Knock, Knock, Is This Thing On??

What, you may ask, has been occupying me since the first of April, leading me to neglect my poor blog?

Are you sure you want to know?

All right then, I'll tell you. And if I forget some of it, well, I'll have to chalk it up to old age or something like that. Certainly there have been a lot of reminders lately that I'm not exactly the spring chicken I feel like inside.

However, I can still get the happy when I'm in a loverly yarn shop and there is a surfeit of wonderfulness. And some of it can come home with me.

Really, what a shock, huh? This was taken at Twist during a "field trip" with my knitting group. It is a fabulous shop--and yes, they sell online--with an extraordinary selection of yarns, including that Malabrigo I'm cuddling (yes, it came home with me) and the Dream In Color Starry next to it. Considering that I was less than 5 miles away from Webs only a week before, and didn't get to go, I think I was being very good.

Well, at least good for Twist's bottom line that day. Our whole group found something, I think , but you'll have to check their blogs and Flickr pages to see. Or their Ravelry stashes. (You can check out my Flickr, too, for more pictures of this and the other things below.)

The Grandcarrot had a birthday, and turned 3. Here he is with his Auntie D4 and his birthday pinata. Made for him by his loving and slightly demented Auntie.

If you haven't met the Yo Gabba Gabba gang, you won't recognize Plex, the friendly robot. He was a big hit, and the little kids didn't seem to mind taking a whack at him--he was, after all, full of good treats!

I noticed that when the kids were scavenging up the loot after a well-placed whack opened him up, that some of them were taking the opportunity to take home an arm or a leg. Well, why not?

Here's something I didn't think I'd see for quite a while: a four-generations shot, and guess who is the oldest generation?


That's right. Little Paige Nicole, with her Grandma (D3) and mom Jessica. At least I'm not quite the oldest in the family--my dad, at 91, has me beat. We would have loved to get a picture of him holding his great-great-granddaughter, but he's not well enough to travel and it's a little far for Paige to go just yet. (Pics on Flickr of my dad meeting his 3 youngest great-grands, if you want to see. Maybe next time I'll post one of those here.)

Here's a shot of granddaughter Alyssa, at her college graduation in Providence, RI. Those are 3 of her proud aunties with her, and her carroty cousin who was more than a little overwhelmed at the whole giant graduation ceremony.

Alyssa graduated with her AA in Interior Design from New England Institute of Technology the day after she got married! Talk about a busy weekend...

Several of us, well, okay, all of us from California, flew out to New England for the wedding and graduation. D1 met up with us there in a miracle of scheduling. We met up with her in the baggage area of Bradley International and shuttled ourselves to a nearby Doubletree, which was a great place to rest and regroup.

There may have been wine involved. In fact, I'm sure there was. The little ones did eventually settle down in their temporary homes, and by morning we were able to get a couple of rental vans--followed, of course, by the obligatory breakfast at Cracker Barrel.

We spent Friday visiting my dad--the Massachusetts part of the trip--then found our way down to the lower part of Connecticut to #2's house, where we visited and relaxed till it was time to split up. I went to the wedding rehearsal and rehearsal dinner, and the rest of the gang went to Mystic Pizza for dinner. There also may have been a trip to a package store for beer and wine and champagne...

Saturday was the wedding, followed by the reception at the wonderful Mystic Aquarium. I'm only including one picture from the reception here--if you want to see more, check out the Flickr links! This is me, in my pink suit (sometimes I call it my pink whale suit, but The Daughters don't like that so I won't do it here) with #2, D1, D4, D5, and D3. It was a beautiful wedding and the reception site was perfect.
So that's a quickie recap of the last couple of months. I've left out whole bunches of things, like D1's new house and being almost snowed in while we were in Denver, and peahens in the jacaranda tree, and how fast Little Miss is growing, and how cute the little grandboys are being, and all kinds of other stuff. I guess I will just need to be better about maintaining the blog.

I'll try!

April Already??!

Not the best picture I've taken of the little cousins, and I'll work on getting a better one. However, as anyone who's ever had a toddler in this age bracket already knows, they are perpetual motion machines, and getting even one of them to stand still this long is a major feat.

I did get several pictures of blurs. Sigh.

Anyway, time does seem to be marching on, and March has marched its way into history. Time for some new blog resolutions, or maybe just trying to do a little better. Let's see how I do!

There are some interesting and exciting things coming up this month. First up, tomorrow morning D4 and I will be on a plane to spend 4 days with D1. While we're a Mile High, there will also be the opening of signups for the much-anticipated Mean Girls Yarn Club, on Friday. Then at the end of the month, most of the California contingent will be on a plane headed for the East for #1 Granddaughter's wedding and college graduation--talk about a busy weekend!

Oh, and Great-Grandaughter #1, aka Paige Nicole, made her appearance last week. So instead of having a "lucky 13th" grandchild, #13 turned out to be a "great" instead. Pictures are on her great-aunts' Flickr pages, since my phone has stopped accepting pictures. (Yes, I know, it's probably time for a new phone. Sigh.)

In yarny-goodness news, there's a new Yarn Club in town, and the signup frenzy will be happening on Friday April 3! The club is being organized by Laura from Dizzy Blonde Studios and Knitty Knitterton of the House of Awesome. (Did you see my Awesome yarns in previous posts? Yeah, those base yarns are sooo soft, and the colorwork is to die for.)

Club details:

• Website is The Mean Girls Yarn Club
• Signups begin April 3
• Shipments will go out every other month for 1 year
• Cost is $150 for the year, payable in one lump sum or 3 installments of $50 each
• Membership is limited to 50 people
• Colorways will be club exclusives, and will never be sold outside the club.
• There is a theme within a theme, and guessing is encouraged.
• Each skein will come with a little something COLLECTIBLE attached to the band, and a little extra "something else."
• There are Ravelry groups for both dyers: Dizzy Blondies and House of Awesome.

I'm encouraging you all to head over there and sign up, just please please leave a spot open for me! If I don't get in, there will be some sort of major tantrum going on, probably with a triple back flounce and a touch of acid reflounce too! (Okay, that might not make sense, but if you're a Ravelry Rubbernecker, it definitely will. And if you're not, why not?)

So, that's it for March, and looking ahead to April, it looks as if it might make for interesting blogging.

Especially if I don't get into the club... because we all know I NEED MORE YARN.

More March-ing Along

First day of Spring today, and it does look as if spring has sprung around here today.

I went out and took lots of flower pictures. Uploaded them, and most of them are so blurry they're unusable.

Boo. Bah humbug. Guess I'll need to go out there and try, try again.

I did get pretty decent picture of the Mock Orange, which is in full bloom back there. The tree is huge, and it smells absolutely wonderful in the back yard. Yay for fragrant trees!

Oh look! The spider plant seems to have grown some Awesome Sock yarn. I'll give you a link to Sharky's etsy shop, but right now she seems to be sold out.

This is her sock weight in a color called Power Tie. It reminds me a lot of Bob's favorite red tie, the one he always wore when he needed a little extra confidence.

There was another hank o f yarn in my package from Sharky, too. A worsted weight, in shaded bright pinks.

Look how nicely the pink yarn goes with the pink Transvaal daisies! And by the way, these little survivors have made it through another year, and have come back quite exuberant. The other one, a pale pink, is also doing nicely. Thank goodness all of the plants didn't die off with last year's massive invasion of the contractor's men.

See, even some of the daffodils survived. I'm planning to feed all of the surviving bulbs and plants so that they can make it through another year.

The brown iris is once again holding forth, and I'm so glad to see it! If you look at some of the pictures from last year, you'll see this stalwart survivor bravely waving its pretty flag (pun alert: irises are also known as "flags" in some places, tee hee) next to the ditch the plumbers dug to replace all the pipes.

Whew. While the lawn still looks horrid, and there are a lot of valleys where the filling-in was pretty sloppy, I'm cheered and encouraged by any signs of recovery. Acutally, the irises seem to be doing well everywhere. I'm glad we were able to move them out of the driveway border since that is now a wasteland of concrete, broken glass, nails, and general yuck. I'm hoping that with a little hard work it will be a good place to plant--I'm thinking lavender and sunflowers to start.

I've got seeds, and starter pellets, so maybe I can grow my own baby plants this year. I do get some teasing about having a "relationship" with my plants, but gee--why not?

For instance, when I look at this iris, I think of Sheila, who gave me a whole bunch of tubers when she thinned out her iris bed. She was a quilter and the only person I've ever met who (like Bob) was born in Wilmar!


And the lilacs are beginning to bloom. Only two panicles so far, but it's coming along.

I like this silhouetted against the bare trees in the neighbor's yard.

Here's Li'l Missy, giving me the ol' stinkeye because, after all, doesn't everyone need to have a drawer to sit in? Her next step after this (Mom says it's ok for her to play in this drawer, so it's ok with Grandma too!) was to empty everything out of the drawer onto the floor, so she could get her whole self in there. She's very focused when she's doing something like this--and she also put everything back in when she was done, and closed the drawer and the door too. It's so much fun watching her learning and doing--everything is so new!!



I have more pictures (including Cousin N8) but I'll save them for another day. I'll also fill you in on my latest "plunge" since I've joined the world of Facebook. Sigh. Only way to keep up with all the family, I guess!

March Maunderings

Is there anything more appealing than the doorway to a wonderful quilt shop??

This one is Back Porch Fabrics in Pacific Grove. And it's just as wonderful as it looks.

Yes, it was Asilomar Week again.

There are some rituals involved with going to Asilomar, although they are very fluid. One of them is visiting Back Porch. They have a fabulous collection of fabrics, and their book selection is great. They also make every effort to be Empty-Spools-friendly, so when you walk in the books by the teachers for the current session are right there on display. (Assuming your teacher has written a book! Not all of them have, including my teacher for this timeast

Their back room is set up as a gallery with ever-changing displays. This time, it was quilts by their very talented staff. Last year, it was quilts by Ruth McDowell from the Thomas Collection.
Well worth a visit, any time I'm in the area. And, it's only a block from Monarch Knitting. Did I mention that I love this area??

There's some wonderful scenery at Asilomar, and even though the weather was stormy and rainy and windy much of the time I was there, I loved it anyway.

I thought the sun behind the clouds and the wind-whipped trees were wonderful.

This is my first project--well, except for a "trial run" at the technique. My teacher was Sylvia Einstein, who does wonderful "fractured landscapes" by building up layers of split and pieced fabrics. My blocks are supposed to be trees--use your imagination!--and they're done with cutting the block apart and inserting the strips to form the tree shape. I had done something similar in a workshop with Doreen Speckmann the first year I was at Asilomar--she had us experimenting with window panes on scenic fabrics.
I really like the technique, and once I get my sewing room set up, I'll probably experiment with it some more.

The second quilt top is what Sylvia calls Magic Squares. It's a very simple technique--this quilt is 20 blocks, and they are all cut from 4 fat quarters of batiks, except for 3 shapes cut from the remnants of the batik from the tree quilt above it. The border was something I had with me--yes, I brought my famous tub O batiks with me, and by a serendipitous chance it had a whole baggie of precut strips left over from my class with Colleen Wise three years ago. Made the tree quilt much easier to play with!

Lots more pictures on my Flickr page. I'll try to make sure they are all captioned but you know how that goes. I'll leave you with one of my favorites:

This is February

The contrast between the weather out here and in other parts of the country is pretty amazing.

This is the view out of my back door: camellia bush in full bloom. It dawned on me, when I was passing out camellia food to the 20+ bushes that are growing around the house, that this one has done pretty well in its odd little enclosure.

When we started the addition to this house--back in 1983, if you'd like to keep track--we had two camellia bushes growing side by side just outside the kitchen door. Because of the way the house is oriented, the stairs to the yard went away from the bushes; but it soon became obvious that one or both of them was going to need to be moved so that there'd be room for a back door and a deck. So one of the bushes got moved, but the other we decided to leave in place. The deck was actually built around the bush; and when the deck was replaced, the new deck had a cutout for the camellia as well. I tend to think of this as an in-process arrangement, but after 25 years, I guess it's safe to say the camellia is pretty content in its spot.

Then there's the snow on the mountains from the recent rains. The clouds sort of obscure it in this picture, but hey, when you're sitting at a red light trying to take a quick photo, this is what you get.

It's no secret that I love snow, and rain, and cold weather, and while I have really enjoyed our recent storms, they've now passed into history and I'm once again dealing with bright hot sunny days. I hope we get more rain soon.

Today was a knitting day, and we had a little visitor.

You can never start a boy off too early with the yarn love.

I'm not sure what you'd call this particular technique. Yarn sampling?

He also enjoyed petting people's sweaters, especially the Yarn Addict who was sitting right next to him.

She also had a couple of skeins of Sundara yarn that he would have loved to get his hands on, but he had to settle for the leftovers of Memere's Encore.

Oh well. He had fun with it! And he was a very good little knit-visitor.

His momma could have done some knitting, if she had a project in the works. We're working on her! She does know how to knit and crochet both--and when we took our infamous tatting class, in San Diego, she was the only one of us who could actually produce a respectable piece of tatting. That is my biggest regret, that I have never been able to master the art of the shuttle.

My mother did beautiful tatting, though, and we have some of her lace. Heirloom stuff!

This grandma, however, does much more utilitarian knitting most of the time. I think it's almost time to tackle one of my silk shawl projects.

Hmmm. A silk shawl would be the perfect accessory for the Grandmother-of-the-Bride, n'est-ce-pas? I'll have to see what I can do about that.

Meantime, Mr. Dimples seems pretty pleased with his foray into the Yarn Arts. Maybe he'll come visit again!

Happy Valentine's Day!!

Here's sending good thoughts to everyone for a very happy Valentine's Day!

(Thanks to David Malki at www.wondermark.com for the valentine image. Do go over and check out his pseudo-Victorian-engraving webcomics!)

Tap, Tap, Tap...

...is this thing still on?

Yes? Good.

So much for good intentions for posting every day, huh? I think I'll call January a loss and try again in February. NaBloPoMo has a neat theme for February: "want." So maybe I'll be able to explore that.

January has been one of those months that has been so up and down, I'm still trying to process it all. I think one of the reasons I've had "blog block" is that I wanted to do a post to honor my friend Dinah, who passed away this month, and it's been hard. How do you sum up almost 40 years of friendship in a meaningful way?

I've also been sick. Really truly awfully sick, to the point that I wasn't well enough to make the trek to Vegas for "the" baby shower last weekend. More about that later. The up side to it all is that I have finally recovered and it was truly amazing on Monday to find that I actually feel "good" as opposed to just dragging myself around. It's quite amazing!

Today is #1 Grandson's 21st birthday. Just in case I wasn't feeling "elderly" enough with a great-grandchild on the way, now I have a grandson who's "legal."

So, okay. I'm back to blogging. Let's hope I can keep it up! I've got a couple of pieces of unfinished "blog business" that I'll try to catch up on the next couple of days, and then we'll see what happens with "want"ing to do better!

On the Twelfth Day of Christmas...

... the Three Kings finally made it to the stable! We have a family tradition where the manger gets set up, minus the Baby Jesus (he shows up at midnight or so on Christmas morning, if we remember where we hid him) and the Kings travel all over the living room. They usually go across the mantel, over the windowsills, and finally get to the stable about the time the tree is gone and the rest of the room is cleared of most vestiges of Christmas. Well, not this year. It's been a bit busy and both D4 and I have been hacking and coughing so things are moving a little slowly.

However, I have managed a few things. My square for the Ships Project afghan is in the mail, and my Special Olympics scarf is done and ready to mail in the morning.

As far as floozy casting on, well, I got one thing started tonight while watching the first episode of the new season of Biggest Loser. This:

It's two colors of Encore Colorspun, Mistake Rib pattern, pretty fast and easy so maybe it will get done quickly.

I'm t hinking seriously of ripping out the basketweave scarf I started earlier in this Flooze-along, and redoing it in this pattern. I'll have to sleep on it, though, and maybe take soundings from the rest of the OOPs floozies.

Happy Twelfth Night (even though I'm posting this after midnight, so technically it's over. Pfffttt!).

On the Tenth Day of Christmas...

...we worked on taking down the Christmas tree, and cleaning up around the place.

Hi-Hi helped. Being his typical modest self, he didn't want to be shown packing ornaments or taking down lights, so he ducked the camera.

Oh well. He's still pretty!

Simon helped too. Simon's idea of helpful is to stay out of the way, thus avoiding being stepped on. He did, however, convince me that it's a good idea to leave the shredder unplugged. No, he didn't get shredded, nor did he get tail fur caught in the blades (again). He just jumped off the computer table, and turned it on, once again.

No more of that. So here he is, being helpful in his own way.

The pillows and afghan are a present from D4. I'm thinking they are going to stay around for a while longer, since they are really more "winter" than "Christmas."

Right?

I was a bad floozy today, didn't cast on anything or even wind any yarn. I'll try to make up for lost time tomorrow, though, since it will be back to work and back to chasing Li'l Missy A around. The segue to that is that once I've done that, I'll be ready for some good couch time.

Besides, there's a new season of The Bachelor starting. Talk about a cheese and whine fest! Oh yes, there will be good TV this week--new season of The Biggest Loser starts on Tuesday (thank you, DVR, for making it possible for me to watch it even though I'll be teaching that night!) and we've already started the Miss America reality show. These are perfect knitting shows--they capture that percentage of brain that isn't engaged in the knitting, so I can sit still and get lots done!

It's Contagious!

ATTENTION: There are SPOILERS below, so if you're in either the Year of Lace or Big Ass Yarn Club, and haven't gotten your Dec. package yet, and don't want to see what it is, DON'T LOOK !!!

Looks like there's another blogger in the family! This time, it's D1's sister-in-law, Pam, who lives in Washington. She's started a blog for her family news and is currently showcasing some of the wonderful photos taken by her daughter Catlyn. Check her out: Pam's Blog is here.

Also contagious is the Floozy Cast-On for this week! Here's my latest project:



and... a closeup of the project! Yes, this is the Totally Autumn pattern from Knitty, which I had started in a pretty lavender Lullabye from Lotus Yarns. It just wasn't working--the pattern and the yarn clashed too badly so it was frogged. Sigh. At least I was able to reclaim the yarn, and now I've cast this on in a different and I think more appropriate yarn.

This, if you're a regular reader, you may remember as having arrived in a box as a tangled mess. Once it was untangled and wound into a nice ball, it was given to me! So I'm using it with this pattern, in one repeat's width, to make a scarf.

So far so good.

I'm halfway through the first repeat, and it's looking as if it will work very nicely with this yarn.


Okay, here's another project that has been malingering but which has a deadline. I need to finish this so it can get in the mail in the next couple of days, since it needs to be in Idaho by the 14th!!


The scarf is for the Special Olympics, and the organizers requested that everyone use the same yarn: Red Heart, in these two specific colors. I had high hopes, but this scarf has definitely been another one of those "learning curve" things.

Oh well. It will get done, and hopefully it will be well received and well loved.


Okay, here come the spoilers.

You are warned.

If you don't want the surprise spoiled, STOP HERE!



First up, the Winter shipment from Year of Lace. The yarn is a lovely very soft merino lace from Fireside Yarns, and the pattern is the Snowdrop Shawl from Nancy Bush.
I think it's going to be very pretty!

Secondly, here's the latest shipment from Melanie at Lotus Yarns, the current Big Ass Yarn Club yarn--a smooshy soft blend of Suri alpaca and merino in a colorway she calls Winter Garden. Love love love!

Okay, that's all the goodies for now. I'm off to get in some couch time and cast on some more projects. I also have located the swift, so if the mood to wind more yarn strikes, I'll be able to do that.

Mission Accomplished!

Herein the tale of a poor little square. Just a simple, 12" by 12" square, in a pretty off-white natural sheepy yarn. A square which proved to me, as if I needed proof, that I am not now and never will be anything but an amateur knitter!



Every year, the nice people of NETA gather for a spa weekend, during which they do a little fund-raising for the Ships Project. This is usually an afghan, made up of squares knitted by the members, joined at a "joining party" and then raffled off.



Well, I'm sure it's no secret that I really want to become a New Englander again someday, so what better way to find knitting buddies than by joining NETA?



And of course, if I'm going to belong, then I need to take part in at least some of the activities. Luckily, knitting a square is an easy one, since the yarn and directions get mailed out anyway so why not to California?

Well, apparently mehitabel in California is doomed this year. I did my square (not as early as I would have liked, but still, it was done) and I had enough yarn.

Then I blocked the puppy. Ummm... 9" x 12" isn't going to do it.
So I waffled, and thought, and finally, on Monday of this week, with the support of Ellen and KnitDevil, I frogged the poor thing. Yesterday, since it was the first day of a new year, and I was feeling horrid anyway, I cast on again, using bigger needles, fewer stitches, and a modification of the same pattern.

Have I mentioned doomed to failure? Part way through, my Bryspun needle came apart. I just picked up the piece to work back and whoops, here's a needle in my hand, and a half-unraveled mess in the other.

Yeah. Have I mentioned that this is not the first time this has happened to me with a Bryspun needle? The previous time was on a train speeding through France, with my Sea Silk Paris scarf on it.

However. I do own more needles, and while I couldn't find an exact match--seems a bamboo 10 and a Bryspun 10 are not the same millimeter match, or something--close enough. Got to the end of the square, started to bind off... 12 stitches from the end. Out of yarn.

Project got put into time-out for the night. This morning, time for some stash diving. Came up with a ball of what might be exactly the same yarn, except of course this wasn't pre-washed-and-blocked-and-then-unraveled.

Big sigh. I figured, at this point, close enough, right? So I undid the bindoff, knit one more row for good luck, and then bound off.

The square is now blocked out to 12" by 12" and is happily, I hope, drying on a winter towel.

I know, it looks awfully loosey-goosey, and I'm hoping that once it's dry it will fluff up a little more.

All I know is that it's going to be on its way to Mona as soon as it's dry enough to travel. Even if I have to take a hair dryer to it! I'm crossing my fingers that the nice folks at NETA will think it's good enough for the afghan.

First Day of the Year

Welcome, new year! It's been a quiet New Year's Day chez mehitabel, with both D4 and I barking at each other most of the day. We watched the Rose Parade on TV and sorta vegged out on the couch, watching a Biggest Loser marathon. To be exact, there were two of them today, one on Bravo and one on FLN, so for a while we were clicking back and forth between them. Then they kinda got themselves synchronized, and were showing commercials at the same time, so we settled on the FLN one since it was the most recent. We'd missed the last two episodes, so it was good to catch up.

Yes, I do like some reality TV shows. Not the "Real Housewives" kind of thing, but Biggest Loser, Dancing With the Stars, What Not to Wear, and all kinds of Food Network and HGTV stuff. Hey, the dish is new to us. We are still getting caught up on all this sort of thing!

If you want to see lots more adorable photos of Baby New Year, you can check out his mom & dad's Flickr page.

Hopefully, I will be able to update you all tomorrow on my progress on the Feel Like a Floozy knitalong my knit group is having this week. Right now, I'm retreating to the couch and the TV and my cough drops!

End of the Year

NOTE: Blogger is not letting me upload pictures right now. So there might be a picture post later, but I'm not going to let it stop me from posting. So there, Blogger!!

Last day of the year. It's certainly been a year of changes, of upheavals and disruptions and lots of new things! I was trying to decide if this post should be about the year just past, or if I should use it to look forward to the next year. 2009 certainly promises to have a lot of surprises, and if it follows true to form, not all of them will be pleasant.

And most of them will be things we as individuals have little or no control over. So here's my list of things I want to see happen over the next year, with a little rambling added for auld lang syne!

One of the things I need to get working on is finishing the organizing and setting up of the house. I know it would have been done a long time ago, had it not been for that last fall back in June, which messed me up in a lot of ways. Of course, that could just be a pipe dream; maybe it would still be in the same state it's in. So:

1. the office needs to be organized and set up so that we have a place to do bills, and mail, and use the computer for fun and "work" without blocking off the passageway and without having to spread everything out on the dining room table.

2. the sewing center needs to be set up and organized. This is going to involve organizing and going through both the fabric and yarn stashes, and the button stash as well. Oh yeah...the buttons. Let's not think about those just yet.

3. the garage needs to be organized and cleaned out, too. There are still a lot of boxes out there that have things in them that we're missing--like the platters to the daisy dishes. Twice now, we've had to improvise on carving and serving the turkey, because the platters are still packed. And the Geo. Foreman is still missing, too. As are the bulb and lamp for the floor lamp. My Ott lights work all right, but aesthetically? well, they don't exactly exude "Craftsman" ambience!

4. There's that extra 30 lbs. I'm lugging around. Yeah, it's time for it to go. Not sure how compatible that goal is with the FMS, but we'll have to see.

5. I'm needing to "get out" more, I think. Why do I sit at home, wishing I had a knitting group to go to, when there are groups meeting all over town if I'd just get up and go? Ditto the Friday night quilting. It will be nice to have my own place to sew, but it will be even better to have people to get together with and bounce ideas around with.

There. That's not such an imposing list, after all. I'm going to sign on for Mission: Possible 2009 (on Ravelry) and also take part in the Feel Like a Floozy GKA this week--not so incompatible, really. Casting on several projects is a good way to get started on winnowing down the stash. I just need to remember to "shop stash first" whether it's a quilt or a knitting project. Or crochet.

What's your take on the whole New Year process? Are you planning to do more/less/change? Inquiring minds want to know!

The Stockings Will Hang...

...assuming that I can locate the stocking board! This is an interesting affair that screws down to the top of the mantle, fitted with cup hooks so that we can hang stockings on it. One of my husband's creations from years ago. It was taken down for the renovation, and it's SOMEWHERE in the garage.

'Nuff said?

The tourtiere is baked and ready for dinner tonight. Yes, it looks mildly underdone--it will "finish" in the oven at D3's tonight. She's making a baked pasta dish, and D4 found a "Yule Log" cake which will stand in for a Buche de Noel.

Christmas Eve is going to be fun!

Then of course, there are t he breads for Christmas morning. D5 has offered to make chocolate-chip pancakes, and these are just the supplement. Lemon-poppyseed muffins and cranberry bread. Mmm! Pickles will go in t he fridge once the bird is out; the fixings for pumpkin pie are handy, and those will get made tonight.



Ah yes, there will be baking tonight! Might even have to whomp out a few cookies, although #2 sent us a nice box of assorted cookies and goodies.

My big sewing project--for someone who hasn't sewn much this year, these two were big projects, never mind that they are very quick and easy quilts!

Well, except for the snipping. And the washing. And washing. And washing.

Ragg quilts are made from squares of fabric, with or without batting in between. (Denim ones are too heavy to put batting in.)

So, the blue one with the vroom-vroom squares is for Nate; the pink one for Audrey.


They'll get wrapped and put under the tree, though of course the wee ones are a little too small to open the packages without help. I happen to know that there's a couple of mommies who LOVE opening packages!


Here's sending wishes for a happy and peaceful holiday for you, wherever you are, and lots of health and happiness in t he coming year!

That Time of Year

Little Missy was wearing her new sweater, and we thought it would be a good opportunity for a photo session.

Well, we got great pictures of Li'l Miss rolling around on the floor. She was not feeling very cooperative.

However, she was nice and warm when she went to the store with Mommy. So it's all good. After all, the sweater was made to keep her warm. And also look cute.

She's wearing some big-girl shoes in this picture. They seriously affect her walking--she's used to barefoot, or stocking feet. Big ol' heavy clunky shoes? Well, it takes more effort to pick up the feet in those. What does she know of "winter" and things like that?








I've set up part of my holiday village on the back part of the sink--the bar that extends into the back room. Tuesday night, I had the quilt class members over for a potluck. This display is called "camouflage" as it's designed to attract attention away from the room beyond.


Because, of course, that room is full of boxes. Including the 17 boxes of ornaments, lights, and assorted trimmings that came over from storage.

We aren't going to discuss storage right now. I was hoping to be able to empty the unit, but after looking at it the other day, well, I'd need to build on another whole garage to house it. I think I'll just wait a bit and go through it a bit at a time.

Let's just say, 17 bins of stuff filled the Explorer, and we did leave about the same amount there of Christmas trimmings. I think next year, maybe, come November I'll go through and pare down the collection.

Maybe. And maybe I'll once again be able to use it all.

Hey, you never know!

We do have a tree up, and it's decorated. Not as lavishly as when there were a lot more pairs of hands to do it, but it's looking good.

Some of the bubble lights even bubble. Some don't. No idea why!

Anyway, the potluck was a rousing success, at least from what I was told that night. Everyone came, we had 15 people sitting around the dining room table (3 of us on bar stools, but still...) and it didn't even have all its leaves in. It was nice to share the finished (sorta) house with the people who've heard me fussing and whining about it all year!


This is just a gratuious cute-baby picture. The Ds and my sis-in-law took me to The Melting Pot in Brea for a birthday lunch feast.

Li'l Miss came along--baby makes 6? She was really a very good girl, ate the things that were good for her and wasn't given more than a taste or two of chocolate...



D3 and SIL, aka KnittingTerror on Ravelry.



The next picture is D5, Li'l Miss, and D4.


Some birthday loot. Amazing, really. There were even cupcakes from my Sooper Sekrit Rubberswap partner. I feel very spoiled!



Christmas house. Doesn't look as good in the photo as in real life...well, okay, they're kind of Charlie Brown lights, but at least we tried. And they are rather festive.


And, finally, my "new" temporary sewing area. Gotta get those babies' quilts done in time for Christmas! Well, or shortly after...

Hey, why am I here writing? I need to be sewing...