Category: Life Happens

Short Blog Break

I realized yesterday that I have updated my blog only 7 times in the last month, and only twice since the beginning of this month.  There are a lot of things going on in my life right now, and committing to writing a 50,000 word novel (NanNoWriMo) by the end of November has been sort of the last straw.  Rather than feel guilty about it, I won’t be blogging until the first of December, unless I have some sort of Knitting News that just overwhelms me with its importance.

I will definitely be back, and I expect to start blogging around the first weekend in December, so please check in around then.  I know how annoying it can be when you keep checking a blog for days on end and there is just nothing.  Those of you who use Bloglines will automatically get notified when I post again.

Here are a couple of pictures for you in the meantime.  The first is so I don’t get kicked out of the puppy/kitty rings.  Riley the wonder dog and Willie the lunatic cat who thinks he’s a dog clearly love each other.

Here is what it looks like in the Pacific Northwest today:

It’s been a bit gloomy here the last few weeks, so the glorious sunshine today is just a gift.  No offense to those of you who live elsewhere, but this is just  the most lovely place on earth.  I’m sure the place that you live is quite nice, but I just wouldn’t move anywhere else unless somebody held a gun to my head.  Maybe not even then.

See you all in a couple of weeks!

I’m Depressed

The votes are in.  Kerry/Edwards won by a huge margin in the election held right here at Knitting Doctor.  The turnout wasn’t huge, but the mandate was clear:  15 for K/E, 6 for B/C.  That means Kerry got somewhere around 70% of the popular vote.

Too bad the real world doesn’t mirror knitting blogs.  Clearly, knit bloggers, and knit blog readers, are smarter than the average American.

I’m looking forward to 2008.  Once W. screws things up even more that he already has, voters will most certainly put an intelligent woman or man in the White House.  Until then, we all can take comfort in the fact that America has endured worse.

Now back to our regularly scheduled knitting blog.

I finally got the body of the purple sweater blocked.  Here is a picture of the pinning ceremony.  You can see my handy-dandy steamer in the background, waiting for its turn.  Take note of my lovely home-made blocking board.

And here everything is ready to get steamed:

The lace detail:

Here’s where I am on the first sleeve.  After I blocked and measured the back pieces, the armhole is a bit larger than the measurements given in the pattern, so I will need to adjust the sleeve width a bit to match.  Last time I knit a sweater, I didn’t take this into consideration;  this error led to an awful lot of swearing in the Knitting Doctor household.

In case you thought I am hiding the green striped socks from you, here are a couple of pictures.  I finished the short row heel and am on my way up the cuff.  This turned out better than I expected.  It looks a little big on my foot because it is intended for my Bigfooted husband.  He refused to model because he was too busy sobbing over election results.

I’m off to watch the concession speech.

Knit Bloggers for Kerry Unite!

It is one of the wonders of this world that citizens of this country have been able to vote for what kind of government they want for over 200 years. Without fear of reprisal we can decide to throw out the current bunch of elected officials if we decide that we don’t like the job they have done for us. I’ve certainly not made any secret of which side of the political fence that I am on. If you are on the other side of that fence, go vote anyway. We’ll all sit on the edge of our chairs Tuesday night and wait for the results.

GO VOTE! I’ve already cast my ballot. (I vote absentee every year, even if I’m in town, just so I don’t get sidetracked by work and not get it done.) My husband joined the local campaign workers this week and spent the day today going door to door reminding people to get out there Tuesday and do their civic duty. I would have gone too, if I hadn’t had to go to work today.

Many of the knit bloggers that I read seem to be Kerry/Edwards supporters, though I doubt that I read a representative sample of all knit bloggers. In the spirit of the election season, who are you going to vote for in the presidential election? Cast your ballot in the comment section, and I’ll tally them up and post the results. As in real life, duplicate ballots will not be counted!

And my parting shot:

Progress on Audrey

This has been one hell of a couple of weeks; of the last 20 days, I have worked 16 of them; mostly long, late days.  It makes me cranky when I don’t have time to do anything but work, eat, and sleep.  Not much knitting progress in the last 2 weeks, but I have finished the major pieces of the Audrey sweater.  I finished the second sleeve last night and just have a few ends to weave in.  I just got home from work tonight, so though I would love to start that lace border, it would make for a very unpleasant day tomorrow if I stay up till all hours knitting.

I’m blocking the pieces before I sew them together.  Somehow the front and back are just a tad bit off as far as measurements.  They are the same row count, one is just a bit tighter gauge, I think.  Weird.  It’s enough to bug me a bit, but not enough to even contemplate re-knitting one piece.  I’m hoping blocking will make them closer to the same dimensions.  I’ll wait to take new pictures till I can do it in the daylight.

I have a sick kitty…Lucy has been acting very weird the last few days.  Normally she is a big lovable chicken and does not go outside much.  If she does go out, it’s while we are on the deck, and she stays very close.  2 or 3 nights ago she was out and gone for the longest time.  We went scouting around the neighborhood but couldn’t find her.  Finally about 10PM she came tearing in the cat door like her tail was on fire and an alien was after her.  She has been acting strange since; not eating, hiding in the closet, growling at us when we try to get her to come out.  She finally today is starting to come out of it; she ate tonight and drank some milk, and is purring, though now she is hiding out in the pantry.  I’m almost thinking she might have eaten something poisonous that made her hallucinate or something.  Either that, or the eagles tried to get her and it scared the hell out of her. We talked to a vet friend on the phone and if she is not completely better tomorrow she is off for an appointment so a real doctor can look at her.  Think “well kitty” wishes for her.

I promise some knitting progress pictures soon!