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: