"Properly practiced, knitting soothes the troubled spirit, and it doesn't hurt the untroubled spirit either." ~ Elizabeth Zimmerman

2/28/15

In Remembrance


Leonard Nimoy, born March 26, 1931 - died February 27, 2015






A man who had a huge impact on the world, on my world, in a wonderful way. I will miss him terribly.


Mr. Nimoy, I am and always shall be your friend.


Live long and prosper.\\//

2/26/15

Snowman Row Is Done

I can't believe I've finally finished Snowman Row. And it's adorable! I love it.

Click to embiggen

I started this project 8 years ago. I worked on it a little bit each year. I'd get all charged up to finish it, get one or two snowmen done and lose enthusiasm. But now it's finished! YAY! The pic above is after I washed and dried it, but I haven't pressed it yet. It was SO dirty from my hands and other little stains on it. The white stitches of the first three snowmen I stitched had actually yellowed. I soaked it in a bowl of hot water with a scoop of Oxyclean for half an hour and it came out perfectly clean. YAY!

Now, to get it framed. I've decided to have it done professionally cuz I don't want to mess it up after all this work.

Since I'm in a finishing mood, I decided to finish my Dogwood and Hummingbird too. All I have left is about two thirds of the background. However, I can't find my pattern. It was not stored with the project. Daughter Ruth and I have searched everywhere. So I've ordered another copy. I found one on Ebay, Should be here next week. I can hardly wait!

My knee is finally starting to feel better. I can stand without feeling like I'm gonna throw up. The swelling is going down and the bruises are fading. Hurray! I went out Tuesday and Wednesday. On Tuesday I went to Rathdrum Knitalong. I just had to get out! I'd been cooped up too long, and since it's only 5 minutes from my house... I was exhausted and in a ton of pain when I got home, but happy that I went.

Yesterday I got up and there was actually a marked improvement in the pain. So I decided to go to the monthly NISS meeting (North Idaho Secular Society). It was a very interesting meeting. My daughter had the day off so she went with me so I wouldn't have to drive. After the meeting we went grocery shopping. The cupboard was getting pretty bare with me being off my feet for 2 weeks. Again, I was able to hobble around and get the few things I needed using my trusty new cane
with the purple paisley pattern on it. Today I'm resting. I need to recover from yesterday. I'm glad I did it though. I think getting out is speeding up recovery a bit.

My blogiversary is coming up. I'm planning a contest. So stop by on March 1st to see what's happening.

Now, where is that ice pack?

Live long and prosper. \\//

2/19/15

Snowman 12

Keeping off my feet and elevating my knee has been kind of hard. I've got so much that needs to be done around the house, places to go, people to see. I've been a good girl, though, and made myself do it. Yesterday I decided to work on Snowman 12 the whole day, between little trips to walk around the house. I got quite a bit of him done while watching movies on Netflix.



All that is left is to fill in the white sparkly stitches, finish his face, and then my favorite part, the outlining! I can hardly wait. I did make a couple mistakes on him, but I left them in. It makes him unique. His mittens were supposed to be blue, but the symbols for dark green and dark blue look very much alike so I misread. The buttons are supposed to be green, but since I made the mittens green, I decided to make the buttons blue. I also managed to leave one row of stitches out at the belt area, so it's a little narrower than the pattern wants. It was easy to adjust the rest of the pattern around it so it looks good. I like it as it is. That red scarf is so cute!

I have a doctors appointment for this afternoon. It's a follow up to an appointment I had a month ago that resulted in a change in my anxiety meds. The Prozac was giving me horrible gas, so I was changed to Lexapro. I'm feeling much better. I will have my knee checked while I'm there too. It actually feels a tiny bit better today, and the bruising is starting to change yellow. Maybe I can get something for the pain. It's still excruciating.

Live long and prosper. \\//

2/17/15

Bright Stripes

I've blocked the striped mens mittens I made for Knitwits. This is my first FO of the year.



Bright Stripe Mens Mittens

Pattern: Seed Stitch Striped Mittens for Men by me for Knitwits.

Yarn: Plymouth Encore Worsted
Content: 75% Acrylic/25% Wool, worsted weight
Colors: Blue and Orange.

Needles: Addi Turbo Circulars size 5.

Cast on: December 31, 2014
Completed: February 12, 2015

Comments: I used the Seed Stitch Striped mitten pattern, but instead of doing seed stitch stripes, I knit in stockinette stitch with two colors and changed them every 5 rows.




In other news, I splurged. I found the original outfit for my doll Serious Intentions Ellowyne at a reasonable price, so I bought it.



I don't particularly care for this outfit, but if I ever decide to sell her, it will come in handy.

We're having another beautiful sunny day in the 40's today. The snow in the yard is almost completely gone and the grass is greening up. It's way way too early for this to be happening. I'm worried everything will start budding and then we'll return to our regular winter weather and kill everything off. But, at the same time, SUNSHINE! Can't be unhappy about that.

Live long and prosper. \\//

2/16/15

Projects

I frogged the color work mitten. I got to the top decreases and it was going to be 3 inches longer than my hand. I was not happy with the workmanship either. Such sloppy tension. Urg! I decided to start it over. I've dropped down to size 0 needles and it looks much better, and is closer to proper gauge. I got this far over the weekend.



I've also been busily cross stitching Snowman Row. I finished Snowman 11. Yay!



Outlining the graphic pattern on that scarf was quite the challenge. I have started Snowman 12 too!



I am so close to having this project done, finally! I'm so excited! I'll be cross stitching like crazy over the next few evenings to finish it.

Today I did some sewing. I'm working on a quilted bag. It has a front pocket that is made of small pieces. My first real piecing project. I cut the pieces out last week and started sewing it together today. I got all the little bitty pieces put together.



While I was sewing my daughter took this photo of me.



It was kind of a rough weekend for me. Last Thursday I went out to check on the hot tub. While coming back up the steps to the upper deck I managed to trip and fall on my right knee rather hard. It is all swollen and black and blue and extremely painful. Fortunately, I didn't break anything. It hurts like heck. Worse than it did after the fall in Times Square last March. It's ice packs and taking it easy for a couple weeks for me. I really need to get into the habit of holding the rail when going up steps. I do it when going down. Why can't I do it going up? I'm glad I bought a cane earlier this year. It's coming in handy.

Live long and prosper. \\//

2/9/15

I Can See You or Snowman's Got Eyes

How about a WIP post today. Slow progress on the mittens. Back side.



Front side.



A certain Snowman number 11 got eyes and a face last night while I watched a Columbo marathon on Netflix.



I am at my favorite part, the outlining. This is when the picture comes to life. That is why I always start with the eyes first. I sort of imagine he can see me finishing him now that he's got eyes.

Have I mentioned I love Netflix? Wow! If anyone had told me 20 years ago that some day I would be able to watch complete seasons of my favorite tv shows anytime I wanted continuously and in episode order, I would have laughed at them. It's making winter livable.

I also started watching Downton Abbey on Amazon Prime. I know it's immensely popular and now I know why. It's fun! Sweet Hubby calls it my soap opera. To a degree, he's right.

Speaking of livable, we had the most gorgeous day yesterday! It was mostly sunny, and warm. In the morning I decided, since I was feeling rather off due to waking up with an annoying cough, I needed to soak up some vitamin D while I could. So I donned my swim suit, made myself a large cup of Earl Grey tea, grabbed my Nook and sat in the hot tub, in the sunshine, reading. It was wonderful. It was so warm out we could go without jackets.

Later in the day I asked my sweet hubby if he would install the new LED motion sensor light out front. His answer was "I'll do it later" and then he went out to his shop to play with his lathe. I'd bought the light to replace the one that has stopped working. Unfortunately, I have learned over the years that later could mean in an hour or in 20 years. I don't like coming home in the dark and no light on out front. So I decided to teach myself how to install the new lamp. I did it! I installed a new front light on the house and I didn't start any fires or injure myself. It turned out to be pretty easy.



I also discovered he'd never hooked up the ground wire on the old malfunctioning one, which I scolded him for. That may have something to do with why it never worked right from the day he installed it. Also, please ignore the Christmas lights. They've been up for at least 3 years now. I plan to take them down soon cuz they've stopped working, I was hoping Sweet Hubby would do it, but, like I said, they've been up there at least 3 years, so clearly he has no interest in the task.

My birthday was Friday. I celebrated the 27th anniversary of my 29th birthday. My present to myself was calling Dell tech support and paying them to fix my computer. T'was not cheap! But it was worth it, and a fascinating experience. After extracting $129 from me, the tech guy directed me to a specific web site where I downloaded and installed a program that allowed him to work on my computer via the net. It was fascinating watching my cursor move around opening and closing things and mysterious fingers typing things in here and there. He fixed it right up, and also checked to make sure there was nothing else wrong with it. He downloaded and installed a couple different programs that cleaned up some problems I did not know about. Finally he uninstalled all the little programs and we were done. My computer is running like a dream. Like I said, worth the large amount of money extracted from me.

Well, I have a class to teach today, so I better sign off. It's the last session of a sock class that has been rather frustrating for me. Sometimes the classes go smoothly, and sometimes they don't. This one is a don't. I am still coughing a bit, but it's not nearly as bad as yesterday, so it shouldn't be much of a bother. Not contagious, but annoying as heck.

Live long and prosper. \\//

2/3/15

Doll Stuff

I haven't been doing a whole lot of knitting lately. Just haven't felt like it. Mostly, I've been dinking around with doll stuff. I've been working on perfecting my doll hat design so it looks like the  picture in my minds eye. A couple weeks ago I finally got it. Amber is modeling for me.



I quickly wrote up what I'd done before I forgot. Then I tested what I'd written. It worked! Now I've got 3 perfect little hats.



I finished a little pink outfit for Josephine Lammily. 



I made another pair of shoes for her too. These ones are made with fabric rather than vinyl, though I used vinyl for the sole. They're better than the first pair, but not as good as I want. Hopefully, third time will be the charm.

As for everything else, I frogged the sock I was working on. I love the pattern, and the yarn, but I hated the two together. The pattern needs a yarn with more variegation. I will have to dig around in the stash.

The fairisle mitten is going along slowly. I've got about 15 rounds left before I start the top decreases.

The orange and blue mittens are moving along slowly too. I finished the first mitten and have just started the beginning of the thumb gusset on the second one.

I haven't worked on Moose at all. Sigh. It's hard for me to knit when I don't feel well. I've been struggling with nasty side effects from one of my meds the last few weeks. About 5 minutes after I take it I get horrible horrible gas and heart burn. I don't know what set it off, but it got so bad I couldn't sleep or eat, and I was throwing up, so I finally went and saw my doctor last Thursday. He's changed that particular med for another one. I'm feeling a little better now, though I won't know for sure if we've fixed the problem for 4 weeks. Keeping my fingers crossed that it has.

What I have been more interested in is working on Snowman Row. I've been working on snowman #11.



I only have one more snowman after this one and it will be finished. I am starting to get excited. I've been working on and off on this thing for 8 or 9 years now. I want to get it done!

Since my last blog post we've had snow, and most of it has melted away. We had one day early last week that was 51 degrees out, with sunshine. It was fabulous! But then winter returned and we got several inches of snow again. A couple days later it rained and melted most of it. Now they're saying more snow. Urg. I want spring.

Tomorrow I have KnitWits. I'm taking a coconut cake for the refreshment. It's my birthday week too, so this will be my birthday cake. I'm waiting for it to cool right now before I frost it. The darn thing didn't want to come out of the bundt pan so it broke when it came out. I can hide it all under frosting, and it should taste good despite itself.

One more thing. I'm having computer problems. For some reason Windows has suddenly decided it's not a genuine authentic version. It's causing all kinds of problems that are extremely annoying. We think the new hard drive and memory might have something to do with it. We've spent several hours trying to fix it ourselves, to no avail. So tomorrow the plan is to call Dell tech support and see if they can help. I expect to be on the phone for a long time. I've got the same Windows 7 on my computer as it had the day it arrived from Dell. It shouldn't be doing this.

I haven't been blogging a whole lot of late, but I haven't lost interest in it. I just haven't been making the time to do it. I will try to post more often. I've got lots of ideas. I just need to implement them.

I think I might have the winter blahs.



Live long and prosper. \\//