It's all about Meme, me

Part of the definition of a Meme is it propagates itself and can move through a culture in a manner similar to a virus. Well I have both. A sinus/cold virus attacked me this week; which, I wish I could get rid of quickly and I was tagged with a Meme from The Jilly. I much prefer the Meme!

So here’s the deal:
The Rules:
Rules are posted at the beginning. At the end of the post, the player then tags 6 people and posts their names. Then the player goes to the "named" people's blogs and leaves a comment, letting them know they've been tagged and asking them to read your blog. If you've been tagged, you do the same, letting the person who tagged you know when you've posted your answer. Your answer of course, is the answer to the following questions. Here we go!

1. What was I doing 10 years ago?
Using my superb math skills that would be 1998 – I was running around the country doing seminars, writing patterns and trying to keep my knitting machine/sewing machine business going while debating if I had to go back to work in the “real world” for health insurance, etc. Health insurance won out. The pull of designing and teaching has been getting stronger lately so I’m trying to figure out how to balance a real world job with my passions.


2. What are 5 things on my to-do list today?
Sleep to get rid of this sinus thing.
Work on the lace shrug to wear to my cousin’s wedding.
Snuggle with the boys – always on my list!
Order some Kauni yarn.
Indulge in a wonderfully rich gooey dessert because I’m sick and I deserve to be pampered.


3. Snacks I enjoy:
Duh – rich gooey desserts (see above). Chocolate – the richer the better. Chips and salsa.


4. Places I've lived:
Born in the house I currently live in (I bought my parents house). In between I’ve lived very close to home. College was 3 hours away in Winona, MN and the rest of the time I’ve had apartments or homes in the Minneapolis northwest suburb area.
Summers were spent living “up nort” at the cabin like most good Minnesota kids.


5. Things I would do if I were a billionaire:
Pay someone to find a cure for cold-sinus things (I’ve got a one track mind today). I would love to have the money to just give away. Find people who need that extra boost to make it to the next level, whether it’s for college, small business, etc – and give them a hand up.
I’d also find way to treat my family and myself: travel to where I haven’t been, learn and discover new things and – buy any yarn I want, whenever I want!

Rules say I have to tag 6 people now so hope you’ll pay along: Guinifer, Toni, SheKnits, Meghan, Wye Sue, and NerdGirl (haven't heard from you for a while!). This is my firset Meme and if you dion['t answer I'll understand but - come on! It's easy and it's something to do on the holiday weekend!

AAAAHHH - CHOOOOOOOOO

I got hit with a sinus - cold thing yesterday. Maybe I'll blog tomorrow.

Alpacas and Llamas and British Shorthairs - oh my!

Lots to catch up on.

Last weekend was the Shepherd's Harvest Festival and the MS Bike Ride. I promised a yarn raffle and you'll get one - but first some llamas and alpaca.

I've got a thing for critters like most of us do. Here's the alpacas and llamas from last weekend.

Can you tell the difference between the llamas and alpacas? The last pictures is the alpacas. It's hard to tell the difference from these pictures but at the festival it was much easier - they all had signs telling me which they were!

Bert has become thrilled with the nature channels lately, well, with HD in general. Any time I put on a show on one of the HD channels, he sits and stares. Makes it hard to see but then -

he gets all excited by whats going on the screen and wants to be part of it. I'm worried that the screen will get damaged with all his pawing on it.

The gray blob is done. It's now a gray lace shell. It's made from Berroco Denim Silk - part silk, part rayon. The pattern is on the Elanns.com web site. Time to start the shrug that goes with it.

Finally - the MS Bike Ride give away. The randomly drawn name will be receiving a skein of Lang Jawoll sock yarn which comes with it's own little skein of reinforcing yarn, and a sock pattern from Amazing Threads - my LYS. I took all the names of people who donated and let the Random generator pick a number. The winner is: kmkat. YEAH!!! I'll be contacting you to get your prize sent out.

Thanks again everyone. Your donations will help the wonderful people at MS Society work on finding a cure.

Happy Mother's Day - give me a hug

I spent yesterday involved with the MS Bike Ride but no the way you'd think - my engine light came on and I didn't feel safe driving over 50 miles without getting it checked out. Unfortunately, I couldn't get it checked unless I gave up the bike ride. If I didn't do it then I'd have to wait until Monday night and I just didn't dare wait that long. It turned out to be a bad gas cap sensor. I think our cars are getting just a little too automatic. BUT-

I did ride my bike around the area in my own version of a mini- ride and more importantly - your donations are still going to a very worthy cause. I will let you know who won the knitting goodies shortly and get a hold of that person to let her/him know something is coming their way. THANK YOU EVERYONE!!

This morning I went over to the Shepherd Harvest Festival and it was cold. I didn't spend much time in the vendor buildings but did get some good pictures of the llamas and alpacas. One problem - I brought my new phone that has a good camera to try it out but I couldn't email myself the pics. I'll play around and get them off the phone and post them, hopefully tomorrow.

The count down to my cousin's wedding continues and the gray blog is starting to have a shape. I've bound off the sleeve caps so it can now look like what it will end up being - a top down lace shell.

If I have time I will also be knitting a shrug to go with it. Ya gotta love rayon on silk. This yarn is a ribbon yarn and a bit rough to knit with but once it's in a knit stitch is already starts the softening up and just feels good.

Last fall I had all that work done on the basement and my window wells to waterproof the basement. In the process my plants got abused. I had some peony bushes that were here when I was a little girl. I think Dad planted them the first year they moved in so those plants were over 50 years old. It looks like they may have survived- we'll see but one of the tulips made it through the construction.

As you all know I have a couple cats. If you don't know that, you are obviously totally new to reading this blog cause all I seem to talk about some days are the boys! Anyway- every once in a while I mention Bert and his love of dragging his toys around. Here is today's view of the living room. The only thing I put in the picture was the kitty tunnel. Everything else is Bert.

That's - 1 knit mouse, 1 stuffed mouse, 1 fishing pole, 1 green sock, 1 piece of paper, the fishy on a rope, and inside the tunnel - 2 more knit mousies. Sadly, this is clean compared to what he usually has it looking like.

Happy Mother's Day - come play with me!

Chief's way to celebrate Mother's Day is to climb on top of me while I try to work on the computer on my lap. Little hard to see the screen but - the purring makes up for it.

Happy Mother's Day - give me a hug! - Chief

And the Knit Goes On

I've had a busy week at work and home. The NW Twin Cities Burbs Knit Night was last Thursday (first Thurs. of the month). It was our 2nd time getting together so the group is still "finding itself". It's a very mixed group of people and everyone is very friendly. We've got new knitters and old timers like myself. Then there's our token guy (his term, not mine!) He has been knitting about 2 minutes and has made several felted tote bags (lined) and working on a fair isle hat. This guy had knitting mojo coming out his ears!

I worked on a top for my cousin's daughter's wedding in June. I had some Berroco Denim Silk in the stash and found a lace top and shrug to make. It's not too far along and is knit from the top down so the picture is more of a gray blob but here it is so far...

The 1x3 rib Fire Socks are still coming along. I swear my SIL will retire as a fire captain by the time I finish these. It has nothing to do with the yarn - Maizy is great. I just am bored with the design (or lack of design) and the length of these socks. In case you forgot - they are Maizy because it will wick and being a fire captain my SIL has hot feet a lot. They are also going to be super long to go over her fire boots to help prevent the chafing from the boots. So far each sock is 1 skein of Maizy.

It has a lot of yardage. I'll be splitting the 3rd skein and making them as long as it allows. The design is just a simple 1x3 rib. In the back I changed the ribbing every 10th row to slowly increase the ribbing at the calf to 1x4 for extra fabric. The front stayed 1x3.

I found a pattern for crocheted sponges and made one. I actually made this on Earth day but forgot to post a picture. I decided to play around with a knit version and will test it out a bit. If it seems to hold up well I'll write my directions on a future post.

Well - it's Sunday night and that means I have to go back to work tomorrow. The new work situation is nothing to get excited about and more something to endure so - I have to start a countdown till next week.

Speaking of next weekend - Saturday is the MS 30/60 bike ride. If you want to donate the link is on the right. After the bike ride I will be randomly picking someone to win some knitterly goodness. It could be you!

Is it winter already!?!

This week we had weather in the mid 70s.

Yesterday morning we had green grass and flags in the yards getting ready for work on our street. There's a duck apparently guarding the street for us.

Can't see him - here's a closer shot.

Looks like he's decided to protect the manhole cover.
But that was yesterday -
Today......

Yup. it's Minnesota I heard we have had snow as late as May 26. GIVE ME A BREAK!

I have a 30 mile bike ride for MS in 2 weeks and I haven't even got the tired pumped up yet. Speaking of the MS bike ride - there's a link over on the right if you want to donate to MS. Thanks.

Actual Knitting Content

I finally got my act together and took a couple pictures of the little bit of knitting I've been doing. Just to prove I really am working on "The socks that will not be finished", here's a shot of them so far. Well - sort of a shot. My model wasn't quite up to the job of standing by them and looking cute. He was busy protecting this week's junk mail.

I dump the junk mail in a pile all week and then Saturday or Sunday I go through and throw out the paper in recycling, the stuff with "credit card applications" in the shredder, and the plastic and other junk in the mail in the garbage. It's amazing how much my folks still get. It's been almost 2 years since they lived here. I've never bought, donated, or in any other way acknowledged the junk mail but - it just keeps coming. Obviously, many companies don't think too green!

Back to the socks.

These socks are still not done. Each sock is 1 skein of Maizy so far. They aren't long enough for my SIL yet but, I'm impressed at how much yardage is on each skein. I've got one more and will split it between the two socks and see how long these suckers can get.

Stitches Midwest

I signed up for 2 classes at Stitches Midwest this August. One of them is Cat Bordhi's sock class on Sunday. It's based on her new book "New Pathways for Sock Knitters". She has several ways to change where the gusset "increase" is and thus create very unique socks. I made the first baby sock last night to see how they worked. It's the Little Sky Sock.

See how the increases are on either side of the front.

That means the sides go straight down to the heel. I can see some pretty interest patterning ideas with increases being in different places! This should be a fun class.

In the meantime - Chief has been helping me knit. he snuggles in between my legs and rests on my tummy. Often he'll help hold the yarn for me. Having a warm purr near me seems to help my knitting mojo - at least until he decides to climb up on my chest!

Why does Chief get all the pictures today? I'm cute too. AND I'm awake! - Bert