Oy!

New and sort of old projects.

On the left we have: Briggs and Little - Atlantic -
Blue Heather and Medium Grey for a messenger bag for my Dad for Father's Day. Two weeks away.

Back center: Paton's - Divine - Icicle White and York - Cotton Caressa - Unknown colour (kind of peachy-pink) to try out some Tit-Bits. I'm not sure who they're for yet. I'm just going to make a popular bra size and hope they fit someone who likes them.

Front Center: Alafoss Lopi - 100% wool - again with the numbers instead of colour names! They'll be a messenger-style hip purse for my sister. I'm thinking of doing a wide edging in the red/multi with the grey/white/black in the center with a red/multi strap. Her birthday is on the 5th. Again with the last minute knitting! What am I, nuts? Don't answer that!!

On the right: Three squares for Warming Grace and a facecloth for us. With one more square for Warming Grace if there's enough to finish it. If not, it'll be a washcloth for my daughter's bathtime.

Once I manage to get all this done and figure out my notes from the bag for my Mother, I'll do up my patterns and figure out how to post them as a category.

Not much done over the weekend I tell ya.

The beginning of more squares for Warming Grace. It's a pretty big ball so I'll be able to get a few dishcloths out of it after I do up a couple of squares. I need some, all of mine are getting old and stinky. Anyone else hate throwing away handknit stuff even when you really can't salvage it anymore?


I'm about halfway through square #2 and not even halfway through the ball. I may be able to do 3 squares and 2 small dishcloths. I prefer smaller ones for dishes and bigger ones for ... what's that called again? ... Oh yeah, dusting blech.


Kerchief finished and delivered!

Here's the mail, it never fails, it make me want to wag my tail...

when it comes I want to wail... MAAAIL! I like Blue's Clue's. Heh. Hrmph... Well.

Look what I got! I LOVE it!! My pal rocks! A Newfoundland music CD. I'm tapping my toes to the "Ladies Dart League Fight" (Singers for Fishermen) right now. The new book "The Comfort Zone" (Juliet Bawden) is full of easy projects to make your home beautiful and usable. I think some of the projects in there will turn into knit versions and show up periodically on this site.


Look at these stitch markers, aren't they gorgeous? The bookmark is handmade, people! It's fabulous! The joins are flawless. It's marking ...


... this page. I think these will be knit projects. Mostly because I can tell people that my crappy sewing is decorative. It's supposed to look like that. Really. Although, some of these projects make me think that learning how to use a sewing machine might not be all that bad.


Ladies Dart League Fight - kitty style! Sharp things flying, someone throws a wicked left hook, the mommy/cop shows up ...

I was so proud...

First the knitting, not much to report there. The other kerchief makes slow progress.


The source of my misplaced pride. I thought I had figured out links finally. I even patted myself on the back. Nearly threw it out giving it a pat (not as young as I used to be). Turns out it didn't work. Apparently I'm not as clever as I thought I was. So here is the picture of Kelly getting ready to do a weave.


My landlord showed up. Kind of. He pulled halfway up the drive, jumped out, took the cap off the well, poured in a bit of bleach (not enough), jumped back in his truck and peeled backward out of the drive. Didn't even have enough kahonies to come up and tell me he had done it. Spineless freak.

The purse.

Here it is in all it's glory!!

Left Side.


Right side.


Both sides. Notice the jog on the side where the stripes don't quite meet up? Let that be a lesson to you to always make sure you have things sewn in right side up!



I don't have the buttons sewn in yet, (again with the lessons), make sure your blocking water is more lukewarm than bathtime warm! The buttons I bought for it no longer fit. I'm thinking I may get small buckles and sew them on the straps then put snaps underneath.



My Mom loves it and she's using it to carry her sheet music around in.

I was asked about Highlights for Hope. It was started by a woman from Thunder Bay, ON, Canada named Kelly Ruberto. She is a stylist who has a business that helps people living with cancer and going through Chemo by doing make-up, skin care and teaching them how to style and care for wigs. Two years ago she began giving people a pink hair weave at the Relay for Life to raise money for Breast Cancer research. She founded and trademarked her charity as Highlights For Hope.

So far there are a few other stylists in various Canadian cities who are starting chapters so they can help. If you know of a stylist who would consider starting a chapter in your town or area, e-mail me and I'll do my best to put you/your stylist in touch with her.

Here is a picture of Kelly getting ready to do a highlight for a Thunder Bay radio personality. Look closely and you'll see Kelly's weave.

This used to be...



this. Frickin' frost. It snuck up on me and my poor pumpkins didn't make it. The Rhubarb seems to be okay so far.



That big pile of sand has become this. Of course our dog f***er of a landlord didn't smooth it out, we did. More on that bas**** in a minute.



I think the dog might be a little spoiled too.



Today we got back a water sample test we sent out two weeks ago. We decided to test it because my hands had been getting really red and sore after doing dishes, water left in a rice pot to soak overnight (I'm not the best housekeeper) got thick and dishcloths smelled like mildew all the time. It came back red flagged. Significant evidence of bacterial contamination. May be unsafe to drink. Contains >80 parts Coliform per 100mL. We phoned our landlord and let him know about the results. He said and I quote him directly here;

"Well I can't come down there today, I'm just packing up to go out of town until Monday. Don't worry about it, everyone has some bacteria in their water. It's not a big deal. I'll prove it, I'll come down there and drink some for you. Just pour some bleach down the well and run all of your taps until you smell bleach out of each one and then leave it overnight and run your water again in the morning."

PARDON ME??!!!! What the f*** did you just say?! Did you just say that you don't care about a water test conducted by medical scientists in a medical lab because your pea-brain holds more knowledge than theirs??!!! Did you just tell me that YOUR well on YOUR property that we pay OUR money to rent has just been failed as a safe source of life-sustaining water and you think it's OUR problem??!!

You, you blood sucking pathetic little dogger have got another think coming. I don't have to work really hard to phone the Ontario Tribunal of Landlords and Tenants. I don't have to take a lot of my time to phone the bank and put a stop payment on a cheque. I already got the local Health Inspector to leave a message on his machine since he just picked up and took off after finally telling us that he would come down and pour the bleach down the well for us. Oh, lucky us. Of course he wanted to know if we had any bleach first. I do. I told him he'd have to get some. Damned if I'm putting more of my money into his pockets by providing supplies for him to fix his well!!

Hope your day is going better than mine!

They aren't spoiled... I didn't leave that there just for them...



Here's a kerchief for the other friend who is shaving her head for Cops for Cancer in the Relay for Life on June 9th. I'm going to be getting a Highlights for Hope done for the event. I'll take a picture to show everyone since this is a relatively new charity started by a Stylist in Thunder Bay.



I think I may have to make a hooded cape. She wore this all day and wanted to put it on again this morning!

Woo-Hoo!!

I finally figured out how to add buttons!! Of course, I couldn't add any until I figured out how to line them up neatly. I'm kind of anal like that. It's all good though!

All Done!!

Finished! Finally. A week late, but, that's not too bad I suppose. Here it is in the bath and blocking out on the deck.

Slogging through.

I was nearly finished last night, but, my eyeballs threatened to close up shop and take off on me, so I had to quit.



"No worries, I'll finish them!"



Here I am today. One side sewn on, one to go and then the handles and buttons. My Mother might actually get this purse before May is out!!

Charity Knits

First the regular "Jane" stuff.



Progress on the purse as of last night. Do anyone else's patterns look like this? I think there are more scribbles than words there! I ripped this a lot for something that was supposed to be so simple to make up and execute!!



Now, on to the Charitable stuff.
The town I live in is starting up a Farmer's Market and I am thinking I would like to sell some stuff there. I want to title my booth "Changing the World Stitch by Stitch" and donate some of the profits to "Knitter's Without Borders" see the Yarn Harlot's blog (I will figure out links on of these days) to find out more.

I already know about the Dulaan Project, Knitter's Without Borders, Keeping Canada Warm, Warming Grace and the Mother Bear Project.

Any one know of more I can get information on and feature in my booth?

They must have their own website/blog, a legitimate address to send stuff to and put more emphasis on helping people than religious or political agendas. For instance: Covenant House. It is a Catholic organization run by Nuns however, they do not emphasis the Catholic point of view. Their main goal is to help street kids by providing a warm place to sleep, showers, a caring shoulder to cry on, non-judgmental ears to listen, counselling and if wanted/needed, help to re-enter school or the workforce and if necessary rehab.

I hurt.

This 3' x 16' patch of dirt made every muscle in my arms scream "Mutiny!" It's my pumpkin/rhubarb patch in it's rough form. I still want to make a mock fence out of 1" x 2" and add some edgings to keep the grass from taking over again. Those pieces of sod were a good foot thick!! I added 3 bags of black earth and probably could have more. All my pumpkin plants are out and when I make over to my parent's, I'll get my rhubarb for the far corner. Now I just have to cut a 2' x 25' plot for my sunflowers and another 3' diameter circle for my lilac stick that I managed to get to root over the winter. I'm going to really be hurting by the end of the week!



All that planting meant very little progress. Ah, well, my Mother won't have to buy a pumpkin for Halloween this year and she'll eventually get a purse.



I feel pretty... so pretty (badly sung Broadway tune)!



I'll wear this to the ball, I'll look fabulous! Chunky necklaces are still in aren't they?



This is how my landlord fills in holes in the yard. Apollo swore it wasn't his fault, he says it was already there. Hmmm...

Help!!

I'm trying to figure out how to add buttons to my blog. As you can see, I figured out how to copy and paste HTML snippets, but have no idea how to do it with other kinds of buttons. Like SP8. I tried to upload to Flickr, but they basically told me to get lost. New to Flickr too! Help me please!
Actual stuff to type in and where would be great. I'm ready for a good bout of the "bang head on wall until sense pounds it's way in" game. That or the "fist through computer" game.

Delusions exposed.

This is where I ended 1/2 hour before Mother's Day brunch. My Mother got a card and a promise. I got a reminder that I am NOT that fast at this yet. Start sooner you fool!! In my defense I had to deal with exploding diapers (someone had a bad tummy) and ...


"No play with Sam!!" As Sam repeated tried to steal and eat her yarn.


"I'll help you wind that, I'll make sure it doesn't get away!"


"I wanna help too!!"


"Leave me alone! I'll get evil on your hinney!"


... not long after this, the box began moving around the room on it's own and saying "Reeeowww!". Spooky!!

Pretty sad when it's more expensive to buy cartridges for your old printer than to just buy a scanner/copier/printer that includes a cartridge!

Hope your Mother's Day had a lunch and breakfast as nice as mine, but, wasn't as stinky and sore!!

Messing around.

I start my course today!! Pretty soon I'm going to get me some larnin'!!

Me so s-m-r-t!!

First I would like to say thanks to everyone who has left me comments. I just found them tonight. I totally did not understand the moderate comments thing. I didn't bother to read about it either. I'm bright like that. Just plow through and hope it all turns out right. Bull in a china shop. I think that may be why I did so well in the industrial sector. "Just pound on the boards until they go through the planer, Dorothy." "Yu-uck! (think Goofy there) Okay! I'm all over that!!"
Now, on to the knitting...


Almost done!! I didn't have enough left in this ball to make ties so I'm braiding the leftovers and tying them on. I'll be keeping this one unless the tying in place goes better than I think it will.



My Jezebel. Yep, that's her real name. My husband liked it, thought it was a pretty name. He didn't know. Although the way she sleeps... just sayin'.

Grrr...

I would have made more progress on this if I didn't have to rip out every freakin' row because my tiny little pea brain cannot seem to remember that there is an increase at the beginning AND END of every second row!!!
Now this would just be aggravating and I would seriously wonder if I actually had graduated from grade three reading, but, I. wrote. this. pattern.!!! Why can I not seem to remember something that came out of my. own. head.??!!!

Yesterday's progress:



I told him to quit begging at the table. He backed up. He thinks I can't figure out what he's up to. I'm onto him, oh yes, I'm onto his little plot!



Last night, I suffered from Knitting ADHD. I got some stuff done on the purse though. My Dad phoned and they've moved the Birthday dinner to Mother's Day brunch so I have more time. I think my Mother is getting ripped off. She should have two days. One to celebrate her life and one to celebrate the fact that she gave birth(2)/adopted(3) five children and didn't kill us.



As Mother's Day is soon, I began to think about how my life culminated in bringing me to this point and have I become ordinary? Is there really such a thing? What am I going to pass on to my daughter? I hope it's that she should not decide any one path is the only one she should be on and that she cannot chose to do something else. My resume reads like a path of stops, starts and confusion.
I know how to take food orders and bring them out without dumping them on someone's lap. I know how to mix the top twenty most requested drinks and shooters, I know how to carry a tray full of empties (very carefully and straight). I know how to stock a shelf and cross-check a packing slip. I know how to rent out movies and balance a till. I know how to measure and build pallets and crates with an industrial air nailer and air stapler. I know how to use a chop saw, bandsaw and a notcher. I can strap up a load with the best of them. I know how to run a 1x4 stacker and I can run (and unjam) a Stetson Ross hydraulic planer at a rate of 19,900 - 2x4 - 92 5/8" board feet per hour. I can use a breakdown and spin boards on sets of moving chains. I can use a impact wrench to change saws and knives inside a Mark II, a Mark III, a V-head and a DDM. I can sharpen the above mentioned knives and add babbit to them to make them fit in the heads properly. I have driven from my home town to B.C. by myself and with friends. I have Chaired and Co-chaired on the Health and Safety committee at the sawmill. I have been involved with the union (IWA Canada local #2694) and gone to conferences in Saskatoon (beautiful city), North Bay (nice), Vancouver (big), and Thunder Bay (alright). I helped negotiate the contract the mill is currently under. I have been to visit my family by marriage in Newfoundland and stood on the eastern most point of North America (Cape Spear). Visit Newfoundland if you get the chance. You won't regret it. I have partied on George Street and shopped in Vancouver's biggest mall. I went to Chattanooga, TN again by myself to visit my sister for her birthday.
I can cook a mean dinner and keep a reasonably clean (hate that part) house. I can take care of three children under three without pulling all of my hair out. I can knit and I want to learn how to spin. I can sew on buttons and make a seam stay together (note that the words nice and straight were not added to that). I can get house plants to grow and have gotten some outdoor plants to survive. I have treated myself with and without respect. Learning to maintian self respect was harder than cracking the nut on the Mark II by hand (I nearly blew out every muscle in my arms, shoulders and back doing that)! As I'm writing this, I'm almost thinking maybe I'm a little weird. Good weird though.
I know I want to pass on the ability to try everything no matter how physically difficult and most important, I want her to respect herself and expect others to as well (especially boys) regardless of what she can do. I want her to know that being a woman doesn't mean that she has to only do the things women traditionally did or only things that men traditionally did. She can do both and she should keep up the fight for women (and men) to be able to choose to do either or both if they want to. She should be smart and show it without being mean about it. She should expect her boyfriend to wait until she is ready and if he says stupid crap like; "If you loved me you would..." she should have the strength and self-esteem to tell him to f--- off because he's a shmuck who just wants a quick roll with an available body.
In long, (this hasn't been a short) I want it all for all of us. My husband did not marry a shrinking violet. He loves his roaring lioness!
Here's to the lioness in all of us! [clunk, (coffee cup) slurp)

You can't always get what you wananttt...

Can't upload photos to Blogger. Guess you get what you pay for huh?

Sam (the cat) to Apollo (the dog): "Filthy mutt! Didn't your momma ever tell you to wash your face? Come here, I'll do it! Yeesh, if ya want something done right, do it yourself!"

Progress on the purse. I may get at least the body done by Thursday. ... I hope.

Happenings over here.

I finished the Kerchief!! Yay! Simple garter stitch. Progress on the purse. My first two colour project and it's turning out to be easier than I thought! Knock on wood. More Moda Dea for the other kerchief (or two).



Did I mention how much I love this kerchief (notice the cheesy smile)? I love how this turned out. I loved it so much, I may just keep this one and knit two others for my friends. I may be delusional about my ability to finish another one and the purse by the 11th.



How to tell when you have been knitting too much! I mean, encouraging creative expression!

UFO's

I think every knitter must have a page entitled UFO's and I am no different. I used to think I was the kind of knitter who would start a project and finish it before casting on another. I think I've developed knitting ADHD. I don't think there's a treatment or cure for it either. Below are the UFO's around my house.




First and oldest is the backpack for my niece (large purple and green bag). I still have to finish the straps for it and sew it all together. It was supposed to be for her birthday. In February. Then for Easter. Now for Christmas. I think I can commit to that... For her birthday she got a little wallet that was supposed to be inside and some other non-knit stuff.
Then I made a few little baskets for the kids for Easter (small multicoloured bag with the drinking glass in it). I did get those done and filled and gifted, but, I wrote the pattern and wanted to check to make sure I really could get two baskets out of one ball of yarn. One done. A month ago.
Then the choke collar for my dog. (white thing with ring in it). I got started on this when I realized his chain one doesn't fit him and I found the idea on the April issue of MagKnits. It got put down when I remembered it was my Mom's birthday May 11th.
I cast this (red rectangle) on to make a purse for my mother. Pray for me! It has to be done in a week!!
This (pink multi-colour triangle) got cast on when I found out that my stylist/friend is going to shave her head for Cops for Cancer. My appointment is on the 11th!! It has to be bigger than an ordinary kerchief to help keep the sun off. I have one more to do for another friend, but, fortunately I have until June to finish that one.

Why is it that we always seem to think we're fast at what we do? Where did I think the time to do all this was going to come from??!!

I have to go.
Have a good one!