Finished Blanket

Fluff post. I finished this blanket last week. I was thinking about entering it into the state fair but missed the deadline date. Maybe next spring at the county fair. I think that might be fun.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

402nd Post

I like to announce when I get to a 100 mark on my post. I noticed that I was nearly at 400, but when I got to 400 I forgot to announce it, so I'll announce my 402nd post. Close enough.

I worked on the veil again tonight. I took more than a week off, mainly due to my Grandma being placed in hospice last Sunday. I spent an hour sewing 20 three-bead pearl clusters onto the bottom tier. I am thinking about sewing 1 pearl sporadically all over the top tier. And I also bought Swarovski crystals from Joann's today. They are normally $2.49 for 10 crystals, but on sale for 25% off, which brought the cost down to $1.86 for the pack of 10. These are also for the veil. I was chagrined to discover another section of beads coming apart due to my ineffective knot tying. I guess I am going to have to break down and buy some fabric glue or something to glue every single end. I can't be wasting time resewing the beads on the edging because the nylon thread is untying itself. I'm starting to understand why people use GLUE instead of spending the time sewing the beads in place. I just like the idea of sewing. It seems like the RIGHT way to do things. I guess the right way for me also means the OTHER way is the lazy way. I should get that out of my head. Maybe fabric glue is just as good if not better, than sewing. It sure seems like it would take less time, and wouldn't keep coming unknotted!

I bought a newspaper today to get the Michael's 50% off coupon. I bought the pre-lit wedding arch for $15.00 plus tax. I was pretty excited about that!

I enjoyed crocheting so much the other day that when I was digging through my stash I came across a baby blanket I'd started but had never finished. So I started working on that again, put a few rows on yesterday and today.



I really want to be a good knitter, and I will continue to work at it. I know the more I knit, the better I will become. However, unless I'm doing straight knit or purl, it continues to be quite confusing to me. And therefore not as relaxing as I'd like it to be. Takes too much brain power, depending on what I'm trying to do. So for now, in my spare time, I'll see how far I can get on this baby blanket.

I'm pretty worn out. Good night.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Kitty Pi In One Day

Ds2 decided he wanted to knit a kitty pi for Precious today. Only he doesn't know how to knit, so he asked me to teach him. Only we didn't have any size 11 DPNs, so we had to make some from wooden dowels that I happened to have on hand from the last time I made my own wooden needles. But then I couldn't figure out to get started knitting in the round and shortly after casting on 9 stitches and not knowing what to do from there, I gave up, grabbed a crochet needle and began creating a crocheted kitty pi. Why I didn't write down what I was doing, I will never know. I pretty much winged it and it came out just like I planned! I doubt if it took me more than four hours. Ds2 did crochet several of the rounds, but he has only crocheted chains in the past, and so today was learning to do chains again, plus learning the slipstitch, single crochet and double crochet. We finally agreed on Hunter's Chicken (aka Chicken Cacciatore) for dinner, but I didn't really want to cook. He really wanted the kitty pi to be finished, so we agreed that I would crochet and he would cook. That worked out great.

I did use wool from my stash, the Irish Twist Yarn for Aran Sweaters, but I don't know if it was prewashed - I don't know if it will shrink and felt like the kitty pi is supposed to. We first read about kitty pi's at Crazy Aunt Purl's.

When I finished it, ds2 put Precious into it and she immediately began bathing. We had the kitty pi perched on top of a TV tray. It was a somewhat precarious, but she didn't seem to care much.







Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Why I Quit Crocheting in 1987

I was 22 years old and pregnant with my first child. I'd made a few items, the first was a blanket. It was a bit larger than I'd anticipated since 1) I didn't use baby yarn 2) I didn't do a gauge swatch. I also used cheap acrylic yarn, which was the only thing I knew existed all those years ago. I used a pattern of squares interlocked with hearts. I used the blanket for both boys over the years, it was great for laying on the carpet when they were tiny infants and then laying them on their bellies. Little heads lifted up high, looking all around the room. I still have the blanket, it is 22 years old! It's in nearly perfect condition, (I guess acrylic lasts just fine!) with only one piece of yarn which has been snagged and needs repair.

After the blanket, I made a tiny pullover sweater in yellow and green stripes (I still have it, but don't know exactly where it's at for photographing). I moved on to a cream colored sachet and bonnet. I bought a big bag of tangled yarn at the local yarn store, which was nothing like today's Local Yarn Stores. It was more like a super selection of acrylic yarns. I think this particular shop was called The Yarn Barn.

It took a long time and much patience to untangle that huge bag of yarn but I finally got it wound into balls. I began the sachet, which was fancy and pretty. I completed it, and started on the bonnet. The bonnet was also fancy and frilly. It was a very complicated pattern so much so that I had to go to the LYS and ask the professionals for help. I was close to finishing the bonnet. I was working the frilly top part.

I carried my crocheting in a Kmart bag. They had these heavier duty bags back then and there was a carrying handle on it.

Dh was helping his mother and stepfather build onto their home. We arrived at their house and they were scurrying around in a hurry gathering up any bags of garbage, on their way to the dump which was closing in about fifteen minutes. I tagged along for the ride.

We got back to their house. I went to the entryway to retrieve my crocheting but couldn't find it... I looked around, getting a bit nervous. I asked my mother-in-law and she started to help me look for it. I asked my father-in-law and he asked if I was sure I brought it with me. I knew I had, and he then suggested I was on drugs and had been hallucinating. I was very taken aback by this as I was 8 months pregnant with a huge belly for heaven's sake. I don't drink or do drugs so I was quite insulted. I then spoke with my dh about my lost crocheting, and he suggested we take a trip to the dump to see if we could locate it. But you see, the dump closed right after we left. There was no way to get into it.

I was devastated. It was so upsetting that I stopped crocheting for years and years. I mean like decades!

Of course, having a new baby probably took up a fair amount of my time and I remember not reading anything but parenting books for the next 3 or 4 years. We were also quite poor and I didn't really have the money to spend on yarn. But if I had not lost that sachet (all those hours!) and bonnet, I probably would have found a way to buy a dollar or two worth of yarn every couple of months.

I began crocheting again in 2003 when a friend of mine crocheted a very beautiful sweater for her daughter-in-law -- who promptly hung the sweater in the closet and never even tried it on! I began to long to feel the yarn between my fingers and soon I started crocheting again. I started out by making a huge blanket for ds2. I had never managed to complete an item as big as this before. I made a few more items, but by 2004 the knitting bug was beginning to gnaw at me. A bunch of my online friends were knitting up a storm.

I had tried to learn to knit every once in awhile, but I couldn't get my hand to hold the yarn properly so I didn't think I could ever learn to knit. After all, when you've been crocheting for almost FORTY years, holding the yarn a specific way... difficult to get the fingers to cooperate. But then I discovered CONTINENTAL knitting. One of my friends told me to try it, so I did. Soon I was knitting scarves and more scarves. All knit, knit, knit, knit, knit. I learned the knit stitch very well.

I crocheted another baby sweater for my sister who is 9 years younger than me, for her first baby. The type of yarn I used for that sweater prompted me to try knitting the next one, instead of crocheting.

I am getting better at knitting. I finally have learned how to tell where I am with this pattern. It uses the seed stitch.

I feel like I had a big day today. I didn't get much housework done. Doggone it. That means tomorrow will be full of housecleaning. I'm tired already.

[Correction to title made on June 9th. I had previously said I quit crocheting in 1986, but actually it was in 1987.]

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Hooded Baby Sweater Update

I've been jonesing for my daily dose of Crazy Aunt Purl -- she's at a book signing event in New York. So I've started reading her blog from the start. I'm up to April 14th, 2005. Anyhoo... it appears she names each item she knits. At least that's how she started out. She sure did a lot of knitting when she first got needledhooked. So I decided to name this item Hooded Baby Sweater.

I haven't had a chance to knit for at least two weeks - where does the time go? But today dh had to do some Home Depot shopping for his job. Sometimes I wander round the store with him. I always bring my knitting in case I find time to knit. Today I told him I'd like to find someplace to sit and knit. This particular HD has a couple of benches but they are right outside the sliding doors. So I sat there knitting, getting a cool whoosh of air every few seconds. Not often enough to stay cool consistently and I didn't even realize I was getting overheated. I get rather cranky when I'm overheated.

However, I did finish the front left side of the sweater! It took me awhile to figure out what I'd done last, but I finally did. Once I completed it, I cast on and started the first sleeve.

Dh was also looking for a stainless steel bowl to make into a sink for the mechanics at his job. They need a handwashing sink and he figures a SS bowl will work great, rather than having to go and buy a whole new sinkbowl. And he thinks stainless steel will work best since they will be able to scrub it clean with an SOS pad.

We stopped at the two thrift stores looking for one. Salvation Army had nothing of interest, so we went over to the other thrift store. Dh found a stainless steel cake pan lid that he thinks will work, for a mere two dollars. If I remember, and it works, I'll take pictures and show them here.

I also found some more yarn to add to my stash. I'm seriously considering making a kitty pi. Or maybe socks. This yarn is 85% Wool, 15% Acrylic. Patons' Totem. It says, "Patonised for maximum resistence to shrinkage and piling". Hmmm... guess no kitty pi for this batch of yarn. That little blurb probably means no felting? I'm quite strict with myself regarding knitting, as you might notice, I'm only allowed to have one project going at a time. I am overly prone to starting something and never finishing, so I could easily fall into the trap of having many projects on many needles... uh, it just occurred to me that I started crocheting a baby blanket some time ago, maybe a year or more and have never picked it up again. See that is what I want to avoid, so I'm only allowed to work on the Hooded Baby Sweater. But apparently it's okay to buy inexpensive wool yarn when I happen upon it.

So I'm still bothered by one small thing. The thrift store had another bag, a bigger bag, filled with lots of small balls of acrylic yarn; however, within the bag, there were at least 3 to 4 more balls of this yarn. The bigger bag was $4.00. I should have asked, but figured they wouldn't go for my getting the other wool out of the bag.

The knitting needles are size 8 and size 10 1/2. The shelf said crochet hooks $0.50 each and knitting needles $0.50. But when I got to the register to pay, the lady said they were a quarter each. So two new sizes of knitting needles for $1.00. Whoo! Luckily I don't mind working with aluminum needles.

The smaller bag of yarn that I got was $3.00. 9 complete balls. Each ball weighs 50 grams and is 370 yards long. Seven of the balls are cream colored, well, more like white with bits of light brown. The other balls are white with bits of light blue. Two of the balls are complete, and the other one weighs 25 grams, so 2 1/2 balls of the blue yarn. You can click on the image at left for a closeup of the yarn. I don't think it's beautiful, but I think it would make some nice socks.

If I remember next week to go by that thrift store and they still have that bag of yarn, I am going to buy it, open it up, take out the wool and donate the rest of the yarn back to them. Maybe right after I pay for the yarn, right at the counter. I think those balls are worth even $1 each.

They had a lot of knitting needles, but the two pairs I found were the only matching ones. The others didn't match, some were dented and one was bent.

For years and years I didn't crochet or knit. I don't think I've told the story here. Hold on. I have to run out and throw hay and collect the eggs. Dh is cooking dinner, ds2 is making chocolate chip coconut cookies (and I wonder why I'm so fat?) so I pulled chore duty. Back soon with my story. No wait, I'll just make it a post of its own.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

The Baby In The Baby Sweater

My sis loves the baby sweater for her little one. She sent me an email today, with pictures. What a cute little boy.

I did finally start on the new baby sweater that I'm knitting. I have about 1 1/2" done so far.

I also am up very late tonight, because I started on my living room redecorating project. I bought a "Webster" from the local Ace Hardware. They are regularly $8.99, but on sale this month for $4.99. I came home last night and took down all the living room cobwebs. We had an overabundance, and I don't think anyone has removed cobwebs since we moved in here about five years ago. Seriously. Hubby loves the Daddy-Long-Leg spiders, actually going so far as to stun flies and toss them up into the spider webs. I don't mind spiders, but these cobwebs were so dusty and filthy no self-respecting spider would ever dare to call them home. So they are now removed.

So the project I started on tonight... replacing the sad looking living room window covering. Yes, that is a mattress pad. ROTFLOL.


The valance at the top is filthy, covered with dust and cobwebs. There is only one blind, and it's filthy and dusty as well.

When we moved in here, we invested in window tint and tinted all the windows in an attempt to keep our place a bit cooler. It did help quite a bit.

Anyway, I found some really pretty navy blue material at $1/yard from Walmart, which I'm going to make into curtains. I completed the top valance tonight, but I will wait to share pictures tomorrow, when I'm finished with the rest of the curtains, and have the new blinds in place.

On the list for this weekend is the boys' bathroom. I don't think there will be any before pictures... it's really a raging mess... I am hoping ds2 will help me replace the toilet. I've also bought a towel rack, toilet paper holder set from Walmart, cost only $8.97 which is going in their bathroom, too. I also bought a fuzzy toilet seat cover and the little carpet that goes in front of the toilet on the floor. I can't wait to see how different it looks. Maybe I'll take some before pictures, which don't show too much of the mess.

Well, it's now almost 10:30pm and I'm exhausted, so I have to get into bed. I think I'll have some Ovaltine.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Face Cozy

Ds2 thought I'd crocheted him a face cozy.

I am having the dickens of a time trying to do Fly Lady. I tried and tried yesterday to get the kitchen cleaned up. I just couldn't stay focused. I did declutter two drawers. The bottom drawer has been catching and sometimes you have to jerk real hard on it to get it out. Well, I took it out and discovered that each metal piece on the bottom only had one screw each left. So I put more screws in each side and put the drawer back in place and it works great. I also took the top drawer out and found that the metal piece with the roller just needs to be replaced altogether. The roller wheel is broken and the metal piece is bent. That's why that keeps messing up. I have one more drawer in the kitchen to investigate. It's the other bottom drawer, and it gets stuck like the one I just fixed. It just takes a few minutes to fix these things. And then the drawer doesn't end up getting demolished from being jerked open and closed. I also have new handles for all these drawers. The ones we have now get hung up on my clothes. I found some new handles last year in June... I am one major procrastinator! Actually, what ended up happening is my MIL found a box of 10 drawer pulls at Home Depot on clearance for around $3 and they are the kind without the edges that catch and I want to use those. Now. If I only knew where I stashed them...

Anyway, back to the decluttering of the two drawers. They both had a lot of lids in them, some of the containers we don't even own any longer. So I threw most of them away. I do have a container with miscellaneous sized lids in case I run across the jars somewhere. The bottom drawer holds plastic grocery bags and the kitchen dish towels and wash clothes. The drawer is almost full of the latter two items! I love have plenty of dish towels and wash clothes. Of course they are all ratty and old, but they still work great for pulling out a new, clean one to dry dishes. So we are really making some progress. Progress being that they are actually clean, folded and in the drawer instead of stashed in a pillowcase somewhere.

Now... I set my timer for 15 minutes yesterday to clean the kitchen, and I could not stay focused. I am wondering if I need to lower my expectations and just try FIVE minutes.

I also confessed to my dear sister (who has been FLYing for years) that I am doing FlyLady. But I told her, "Shhhh, don't tell anyone, not even yourself!" Because I have this stupid thing about if my sister is doing it,then I can't be a copycat and do it, too. And I don't want her to be right that it is helping her. And I don't want to end up failing while she's successful.

I also have to finish up the bookkeeping for the little company, I have to complete W-2's, W-3's, 1099-MISC and 1096 forms today. Then I'm finally done with that until February.

I'm scheduled to work tomorrow, I'm trading days this week. I might even take off a couple of days.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Baby Sweater Finally Finished!

Ohhhhh... I haven't blogged since Monday... first an update to the freezing cold weather I complained about in my last blog entry. I mentioned the frozen water pipes on Sunday, and how cold it was on Monday, but never mentioned the fact that we still didn't have water by noon that day. As it turns out, our well pump froze and cracked. The cast iron part of it cracked.

My M&FIL showed up on Tuesday morning early with a new pump and helped us get it installed. We had water again by 4pm. What a blessing for them to help us out. No fun being without water. Their pump also went out on them, but they live about 100 miles north of us.

It's been a busy week. On Wednesday I bought another sewing machine. It's a Riccar and I found the original receipt in its wooden cabinet. It was purchased for $156 by one Margaret Edwards on March 19, 1966 in Torrance, California. Coincidentally, I paid $75 for the machine, the wooden cabinet it sits in, plus lots and lots of sewing items. I will definitely be photographing all those items for a blog entry one day soon. The machine is currently in a shop, waiting to be overhauled. It costs $79.95; the guy cleans and oils and go throughs the machine restoring it to brand new.

Riccar still sells sewing machines and vacuum cleaners. I found their website has manuals to their old sewing machines. I was really impressed by that (many companies seem to abandon their products within a few years and finding a manual can be impossible). The manual was included with this machine, so I wrote to Riccar to let them know I could scan this manual for their collection. I got an email back that said this, "We would really appreciate if you can forward that so we can place it on our website. Hope everything goes well with your tune up; unfortunately most parts are obsolete due to the age of the machine. Thanks so much."

AGH. Well, I haven't updated my friends, but one of them is sure to tell me, "Told you so!" if it turns out this machine has anything broken. I don't think it will though. I think it is going to be a fine machine and a great blessing. The Walmart special will need to go back. Plan B is to haul out the old Singer my mom gave me years ago and pay to have *it* rehauled. But I really don't think I'll have to resort to that, at least not now.

Thursday was a blur... Friday another blur... and now it's 9:30pm and I'm still up. I did manage between last night and tonight, to finish the baby sweater! I plan to have it packaged and ready to ship on Monday. My sister's baby is 10 months old, and they live in Texas. I hope she will be able to put him in it for a couple more months at least. I made it to fit a 12 month old infant. I was almost done with it by November 20th, but then we had a bit of a crisis situation, so I was unable to pick it up again until just last night. Between last night and tonight I crocheted the buttonhole band, and the collar. Sewed on the buttons, tucked in beginning and ending pieces, finished the toque, made the pom-pom, sewed the buttons on the toque and the chin strap. It's really quite a sweet looking little outfit. I started this little sweater on September 30th. Geez, almost four months. But I took a 8 week hiatus. Too bad, my sister could have gotten a lot more use out of it... maybe. I will ask her to photograph the baby in his new little sweater so I can post a picture here.

Note to self: Never attempt to crochet with this yarn - Bernat Baby Coordinates Sweet Stripes - again. It is horrible for crocheting. The little strand of shiny material around the yarn gets hung up in the crochet hook every single stitch. It might work okay with knitting.

I wish I could be as prolific and as good a knitter as these ladies over at the Sweater-A-Month KAL. I will definitely be visiting this blog over the next year!

OH, and ds2 and I FINALLY got hoof trims done today. One of my milker's front hooves were so long she was being forced to walk crooked. Poor dear. Oh my, oh geez. I think the last time I did hoof trims was on October 2nd! That is far too long to wait between hoof trims. I usually try to get them done every 6 to 8 weeks. It is much easier to trim and keep the hooves in nice condition doing them more often. It has been sprinkling a bit for the past couple days, so it was actually easier to work on their hooves since they were kind of damp from walking on damp ground.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Crocheting On The Way Home

I am sure I've mentioned time and again my lengthy drive home. On the way home on Tuesday evening, I turned my two skeins of yarn into balls, and I got started on the rib for the toque. I learned with the first skein that the yarn would become incredibly tangled if I just pulled the center piece. I ended up having to turn half a skein of tangled yarn into a ball. This was much easier. Took me about 20 minutes per ball.

This yarn -- Bernat Baby Coordinates Sweet Stripes Yarn -- is the worst I've ever used. I am pretty sure the problem lies in the fact that I'm crocheting instead of knitting. The crochet hook manages to hook the little shiny thread that is wrapped around the yarn.

I'll be really glad when I'm done with this little outfit. I can't wait to move onto something to knit. Now on the way home today I got some more rows added to the rib of the toque. Actually I had an opportunity to crochet the rows that are white while I was doing the company banking. I happened to get in line with a new teller, being trained by another gal that I saw for the first time about two weeks ago. I was probably there for fifteen minutes. The training teller asked me what I was knitting. I explained to her that I was crocheting. A few minutes later, she needed "teller assistance" and a young man came over and asked me what I was sewing. ;-)

Then on the way home, I managed to crochet the blue rows.

Have I taken loss of my senses? Driving while crocheting?

No, dear reader. Here is the reason I was able to crochet on my way home on Tuesday evening:

There was apparently a fatality on the only highway that I can get home on. It is only two lanes going both directions. Traffic was held up on both sides for at least an hour.

I considered voting early in the morning (next time I will remember to vote by mail!) since the polling place was 4 miles away from home. But I had such a busy week ahead of me, that I decided to wait until after work. I left work late, and then ran into this huge parking lot on my way home. I had to go home first, (because I forgot my wallet at home!) and of course after sitting and driving for two hours, I had to use the little girl's room. So I got to the polling place at 6:40pm.

Today I don't know what was wrong on the freeway, all I know is it was backed up into a parking lot. So I thought I'd take the alternative route, (this is before I hit the highway which takes me home) which proved to be a lengthy wait, but gave me more time to crochet.

I finally got my asthma attack under control last night. I realized/decided what I was experiencing was an asthma attack. I started back on the Flovent and was taking a homeopathic remedy every thirty minutes which helped a lot. I am still needing to use my inhaler every 4 hours or so. I hope I can get this under control without needing to contact my doctor, who might want me to take prednisone. Although the last time he said I should take it, I told him straight out I wanted nothing to do with it, and he was okay with that. It causes some unearthly cravings and hunger. I am feeling pretty good about my eating and body right now, that's the last thing I need is to be on prednisone.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Real Men Eat Liver

My newest design over at Herd Queen Productions. Since I live with three men, I ought to know what "real" men can and should do.

I get a lot of opinions from the men I live with, just about how tough and manly they all are.

The story behind today's creativity... I thawed out the chevon liver and prepared to fry it for Monday night. I was supposed to soak it in lemon juice for several hours, to remove impurities and give the meat some texture. Only I never got around to frying the liver that evening. I asked ds2 to fry it for Tuesday's dinner, and for Wednesday's, but because I "didn't remind him" he forgot and I didn't have time.

I finally had time to fry it this morning.

You must know that I hate liver. I have hated it all my life. But according to Nourishing Traditions, organ meats are VERY good for us. So, I am trying to make myself eat it.

Note to self: Don't let chevon liver sit in lemon juice for four days before frying it.

It was not good. It was tolerable with the fried onions, but the taste was still coming through.

I asked dh to try it, and he absolutely refused. (He has tried turkey liver, and was surprised that it was not that bad tasting). He is usually a good sport and will try just about anything I come up with. And absolutely LOVES much of it, kefir for example. He LOVES it, while it makes my lips pucker due to the sourness. Even when it's mild!

Ds2 tried a bite and deemed it THE WORST thing he'd ever put into his mouth. Lucky chap. He didn't have to grow up as one of my siblings and then he'd know WORST from NOT SO BAD.

Liver in my family growing up, was HORRIBLE stuff. My mother would buy the cheapest cut, which was the mature beef liver, not the *baby* beef, which might have been good, properly cooked and served. It was my stepfather's FAVORITE meal and the side dishes were, along with the vein-ridden and dry tasting liver (sans fried onions):

• mustard greens (sans butter)
• cornbread (sans butter)
• black eyed peas (sans butter)

The four most driest foods you could put together on a plate... he was in heaven; the rest of us were choking and gagging down this torturous meal.

Found out some neat news today. My mother was married to the man for fifteen years but since she is currently unmarried, she is eligible for survivor's benefits. At the time of his death (a few weeks ago), he still owed her $25,000 in child support, and so she'll still get some compensation with the survivor's benefits.

I could never have attempted using Cafe Press with slow dialup. That is probably why I never even considered it before. But unfortunately, it feels nearly as slow as dialup with Cafe Press. They were having some site slowness problems, and it seems as if they still are. It takes better than half an hour to upload images for a new section, choosing items to sell, labeling and adding images.

Baby Sweater Update: I discovered yesterday that the 5 inches worth of sleeve I'd crocheted was missing two stitches from the foundation row. So I had to rip it out, and start over again. I'm at 6 inches now. I have to crochet even for 7.5 inches, then one sleeve is done and I'll be on to the next one.

Working with dh tomorrow, so I won't have much computer time. And I brought work home from my "real" job, so that means even less computer time. Waaahhhhhh

I was up at my regular time this morning, and was in bed late last night. I'm tired.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Baby Sweater Update

You might want to click on the image to get a better look.

I have the back done, the left front, the right front... what's going on with that right front? Oh. Dear. Me. Something's wrong. I guess I'm going to be redoing that right front for the third fourth time. The sleeve I've barely started on, and it will have to wait until I get that right front correct. Or could it be that the left front is wrong? Apparently THIS is what happens when you ignore the pattern when it tells you to end on the "wrong side" or "right side".

I'm making my fourth trial loaf of soaked flour bread today. I've also thawed out a chevon leg roast and chevon liver, for dinner.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Head Cold

I'm sick.

I think it's a head cold.

I should have stayed home and rested yesterday, but I went and worked with dh. I started sneezing on Saturday afternoon, but couldn't tell if it was due to the green chiles being broiled in the oven, allergies, or if I was getting sick. A telltale sign of getting sick for me is the "nose dripping like a faucet" aspect (that was happening). My tonsils were a bit inflamed as well. This could also be interpreted as allergy problems.

It's always hard for me to tell if I'm getting sick. I don't get sick-sick very often. The last time I was out sick from work was the summer of 2002. I have coworkers that are out every month or every other month, with a cold or flu. Ds2 is JEALOUS that I'm sick. He thinks my whining, "I'm miserable, my nose is running, I think I have a fever" is bragging. He was having the same symptoms on Saturday afternoon. Sneezing mainly. So he was pretty much overjoyed when he woke up yesterday morning and felt crappy. I went off to work with dh, ds2 took a long nap, and woke up feeling great.

When I told him taking a nap is one of the WORST things you can do if you want to continue to get sicker. LOL.

While dh was talking to his sister, and later in the day, his mother, I actually managed to make some progress on the baby sweater. The last time I was able to make any significant progress was on October 2nd. The part I'm working on is the back. I am currently "shaping the armholes" and I have to continue until this section is 5" long.

I've always had some confusion about the "WS" versus the "RS". WS = Wrong Side. RS = Right Side. As in, "...ending with a WS row."

Yesterday I painted a deck using the sprayer. It was kind of a nightmare, since the wind kept blowing. I ended up with several areas of overspray.

Note to self: Listen to what you've always heard all your life. You CANNOT spray a formerly painted surface with *stain*. The stain will drip off the painted surfaces.

Yes. I can't believe I did that. But I did. I actually went ahead and painted an already painted surface with STAIN. I actually ended up making it look okay, but I hope it's not peeling off today, or won't peel off the next time it rains.


I'm making some soup for myself. I sauted some onions and garlic and wow, the onions were strong. I had to continue with peeling my garlic with my eyes closed. I found myself using techniques I've learned about for people who are blind. For example, keeping the sharp edge of the knife away from me. I am using a chevon back. We'll see how this turns out. I'm also thinking yellow squash, zucchini squash, carrots, leeks, and okra. I wonder if we have barley... that would be perfect. I'd be making a gumbo sort of soup.

I have so much to do today, but I'm steeling myself against doing any of it that isn't absolutely necessary. I'm going to take a nap here soon. My back has finally unstiffened from last night and I'm tired.

I made some comfort food for myself, which was partly good and partly bad. I don't believe that regular semolina spaghetti is very nutritious. But butter and freshly crushed garlic are. I also had two carrots, steamed, for the Vitamin A. That's what my mom always tells me to have when I've got a throat thing going on... cooked carrots with butter. My tonsils actually feel less inflamed this morning.

I started taking goldenseal/echinachea tincture on Saturday when I first started sneezing, just in case, to strengthen my immune system. I am still taking that, plus gargling with strong salt water. My MIL reminded me to put some cayenne pepper in the water. I don't think this is going to last long, but I know I need to have extra rest to give my body the chance to heal itself.

Off to nap.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Cotyledons In My Garden

cotyledon. (n.d.). The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Retrieved October 09, 2006, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/search?r=2&q=cotyledon Pronunciation[kot-l-eed-n] noun Botany 1. the primary or rudimentary leaf of the embryo of seed plants.

Okay, lesson over for the day. My garden bed has sprouted hundreds of Malva parviflora cotyledons. The little leaves are heart shaped. I was not sure what they were at first, but then I found one with the first true leaf, a tiny rendition of a full sized leaf. I googled and found this site which describes the heart shape and shows a picture of the cotyledon. I will need to spend some time weeding these babies out.

I also spotted carrots, beets, lettuce and lots of radishes. My dh is going to put up the secondary fence tomorrow. In the following picture, you can see the radish cotyledons popped up all over the place.

Here is a closeup of the weed cotyledons.

I crocheted for a few minutes on the baby sweater while dh was loading ten bales of hay into the back of the truck. I am finished with the first section and had hoped to work on the next section, but never got around to it today.

I did get to take a short nap today, and now I'm up late. That's not how it's supposed to work! Take a nap, go to bed at the same time to catch up on sleep. I read a book many years ago that said sleep works like a savings account. People can only deplete the account for so long before they have to replenish it. That is why people sleep late on the weekends, to catch up on the sleep they missed during the week. At least that is what the book said. I wish I could remember the title of it.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Thinking And Not Crocheting

I've looked all around for my crochet hook, but have not found it yet. I know I have at least two other sized "F" hooks and so I took a look round my bedroom for them. No luck. I really felt like crocheting tonight. It's a little bit scary for me because I can lose interest quickly. I don't want to lose interest. I can't believe I might have to BUY another hook on Friday.

Since I couldn't crochet, I focused my attention on something, which I cannot disclose tonight since someone in my family might read my blog and discover what I did.

I thought and thought and thought while doing the secret something, trying to decide what I could blog about, but nothing came to mind. I could have written about something neat and cute I saw the young pretty rooster do the other day, but I want to take a picture of him to include with the blog, so that will have to wait.

Oh, here's one tidbit of news. There are little green babies peeking their heads up in my garden bed. I am pretty sure some are radishes, but there look to be a lot of weeds, too.

I am very tired tonight, so I guess I will just call it a night.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Lost My Hook!

I've lost my crochet hook! I don't have time to crochet tonight anyway, and I learned it was lost this morning on my way to work when I was wondering if I could sneak in a few stitches while sitting in rush hour parking lot. I mean traffic. Uh, so I guess it was for my own good that I didn't find it this morning.

I also felt a bit more hopeful about my garden last night. I think if I can pound t-posts into each corner of the garden and then wrap chicken wire around the posts, and attach the chicken wire embedded in the dirt up into the chicken wire that is around the posts, maybe I can prevent the gophers from getting into that bed. Only problem is it is going to be like Fort Knox getting into my own garden bed to weed, harvest, etc.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

My Fall Garden

I woke up this morning and remembered that not too many years ago, I woke up every morning without an ounce of pain. Now it's pretty much routine for me to wake up stiff and aching. I'm not sure why, if it's the extra weight, the exercise, the extra work. I hope eventually the pain will subside. I mean, it's not incredible, unbearable pain. It's just uncomfortable, and not normal. Or maybe it is just growing old.

I drove the route we took on the bikes last night. It was 5 and 7/10ths of a mile! It's not too hard to get that kind of distance out here, since there are long, long roads with miles between stop signs, and no signals at all. At least not out in our area. We went north on the main road that goes by our property about 1/2 mile, then east for about 2 miles, then south for about 1/2 mile and then west again, through a neighborhood area which eventually took us back to the main road that we live on. The first little stretch is downhill, the next two miles are downhill - this is just the slightest grade, but enough that you can definitely feel it when bike riding. The next 1/2 mile is uphill, as was the next 2 miles. And the wind was blowing. Not too hard, but enough that you could feel it.

I realized while riding yesterday that it makes sense for what is uphill and downhill, if you take into consideration the flood control: the canals, the washes.

Ds2 helped me with hoof trims yesterday morning and this morning. The last ones we did were on July 30th and we didn't trim the herd sire's hooves. His don't seem to grow as fast as the does. We have two bucks, the other is a Nigerian Dwarf and he almost never needs hoof trims. I probably did his six months ago and his hooves were barely overgrown. Wish I could somehow pull his genetics for feet into our herd.

We did fourteen sets of hooves. We also gave everyone a shot of BOSE, and took girth measurements on them all. I'm still trying to do things to increase milk production. Everyone has stayed about the same. BOSE is given for selenium deficiency, and we live in a deficient area so we give shots every six months or so. It can also cause milk production to drop.

L's milk production went from 2 pounds one day to 3 pounds the next day. She used to give 5-8 pounds, so she is still down. They are supposed to increase every year, not go down!

Here is my progress on the baby sweater. I was able to put on a few rows while waiting for dh to throw 17 bales of hay on the back of the truck. I'm supposed to make this piece somewhere around 7 inches long. I'm getting there.

I put in one bed of my garden tonight. It has been over a year since I have tried to garden. I think it's been over a year. The gophers win every time lately. It's been a big fight out here. The first year, Fall 2002, I just put the seeds in the ground. The birds came from far and near and ate every single tiny green shoot coming up. So dh made a chicken wire cage about 18 inches tall to surround the entire garden. I managed to grow some that year. The next year we made a chicken wire enclosed garden. That worked for a couple of years, keeping out most of the birds (the smallest could still slip in through the 1" chicken wire), ground squirrels, ground chipmunks, cottontail bunnies. Until Fall 2004, when the gophers came. They took one look at the succulent goodies inside and burrowed right under the fencing.

I tried again last Fall, but had no luck. Tonight I just tossed seeds here and there... well I kind of tried to put them in specific places, but as I was planting seeds I noticed the dirt was also overrun with fire ants. Those cannibalized my okra one year. I put Amdro down around the perimeter of my garden, hoping it will get rid of the ants.

I am not sure why I'm trying again. It makes me sad to not have a garden. Here's a picture of my garden in October 2004.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Dairy Dog

LJ loves his raw goat's milk. Especially fresh from the goat. I shot these pictures this morning. We practice his sit/stays every morning and he waits patiently to have his goat's milk.



I did the gauge swatch with the "G" hook, but it was too big stitch-wise, so I started the pattern with the "F" hook. Here is how far I got. Ds2 distracted me for a while to show me some Matrix spoof flash movies on www.ugoplayer.com I was cracking up at the silliness.
And last but not least, one of our does is in heat and was flirting with the buck. We are keeping with our plan to not breed anyone. So the does will cycle every 21 days until about March and the bucks will go bonkers.


Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

The Gauge Swatch

It's official. Satellite Internet is so cool, so MUCH faster than dialup. I just counted off the seconds for uploading this image and it was done in THIRTEEN seconds. WHOO!!

This is my gauge swatch. I don't like doing them. I don't think many people do. I think most, like me, just want to get started on the project! But it's really important for sweaters. This evening's question is, "HOW important?"

My pattern's gauge: "15 hdc and 10 rows = 4 ins"

My stitches gauge is right on, but hold on... I'm using the "F" hook, instead of the "G" hook! I have always liked the "G" hook. It reminds me of my maternal Grandma. She used to crochet slippers for us when we were little, and she'd put a nice soft padding of material inside, and then she'd sew a plastic foot to the bottom. I can remember lining up to have her trace our feet onto the paper. She worked for the county as a court recorder and she always had foot high stacks of legal sized paper. We were admonished to NEVER look at the writing side as these papers were legal documents that had been thrown away - long before the days of document destruction and identify theft concerns, but my Grandma was quite the recycler. I'm sure to her way of thinking, throwing all that perfectly good paper in the garbage was simple horrid. She did live through the Depression, which I understood had the effect of making a person very frugal. It is interesting that I always viewed the writing side as the "back" side of the paper. The blank side was the "front". Now of course if I see a piece of paper with writing on it, that is the "front" side. The plain side is the "back". Even though I could read, I never, ever read the back side.

Now back to my gauge swatch... alas, my rows are a bit off, unless I do some flattening and stretching. Once I do the flattening and stretching on a flat surface, then it measures properly.

I went online to do some research into what happens if your gauge is right one way, but off the other way. I found this site which gave some great explanations:

Annie's Attic - Yarn FAQ

According to Annie, it's much more important for your stitch gauge to be accurate. Let me take the liberty of quoting her:
Q. What if my stitch gauge matches, but not my row gauge?
A. Of the two, the stitch gauge is more important. In a sweater pattern, for example, most patterns will tell you to work so many inches to the underarm, then so many inches to the neckline shaping. In this case, it doesn't matter if your row gauge is a bit off since you're working in inches.

I just realized that I have the option to "Show all" of my Blogger labels at one time, so I don't have to try to remember which ones I have already used. I wonder if there is any way to change all entries labeled with one thing to another, for example, how hard it would be to change "memories" to "Memory Lane". I know I haven't labeled too many posts with "memories" yet, so it won't be too hard to just change those few. "Memories" sounds a bit ominous.

As you can see in the image to the left, after the stretching and patting, I'm almost at 4 inches.

I did pretty good today. I had a good breakfast: leftover chicken breast with a red bell pepper and one zucchini squash. It kept me going without feeling tired. I managed to watch the movie I said I wanted to watch, about a month ago. Days of Heaven. It was a confusing movie. I am noticing more and more that I enjoy older movies though, rather than most newer movies. My back is still feeling pretty good. I think I'm going to take a bike ride with ds2 tomorrow morning. We have to do hoof trims one day this weekend; either tomorrow morning, or Monday morning. I also got through figuring out our finances and know where we are at, and tomorrow I'll write out some checks to pay some bills.

For dinner I made meatloaf. Of course I couldn't stick to the recipe. Thank goodness. It called for 1 1/3 cups brown sugar and it was way too sweet using only 2/3 cup. We also had frozen corn.

I think I'll crochet another swatch using the G hook. The yarn that I chose is a bit frustrating to work with... There is this thin shiny piece of thread wrapped around the yarn and it keeps getting hooked onto the crochet hook.

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

What's a Toque?

I have a new project I'm itching to begin. I have a new, okay relatively new baby nephew. He turned six months old yesterday! I sent a crystalline baby hand thing from JoAnn's as a present for my sister (it's a thing where you end up with a crystal fist which is your baby's fist?) I'm looking over at Joann's right now to see if I can find the thing. I had the thing in my possession for a couple of months and finally mailed to my sister. When she got it, it was all dried out so she couldn't use it. Anyway, as usual, I digress!!

I have so much going on, but this weekend I'm supposed to not have to go anywhere, well, maybe on Monday. And it's getting cooler, and that's when I start longing to knit or crochet. I'm a much more experienced crocheter, so it tends to be less stressful when taking on a new pattern. I taught myself to knit about three years ago, and only know how to knit and purl. I really should start remembering the YEAR that things happened, instead of trying to keep count.

Whoo boy, more digression. On to the pictures. OH. WOW. I just discovered that I can add more than ONE photo at a time with Blogger. I'm sure that option has always been there, but I would never have bothered to try it out with my slow dialup. It already took 2-3 minutes to upload one SMALL image, so no sense in torturing myself. But with my FAST Internet, which is working out WONDERFULLY so far, it's no problem!! I must go to www.dslreports.com and rave about my new satellite ISP. It was receiving LOTS of complaints, so we were a little hesitant. Did I digress again?

Here is the yarn and the buttons.


Since my time is limited, I decided to spend another $5 on new hooks, instead of trying to find the ones I already own. And I didn't even notice until I was taking these pictures that the hooks come with a tiny little pair of scissors. Cool!


And here is the pattern. The "toque" uses an entire "ball" of its own. I think the toque is the hat? And since it's for a boy, of course it will be in blue. Especially since my sister gets into that sort of thing. She would probably flip out if I'd made it in orange or green or lavendar.



Now, I must get off here for now. I have SOOOO much to do! First I have to tend to the milk, which has been waiting on me since 5:45am! And then I am not sure what I'll do next. I redesigned an entire website in about four hours between Thursday and Friday evenings. I have a paid for website to continue working on, the gratis website will get some attention as well. I have to figure out our finances, too.

One more thing. For days my lower back was horribly stiff for hours each morning. So bad that I have been scared that something bad was wrong, like a slipped disc or something. I wasn't able to bend over in the morning, milking hurts, I would have to lay down and stretch. It was starting to feel so stiff that I felt like my legs were going to give out. I even took Tylenol on Tuesday morning to try to help, which I rarely take pain medication. Yesterday we left for town at 6:30am and my back bothered me the whole day until 1pm. Anyway, of all things, I think I made the bed too soft. I finally figured it out yesterday, when I laid down for a short nap. My back felt like it was being held in the wrong position. So I removed the second foam pad I'd put in a few days ago and this morning my back is MUCH better. Either that or I threw something out bike riding a few days ago.

I'm also VERY hungry and so I must eat and get my day started!

Until next time.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...

Crocheted Dog Scarf

Okay, here's the doggie scarf I designed and crocheted. I even wrote the pattern down, and have crocheted a second one to make sure I got the pattern right! I sell scarves on the Internet and a dog club in Canada wrote and asked if we would be willing to donate something to them. So I created this scarf.

I tried to reach the lady who emailed me twice, and finally she got back to me and said she'd been away from a computer for three weeks. She finally gave me the address where I could send the donation.

Display Entire Post...

Back to Summary View...