Pancho Via!

PANCHO VIA!

Here's Pancho!! My baby boy. I've had him for awhile now - since around Sept/Oct '07. I love him lots!

I'd like to be... under the sea ...

... in an alpaca's garden in the shade. We'd rest our head on the sea bed in an alpaca's garden near cave. Oh what joy for every girl and boy knowing thier happy and their safe ...

SING IT WITH ME!!

I'd like to be under the sea in an alpaca's garden in the shade. We would be so happy you and me No one there to tell us what to do I'd like to be under the sea In an alpaca's garden with you.

LOUDER!!!

I'd like to be under the sea In an alpaca's garden in the shade He'd let us in, knows where we've been. In his alpaca's garden in the shade. I'd ask my friends to come and see an alpaca's garden with me!

Lovely. Just lovely!

Cable Scarf

So, it's been awhile since I've posted on my blog. I have just been so busy with work and church. I'm finishing up the cookbook this week for the church. I'll be glad to get this task over with. I do hope that the lady's group raises lots of money for the missions that they want to support.

Here is a snapshot of the scarf that I am working on right now. I am really enjoying this.

This is my first attempt at anything cable and it's really cool. I haven't got my brain wrapped around how this is happening but I love it.

I've been using a cable needle and have found that for now that works the best for me.

Oh the home front ... Tinkerbella went back home to live with her previous family. I miss her so much. But, I got a new baby. His name is Pancho Villa. He's a rotten little 2 1/2 pound Chihuahua. He's quickly winning over my heart.

I also finally got on Ravelry! Woo Hoo! That really is a great website. I've been pestering Kibbles over the fact that I got in before her! (slight snicker) but I'll get her a T-shirt to make it up to her.

Oh ya - believe it or not there is a Chihuahua group inside Ravelry. I'm a member of course. I hope to find lots of patterns for my little Hua.

Life is good. I'm off work today and tomorrrow. That's good. I'll have a short work week. That's good. Knitting on Thursday. That's good. Everything is really good now ... maybe it's the meds! haha!

The New Baby!

Yes, I have a new baby!


Here she in in all her glory. As you can see here in this photo, she's been very busy unraveling a $40 skein of alapca. The yarn goes around the green chair, down the hall and the rest is in the kitchen. I was just telling someone that she was so good - that she will sit on my lap when I knit. Then she goes and pulls this stunt. I didn't even hear her.


This isn't a really good photo of her. She's a going concern and rarely stops long enough for a photoshoot session. The neighbor guy came over and she charmed him a bit. He was doing the ole' dog whisperer thing with her and she responded great. He had her sitting and laying down.


I can't get her to do anything. I will say however that since I've had her ... almost one week now. She's only bit me once or twice today. On day one, she bit me about 100 times.

I love her. I can't help it.

A little more mileage ...

I just gotta get a little more milage out of my blue ribbon.

Here is my baby brother modeling my hat.

Ain't he handsome?

He's a good sport!

Cabin in the Woods

I haven't posted a blog lately so I thought I'd post a picture of my mom at the folk's cabin in Canada. They are up there adding the front deck onto the cabin. I think the deck is as big as the rest of the cabin.

It looks really nice and I'm sure the boys - Baxter and Bismark, a Sheltie and Weinie Dog, are loving the deck where they can run in and out. Mom said it's cool there. I wish it was cool here. I hate hot weather and especially when the weather man is saying it's going to be at least 100 degrees three out of the next five days.

Anyway, Frank is going to have a surgery in a couple of week to remove some spots found during his colonoscopy. Please say a prayer for Frank so that his recovery goes quickly.

As for knitting, I've not knitted quite as much this week. I am however still working on my second booga bag. I'm going to add a closure on this one and I've been looking as how to put purse frames into my bags. I think those are pretty cool.

By the way Liz, we had 6 knitters for Friday's knitting. Everyone misses you at the sessions so hurry back!

My new project bag!

I've been trying to find a new knitting bag. The one I have is a big red and black canvas type bag and it flops over. I saw one knitting bag that someone had at Four Ladies that I really liked. It was more of an oval shaped basket that was lined and had handles. I think that's what I'll try to look for.

A second thing that I needed was a small project bag so I can just take a single project with me. I was sitting today sewing on the handles of my first felted bag and it came to me that this would make a perfect project bag!

So here you have it. My new project bag. I love it!

I'm so organized!

So, I guess it's official!

I'm a knitter! My yarn stash is very, very small at the moment. I'm documenting this photo so that I can come back in a year and see what this fascination with yarn and needles and scarves, hats, socks, etc. will have done to me.

:-)

These bins used to be full of fat quarters in all sorts of colors. It's all packed up now in the closet and I've started a system for keeping track of my projects.

I just love this!

Fuzzy Slippers

Here is my latest creation!

These knitted up really quick and they are allot of fun to make. I really enjoyed making these so if making socks is like this, I'm going to like making socks.

The first one that I made looked like a train wreck. There was stockinet stick and garter stitch all mixed up together. This is why I like felting. A little hot water and all the mistakes are covered.

The second slipper was so much better. I only had 2 mistakes on it and I know what I did wrong so I’m thinking my next pair should be perfect!

Wouldn't he make a beautiful sweater?

This guy is beautiful!!

I want one just like him!!

This lama was at the fair. I really don't think the lama's liked me much. I actually think I was about 10 seconds from a face full of lama spit.

If they only knew how much I like them!

I'M A BIG WEINER!

LOOK AT ME!!

I won a blue ribbon!

I won a blue ribbon!

I won a blue ribbon!
I won a blue ribbon!

What talent! What skill!

You'll notice in the picture that I'm the only entry in this catagory. Now, that's not why I won the blue ribbon so zip your pie-holes!

I won because knitters across the land quake in their yarn bags at the mention of my name! Many knitters have come before me but I, yes I, won the blue ribbon at the fair in the unlisted catagory!

Autographs and photo's with me and my ribbon will be available for $5.99 next Sunday.

Another Hat!

What a cool hat!!

Look at the front of the Fall 2007 Knitsimple magazine.

Look familiar? I really like that magazine. There are 3 or 4 other patterns in their that I want to try. I think mittens are in order to match this hat and there is an easy pattern in the mag.

This one went really fast. I knitted it up while watching television. It's all knitting in the round and decreases once the ear flaps are connected. It took me a little while to figure out how to attach the ear flaps but once I figured that out, I was off like the Mad Hatter.

The neat thing about making these different hat patterns is that the first time around there are mistakes but I've learned ways to improve on each hat that I make.

The mannequin's name is Miss Star Phoam. Upon recommendation, I'll be looking for a wig for her.

Evan Almighty

Is this not the cutest face you've ever seen?

So, on the last day of my vacation I decided to go to the movies. I didn't want to see anything too long because I hate being in the theatre 3 hours. Pirates is 2 hours and 45 minutes long so I chose Evan Almighty.

What a cute movie!

It is entertaining, funny, not too long, and it is a feel good movie with lots of animals in the scenes. There were four of five scenes with alpacas and just think up until a few months ago, I never even thought about alpacas! Now I want a herd of them.

Here is a cute link that I found on the net for the movie.
http://www.evanalmighty.com/pops/anAlpacaSays/site/

Like my new red hat?

Look what I made!

A lovely red hat.

I used a double strand of worsted weight, red wool yarn.

I also felted it in my front loading washer. I put the washer on hot water and let it run through a wash and spin cycle. When it got to the spin cycle, I looked at the hat and it wasn't ready. I put it back into a second hot water wash cycle and it felted right up. The only problem is that it felted too small for me but it will probably fit someone else.

Anyway, I like it. I will decorate it with some purple feathery stuff and give it away as a present sometime.

Hat in a Jiffy!

Starry, starry night!

Or scary, scary night on a weird head.

Anyways ... the hat is my latest project.

Tah dah!

These hats whip out in a couple of hours and I like knitting 3 strands together.

This hat has one ball of ribbon yarn, most of one ball of mohair, and about 1/4 ball of worsted weight.

I'm a blocker!

Block! Block! Block!

I'm such a blocker.

Don't know if I did it right, but I soaked it in the sink for 20 minutes like Liz said. I'm not sure if it "bloomed" or not. I then squished out the water and rolled it up in a towel for a couple of minutes.

I put a vinyl tablecloth ($2 Dollar Store Model) on the bed and then a beach towel down to soak up any water. I used my new handy dandy blocking kit from Four Ladies and blocked the top straight across. I just used pins on the bottom half. It's resting now under the celing fan and it's been drying for a couple of hours. It did stretch out a few inches ... which is a good thing!

Oh and Liz, you were right - the crunchiness went away!

I'm such a blocker!

Say it!

SAY IT!!

Calling Dr. Mary

This is little Miss Mary, my great niece and future veterinarian for Mesker Park Zoo.

She's the first grand child in some cases and the first great-grand child in other cases. She's a bright little girl.

Here she is with one of her animals I got her. Her mommy says that the 5 eighty-eight cent plastic Wal-Mart animals are her favorites and that she spends time with them on a daily basis. She bathes them, feeds, them and take them to potty outside.

I hope Mary doesn't end up too rotten.

Pepperoni

Introducing
Miss
Pepperoni ...

Peppy, Peppercorn, Peckercorn, Pecky, Sissy ... all names by which Miss Pepperoni is called.

She's such a good girl (usually). Being the alpha dog of the house or so she thinks, she's always busy watching anything that moves.

She's slightly psychotic in that she doesn't like things that change without her prior authorization. Examples of this include branches that blow out of trees, a woodpecker in the backyard, a paper bag blowing across the yard from the neighbor's yard. She voices her concern until I come and take care of the problem. She likes fresh tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers from the garden. She loves her chewies and she even loves her two kittys even if they detest her. She likes to ride in the car and she likes walking on the leash even if she wants to go faster than I want to go.

She does not like fire crackers and trick-or-treaters. She's not too fond of rain and thunder and she doesn't have much use for her swimming pool other than to take a drink out of it occasionally.

She knows quite a few words. She knows "Peppy, get in your bed.", "outside", "T-bones" and "sit". She went to puppy training class but she was more interested in getting the treats from the instructor than following orders.

Again, introducing Miss Pepperoni - she definately marches to the beat of her own drum.

My "Who Killed Kenny?" Hat

So ... I admit, I have quite a bug for knitting. (Thanks to Liz, my enabler) I've had a couple of bugs before knitting. I had the ceramics bug. I did ceramics for years when I lived in California. My best bud and I used to make ceramics like mad women twice a week and on Saturday mornings. We took over an empty cube in our work area and set up a shop. It was nothing to make $600 to $700 around Christmas. People bought our things left and right. Pac Bell never seemed to mind so we'd come in at 8am to set our stuff out and every day at 4:30, we'd put it up.

I really liked doing ceramics but I could never find a shop once I moved. The shop had allot to do with it I think. I made friends with all the ladies at the ceramic shop and we had big fun. The shop owners were Sherm and Elly Grimm. Interesting how people with that last name cost me money, eh?

So I moved on to quilting once back in Indiana after leaving the land of the fruits and nuts. Quilting is big fun too! Again, I really liked the shop. I had fun making all sorts of things with the ladies at Rosie's shop. I was very sad when her shop closed. There isn't another quilting shop in Evansville like Rosie's. The closest shop is in Boon-Vegas and it's just not convienent to go there very often.

Now! I'm knitting. I really like it and again ... I like the Four Ladies Shop that I go to. The people are so nice and so helpful. They made me feel so welcome and encourage me to try new projects. I really enjoy knitting on Thursday evenings with Chris and the other knitting nuts and I like being in the shawl gang and the scarf gang. I'm firmly planning to join the sock gang too!

Anyway, it's so nice to "have" a shop again to go to and spend a little time doing something fun while chatting with so many nice people.

This photo is my latest project. It's my "Who Killed Kenny?" hat! I love it. It took me about 2 or 3 hours to make this hat. I did have to start over 3 or 4 times but now I've got the hang of it and I think I can whip these babies out for Christmas presents quickly.

Check out the nice pom-pom too! It's my first. I'm keeping it and I just might make a matching scarf and mittens next!

Meet Rudy!

Meet Rudy! Also, known as Rudolph Alexander Princeton. He's quite the spoiled little doggy. Rudy came to live with me when he was about 12 weeks old.

I bought him from a breeder in California who was a active member in the Yorkshier Terrier Club of Northern California. That was 14 years ago. Rudy has been my constant little companion ever since. He's flown across the country with me on a few occasions and quite enjoyed riding in an airplane and all the attention he got from the flight attendants.

Rudy has outlasted five or six fiancés (who's counting, right?) as well as five or six apartments and 2 homes. He's quite mobile. He loves to ride in the car and he loves going in the RV with his grandma and grandpa. Rudy has two sisters, Pepperoni and Abby, but he's not very impressed with them. He's much more content to sit on my lap and watch television or sit on the back of the couch and watch his sissy's outside being silly.