SISTERS...

How quickly they grow up!

jOsIe & sAdIe

It just seems like yesterday they were tiny pups -

snuggling together on their own...

getting their first bath...

still snuggling as "teenagers"








finding creative uses for exercise equipment.

What I won't show you are all the ways they've helped us in our remodeling projects - like removing the kitchen linoleum, ridding us of unneccessary shoes (who needs more than a pair or 2 or socks for that matter?!!), using the sofa to re-skein my yarn (how is it they are still breathing?!!), making it snow in our backyard in late spring (who needed THAT pillow?), chewing a HUGE hole in our screen outside the sliding doors so that it's ever so much cooler when we open it and making it so much easier for them to circle through the house, or the ever helpful digging of holes in the backyard - checking for gophers!!

All that aside they bring such pleasure to our lives, keep me company when HWFRCA is on the night shift and lick the pizza delivery person to death!! We love our girls even though we swear they are our last! We hope that soon they will outgrow the need to chew up everything they can find. They run and play with each other and have loads of fun trying to eat the water from the sprinkler. Being sisters - they chew and bite each other, drag the other one by the tail and Josie snaps away and barks like some strange doggy language, while Sadie will guard the inside of the doggie door - keeping Josie at bay - outside!! Suffice to say - it's never a dull moment!

On the human front - we have BABY NEWS!! Grandchild #2 recently born last week to Son #2 in AZ. As soon we get photos from them I will share - in the meantime, here's where the baby's been hanging out for the past nine months!

Me with the happy parents-to-be on a recent trip to the BABY SHOWER!

All the baby's grandmas meeting for the first time.

PSSSSST - Her name is Isabella, 6 lbs., 14 oz., 22". She was born on Flag Day, June 14. They've sent pictures of her to my phone but you'll just have to wait until they email the pics so YOU can see! She's another BEAUTY!!

Socks and Stash Enhancement

I know - my photography skillz leave something to be desired - in fact, they are sadly non-existant. I digress.

I finally purchased some sock blockers - mainly for "sock modeling" as you'll see. I got them from Sheri at the loopy ewe, she's great! She puts lots of goodies in the package. Not pictured are 2 yarn card samples and a couple of sock cards that you list the info about your sock recipients sizes, likes/dislikes, etc. She takes very good care of her customers!

Back to the sock blockers...yes, they are GINORMOUS because I have BIG FEET!! To the the left of the blockers is some gorgeous Fleece Artist seawool yarn in the Parrot colorway and to the right is Claudia's Hand Painted "short sport" in the Peppermint Mocha colorway. It is a Louet base and is sooooo yummy!

Beware though!! I didn't read the whole description about this yarn, specifically, how many skeins were needed for a pair of socks. Turns out that 3 skeins are needed for GIANT feet like mine and I only purchased 2. Instead of trying to get another skein I decided to just make a simple stockinette sock. I used wendyknits! basic toe-up pattern and just made the leg shorter. I ended up with a few yards left over and could've ripped it out and knit a few more rows but I'm satisfied with the way this first one turned out. I just need to cast on for its mate! This yarn is a sport weight - just in case you didn't catch that right away. I'm loving the Louet!

These other 2 lovelies are on the left, Lorna's Laces in either mint chocolate or chocolate mint. They came from a since-forgotten ebayer who has it custom dyed for her. This was my first attempt with wendyknits! pattern. It was about that time (a few months ago) that I realized that my growing sock yarn stash was becoming completely overwhelming for me. I mean, how many complicated sock patterns can I knit in my lifetime?!! Since I'm not overly fast - I decided to just take some of my yarn and just do something simple. After I made that pair I tried Wendy's feather and fan pattern. That is one of my all-time favorite stitch patterns. I used Lisa Souza's Violet's Pink Ribbon from the Lime & Violet podcast fame.

Here are my Embossed Leaves Socks by Mona Schmidt from IK Winter 2005 (and I understand it's also in their new Favorite Socks book). I used Sophie's Toes

in her Tapestry colorway. It also is a Louet base.

This yarn is YUMMY (much like the Claudia's above only it is fingering weight). The picture came out dark but maybe you can get a better view if you click on it. It was maybe too dark a color for lace but I think they turned out lovely!! I was very tired of the pattern as I got close to the end of the 2nd sock. All in all though, they were very enjoyable to knit and I would knit another lace sock pattern again. Problem is that most of my sock stash is hand-dyed, variegated yarn that doesn't always show the pattern to its best advantage but I sooooo love the handdyes!!

HWFRCA exclaimed to me the other day "So are you a SOCK knitter now?" I guess it's looking that way, however that's not the only thing I'm knitting these days. The lavender heather sweater up there in the corner is still on the needles. It's vacationing on Sleeve Island right now but will hopefully be finished before this fall. And there are other (read - too many) UFO's in the wings crying "pick me, pick me!!!" just waiting to be finished. For me, it's never been about the destination - it's always about the journey.

Woes of Blogging

Sheesh, I had no clue when I started blogging how TIME-CONSUMING it would be for me!! So, because there is a serious lack of bloggage going on around here (but VERY serious amounts - for me - of actual knitting going on) - I give you this until I have time to blog about the knitting and the lack of sewing! (Spooky how right on this was about me!)

What does your birthdate mean?

Your Birthdate: December 3

You are more than a big ball of energy - you are a big ball of hyper. You are always on the go, but you don't have a type a personality. Instead of channeling your energy into work, you instead go for fun and adventure. Witty and verbal, you can have an interesting conversation with anyone. Your strength: Your larger than life imagination Your weakness: You tend to be pretty scattered Your power color: Lime Your power symbol: Lightening bolt Your power month: March

What Does Your Birth Date Mean?