Let's S-T-R-E-T-C-H out and take a nap...........

Baxter in one of his favorite spots.   He's a Mastador (half Mastiff, half Labrador) so I guess he get's his lazy side from the Mastiff part.  His rowdy playful side is from the Labrador.  One minute he'll be snoring and the next roaring around the house like a racehorse.  If you want a seat on that couch you have to beat Baxter to it!

Trying something new

Yesterday I went kayaking for the first time, what a blast!  My sister recently built a house at the lake.  She bought herself a kayak and very bravely attempted to navigate the lake alone, without any knowledge of kayaking or being on the water really.  After a time or two she discovered that she LOVED being out on the quiet lake with all the beautiful nature scenes and wildlife to see.  She bought a second kayak and all the gear so that when she had friends visit (or her sister, me) they could enjoy kayaking together.  I had so much fun once I got the hang of it and quit worrying about flipping the kayak over.  A huge blue heron flew right over our heads, maybe only a couple feet above us.

My sister snapped this picture of the blue heron after he landed (click on the picture to make it big enough to see him).  She also got a picture of some geese taking a break and just chillaxin on a small dock floating in the lake.

And finally, a picture of my sweet sister loving life.

Update on my adopted rescue puppy

This is Baxter the rescue puppy I adopted in November.  He has turned into quite a handsome boy, don't you think?  When the Animal Control picked him up he was emaciated and they were going to put him down.  A rescue group stepped in and saved him.  Since I adopted him six months ago we have been walking about 3 1/2 miles each day.  He is building muscles and filling out nicely.  I think he's gorgeous of course.  Since Mom passed he has been my constant companion and I'm blessed to have him that's for sure!  If you are thinking of adding a pet to your home, please adopt or rescue.

We Miss You So Much Maw Maw!

My mom (Maw Maw) went Home to be with the Lord March 3, 2011 at the age of 89.   This picture was taken six days before she passed.  Mother's Day without her is going to be SAD,  we all miss her so very much.  We know Maw Maw has gone Home to a much better place.  I think of her a thousand times a day, and hear her "voice" in my ear when she would tell me how to do something.  I laugh when I remember some of the funny things she would say........Rest in Peace sweet Maw Maw,  you will be with us always,  I love you with all my heart!

                                                  Beautiful Maw Maw last Mother's Day

I wish I could tell you one more time how special you are.......

Settling Into His New Home

Baxter came home to live with me last Friday.  He is settling in pretty well, although I think his first Thanksgiving Day was a little too exciting.  He looked like this after everyone had gone.

Has it really been that long since I posted..........?????!!!!!

Life has certainly gotten in the way of my computer time!  Not to mention that my computer is limping along on it's last leg as I type this.  I made a big decision yesterday and adopted a precious rescued dog.  He is a Mastiff mixed with Boxer or Lab (maybe both).  He was rescued from the Animal Shelter minutes before he was to be euthanized by Carolina P.A.W.S.   He's right at a year old.  Ain't he purty?  He is 5 weeks into his 8 week training in the New Leash on Life program.  That's a program where the rescue group and a low/medium security prison work together to train dogs.  It's a win win for all involved.  The prisoners love learning to train, working with, and living with the dog they are responsible for.  The dogs come out with basic, advanced, and agility training, ready for a forever home.  This sweet dog is the top of his class and will graduate November 19th.  I get to take him home with me after graduation, can't wait! 

There has been a little knitting going on, but the pictures haven't been taken yet.  Hopefully that will happen soon.   

Who knew bees would chew up wood?

Okay, so now I've learned another lesson about living out here in the woods.  The weather has been beautiful which got me busy working outside.  Living in the woods I have mountains of leaves to get out of my landscaped beds and blown back into the floor of the woods.  As I came in for a snack break I noticed something on my front door.  When I stooped down to see what on earth was on the door I saw this guy (or gal).

Oh, okay, it's just a bumble bee, so I grabbed a broom and knocked it off the door.  This is what I saw.........

and this.................

This would be the threshold where the chewed up wood fragments fell from the hole the bee made in my door.  I have to say that I LOVE my beautiful wood front door and I'm more than a little upset to have a giant hole bored in it.  After I discovered the damage to my door the giant bad ass bee bumble bee had an unfortunate accident and is no longer with us.  Awwwwww, I feel really bad about that.

Let's recap my encounters with woodland visitors since I've moved into my new home.  First off there was the baby copperhead in my garage, that was fun.  Then the marble sized black widow on my screened in porch, thank heavens it was on the outside of the screen.  After that it was the Super Pooping opossum that took up residence in my garage and destroyed just about everything including the walls.  Now I have bees chewing up my doors.  It's a good thing it's beautiful and peaceful here because I'm beginning to think it may be hazardous to your health!

I googled wood eating bees and the best I can tell is that it must be a carpenter bee.  Evidently they don't eat the wood, they bore a hole and nest in it.  Well now, that makes me and my door feel much better.  On a good note it also said that they are usually solo, so maybe my door will be safe for awhile.

What? The Olympics are Over?

   
                            

This is a pattern that someone graciously posted on Ravelry.  It is a pretty good replica of the the hat worn by Lindsay Vonn (see below).  The rings are a little "squarish", but I like it all the same.  My young adult children all think it's pretty great and it looks like I'll be making more of them.

So, are you guys as sick of winter as I am?  We got a teasing of sunshine and a 73 degree day, the next day was in the 40's and raining.  Weird weather, totally weird. 

My 16 year old daughter came home from school with not one, but TWO projects the other day.  One in Biology, the other in Math.  Both are due on Monday.  I survived endless projects with my three older children, somehow I just don't seem to be able to muster up the stamina for a double barrel shot of projects just now.  Someone (ahem) is yelling for help on a project as I speak.  As much as I hate to leave such good company, duty calls.............

A Very Happy Birthday!

 

Monday was my birthday............having all four of my children together at my house rarely happens now that three of them are in college and live out on their own.  The best present of all was having them all here with me. 

 

Two triple chocolate cakes!  These won't help me lose those few pounds that appeared over the winter.  Obviously everybody knows that my weakness is chocolate, but hey, I love wine too, where's my Merlot?

My son's girlfriend brought beautiful roses too. 

It was a great birthday.

I've been knitting a little,  something Olympic actually.  I'll save that for the next post.

Yucky Weather and Finished Objects

Our weather has been HORRIBLE DEPRESSING UGLY less than comfortable all winter.  The temperature has steadily remained 15-30 degrees below normal.  Along with the abnormally cold temperatures we have also had ice, snow, sleet, and rain............everything but sunshine!  Yep, I'm definitely whining.  We are usually enjoying sun and temps in the low 60's this time of year.  One good thing comes out of bad weather though............finished objects!

I got the pattern for the makeup bag (largest one on the bottom) from Ravelry.  Once again, it's a free pattern that the designer graciously shared with everyone and I thank her.  It's called Sundance Makeup Bag.  I liked it so much that I also made a case for my little Blackberry Pearl cell phone and a credit card case to match.  I've made a ton of these things in the last couple of weeks, my daughters all like them too.  I also finished the gray Cable Luxe sweater and a hat like Lindsay Vonn wore in an interview.  The off white one with "USA" and the Olympic Rings on it.  Pictures coming soon.........

Useful Finished Object, Yay!

I have this weird thing going on with my fingers called Ranaud's Syndrome/Disease.  When I get cold or touch something cold my fingers go totally white with no blood circulation whatsoever.  That makes riding my horse in the winter almost impossible.  I tried using the hand warmer packs like hunters use in my gloves, but of course I can't get the warmth from the pack down in the fingers of the gloves where I need it and they did no good.  I would be able to get the hand warmer pack down in the finger end of a mitten though, so I set about making a pair of thick wool mittens.  Riding in mittens isn't ideal for holding the reins, but it beats not getting to ride.

                                      

                                        

After a pattern search on Ravelry I settled on a mitten pattern from World War II.  It's as basic as it gets.  Long warm cuff, dense, thick, perfect to fit my need.  I made them out of Lion Brand Fishermen's Wool.  They are knit on a size 3 needle, so the fabric is nice and dense.  Hopefully the heat from the hand warmer packs will not escape.  Can't wait to try them out!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas!  Christmas was wonderful at my house, all four of my children and their boyfriends/girlfriends spent the day with me.  My son gave me a new camera, yay!  My old camera only worked when it decided to.  Well, it worked, but the pictures were fuzzy more often than not.  Maybe I will be a better blogger now that I can take pictures whenever I want.  This picture was taken at night in a pitch dark room with only the lights on the tree on.  I can't believe my new little camera was able to do this!

Here's wishing everyone a VERY HAPPY New Year filled with LOVE, JOY, FAMILY, and FRIENDS.  If you are celebrating tonight, be safe.

New Friends, Birthdays, Family,.......All Things Good

So much activity since my last post!  I have a wonderful new friend all the way up in New York, my mother celebrated her 88th birthday, my cousin flew in from Kentucky to help us celebrate, and there is actual knitting to report.

I met my new friend through Ravelry when she contacted me about a new yarn shop that was opening in my little town. I hadn't even heard about it, but sure enough when I went to investigate, there it was!  Wow, it took someone from New York to tell me I now have a LYS!  Thank you Claudia!  She came to Charlotte with her husband on a business trip.  We met at the new yarn shop and had a wonderful time.  A few days later we went on a "road trip" to Seagrove which is a neat little rural town where there are 100's of pottery shops. It was a GREAT day!!!  I hated to see Claudia go back to New York, hopefully we'll have another "road trip" some day.  Now is when I should insert a picture of Claudia and me..................As usual, I didn't have my camera.  I'm so stupid, absent minded, disappointed that I didn't even get a picture of the two of us.

My mother turned 88 Sunday, Happy Birthday Maw Maw!!

                                                Relatives came to celebrate....................

And I know it's hard to believe, but I have proof of actual knitting..................

Even something finished a while ago and now ready to be mailed out to a friend

                   Hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving!                   

Getting back to normal after the critter invasion

The road I live on at dusk.  (click to enlarge)

While my sister was visiting we took an evening walk and couldn't help but stop for a shot or two of the changing leaves.  So peaceful.......................God is good.

Thank goodness this guy is now happily roaming on a nature preserve instead of shitting all over destroying my garage.  As I was doing my final cleaning of the aftermath he left I discovered that not only did he poop all over my new window blinds, he left teeth marks in almost every slat! The little varmit is lucky that I've mellowed in my old age, or he might have been toast possum stew!  The smell is finally starting to abate and hopefully there won't be any more possums to take up residence in my garage.  What a nightmare!  (Click on the picture to check out the claws on my little friend) YIKES!  Oh, by the way, I saw yarn on a website that had oppossum hair spun in it.  To each his own, but if you ever had to deal with one of these guys and the smell they leave behind, the thought of knitting with their hair is totally disgusting.  Exactly how does one come to have possum hair anyway?

I've completed several small projects here and there.  One is a pair of helmet earmuffs.  These are going to feel so good while riding my horse this winter.  You can get the pattern here:  http://brineydeepdesigns.blogspot.com/2008/10/free-pattern-bike-helmet-earmuffs.html
A big thank you to the designer, she did a great job and filled a need for a lot of people.

Pictures of my sweater in progress coming soon.

Super Pooper

Apologies for the long absence in my blogging. There have been health issues with my mother, and lately, various other distractions..................

A few days ago I noticed an awful odor in my garage. It was distinctly the smell of, well for the lack of a nicer word, shit. I couldn't figure it out. Later that day I pulled in my garage and got out of my car, started toward the door into the house when I noticed something on top and dripping down the rungs of a ladder that is leaning against the wall in a corner of my garage. YIKES, yes it was piles of poop, runny poop at that, on top of the ladder and dripping down the steps, even on the wall of my garage. I took the ladder out to the yard, hosed it down, and sprayed it with disinfectant.

The next day I was having beautiful 2" blinds installed throughout my house. I arrived home just before the blinds were to be installed to find poop dripping all over my garage walls, window sills, smeared on the windows, and just everywhere in the garage. Things were knocked off the shelves, even my new blower was knocked off the shelf onto the floor. Now I'm thinking that my two outdoor cats have suddenly gone crazy and somehow done this. Either that or I must have closed the giant stray cat, that has adopted us, up in the garage and he went ballistic. Since my cats always use their litter box in the garage I was betting it was the stray. I cleaned up all the poop AGAIN, and was confident that everything was clean before they hung my new blinds in the windows. The next morning, there it was AGAIN! Poop all over my beautiful new blinds, the walls, the window sills, the floor, all over everything in the garage. Unbelievable!

It took several hours to clean up all the poop AGAIN. Now I'm thinking it must be MY cats. I banished them totally out that night. It was the first time they had to sleep outside at night. I always let them in the garage at night because I live in the woods and don't want any wild animals to get my girls. The next morning, there it was AGAIN! Okay, it wasn't the stray, it can't be my cats, what IS it? I called the only company in the phone book that traps animals alive to remove them. Let me tell you, it's not cheap to get rid of a wild animal. They came out, told me they thought it was an oppossum and said that I had to buy a permit to trap wild animals to catch it and remove it. Are you kidding!? WHAT A RACKET!! Anyway, he left me a trap with a little cherry pie in it for bait. I fully expected my cats to get nosy and go in to check out the cherry pie and trip the trap, but they didn't. The second night the trap was out I scored! This is the varmit that shit all over my garage, including my brand new window blinds.

Notice the chaos in the background? This rascal did that the night he got trapped. You can see some poop on the stepstool and running down the front of it. Also, see the wet concrete under the trap? Yep, possum pee. YUCK AND PEEEEEEEUUUUUU!!!!!

I happily called the "critter man" the next morning to tell him we had caught the "shitter critter" and he came out to pick him up and take him to a nature preserve to turn him loose. That's the good news, the bad news..........oppossums usually travel in two's or three's. This means I'm still trying to catch more oppossums. I guess since I had to pay for a permit to catch them I might as well catch several of them. Wish me luck. The guy said if I don't catch any more within ten days, then it must have been just the one.

It's been two nights since the score of the first critter. So far the trap is empty, what will tomorrow bring?

There has been actual knitting going on here and there. I have completed several small projects and am about half way finished with a sweater that I am tweaking to suit me and my body shape. Pictures coming soon.

Time for Fall Sweater Knitting.......

Last Fall I knitted this sweater, it's called Silver Belle and can be found on Ravelry. I use it as a jacket instead of as a sweater and have really enjoyed wearing it. The construction was different so made the mundane task of sewing the pieces together a little more interesting. For one thing, the long cable up the center back is knitted with the peplum bottom and the back pieces are sewn to either side of the cable.

My knitting mo-jo kind of leaves me during the summer when there is so much to do outside. Now it's time again to start scoping out a pattern for a great Fall sweater. There are a zillion patterns out there, the problem with about half of them is that they really aren't practical to wear. And so the search for a perfect Fall sweater pattern begins............................any suggestions? I love to learn new techniques during project knitting and admire a lot of the Japanese designs, but am not sure I could figure out the directions.

Comfort Knitting

This is the third Running Horse hat I've knitted. I just love the pattern. A dear friend of mine was in a horrible accident and I needed something to keep my mind occupied. Knitting a familiar pattern with enough difficulty to make me pay attention was just what I needed.

My experiment in making a bath puff using a modified kitchen scrubby pattern turned out so-so on the first try. I tried starting on the same size hook and increased the hook two sizes for a few rows and then increased two sizes again for a few more rows. The end result is cute, but still too dense and compact to make a good bath puff in my opinion. It just needs to be more airy and open, which I'm not sure can be achieved. I may give it another try, we'll see...................

Plain Jane, but very useful

This is a quick to make set I made to finish using up the last bit of what was a huge and never ending skein of cotton. I lost count of how many dishcloths I made out of that skein.

What I like about this duo is that they are so very usable. The dishcloth is exactly the same on both sides, so there's no wrong or right side. I've never made any of the little scrubbies before, so can't swear to it, but it seems like it will be great for dishes.

The scrubby is crocheted, which I seldom do. It always takes me a little bit to get back in the swing of crochet because there's always such a long span between the last time I made a crocheted item. At first it was really hurting my hands to crochet the thick cotton, but it got a little more fluid as I went along. I still prefer to use thinner cotton to crochet, and I've always much preferred knitting to crocheting.

Both of these are the simplest patterns I've ever come across. The plain little dishcloth is called Grandma's Favorite Dishcloth (on Ravelry). Directions: worsted weight cotton, size US 6 needles. Cast on 4 stitches.

Row 1: knit 4

*Row 2: Knit 2, YO, knit across row

*Row 3: Knit 1, K2 tog, YO, K2 tog, knit across row

*Repeat Row 2 until you have 44 stitches

*Repeat Row 3 until you have 4 stitches, bind off, weave in ends.

I can't find where I came across the pattern for the little scrubby, but it is very simple and best I can remember this is all you do: Size G hook, worsted weight cotton

Chain 3

SC 6 in second stitch from hook, do not join, but turn and

*SC 2 in each SC, turn*, repeat between **'s until desired size

It won't really start looking like a scrubby for quite a lot of rows, but it's really fast to make.

I think I'm going to try using a larger crochet hook and make a bath puff from the scrubby

pattern. It would make a great machine washable bath puff if it weren't so dense. We'll see how it comes out.........

Fun Dishcloth #2

This was really fun for me to knit since I'm horse crazy. The pattern calls for size US 5 needles. Worsted weight cotton on size 5 needles can be a little rough on the hands. The larger dishcloth was knitted on US 6 needles. Much easier on the hands and a more usable fabric density for a dishcloth, but the actual horse design loses some crispness. Since I like to actually use my dishcloths I vote for the larger one on the size 6 needles. Which one do you like?

You can find the free pattern on Ravelry, it's Giddy-up Cloth by Amy-lynne Mitchell.

I've been making a few jewelry pieces and am beginning to think about what knitting projects I'd like to start this Fall. The colorwork hats I knitted at the end of last winter were so much fun I may start with something small like that and work my way into a larger project as the days grow shorter and colder. Here's a picture of one of my favorites:

YIKES!!!!!

This ginormous black widow spider greeted me this morning when I went out on the screened- in porch to have a cup of coffee. She was just chillin' there hanging on the screen. Thank goodness she was on the outside of the screen and not in there with me. It was hard to get a good clear picture with my dinosaur of a camera, but you can get the idea. Her abdomen is the size of a marble! I wasn't quite sure what to do, so I left her there while I ran some errands. After talking to a friend who scared me to death about what the spider could do to me, I decided to take action. The only bug stuff I had on hand was some extreme ant killer. I unloaded several blasts from the safety of the inside of the screen. Once I had pretty much drenched her I let her alone for awhile and then out of pure curiosity got a jar and went out and carefully pushed her into it with a stick. I've seen a few black widows, but this one is 10 times the size of any of them. I have to add that moments prior to going out to find this black widow hanging from my screened- in porch the Terminix man had knocked on my door to let me know he had just completed his quarterly treatment of the perimeter of my house. Wow, d'ya suppose he could miss a marble sized black widow sticking out like a sore thumb on the screen if he'd actually sprayed the perimeter? One can only wonder................................