One Freaking Sock

There you have it. I posted my June goals earlier on in the month. I must say, they were rather ambitious, given that I finished exactly seven projects in the past year and a bit. Why don’t you people tell me when I write something as stupid as “I’m going to finish a sweater, a pair of socks, and part of another sweater. Oh, and a million rows of a complicated lace shawl that requires my total concentration and cannot be worked on if anyone is speaking within a hundred miles of my location.”

Ahem. On top of my lofty goals, work was a bit busy. And I tried to cut my left index finger off right after I said I was going to knit a row a day on that shawl. It was a relatively tiny cut, but it was right on the tip of my finger where the knitting needle hits it with every single stitch. So I couldn’t knit anything for about a week or it would start bleeding again, and since then it is healing OK, but hurts every time I poke it, which is with every single stitch.

No, there was no alcohol involved. I was trying to slice bread. Serrated bread knife meets finger, part eleventy billion. My family appears to be known for this talent, so much so that my husband’s first instinct was not to grab a towel or a bandaid, or even to see if he needed to call 911. No, he grabbed his camera so he could post a photo of the carnage on Facebook for my loved ones to laugh at. I’m not linking to that. Imagine my hand, some bread, and quite a lot of blood.

But I did finish a sock. Here you go.

Of course I still have one sock to go, but at least I’ve started it.

I was a bit worried as I finished the first sock that I will run out of yarn, since the yardage is a bit short on this stuff*. After I finished, I hauled out the trusty drug-dealer scale to check.

Finished sock weighs 45.9 grams (including a bit of heel and toe reinforcing yarn).

I have 54.2 grams left, so I should be good.

I’m also baking bread again. Last week’s bread was a white-wheat-rye blend. Here’s what’s in the bread machine today.

Here are the approximate proportions of what’s in it.

2 cups regular bread flour

1 1/2 cup whole wheat flour

1 cup water

1/2 cup mixed “harvest grains“, softened in about 1/2 cup hot water

2 TBL canola oil

2 TBL molasses

1 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 TBL wheat gluten

1 TBL yeast

I get my bread making ingredients at the King Arthur store online. I linked to the harvest grain blend, but the rest of what you need can be found there as well.

I’ll bake that in the oven on a stone instead of in the machine, I like the texture better that way. I’ll try to remember to show you a photo later when it’s out!

*The yarn is Unique Sheep Tinsel Toes sock yarn. It’s 367 yards, which for someone with a foot that is close to size 11, can be a little light. Can I tell you how much I love them though? When I went to find a link to this, I discovered that they now make their sock yarns in “Big Foot” sizes. You can buy a skein and a half if you have Sasquatch size feet!

Summer Of Lace

Now that summer is almost here, I really want to knit lace! Fortunately I have a couple of lace projects on the needles. I just wish the weather would feel more like summer. It hit a high in the mid-50’s today, and rained much of the week. Oh well, I can hope, can’t I?

Here’s the big lace thing in progress.

That is my Evenstar shawl, started over two years ago. I think it’s high time it’s finished, don’t you?

Here’s where I am. This is a round shawl, with endless rows then a knitted on border. I have 56 rows to go, then the border, which is a 20 row repeat done 28 times. There are 560 stitches on the needles. This may take me a while.

We’re leaving town on September 24th for a big adventure that I’ll tell you about later. I want to take this with me, finished and blocked. That gives me 108 days to finish. If I do “only” a row a day, I’ll still have 49 days to do the border.**

59 rows + 28 border repeats; 108 days. Let’s keep track, shall we? I put it in the sidebar over there on the right. And please, don’t calculate how many stitches that is. I might have to break out the bourbon.

In other news, our fabulous peonies finally bloomed. Peonies might be my favorite flower, and we planted several the summer before last. They didn’t do anything exciting last year except grow leaves, but they are going to town with flowers this summer.

This is where being able to add fragrance to a blog post would be helpful.

Last but not least, next week is the 125th anniversary of the founding of my home town.  There is a big celebration planned that coincides with the annual alumni banquet (that absolutely every alumnus that lives in the vicinity attends every year!) I can’t make this one, though it’s scary to recall that I was at the centennial celebration 25 years ago. I think I even still have the t-shirt! In solidarity with all of my fellow alumni, I rummaged around in my jewelry drawer and found my class ring.

 

That ring was designed in 1930, and hasn’t changed since. Of course the Edgeley tribe mostly doesn’t need the ring to identify each other, since the town is so small. If we run into each other somewhere, it’s a good chance we’ll be recognized.

So who is with me on the lace bandwagon? If you are, let me know in the comments and tell me what you are knitting/finishing!

**Updated with the right numbers. Apparently I can’t add or subtract, not a good sign.

June Goals!

Let’s get back to this, shall we? For awhile I was doing a beginning of the month post with goals for the month, and how I did on the prior month’s goals. Here we go.

First up is the 2012 Great Office Cleanup. Unfortunately I didn’t get any “before” photos, but trust me, it was a freaking disaster. Here are the “after” pictures.

I got rid of a ton of books. I had a million bags of CDs sitting around, I finally got them all uploaded to iTunes, and got rid of the originals. Let’s just say that our local library is very happy. They have a biannual sale of donated books/media that benefits the library, and that’s where all my surplus went. I had two desks in my office, the one you see up there, along with an ancient roll top oak desk that I’ve had since I started practice in 1985; I bought it used for my medical office. I found someone willing to give it a good home, and off it went. My goal was to get everything off the floor, so I kept dredging out until I got there. I’ve always snickered a bit at the “fung shui” people, but it really is easier to get something accomplished when your workspace isn’t a disaster.

Knitting? Same projects. Here’s one of them. I didn’t show a very good photo of it last time.

That’s reasonably accurate for the color. Here’s a photo of the stitch detail on the sides. Click to embiggen.

The main body stitch pattern is plain stockinette, but there is a two row garter stitch detail every so often, just enough to keep this from being totally boring. This is my Mr. Greenjeans Corduroy sweater, in case you’ve forgotten.

I was a bit worried about the sizing, so yesterday I put the whole thing on a bigger circular and measured it against another sweater that mostly fits (my not-quite-a-cobblestone). You can just see it peaking out in the photos. The not-quite-a-cobblestone is just a tiny bit roomy on me, so this one should be perfect. The fabric this is making is quite stretchy, and I don’t want a big baggy sweater.

So, goals for June:

Finish the body of Mr. Greenjeans.

Finish the socks on the needles (Primary Ink Tinseltoes).

Finish the blasted hood of that Faery thing.

Read more. (I wasted an inordinate amount of time in May reading that hopelessly muddled up mess of books called Fifty Shades. I need to read something more intelligent to get the bad words out of my head.)

I’m off. We have tickets to the symphony tonight, and I need to get a few things accomplished first!

 

Oops!

Contrary to rumors, I have not fallen off the face of the earth. I’m still here, just got sidetracked a bit over the past two months. Here’s a recap:

I worked a lot in March and April. Busy, busy, busy. Things have started to slow down a bit in the hospital since the warm weather (all the way up to 56 F so far today!), so I’m getting a little more accomplished outside work.

No exciting trips! Actually, not even any boring trips. We have a couple things later this year that I’ll tell you about as they come up, but now is just the best time to stay put in the Pacific Northwest. Flowers are blooming, the trees are all leafed out. Remember the ice storm in January that took out a big old maple in our back yard? We planted a cute little new tree to replace it (little is the operative word here).

It’s a Stewartia pseudocamellia. No, I’d never heard of that either, but they do well here apparently, and will fit better into this space than a huge canopy tree. And it won’t drop those little wingy things all over the decks and roof like the big leaf maple did. It looks pretty pitiful right at the moment, so we got the bright idea to put a small Japanese maple tree in a pot on each deck.

Neither of those will get huge, but they disguise the neighbor houses a bit.

Let’s see, what else? Oh, I got a new computer. My ancient Mac has been threatening to bite it for the past year. It was so old that I couldn’t even get memory cards for it, even if I had wanted to update it. It also didn’t have enough oomph to handle any further upgrades to the operating system. Even though I had everything backed up and double backed up, I finally got nervous enough that it was going to die on me, and got a new Mac. Meet Bert*:

Why yes, there is a crown hanging off my computer. Why do you ask?

We’ve done assorted other fun things with friends and family, saw a few good concerts (Pink Martini, Arlo Guthrie, Mary Chapin-Carpenter). Oh, and there was the Kentucky Derby. We had mint juleps, and one of us dressed up. I don’t remember which horse won, but my, that hat is swell!

I’ve been in a bit of a knitting slump, but am getting back at it. I got a real bug up my you-know-what this spring to dredge out my office/loft. It was getting to the point where I had to almost crawl over stuff to get to the desk, so it was time to take action. I pretty much have it done, but it involved weeding out tons of books and junk, and getting rid of one of the desks, since I only really need one. I have some shelves coming next week to organize all my craft crap, and my goal is to have nothing on the floor except furniture. It’s already a huge relief to get rid of a bunch of clutter.

One benefit was finding and organizing all my knitting projects. I took photos, of course.

Everything is in its own bag, with the pattern and extra yarn. I bet you want to see them.

Sock-in-progress. Same old sock, the yarn is Tinsel Toes from the Unique Sheep shop.

Lewey thinks I should have finished that by now. He said, “Even I could knit a sock faster than that.”

 

Dog mittens, those have been in progress for years. They may get done someday. Actually, teaching the dog to knit might help.

Box full of little balls of sock yarn. Any guesses? Here’s another hint.

Hexipuffs!

Yes, it’s a Beekeeper’s Quilt. I’ve totally lost my mind. Somebody send me a virtual head-slap.

Ancient lace. That’s that Evenstar Shawl, which has been in a very long time out. It’s just too pretty not to finish it though.

More ancient lace. This one has actually seen some progress. It’s about half done. The pattern is Morning Glory by Anne Hanson.

True Blood Faery Ring sweater. It’s all done except the hood and button bands. My hard stop goal is to finish this to wear this fall/winter. Somebody remind me of this later when I’m screwing around starting new projects.

Speaking of which. The only logical thing to do when you’re bored with a million old knitting projects is to start a new one. Right? I thought you’d agree.

It’s a sweater. The yarn is Araucania Nature Wool that’s been marinating in the stash for years. The pattern is Corduroy from the book “A Fine Fleece” by Lisa Lloyd. It’s pretty mindless knitting so far.

Then there are the failures. Remember this?

This was a mystery knitting project that I started God knows when. I got this far and decided to be skeptical, and waited until the last clues were out. It did turn out to be a hat, but it’s something that I would never wear. Here’s a photo of a finished one.

Cute, but not for me.

So it sat around in a bag for a few months, until my cleaning frenzy. I ripped it out and wound it all up back into little balls.

I think those might make cute little hexipuffs, don’t you?

Enough already. I’ll try to be back before another two months goes by!

*The old one was Bert also. My laptop Mac Air is Ernie, of course.

 

Dang!

John and I don’t buy lottery tickets. Except of course when the prize gets to over $500 million, at which point every other human in this country is buying them too, and our chances go from “nil” to “same as getting hit by lightning a bazillion times at once”. But we did have plans on how we would spend it. Inspired by Lee Ann’s post, here are mine. Were, not are, I guess. Oh yeah, somebody else won.

1. Buy all the yarn I want. Right. I already do that.

2. Pay off the house, remodel the bathroom.

3. Travel. Oh, right. I already do that, too.

4. Change the locks on the house. There are too many people out there that have keys and codes to the garage door.

5. Get an unlisted phone number.

6. Get my 1998 VW Beetle to the body shop and have the dings repainted. What can I say, I like driving an ancient car.

7. Like Lee Ann, say “I quit”. I’ve always joked that the first thing I would buy if I won enough money would be a fax machine so I could fax in my resignation.

8. Figure out which of our relatives would get to retire, too. 😉

I guess we’ll survive without the lottery winnings. We have a terrific house, even if the bathroom makes me want to take an axe to it. I have a great job to dream about retiring from, as do most of my not-already retired family members. And my beater car is paid for, dents and all. And I have more yarn and fiber supplies than I will ever use up in any imaginable lifetime.

Your turn! What would you have done with it? Let me know in the comments or on your own blog!

Blogiversary!

I almost, but not quite, forgot about it! Good grief. Eight years ago today, I got this blog up and running. It has been great big fun, I’ll tell you! I’ve learned a lot in the process, and met some terrific people. Even though I occasionally lose it and forget to blog for weeks on end, I’m still here!

In honor of the day, I decided to post some actual knitting. I know, you’re shocked. The past few weeks since we got back from vacation have been a bit of a slog at work, but I have done a few things. Here you go!

First up is True Blood. This is slowly but surely coming along. I have finished both sleeves, and started the hood.

 

The first photo is more like the real color. After the hood, I just have to attach the sleeves, then knit a big honking button band all the way up one side, around the hood, and down the other. And it’s a hemmed band, so it will be eleventy billion stitches. Then I can attach my little garnet and silver faery buttons, and I’ll have a wonderful wool hooded coat, just ready for summer!

Next up is an actual finished project!

 

Project Details:

Houdini Stole

Yarn: this is a combination of Art Fibers Houdini and Kyoto. The Houdini is a wide nylon ribbon, and the Kyoto is a silk mohair blend.

Pattern: made up stole pattern (see below)

Needles: Big ass 12 mm needles. This was a little like knitting with beginner crayons.

For: Me

Started: March, 2011

Finished: yesterday

What I learned: I don’t generally go for artsy fartsy novelty yarns, but this actually turned out quite pretty, and I think I will wear it. It’s quite long, good enough to wrap a couple times around my neck. The shop lady at Art Fibers just made up the pattern on the spot after I picked out the yarn. Since it’s hand written in pencil on a piece of scrap paper, I’m pretty sure I’m safe to share it here.

With Houdini, cast on 3 stitches. Knit every row (garter stitch). Increase at the beginning and end of every other row until the piece measures about 20 inches (or as wide as you want). Then increase at the beginning of the row and decrease at the end of the row every other row, until it is as long as you want. Then decrease at each end every other row until you have 3 stitches left and bind off. AT THE SAME TIME, alternate the two yarns (Houdini and Kyoto) every two rows. So, two rows of Houdini, two rows of Kyoto. I just did the increases and decreases with the first and last stitches, and did a knit in the front and back increase, and a simple K2tog decrease. The yarn is busy enough that you can’t really tell.

You end up with a big long rectangle, but with the knitting on the diagonal.

Now that I finished that, I’ve resurrected an old lace stole pattern that’s been marinating quite long enough.

The is the Morning Glory stole, by Anne of Knitspot. The yarn is Harmony, a discontinued yarn from Brooks Farm. The color is named Froot Loops. This is sort of “moose lace”, but the pattern takes a little concentration. It is patterned on both sides, so no easy purl back row, and the pattern repeat shifts around on almost every row, so markers are a bit useless. It’s making me pay attention! It is knit in two halves, then grafted together.

Enough for today. We have a cooking class tonight, which should be a lot of fun. I’ll report back…

 

Last Post From Vallarta!

Boy, that week went by fast! All the same I’ll be glad to get home to the house and mutts. I do miss them when we’re gone, though I know they are all in good hands with our house sitter. In fact, I’m pretty sure that at least the dogs like her better.

We went on a sunset sailing cruise of Banderas Bay last night, and I had to leave you with these photos.

That was our sister ship.

We actually saw a mama and baby whale, quite unusual for a night time sailing. They circled around our boat for about 20 minutes, giving us a nice show!

Of course there was knitting.

This was one of the eleventy billion sunset photos we got.

And of course, a full moon! What’s not to like: terrific weather, whales, an open bar, beautiful sunset, and a full moon! And knitting!

And that’s us at the end of the evening.

We’re headed to the airport in a few hours, so I’m off to pack! See you on the flip side! Buenos dias!

More Puerto Vallarta!

So what have we been up to??

We went to church at the local cathedral:

We got invited to a nice lunch:

I found yarn, sort of:

We spent a whole day at the resort doing next to nothing:

Today we took a tour out of town, and went to a botanical garden:

We saw cheese being made in a tiny village (and tortillas though there is no photo of that):

Our tour guide, Sandra, gave us the rundown on how tequila is made:

I found a parrot that wasn’t very impressed with my knitting skills:

We bumped around the countryside in an open truck:

And we tasted tequila, of course!

We have one more full day here, then home. The latest report from the home front is that the temperature is below freezing, and there is an inch of new snow on the ground. Sheesh. I wonder if they’d believe me if I called in sick and just stayed here. Right. Not so much. Later…

First Day In Photos

Puerto Vallarta, of course! Here you go:

I guess I’m easily amused. 24 hours in this sunny place, and my seasonal affective disorder is all but a dim memory.

P.S. The boys making those mojitos and margaritas last night were quite fascinated by the sight of me knitting a sock. I’m pretty sure nobody knits here.

Leaping Lizards!

We get an extra day today! Make the most of it, I say.

Here’s the wrap up on Wintergrass. It was a terrific festival. The theme this year was international bluegrass, and there were groups from the Czech Republic, Italy, Sweden, Japan, and Switzerland. We saw all of the non-US groups except for the Swiss group, and they were all good. Väsen, the group from Sweden, has been to Wintergrass a couple of times before, and they are always a hit. Despite the fierce competition from many other fine bands, they were also my favorite group of the weekend. Here are their photos.

That instrument is a nyckelharpa. They play Swedish folk music, sort of. You really have to listen to it. Here you go!

There were lots of other great things going on. Here are just some photos…




Ok, I have to comment on that one. That’s a young lady we met in the restaurant at breakfast one morning. The instrument is a stumpf fiddle, made at home with a variety of pots, pans, a toilet plunger, and a wooden car horn. She even played it for us.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIuDWA1t1fc&feature=youtu.be

That’s not her in the video, obviously.

There was some spinning! I didn’t spin during the performances, since I think it’s a bit distracting, but did during the breaks. I also did some knitting during the music.

And those are done done done!

Project Details:

Yarn: Pink Carrot Creations, color is Carrot Top. I bought this in Ketchikan when we were on our Alaskan cruise.

Pattern: same damn pattern as always

Needles: size 1, sterling silver needles from Celtic Swan.

Started: Oh who knows. Probably in November, since that’s when I finished the last pair.

Finished: Today!

For: Me

There you go! I really need to kick it into gear and finish more socks. My sock collection is starting to show its age, so I need some new ones. Bluegrass festivals are terrific for sock knitting!

And here are the new socks:

The yarn is Tinsel Toes, from Unique Sheep, in Primary Ink. For the record, I’m using Ivore needles in 2.00. I snapped one of them this morning while doing the picot hem, which irritates me to no end. These are my favorite needles, a little hard to come by. I can’t find them in the US anymore, though I have a website in Australia that still sells them, albeit with exorbitant shipping costs. I have a couple extra from another set, so I’m good to go for now, and there might be a spare set or two on the way just for insurance. I’ve had these a long time, and this is the first time I’ve ever broken one. Most people hate these because they are very long, and very flexible, but I adore them.

Last but not least, we’re on our way out of town again. It’s about time for some warm and sun, since we’ve put up with months of cold, damp, rainy, windy, dark, gloomy, and tree-killing weather. We’re headed for Puerto Vallarta tomorrow! We’ll have internet access there, hopefully, so I should be able to update!

I’m off to pack!

This And That

Just as the title says. First up is knitting. No photo, but I’m almost done with the second sleeve of the Faery sweater. Then it’s the hood and the button band, and it will be done done done, probably just in time for summer. There was a brief dust up with the second sleeve. I sat down last week to start working on it, found the finished first sleeve and all of my very cryptic notes, and found a ball of yarn to cast on. As I was doing so, I had the distinct feeling of deja vu. I almost chalked it up to the fact that this was in fact the second sleeve, and I indeed had done it before. Some little voice in my head made me go upstairs to my disaster of an office. I hunted through about six knitting bags before I found it. Not only had I cast on for the second sleeve, I had finished the cabled cuff and about eight inches of sleeve. Sheesh. I need a better organizational system. Either that, or I need to cut back on the vodka martinis. The theory* that the alcohol only kills the weak brain cells, leaving me smarter, may be wrong. Sorry, Cliff.

Next is the dyepot. I did some fiber prep last weekend, and did a bit of dyeing this week. Here you go.

That is undyed wool yarn, pre-mordanted in a copper sulfate solution. The pretty blue crystals in the jar are the copper. I liked the color so well that I almost left it like that. Almost. Here’s the dye stuff.

That is a bowl full of mostly marigolds. I had topped all the marigolds in our pots last fall when they were at the very end of the season, and spread them out to dry. I got a little paper bag of more mixed flowers in my last CSA dye shipment, and mixed the two. Here is the dye pot simmering.

That simmered away for about an hour, then I let it sit overnight before straining the flowers out. Then the wet yarn went in, that simmered for an hour, and again sat overnight. Here’s what I got for my trouble.

I think that is just the most gorgeous bronze color. I put a bunch of alum mordanted Polwarth top in the same dye pot yesterday, It is draining right now. It’s a bit hard to tell when it’s wet, but I think it will be a paler less vibrant version of the same color. So far it is exactly the color of something Lucy might hork up, so it might get overdyed. We’ll see. I’m pretty pleased with the yarn, though.

Next up is food. Tuesday of course was Mardi Gras, and we celebrated in style at the Knitting Doctor household.

Yum. The dinner was shrimp etouffee, rice, braised kale, and bread. And wine, of course.

Last but not least, you might notice that sweatshirt that I am wearing up there. This is Wintergrass weekend, and we are off later today for the festival. We have tickets to hear Itzhak Perlman at the symphony tonight, then the rest of the weekend is all bluegrass, all the time. I have my knitting and spindle packed and I’m off to follow the call of the banjos! I’ll update as I can!

*”Well you see, Norm, it’s like this . . . A herd of buffalo can only move as fast as the slowest buffalo. And when the heard is hunted, it is the slowest and weakest ones at the back that are killed first . This natural selection is good for the herd as a whole, because the general speed and health of the whole group keeps improving by the regular killing of the weakest members. In much the same way, the human brain can only operate as fast as the slowest brain cells. Now, as we know, excessive intake of alcohol kills brain cells. But naturally, it attacks the slowest and weakest brain cells first. In this way, regular consumption of beer eliminates the weaker brain cells, making the brain a faster and more efficient machine. And that, Norm, is why you always feel smarter after a few beers.”


 

The Color Of The Day…

Is red!

I’ve finished the first sleeve for the True Blood Faery sweater, and am well on my way with the second sleeve. I don’t really feel like I’m on Sleeve Island with this for some reason, I think it’s the cable section. I  can be pretty entertained by knitting the same cable over and over and over and over…

Then I’ll have the hood and the button bands to go. Of course the button band is about a million stitches long, and it’s double since you knit it, then do a turning row, then knit it again. Then you get to SEW the damn thing. And it goes all the way around the hood. Terrific. It’s a good thing that I’m into mindless knitting most of the time.

Here’s the body, all done, ready for the sleeves and hood. And button bands.

Here’s something else red:

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Corgis!

Ok, ok. I sort of forgot about the blog. Here’s the quick update, in list format.

Work’s been a bit busy. I could just stop there, and hit “publish” and be done with it.

We did finally get the huge downed maple out of the back yard. It’s now in pieces in the front yard, awaiting a log splitter to turn it into firewood.

I haven’t been doing much knitting on old projects. I have a bazillion of them, and I am just bored to death with them.

So I started a new project. If any one of you honestly says that you wouldn’t do the same, I still won’t believe you.

Here it is:

 

And another shot.

Don’t ask, I have no idea what it’s going to be. It’s the first clue of a mystery project. I’m suspecting a hat of some type, but we’ll see. John thinks it’s half of a bikini top.

I had a little dust-up with the circular cast on, and finally searched out a you tube video on the Emily Ocker cast on, and figured out how to use the magic loop technique to get the thing started. The yarn is from Abstract Fibers, and the designer is Mary Scott Huff. Here’s the Ravelry link. I forgot how much fun color work is!

Then there are Corgis. When you don’t know what else to blog about, there are always dogs. There’s one of them up there in that photo. You can tell he’s not very energetic today. We’re also dog sitting for friends today.

Riley really thinks that three Corgis are an unnecessary number of Corgis. She really wishes she were still an only dog.

Last but not least, I am making roasted garlic pasta sauce for supper tonight. The garlic is roasting in the oven, and the house smells divine!

I’m off to knit!

 

Still Digging Out

Well. This week has been very weird. Thank you to everybody who commented on my last post. It is indeed traumatic to lose a grand old tree, and even more traumatic to think how close it came to doing serious damage to my sweetie and the house. At some point though, you have to put it in perspective, and move on. We were only without power for a little over a day, and we do have a generator that runs the essentials. I couldn’t  get my car (a little VW Bug) out of the driveway until Sunday, but John was able to get his car out once we cleared some of the downed branches, so I did get to work.

We still have snow on the ground, though it’s melting relatively quickly. We also still have a huge tree on the ground in the back yard. Zeb (remember Zeb?) and his crew came last week to survey what needs to be done, but couldn’t get their truck down into our yard, so all they were able to do was cut the tree back enough so it wasn’t leaning on the house and deck rails, in case it were to shift. They are coming tomorrow for more definitive management, meaning turning it into firewood. Here are some more photos.

And here’s the maple in the front yard. It lost about a third of its branches. Zeb thinks it will survive, though it looks like it got drunk and gave itself a really bad haircut.

The good news part of this is that we’ll get to plant a new tree in the spring! Exciting! I want an oak tree, but I’d have to live to about 150 to see it grow up. Whatever we plant, it will be fun to watch it grow.

In much more fun news, my home town has a new burger joint. The sign has been up for awhile, but they finally opened a week or so ago. We got there today for lunch.

Really, John was much happier about his burger than he looks. I just didn’t want to take any more pictures. Yum!

And speaking of even better news, I got an early Valentine’s present* yesterday.

My old camera was starting to get a little “quirky”, and this (it’s a Canon 60D) is a definite step up. It does everything except, apparently, clean dog hair off my furniture.

OK, I’m off, I have an appointment for a haircut later today. One of these days I might even post knitting photos!

*Of course, John thinks it’s OUR camera. He can have his little delusions.

The Ents Are Sad

We are at the tail end of a big snow storm here in the Pacific Northwest. It started on Monday, and we woke Tuesday to a light layer of icy snow on the ground. Snow here is pretty crippling in general, mostly because the weather hovers around freezing, so we get a layer of ice along with the snow. It hit in earnest on Tuesday night, and we had about 6 inches on the ground yesterday morning. It’s all quite pretty, and John took some cool photos yesterday to prove it. I don’t have the heart to post them today though.

Last night we were doing the end of the day routine before we went to bed. John took the dogs out back and came in. A few minutes later we heard a loud crack and a crash. A huge old maple off one of our back decks had come down from the weight of the snow and ice, landing within a few inches of the kitchen windows and decks. It took out at least one smaller tree that we had planted on the other side of the yard a few years ago, we can’t really get to it to see for sure but it is leaning and looks like all the branches are stripped.  There are broken branches over all three decks, but the only house structural damage is a bent railing on the upstairs deck off our bedroom. A few inches to the left and I would not be sitting in my kitchen this morning. A few minutes earlier, and this could have been a tragedy, since it came down right where John had been standing while the dogs did their thing.

Here are a few photos.

Sorry those are so dark and gloomy, it’s pretty difficult to get decent photos here today.

I’m pretty bummed out by this, though it could have been much worse. One of the big branches landed right up against our kitchen windows, I’m really surprised that the windows didn’t shatter. The fence that separates our yard from our neighbors’ house got pushed over a bit, but there was no damage to their house. We also lost a big limb from another large maple in front of the house, hopefully the rest of that tree won’t go as well. The forecast is for about the same temperature today, with freezing rain, so hopefully this will be the only tree damage we get. Right now we can’t get out of our driveway due to downed limbs. We have the tree guy coming hopefully tomorrow, I’m supposed to work tomorrow, so I hope we’ll be able to get out by then.

In light of other tragedies, this seems minor, and I’m not unaware of how lucky we are that this wasn’t a disaster. But still. There have been many, many days in the eleven summers we’ve lived here that we sat out on one of the decks under the shade of that big old maple. We have commented many times how much we loved the canopy of the tree. Especially from our upstairs deck, it felt like we were living in a treehouse. We’ve complained every fall about the little whirligig seed pods that end up everywhere, including the rain gutters. I really will miss that tree. I’m already trying to get used to our new view, and I suppose we will plant new trees to replace the two that are gone. It won’t be the same.

I’m sure that the Ents sang a sad tree song last night.

Damn. Damn, damn, damn.