, it was used and the magnetic clasp was broken, but fixable, happy me, here is a picture of the bag.







Now it is Saturday, I began the morning at a De-stash garage sale, pennies on the dollar for very good quality yarns, found things for myself as well as JW and SD. After that LS, KI and one of K's friends, who may join our Wednesday knitting group, wen for breakfast, then I was off to Linden Hills (of course) for more knitting. Funny thing is, I broke up with the owner of LHY earlier this week, because I acquired the yarn for a few more sweaters and told her I could never come back. KH said "she is breaking up with us", after questions on what they did to offend me, I had to say "its me, not you". I know, a tired and worn out line. I can't stay away, all the souls in the universe know I may need help with the Isager zigzag sweater.

I have now played Farkle on face book, scored over 7,000 and decided to get while it was good. A good example of how nieces and nephews can and do, lead you astray.

I am making progress on rydal, my cable sweater and Willoughby, the wonderful lace wrap by Jared Flood.
The pink is my Rowen rydal cable sweater, I am working it in the round until I reach the armhole decreases. The Blue lace is Willoughby, if you are able to see the white line at the bottom of the wrap, that is my provisional cast on, to work the second half of the wrap.

The ball of year with the double pointed needles sticking out and the blue and white piece hanging off it, is a mini sock made with road to socialism, Opal sock yarn.










Happy Stitches to you all.

Seriously?

Again, I was going through my stash and surfaced with the renewed knowledge that I have a lot of projects in process. How did I get here? Ooh, well, must be the excitement over new yarns, patterns and Ideas.
Mulling over this knowledge is the layer of news that, a couple of guys showed up at an Obama town hall meeting with assault rifles, The Vikings have Brett Favre, for a cool 10 to 12 million, and I am still shaking my head, hoping that really, really soon, America will pull away from all the voyeurism on television and regain some form of sanity. OK, I dream a bit now and then, I can admit it.
Now, what can I have some affect on? My knitting! So there we go. I am NOT going to try to stop two guys with assault riffles from attending a Town Hall Meeting, Ticket prices for the Vikings are going to skyrocket with the news of Brett Favre joining the team today (I had no input on the deal, I never would have been asked) and have not gone to a game. Americans will watch, what they are going to watch.
I have finished a few things this year, sweaters, socks, a shawl. So, many things in progress and so many things in the queue.
Linden Hills has put in many new and very lovely yarns, including Isager and a really yummy cashmere at a ridiculously low price. Lots of Isager, Classic Elite and such, but most of the cashmere was snapped up right away. I have some of the Cashmere for a gorgeous lace scarf by Jared Flood, in the new "Made in Brooklyn" booklet, the yarn is a beautiful Periwinkle Blue and the pattern is called Willoughby.
I joined the cable challenge, that Linden Hills is having along with my friends K.P. and J.W.. I am using a lovely felted tweed DK yarn in a Pink, and my pattern is rydal out of the Rowen book "The Purelife Winter Collection". The CEY Heron Island booklet has two things I have queued up and ready to go, the vintage Cardi and the bamboo tee. I printed the instructions for the Navdanya prayer shawl, and yes, I do have the yarns for all listed projects. I want to purchase yarn for and make the Zigzag sweater from Marianne Isager's Autumn/Winter 2008/2009 booklet ( have the booklet).
Today while at the shop, I was looking at some really lovely, self patterning German sock yarn, and found two Isager tvinni yarn colors to work a fair isle pattern I am floating in my head for socks.
I think I need a twelve step program. I have often been called a yarn snob, but Saturday it escalated to yarn geek. I was planning my cable sweater, I had the Purelife book and was looking at the felted tweed, need 10 balls, they had 9, doesn't it just figure someone bought just one ball. Jan the shop owner was calling around to see if any of the local shops had a ball in the same dye lot and I got to thinking, hm, I pulled out a composition book I sometimes carry for notes and looked through the pages, I had the dumb ball of yarn at home! I bought it to play with, Clear as day in my notes were the gauge I was getting and the lot number. Poor Jan put her arm up and slumped against the shelves laughing at me, and my friend K.P. whom she was helping, said, "Your such a yarn geek". Apparently this new label is something I need to own and embrace, I could not deny it at that point, after all, it was slapping me in the face.
I am excited about my new projects, I made my gauge swatch and started my cable sweater, a lot of stockinette at the beginning, but I am two inches in to it, about 5 cm and I need 24 cm of stockinette prior to the cable work, I have until December 25th to finish and take my sweater in for photographs and in the mean time I have to perseverate on my UFO projects, one of which is the lovely Corset tank top in silk by Annie Modesitt. That is a project that was going quite well and it was so lovely to work on, going back into the knitting bag tonight!
So little time and so much to do, yes, cliche, but true.

Happy Stitches everyone!

Bits of life

Life is interesting and continues to create learning, teaching and helping moments.
Here it is, the end of July and I have not finished the number of knitting projects I would have liked to finish. I may have mentioned that, I have several projects started and queued to go.
No progress on my Isager fan sweater, I had knitted too far, had to frog and it has been sleeping in the on the edge of the frog pond by the queue. I have been lacking ambition, but I am plugging away. I found a lovely baby yarn called cocoon baby, and fell in love with the soft green. I am working through a baby sweater for a great nephew (son of a niece), Green and Blue. he sweater back is finished and I am working up both fronts at once, nearly at the armhole mark, I will post pictures after I take some; I am keeping my eyes open for the perfect buttons for my project as it will be a cardigan as you may have guessed.
July 14th through the 18th I took care of my great nephew, A bit of work, but he is a very happy baby who does not cry much, just wakes up between 3:30 and 4:30am. a lot of feeding and care giving, not a lot of knitting.

Of course I have also been working on stash control, I can knit fast, but not fast enough and with the lack of umph, not so much progress, but maintenance required.

The fourth Saturday of each month one of the Nokomis Knitting ladies (Nokomis Knitters meet every Wednesday at Nokomis Coffee), hosts "knitting our World Together". During this time together, there is conversation, sharing of ideas and among the knitting projects are some chemo hats and preemie hats for donation. D.T. Usually brings a couple of neighbor boy who are bout 13 yrs of age, and are cousins from Arkansas, they are well mannered and polite boys who went with us and worked hard last month when we helped with a dog rescue. I was sad to learn that one of the boys families had to move back to Arkansas and the second boys family could have to do the same. Jobs brought them here and lack of such is pushing them back south, we were able to network and find job leads for the remaining father, so I am hopeful that this job lead works out and brings the other family back. I have to say that I am so impressed with the two boys, always polite and respectful all the time to everyone. Not that I don't know other children or young people like these two, but in this day and age it is not common place behavior for teenagers and this tends to renew my hopes and belief in humanity.

I have in the past crossed paths so to speak with others who share my name. coming across the name mix ups at two different clinics and two pharmacies, I was mistaken by name for one of them, by someone at a state representatives office, now the name has come up on Facebook. Interesting how these incidents continue.

Sadie is looking quite lovely, she was at the groom today and she is so cute! She looks so cute with the little bows in her hair, and with her clean sun dress she is adorable. Yes, I know I am goofy about my dog, but she is a great companion.

Today I am cooking up meals for freezing so all I have to do is reheat and that really works great in the summer. I like doing this because it is all from scratch and much more healthy, you do not get all the msg or other additives that manufacturers put in to prepared foods.

Several months ago Linden Hills had a knit along using Opals Hundertwasser line of sock yarn, many things were made during the knit along, such as baby sweaters, bags socks, hand warmers and such.
But I need to finish a small project and went on Ravelry to the Linden Hills forum where I asked for left overs and was offered left overs by a couple of people. Aren't knitting friends great!

Happy Stitches

An added Note

Okay, so I did the shop hop here in the metro area and was shocked, happily so, that I won the large drawing, here are pictures of the new additions to my stash! Very fun!

I rarely win any thing, so this was really fun to get, I think my eyes bugged out cartoon style when I saw what the woman in the shop was handing me. More fun to be had and projects to be done.

Happy Stitches

Here comes the sun

Ready or not, here it comes. Yes, summer will officially be here next week; I know I live in Minnesota, and live with the winter and can totally appreciate the coming of summer, which will be so welcome after the storms that hit in the last couple of days. Tornadoes terrorized Austin Minnesota, although Todd Park and the J.C. Hormel Nature Center were hard hit, lives were spared and the lovely summer weather will be here next week.
Humidity is not my friend, but it is the trial I face to live here, but extreme dry is no better, so live and let live.

I am knitting on my fan sweater, from the Marianne Isager book; "Japanese inspired knits." Working on the first piece, the right front side, about a couple of inches up from the fan patterning stitches in the beginning, but I am, of course rotating projects as well. One project is a pair of socks with the Opal sock yarn "Tonks" color, from the "Half Blood Prince" colorway line. This is the sock I frogged a Christmas time because it was too small for my niece and after measuring her feet increasing stitches and going up a needle size they will fit.

The new VERENA magazine (a European knitting magazine) is out, and it has a pair of lace, toe less foot warmers that I wonder if the little dancer would appreciate? I may ask, I think I have her e-mail.

Where were you last weekend during the first and original world wide knit in public day was happening? Will you be knitting and where during part two this coming Saturday? I was thinking of going to Linden Hills again and of course, the home of the Kiads.

Happy Stitches

New developments on projects and such

So Facebook is an interesting medium, I joined, have not done too much with it. I pick up messages and write back, not interested in the games and quizzes really. I do not care if someone thinks I am stupid and wants me to take the IQ test, I have had them done a few times, they are rather relative and I test out about 130 or so. I do like the availability of non knitting friends that I cannot reach on Ravelry.
I have a new friend on Facebook K.B., I met her through my sister H.S., K.B. has asked if I could make her a prayer shawl, I could make that. I told her to get my number from my sister. Normally a prayer shawl is just something you give so karmically I do not think it would be a good thing to charge for, except I would ask for the cost of the yarn I use for it. I asked if she wanted a traditional one or this.

http://prayershawlministries.blogspot.com/2008/06/how-to-do-navdanya-shawl.html

I rather like this one, the navdanya shawl, I may want to make one for myself.

I finished a little hat for a three month old and toddler socks, something to try on a visiting baby later today and keep if they fit. Now that my batteries are recharged I can take those pictures and upload them to post here.

So I tried my hand at making stitch markers and decided I did not like it so much, I do not want to practice to get the wire end twisted tightly, so, yesterday at knit night, I asked S.D. who makes lovely stitch markers if she would finish them. She thankfully said yes and I gave her the paraphernalia to make them and a down payment. S is undercharging for her work and I don't know if she realizes how much I appreciate her bailing me out in this endeavor, I decided that I would give her double her asking price for her time.

Baking is something I have not done in quite some time, today finds me working on a rhubarb custard type of dessert. My bag of rhubarb is thawing and I am trying to fold flour, powdered sugar and butter together to make the crust. Hmmm, not so pretty, but I think doable. Good luck to me.

Happy Stitches to you.

Keeping busy and catching up

Monday, June 8, 2009

Keeping busy and catching up

More pictures to post and GREAT! news. The socks I entered in the XrX Thionk outside the sox contest are going to be in the book coming out later this year. I am so happy about that and I cannot wait to see the book.
Here is a picture of my socks, modeled after southwestern pottery, I named them Aztec pottery.












My Severus socks are complete, I decided not to put the buttons on. The socks are a bit big and will make good bed socks for the winter. The socks were designed by Angela Tennent, who goes by H3Dakota on Ravelry.









These pink socks are a butterfly lace, designed by Evelyn A. Clark and supplied through Fiber Trends.










The last weekend of May was the yarn shop hop here in the metro area, seven shops were involved total and I, being the yarn fanatic that I can be, went to all seven shops both Friday and Saturday. I collected my charms and key chain on Friday, so that I could just focus on a good second look on Saturday.
the shops involved in the hop were; Zandy's in Burnsville, Three Kittens in Mendota Heights, The Yarnery in St. Paul, A Sheepy Yarn Shoppe in White Bear, Amazing Threads in Maple Grove, Cold Water Collaborative in Excelsior, and Needlework Unlimited in Minneapolis.
It was a blurry whirlwind two days and I had a great time, even with all the headache and allergy issues galore.
One of our knitting friends put her charms on a bracelet, but I am following an Idea Lisa had to make stitch markers. I visited The Bead hive in south Minneapolis and bought the accoutrement to make the markers. Below are a couploe of pictures of the charms and the key chain.











Just a small amount of yarn was purchased, a couple of skeins for bags, yarn for booties and hats for gifts, little bear pattern and yarn for gift as well as an adult and baby sock monkey hat kits for gifts. I completed the baby hat which I will be taking pictures of on a baby this Thursday for posting. Needlework Unlimited called me to say I had won their drawing and I picked up my prize which is a hand painted skein of Heritage sock yarn in Green with a pattern.

This is the Baby sock monkey hat.










I completed a Caribbean Blue cable and eyelet scarf for a cousin, I sent it to her and she called very excited and happy, she totally loved the gift.








Here is a picture of my Yellow cotton sweater, which took about a week/ week and a half to make.









Well for now, Happy Stitches to you all.

Thursday musings

Occasionally I wonder about the odd things like:
Isn't there a fine line between opinion, information and gossip, where is the line?
When individuals on programs spread propaganda, half truths and smoke, who holds them accountable? Is there an accountability?
Is news really news when there is repetitive hype involved?
Is downsizing and rightsizing really that, when the people left doing the jobs, are no longer able to do the jobs to a standard or efficient degree?
So many more things do I wonder about off and on, but if I know anything about anything I may know this; lines move, accountability can be rare, places such as politico, snopes, Libraries and others need to be advertised better, lack of services do not get fixed until the people who have influence are affected and, there is a part of society that is excited by hype.
The other night on the news, Don Shelby (I cannot quote verbatim) stated something to the effect of; the first amendment not only protects peoples right to speak, but it also assures that your opinion may be countered and objected to. This comment brought to mind something a co-worker once said, "you have a constitutional right to be offended".
I believe in our First Amendment rights, however, I am deeply concerned at times that we live in a society borne of highly intelligent and thoughtful men, and that too many in our society are not responsible to its constitutional rights and freedoms, in that they do not care to educate themselves, look into and find the truth that is overshadowed by the propaganda this world produces.
Children (at least a good share of them) are always worried about themselves, what they want and their needs. As adults, although we do need to have validation and needs met, we need to realize that we are responsible to help meet the needs of those people in our lives, especially the needs of our children and that we may and probably will not get all of our needs met. Yes, we need to take care of ourselves, but how many people consider others as they meet their wants and needs in life.
I feel that if I am a responsible adult in society, I will always keep my impact on others in mind, so that I do not interfere with the needs of others, but I do not go so far as to not stand up for myself. I am surrounding myself with people who I feel are like minded, we can be HONEST with each other and not be called abrasive or offend each other because, I think we are responsible adults of society who dialogue and make an effort to understand each other. I know, this is not the norm and to my dismay, this circle may only include one of my sisters. being lied to and manipulated is not in my list of things I want in a relationship, and I rest assured that removing someone who hurts you emotionally, physically, and tells you that they owe you nothing, from your life does NOT make yo a bad person and that it is not a conscionable thing that an adult would let their children believe that you are bad for that.
My mother NEVER even remotely fit the definition of mother (the reality was bad) and I finally had enough, she then had a severe degeneration into Alzheimer, this does not change the past or make any room to go forward. Sad? yes, but bad no. With the help and advice of my well educated professional friends, I am at peace and know I met my needs without infringing on her needs, because for one thing, I have several sisters who are close by and could be far more effective in looking after her.
My hope is this; that people become more considerate, investigate what they hear, even on the news or news programs, not propagate propaganda and think things through.
I do not believe that education is the only thing that makes you intelligent and there are well educated people without common sense, but this is across the board, and lack of education can and does hold people back in life, higher education should be promoted, it is important.
It is important that as we do not dwell on the past, we are mindful of it and bear in mind that it can and does repeat it's self and events of the past can be significant and influence the present. People can and do change, but their past behaviors, circles and events can be significantly important in the present.
Forgive, move on, but remembers in such a way as to keep yourself safe and events from reoccurring.
Enough of the thoughts, on to fiber fun.
I have been knitting and finished a pair of socks with Cascade Heritage sock yarn, (I need to post pictures of finished projects) this is great sock yarn and is a lower price point because it comes in solid colors, I was happy when Jan at Linden Hills decided to stock it. The yarn itself knits up smoothly, and is great yarn to work with, it looks great in lace or with cables, and delicate small cables in socks are rather lovely. I used the pink and made a lovely pair of socks with a butterfly lace pattern and I have been thinking about purchasing a skein of Gray to make a pair of Yarn Harlots Earl Grey socks, which have a lovely cable which pops nicely in the gray color. This would also be one less thing in my Ravelry queue.
I went through my stash of yarns and put kits together of yarns, patterns and books, so my queue of projects is set up and all I have to do now is to knit them. Yeah me.
In undertaking said task of putting stash into kits, I have unearthed a lot of sock yarn, I will need to find patterns and put sock kits together and just make a few pairs of basic socks one of which will be for a niece of mine using the Opal Harry Potter Yarn called Tonks.
I have been working on a ribbed cabled scarf for a gift, it has been my travel, I don't have to think about it and can talk while I am doing it project. Whew! Anyway I am getting a bit ready to be done with it, because it feels like it has been going on to long. i was thinking about giving it as a Christmas present, but as I have not traditionally exchanged Christmas gifts with it's recipient and I wanted to make it to cheer her up, I may just give it to her when it is completed. A happy Caribbean Blue scarf, I think it will be a cheerful gift.
Now to finish the shawls, sweaters and assorted other things in progress.

Happy knitting

A Great Day at Yarn Over 2009 and more

This morning KP, CF, JW and I went to Yarn Over 2009, which is being held at Hopkins Senior high School in Minnetonka. There were several vendors available, from local and not so local yarn shops. Some patterns were given away free, I purchased some clearance Louisa Harding yarn for a hat I want to make, (maybe as soon as I finish my summer lace tee); there was yarn from the March Hare, great stuff, one of our fellow knitters who used to go to sock club, maintains the Etsy store. My friend CF bout me a mug I had thought about buying, it says "knit one sip one" and "if I knit fast enough will I loose weight" a great coffee mug and a great friend. The scents of soap, cedar and perfumes were starting to get too be too much and I retreated to a seating area, where as I was getting ready to put on my whisper shawl, to combat the air conditioning, a woman came toward me and asked if I made the shawl, I did, and she recognized it as Suri Elegance yarn, for which she had created some designs, to my delight, I was meeting Sharon Winsauer, designer of among other things, The Dragon Shawl. She had just finished teaching a class on her snowflake shawl ( a pattern I have, but not the yarn), and would be soon teaching "Taming The Dragon", to go over the specialty stitches. Will have to give her a call when I finally purchase pattern and yarn for this, I have loved it from afar for a long time. Sharon has Alpacas and has an Etsy store, where she sells her wares. Lunch was at Fudruckers, CF and I split a meal, it was plenty of food. The burger was good, and it worked well, as it turns out, CF and I are kind of sympatical in our food likes and dislikes.











As posted prior to this date, I have finished my Fair Isle cardigan and have shown it over and over again to fellow knitters this past week, of course the real fianle was at knit knight when I was applauded for my efforts; a most proud momment in time. More detailed pictures were requested, so I am attempting to show just that in this post (Photography is not my forte). Happiness is a finished project or object, AKA FO. Last Saturday I began my summer project, a lace tee made with sprout cotton yarn from Classic Elite yarns, I am happy to say I am about two thirds the way to completion, my new goal is to be finished in about three days, Tuesday the 21st. Pics to come on completion of that project, of course I have a full queue of projects, so I will NOT die of boredom. Sweaters, cardigans, hats, oh my. I am working on a Blue cable and raglan Cardigan , I want to make the hat I bought the Louisa Harding yarn for, it will go fast. Socks are on my agenda, at least finishing a few pairs up that I have on needles, oh thngs to do, things to do, have to go knit now.

Happy stitches to all.

Fair Isle Winter Sunset Cardigan Completed

Here it is, I began My Fair Isle cardigan on December ninth and completed it last night, April 10th.
I am so proud of all my work and thankful for all the support and encouragement that I received during this endeavor.

Now I am on to a new project, using sprout, a cotton yarn. I began my summer sweater last night and hope to finish it soon.

Yarn Crawl, it's a day with the girls

With spring fever in the air and the lure of fabulous fiber filled day of decadent yarn porn, plans were made and a yarn shop crawl was in progress. Little did I know, one of our com padres would be a bit ambitious about it. I had put together a list of shops and with list and phone numbers in hand, JW played co-pilot to LS's adept piloting skills. LS seemed determined to make it to more than a couple of shops.
We made it to 5 shops and stopped for lunch in between them.









First was Amazing threads in Maple Grove
http://www.amazing-threads.com/home.htm
This was a lovely shop medium to large in size, neat and drawers for those balls of yarn that pop off the shelves. The women working were friendly and helpful, I found a great half priced hat pattern called "Arsenic and Old Hats" the hat is cute and the name cuter, so it was a must have. JW commented that I should knit it while watching the old Carey Grant Movie " Arsenic and Old Lace", have to find a rental.
there was a great Andes inspired hat kit that was perfectly priced, perfect for and purchased by CF. Other lovely yarns were purchased and we went on our way.









All about Yarn in Coon Rapids was our next stop.
http://www.allaboutyarn.com/
We were warmly greeted, there were bags and notions, small selection of sock yarns but a lovely little variety of yarns. The shop has tow seating areas, one near the front with a couple chairs and a couch by a fire place, in the back was a large table and what looked like a class was being held. This is an inviting store not as large a selection as the last one mentioned, but I could get cozy by that fire place.




CF had never been to the yarn garage in Rosemount which is where we went next.
http://www.yarngarage.com/
I had not been there since the commotion on Ravelry about it being reorganized, still claustrophobic I thought, one of our group wanted to buy a Namaste bag, had them get it down, really wanted the skein of yarn she had, but could not make it to her turn at the register, with the people and the confinement of the shop, time to put the stuff down and just make it to the exit. He does carry a nice variety of knitting and Namaste bags, a large selection of yarn and plenty of help.





Lunch was at Red Robin, always a great place to eat with the most savory strawberry lemonade, which is endless and your fries are endless too, I barely make it through the first serving of fries, have never been able to get more.
http://www.redrobin.com/










Knitter's Palette in Lakeville was our next stop.
http://www.knitterspalette.com/blog/
I locked onto a seductively delicious hank of roving for spinning from After The Sheep Fiber Arts. The fiber was right by the door and was in my hands before I knew it, it is called Butter Cream Panda, it is creamy whites and light yellows, is a blend of 60% Superwash Merino, 30% Bamboo and 10% Nylon. The roving is 4oz and I am hoping to spin it up for either socks or a hat (maybe Arsenic and Old Hats).
I purchased the roving as well as two skeins of a cascade superwash in a beautiful Caribbean Blue to make a scarf, a Christmas gift, thinking ahead and it is knitting up to be very pretty.

Our last stop was Three Kittens in Mendota heights.
http://www.3kittensneedlearts.com/
The front half of the shop has yarn and the back half is needlepoint, a moderate selection of yarn is available, there are three seating areas, two in the front with the yarn and one in the back for the needle point.
They have a few Namaste bags, a bit of sock yarn was purchased there. They offer a 10% discount on yarns to Knitters Guild members, so don't forget to take your member cards.

It was a great day. We were tired by the time it was over, but I think we could have worked in Zandy's and one other shop perhaps? Any way, my LYS is still Linden Hills Yarns, I enjoy loitering and knitting with everyone there.

Happy stitches and keep your sticks in the yarn.