Saturday in the House

The most positive thing I can say so far about our lay low weekend is that minus weaving in the ends, sewing side seams and tagging. I have gotten 2 scarfs, 1 poncho, and 1 hat off my needles so far. UFOs seem to be flying off at a good rate. I also spun 2 mini skeins. So tomorrow morning I will be sewing and weaving in ends. Then it will be off to see how many projects I can finish. When the weekend pile is finished I will post a photo.

Well its getting late to good night all and have a great evening.

A Very Slow Day

I can't decide weather I spent the day catching up on sleep and rest or pre-loading on sleep for the weekend.  But one thing I know for sure is that my 4th operation gratitude scarf of the year got finished, the ends woven in and tagged with the yarn content which was super wash merino. Then put in a giant Ziploc bag with the other 3 scarfs so it would not get lonely. I just love those XXL Ziploc bags for finished craft projects. I also cast scarf number 5 for this project on the needle today.

I also worked on a scrappy hat, although with the amount of yarn I have it may not turn into a scrappy hat at all. It might just get finished tomorrow. Maybe just maybe I am in a finishing streak instead of of a starting streak. I will see how many thing I can get off the needles and into the bags this weekend.

I did not get much spinning done today, but for that there is always tomorrow. I also got a very small amount of house work done and attacked another pile not all gone but half way there.Well it is getting late and I should not be this tired but I am so good night all.

Life on the Mommy Track

Well it has been a couple of pretty busy days around here, with spinning, knitting, cleaning child care and finally getting Eric back to school today. I took full advantage and got a lot of errands done, the usual and not so usual errands included shoe laces, light bulbs, tall shoes with a 3 inch heel. Guess what!  I am still short when I wear them. I also got a great deal on a new fry pan originally $39.99 I got it for $13.99 and I don't care that it was lasts years model, I really don't think the function of a fry pan changes from year to year. Shopping for dinner. Poor John I really don't feel like cooking so he is getting roasted turkey breast, steamed green and wax beans with rosemary bread. Tomorrow it will be turkey and avocado sandwiches on hopefully rosemary bread ( or I will be back at the store again.),  vegi sticks and pineapple wedges.

I have one room left to do. The craft, guest and exercise room left to do. Yes the ultimate multi purpose room. I know it will be the hardest room yet as I find it hard to part with craft/sewing supplies. But I should really get in there at a few minutes a day until it is done. I am hoping that I get it done before it hits the 100's because I would like to tackle the garage next but will not do that on days over 100f just because I say so.

Well I am headed to the craft room to start. since I have to finish dinner I will not be there long by design. Have a great evening and enjoy your families.

My Hand Spun Yarn

OK, I finally got it together and took some pictures of my hand spun yarn as of late. It is not all the yarn I have spun as I have some bits and pieces waiting to be soaked and thwacked. As You can see there is a jumble of colors and different types of fibre. Some 1 ply and some 2 ply.

A more artistic presentation  is show below.

The Yarn that is still on the spindle is about 1.8 ounces of merino wool.  I have put the picture here so Teri can get a better look at the color. She has first dibs on this yarn. There is enough on the spindle for a nice scarf. I will figure out the yardage( apx. 2640 inches and 73.33 yards. I just measured) when I get I take it off the spindle this afternoon.   It will get the soak and thwack treatment today and should be well rested and ready to knit in a few days.  

Well it is time to get back to my day, after a long night with Eric I managed a nap with the nurse here and am so behind on everything, but if I hustle I will get most of it done today. So Enjoy your families and have a wonderful day.                                                                      

Weekend - What Weekend

I spent the weekend bouncing my attention between my guys. One started off the weekend early and sick the other decided to play catch up and got sick too. One will be out the door tomorrow( fingers crossed on that one) and for the other I called in back up for the next 2 days.

A lot of knitting got done on a whole lot of projects and needless to say nothing got finished. My mind was just too distracted to sit down and finish a project. I landed up with projects scattered around the house and where ever I happened to be was the project I worked on at that particular moment.

I got some spinning done and will devote my blog tomorrow to that. I will have pictures. Note to self get the camera out. I think the house if finally quiet and I hope to get to bed before tomorrow. So good night and enjoy your families.

Good Friends Good Food

I taught my friend Carolyn how to spin at Friday Fun Knitters today. I can officially say how jealous I am of her. After just 1 1/2 hours of spinning her yarn looked like mine did after a couple of weeks. I on the other hand manage to spin and ply one sample that arrived in my Phat Fiber sample box with out a tag, the yarn was yummy green with blue flecks if any Phaties know what it is please let me know.

We did go out to lunch and the company was great and the food was good. The only thing bad about lunch was I got a call from the school nurse saying that Eric had a seizure in class and was running a fever. Well that call broke up lunch while I went to retrieve the above mentioned boy. Well that broke our streak of 15 straight days of school. The fever has broken as of  now and he seems not to have lasting effects from the seizure today. But I have declared it a lay low weekend anyway. I have yarn, fibre and my 2 guys, who could ask for anything more? Well...maybe Teri.. but school comes first and I am quite happy with everything she has done this semester.

I hope everyone had a great earth day. Well I think it is time to say good night and enjoy your families.

Stepping It Up a Notch

This morning was the knitting guild meeting and somehow I managed to irk a lot of people.  No I don't think it was the kosher for passover snacks and pre packaged utensils it. Maybe it was because I brought some stitch markers to sell, nope I did not sell a one. Was it that I was wore the nice pin that Candy made for me when I could not manage to knit with double pointed needles, I don't think so. Was it my noticeable loss of inches, maybe. Was it that I tried to give a link to Yumiko Alexander's web site and scarf pattern. I had also tried to mention that the Friday fun Knitters and I have already managed to donate 2 1/2 boxes of hand made items already, probably. Here is the link and if you have not made one just give it a try and send it to the address on the pattern.  http://dandoh.blogspot.com/2011/03/on-march-11-2011-japan-suffered.html 

There was a nice lunch with Nancy and Darlene. There is nothing like good food and good friends. I did manage to bring home lunch for John, he said that the hot soup hit the spot.  Then it was catching up on Nova's with John while spinning. When Eric came home he "helped" with the paperwork, bills and filling. I think he just wanted to hang out with me.

For my walk today I decided to try a pair of Earth Shoes, they were great on the down hill and flat straights but going up hill I slowed my pace down and could still feel the burn. If I am not walking well tomorrow it is because I stepped it up to fast.

Well it is time to go move my car before the pack rats attack and get dinner on the table. Have a Good night and enjoy your families. By the way I ask everyone to wish my mom a belated Happy Birthday, being that I am a bad daughter and forgot. Sorry Mom. Happy Birthday very belatedly from your very forgetful daughter.

Reaping Dividends

I have started trying to find time to exercise every day. It is all part of my trying to be good to my self personal campaign. Aside from getting down to a 15 minute mile, to clarify the starting point was about a 30 minute mile. So now I have to walk 2 miles to get my 30 minutes in. Same time double the distance. In my humble opinion not a bad start.

The dividends started really coming this morning when I got dressed for the day. I either needed to be 6 inches taller, buy much taller shoes or dig into my closet for smaller pants. I of course choose the smaller pants. Here I am go through my closet like a teenage girl trying to find something that looks nice.

Another dividend that I noticed is that I have more energy. Which means more things are getting done around the house. Today was not one of those days however since I was up until  a little after midnight with Eric and started my day at 5:45 am. So goes my life with Eric. I did manage to get him out the door for the 13th straight day of school, for which I am very grateful to the powers that be.

I did manage to ply 1 small skein of alpaca this morning while we were waiting for the bus and then proceeded to start spinning another bit of Moreno wool. I spent a lot of time spinning and did even manage to get a nap, baking and a little cleaning in today.

Well it is time to go hook up a hungry boy for the night. So have a great evening and enjoy your families.

A better day

It was a better day today. I got up extra early this morning to make a breakfast of fresh mango, sausages and a potato kugle to share with John.  There was some random surfing and knitting that went on. Then it was off to knit with the girls.

After Knitting I introduce Carolyn to Unique Designs by Kathy. I am going to teach Carolyn how to spin so we went to pick a spindle and some nice roving. If you would like to see some very fun well made yarn please stop by Kathy's shop at 4010 West Palo Seco.  Kathy also has a lot of unique batts.  Kathy's yarn holds up very well. The shawl I knit with her hand spun mohair is going on 5 years old and still in great shape with a lot of wear. Just don't tell Kathy I wash it in Tide on gentle wash and hang it dry. Yes I know it is not recommend for mohair.

The afternoon was spent doing laundry and sending robots off to do various chores around the house. I also managed to ply 3 skeins of yarn. I find a quiet house when I am wide awake the best time to ply. I am also spinning a small sample of Alpaca which is a dream to spin with.

I did manage to get a walk in today. I am now at a 15 minuet mile. Then made a very lazy dinner of left over roast, potato kugle and canned asparagus. Then some more spinning and now it is time to get ready to turn in for the night. So have a great evening and enjoy your families.

Happy Holidays

I would like to start by wishing everyone a Happy Holiday no matter which holiday you celebrate this week. May you enjoy your families and enjoy the fact that we have all made it to this season.

That being said, I am a little melancholy this year. As you know Eric has had a lot of tough health issues this year, which have left me exhausted. I can report on the good side that Eric has slept 5 yes count em 5 nights in a row. Yes miracles still do happen. With just the 2 of us eating tonight I will not be preparing the huge festival meal. First I don't have the energy and second we can not eat that much. I have instead spent the last few days really cleaning and there is a large visible difference. Today I even let roomba have the run of most of the house, he did a good job but did not have enough juice to make it back to his docking station. I would also like to say that roomba still does not like Eric's hoyer lift. I also gave scooba a work out and plan to do so again tomorrow in another part of the house.

With all that being said I still prefer huge holiday gatherings and the formality of the the order of the holidays. It is my hope that when our daughter finishes grad school we will again be able to have nice family holiday dinners. It really does not matter the location as long as we are together. Well I have to go put the finishing touches on dinner.

Happy Holidays to All and to all a very festive meal.

It has Been a Week

It has been a week since I last blogged. In the interim Eric made it to school 5 days in a row. I got a whole lot of cleaning and knitting done. And yes it being Saturday I made another charity run of hand knit items.

This was more than my knitting this time. I had a full box and a bag from my Friday knitting group the Friday Fun Knitters and a full box of items I had hand knit. These were all destined for Japan. They were delivered to Yumiko Alexander of DanDoh who was doing a trunk show at Grandma's Spinning Wheel on Tanque Verde. I was also able to have a nice chat with Yumiko, she is always so delightful to talk to. I can't wait for Yumiko's next book to be published.

If you would like to help in this effort here is a link to Yumiko's blog: http://dandoh.blogspot.com/2011/03/on-march-11-2011-japan-suffered.html
The pattern is quite easy. I made 6 of these scarfs last week. I also included some hats. Please tag your hand knit items with the yarn content and write a short note of encouragement.  They survivors have a long road ahead of them and they need all the help and love we can send. You may also send hand crocheted items. The address of where to send your finished pieces is on the scarf pattern sheet.

I think it is time to start working on Teri's blanket again. so I will be rearranging things to get that endeavor underway tomorrow. I only have about 15 square feet left to knit, so I hope to get it done before I loose my blanket mojo again. I have only manage to get 10 square feet done so far. It is by far the largest project I have undertaken since I started knitting. And NO you may not have a queen size blanket as this will be the last large blanket for a while.

I did manage to get some spinning done tonight, but I am saving plying for when I am a bit more awake and have a little more patience. As we are going into a holiday week may you all enjoy your holiday celebrations with your families.

Saturday in Tucson

Need less to say my day did not go as planed. But I did manage to drop off a bag of hand knit items at a charity event before I came home. I have lots of skeins of freshly spun yarn hanging in the garage waiting to dry. Think back on my, plan a cold rainy day was not the best day to do the final processing of the yarn, so it will take a bit longer to dry.

A lot of random knitting went on but nothing was finished. A lot of progress was made on a lot of projects. I kinda of envy those who can work a project from start to finish without picking up another project. I am not that type of person so I have random knitting projects placed where ever I tend to spend time in the house. I even have my emergency knitting kit in my car. After all I never know when knitting will come in handy.

Some plying and spinning also went on. I definitely need to practice my plying to get a better technique down but since plying is a relatively new activity I suspect it will take some time to learn.

It was a very cold and rainy day here I think the high was around 48 and it rained all day. Don't get me wrong I enjoy the rain and we are at a rain deficient but some things just cant be done in the rain. Such as taking pictures of some of my newer projects.

Well it is getting late here and tomorrow is going to be a very long and busy day. So enjoy your families and have a great weekend.

Learning is Good

I learned something new today. It has to do with my spinning. I found that it is easier to spin lace and fragile fibres on a lighter drop spindle. 4/16 of an ounce can really make a big difference. Well you seasoned pros already knew that but for this newbie it was a huge break through.

Well here is hoping it is going to be an early night. Enjoy your families.