The Weather

I was going to write about a couple of books I am reading but it seems more appropriate to write about the weather. Here is a screen shot of the appropriate page form The Weather Network.



There are two important things to note: the temperature and the feels like. Feels like everybody should be indoors.

But did you note the sponsor Workopolis's tagline - "It's a great day to look for a new job in Calgary."? Who are they trying to kid?

ps if you click on the picture you'll get an enlarged, easier to read version.

No Boxing Day Sales For Me

Two yarn stores were having Boxing Day sales and one store was having a day after Boxing Day Sale but I decided to pass on all three. I just didn't feel like swarming with the masses to purchase yarn that I didn't know when I would use or on what just because it would be cheaper than when I would eventually buy it. And I am trying hard not to add to my stash just for the sake of it.

But I did buy a bag at The Gap that was on sale that I had decided not to buy before Christmas as I didn't want to pay the asking price!

Happy Christmas

It's Beginning to Smell A Lot like Christmas

Because in the oven right now is the Christmas Cake. The spousal unit had enough of the cheapo American whiskey left for me to soak the fruit last week and today I made the cake.

The theory is that next week the cake will be marzipanned and the week after it will be iced. But it has not been unknown for the cake to be iced after Christmas so I am not bound to that timetable.

And we have appropriate Christmas weather for the making of the cake as it has been so cold the snow has been lingering, add the Christmas songs from the radio and it feels a lot like Christmas.

A Baby Blanket

One of the ladies in our walking group is pregnant (or maybe not as she has passed her due date).

That is music to my ears when a friend or family member is in the family way because what an excuse to knit (or crochet in this case). And. of course, there is nothing in the stash.

I found this pattern when looking at some else's blog. She had made the blanket when pregnant and I had saved the link in case and was glad to be able to use it. Don't you find that the blogging world is dangerous with so many links to different patterns and yarns? I actually save very few patterns or links otherwise I would be overrun with them.

The pattern is produced by an Australian company so, of course, the yarn isn't available here. But, once again, thanks to the scope of the internet I was able to get yarn details from another site. So off to the yarn store I go.

I ended up with an Italian cotton yarn, Pluto by Punto in an aqua green colour. My friend did not want to know if she was going to have a boy or a girl and I did not want to use white so I decided green was a good colour for either sex. I had to guess at the hook size as the size on the pattern seemed too large for the yarn, the ball band suggested needle sizes of 2.5mm to 3mm so I used a size 3mm hook. I think the finished blanket ended up smaller than the pattern size but I forgot to measure it before I gave it away but it was still a good size.

The pattern was very easy. Mostly double (treble) crochets and some chains and like all circular projects goes very quickly at the beginning and then it seems as if it will never end. So even though I had yarn left over, I didn't make the blanket bigger.

Before I post a picture of the blanket, I have to tell you the best thing about the yarn; the day I bought it the shop was having a 20% off everything sale which I didn't know about until I got there.

Our First Snow

Frequently, I take a picture to post on this blog and it never gets posted because I am mentally composing the post or I have no idea what to say except " here's a photo of x". This photo was taken way back on 25 October after it had snowed overnight. Although we have had a couple of snowfalls since then, this is the picture of the first one. The way the snow had melted made it look like pussy willow on the trees. Hope the photo does it justice.



There has been some knitting and crochet going on and a photo ready to post next time.

Saturday Sky and.......

I did take a photo last Saturday and I was getting ready to post it today when I saw this



So I decided you could have two sky photos today. We get interesting cloud formations which makes for wonderful sunrises. But you have to be quick as they don't last long.

And here is the photo from Saturday.



It was taken just before sunset. Unfortunately, you can't see the sun shining between the clouds and the houses.

A Cucumber

When we planted the new beds, we sewed cucumber seeds even though it was a bit late to plant them. They came up and then were all but destroyed by a late hail storm. This seemed to give them strength but it was too late for them to do anything. So I forgot about them and let the squash take over. Well this is what I found when I cleared the bed the other day.



It was a determined plant that had stretched to the end of the bed. Cucumbers will be on my list of things to plant next year if they are going to try this hard.

Happy Thanksgiving

Yes I know Thanksgiving was yesterday but I couldn't write anything before dinner and I didn't feel like writing when we got home.

The boy child and I went to a friend's house for dinner. There were 13 of us and not one person present was born in Canada. The only Canadians were the host family but nobody's going to turn down a good meal, right?

This year I bought cranberries when they went on sale as they are unavailable in November. They're a seasonal item I was told last year. They just didn't celebrate the same season as me. So now I am ready for the 23 types of cranberry sauce that I serve.

Saturday Sky

It's been a while since I've posted a photo of the sky, so to make up for it here's two from yesterday.

This is what the sky looked like in the morning. No way was it going to be an 11 degree day. Although the sun came out in the afternoon, the high only reached 6 degrees.
What I find interesting about this photo is that the camera has picked up a blue tint in the sky that could not be seen with the naked eye. I saw it through the view finder before I took the photo. To my eye the sky was very white, I do not know if the blue was there or if this is a quirk of the camera.



We did not get any snow but this is the cloud formation last night.



As usual, the weather forecast this morning is different from the report two days ago; it seems that everything is a couple of days off, so instead of it being a nice weekend, it will be fine just in time for everyone going back to work.

Finished Object and A Change of Mind

I finally finished a second sock this week. I had so many easy things on the go that it seemed to take forever to finish anything. This was a simple pair of socks that I am sure I must have started during lacrosse season but I can't remember. I used the Supersoxx yarn I bought at the Boxing Day sale. As this yarn was self-striping I worked the leg in k3 p1 rib and the foot plain. I worked a star toe which I have not done before but I am not really sure I like that style of toe. Well you don't know until you try.



I changed my mind on the shawl I had started knitting on vacation. Although I liked the pattern, I decided I didn't want a triangular scarf, so yesterday I unpicked the thing. This is how far I had got before it became a ball of yarn again.



I like the lace pattern its the shape of the shawl that put me off. I should have unpicked it when I first had doubts. But, never despair, I cast on for a stole last night in a different lacy pattern. Let's hope I like this one.

Knitting Update

Some of you may have noticed that I was a bit vague about the knitting I took on vacation. That was because one item I was knitting was a present for my mother-in-law. Her birthday has passed and present has been received and admired so I can now post photos. They are not very good photos but I think they will show the effect.

I knitted a shawl using Misti Alpaca Laceweight.
This is the shawl off the needles.



and this is the shawl while it is being blocked.



You should get the effect of how the shawl changes once it is dampened and stretched.

Also on the knitting front I finished a jacket for my niece.



And this week I finished a sock which was leftover from lacrosse.

Miserable Monday

Did you know that Miserable Monday follows Sodden Sunday in the summer calendar? The good thing is that I have not watered my lawn since returning from vacation. I knew it would rain sometime. But it is too wet to pick produce so that will have to wait until later in the week. Just hope that the zucchini are not turning into marrows as I write.

I was trying to take a photo to show how rainy it is but I couldn't get the effect I wanted and I didn't want to get wet doing it. So I am leaving you with a summer picture instead.




The seeds came from a friend who had saved them from her flowers last year. There was a little soil left after filling the raised flower beds so boy child placed it where I'd like to have a flower bed next year and threw the seeds down and now we have sunny flowers.

Critter Contact - Again

We left Nelson early in the morning, stopped at Safeways for muffins and Starbucks and continued to our next destination - which shall remain nameless for the time being. But I do rate businesses on how well they handle problems so this particular hotel may not stay nameless for long.

It was a very nice hotel with good facilities that, I expect, is relying on its location to attract business and is not concerned about the unfortunate experience of one visitor.

It was a dark and stormy night. Isn't that how all tales start? It was night and it was dark outside. It was about 10 o'clock and we were all sitting on the beds reading. When I saw this thing and I made I've seen a thing noise. I saw a bat - in our bedroom. My happiness meter dropped. Before any of you say what's the fuss it was only a bat; you need to know that the bats in Alberta carry rabies hence my concern and this bat was flying around our bedroom.

So I did what all people in the right mind would do - hid in the bathroom. And the spousal unit did what all calm, collected people do - caught the thing.

His first thought was shoo it out the window but the window had a screen on it - it obviously hadn't come in that way. His second thought was to shoo it into the corridor but that would have moved (literally) the problem onto other people. So he picked up the recycling bin, waited for the bat to tire and rest and then he trapped it against the ceiling. I had offered advice on my way to hiding - don't let it bite you!

So there's my husband standing with his arm in the air holding a bin against the ceiling with a bat inside and I was on the phone summoning help (not a time to take a picture) except no help on the other end just the infernal 'please hold'. I ran down to reception, explained the situation and that we needed someone to our room pretty quickly. Actually someone did arrive quite fast. Two women from housekeeping. One older who knew what to do. She sent the young one to get some cardboard which the spousal unit slid between the recycling bin and the ceiling and then handed the precariously sealed unit to the older woman.

Now I don't blame the hotel for there being a bat in the room. Although I do wonder how it got in there. We were in the middle of the third floor and the window had a screen and there wasn't a fireplace. But, I would have thought they might have checked on us to see if everything was OK. Not a word. When I checked out a couple of days later, I expressed surprise that nobody had checked that everything was now OK.

So when I got home and saw a couple of e-mails from the hotel I felt a little glow of happiness, but they were just requests to complete a survey. I sent a wonderful missive to the name on the survey but no response as yet. I'll give it another week as Canada Post is not the most reliable but then this hotel will be outed.

Saturday Sky

This is a photo taken on 28 July, the first day of our holiday. We were in Nelson, B.C.

It is the smoke from a forest fire. A helicopter had been flying regularly but not constantly with something in its bucket to put on the fire. It must have been some sort of fire retardant, maybe water but they were not dragging the lake as the helicopter was flying the length of the lake to land after each trip.

The smoke was a lot more red when we first went so I don't know if the change meant that the fire had been reduced but it would have made a better photo.

The next morning when we checked out of our hotel, there was a group of fire fighters leaving. They must have been working on that fire.

Not Very Helpful!

One thing that really brings you back to reality after a vacation is the laundry. So I got a BBC series on DVD from the library and worked through the ironing until it was done.

Well, someone obviously decided I was working too hard and needed a break.

We Interrupt This Broadcast.....

I know I said I would write about my vacation but I just had to show you what I picked this week



I was given some seed potatoes by a friend who had some left over and as they were late crop I had been very self-controlled and not looked at them until another friend asked if I'd been potato diving yet. What? She said to dig just under the surface of the dirt and see what potatoes I could find.

Did you know potatoes can melt in your mouth?

Home Again

I haven't posted for a while as I have been on vacation. I didn't know what, if any, Internet access I would have so I decided not to write at all while I was away. Turns out that apart from one place everywhere we stayed had free WiFi.

Before I start writing about the highs (and one little low) of the trip, I'd better mention knitting. I usually take easy projects on vacation, then I can do other things and still knit and I have learned to take more knitting than I think I'll need. One of the projects to vacation with me this year was a simple shawl. The yarn was Goldilocks by Fleece Artist which I had bought at a sale specifically for this trip. The label even includes a pattern although you don't really need a printed pattern for a simple triangular shawl.

This is what the yarn looked like after I had wound it.



I didn't wind it until the morning before we left and after winding I started to wonder what it would look like on the size needle suggested. This colourway and yarn begged for something light not dense. So a googling I went. The first shawl to come up had a lace pattern which I liked but vacation knitting is supposed to be simple, right, no referring to patterns or charts. The other pictures that came up just seemed too dense for me. But I managed to find a pattern for a triangular shawl in a lace book I had out from the library. 6 rows of knitting and 4 rows of an easy remembered pattern.

I started the shawl about halfway through the vacation but after a couple of days I started having doubts. Would I like this shawl, would I be able to give it away, should it be square, circular. I obviously wasn't happy with it and I ended up not knitting for a few days. Then on a hike I came up with a solution; turn it into a stole. I could leave the end pointed so I wouldn't have to unpick too much and I could continue the pattern and hope I guessed correctly when to start the other point so I didn't run out of yarn.

But when I returned to my project and looked at the shawl to work out how wide I would want the stole, I realised I liked the shawl as it was and carried on knitting.

Of course vacation is over and back to reality so the shawl will have to wait until the next break.

I'm A Real Knitter

I'm always amazed when I don't have the right size needles for a project. I have been knitting for ever so you would have thought I had enough by now. Mostly it is when I want to use a circular needle and the ones I have are either too short or too long, never just right.

So I head off to the LYS as I need a super dooper length of circular needle. And what does the owner say to me? You're still knitting in this weather. You must be a real knitter. I felt like asking why she was open if she didn't think anyone was knitting.

But she was very kind and said she would put the right size needle to one side for me when it comes in.

No Sky

Last week I showed how easier it was to see the Saturday Sky. This week I will show you what I have done to make it harder to see the Saturday Sky.

One of the windows we had replaced was in our bathroom which was all well and good except that now we didn't have a blind so I had to put my body through contortions to get in and out of the shower without scaring the neighbours. I want to make a blind for the window but I can't wait for the long nights to settle in so I needed some sort of temporary solution. I decided a telescopic pole inside the window with some fabric hanging from it would work fine for a while.

First trip to Linen n Things for the pole. My window width is 18 inches. There are two poles that cover that length: one goes up to 18 inches and the other starts at 18 inches. I made an executive decision and bought the longer pole which was a good decision as it started shorter than the stated length. I remembered that I have a table runner which is the right width and I thought would hang over the pole and do the job; but when I opened the drawer, I espyed something more interesting which did not have a current home:- a crocheted lace circular table cloth.

The edging was holey enough to go through the curtain rod and the cloth was the right size and colour to fit the window and room.

What do you think?




The funny thing about this is that I have always wanted to crochet a lace curtain but haven't done so because I haven't wanted to put a lot of work into something that looks awful in use. This has changed my mind.