Paws for Thought

Moving on...

2011-07-29T15:31:00.000-04:00

As others have noted, living with more than one dog means more opportunities to observe dog behavior because you can watch the dogs interact. Over the past two months, it has been really interesting to watch Katie and Arlo figure out how to play and just generally be together. Arlo is gradually learning how not to send Katie away. (Jumping on the big dog's head, nipping, barking = big dog leaves.) In calmer moments, he's content to lay near her (notice how in the above photo, his paw is just touching hers?) and if he's not too much of a pest (read puppy), Kate will let him. Hard to say for sure what Kate's body language above indicates. Her head turn might be because I'm standing there with the camera (her usual response to being photographed unless I've got food), or it might be because Arlo has gotten a bit too close.

* * *

It's probably not obvious from the above photo, but Arlo has gained about 6 pounds since he came to live with us. He still looks like a puppy, with his parts not quite in proportion--he just looks like a really big puppy. We've been taking some training classes, and I think he's doing great with basic behaviors, and even a couple tricks (I'll post videos soon). Interestingly, the more he learns, the more he learns about learning. In just a short time, he's gone from a dog not too excited about training, to a dog who regularly offers behaviors. Like Katie, he dances around now when I pull out the clicker.

* * *

I've been trying to think of a graceful transition to my next topic, but I'm not coming up with anything. So let me just close by saying that this is the final Paws for Thought post. I've started a new blog here, mainly so that I could change the title. I'll still be writing about the same things. Thanks to my friends for reading PFT, especially early on when I was new to blogging. Hope to see you at the new place. :)

It's Alive!

2011-07-24T19:39:00.000-04:00

My sourdough starter has gotten out of control. I hate to throw it away, so every week I feed it and, unless I make bread or pancakes, I end up with more! I made eight loaves of bread yesterday, and barely made a dent. I even gave some away last week!

Dear Dogs

2011-06-24T11:54:00.000-04:00

Dear Dogs,

Imagine my surprise when I discovered this empty food bowl on the bed. Any idea how it got there?

Sincerely,
B.

Adventures with Arlo: Week 2

2011-06-21T10:04:00.002-04:00

Arlo continues to make himself right at home, and we continue to be impressed with his social skills and easy-going, laid back personality. Last week he spent a couple afternoons with me in my office, where--after snagging some treats from our secretary--he curled up on his blanket and enjoyed a long nap.

Over the weekend, we did a lot of entertaining, and I was interested to see how Arlo would behave with new people in the house. When guests arrived on Friday, I had both dogs outside in the back yard. My thought was to avoid the potential for chaos at the front door. Katie isn't a problem when guests arrive, but I wasn't sure how she'd be with another dog around, and there hadn't been an opportunity yet for Arlo to greet people at the door, so I didn't know how he'd behaive either. Rather than give them the opportunity to practice bad behavior, then, my plan was to avoid the possibility all together. In addition, with people coming to the house, I had a perfect training opportunity. So I left a note on the front door inviting people to come to the back yard and also asking them not to pet Arlo unless he offered a sit. The humans did a fabulous job, and Arlo responded appropriately. As I think I've mentioned, he's not normally a jumper, but I thought he might be overly excited with so many new people around. I think he tried jumping on the first guest, but when that didn't work, he gave up. Good boy!

Although Arlo seems very mature to me for his age, he really is just a puppy. And one of his puppy habits is that he follows us from room to room--just in case, you know, we might be doing something REALLY INTERESTING. Even though I know he'll probably grow out of this, it's kinda flattering for now. Here he is "helping" me change the sheets in the guest room by squeaking his squirrel.

Arlo and Katie are continuing to work things out, and I'm proud of both their efforts. Arlo is of course dying to be friends with Katie who is still mostly ignoring him. Once in awhile she'll interact, but she seems to avoid getting him all worked up. Probably a smart idea since he's an enthusiastic player and Katie is beyond that kind of thing these days. When Arlo is calm, though, she doesn't mind him laying nearby.

As we get to know Arlo better, we have a better sense for when he's most active and, consequently, when he'd do better playing with us than pestering Katie. As I'm learning from Managing a Multi-Dog Household (a terrifically helpful e-book from Whole Dog Journal), the key to a happy 2-dog household is good management (backed up, of course, with solid training).

Training over the past week included more sit-to-say-please, down, stand and touch. On leash, squirrels are his biggest challenge. He's so interested in them that he can't pay attention to anything else. I've been using penalty yards to get his attention (backing away from the squirrel until he looks at me, then reinforcing attention to me with hot dogs). This is working okay except that I don't like putting pressure on his neck when I back up, even when I move slowly. So I'm going to order him a Sense-ation Harness. Probably, squirrels are going to be the biggest obstacle to eventually letting him off leash. The good news? The very healthy squirrel population around here means we have lots and lots of opportunities to practice.

ETA: In the first photo above, Arlo is wearing his new, spiffy collar purchased recently from Nola and Spencer, my new favorite place for dog collars.

Arlo's First Week

2011-06-12T11:01:00.002-04:00

Arlo's first week with us has has gone pretty well. As he becomes more comfortable, we're seeing more of his personality. He's a little more rambunctious than when he first arrived which isn't surprising. But I have to agree with his foster fam, who told us that after some healthy activity, Arlo is perfectly happy to settle down for a nap. In fact, that's what he's doing right now, and that's why I have time to do some writing.

Although we've missed the critical period for socialization (the period roughly between 3 and 13 weeks when dogs are most open to new experiences), because of his beginnings, I suspect he may have had exposure to more people, dogs and experiences than many dogs. Still, to build on what he's already learned about the world, I'm taking every opportunity I can to continue introducing him to new stuff. So this week in addition to daily walks, Arlo and I went for several car rides, and we visited the vet, campus, our local strawberry festival, the farmer's market, and my friend Melanie's farm.

On all of these outings, he was a model dog. I know I keep saying this, but for a 6-month old puppy he shows very good impulse control. He rarely jumps on people, for example. And he's pretty good about keeping a loose leash.

Until today, I've been walking the dogs separately to get a sense of Arlo's behavior on the leash. Yesterday for the first time Andy and I took both dogs for a walk. I was worried that Arlo might pester Katie, but except for sometimes grabbing her leash, he was pretty good. This morning, Katie, Arlo and I went for a walk with our friend Bob and his dog Quinn. Kate and Quinn are old pals and walk together often. Arlo introduced himself to Q. with typical puppy enthusiasm which Q. discouraged right away. So Arlo tried again much more respectfully. Good puppy.

It wasn't as difficult as I thought it might be for me to walk Katie and Arlo together. They both did a nice job of keeping loose leashes. What I discovered, though, was that I kind of missed having that one-on-one time I get when I only have one dog with me. Morning walks with Katie--and now Arlo--are part sniff walks, but also part training. And I can't do that when I have two dogs to pay attention to. So for the near future, morning walks are going to be single-dog walks--first one dog, then the other. I'll just get up a little earlier. And the extra exercise will be a good thing.

But I still want the dogs learn to walk together, so I'm going to try short walks with both of them every day or two, and be very generous with rewards for checking in. We'll see how that goes.

Introducing Arlo

2011-06-09T15:44:00.001-04:00

Meet Arlo, a 6 month old collie mix, and the newest addition to our family. He's been here since Monday and is settling in nicely.

Arlo hails from a shelter in Kentucky where he was brought in as a stray, and he came to us through the Collie and Ibizan Rescue of Central New Jersey. In spite of a rough start, he is remarkably sweet natured and well socialized. I'm guessing most of that is probably due to the good foster care he had before we got him.

At 6 months, he's mostly legs and tail. And big adorable ears. Since he arrived, he's been getting to know the neighborhood. He's relatively new to walking on a leash but surprisingly good at it. And he was a perfect boy in the car yesterday and at the vet's office.

Like other pups his age, Arlo is a quick study. Already this week he's learned that good things (his food bowl, greeting new people and dogs, access to the back yard, etc.) come to dogs who sit.

Starting tomorrow, we'll be going to training classes, and I look forward to writing more about that on this blog. Until I do, here's one final image from Arlo's first day. Notice the ears. He was intently focused on some squirrels in the bushes.

Birds Like Lettuce

2011-05-30T13:16:00.000-04:00

Gino and Rocky feasting on a bit of lettuce that's fresh from the garden.

A Snack for Gino

2011-05-17T08:59:00.000-04:00

Gino enjoys some homemade bread.

Dog Product Reviews

2011-01-06T13:31:00.003-05:00

As promised, I have a couple of dog product reviews.

First, this leash, which I bought at Pet Expertise. It's "hands-free" and a whole bunch of other cool and useful things including a traffic leash, and over-the-shoulder leash, a tether, and a nice 6.5 foot leash. So, for example, I'm walking to school with Katie, carrying stuff, and in a hurry. I tie the leash around my waist, my hands are free to carry things and/or treat Katie for keeping up with me. But later on the way home, there's no rush, so I convert the leash to its full 6.5 foot length and Katie has lots of slack to sniff stuff as we walk. Two kinds of walking situations, one leash. Another plus? This leash is affordable ($14.75-$19.75). Not as upscale as the more expensive leather Euroleads I've been coveting (and which I still want), but it does the same job. I haven't tried this leash out in a training class yet, but I imagine it will be really useful there too.

Next, for the first time this week I used a dog training food tube (also purchased at Pet Expertise @ $5.75, or $4.50 for 2 or more). This one (made by folks at The Well-Mannered Dog came recommended (on Facebook) by Casey Lomonaco at Rewarding Behaviors Dog Training. She mentioned it as a good option in cold weather--instead of juggling gloves and treats and then having cold slobbery fingers, just give your pup a lick from the tube. I'd read about using food tubes before, but Casey's point about the cold-weather convenience convinced me to give this a try. I don't mind the slobber, but I hate cold fingers. And after yesterday morning's walk, my fingers were much happier. Katie was too--this was a nice change from her usual treats, and because I'm not fumbling around in my pocket, my delivery time is much faster. :)

A couple days ago I also used the food tube in a training session with a client, and I really liked the results. For example, instead of cutting up treats which takes awhile, in no time at all I mixed up some cream cheese and canned chicken in the food processor. (Katie was kind enough to give this recipe a test-lick before I headed out. She gave it four paws up.) And of course because I wasn't doling out treats, my hands weren't all slimy (again, while this doesn't bother me, it might be a plus for some people). The tube is also handy for luring behaviors, should you need to. And--probably the biggest thing--the dog I was working with totally loved the cream-cheese-chicken combo. I could imagine testing all kinds of combos to keep a dog interested. Finally, this particular tube comes with good instructions and recipe ideas. I just bought two more so I can have one filled and a couple clean ones ready.

I hope everyone's new year is off to a good start and filled with many happy training adventures.

Smitten

2011-01-04T18:43:00.002-05:00

For my first post of 2011, here is my last FO of 2010. Sprig Mittens by Eli Stubenrauch in Lamb's Pride Bulky. (Details and more photos available on my Ravelry page.) I finished knitting these just in time for the weather to warm up a bit, but I've been wearing them anyway. They are really warm, and the LPB yarn is totally snuggly. Spring is still a long way off, so these will be keeping my hands toasty for awhile. (If the current forecast is right, I may get to see how well they do in the snow this weekend.)

I had a couple dog product reviews to share but stupid Blogger is not cooperating, so they'll have to wait until next time.

Fall Planting

2010-11-07T17:44:00.003-05:00

Garden season is winding down. This afternoon we planted garlic and shallots, and it felt really good to be digging around in the dirt one more time before the weather turns too cold. Fortunately, we had a lovely sunny day for working. It took us about 3 hours to turn over a couple of beds, plant everything, and clear out the last of the dead plants. We left our broccoli plants which to date have produced exactly three tiny heads of broccoli. I'm curious to see whether the heads will get any bigger.

In some ways, this year's garden wasn't as successful as last year's. We battled heat, drought and bugs. But as a result we also learned some things and the stuff that did really well--like eggplant, tomatoes, lettuce, peppers, and beans. Because we doubled the size of our plot, we had room to try new things. We also started much earlier in the spring and kept going through the fall.

This was the first year that we tried lettuce, and we were really happy with all the varieties. Especially tasty was Black Seeded Simpson, which grew nicely in spite of the very hot, very dry weather. We tried spinach too, but it didn't do well at all. Other firsts this year included garlic, peas, snow peas, buternut and acorn squash, watermelon and cantaloupe. We were so happy about the garlic that we planted twice as much for next year. Peas were yummy, but we needed to plant a lot more! We munched our way through two crops of snow peas: what a treat. Watermelon was pretty successful--we ended up with six good-sized melons. More importantly, they were delicious. Cantaloupe tasted awful (we probably won't do those again next year). Squash, zucchini and cucumbers were all devastated by bugs.

Possibly my most favorite vegetable for 2010 were the Nardello peppers, which I probably would never have tried or even known about except that CR gave me a packet of seeds. Another fav would have to be the zinneas, which brightened up the garden entrance all summer long.

The whole set of garden photos for 2010 is on my Flickr page. In a few months, we'll be looking at seed catalogs and planning for 2011.

My Little Dumpling (Bag)

2010-10-03T12:54:00.000-04:00

How cute is this bag?! Like many other knitters (okay, maybe I should qualify that: like many other knitters also challenged by project monagamy), I immediately CO for a dumpling bag of my own when I spotted the pattern in IK (way back in fall 2008). Dumpling is a super-fast knit, great stash buster, and leaves lots of room to improvise. (If you don't believe me, check out the 1000+ project photos on Ravelry.) As knits go, this one is instant gratification to the max.

Except I couldn't find any lucite rings I liked for the handles. So while I searched, this little Dumpling lived in my WIP pile. I don't know why I had so much trouble finding the rings (again, there are OVER A THOUSAND Dumplings on Ravelry, so this was obviously not an issue for other knitters), but I did--until last week when I found what looked like perfect ones online at The Beadin' Path. They arrived yesterday, and they WERE perfect. So this morning I sewed up the handles, weaved in all my yarn ends (not a quick chore BTW with all the ends left over from the embroidery), and tossed my Dumpling into the washer to felt. The pattern says 15+ minutes, but I got the right fabric after just 10 minutes (with two pairs of jeans in there). I was worried the French knots might unravel during the felting process, but they came out just fine.

I'm thinking I'll keep this Dumpling as a project bag (it seems like the perfect size for a sock project). But I may make more of these for gifts. Except not for GK, who has requested mittens anyway and who is probably "still wondering what the point is."

Once my Dumpling is dry and I add the inside snap, I'll post an FO pic on my Ravelry page.

Crate Re-Training

2010-09-30T15:57:00.003-04:00

In another month, Kate and I (and another friend and her dog) will be attending this workshop. Because Katie will have to spend a little time in her crate (while I'm listening to lectures), we're doing some intensive crate re-training. Kate was crate trained as a puppy, and I used to crate her when we were doing agility, but in the past few years, except for going to the groomer or vet, she hasn't had to spend any time in a crate. At the workshop, she'll have to stay on her own in a room with other dogs in new surroundings. I'm hoping that I can get her (us) ready for this. (If I can't, my friend has kindly offered me one of her dogs to train for the weekend--now that's a real friend!)

So about two weeks ago, I set up the crate and, without making a big deal about it, I started leaving goodies in there for her to find. Of course she went in there, snagged the treats, and left. But still, I'm continuing to do that and hoping it teaches her that good things happen when she goes in the crate. After about a day of this, she went in on her own and took a nap. And that's happened a couple more times--usually in the evening when we're all down there watching TV. She learned pretty quickly (or maybe remembered from puppyhood) what "go in your crate" means, and gradually I've been leaving her in there for longer periods. I give her a stuffed kong, close the door, and do some chores on the 1st floor where she can see me. She can now do about 20 minutes before she gets restless.

In this clip, I'm asking her to go to her crate and then reinforcing when she does. At first I'm reinforcing for just going in, but then she offers me a down, so I reinforce that.

When your dog is "bad," roll up a newspaper and give yourself a whack

2010-08-18T11:56:00.012-04:00

Ordinarily, Kate is the best of dogs. I can take her anywhere and count on good behavior. But like the rest of us, she has her bad moments too, and one of those happened last week at the local (and very dog friendly) farmers' market. I'd stopped at a favorite stand to buy some honey and, as I usually do, asked Katie to sit next to me. As I was talking to the stand's owner, suddenly behind me I heard very loud and unfriendly barking. I turned around to see my dog nose-to-nose with a service dog. I quickly removed her from the situation and apologized to the dog's owners. It didn't help matters that at the same moment a motorcycle roared by. Kate hates motorcycles, so she kept barking for a bit until I managed to get her attention and return her to a sit.

I was mortified not only because she was so rude to a dog who, so far as I could tell, wasn't bothering with her at all, but also because this is the same farmers' market where yours truly recently offered free "market manners" dog training classes.

Oy.

Putting aside my feelings, though, it's worth thinking about what can be learned here. First, what happened was hands-down my fault. I wasn't paying attention to my dog (who clearly needs some proofing work on sits in public places). Second, to say that my dog was "bad," is anthropomorphizing. After things had calmed down, the stand owner observed, "something must have set her off." And he's exactly right. That kind of behavior isn't normal for Katie, who is generally dog-friendly, so something happened that made her anxious. Maybe it was too crowded, maybe a person stepped on her foot or startled her somehow, maybe the other dog gave some kind of signal. Who knows. None of these are excuses for what happened; they're just possible reasons why she may have reacted as she did. As the stand owner also pointed out, "Sometimes you don't know what gets to them. We're all animals, you know, but we humans forget that." As Jean Donaldson might say, we idealize dogs to the point of making them "honorary humans," but of course they don't think in the kinds of moral categories that we do. Thus, in trying to understand what happened, it doesn't make sense to label her behavior "bad."

As I understand it, there is some debate over whether anthropomorphism is helping or hurting non-human animals. That debate might be a good topic for another post, because I'm not sure where I stand (I see good on both sides). In this particular situation, I can, for example, emphathize with what may have been Katie's feelings of anxiety in the middle of a crowd. Maybe she did check in with me before she reacted (she usually does), but I didn't see it and she was on her own. At the same time, that empathy is really a starting place for thinking about a training solution (one based on a scientific understanding of dog behavior) so that this situation might be avoided in the future.

So this week, we're proofing our sits around town, and we'll take another (more closely-supervised) shot at some market shopping again on Saturday.

In closing, I'll add that the stand owner's reaction reflects just how wonderful the market sellers are about their customers bringing dogs along. He might have given me a disapproving look, or made a comment about Katie's behavior. Instead, his response mitigated some of my embarrassment.

Works Cited:
Jean Donaldson, The Culture Clash. Berkely CA: James and Kenneth, 1996.

Saved!

2010-07-30T08:53:00.004-04:00

Mild panic yesterday afternoon when I handwashed my pinwheel blanket and blue dye bled all over the yellow and white sections. Ugh. The weird part is that the blue yarn comes from a cone I've had for, like, a year and used in other projects with not problem at all.

So, anyway, not knowing what else to do, I spot cleaned the stains, rinsed, and got most of the dye stains out. But then I started thinking that there was no way I could gift a baby blanket that wasn't washable. So, I held my breath and put the blanket through a wash cycle. This time, no blue dye stains, but a lot of blue lint which--fortunately--is not a project-ruining outcome. A spin in the dryer on low produced no additional problems.

Phew.

Project details are on my Ravelry page.

Garden Notes

2010-07-21T12:23:00.015-04:00

A couple weeks ago, we were battling drought conditions. Thankfully last week brought some much needed rain. This week we have different challenges: weeds and bugs. For the past three mornings, we've been out there weeding away. Today, finally, we have the weeds mostly under control (see the photo above or see an annotated view). Not that things will stay that way for long, but we've turned a corner and so long as we keep up with the weeds, it shouldn't get as bad as it was again for the rest of the summer.

Re bugs: earlier this week, we discovered our zucchini was infested with squash borers. Then, a few days later, we noticed lots of cucumber beetles flying around. We ended up pulling out the zucchini, but it may not matter in the end since mostly every plot in the community garden has the same problem. So no matter what we do, these guys will be in the soil next season.

To discourage cucumber beetles, Helena whipped up a batch of garlic pepper spray, which we applied to the leaves of our cucumber plants and other CB favs.

Scary looking stuff, no? And it smells pretty bad too.

On a happier note, we're proud to announce the appearance of two lovely cantaloupe. (See them there under the leaves?)

Knits from the WIP pile (!) and why dogs are so cool (not related)

2010-07-13T08:54:00.010-04:00

I'm on a mission this summer to get control of my WIPs. A long time ago, I knit several pairs of this Easy Mittern pattern (by Sue Dial and available in Judith Durant's One-Skein Wonders). At the time, I had just discovered the wonderfulness that is Kraemer's Alpaca Yarn, and I was looking for reasons to knit with it. So I tried knitting the smaller size on US 9s. With a few pattern mods, I ended up with a mitten that was only slightly too big, and rather than frog, I decided to set it aside, knit a second slightly bigger mitten later, and either add a lining or felt them. "Later" turned out to be, like, three years later but fortunately I'd kept good notes, and I was able to complete the second mitten. Okay, well maybe not perfect notes, because mitten two was just a teensy bit bigger than mitten one--which confirmed for me that felting (lightly) was the way to downsize. (It also underscored the wisdom of GK's advice to always knit two mittens or socks at once.) I now have two, same-sized mittens for my Christmas 2010 gift stash. I confess that I did have a pang of regret when I tossed these into the washing machine. This yarn (on US 9s at least) knits up into such a lovely, drapey fabric,and it's kind of a shame to felt. But considering that the alternative was frogging both mittens, in the end I think felting was the best option.

Okay, I don't have a good segue here to my next topic, so here's a gratuitous Katie pic. Friends will recognize her are-you-gonna-give-me-that-biscuit face.

So, speaking of dogs, here's a cool thing that happened last week with clients whose dog, let's call him Rex, wasn't responding to "sit" but who, I noticed, was offering me a lovely sit as we were all standing there chatting. I decided to see what would happen if I tossed a treat far enough for him to have to get up to eat it. Would he come back to me and offer another sit? So I tossed a piece of lunch meat and waited. He looked a little surprised, but went for the treat. Then he looked at me again, thought about things for a minute, and went back to his spot in front of me and offered a down. Okay, so not a sit, BUT since Rex needed to learn the down command as well, I reinforced with another treat and then repeated the sequence again. Toss a treat so he has to move, wait to see what he does next. Again, he offered a down. And after a few more repeats, he offered a sit. The point here is that he was offering stuff, and what gets me every time I see this kind of thing is that moment when the dog stops to think about what's going on. Who knows what goes on in their doggie brains, but something clicks and they understand how the game works. And, because Rex's people are smart, they noticed this moment as well and were really impressed with their dog. After a few more reps, they took over, and we started saying "sit" or "down" as he did one or the other and following with a tasty treat. What I also appreciate is that Rex didn't just figure out the game, he also changed up the rules a bit and we ended up playing on his terms. I expected him to offer me a sit after the first toss because (1) that's what most dogs do and (2) that's what he had just been doing. But alternating downs and sits turned out to be more his style. And really, when you think about it, isn't that a more interesting game? Rex learns that offering sits and downs makes good things come his way. And the owners end up having to observe Rex very closely in order to correctly name the behavior as he offers it.

Adventures of Tiny the Dog

2010-07-08T14:54:00.004-04:00

This is the third summer that Kate and I are participating in Reading to Dogs at the Easton Library. Above, Kate chillaxes while she listens to a story about Tiny, a giant dog who gets into all kinds of trouble. It's one of her favs. Many of the books in the reading room are about dogs, and I think the dogs appreciate it. I also think they appreciate the air-conditioning and the cool tile floor. The library provides mats for the kids to sit on, but sometimes the dogs claim them instead.

Kate is a surprisingly patient listener. When we first started coming to the library, I was worried that after 10 minutes she'd be giving me her "let's go" bark. But as it turns out, she's pretty happy to lay around listening to the kids read and hearing from the adults about how "she's such a good dog." (I like that too.)

These days, when Kate's not listening to stories, she's camped out in front of one of the AC vents at home. We still take a long morning walk, but it's already pretty hot by the time we get back around 7. And dinner walks are considerably shorter.

In spite of the heatwave (and thanks, probably, to diligent watering on our part), our garden is doing great. Helena and I have been documenting as we go so that we have a record to guide us for next year. This week, the big event was harvesting our garlic, but we also have snow peas, radishes, beans, zucchini and more lettuce.

No Sew Bandanna

2010-06-11T20:28:00.003-04:00

Tomorrow I'm teaching the first of 3 free "doggy manners" classes at our farmer's market. We thought it would be fun if the Market Manners dogs in training wore bandannas, so I came up with these (with some good advice from cauchy along the way). Nothing complicated, just squares of fabric cut with pinking shears so they don't frey, and then cut across the diagonal. I made a few different sizes. And I added a "Market Manners" label along one side.

Googled

2010-06-09T18:16:00.004-04:00

Google "garlic scape," and you'll discover just about everything you needed to know about this delicacy. Which is exactly what we did this week when it was time to de-scape our garlic crop which, I know, you've been dying to hear more about. Garlic scapes are not only delicious, but they're fun to photograph because they're so weird looking. When I Googled "garlic scapes recipes," I found lots of options. Fortunately, I have plenty of these things to experiment with. For a first try, I added them to stir fry. Totally tasty. Garlic scape pesto seems to be the big thing, though, and that's probably next on my list.

Also--weirdly--while on Google maps recently, A. discovered that if you click on the image icon for one of the intersections near our house, you get the following shot of me and Katie. Pretty unnerving. I know there's no privacy on the internets, but on my own street? If, like me, you're asking how did they do that, you can read more here. I am of course aware of the irony of my posting this photo on my blog (i.e., in public) in order to complain about an invasion of privacy. Such are the contradictions of our wired culture.

Garden Views

2010-05-16T11:27:00.005-04:00

After a week-long stretch of pretty cold weather and a couple frost warnings, spring seems to have settled in. Some of the first things to bloom in my back yard were these lupines. And shortly after, the yellow flowers on the right appeared, but I'm not sure what they are! I don't remember planting them, and I can't find any photos in my notes from last year.

The community garden plot--now double last year's size--is also looking good. More photos of both gardens here.

The weather could have been warmer for Mother's Day

2010-05-09T19:20:00.005-04:00

We're still having frost warnings here in eastern PA. :( Normally, we wait to plant warm weather stuff until after Mother's Day, but temps might dip below freezing tonight. We just finished bringing in plants in from the porch.

Even so, bright and early tomorrow morning I'm meeting H. at Leiser's to rent a tiller and then head out to the garden. Classes ended last week, and I'm taking ONE day off for gardening before I turn my attention to grading and all the other things that demand my attention at the end of term. It might be too cold to do much planting, but we can at least get the ground ready. We do have some things up already including asparagus and lettuce.

In spite of the chilly temps, I was able to pick these lovely bunches of parsley and mint from my herb garden at home.

I used them to make some Tabouli, which I brought to my in-laws for dinner. My MIL really likes handknitted cotton dishcloths, so I made her this one to add to her collection.

Some Spring Planting

2010-04-18T07:06:00.006-04:00

Right now, our plot at the community garden looks mostly like a big weed patch. Actually, since we opted for a second plot, it looks like 2 big weed patches. Thus the name for the new plot:

(Excuse my fingers in front of the lens on that photo.) The ground was a little too wet for rototilling, so we dug out a couple of beds by hand. As Helena put it, "we don't need no stinkin' tillers." Actually, true. We did just fine with a couple shovels and my trusty garden claw.

This year, since we have more room, we're trying some new things, including asparagus--which, can I just say--no one seems to agree about how to plant. Esp in terms of how deep to dig the furrows, and then how much soil to cover the crowns. In the end, we dug our furrows about 6" deep, and covered the crowns with loose soil almost to the top of the furrow.

If you've never planted asparagus, the crowns look kind of like big spiders.

We planted 10 crowns total of Jersey Giant, ordered from Seeds of Change. Asparagus takes several years to mature, so we won't be harvesting anything from these plants any time soon.

We also planted some lettuce, something we didn't try last year because (1) we got a late start in the spring and (2) the fall was pretty wet and we didn't do much then except to plant garlic (which you can kind of see in the first photo at the beginning of this post).

You can't tell from these photos, but it was pretty darn cold out there. And windy too. After two hours, we packed it in.

Garden 2010: It begins

2010-04-04T09:00:00.006-04:00

Last weekend we officially kicked off the 2010 garden season. H. and I started a bunch of seeds inside, including the ones I received from CR for my birthday, some of which are pictured here. For most of this past week, there was no activity at all. And then yesterday we started to see some activity. First, as Katie and I headed out for our morning walk, I noticed these little bean sprouts.

Then later in the afternoon, suddenly the peppers had sprouted.

And by the end of the day, they were looking like this. Amazing.

Dogs and Frogs

2010-03-28T10:13:00.004-04:00

Happy birthday to Katie, who turned eight this past week! We had a fabulous bday party in The Dog Course, complete with balloons, presents and, of course, cupcakes.

I was kind of short on time, so these are just from a box mix. They tasted ok. They're all human grade, but the ones with the biscuits were for the dogs. After Katie ate her cupcake, she snagged the paper off the table and ate that too. (More bday photos on my Flickr page.) Personally, my favorite thing about the cupcakes was transporting them in the nifty carrier I bought especially for the occasion. I may go on a cupcake-making binge just so that I have more excuses to use it.

I am far LESS enthusiastic about the gloves I've been knitting for A. The pattern is unnecessarily complicated at times. And the sizing is weird between the thumb gusset, which seems to be sized for a smallish hand, and then the hand and fingers, which are ginormous. I spent the morning fiddling with the fingers which, as written, were at least an inch too long. I guess part of the problem could be that I'm not using the yarn called for in the pattern, but I am using another worsted weight yarn (Cascade 220 Heathers, which I really like), so I shouldn't be that off, right?

Why.

2010-02-28T09:54:00.003-05:00

Sometimes I learn from my knitting mistakes. Sometimes they just make me want to cry. For reasons I don't understand, my second Bird-in-Hand mitten is about a quarter of an inch smaller all the way around. It's the same yarn, same size needles, and same me. WHY is this happening? This is my second try on the second mitten, so I can only assume that the bigness of the first one is a fluke and the second one is more likely my usual gage. So I guess I'll be frogging mitten one.

Nuts!

Kindle Love and Other Things

2010-02-18T09:28:00.003-05:00

Last month I treated myself to a Kindle. I blame CMR and some other friends who kept talking about how much they loved theirs. And I have to say, now that I have one, I see what they mean. In case you're admiring my Kindle case, you can buy your own on Etsy from Janine King Designs. In addition to the terrific construction and cool fabric, I'm loving the extra zipper pocket on the front.

I had a bit of a delay with my BIH mittens. As I was working on mitten #2, I broke a fav pair of Knit Picks circs. :( But an email to Customer Service got me a brand new set. Thanks Knit Picks. You rock! :)

New Year, New Mittens (What WIPs?)

2010-01-03T15:29:00.005-05:00

I allowed myself to start a new mitten project because, well, I have no will power. I think I'm in denial about my WIP pile... But since the holiday rush is over, I decided to start a pattern I'd been saving for when-I-had-more-time. Which I don't, actually. But I'm pretending. Like I said--my WIPs, denial, like that.

Also, I turned out some really nice Christmas knits (like these gloves and this little piggy), so basically you could argue I pretty much deserve to impulsively start a new project.

I'm just saying.

Enter: Bird in Hand Mittens. Ahhhhh. These are just as lovely as the other 644 Ravelers who've knit them say they are. I knitted the cuff of the first mitten and a couple rows of the hand. I'm knitting with stash yarn (points for that, no?): the blue is Lamb's Pride Nature Spun and the white is some Cascade 220. The dark blue with the bright white turns out to be really striking.

And after I finish these, and maybe a WIP or two, I can maybe try these mittens, which a very nice friend gifted to me on Ravelry. :)

Mine!

2009-12-01T10:12:00.004-05:00

Some people say you shouldn't play tug games with dogs because it teaches them to be aggressive. Other people say that, taught correctly, tug can teach your dog self control. And anyone who does agility knows that tug is a perfect reward. I'm (obviously) in the pro-tug camp. Some of the pro-tug people recommend designating a special toy that the dog doesn't have access to until the human decides to play. And they say that the human should always win. But what's the fun in that? We love to watch Katie dig through her toy box, choose a toy, and bring it over to us. Sometimes when she wins, she "kills" the toy. Sometimes she drops it in front of us for more.

We do have a couple of rules, which we established when she was a puppy:

If doggy teeth touch human skin, even accidentally, the game ends.
She has to drop the toy when asked, or the game ends.

I don't know if this works because we started when she was a puppy. I'm sure her general good temperament also has something to do with it. She loves interactive games--but is that because we taught her to play that way, or because her herding genes condition her to cooperate with humans, or because we just kind of lucked out and got a good dog? Probably it's a combination of all these things.

New Project

2009-11-28T15:48:00.005-05:00

Because I didn't have enough WIPs and hadn't finished the actual work I'd planned to do yesterday or made much progress on Christmas knitting, I started a new project: Alexandra Tinsley's EDI ("Everybody's Doing It") Cowl (available here). I'm using Lamb's Pride Bulky, which, I know, some people (GK) find "too itchy," but which I find really toasty for scarves, especially when I'm bundling up in the wee hours of a cold winter morning to walk the dog. And--bonus: no scarf ENDS to dangle and possibly touch (ugh) the dog poo when I bend over to pick it up. I've knitted my way through one skein and I expect to use most of another before it's long enough.

I am trying to be disciplined about the Christmas knits, and I'm making some progress. I can't show everything here, but as I was knitting another finger of Welig this afternoon, I noticed how gloves IP look kind of alien--in an ET-phone-home sort of way.

(Source: http://www.free-wallpaper-download.com/movie/ET/slides/ET.wallpaper.htm)

Hand Warm-y Thoughts

2009-11-27T12:34:00.006-05:00

I've been preoccupied lately with knitting mittens (and other hand warm-y type projects). This is a photo of some things in my gift stash. Clockwise from the top right are Sue Coffin's Fingerless Mittens (from 101 OS Wonders), Eli Stubenrach's Herringbone Mittens (on Ravelry),
Robin Melanson's Jack-in-the-Box Mittens (from Knitting New Mittens and Gloves), Diane Soucy's Super Fast, Super Bulky Mittens, and creativeyarn's Mohair Handwarmers.

And then this week I've been working on Welig, another pattern from Knitting New Mittens.

Like the other pattern I tried from Melanson's book (Jack-in-the-Box), this one is really well written and the yarn (Nashua Handknits Julia) is a perfect match for the project. It's warm and soft and if I'm going to gift these as planned, someone may need to pry them out of my hands.

Planting Garlic

2009-11-10T12:17:00.002-05:00

On Sunday we planted garlic, which will be ready to harvest next summer. We were also hoping to plant a cover crop, but it's been so rainy here that we missed our window of opportunity. So we'll just have to suffer the weedy consequences next spring.

Happy Halloween

2009-10-31T13:57:00.003-04:00

Rice Crispy Ghosts from Recipezaar

So I finished the the second of my Falling Leaves socks and, for some bizarre reason, it's bigger than the first sock. I cannot figure out what went wrong. Same needles, same yarn, same me, bigger sock. It's a Halloween mystery. I've already frogged sock #2. I'm going to try again on smaller needles, but if that doesn't work, I'm not sure what I'll do--probably just frog the whole project. Sometimes, knitting is hard.

Some Sewing

2009-10-25T12:41:00.003-04:00

Dinner napkins from Weekend Sewing. Except for me these were a weekLONG project, because--well--I'm still not so good with the sewing. But I'm learning. These will probably be a gift for a friend's bday (no, CR, not you), and I may make a few more sets for Christmas gifts.
If I had a big fabric stash, this project would be good for using up leftovers. As it is, this project is a good excuse for me to buy fabric so I can have a stash to bust later on.

Knitting!

2009-09-13T11:42:00.003-04:00

I haven't done much knitting lately, but we've had had two days of rainy, unseasonably cool weather, and (after a day of writing) knitting some mittens seemed like the right thing to do. So I pulled out these flip-top mittens that I'd started at the beginning of the summer, and this morning I completed the first one (except for the sewing up), and then CO for the second (to avoid SMS). This is SUCH a nice pattern, and I love working with Lamb's Pride Worsted. These were planned for my gift stash but I may keep them for myself. Their mohair, cable-y goodness is hard to resist.

What I did yesterday

2009-08-28T07:52:00.003-04:00

Classes begin on Monday, but instead of writing my syllabus yesterday, I spent a crafty afternoon with C and another friend. My goal (besides avoiding other more pressing responsibilities) was to learn to put in a zipper. Even for a newbie sewer, I am painfully slow. The above photo documents my progress after 3 hours. At this rate, I should complete the project in a year or so.

Garden Notes

2009-08-19T09:10:00.003-04:00

Yesterday's haul included hot peppers, beans, tomatoes (which last week finally started to turn red), and our first eggplant. The hot peppers were an accident--we thought we were buying sweet banana peppers but the plants must have been mislabeled. We're not sure what we actually have. We only know that they're really really hot. So I'm looking for things I can make with them, and I'd welcome suggestions.

Locavore Lunch

2009-08-12T15:46:00.006-04:00

Tomato sandwich with homegrown tomatoes. MMmmm.

It's Official

2009-08-04T22:16:00.003-04:00

High as an elephant's eye. (I've been waiting all summer to say that.)

Attack of the Giant Zucchini

2009-07-31T11:13:00.003-04:00

This week's haul included those two gigantor zucchini in the back, cucumbers and a handful of beans. I'm running out of ideas for zucchini :O --especially these big guys which don't taste as good. These cukes may be the last of the summer, but we sure have enjoyed them. And next year I think we'll plant more so we can enjoy them longer. My favorite cucumber recipe at the moment is to just add some rice wine vinegar, a little sugar, and a few teaspoons of toasted sesame seeds. Totally yum.

A big distraction this week has been 365 Days of My Dog--my new favorite Flickr group. Which I joined. Because (1) I need more excuses to take pictures of my dog and (2) I need more reasons to be at my computer.

Also keeping me online these days is this podcast on dog training hosted by Jolanta Benal. If you're looking for excellent advice about positive training, this podcast is worth a listen.

Vegetable Gardening (what else?)

2009-07-24T10:59:00.006-04:00

Earlier this week, A and I took a pail of freshly made compost out to the garden. While we were there, we did a little weeding. Recently, a shed was added to the garden which will allow us to store tools instead of dragging them back and forth.
It's so great to see our stuff actually growing! This week we had lots of zucchini and cucumbers.

And we appear to have lots of peppers in progress.

Garden Notes

2009-07-20T10:15:00.005-04:00

Cucumber salad from our very own, homegrown cucumbers. Mm-mm. I wish we'd planted more than one cucumber plant! Oh well--something to keep in mind for next year. Mostly what we're eating at the moment is zucchini. Lots and lots of zucchini...

Embossed Leaves

2009-07-12T11:30:00.005-04:00

This photo was taken with my iPhone and then enhanced using the CameraBag app. Cool, no?

I finished the above Embossed Leaves sock this morning, and then just to ensure it will have a mate, I CO and knit the first two rows of sock #2. I would have finished these sooner, except that I got distracted by these coasters (one set for me, one gifted), this quilt and these mittens.

Now that we've had more sun, our vegetable garden has perked up. On Monday, we picked the rest of the radishes and in their place planted brussel sprouts. We also weeded and thinned out the corn, and added a nifty stepping stone path. Re the War against Weeds, er, Wild Plants--I can't say enough good things about our stirrup hoe. It's unbelievably efficient. Worth every penny. Srsly.

Accomplishments

2009-07-04T11:48:00.005-04:00

I'm proud to say that Katie has earned her TDIA, awarded by Therapy Dogs, Int'l (TDI) after 50 visits. When I showed her the certificate, she gave it one snoof, and went back to her afternoon nap. Oh well.

Last week in the garden, we noticed that the string beans and radishes were ready to eat.

I don't like radishes, but I heard from A. and H. that they were good. I do like string beans, though, and I'm disappointed that the plants don't seem to be thriving. Or maybe 8 plants isn't enough to produce many beans. Or maybe we planted them too late. Or they don't like the soil they're planted in. Clearly, I need to read more about growing beans.

On a more positive note, my stirrup hoe arrived. Look out weeds!

Summer of Weeds

2009-06-16T12:18:00.007-04:00

Okay, I lied. I'm sick of weeding! After two hours of work, Helena and I had the corn patch under control, but unless we want to spend all our spare time out there, we're going to have to be more pro-active. We're thinking of mulching with grass clippings. According to Organic Gardening for Dummies, after cutting the lawn, you can let the clippings dry out in the sun for a bit before raking them up and they won't get slimy.

While we were out there, we spotted an indigo bunting. Srsly. Helena made the call in response to my "hey, look at that blue bird!" What a sight! Unfortunately, the bird took off just as I was heading for my camera. Maybe he'll make another appearance.

Community Garden

2009-06-11T11:34:00.005-04:00

This summer we're participating through the College in a community garden project. Because the plots are huge, we're sharing ours with another couple. I think we'll still have more vegetables than 4 people can reasonably eat--provided the critters don't get to them first. There's a big fence around the whole thing, designed and built by students and faculty, but it's not going to keep out any self-respecting ground hog or rabbit. More photos of the project here, and of our plot here. With all the rain we've had lately, it's getting hard to tell the plants from weeds. Still the rain has gotten our seeds and plants off to a good start, and in exchange, I don't mind pulling some weeds.

Weekend Gardening

2009-05-17T10:52:00.005-04:00

Yesterday we gave our hedge a haircut. The hedge came with the house, and it's a pain to maintain, but when it's all trimmed, it does make a nice backdrop for flowers. And of course it provides some privacy. Because I can't ever seem to keep a straight line, A. did the trimming, and I picked up the clippings, about a third of which I shreddred in our new chipper and composted. But there was such a huge pile (you can sort of see it in the photo above, in the upper right corner), we'll be taking a bunch to the city compost center too.

For ordinary backyard jobs, though, this little machine does the job. Yesterday it turned a wheelbarrow full of sticks and leaves into this (which I added to the compost bin to balance out the grass and hedge clippings):

May 15 was the predicted date for a final frost, so this week, in between grading and other end-of-term chores I'll start putting things in the ground. (Additional garden photos, as always, are posted in my garden notebook on my Flickr page.)

In the meantime, I'm posting some knitting for GK. My first Selbu pattern. TaDA!

It's a dog! On a mitten! Although I'm not completely new to colorwork, I did have to rip and reknit because the fabric was looking (as Chawne puts it) all puckery and weird. As you can see from these photos, the knitting still isn't perfect, but hopefully I'll improve with practice. Here's the palm side:

At the Dog Park

2009-05-09T06:04:00.015-04:00

A topic of discussion at the dog park this week has been whether we can say that dogs smile--which question we all answered in the affirmative. Readers of Bark magazine know this unequivocally thanks to Bark's tireless efforts to photograph smilers. The more scientifically inclined dog person might be interested in recent studies of dog laughter. But for those of us content to hang out at the dog park on a nice spring morning--really, we don't need no stinkin' studies. Consider EXHIBIT A

and EXHIBIT B.

Some dogs, smiling and otherwise, are admittedly harder to photograph at the dog park than others. It took me a few tries, for example, to get a shot in which all of Beau appears in the frame. (That's part of Beau there on the right, and behind him Snowy is investigating some interesting something or other under a pile of leaves.)

Eventually, in response to the magic finger, Beau performed a brief, but beautifully executed down, for which he received a treat.

Not surprisingly, mugging for treats is a very popular pastime.

The dogs throw us a look like I'm sooooo hungry...I haven't eaten in days...may I please have one of those treats in your pocket? and we oblige.

Another favorite game is to roll the balls through a hole in the fence so that Bob has to retrieve them. (This is something like the opposite of "Fetch" where the human throws the ball and the dog retrieves it.)

Can you hear the doggie laughter?

2009-05-08T09:36:00.000-04:00

Happy spring, everybody.

Birds Ate My Breakfast

2009-05-05T10:48:00.005-04:00

Gino and Rocky are nothing if not persistent. And they love cereal. Here they are perched on my bowl looking for a handout.

Katie, meanwhile, has been giving our new mudroom rug a test drive.

This is a super tough, indoor/outdoor rug--guaranteed to stand up to muddy feet and paws. A couple passes with the vacuum and it looks like new again.

This is my first post in a while. The past couple months of this term have been unbelieveably busy. Not much time for blogging or knitting. Classes end this week and, hopefully, things will settle down a bit.

Winter Walk

2009-01-19T11:30:00.023-05:00

Yesterday morning we woke up to more snow and, thankfully, somewhat warmer temperatures. After zero degrees, 32 feels downright balmy. Kate loves the snow, and she couldn't wait to go for a walk. Thinking I might get some nice photos, I grabbed my camera and we set out.

Kate and I have a pretty regular morning route around our neighborhood and over to school. Once we turned the corner, Kate noticed a couple of corgis walking their person.

One of our walking games (that I learned from Control Unleashed) is that when Kate "finds" a dog, she gets a treat. It's a strategy that allows her to look at other dogs, but instead of barking at them, she looks at me for a treat.

Kate is a dog of routines and a dog who keeps track of things, and she'll sometimes bark at dogs she doesn't know. It's not so unusual--especially for herding dogs who can be vocal and who are predisposed to pay careful attention to who's where in their flock (Kate's part collie). But it's not a habit I want to encourage around other dogs, so instead her "job" is to find dogs and check in with me for her reward. I used to ask her to focus on me first, but getting a look at the other dog actually works better. And she can look more than once. The point is that she "checks in" between looks.

Another walking game is that we only move forward when the leash is loose. I hate it when I see people dragging their dogs around by yanking on the leash. I don't want Kate to pull--obviously--but I also try to avoid pulling too. If Kate does pull, I stop, or walk in another direction. It's a zen thing. To get what she wants, she has to keep a loose leash. Here she wanted to sniff this particular spot (probably some pee-mail), but to get to the spot, she had to walk there calmly.

This wall is one of Kate's favorite sniffing spots. I thought it looked really pretty covered in snow. That's New Jersey off in the distance.

By this point, we're just a few blocks from campus and Kate's favorite part of our route because she gets to run around off leash. It was too snowy to throw a ball, so she just enjoyed messing around in the snow. Here she is demonstrating her excellent recall skills. Who's a good dog?!

Deep Freeze

2009-01-15T10:08:00.007-05:00

Like much of the country, here in eastern PA it's pretty darn cold. This morning we woke up to a light dusting of snow (which, it turns out, is a nice break from all the ice we've had lately). A good day to stay home and knit. I've been working on another pair of Newfoundland mittens, mostly because I like how these two yarns looked together.

The white is Lion Brand Wool Ease which I had in my stash from a long-abandoned learning-to-crochet project. The blue is some gorgeous (but itchy!) Rowan Scottish Tweed that I'd been trying to find a good use for. As I was trying out colors for another project, these two landed next to one another, and I liked the combo.

I made another pair of these mittens (Ravelry link) about a year ago, and since then I've been wanting to try the pattern again with some other colors and yarns. Plus, this weather is making me want to knit things to keep my hands warm. And the RST yarn is REALLY warm. The warm outweighs the itch.

But this morning as I was working on the second thumb, I noticed that it was a little different than the first. Here's a closer look:

See how the thumb on the left has that nice row of white purl bumps underneath and the right one doesn't? I'm pretty sure the one on the right is wrong, and even though it's not a huge mistake, it's going to bug me, so I think I'm going to frog.

Ribbit.

ETA 1/16/09. Turns out? the one on the LEFT is wrong. Should have read the pattern again BEFORE I frogged. Oh well. I don't think it much matters in the end. At least now the two thumbs will look the same.

Christmas 2008

2008-12-28T12:43:00.007-05:00

We've had a lovely Christmas, and we're now enjoying the break between semesters.

As always, Katie thoroughly enjoyed opening all of her presents.

And when there were no presents left, she chewed up the boxes they came in.

Here she is in action.

Iron Man Cowl

2008-12-07T11:22:00.006-05:00

Another great gift pattern--Christina Walls' Birthday Cake Cowl (available on her blog)--most of which I knit last night while watching Iron Man.

ETA: I was wrong--pattern is available to Ravelry members. There's a link from her blog, but you can only get to the pattern if you belong to Ravelry.

Addicted

2008-11-22T10:30:00.004-05:00

Finished one pair of Mosaic Mitts...

...and started another.

Love. This. Pattern.

Random Stuff

2008-11-08T12:00:00.009-05:00

It's dark and rainy here--just the kind of day to stay inside and knit. And read Harry Potter (which I'm teaching this week in Intro to Children's Lit). Before the rain started this morning, a flock of sparrows was gathered by the back door where I'd tossed out some birdseed. In their midst was a little chipmunk. Kate, an unrepentant chipmunk chaser, couldn't tear herself away from this little scene.

In between the usual insanity that increases as the end of term approaches, I've been trying to fit in my Christmas gift knitting. Which, of course, kind of limits what I can show here. But here's a peek at one project:

I've been itching to try these Mosaic Mitts (from IK), and now, having nearly finished the first one, I can heartily recommend them to anyone looking for a quick gift knit. This pattern is a good stash buster (although I admit I did buy some new yarn for these). And it's fun to try different color combinations.

Also IP are these Monkey Socks, which I started a couple weeks ago. These are for me because, well, I heart the colors of this Trekking yarn too much to part with them. Unfortunately it's hard to get a good photo today because it's so dark outside.

11/10/08 ETA: Mitts are worked on my new Knit Picks Harmony DPS--which, can I just say?--are totally fab.

Halloween Dog

2008-11-02T21:41:00.002-05:00

Never fear...

...Superdog is here!

"Who, me? Steal a piece of Halloween candy?"

Socktober Reading

2008-10-05T13:30:00.004-04:00

Happy Socktober everyone!

This week, my Intro to Children's Lit class has been reading Alcott's Little Women. As I was re-reading the book (for, uh, the zillionth time), I came across a passage I thought was especially appropriate for the month of Socktober. The passage is in the voice of the narrator, but from Laurie's point of view. He's just spied the March girls leaving their house for what he suspects is an expedition to which he hasn't been invited. So he follows them (bad boy), and comes upon this scene:

It was rather a pretty little picture: for the sisters sat together in the shady nook, with sun and shadow flickering over them,--the aromatic wind lifting their hair and cooling their hot cheeks,--and all the little wood-people going on with their affairs as if these were no strangers, but old friends. Meg sat upon her cushion, sewing daintily with her white hands, and looking as fresh and sweet as a rose, in her pink dress, among the green. Beth was sorting the cones that lay thick under the hemlock near by, for she made pretty things of them. Amy was sketching a group of ferns, and Jo was knitting as she read aloud. A shadow passed over the boy's face as he watched them, feeling that he ought to go, because uninvited; yet lingering because home seemed very lonely, and this quiet party in the woods most attractive to his restless spirit. He stood so still, that a squirrel, busy with its harvesting, ran down a pine close beside him, saw him suddenly, and skipped back, scolding so shrilly that Beth looked up, espied the wistful face behind the birches, and beckoned with a reassuring smile.

"May I come in, please? or shall I be a bother?" he asked, advancing slowly.

Meg lifted her eyebrows, but Jo scowled at her defiantly, and said, at once, "Of course you may. We should have asked you before, only we thought you wouldn't care for such a girl's game as this."

"I always like your games; but if Meg don't want me, I'll go away."

"I've no objection, if you do something; it's against the rule to be idle here," replied Meg, gravely, but graciously.

"Much obliged; I'll do anything if you'll let me stop a bit, for it's as dull as the desert of Sahara down there. Shall I sew, read, cone, draw, or do all at once? Bring on your bears; I'm ready," and Laurie sat down with a submissive expression delightful to behold.
"Finish this story while I set my heel," said Jo, handing him the book.

"Yes'm," was the meek answer, as he began, doing his best to prove his gratitude for the favor of an admission into the "Busy Bee Society." (115-16)

(The Busy Bee Society is the girls' attempt to avoid idleness over the summer holidays--in a previous chapter, the girls take a week "off" from their chores, with Marmee's approval, and must deal with the disasterous consequences). LW includes lots of descriptions of women's domestic work, but I guess I hadn't paid special attention to this particular one until I learned to knit socks.

Garden Notes and Some Knitting

2008-09-06T10:55:00.004-04:00

Haven't had time for much knitting, so here are some garden photos. I discovered this guy in the back yard a few days ago while I was rushing to get ready for school. Even though I didn't really have time, I snapped a few photos so I could identify him (or her) later. I wish I'd thought to put another object in the photo for scale, because this was one ginormous slug. And kind of striking with the spots and all. Kate was way too interested, so I had to put her inside while I snapped the photos. Eventually he crawled off into the grass leaving a nice slimey trail.

So, if you know your gastropods, you'll recognize the above specimen as a leopard slug, so named for the cool spots. I found lots of info in the internets, but I especially liked this page which refers to them as "handsome," because--sliminess notwithstanding--they are something to look at.

Also featured in the garden this week are these wonderful Morning Glories.

My friend Beth gave me several seedlings in early spring. Thanks to our backyard squirrels, this is the only plant that survived. I planted it a bit late, so the flowers have only recently appeared--but I think they're gorgeous. I was expecting the usual blue variety, but these are huge white flowers about 4 inches across. They provide a nice bright spot just as everything else is fading away (like the purple coneflowers in the lower right corner of this photo). The purple asters have just started to bloom. I'll post pics next week when they really start to take off. I'm hoping today's rain (from Hurricane Hanna) will encourage the plants to bloom.

Even though this past week was only the second of the semester, I was busy enough that I had hardly any time for knitting. I still try to do a little every day though, even if it's just a half hour. So this week I did some swatching to find a good pattern for some Regia Bamboo I've had in my stash for awhile now. On the left is the Chevron pattern from Sensational Knitted Socks which I thought might show off the pretty colors of this yarn. On the right are Froot Loop Socks from the spring '08 issue of Knitty .

I didn't think either pattern did much for the yarn, though. Then I tried Retro Rib from Favorite Socks.
I tried this pattern once before in a different yarn, but gave up because I kept making mistakes. It's not a hard pattern to memorize--just 4 rows, with only minimal variation between rows 1-2 and 3-4. But I kept making mistakes. I'm doing slightly better this time, although I have had to frog bits here and there. The above photo isn't great, but I think that the pattern nicely shows off the colors of the yarn, even if the yarn overwhelms the pattern just a bit. So I'm sticking with this for now.

School Daze

2008-08-30T12:44:00.005-04:00

Classes started last Monday. People keep asking me if it's hard to be back after a year on sabbatical and, ya' know? it's really not. The nerdier part of me always gets a little excited about the beginning of a new semester, and this year was no different. Plus, I've been saving the above (temporary) tattoo (courtesy of GK) for just the right moment, and the first day of school seemed to be it.
I walk back and forth to school most days, and this time of year, whenever I leave or return home, I'm treated to the wonderful vanilla smell of this clematis paniculata growing along the front steps. This stuff grows like a weed in my neighborhood, but still I'm happy to have my own bunch. It was here when we moved in, and I've thought about transplanting it to the back because--until it blooms--it really does look a little weedy. But then when it finally does bloom I think, heck, it was worth the wait.

In the weeks before classes began, my back to school preparation included baking up some dog goodies from two fabulous cookbooks I just discovered: The Bubba Rose Biscuit Co's Organic Dog Biscuit Cookbook and You Bake 'Em Dog Biscuits by Janine Adams. Prior to this I'd done some baking for Katie, mostly for special occasions. But these recipes are so fast and easy (and the tips for clean-up are great), that I've been baking doggie treats more often. And not only baking. The first thing I actually tried were some frozen peanutbutter-yogurt treats (bottom right) from the Organic Dog Biscuit Cookbook.

I first saw the recipe in the recent issue of Bark magazine. These turned out to be such a hit that I decided to buy the book (which calls them "Ice Cubes Just Got a Lot Better"). Since then, I've also made "Grilled Cheese and Bacon" biscuits--also a huge hit. From You Bake 'Em, I've tried--and received rave reviews for--the "Cheddar Biscuits." What I like about these books is that the ingredients are easy to get, and there are plenty of recipes that don't involve grinding up liver (although I'm building up to that). Also, if you use treats for training, as I do, it's nice to be able to give your dog something that's wholesome. (Not to mention your dog's friends--I've become pretty popular at the dog park.) One time saver I've discovered is, instead of cutting shapes (since, seriously?, dogs don't care), I just roll out the dough and use my pizza cutter to make 1-in squares. Once baked, they're easy to carry in my pocket and to break into smaller pieces. I can make one square go a pretty long way.

I wanted to post a picture of Katie enjoying her treats, but by the time I clicked, she'd eaten them all...

And, finally, a couple days ago, I heard from my friend Josh that little Teddy, cutest hamster ever, had passed away. Our thoughts go out to his person Sarah and her family. He was a good hamster, and he was very popular at pet sleep away camp. I'm glad we had the chance to know him. We'll miss you Teddy.

Bday Wishes for Sam

2008-08-13T11:24:00.003-04:00

A special birthday shout out--times FIVE--to our nephew Sam! Whoo hoo!

Sleep-Away Camp. For Pets.

2008-08-08T18:26:00.009-04:00

Our household has grown temporarily: meet Skylar

and Teddy.

They moved in last week while their people are on vacation. My study is Pet Central, and we're all having a very good time. At first, it seemed like my parakeets weren't quite sure what to make of Skylar, but then they decided it was okay to play together. Here's a clip of the three of them on the play table:

There's another video posted on my Flickr page. (Thank goodness I finally figured out how to do this with my digital camera--these little guys almost never stay still long enough to get a photograph.)

Teddy, being nocturnal and black (with the cutest white spot), is pretty hard to capture on film. Here's a murky video I took the other night.

I have lots of parakeet experience, but have never lived with a hamster. I got some good advice from Sarah, Teddy's person, and also from my friend Harry, previously owned by Brian, one of the cutest (and most spoiled) hamsters ever. I also found helpful information on the HSUS and ASPCA sites.

I'll post more photos and videos soon. As I was writing this--which used to be much longer--Blogger ate part of it. So I'll try again later...

Beach Dog

2008-07-17T11:50:00.008-04:00

Just returned from a week at the beach where, it turns out, Kate discovered her inner water dog. (Kate's half collie, and we suspect the other half is some kind of retriever--she looks a lot like a flat-coated retriever.) Up until last week Kate showed zero interest in the water, but something about the ocean made her curious, and, after giving me a heartattack by suddenly plunging in--and UNDER--her little head popped back up, she paddled to shore, shook off, and was ready to go back in. Fortunately, we stayed at a dog-friendly hotel, so dragging a wet dog back and forth to the room wasn't a problem, even when Katie decided to "dry off" on the carpet in the lobby.

On our way to the beach, we had a great visit with CMR and EO. Here's Katie enjoying the view from their back porch. Among many other treats, we enjoyed a dessert of homemade ice-cream from C's new ice-cream maker. C and E are the epitome of dog people, and Katie took every advantage of that fact.

I didn't do as much knitting as I expected to while we were away, but I did knit most of the second waving lace sock, which I finally finished this morning. This is an excellent pattern and, if we weren't having such pleasant summer weather (good rain, not too hot), I might wish for wool-sock-wearing temps.

Since we've been home, Kate's been spending a lot of time doing this--
Since the spring, several new puppies have moved into the neighborhood, and this is what she looks like after playing with them.

Housepainting, Waving Lace and Other Things

2008-06-30T09:32:00.008-04:00

We're having our house painted, so it's been a little crazy around here. Add to that the fact that my camera batteries ran out of juice and, well, that's why so much time has lapsed between posts. But, I have been knitting, and I'm especially proud of these:

Waving Lace Socks from Favorite Socks. And here's best part. They're knitted from my first hand-dyed yarn. Knit Picks bare merino/silk dyed with Kool-Aid. I love the color, but it was sort of an accident. I wanted blue socks so I bought some Tropical Punch which, contrary to the color of the package, is (of course) punch RED. Ick. I had some Grape already which I thought might make a nice sock color, but I didn't have enough. So I ended up using 4 Grape plus 2 Tropical Punch, and that combo produced a purple-pinky color, not unlike the color of the socks on the cover of FS. I may have stuffed too much yarn into my dyepot, or maybe I didn't stir enough, because there are sections that barely took up any color. But I kind of like the heathery effect, at least as a first effort at hand-dyeing. I already bought more wool to try again, and I've been reading more about hand-dyeing, includine A Dyer's Garden. If I can bear to chop off the heads of my marigolds, I'd probably have enough to dye yarn for a pair of socks.

We've had quite a bit of rain here in eastern PA, and my garden is looking fab, if I do say so myself. Last week's prize was this lovely lupine. I'd planted four in early spring, and didn't expect to see any activity until next year, but then last week, I spotted this purple spike and have been adoring it ever since. I also added a few more things, just for a bit more color, including some cosmos, one of my favorite annuals.

Kate as always loves to be outside, and on hot days, she flops down in this cool spot, which we've taken to calling her "nest."

Over the past few weeks, we've spent quite a bit of time deciding on (and changing our minds about) paint colors. Now that the main color is on, we need to make a decision about accent colors. At the moment, we're wondering whether to go green (left column) or gold (right column).

Garden Notes: Memorial Day Weekend Edition

2008-05-27T10:51:00.005-04:00

We've had so much rain lately that everything is green and growing like crazy. I know it won't last, but I sure am enjoying it now. We spent most of the holiday weekend working in the yard, but I did have some time for knitting, including--taDAAAAA!--rescuing these Broadripples from my WIP pile. I started these over a year ago, shortly after learning to knit socks. I don't remember why I put them down, exactly. Probably I just got interested in something else. Anyway, I thought I had only the toe of the second sock to go, but discovered a small mistake. So I ripped the foot back, re-knit, and finished them this morning. Yay! I wish I'd knit the foot a little longer, but it's not a big deal since Cascade Fixation is so stretchy. I love the springy colors and how they kind of go with the colors that are appearing in the back yard as various perennials begin to bloom. Like these peonies.
Even before the flowers open, the buds provide little balls of color. And lots of ants--which might have attracted this guy,

although I suspect he was more interested in all the worms I unearthed as I was working. I don't know if it was the SAME robin following me around all day. All I can say is that every time I looked around A robin wasn't far off, and he had a beak full of worms. We seem to have lots of earthworms this year, and I'm taking that as a sign that our efforts to improve the soil are working.

Katie doesn't bother birds foraging around in the grass (maybe because she's used to our parakeets Rocky and Gino). But she's definitely interested in our resident chipmunk. He's way too fast for her, but that doesn't stop her from trying.

The Knit Knack

2008-05-21T10:27:00.005-04:00

Photos from yesterday's visit to The Knit Knack in Maplewood New Jersey with Chawne. One last fiber fling to mark the end of our sabbatical year. You can see how much fun we had--just look at the expression on Chawne's face.
Of course, surrounded by all of that beautiful yarn, who couldn't help but smile?It was cold and rainy outside, but warm and cozy inside the shop, which now has a table in the center where you can work. This time, we also got to meet Loki, official shop dog and all-around handsome boy.
[Kiss!]

Chawne showed a bit more restraint than I by picking up this lovely apple-y green Rowan Felted Tweed, which was on sale. But since most of my yarn was for gift knitting I didn't feel too guilty. Well, okay, except for that one skein of Misti Alpaca sock yarn. But I couldn't resist. Really, I blame Meera for showing it to me in the first place. :)

After a nice visit with Meera, Glen and Loki, we had a yummy lunch at a cafe down the street. The hour-long drive back home in the pouring rain would have been gloomy except that we had all that yarn to cheer us up.

Garden Notes

2008-05-05T11:45:00.007-04:00

Another gardening weekend. Perennials are sprouting up all over. Sometimes I can't remember what's where. I've tried marking things, but my markers seem to end up all over the place by the next spring--due, I'm sure, in no small part to the fact that my garden shares its space with my giant dog. Being surprised by what pops up, though, is half the fun (for me). Here's some columbine that I put in last spring. This was not a surprise--I've been hoping it does well so that I can put in more. These lovely primroses came with the house.
I did have a couple surprise returns from last year. Here's some parsely that somehow survived our cold Pennsylvania winter. He was partially covered by a yarrow plant, so I moved him to his own spot. I always end up with more parsely than I can ever use, but I like to grow it especially for our parakeets.
These pansies are also from last year--in a rush to do fall cleanup, we stored this pot in the garage without emptying out the dirt. One afternoon over the winter, I was in the garage and noticed that the plants were still living--and blooming. So as soon as it was warm enough, I moved the pot back outside.
My garden, which is mostly perennials and which I'm trying to convert as nearly as possible to native plants, is doing well enough that I needed to divide a bunch of things. Instead of composting the extras, as I used to, I offered them to friends. I wasn't looking for a swap since, partly, I'm trying to make room for more of a variety of things. But when one friend offered herbs and some flowers, I couldn't resist. She gave me some thyme, oregano, rudbeckia and morning glories.

Because we're having our house painted, I wanted to move a few things to save them from being trampled. Here's Kate helping me transplant some astilbe. As you can see, we worked until we were "dog" tired.

Signs of Spring

2008-04-28T11:33:00.006-04:00

Among the first signs of spring around here are huge mulch piles in everybody's yard. This is a small portion of the load delivered to us a few days ago along with a bunch of organic soil. A. and I spent the weekend preparing planting beds--i.e., weeding, edging, etc. We made a start, but there is a lot of work left to do. And we really don't have a big yard. One of my spring favs is sweet woodruff (above). Ours is just about to bloom. The tiny white flowers appear in early spring, and the leaves keep that pretty green all season. Plus, as the name suggests, the plant has a really pleasant smell.
As for Kate's contribution to our gardening efforts, when she's not sitting on plants or stealing our gloves, she's stretched out on the grass.Can't say much about my current knitting projects, most of which are Mother's Day related, because my Moms? She's now on the internets (yay Mom!) and she checks my blog. :) On a recent visit home, though, I did make good progress on the above Oak Ribbed sock, which is installment 4 in my knit-every-vintage-sock initiative

Lined Mittens

2008-04-12T11:48:00.007-04:00

At the end of 2007, I was itching to try some stranded colorwork. With patterns like Kate Gilbert's Bird in Hand Mittens available, who wouldn't be? And I've long admired Stacey's beautiful colorwork. (I started reading her blog around the time she finished her fabulous Turret Socks.) And then my friend Chawne was working on these lovely Chocqua socks.

My first colorwork project wasn't actually stranded knitting (at least I think not in the technical sense) but these Newfoundland Mitts, which gave me practice maintaining gage with more than one color. (Pattern is from Creative Whimsy.)

Next, I tried these lined mittens from Marcia Lewandowski's Folk Mittens. My first mitten, pictured below on the left, turned out to be kind of skinny because, well, I was holding the yarn too tight. But I did gradually get the hang of holding the yarn in two hands--which, I'll just say, feels very cool. (I'm a continental knitter--never even tried it the other way before this project--so it took a while to get used to managing yarn in my right hand.) I left the first mitten as is for the sake of comparison and then cast on for a second mitten making a conscious effort to hold the yarn more loosely. And--yay--it worked! Check out the mitten on the right there. Notice that it's a little wider? (It's also not all curled up on the bottom which might be the result of using a long-tail rather than a knitted cast on?)

Also for the second mitten, I reversed the yarn so that the grey was dominant. But I decided I didn't like that as well, so I frogged and started again aiming again for a nice even gage but with the blue dominant. And, after about a week, I had completed...GIGANTOR mitten! Here it is next to ordinary sized mittens--that's one of A's there on the left and one of mine on the right.
Now, it's true that eventually these mittens will have a lining (hence the pattern name), and so they can afford to be somewhat large--but this one was WAY bigger than it needed to be. So, I frogged the top two sections (which included all the decrease rows) and then 6 more rows. This meant I was starting my decs on row 5 of the 5th section from the bottom. That modification got me a more reasonably sized mittenbut now I'm not happy with the way the decs look.
I think they're more obvious because they start in the middle of a section. In the original version, they started closer to the border rows that separate the sections. So... back to the drawing board. One possibility is to just start the decs sooner, closer to the border and, if the length is looking short, add extra rows between the dec rows. Or, I could try casting on for a new mitten (leaving Gigantor as is for the moment) and try fewer rows in each section. The original pattern calls for 10 stripey rows between border rows--if I tried, say, 8 instead, I think I'd get something close to the right length.

* * *

And now for a complete change of topic--if you need a lift (if, say, you've been knitting and re-knitting the same mitten pattern and your head is about to explode), check out these wonderful pics of the newest additions to Bella Vita Farm & Fiber. They will make you smile.

Favorite Blogs and a Dog Birthday

2008-03-30T11:54:00.007-04:00

I'm kind of between knitting projects, and although I've finished a few things that were IP and swatched for others, nothing has seemed worth writing about. I did, however, make some changes to my blog--my inspiration came from Rima at Yarny Days who recently honored me with this award. As I thought about the knitbloggers who make my day, I realized most have received this award--some more than once. So I decided to (finally) add a "Favorite Blogs" list to this page which includes those knitters and which, of course, I will update as needed. But the blogs and websites listed there are ones I visit regularly.

Here's why.

If I didn't know cauchy09, for real (i.e., not just on the internets), I might not believe an ordinary person capable of such knitting feats as you'll see on her Flickr photo page. This girl is one fine knitter (and quilter). It's her I have to thank for introducing me to sock knitting--which is how I came to be a fan of Cosmicpluto Knits!, whose short row heel tutorial is just one of the many reasons to visit her blog. Knitizen always has the best newest pattern on her needles, and you can see the results at Daily Fiber Intake and, if you're on Ravelry, her projects page . If, like me, your love for dogs is equal to or greater than your love for knitting, you've probably already discovered Dogged Knits and On and Off the Needles. If you haven't, you're in for a treat. (Sit! Stay!) Dogs are also featured frequently along with fabulous knitting and, now, weaving at Lolly Knitting Around.

Now, I'm not sure if, having received the "You Make My Day Reward," I can re-award it to the person who awarded it to me, but I am a total fan of Rima's blog, which most recently treated readers to her knitting and crafting adventures in India.

Of course some of my favorite knitters don't have blogs, but their Ravelry project pages totally make my day. If you have access to that site, check out project pages by craodc46 and Gruffy. I regularly raid their queues, but, hey, what are best friends for?

~~~~

I didn't post about knitting last week, but I did want to make a point of mentioning that on March 22, a certain beloved black and white dog celebrated her sixth birthday. Here she is posing politely by her plate of homemade dog birthday biscuits. (I won't tell you how many biscuits she snagged while posing and, thus, how many shots it took us to get this one picture.)

I'm a Retriever

2008-03-11T10:13:00.005-04:00

Take the quiz

Odds and Ends and Thank You

2008-03-10T11:23:00.005-04:00

It didn't seem like I was doing much knitting this past week, but when I took stock of everything, I realized I did, in fact, accomplish a few things. Clockwise from the top: Fireside Footies for A (thus the manlier colors), Garter Rib socks (finished!), Biscuit Blanket in progress (which I stole from someone's Ravelry queue...CMR?... Rima? because I thought it would make a nice hostess gift to have on hand), Ela's Fav with tassels (as called for in the pattern--really? the tassels only increase the fabulosity of this hat), and finally finally A's (not so) Fast, Easy Vest all sewed up.

Re the last item. This will be the last time I knit something from the bottom that can't be tried on along the way because when A. did finally try it on over the weekend the fit wasn't so great. I did size it to one of his other vests that fits well--and, laying flat, the two garments look about the same. But on an actual person, the FEV stretches out just a bit too much. Perhaps Cascade 220 wasn't the best choice for this project after all--maybe I should have used a less sproingy yarn. I'm wondering whether adding the strip around the front for the buttons and button holes will make any difference.

On a happier note, dear Rima, author of the very wonderful Yarny Days gave me this

the other day (thank you!). In my next post, I'll reciprocate. :)

Weekend FOs and a Change of Heart

2008-03-03T09:20:00.006-05:00

I made these little mittens for our youngest neice, who celebrated her second birthday last week and whose birthday party we attended yesterday. There were so many presents that our little package was nearly lost in the shuffle--but the mittens captured her attention anyway. She put them on immediately, and began wheeling around her baby and carriage (another gift). Completely adorable.I used the "Classic Mitten" pattern in Folk Mittens and then Ann Budd's Handy Book of Patterns for help with sizing. Yarn is Lion Brand Wool-Ease, not one of my favs, but I figured these will probably need to be washed after a bit of wear. Because these are teensy and because I've made quite a few mittens in the past year, this was a fast project until I got to the finger-knitted cord, which I had to practice a few times in order to get the hang of the technique. Not that it's hard--once you understand, it goes fast--probably faster with two colors since it's obvious where to go for the next loop--but initially for whatever reason, my brain wasn't processing the instructions.
Also finished--well, nearly finished--this weekend was Ela's Favorite Hat from OS Wonders. I've been looking at patterns for a while now in search of something I could wear for early morning dog walks. I queued a bunch of things on Ravelry, and then remembered there were some patterns in OS Wonders that I'd liked. I also had a skein of Malabrigo (Vaa) left over from Christmas knitting that I thought would be good for a hat. I love LOVE how this turned out. I still need to add the i-cord decoration at the top. But this hat is warm and totally cute and, if I can say, the Malabrigo was an excellent choice for this pattern. I was a little worried that the pattern wouldn't look as good in such a soft yarn, but that didn't turn out to be an issue. Plus, the pearl rows nicely bring out the subtle color changes of the yarn. I did have to CO an extra 10 stitches to accomodate my huge head, and consequenty I was a little worried the extra stitches would ruin the proportions. But in the end, these mods didn't seem to matter.

And, last but not least, I've been working on a pair of garter rib socks (based on the 4-stitch pattern in Sensational Knitted Socks), on and off, since mid-January.

I started this project because I needed portable travel-knitting and because I wanted to try a Magic Loop sock. Since it was my first ML effort, I decided to use a yarn I wasn't that fond of (like, in case I made mistakes and had to rip, I didn't want to be doing that with an expensive hand-dyed yarn). So I CO in this Knit Picks Essential tweed (Flint), which I'd purchased last year shortly after I learned to knit socks and before I was confident enough in my sock knitting abilities to be spending a lot of money on yarn. Unknit, this yarn looks kind of... well... blah. And a little fuzzy--like it's going to pill easily. But the more I knit with it, the more I'm liking it. I've used KP Essential before, but on 2.75mm, and the results were okay, but nothing special. But on smaller needles (2.5mm), the yarn looks a lot better, and the little tweedy bits? Very hand-made-y looking. In a good way. I knit down to the toe on the sock pictured above. Its mate is knit to the bottom of the leg. (I usually knit two socks at once--i.e., cuff/cuff, leg/leg, etc.) There are nothing fancy--just your basic sock--but as basic socks go, I'm thinking these will be among my favs.

Weekend Photos

2008-02-25T11:14:00.004-05:00

A snowy weekend here. We woke up on Friday to a couple inches, and Katie and I had a nice long walk. That dog sure does love the snow.

Over the course of the day, it snowed even harder, and most things were closed. Everything was really pretty, actually. (My friend cauchy snapped this pic, which perfectly captures a favorite stretch that Kate and I pass through on our morning walks.) Today it's warm and sunny, so much of the snow has melted--which is okay too, because underneath? spring bulbs are poking through.

Fireside Footies

2008-02-19T10:28:00.002-05:00

Finished these over the weekend and felted yesterday. They were still a bit damp this morning, so I put them in the sun to speed up the drying process. It's cold and windy here in Eastern PA, but the sun is shining. I love how these turned out, and I wish they'd dry already so I can wear them!

Pattern Deets:

Fireside Footies from PippiKneeSocks.com

in Paton's SWS on US 10.5 DPNs

Bad Dog

2008-02-15T09:03:00.004-05:00

On my way into the kitchen this morning for a second cup of tea, I discovered Katie in the hall with my (brand new) Chibis between her paws. Apparently, she thought the label said CHEWbi. She is so in the dog house for this one. But, if you're wondering? The plastic case is pretty strong...

Obligatory Valentine-y Post

2008-02-14T09:14:00.003-05:00

In honor of the day: a handmade Valentine, a basket of red yarn...
...and (what else?) a Valentine's dog.
Happy Valentine's Day!

crochet heart pattern

Not so Fast Easy Vest

2008-02-03T12:23:00.000-05:00

Hm... after uploading my photos for this post, I noticed that they all have really similar colors. Not on purpose. I guess I'm in an earthy neutral-color-y phase. Maybe that's why I was attracted to the dried Oak Leaf Hydrangea blossom (above). I have been working on some Newfoundland Mitts in brown and blue--does that count as colorful?

But more about those in another post. At the moment I'm stuck on the Fast Easy Vest (from Men In Knits ) that I'm making for A. In spite of a couple stupid mistakes on my part (all fixed, I will add), this has not been a difficult knit. But now I'm stuck on the neck decreases. The instructions say to "shape V neck by dec 1 st at neck edge every 3 rows" 15 times. To me that could be read two different ways.

Way 1: Decrease row, followed by TWO pattern rows, followed by next decrease row
Way 2: Decrease row, followed by THREE pattern rows, followed by next decrease row

The problem with the first approach is that every other dec row is on the WS--which makes it hard to have left and right slanting decs, doesn't it? The problem with the second approach is that, as cauchy pointed out, the neck would be really long. So far? after asking for advice, I've had one vote for each approach. (GK votes for #2 to avoid the WS dec problem and cauchy--who's knit this vest before but can't quite remember what she did--votes for #1.) So it's a tie. But since I'd already started doing the second thing by the time I asked for advice, I'm just going to forge ahead and see what happens. Here's what I have after 5 decs:
Truth? To shape the decs,when I'm on a WS row, I'm actually turning to the RS and k2- or ssk-ing as needed. Is that weird/necessary?

My big accomplishment this week was finally FINALLY completing the Simple Yet Effective Shawl Whoo HOO!

Oh man, is that the wrong side there in that picture? Duh. Anyway--nice, easy pattern. And it was lovely to work with this alpaca (from Kraemer Yarns), which drapes beautifully. Really. But because it's DK weight, the thing took me forEVER, even on US 10s.
Planning to gift this to my MIL next weekend. In the meantime, I can't decide whether or not to block. It's only a little crinkly, which I kind of like--somehow it suits this shawl in this yarn--and the weight of the shawl kind of stretches everything out. Blocking might make the eyelets in the center and edges more uniform. But how important is that?

Difficulties

2008-01-26T12:55:00.000-05:00

This past week, as I struggled (and grumped) over fixing the mistake in my Simple Yet Effective Shawl, I wondered whether there was anything I was learning from the experience. When my students run into difficulties reading and writing, I'm all about telling them how their struggles are really opportunities for learning. So what did I learn this week? Mostly that there are moments when I just need to step away from the knitting so that I can return later with a better attitude. I probably knew that before, but I have a thing about not walking away from mistakes--on the theory that it is SUCH a bummer to pick up a project and have to face a problem. So I have an agreement with myself that I have to fix a problem before I can put something down. But I guess there are times when I need to suspend that rule.

But before I explain my fix, here's a quick re-cap: Earlier this week, I was knitting--I forget what--probably a sock--when I happened to look across the room at my SYE shawl in progress (really, nearly finished), and I noticed something weird with one of the garter stripes. On closer inspection, I saw that I had about an 18 stitch stretch where, stupidly, I had st st'd when I should have gartered. Bummer. I thought it over for a couple days because I was torn between frogging and reknitting (in total about 25 rows of 100+ stitches), or trying a vertical fix. In the end, I decided that even though I was worried about losing the yarn overs (on alternate rows, 2 in the middle and one on each), frogging/reknitting would probably be less of a pain. I then wisely waited until the following morning, when I had good light, to attempt my fix.

I first inserted a lifeline a couple rows below the problem section:

Then I ripped (and tried not to cry). Not that this project is hard--just knits and purls, but I'm soooooo tired of it, and I was sooooo looking forward to being finished--which I had to be because this is a gift.

After I had ripped to about 4 rows above my mistake, it occured to me that maybe a vertical fix from this distance wouldn't be so bad. So I put the live stitches on circs smaller than the ones I was knitting with (so as not to stretch out the stitches)--except the live stitches above my mistake. Those I put on a DPN. And I put point protectors on all the needle ends so no stitches would pop off. (I left in the lifeline just in case this approach wasn't going to work and I would need to rip after all.) Then, one stitch at a time, I unknit down to the problem row, fixed it, and knit back up.

After about an hour, voila, problem solved. Yay! Except that later that day, I discovered another problem where, a couple rows earlier, I had joined a new skein. It was late and I was tired, and I should have walked away, but I didn't. After trying--and failing--another vertical fix (since I'd just had so much practice), I had to admit failure and go to bed. Early the next morning, and without overthinking it, I got up, unknit 2 rows, and figured out that my problem was the loose knot I'd tied to keep even tension was pulled way too tight. After relaxing the knot just a bit, I was able once again to knit on.

Not surprisingly, I didn't get much else done this week. But next time I'll talk about progress on my Fast, Easy Vest. Here's a peek at the front and the beginnings of the v-neck.

Holiday Travel Knitting

2008-01-20T13:29:00.001-05:00

Two new sock projects for traveling between Philly, Pittsburgh and home last week. With some beautiful Trekking XXL, I cast on for Retro Rib socks from Fav Socks.Retro Ribs were my on-the-plane knitting, because they're on wooden needles, and then in my checked luggage I also brought along these garter ribs--also my first magic loop-ers--for knitting I could easily do while talking and visiting with family and friends.
The GR pattern's easy, and with ML, there's no chance the needles will slide out or be misplaced during transit, or, more likely, during exploration by inquiring nephews. :)

Before I left, I received this wonderful box of bday goodies from GK (with help from MK at The Knit Knack). And then while I was in Pittsburgh, GK took me to Natural Stitches, where I bought this and this, which pretty much took up the last bit of room in my suitcase. Except for the coolest of cool needle sizers, a bday present from JG, which I likewise needed to save a tiny bit of room for.

While in Pittsburgh, I also spent a memorable afternoon at The National Aviary, where we were lucky enough to arrive just as the birds in the rain forest room were having lunch--and we got to help! With my nephews, I volunteered to hold various avian delicacies (live and dead) high in the air so the birdies could snatch them as they flew by. Could there be anything more fun? (Nope.) Then it started to "rain," and we watched the birds bathe and preen. An extra treat for me was listening to the woman from the Aviary staff answer a zillion questions (mostly from my nephews) about the different birds. She knew everything about every bird.

And now for an abrupt change of subject (because I can't think of an elegant transition), in my next post, I'll have some things to say about progress (and lack thereof) on my MIL's Simple Yet Effective Shawl (in Kraemer's Alpaca, DK weight, which knits up nicely on US 10s) which was coming along NICELY...

and nearly finished until I discovered THIS MISTAKE:

Yes, I am an idiot--I totally screwed up this garter st stripe by purling instead of knitting 18 stitches. Who knows why. And I didn't discover it until about 25 ROWS LATER! 25 LONG ROWS, I should say, with yarn overs that I sometimes lose track of.

I spent all of this morning working to correct my mistake. I'll say more about what I did next time. It probably wasn't the most efficient approach, so if anyone has advice I will be happy to hear it.

In the meantime--and on a happier note--I think these are my fav FO of 2008:

Pattern deets here.

New Beginnings

2008-01-04T13:16:00.001-05:00

My first FO of 2008: Christine's Stay-On Baby Booties, which will go into my gift stash. (Pattern deets here.)

And...
... a new sock for a new year. For me. The "Child's First Sock" from Vintage Socks. Yarn is recycled from my frogged "Yarrow Ribbed Socks" (also from VS), and I'm using size zero DPNs.

2007-12-18T11:10:00.001-05:00

Christmas kitteh?

I havs one.

(Truth: Kate and I are big icanhascheezburger.com fans.)

Christmas Knits

2007-12-11T10:31:00.000-05:00

Seems like these days I can knit, or I can blog about knitting. But there's not time to do both. Two planned presents hit major snags this week (no pun intended). Above are some FOs (from L to R): Dashing (in Crystal Palace Aran), and--from OS Wonders in Malabrigo (my new fav. yarn)--Mel's Funky 3-Way Hat, and (my umpteenth pair of) Easy Mittens. All of these patterns are great gift knitting!

Among my other holiday chores? Taking Katie to the groomer so (as they put it) she can "look nice for Santa."

Hogwarts Scarf

2007-11-25T11:34:00.000-05:00

From the newest student at Dogwarts School for Canine Witchcraft and Wizardry, a special bday shoutout to my nephew Gus. Hope you like your scarf!

Pattern: Hogwarts scarf, designed by Lauren Kent at atypically.knit
Yarn: Cascade 220 wool
Needles: Size 7 DPNs

Anniversary Weekend

2007-11-19T10:35:00.001-05:00

This past weekend I celebrated my one-year sockiversary and also? seven years ago, on a similarly cold and snowy weekend, A. and I tied the knot.

:)

In honor of the former, a brief retrospective of sock highlights from the past year.

First Sock? In the beginning, there was the Class Sock, from Sensational Knitted Socks. (The addiction begins.)

Favorite sock pattern? My two Vintage Sock projects are tied for first: Madder and Lichen. Chevron Socks from SKS are a close second.

Favorite sock heel? I think I'm over my infatuation with the short row heel, and these days, I'm happiest with patterns that call for some kind of heel flap. As I work my way through VS, I'm learning a lot about different heels (and toes--more about this in a sec). No doubt I'll encounter some favs there. For all around beauty-osity? it's the eye-of-partridge heel , hands (feet?) down.

Favorite sock yarn? Hm. Hard one. For all around goodness, I'd pick Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock. For softy-luxury worth splurging on, Apple Laine Apple pie. And I seriously mis-underestimated both Knit Picks Gloss (yes, it does get a little fuzzy, but it's very very [very] soft) and Crystal Palace Panda Cotton (splitty, but the softness of the final fabric is worth the aggravation).

Most ambitious project? Probably the Ribbed-Lace pattern in SKS. And, long-term, probably my knit-every-VS-pattern-while-on-sabbatical plan.

Favorite toe? I was skeptical of the pointy toes in some of the VS patterns, but it I actually love the fit--and look--of the 3 pt star toe on my Lichen Ribs. And, honestly? Madder's pointiness has grown on me.

Socks I wear most often? Lichen Ribs, definitely.

Total sock pairs completed? I confess, I could have kept better count, but my sock-sense tells me it's somewhere around 12. About one pair a month. Not speedy, but at least steady?

What about UFOs? I don't have many, actually. I tend to finish socks. For some reason. The second Broadripple awaits a toe. And I have a pair of Trekking socks that is currently IP.

Plans for year two? Well, my Ravelry queue of patterns grows daily. Way too many to list here. But in addition to more Vintage Sock socks, I'd like to try a bunch of Favorite Sock patterns. And toe-up socks. And I probably need to give magic-looping another try. And then there's all the sock yarn waiting patiently in my stash (now, at least, nicely organized by color so that I can see what I have). Is that too much? :O

Ah, Vaa

2007-11-14T10:02:00.000-05:00

Can you play hookey if you're on sabbatical? If not, what do you call it when you take off a day of work to go yarn shopping? My haul from yesterday's visit to The Knit Knack with Cauchy09 included multiple skeins of Malabrigo (GK this is at least partly your fault) and a couple balls of Rowan Scottish Tweed Aran (hey, it was 40% off). Malabrigo colors are Alpine Pearl and Vaa (which everyone at the store was saying like Va-a-a-a-ah, and it's true, you look at this yarn and think Ah-a-a-a-a-a-ah, Va-a-a-a-a-a-ah). I think these will all be used for Christmas gifts. If I can resist the urge to knit them into things for me.

Dog's Eye View

2007-11-12T17:23:00.000-05:00

"What is the meaning of this fall back thing, and what has it done with my dinner?"

Not Much Knitting

2007-11-04T08:33:00.000-05:00

My mom isn't a knitter, but she loves sheep. About a month ago, she saw this little sheepy tape measure at Jo Ann fabs, and sent it to me. Adorable, no? For some reason, Katie finds this guy irresistable. If I forget and leave him within her reach, she'll carry him around until I notice.

Between little time for knitting (yes, even on sabbatical that happens--who knew?) and the fact that I'm working on Christmas presents that I don't want to write about here, I don't have much to show for this week. CR asked how Kate, who's temporarily on "restricted activity" due to some tendonitis, is tolerating her leash walks, and, well, let's just say that the mental and physical energy she'd normally burn off during her daily outings is finding other outlets. Here she is "trading" me: I can have my tape measure back if I open the back door to let her out.

Clever dog.

Chevron Socks

2007-10-29T09:46:00.000-04:00

Busy week and not much time for knitting. I made some progress on the Anthropologie Capelet, but I've had to rip out a row here and there because the stitch markers occasionally slip over the YOs. It helps to keep track of increases--if I know how many stitches are supposed to be in a section, I can tell if the marker has moved. I also finished the pair of socks for my niece started way back in June. She picked out the yarn--green is her favorite color--and I gave them to her for her bday last weekend.

Pattern deets: Chevron pattern from Sensational Knitted Socks, knit on 2.5 mm DPNs, in Crystal Palace Panda Cotton in "Fern"

Confession: halfway through sock no. 2, I noticed that it was a little narrower than sock no. 1. And what I finally figured out was that I had accidentally used 2.5 mm DPNs on sock 1 and 2.25 mm DPNs on sock 2. Duh. (Oh, Knit Picks nickle-plated DPNs , I love you, but I wish you came with sizes tatooed on your shiny selves!) So I frogged sock #2, and started over. Along the way I was fairly crabby about the splitty-ness of the yarn. But as the socks began to take shape and I figured out how to catch/fix the splits, I grew fonder of the yarn, and I will definitely try it again for socks. Making the forethought heel for this project also added to my heel repertoire. Always a good thing.

Some Faves

2007-10-20T11:54:00.000-04:00

This week I tried a couple new yarns that have been waiting patiently in my stash. (Yes, this means, I have two new FOs, which puts me at 9, I think--just over the average recorded in Knitting Daily's recent poll.) Below is the beginning of the Anthropologie Inspired Capelet from Peony Knits

I'm using Kraemer Yarns alpaca, bulky weight, in rose gray on size 10.5 circs. This yarn is buttery soft, and I look forward to using it for other projects. As for this project--it's quick and easy. I added 5 extra stitches (which gives me 55 total at the cast-on edge and works out to one extra for each section--i.e., two front panels, 2 sleeves, back) since my gage on these needles is slightly fewer stitches per inch than in the original pattern. This may make the capelet too big-- I'll just have to see.

And then below is another pair of Easy Mittens from OS Wonders. I really like this pattern--and, actually, I really REALLY like it with this yarn: Paton's SYS. (GK tells me that she finds this yarn too splitty. And it is. A little. But for me the fuzzy softness is worth dealing with the occasionally splitty strands. Also? So far, it's not pilling. Gotta love that.) I knit these in the smaller size on #6 DPNs.

Truth? They're just my size, which means that they'd probably be a bit snug for a person with average sized hands. If I were making these for someone else, I'd probably go up a needle size.

And, last but not least, can I just say that I recently spent a TOTALLY pleasant afternoon at The Knit Knack in Maplewood NJ. This shop is fab, in no small part because of the friendly owners and the wonderful selection of very beauteous yarns. GK and I spent a very cozy couple of hours knitting (and catching up) as we sat in the comfy chairs at the front of the shop. I also came home with more than a few things to add to my stash, including the most lovely Trekking XXL, which I've nearly finished knitting into a pair of socks. Just for me.

2007-10-13T09:56:00.000-04:00

Giant Yarrow Ribbed socks, you are no more. At least for the moment. I finally faced the music (or the knitting?) and decided to frog this project because the socks were just enormous. They wouldn't fit me. No one else I know would want to wear bright gold socks. And this Apple Pie yarn was just to pretty to waste on something that was going to sit in a drawer.

So, I'll find another use for this yarn. Fortunately, I got my Ravelry invite last week (wooHOO!!), and I can look for new ideas there.

Rag quilt #2 is coming along. In the above pic are some sewed-together rows.

2007-10-08T10:58:00.000-04:00

The results of Saturday's quilt workshop:

It took me most of the time (about 4 hours) to sew the squares together. Now I'm sewing the rows (7 squares across). This project is not hard--i.e., it's right at my level, and it's helping me improve my sewing literacy! :)

2007-10-05T14:00:00.000-04:00

A pile of flannel squares. I cut these yesterday in preparation for tomorrow's rag quilt workshop at my LQS. And yes, if you're keeping track, this is quilt no. 2. (No. 1, blogged here, is still in progress.) Note to self: next time, don't sign up for two workshops with just a month in between them.

2007-10-01T10:39:00.000-04:00

HAPPY SOCKTOBER, EVERYONE!

Painting, knitting, quilting

2007-09-16T10:23:00.000-04:00

A busy but fairly productive week. There was, of course, painting. And there was also progress on Dashing . Here's one mitt.

For LLM, here's progress on my chenille quilt. On Monday, I picked out fabric.

(Note: I'm just learning about quilting, so I might not be using the right words to describe stuff here.) Tuesday morning was my first class. Actually, it was the only class for this project, which doesn't take a long time to learn how to do and which (so far as I can tell) is similar to a rag quilt, at least in texture (and which I'll be learning to make next month). But instead of piecing squares, you're working with whole pieces of fabric layered on top of one another, with the bottom layer facing RS out. Then you draw one line on a diagonal across the quilt (it can go corner to corner, but doesn't have to) and then a second line so that it forms a T (i.e., it's at 90 degrees) with the first. (Lines form a T, not an X--i.e, the second line doesn't cross the first.) Once you have your two lines, then you sew (and sew and keep sewing until you can't remember a time before sewing) parallel lines.

My lines are parallel, sorta. I started on the shorter side because it was easier. After your lines are sewn, you cut in between them and through all but the bottom layer of fabric which produces the raggy edges. I did just a little to see what it would look like.

I was doing fine in class, but then at home, I managed to bunch up the fabric and (sob) I had to rip out 7 of those seams. Actually, I'm still ripping--I only have patience for so much ripping, and then I have to work on something else. Which is probably why I finished this first of the Dashing mitts. The finished pair will go into my Christmas present stash, which is growing nicely.

Last post I mentioned that I had to alter the pattern a bit--which I did--and I'm pretty happy with the results. Basically, for each inch (each set of 8 rows) I multiplied by 7(-ish, i.e. it wasn't exact), which worked out this way:

Cuff: 15 rows instead of 18
7 rows between cables instead of 9
Hand: 21 rows instead of 24
Thumb: 6 rows instead of 9

Now I have to go rip the mitt I started before I figured all of this out and start over. At least I'll be able to keep 15 rows of the cuff.

Hair of the Dog

2007-09-10T09:44:00.000-04:00

Last week, my Stitch 'n Bitch page-a-day calendar (a very thoughtful and cool present from GK) offered this knit bit: "An old superstition says that knitting one of your hairs into the garment will forever bind the recipient to you" (9/6/07). If that's true, then anyone I've knitted for in the past 5 years must be forever bound to Katie, because her dog hairs get into just about everything--including wet paint, which there is no shortage of around here these days.

A few months ago when A. and I decided to save some money on our remodeling project by doing the painting ourselves, it seemed like a good idea. Now that we have to actually do it? Not so much. But this weekend I started things off by bravely painting one (very expensive) pocket door. And I learned a few things in the process:

Having the right tools is key (I did, thanks to A).
Having to stop and pick bugs out of the wet paint really slows things down.
I could never be on one of those DIY shows where you make over a room in a weekend, because even with no bugs I'm the slowest painter ever.

Katie was eager to "help" by following me around with her tennis ball and offering to chase it.

I did do a little knitting over the weekend, but not much. Here is the beginning of Dashing (from Knitty Spring 2007).The yarn I'm using, Crystal Palace Aran, is bulkier than the Gedifra English Tweed called for (and which I wanted to use, but had trouble finding). But on size 7 DPNs, it's close except that I get 7 rows per inch instead of 8, which is the right gage. SO I'm going to see what happens if I do fewer rows for each section of the pattern. The cuff, for example, is supposed to be 18 rows of ribbing--about 2 1/2 inches. So I'll try 15 rows instead. Not sure yet what I'll do when I get to the cables, which are 10 row repeats (cable row + 9 ribbing rows). I'm having a little trouble keeping even tension on the cable rows, and I'm not sure why. I've never had this problem before with cables.

The piece of fabric in the background above was an impulse buy last week when I also, impulsively, signed up for a quilting class. I'm a little nervous about this because I don't really know how to sew.

:O

Room With a View

2007-09-03T10:13:00.000-04:00

Here's a photo taken from the inside of our construction project--this is what it looks like if you're standing in the kitchen looking out toward the back yard.

Before, you had to walk through that doorway on the right to get to the back, and so we had two rooms that weren't very functional. Now we have a nice entrance to the back and, to the right, a little pantry.

Below are two new projects I started over the weekend. On the left, "Yarrow Ribbed Socks" from Vintage Socks, and on the right, 20 rows of what will eventually be a bird cage cover to keep Gino and Rocky warm once the temps start to drop.

Socks are on size 1 DPNs and I'm using Apple Laine's Apple Pie sock yarn (50% wool, 20% mohair, 20% silk, 10% Nylon) which I purchased at The Loopy Ewe . This yarn is really really soft and a pleasure to knit with. These will be really warm socks! The cage cover is KnitPicks Wool of the Andes because, well, it's cheap, and this project requires a lot of yarn! I've been thinking about this project for a while and trying out different designs, including crocheting a giant circle, which, after 15 or so rounds, turned out to be really really boring work--probably because I'm not experienced enough with crochet to come up with an interesting design. In the end, I decided to knit separate panels to form a box. That way I can break it down into parts and maybe do something interesting with the individual panels and/or in piecing them together--I'm thinking maybe buttons or ties. Other than those plans, I'm mostly making the design up as I go--which, I realize, could be a terrible mistake. The panel in the above pic will go on the top. It's just a rectange of st st framed by garter st. Here's what I've done so far:

CO 95 (I used a cable cast on).
K 16 rows.
Beginning with row 17 and then for all odd rows: K 10, P 75, K 10.
Beginning with row 18 and then for all even rows, K.

I think I'll keep going this way until I cover just a little less than half the area of the cage top and then do another 16 rows of garter stitch. Depending on how things look, I may actually construct the top piece of two panels rather than one big one.

Not about Knitting or Dogs

2007-08-27T09:40:00.000-04:00

This post is for my Dad and others who requested photos of our remodeling project, which (mostly) involved moving a door to create a nicer entrance to the back yard.

As the above photo shows, the outside is mostly finished. Below is a close-up of the new French doors. You can also see planks for the new wood floor which were laid out over the weekend to acclimate to the space.

We left the brick wall exposed, which (long before we moved in) used to be an exterior wall. It's hard to see in this photo, but the bricks create a cool effect. I couldn't really take pictures of the inside without stepping all over the flooring; I'll post more once I can walk around again in there.

Yarnventory

2007-08-25T12:41:00.000-04:00

I devoted some time this past week to organizing my yarn stash, most of which used to fit in this cool old box.

By "used to," I mean before I started knitting socks. Now I have yarn in many places--some organized by project, some by color or fibre, etc. It was getting so that I couldn't remember what I had. So, earlier this week, I forced myself to go through everything, and I think I made good progress toward organizing yarn and also supplies. Current and upcoming projects as well as stuff I use every day (needles, stitch holders, etc) are organized into various bins and containers on shelves where I can easily find them. Patterns not from books are organized in a magazine file. Everything else is sorted into bins that I'll store out of the way in a closet. (I am currently procrastinating the organizing of that closet as I write this.)

In the meantime, as I was sorting, I found a few treasures, including an old Cascade Fixation vest pattern that I started a l-o-o-o-n-g time ago (think graduate school) and never finished, a row counter, some needles and stitch holder.Here's the squashy bag pre- and post-felting:

I still need to add the snap and maybe some decoration on the flap. Also above are "Easy Mittens" from OSW, knit in Andes wool I had in my stash. I think the finished mitt is a little on the long side, so I'm going to rip out a couple rows. But I got a nice striped effect with the blue and tan varigated yarn on size 6 needles.

Note: Re problems posting last time--the post finally did appear; it's the one right under "Technical difficulties."

Technical Difficulties

2007-08-22T12:41:00.001-04:00

Unfortunately, my last post isn't appearing here. I have no idea why. It's there on my list of posts and it appears to have been published. Somewhere. Obviously not here.