My Claim To Fame

The other evening I was showing the spousal unit the statistics that my host provides for this blog. He was particularly interested in the page that showed the searches that people had done that had brought them to my blog. They were all knitting or yarn related except one. Someone had come to me by searching for chinook cloud.

So into Google that phrase went and the Spousal Unit was really impressed that my blog came up on the first page of the search results.

Gentle Reader, I will let you live vicariously through me and you may tell all your friends that you know someone whose blog comes up on the first page of a Google search.

It's A Bear!

Winnie now has a face and is complete.

Last time I made a bear it was a panda. The limbs and other parts were made separately from the body and were sewn to the stuffed body. This was not easy and involved one person (me) pinning the parts to the body and another person (spousal unit) standing at a distance giving directions. That bear I gave away to a charity auction.

With Winnie, the arms, legs, ears and nose were made separately and then crocheted to the body at the appropriate place. As I completed more of him it felt like he was hugging me as I was working. Combine this with no intended recipient and Winnie is here to stay.

Another Upside-down Adventure

We had a couple to dinner on Saturday. For dessert I made a raspberry Charlotte Russe. Very basically, you put fruit and jelly (Jello) in the bottom of a dish, put sponge fingers around the sides of the dish and then fill the middle with a mixture of fruit, cream and gelatin and let it set for several hours. When you are ready to serve, it is turned out onto a serving dish. Hence the upside-down part.

The moon must have been in the right phase on Saturday night as it turned out perfectly. Except the Spousal Unit decided to tease me and ask if I was going to take a photo of it.

So no photo and it did get eaten.

Look What I Made

It's a pineapple upside-down pudding. I bake fairly regularly so I am not showing off that I actually made something. It's just when I brought this to the table, I thought "we can't eat this". So I took a photo as the next best thing.

Saturday's Skies

I am not sure if I am breaking a rule of the Saturday Skies web ring when I post photos that were taken on a day other than a Saturday but, sometimes, the sky is more interesting on other days.

This photo was taken on Sunday morning. Now it is Spring we get heavy snow, rain and heat in the same day. An hour after the photo was taken you would not have known it had snowed.

An Unlikely Read

I have joined a book club. I joined after the selections for the first half of the year had been made so I cannot say why certain choices were made. And this month's read is very surprising:- Extreme My Autobiograpy by Sharon Osborne. Sharon Osbourne is married to Ozzy Osbourne who used to be the lead singer of Black Sabbath and was the lead in his own festival Ozzfest. Lately, the whole family became famous for their show about themselves on MTV. I find it interesting that MTV's cameras have followed other stars and that has been the end of the relationship but it didn't seem to have an impact on the Osbournes. Maybe because the Osbourne's life is so volatile anyway.

I started reading the prologue and it is full of swear words and I didn't think I could continue reading. It felt as if they were put in for effect. But after that the ratio of swear words to non-swear words reduced and seemed to be in the places where a swearing person would put them. The book was interesting for background into the music industry; especially for bands being ripped off. It seemed as if you had to find the person who would rip you off the least.

How Long Would You Have Waited?

Yesterday I had a dentist's appointment. The dentist had been recommended by a friend, so it was not a random choice. My appointment was for 1.30 and I arrived at around 1.25; I was finally shown to the dentist's chair at some time after 2.20.

I was in a quandary as to what to do and had decided to wait an hour and then leave. I didn't want them charging my insurance company if I left without seeing the dentist and I didn't want the immediate hassle of finding another dentist. Now, at least, I have 6 months to find another one.

As this is a new dentist I do not know if this is normal for them or if I was unlucky. The receptionist did not say anything until she saw me looking at my watch and at no time did anyone apologise for the delay.

If I had turned up nearly an hour late for my appointment I am sure they would have charged me and told me to reschedule. A pity it doesn't work the other way around.

What's On The Needles

A little while ago I posted a teaser to say that I had taken some yarn out of my stash. I didn't say any more as I didn't do anything with it until a friend e-mailed and at the end she asked how I was doing with the stash. That finally got me motivated to start the project. A few years ago I bought the yarn and pattern to crochet a toy Winnie-the Pooh. So I have finally started it. My knitting project is My So Called Scarf with some yarn I was given. And last night I wound the wool that refuses to be a scarf into two balls for socks. That should keep me going for a while.

Another Sale

The nearest yarn store to me is closing down and they started their sale on Monday. I was debating whether to go on the first day or not thinking that better bargains could be had towards the end of the sale. But I am glad I went as everything was 50% off from the get go and I imagine that they would not have had much left after the first day.

The store is closing due to the ill-health of the owner. It has been open for about 8 years. Their shop was sorted by colour so it was hard to zone in to find the specific weight of yarn you wanted. But they had good basics so you could knit a sweater without breaking the bank.

I was very pleased to buy some yarn with a specific pattern in mind. I had seen the specific yarn for the pattern in another LYS but not in a colour I liked and I had been trying to decide from where to order it and when. So I was happy to see something similar by the same manufacturer in a colour I liked. This is the yarn; I bought shade 23 but I won't be starting the pattern for a little while as it will require some concentration.

I also bought a book Felting from the Vogue Knitting on the Go series. I had borrowed this from the library and knitted one thing from it and there were a couple of other patterns I was interested in. Books in Canada are very expensive so I do not buy them anymore.

And I bought some yarn for my lace collection, ready for the next mystery project.

Saturday's Skies

Well this is Friday's skies really. There was no school on Friday and spousal unit was out of town. Many people would take the opportunity to stay in bed but I like to get up early and enjoy the quiet. Where we live is fairly quiet so I can open the curtains and enjoy the start to the day. At the right time of the year I can watch the sun come up. So Friday, I made a cup of coffee, took the last piece of pumpkin pie, and sat with my knitting to watch this.



This is a Chinook cloud at sunrise. Pretty amazing, eh? I should have gone out to the fields to take a picture of just the sky but I was still in my PJs and I didn't want to scare anyone.

More Socks

I finished the mitred square socks. They are from a pattern in Vogue on the Go Socks Two. Being a typical Vogue pattern there were some mistakes but nothing horrendous. The only parts worked in the round were the toe and the gusset. The heel shaping was the same as for a top-down sock so that the slipped stitches are under the heel and not at the back so there is very little heel at the back.

The yarn is Anne from Schaefer Yarn Company and was once that tangled mess seen here.

Warm Enough For My New Sweater

For once the weather forecasters were correct. The Chinook came in on Saturday. On Friday it was hard to imagine that we would get a Chinook as it was snowing and the temperature was around -10 C. But we have had a Chinook cloud since Saturday although today it is still below freezing in our part of town.



Anyway, it reached about 10 C on Saturday so I was happy to wear my new sweater. I am pleased with how the sweater fits and I will be using it as a template for sizing other things I knit for myself.

My Yarn Is Talking To Me

I've heard people say their yarn is talking to them and always thought that some wiring had come loose in their head; but now it is my turn to give my yarn anthropomorphic qualities. At a sale in the summer I bought some yarn which the owner of the store had recommended for socks. Atter seeing a pattern for a lacey wrap I decided that the yarn would look good in that pattern; which it did; except I didn't have enough yarn. The yarn is hand painted and I couldn't get anymore so the wrap was unpicked and the yarn rewound. Next iteration was My So Called Scarf. But the resulting pattern seemed very stiff; so that was unpicked before I had gone too far.

Now I know what you are saying. "If I liked the lacey wrap why not use the pattern for a regular scarf?" You know, some things in life are just too obvious. The next iteration was a scarf from Modular Knits. I didn't like that either. I think the yarn is not varied enough in colour to show some patterns well.

So another unpick and the yarn is sitting next to me waiting for me to choose a pattern that will show it off to its best. And it happened; I nearly spoke to the wretched stuff. But it was in my head. "You just want to be socks don't you. That's why none of these other patterns are working." So close to joining the crazies.

I haven't started socks yet. There might be a few more scarf varients in this yarn yet. Or maybe I'm just too stubborn to listen to inanimate objects when they talk to me.

Faithful to One

Surprisingly, I am working on just one project; socks. It is an interesting but easily remembered pattern so it is simple to pick them up and work on a few stitches at a time. I did take some yarn out of my stash when I completed the black sweater But I haven't started anyhting with it yet. I have been working on a few sewing projects that needed the final finishing touches.

Yesterday, the boy child asked me if I got bored knitting socks. That depends. The ones that go round and round that I take to his sports can get very boring and tend not to get worked on out of season. Socks with visual interest, like any object, are more interesting to knit.

He is more sure of my accomplishments than I am. He declared that I had knit at least 10 pairs of socks this year. Actually this is just my second pair.

A Finished Object

On Wednesday I finally finished my sweater. I am not going to take any photos of it as it is black and I doubt they will come out clearly enough. Here is a link to the pattern. The original pattern uses a bulky mohair. I used Patons Lacette which is between fingering and DK weight. I have used this yarn once before on larger neddles and liked the effect so I decided to use the yarn at a looser gauge again. Because it is a brushed type yarn it works well knitted at a looser gauge. I have just under a ball left so at some point I will have to see what it is like at the recommended gauge. This was the project mentioned in this post.

So I have just some socks on the needles right now but I will soon be digging into the stash for my next project.

A Chinook

After more than a week it finally stopped snowing although Wednesday was still very cold. The chinook came in yesterday and we had sunshine and temperatures above freezing. Here's a picture of the sky although it does not show the arch as well as real life.



The city should be happy as this is their main form of snow removal. It is amazing how poorly cleared the roads are but this week one of the news stations counted the cost of uncleared roads. The costs include insurance claims, emergency personal, time spent in traffic and people taking sick days. It will be interesting to see if people's opinions on snow clearing change when the good weather comes. The city has a sidewalk clearance by-law. Your sidewalk has to be cleared within 24 hours of the last snowfall so the by-law officers were out yesterday ready to ticket the non-compliers. Shouldn't the city set an example by clearing the roads.

Saturday's Sky

It's a good thing that the webring is called Saturday Sky as this means you get some blue sky. After the Chinook last Monday, it has snowed every day. But, at least, it stopped snowing during the day on Saturday and we had some sunshine. So make the most of it as it is going to have to keep you going for a few more days.




On the knitting front, the mess from last week is fast becoming a pair of socks.

No Second Sock Syndrome Here

Did you know that some people have many odd socks? They knit a sock and then never knit its mate. I wonder if these people wear odd socks or are doomed to always wearing store bought socks.

No such problem in this house. I love wearing my hand knitted socks so I am always going to complete the pair. I knit my socks on 4 double pointed needles (dpns). I have tried the magic loop method on hats and mittens but didn't really enjoy it and I can't really justify buying more circular needles to try the two circular method. When I say 4 dpns, I mean stitches on three needles and one needle for knitting. I have had most of my dpns for years so they only have 4 needles in a a set and not 5 like you can get nowadays.

So here are a couple of photos of my completed Baudelaire socks.



I did not make any adjustments to the pattern as I used Stretch by Regia which I had bought in England last summer and I decided that the "stretch" would make up for the inelasticity of the pattern. I saw some Stretch in the LYS on Monday but for some reason the owner did not realise that I was interested in buying. But that is a story for another day.

Those photos were taken indoors as this was the view from my front step at lunchtime (and it is still snowing).

What a Mess

or this yarn will not get the better of me.

I have nearly finished my two projects so I decided that Saturday night was a good time to wind the yarn for my next project. Usually I can wind yarn and knit a gauge swatch while watching a movie. The chosen yarn was Anne by Schaeffer. Yarn bought in a sale in the summer and recommended for socks. The store was not winding while the sale was on but I could have gone back at a later date and had the yarn wound. Except I never did as I am one of those people who like to wind yarn just before I use it so it is not always convenient to return to a store. Plus I don't really mind winding yarn even though I don't have a swift nor a ball winder.

So Saturday night I untied the yarn put it over the back of a chair and thought it looked a bit crinkly but I brushed that thought aside as I wondered if maybe it had just been tied up for a while. After a few winds of the ball I was faced with this.



I have no idea what went wrong. This has never happened to me before. I didn't get a gauge swatch worked I didn't even finish winding it before bed time even though I watched a (the) hockey game after the movie.

Sunday morning I was back working on it aided by some buttermilk pancakes and coffee courtesy of the spousal unit. So by mid-morning it looked like this.



I was convincing myself that there was an improvement. But I was in a quandry. If you recall I wanted to finish my black sweater while the Super Bowl was on but I also wanted this mess finished with. Should I go with the mess and hope to finish it before the end of the game or should I go with the sweater and then return to the mess. Decisions, decisions. Plus how could I eat Super Bowl food and work with this?

I decided to continue with the mess. As much as I wanted to finish some things. I couldn't bear the thought of having that sitting around for another day.

After watching the Super Bowl and Miss Marple, I finally had this



It needs to be wound again as I gave up worrying how it was wound when the bigger issue was getting it wound at all. But it is done.

Saturday Skies

Here are a couple of photos from yesterday. They were taken shortly after 7.30 am.


The first one is the view from the back of the
house and you can still see the full moon;
the second one is the view from the
front of the house and it shows
the sun rising through the clouds.



Here is a photo from last Saturday. It was a lovely sunny day and I noticed an airplane that looked as if it was going straight up. I am pleased that the con trail came out in the photo.