Happy Thanksgiving!

I have so much to be thankful for, and I am grateful for the many blessings in my life: family, friends, pets, job, this wonderful country we live in, the grace of God.

Happy Thanksgiving to you all!

It's a dog's life

or, alternately described: A Boy and his Dog....




and the dog is snoring.... (by the way, her tongue's not purple, that's her dogtag.)

One down, two to go

Ten pattern repeats of the Irish Hiking Scarf took one skein of KnitPicks Cadena. A tidbit I found interesting. That means that my scarf should work out to be 30 pattern repeats, or about 48" long, since I have three skeins to knit up.

Pennies for Bella

My friends over at Sonny and Shear, Dana and Kris, blogged about a little girl in their church who has Hurler's Syndrome, named Isabella.

Isabella was diagnosed with Hurler’s Syndrome, a genetic disorder that prevents the body from properly storing mucopolysaccharides. The end result is organ damage, mental retardation from the resulting brain damage and a life expectancy of no more than 10 years. Bella is only 18 months old. That’s the bad news. The good news is that if Bella receives a bone marrow or umbilical cord stem cell transplant before she reaches age 2, much of the damage from Hurler’s can be prevented, Bella can have a greater quality of life and she may actually be able to avoid the brain damage that leads to mental retardation. While it isn’t a cure, a transplant can greatly change the outlook for Bella.

How can you help Bella? Visit Sonny and Shear's site, read more about Bella and see pictures of that beautiful little girl, then follow the links to PenniesforBella.org, click on the Chip In button and make a donation toward Bella’s care. (Or you can use the link in the righthand bar of my blog and go straight to Bella's site.)

Thank you!!

A change from mittens

I needed to knit something other than a mitten right now, and the Irish Hiking Scarf fit the bill to a T. I'm using Knit Picks Cadena, in Saffron. This is a lovely little pattern, satisfying to the touch and visually very pleasing. Cadena is a bulky weight yarn, 70% Peruvian Highland Wool, 30% Superfine Alpaca. Mmmmmm, yarn.......

The pic makes the yarn look much too red, it's really paprika-y orange-red with almost not there yellow tones.

Yes, I know, I am procrastinating on the last and final mitten to finish off all my Christmas projects, the second Sea Minerals mitt, but I can't make myself pick it up. This is still only November, though, and I can knit on the Scarf for a while yet, and still have time to finish my self-imposed gift obligation. December is lots of time, Christmas comes very nearly at the end of the month, plenty of time!! Yeah, I keep telling myself that. Often enough and I'll believe it.

Willistead is finished and steam blocked. Finally! The knitting for work is done. Hubby took my MIL's Hamsa scarf to the post office today, and it's winging to the UK, just in time for Christmas.

I love my White Witch mitts, they were the very first mittens I had ever done, and stranded, no less. Very pleased with them. They were knit in KnitPicks Telemark, and despite 100% wool, not itchy or scratchy at all. But.... even though my fingers are already warmer in the wool than they've ever been in any of the other mittens/gloves I've ever tried, I could still feel some windage sneaking in around the fingertips. So this last weekend I tried something that was only a nebulous thought in my head. Certainly not a new idea, but new to me.

I know about knitting mitten liners, and had even entertained buying cashmere to make the liners, until fiscal responsibility reared its ugly head. And the thought of actually knitting another whole mitten to go inside the other put me off, a bit. So I made a fingertip lining for them out of stash KP Palette. A few rows above the thumb hole, I picked up stitches on the wrong side of the mitt, and proceeded to knit up the fingers, decreases and all in the proper places. Turned right side out, you can't even tell I picked up stitches, or that there's any extra bulk at all!!

I tried them this morning, in the high 30-degree temps and Oklahoma wind, and no windage got to my fingers. Warm and toasty, they were. Happy, am I.

Mitten Madness

I am on the thumb of Willistead #2. Doin' a happy dance, because the completion of this mitten will mark the culmination of my Christmas knitting for the ladies at work. Then to wrap it all up by finishing the second Sea Minerals mitten for my son's girlfriend.

Through Ravelry, in the I Make Mittens forum, I found a link to another marvelous knitting blog: Two Strands. It's been added to my links section for frequent future perusal. Mary Ann's Postwar Mittens are offered through Twist Collective and they are gorgeous. I need, I want, must have pattern. In fact, I drooled over quite of few of the designs found on the site. Pop on over and take a look, it's well worth it.

Happy Birthday!

My darling daughter turns 18 today. Much love to you from your Mom and Dad!

Adorable animals ahead

The thumb of the second Daina mitten caused me no ends of grief, to the point where I chopped it off, picked out the stitches and redid it, twice. Grrr. But the poor little whacked off piece did prove to be the perfect cat eartip mitt:

She looks thrilled, doesn't she?

Hubby has to sleep in his recliner while recuperating from his second shoulder surgery, because laying down in bed hurts too much still. To make him more comfortable he's taken his pillows from the bedroom and uses them to help prop up his arm. He does, that is, when the dogs let him:

President Obama

History was certainly made yesterday. I am hopeful for the future of my country.

Election Day 2008

Today I exercised the freedom to vote for the candidate of my choice, without fear or coercion. What a wonderful thing this freedom is! May God bless our country, and bless our leaders with wisdom, compassion, strength, and goodness.

Lovin' Lupin

You may have noticed that I added another linky to my Yarn Blogs I Read section: Lupin. While this artist isn't primarily a knitter, she is head over heels into the fiber art of felt. And she's a master of it, I think. I love her ingenuity, her incredible color sense, her spot-on depictions of flowers, critters, and things --- all boils down to the fact that I visit her Etsy site and her blog several times a week.

Please check out Lupin Handmade, run by Laura "Lupin" Howard. Linky to the righty!

Well, finally!

I seem to have a major problem with taking pictures. My intentions are good, but my follow-through is sketchy. Maybe it's because I'm not much of a photographer, and I'm rarely happy with my results. But today when I finished the Daina mittens, I made myself get the camera, the latest finished knits, and take a pic NOW. No lollygagging, no procrastination, no "I'll take pictures tomorrow when the sun is shining better" or after I finish the housework.




(top left) Daina, (top right) Swirly , (bottom) They Call Them Pirates.



Spooky decided to trade laps for a change - she's normally on mine while I knit - but this time she graced my hubby's lap instead.