It's all about the numbers

This week has been all about numbers.

How many days till Thanksgiving (i.e. - how many days to get the house cleaned)
How long till I get out of work each day - so get working on the house cleaning.
How many pounds should the turkey be to feed everyone and have some leftovers.
How many pages can I get read during lunchtime to get the book I'm reading done before it's due back at the library.
How much yarn will the current project take.


One set of numbers I miss because I haven't been machine knitting for the past couple years is the numbering system for yarn. I really wish hand knitting would embrace this system. There's a couple systems - cotton vs. "worsted" type yarn. I'll explain the basics behind the "regular" yarn system. See if you don't agree that this would be great to have with hand knit yarns. All yarn is given a 2 digit number, a fraction. The most common I'd use was 3/15 weight yarn. Other frequently seen numbers were 2/15, 2/24, 2/8.


The way this system works is - the first number is the number of plys. The second number is the weight number of 1 ply. The bigger the number the thinner the ply and the more the yardage. I won't go into exactly what the numbers mean but the way most machine knitters used these numbers was to figure yarn size.


The number you get when you divide the numbers of ply and the yarn size tell you the "size" of the yarn. The closer to zero the fatter the yarn and the less the yardage.


For example: a 3/15 yarn is 3 plys of a 15 weight yarn. It's "number" is 5.
A 2/15 is 2 plys of the 15 weight yarn and its number is 7.5
So the 3/15 yarn would be bigger and have less yardage than the 2/15 yarn because its number (5) is closer to zero than the 7.5.


Not only does this give you the yarn size but it lets you substitute yarns with confidence.
Say your pattern calls for a 3/15 yarn but you have one that you absolutely love but it's a 2/24 yarn.
OK - the 3/15 yarn is a 5. The 2/24 yarn is a 12- too thin. If you take 2 strands of the 2/24 yarn you now have 4 plys and when you do the math you get 6. That's pretty close to 5 so if you double up your really pretty 2/24 yarn you can very probably make your pattern and get gauge.


Wouldn't it be nice to have our hand knit yarns have a system that gives us the most accurate sizing as possible. Right now a DK may really be an aran weight because the person who decided it's weight decided it looked thicker or thinner. I don't know how many times I seen a yarn that's marked dk weight but was really sport weight once I figured out gauge.



That's enough about numbers for now. The last number I'll mention is 1. Have a number 1 great day Thanksgiving with whoever you get to spend it with.


Thank you for taking time to read my blog the past few years. Thank you for your comments and friendship you've provided through the comments. Thank you for helping me get through the family problems this past year. Finally - Chief & Bert want to thank all of you for putting up with the billions of pictures I force upon you of them.

The boys first meal together - 4 years ago.

Bert joined the family 11-14-04

Cat in the Box

When I got home tonight I didn't get my usual happy little kitties at the door to say "Hi Mom". Chief was camped out on the sofa staring at the dark-dark night. I called. He didn't even bother to turn around to look. I took off my coat. No movement. I went over to the front door to retrieve the package that had been left. Not even a whisker moved. I brought the package in the den and grabbed the camera. Still nothing. That cat was camped out for good.
You may notice the kitty afghan FULL of cat hair. I made that several years ago to protect the top of the sofa. I learned early there's no way to keep cats off such a wonderful spot so you might as well protect it. The kitty afghan is about 18" wide and the length of the sofa. It's folded in half in the pic. Guess I was planning on grabbing it to clean and didn't quite make it. Maybe this weekend.

Meanwhile - Bert was camped out in front of the kitty tunnel and looked like he was ready for a quick get away if I tried anything.


So - what was in the package and what would actually make a Chief move? The Chief answer is - he found an empty box too tempting to stay on the sofa and had to check out the box. See the side of the box - it says "Knit P" in that purple script that can only mean I got something from Knit Picks.

I finally decided to give myself a birthday present and ordered the Options set. I have a couple needles and a couple cable sizes and decided I definitely wanted the whole deal. I also got some Swish to make a pair of gloves for a Christmas present.

While the camera was out and while I was thinking about Knit Picks - here's a picture of my latest Quick Beret. It's KnitPicks Suri - a bulky alpaca mix. The hat knits up super fast and this one looks best purl side out. Another present off the list.....

Still while the camera was out - Bert noticed the camera strap and decided it's time to play.

Guess I'll go find supper and play with the little boy.

Have a great weekend. I'll be cleaning the house for Thanksgiving company.

Gout - what a pain!

Long rambling dementia story ahead… good knitting stuff below....
First off – the gout is not me, it’s Mom. I just get to deal with all the things involved in her getting gout. Gout, as I’ve learned the past couple days, is a build up of uric acid creating crystals in joints. Usually the big toe the first time around. It’s kind of like having a kidney stone in your toe, same stuff creates both problems. It can come from too much meat and other causes. But no matter how you look at it, it’s swollen, it's ugly, it's painful.

Thanksgiving started quicker than I thought. I called Mom multiple times to remind her when to be ready and called Dad’s caregivers to reminder them not to let him sit down for the noon meal. Mom was to be ready at noon for me to pick her up. When I called at 11:30 I didn’t get her so I figured I better head over there NOW so I’d have time to find her before she sat down to eat at her place. When I got there 10 minutes later she was ready except she had a flimsy sweatshirt instead of a coat. I ran up to her apartment and got a coat. Gave it a once over to see there was still chow mein from 2 weeks ago in the ‘frig (mental note – clean Mom’s ‘frig). Back down stairs and we headed over to Dad’s to get him. He was mostly ready except to put a shirt on over his t-shirt and grab his coat and pills. We were off and heading to my cousin’s almost half hour earlier than I planned. I've learned to give myself ½ hour more than I think I need when getting both of them – it’s a dementia coping thing. This time they fooled me and were ready. Oh well, better than being way late. Can't keep that juicy bird waiting!

Anyway, Mom has had a sore foot on and off from wearing crappy shoes her whole life so that she has a corn on her 2nd smallest toe that can best be described as Devil’s Tower- it’s tall and has a wide flat plateau. At my cousin’s house I told her to take off her shoes and just go bare foot for the day. By the time we got ready to go home her foot was swollen and sore. Turned out it wasn’t the corn but her big toe. By Friday morning this was nasty! Her big toe was about 3 times it’s normal size except for a little tiny toe nail sticking out and it was red and shiny and really sore to the touch. So – off to the doctor. After quite a bit of time there, a shot in her back side for infection and 2 prescriptions later, we headed back to her place. I got to spend more time getting the pills, getting her settled in after she had supper in her place’s restaurant, and cleaning the frig (you do NOT want to hear what I found in there!) So, my day off ended up being over 5 hours of Mom toe stuff. The pills should clear things up very quickly but getting Mom to remember to take them is another story.

I bought one of those pill boxes with 4 slots per day. Nice and big, easy to see and read. Each day for a few days I put in one white pill breakfast and supper and 1 green pill for all three meals. Each day can be taken out of the main box for easy use. So do you think I can actually get her to take the pills at the right time, even with me calling to remind her? Nope. I spent 15 minutes on the phone asking if she took her supper pills (we had the same conversation at breakfast and lunch). After my question and her total lack of understanding till I repeat several times we get into the “No, don’t look at Monday, only look at Saturday” phase of our conversation. Followed by her saying Saturday is empty but then Saturday has 2 pills, then it’s empty, then…. You get the picture. Sorry about the ranting. I just needed to babble to someone and my family hears about these things way too often. I have to spread out my frustration a bit to deal with life sometimes. At least it's a finite time period and not forever. When we go back Thursday to have things checked out I'm going to have all her meds reviewed - start fresh and sign her up for daily visits from the nursing staff at her apartment.

Now on to some fun stuff.

Chief and Bert helped me open up my new toy.



I finally got a digital scale because I was worried about having enough of my pretty sock yarn and didn’t want to have to unknit. Turns out no problem. With the knitting needles I’m only at 42 g with over 60 g left. This scale is from Target and works in oz or grams up to 72 grams. It also has a nutritional program with it so it can serve double duty.

The sock I was worried about was my All Things Heather sock. I'm using Wendy's Eyelet Rib Sock pattern. I like the yarn and the pattern.



I finally finished the first Stars and Stripes sock. What? You haven’t heard about this sock?


Probably because I started the sock last summer for 4th of July and it kind of got lost in the pile of stuff until today. It’s Dalegarn Stork – 100% cotton. The sock took one skein. It’s toe up and I’ll be writing up the pattern one of these days. It’s just off the needles so is in bad need of blocking. First picture is the more accurate color.


Meanwhile, this weekend Bert has been busy trying to get into any and every box in the house. This one holds finished Christmas knitting. Maybe he smells the wool? Maybe he's just like to snoop in every box he can find.

Chief on the other hand likes long weekends to catch on on his 23 hours a day of sleeping. Maybe he has a good idea!

Take time to give thanks

Time to look back and give thanks. It's a good think to do. In today's world it's so easy to get involved in the day to day activities that we forget to take the time to be thankful. Tomorrow morning before I go to get Mom & Dad ready to go to my cousins house I've decided to take 1/2 hour to review the past year and write in my journal. Look at the good things to be thankful for. I know there are many. I decided to share a couple silly ones with you.

I'm thankful that little critters hold such promise of companionship and create warmth in my house that would be lacking without them. Who knew these little ones would engulf so much of my heart!

Chief's first day as part of the family

Bert a few weeks before joining the family

One other thing I'm grateful for - we live in a country that let's one totally disagree with it's leader and yet you can speak your mind and actually meet the guy in person.


This shot was taken a second before I shook hands with GWB in the summer of 2004. I found out about 1 hour before this picture that he was going to be stopping in my home town so - what the heck - I decided to check things out and ended up in the secure area shaking his hand.

Check out all the guys in black and the totally serious looks they're giving the crowd.

I wish all of you a wonderful family time on Thanksgiving and wish for you the time to reflect on all the things you are thankful for. I know family and yarn will be on your list as they are on mine!