your last chance

Today is your last chance to bid on Gladys' woven scarves. There are currently no bids.


Phoebe sez, "I bid one catnip mousie!"

Sorry, Phoebe but the Canadian Cancer Society needs people money to find a cure for cancer. But if they ever decide that catnip works/helps, I will gladly mail them one of your (unused) mousies.

Phoebe and the cycling jersey

Our cats are attracted to some pretty unusual things. For example, Ricky likes the smell of feet & loves sticking his head into a freshly vacated shoe. He'll roll around like he's on a catnip high. And he'll only do it with hubby's shoes. Phoebe has a similar attraction to hubby's clothes. In particular, his stinky cycling stuff - the stinkier the better. Enjoy:

(We got a Flip video camera at Christmas so expect more cat videos)



Hubby must have a scent that the cats find irresistible. He is their favourite lap/sleeping spot/cuddle buddy.

PS. We don't leave clothes all over the floor. I took this video in the bathroom while hubby was showering.

what a pain in the butt!!!

Literally! I went outside yesterday after lunch to throw some tulips into the ground. I'm planting a small cutting garden. I was out there 15 mins tops in heavy sweatpants and the one mosquito in the entire province found me and bit me in the ass. It's November! How can there be any mosquitoes left? My butt itches every time I sit down. You have no idea how annoying that is. I really, really hate mosquitoes.

I've been pretty busy last week - a couple of knitting classes to teach, some homework for an upcoming class, hanging out with my peeps, and going to a book reading.

My manually striped sock is progressing well. I'm past the heel now:


This is Grant Lawrence. He's the author of the book at the book signing. The book is titled - "Adventures in Solitude: What Not To Wear To A Nudist Potluck". It's a memoir of his adventures in Desolation Sound - a boat access only recreational area. I really enjoyed reading it. The book reading was lots of fun. He showed us a short home movie and his wife, Jill Barber sang a few songs. I got my book signed and he graciously posed with my sock for a picture. While I was taking the photo, I heard a laugh behind me and it was Grant's Mom. She told me that Grant learned how to knit when he was young. Maybe holding my sock will inspire him to start knitting again?

Christmas knitting is zooming along. I have just a few finishing touches to make on the yoked sweater - weaving in the remaining ends, knitting the button bands, and sewing on the buttons.


It looks so darned cute!

Hubby is going out of town for a Yahoo conference so we spent most of yesterday catching up on housework and watching a few rental DVDs that I wanted to return today. I didn't feel like working on one of my WIPs so I cast on a new pair of socks for myself.


My MIL gave this alpaca/bamboo blend to me a few Christmases ago. I find alpaca incredibly itchy despite the fact that I'm not sensitive to wool. I've been wanting to make something nice with this yarn but the only place where I can tolerate wearing alpaca is on my feet.

Gladys has been playing around with yarn dyeing so I dragged out a few skeins of yarn this morning to over dye. I had this pretty blah skein - off white & beigey tan. Three packages of Kool Aid later (2 Changin' Cherry and 1 Berry Blast), I've got this:


It reminds me of beach glass in the sand. I like it.

After being terrorized by Ricky this week because her favourite sleeping spot is on the rug right in front of the litter box (Ricky cannot resist smacking Phoebe when she's lying there), Phoebe's found a new favourite sleeping spot.


It's an ootch too small for her butt and her tail & back leg fall off. I should go and get another one and glue them together. Or would that be spoiling her too much?

yarn hangover

Have you started Christmas knitting yet? I have :P


Pattern: your basic top down with a picot cuff and slipped stitch heel
Yarn: SweetGeorgia Tough Love Sock in col River
Needles: 2.25mm dpns
Notes: These are a Christmas gift for someone special but I'm not telling who. Pair #52.

For my birthday, hubby bought me tix to see Harry Connick Jr. The concert was Fri night.


They don't allow pictures inside the theatre so this is all you get. Harry was wonderful even with a huge walking cast on his right leg (something about ripping a calf muscle while exercising). Lucky for us, leg injuries don't impact the lungs or vocal cords. It did limit his movement on stage but he did manage to shake his booty enough to make me drool a little.

Today, I have a bit of yarn hangover. Yesterday, I filled hubby's SUV with 4 other crazee knitters (3 that I'd never met before), a bunch of food, and went on a yarn crawl called Yarn Harvest.

We started out at Black Sheep Yarns (where I work) to witness the MadTosh mosh pit. It was pretty hectic. I didn't buy anything but I think everyone else in my group did. We had a knitting newbie in our group - Meggin and we worked hard at corrupting her. She broke her "only buy yarn for a specific project" rule at the very first store. I'm so proud of her.

After BSY and struggling through some crazy road construction, we made it to Baaad Anna's. Didn't buy anything there. I was saving myself for our next stop - SweetGeorgia!!!!! I was not disappointed. She had racks and racks of yarn and spinning fibre drying in the main room. We headed up to the loft area to do our "real shopping".

I just happened to have a sock WIP in my purse and I asked Felicia to pose with it.


That's vintage SweetGeorgia yarn (in the framboises colour) that she dyed before her hiatus. The picture's blurry because I might've been a little excited to hold the camera steady.

Then we headed east and into Surrey. We took a little break for lunch at Semihamoo Park in White Rock. We decided to skip Penelope's and head to Knitopia. Their new shop in White Rock is teeny tiny so there's yarn stacked right to the ceiling.

Our last stop of the day was 88 Stitches. I was hoping to meet Judy Marples but she'd already left by the time we got there. She's the designer for the Dover Castle shawl which is one of the patterns in Shawl Wars. BTW, Gladys and I are still very much alive.

And this is what the back of the SUV looks like after a yarn crawl:


Hubby's SUV is a Toyota Highlander so that you can understand the scale of our purchases. Not all of it is mine. Just this:


From left to right: 3 skeins of SweetGeorgia; 5 skeins of Yarn Candy; a skein of Berroco Lustra; and a skein of West Coast Fibre Works (the perfect Yarn Harvest colour)

I also bought half a pound of West Coast Fibre Works BFL from Knitopia for spinning:

As we headed to the restaurant to meet all the other Yarn Harvesters for dinner, I realized that I wasn't that hungry. We'd been eating all day - pakoras and chocolate coconut bars (courtesy of Marina), chips & 3 layer dip (Meggin's contribution), and a super yummy chocolate banana bread (love you, Judy).

The dinner was super fun. All these knitters crammed into the private room and spilling out into the restaurant. A lot of us showed off our purchases. The yarn fumes were overwhelming at times. After dinner, the organizers held a draw for all the door prizes.


My number was drawn twice and I won a pattern book and a small notebook for keeping track of yarn/projects i.e. the hard copy version of Ravelry. My friend, Vicki won the grand prize (valued at $275) containing yarn, patterns, Namaste bag, and a gc to Signature Needle Arts.

After being on the road for more than 12 hours, I had just enough energy to drop off everyone and then head home for my bed. I slept for 10 hours straight.


Phoebe says, "The best cure for any hangover is a little catnap on my new cardboard lounger."

the big five-oh

No, I didn't age a decade in the last month but sometimes it feels like it. We're mostly recovered from the camping trip although our cookie stash is still severely depleted. I made 8 doz chocolate chip pecan cookies and they didn't make it past day 3 of our camping trip. Yes, we're oinkers when it comes to cookies. The nieces definitely helped out.

The other big thing that happened is that we finally figured out why my computer (less than a year old) has been acting flaky the last 8 months - bad RAM. It started out with the odd app error and escalated to full out OS crashing. We ran a diagnostic tool which pointed a big finger at computer memory. I convinced hubby to yank the RAM out of his computer and put it into my computer. We ran the tests again and the RAM passed so at least, we knew it wasn't the onboard memory that was flaky. Hubby did some research and I made him pick out a "better than good" RAM for me to buy. I installed the new memory and I've been crash free for 3 weeks. I don't even want to think about what data might be corrupt on my HD...


Pattern: plain top down 60 sts with picot cuff & short row heel
Yarn: Socks That Rock Lightweight; col unknown (mill end from Sock Summit; might be Spy Say Guacamoly)
Needles: 2.25mm dpns
Notes: Number FIFTY!!!! Yes, I have knit 50 pairs of socks. I've been knitting socks for 4 years now and I'm averaging about a pair each month. That's pretty good.

I've been working on another pair of socks which are top secret. But after completing the first leg, I had to rip the whole thing out. I decided that it was too tight in the leg and the row gauge was so far out that the heel wasn't working out. It's one of those Cat Bordhi heels and my row gauge resulted in a too-high instep. I'm going to go up a needle size (to solve the too tight leg) and use the shorter instep heel instructions.

I always need a plain pair of socks to work on. So I dug in my stash (nearly got lost) and pulled some Claudia Hand Paint that P-la gave me for my birthday last year.


The base reminds me of Cherry Tree Hill Supersock which I absolutely love - my second favourite behind STR.

Sadly, I haven't gotten very far. I seem to have hurt the thumb on my right hand. When I grip stuff a certain way - chopsticks, steering wheel, knitting needle - it hurts. I don't know why but it does. So I'm giving my thumb a rest. If I hurts, I won't do it. I haven't knit for 3 days and it does feel better. This self-imposed ban is driving me a little crazy but it's not like I don't have stuff to work on.

I finished sewing on the binding on a quilt top that I rescued.


It's taken me 3 years but it's finally done. Talk about a labour of love. I bought two embroidered tops and carefully took one completely apart. Then I took one strip of blocks from the second top apart because those blocks clearly matched the other quilt top. There was a lot of careful measuring and cutting to get all the blocks the same size. I fixed up some of the embroidery where the knots had come undone or the tails had been pulled to the front. I used Fray Check on some of the places where there wasn't enough tail to make a knot. I hunted high & low until I found the perfect sashing & border fabric (Aunt Grace 30's repro print). I preserved the original layout of the blocks. With one exception - I accidentally turned one the blocks on its side. Oops! The backing is unbleached muslin. It's machine pieced & hand quilted. All that's left is a label. I'm going to see if I can use pre-treated fabric in my new printer otherwise, I'll have to go the iron-on transfer route. I know what the label will say. It will identify the flowers in each block and document the construction of the top. This is one quilt that will hang on a wall to preserve the embroidery.

I've also pulled out my drop spindle. I had some BFL on there and decided to ply it to see how it looked.


I was aiming for fingering but I seem to have lace instead (that's Claudia HP on the right).


That's why the spindle never seemed to fill up no matter how long I was spinning. Oh well... I don't have much of the BFL (and the store that I buy it from no longer has a source) so I'm trying for fingering with another fiber before I return to the BFL. Wish me luck.

Neither cat has been very photogenic lately. Phoebe is sleeping under the bed and Ricky's in a heap on the washing machine. A few days ago, they were standing guard by their food bowls. Every time you got near them, they would dance on their paws and meow at you. When you left, they'd settle down and wait.


Phoebe's sitting on the new step stool that I bought from Ikea. It helps her and Ricky reach the "cat shelf". I used to have a small desk in front of that window but the cats were always sleeping on my stuff and knocking bits onto the floor so I got rid of the desk and installed a shelf for them. I'm well trained, aren't I?

scaredy cats

I have a pair of scaredy cats on my hands. The roofers started work on Tues which promptly sent both cats hiding under furniture. The first thump actually interrupted Ricky's breakfast and kibble was flying out of his mouth as he ran for cover. I didn't have any warning that they were starting work so I had to scramble to catch them and drive them over to my Dad's.

Even at Dad's place, Ricky is unsure and spends most of his time hiding under the sofa. But he'll eat if I put kibble down.


Phoebe instantly made herself at home.


She's either lounging on the floor in the sunshine or watching the birdies from the armchair. Phoebe's checked every nook and cranny. When she came out from behind the sofa, her face & whiskers were covered in cobwebs. Guess I don't have to vacuum back there.

All these days at Dad's means that I have a lot of knitting time. I've got my entire collection of BBC's Poirot mysteries, a ton of yarn, and a drop spindle & some fiber. I am busy churning out tons of stockinette & trying to spin BFL. I did a lot of quilting on the birdie quilt but I've put it aside to give my arm a break. Many years ago, I gave myself tennis elbow by over-quilting. It took a lot of physical therapy for the pain to go away so I have to be careful.


Ricky sez, "What was that noise? It's out to get me, isn't it?"

wet enough for webbed feet

This is Dotty reporting live from Chopper Kitty. There seems to be a problem just north of the water bowl. I see two cats squeezed onto the counter. I don't see any snarling while the second kitty waits for the first one to finish. This should clear up soon. Back to you, Bob.

I've been wanting to knit these Rubber Duck socks for awhile and have been searching for the perfect ducky yellow and a nice blue (for the water) sock yarn. A few weeks ago, I got lucky and bought 5 cones of undyed Louet Gems fingering and the stores were clearing out their Easter egg dyes. I broke out the glass bowls and vinegar and played around with some yarn. I used one tablet for each 50g skein and used the amount of vinegar specified on the package.


The blue turned out perfect. The yellow was much too canary. So I dissolved an orange tablet and used very little vinegar. I very quickly dunked each skein in hoping that the orange would soften the yellow without actually turning it orange. It worked out pretty well.

The weather's been pretty stormy lately. There was quite the downpour the other day and I noticed that water was cascading waterfall-like from the second floor gutter onto the roof of the first floor. So I made Hubby get on the roof the next morning (at 6am) to clear it out. All this poor weather has also delayed the roofers by at least a week.

There hasn't been a heck of a lot of knitting lately. I got one quilt basted and I'm machine appliquing the birdie blocks. I need to get those two quilts finished soon.


Phoebe sez, "Thanks for the mousie, Mom. It makes a nice pillow"

frozen fingers

Do you ever have the problem where it seems warm enough to go outside without gloves/mittens but then the minute you touch the ice-cold steering wheel, you wish you'd taken the time to grab a pair? That's me. (This will lead somewhere knitting related. I promise.) Over the years, I've gone through 2 super fluffy sheepskin steering wheel covers but they are getting harder to find. The first thing I did when I bought my new car was buy it a steering wheel cover that I thought would protect my fingers but it's not doing a very good job. So every day I go out with warm hands and end up at my destination with frozen fingers. This is not usually a big deal unless I need to knit with them. The last straw was Sunday when I went to teach a class. My hands and fingers were so cold that I couldn't even feel the knitting needles. And then I thought, "I'm a knitter - I can solve this problem."

The idea of knitting a steering wheel cover crossed my mind but hubby drives the car, too. He never liked the sheepskin ones and I'm pretty sure he wouldn't like a knitted one in my car. The next best thing is a pair of mittens that I'll leave in the car just for driving. So I tossed the stash a little and came up with some Knit Picks Imagination in Pixie Dust. I've avoided using this yarn (bought for a stole project) because I discovered awhile ago (after I'd bought it) that alpaca doesn't agree with me. I can't wear it around my neck because it's sooooo itchy. I am hoping that I'll be able to wear the yarn as mittens.


I've put them on a few times and they haven't made my hands/wrists itchy but we'll see what happens after they are washed (as was the case with my alpaca scarf).

It's sunny outside so that means it's also a little chilly. Phoebe's spending a lot of time on her "hotplate" aka heating pad.



PS. Batty - could you please send me your email address? I'd like to reply to one of your comments. Thanks!

counting down

Everything at my house is about numbers these days - 7 days til Christmas (eek!), half a sock left to knit (double eek!!), 4 days til the in-laws show up (triple eek!!!), 23 hours til the pest guy comes to evict an unwanted rodent from our attic (I think it's a rat because of the gnawing wood noises that wake me up at 5am), 11 cowls delivered, 2 cats sleeping off chasing said rodent (Phoebe was chittering at it this morning as if she was trying to lure it downstairs), 4 dozen gingerbread cookies baked and ready to be frosted, umpteen presents left to wrap, gajillion Christmas cards that still need to be written & mailed, did I mention that there's only a week left til Christmas?!?!?!? I think I'm going to pass out - where are my smelling salts?

So instead of tackling those things, I'm here to blog (and take a breather from all the madness).

Here's a cowl that I knit as a sample for a class that I'll be teaching in January:


Pattern: my own; I have a PDF for it but I haven't uploaded it anywhere and I'm too lazy to type it up here on the blog so email me and I'll send it to you.
Yarn: Malabrigo Chunky; col Charrua; 1 skein (104 yds; 100g)
Needles: 6.5mm circs
Notes: If I were to knit this again, I'd use a slightly larger needle like a 7mm. It's plied so has a bit more body than Malabrigo Worsted. It's soft yarn but not as soft as Mal Worsted.

And this is my last gift cowl:


Pattern: Birthday Cowl by Nova Seals
Yarn: Lion Brand Cotton-Ease; col Maize; 1 skein (207 yds, 100g)
Needles: 5mm Addis
Notes: I can't find my notes but I think I cast on an extra repeat. I changed the skp to ssk.

All 11 cowls were gifted yesterday to my quilting friends (waves hi to QHuackers). I got lots of goodies to eat, two lovely embroidered towels, a little notebook, a small duck that glows when you squeeze it, and a small paper pieced quilt of a duckie.

After I finished the last cowl, I whipped up two hand towels and two dish cloths.

Pattern: my own; the wash cloths are plain garter; the towels are some sort of waffle stitch
Yarn: Bernat Handicrafter Culinary Cotton; col Summer Resort; 1 skein (340g; 608 yds)
Needles: 5mm noname bamboo
Notes: I love how the colours zig zag across.

I've got to finish knitting that last Christmas gift and then I'm knitting for myself for a few weeks. I desperately want to finish my Mondo Cable Cardi before winter's over.


Phoebe sez, "I'm mad at you, Mommy! You unplugged my heating pad!!"

making a list, checking it twice

Like Santa, I am busy making lists and checking things off.

1. Bake - so far 6 doz butter tarts, 8 doz chocolate crinkle cookies (hubby helped because my hands were too hot to roll the cookies), 6 doz cranberry choc chip cookies, and 8 doz pecan choc chip cookies (2 doz were immediately scarfed by my quilting group). We've got two more batches of cookies to make - gingerbread and either sugar cookies or shortbread.

2. Take pictures of Ricky snoozing in the sunshine:


3. Decorate house - done!!!

4. Knit cowls


Pattern: Swirling Petals Cowl by Casandra Roberts (Ravelry link only)
Yarn: 1 skein Mirasol Tupa (50g; 137 yds)
Needles: 5mm Addis
Notes: Used thinner yarn so cast on 96 sts (added extra repeat)

My last (official) cowl is on the needles and pretty close to being finished. I should knit a few extra non-scratchy ones but I'm cowl'd out. I also knit a cable cowl for a class that I'm teaching but I forgot to take a picture of it so I'll blog about it later when I have pics and the pattern written up.

5. Wrap presents
So very very far behind on this one. Only 3 presents have been wrapped because I had to get them in the mail. The others are still languishing in a heap upstairs.

6. Christmas cards
Ditto. Don't even know which storage bin the cards are in.

7. Clean up the house
It looks like the Christmas hurricane has blown through and left a ton of wrapping paper, tape, gifts, and storage bins (now empty because everything is all over the house). So the house needs a major clean up not just because it's a maze to get to the laundry room but it turns out we'll likely be housing my parents-in-law for the holidays. MIL called earlier this week and Christmas is cancelled at their place. They live way in the Rockies and it seems that their water source has dried up and/or frozen solid. Since any precipitation is falling as snow, they essentially have to wait for spring thaw before running water is restored.

8. Install Phoebe's heating pad


She loves it and sleeps on it all the time. Thankfully, I got it just before this latest cold snap. She's definitely not as stiff. I would like to get her a cushy cat bed to go with the heater. Ricky hasn't discovered the heating pad so there haven't been any fights over who gets to sleep on it.


Ricky sez, "Who needs heat when I've got sunshine"

never doing that again aka I should know better

I've been busy busy trying to get a jump on Christmas shopping. I slogged through two major malls early this week and I'm done shopping. The only person that I haven't bought anything for is my Dad. He is so hard to buy for. I really don't know what to get him. It doesn't help that it's also his birthday next week.

I taught a cowl class last weekend and I brought some of my cowls to demonstrate the different patterns available. The students tried them on and some were deemed 'scratchy'. I'm not that sensitive to wool but now I'm realizing that some people are so I'm digging out my wool/silk and wool/cotton yarns to make some non-scratchy cowls.


Pattern: Ashford Cowl by Nicola Faull (Ravelry link)
Yarn: Cascade Sierra; col 16; 1 skein (191 yds; 100g)
Needle: 5mm Addis
Note: I didn't do the scalloped edging.


Pattern: Abstract Leaves Cowl by Deb Mulder (Ravelry link)
Yarn: Mirasol Cotonani; col 406 Tangerine; 1.6 skeins (90 yds per 50g skein)
Needles: 5mm Addis
Notes: Used larger needles & thicker yarn. Cast on 90 sts.

Surprise, the sun came out briefly and there was a cat sitting by the window. Time for a cat'n cowl picture:


Phoebe let me know how much she hates cowls (click to embiggen):

moving on

The whole mitten fiasco is behind me. I'm not thinking or obsessing about it. I haven't frogged them yet because it's a two person job and I need hubby to help me. And I'm making him help me because it's his fault that his hands are freakishly large. Thanks to everyone for your words of sympathy & encouragement. The idea of sewing up the gusset is a good one but if I take away sts from the gusset, I have to add them to the palm otherwise, the mitten is too small. Curse his big hands!!!

And there was another near knitting tragedy. While rethinking hubby's mittens, I wanted to check something in the Anemoi charts and I couldn't find the PDF on my computer! I looked on both hard drives as well as the backups for the laptop and my old computer - nada. I was very close to having a heart attack. I finally plugged in the Shiny Blue Thing (my name for our external hard drive). I looked through all the backups and finally found it in the March backup of our previous computer. Bad hubby for not restoring all my files.

So moving on... Did you know that there's less than 45 knitting days til Christmas? Yep, it's officially crunch time. I am furiously working on Christmas projects. I finished a cowl yesterday and here's a craptastic picture (really dark yarn on a pouring rain day is really hard to photograph even with an Ott Lite):


Pattern: Turtle Tracks Cowl by Vicki Susan
Yarn: Queensland Collection Kathmandu Aran; col 117; 1 skein plus 4 yds of a second skein
Needles: 5mm Addis
Notes: Major errors in the pattern - only rows 2 & 16 are correct. So very annoying. Lucky for me, I've knit this lace pattern before so all I had to do was pull out the other chart and use that as a reference. If you want to knit this, email me and I'll send you a list of corrections.

ETA: I stand corrected. Vicki has made changes to the original stitch pattern that results in a column of garter stitch rather than a column of rev. stockinette. My apologies for misrepresenting her pattern.

No Ricky cowl picture because there's no natural light left in this part of the world (til next April). I immediately cast on another cowl.


The yarn is Berroco Peruvia Colors. I am using the same yarn but the unpainted version for the Mondo Cable Cardi. There is quite a difference between the two even though they're both Peruvia. The dyed version is very similar to Malabrigo.

I will officially start Christmas shopping tomorrow when hubby and I head out to a huge Christmas market. It's all about high end handmade items. I haven't told hubby yet but a local dyer will be there selling yarn (and her handwoven shawls & capes). I'm pretty sure that I'll buy yarn from her.


Phoebe sez, "I want bigger cat furniture for Christmas"

new toys

I am blogging from my new toy (and my new 'office') - a brand spanking new desktop computer. The laptop has been relegated to the 'almost scrap heap' and my bootable HD in hubby's desktop will soon be reformatted (must make a backup before he does that). The CPU is pretty cool - it's got a big removable filter screen so that I can clean it when it gets filled up with fabric lint cuz it has to share space with my quilting corner. The area has been redesigned (aka cleaned up) but I still need to find a place for the scanner and the printer which is on back order. I get my own widescreen monitor and you should see the fancy monitor arm (costs more than the monitor!).


I can push the monitor out of the way when I need the space to sew/quilt and still be able to watch a movie or maybe a video tutorial. It pulls way out so that I can even see it while ironing. With 3 horizontal pivot points, 2 vertical, plus tilt & swivel, it's very versatile.


I can adjust it with the flick of my hand and it's very stable. It's a slick piece of hardware. I believe hubby is very jealous of my monitor arm.

Sorry but there's no knitting content today. I worked 3 days this week plus we had dinner guests on Thurs. Every spare moment has been spent getting my new toy up and running. Hopefully, I'll have some knitting to show you next time.


Ricky would like some sympathy for his boo boo (click on pic for a close up). He came up to me a few days ago with blood smeared on his face. On closer inspection, there is a good sized hole and I believe he walked into Phoebe's claw. I'm sure he started it.


Phoebe says, "Take that, Ricky!"

ETA: CarrieK (I can't find an email address for you) - I read these 4 books: "Cat in a Flamingo Fedora" and "Cat in a Jeweled Jumpsuit" both by Carole Nelson Douglas plus "Cat on the Edge" and "Cat Breaking Free" both by Shirley Rousseau Murphy. They are murder mysteries where a cat (Midnight Louie and Joe Grey/Dulcie respectively) solves/helps solve the crime. They're very fun to read.

catching up

I am finally catching up on a bunch of things. Like gardening. Yanked out some knee high weeds this morning. Got about 2 hours of work done before it got too hot. It's going to be close to 30C/90F today.

A bunch of new yarns seem to have entered the house. I got 2 skeins of Panda Silk as a birthday present from Angela. She and I also drove down to Bellingham yesterday to shop at Apple Yarns. That's where I bought all Cascade Heritage sock yarn (for heels/toes/stripes). On the right is a skein of Harrisville Shetland Flax & Wool that I bought from Maiwa on Canada Day.


I spent most of last evening cleaning out my sewing room in preparation for the new computer. I have 3 garbage bags full of fabric to give away, one bag of garbage garbage, and another bag of recycling. Some fabric hit me on the head while I was cleaning up so I still have lots. It's still a disaster but I hope to make enough room for a small shelf so that the CPU doesn't sit on the floor (and suck up all the fabric lint). I also need to move stuff off the wall to make room for my fancy schmancy monitor arm (a bday present from hubby - it costs more than the monitor) and clear off a shelf for the new printer and my scanner.

I cast on the Anemoi mittens yesterday. Out of the 18 rounds that I've knit, only 9 are usable. I blame the heat for affecting my brain cells. It is not fun undoing stranded knitting especially when the yarn is sticky shetland. But I'm back on track and the ribbing looks like ribbing rather than something else.


Phoebe sez, "I'm melting".

still recovering

Yawn! I'm still recovering from the hectic weekend. I started a sock at the Test of Metal and I'm very mad at it.


It zigs to the right and then zags to the left. It looks so ugly compared to the first one. I want to chuck it out the window. So to console myself, I went to my LYS and engaged in some retail therapy.


The STR has entered the building and is leaving just as quickly. I tried to be good and limit myself to just the colours on my wish list but the Bleck was calling my name. The LYS has 26 colours of STR lightweight and a lot of them are purples. This is my all-time favourite sock yarn and it'll be hard to resist buying one of each.

After my shopping spree, I was a good girl and made some quiches for a friend who just had a baby.


Don't they look yummy? Unfortunately, there was a slight kitchen disaster. The cookie sheet flexed and the egg spilled onto the bottom of the oven. There is a very black mess that I need to clean up. The kitchen smelled pretty burnt all afternoon. Ick!


Phoebe sez, "Does this make my butt look big?"