Looky, looky

I've been trying since Wednesday evening to get this post completed. I'm slow, mainly because I've been trying to work steadily on my cropped cardigan for the upcoming wedding. My labors are paying off and at least now it kind of looks like a cardigan.
I personally think that the Tweetie shirt makes it look even better, don't you? So, I'm very happy that it seems to fit and have just kept going. Plus I've found that I love raglan construction and that this may be my sweater construction of choice from now on. No seams!!!

But more importantly then my progress is the fact that I received my package from my HP Sock swap 3 partner. I was fortunate enough to be paired with Cassandra Grubbly Plank who is also the wonderful woman who hosted this swap. She not only did a fantastic job hosting, she totally outdid herself with this package. The poor owl was a bit tired so I let him rest and gave him a really wonderful treat before I sent him back home. I opened the box and found loads of lovely pink paper....Inside were lots of smaller packages wrapped in more pink paper...Inside the pink paper was all this!A new pair of socks, patterns that you can't see, a new journal that's covered in pretty ribbons, candy, cool yarn including wonderfully soft sock yarn, 2 sets of dpn's, point protectors, stitch makers, a bookmark and I'm sure I've left something out.

Look at my beautiful socks!And the stitch markers and bookmark. Oh, and my very cool History of Hogwarts book that will be finding it's way onto my bookcase.

So, as you can see, I was very spoiled by my pal. I'll have to find the perfect pattern for the sock yarn, it's so deliciously autumn.

Trying to catch up...

It's not like I was gone on vacation for over a week, it's more like I was gone for 4 days and then the rest of the week just slipped on by. I apologize and will attempt to make it up by posting about a few things to get caught up.

First...I managed to not only finish my sock for the Hogwarts Sock Swap, but I even mailed it out. I'm not positive my pal has received it, even though I sent it by Priority Owl on Tues. so I'm reluctant to put a picture up. However, I'm going to anyway.... You can see a glimpse of the socks, with of course the dpn's and in that tiny silver box reside some stitch markers. I decided to try my hand at making them. Hopefully they turned out ok. I liked them. I think I'd try something different though, if I made more. As you can see I included a couple of other goodies, some tea and a shortbread cookie, some chocolate and some "magical bath salts". I also included a bookmark that I'd made, but it didn't make it into the picture.

Second...I got my package from the lovely JennieferW.
This is what it looked like before I opened all the pretty packages tied up in Gryffindor colors.
I would show you what it looked like all opened up, but for some reason I can't seem to upload that picture. So, I'll try to tell you instead...

1 pair of beautiful socks in the best colors in the world!
1 set of fantastic and beautiful stitch markers
1 set of Crystal Palace bamboo dpn's
1 box of Bertie Botts All Flavored beans
pattern and materials to make a HP book scarf. (I hadn't seen this before and it's very cute. Will have to start on it soon.)
a great HP bookmark (which I used while reading this weekend)

All in all, a great package. The socks fit wonderfully. Can't wait for a cool day to wear them, it's been a little to hot around here lately, with heat indexes in and around the 100's for several days last week.

As you may recall when I last posted I was headed to hot-Lanta to visit with friends, stitch, attend a HP movie party and generally have a good time. Let me say that I managed to do all that and more. I arrived without too much delay, although I had started to worry about my luggage, made my way on MARTA to my friend Jill's house and had a great evening catching up with her and our friend Ann who'd driven that evening as well. We did some prep. cooking, since we had to provide lunch on Sat. that evening and Fri. morning. Also Fri. morning we met up with Jean, Judy and Judy's good friend Joan (who was braving our get-together for the first time) at The Whole Nine Yarns. My goal was to purchase yarn for Mystery Stole 3, I purchased some, but ended up letting Jill buy it from me since it wasn't exactly what I wanted and was having buyers remorse. Then it was on to Vicky's for food and stitching. I did manage to stitch, oh and eat, and finished stitching the Pear Ornament which was a kit from last year's exchange and so was in the 2005 JCS Ornament issue.

Jill & I left a little early so we could go back to her place, relax and change before going to Heather & Michael's for the HP movie party. As usual the party was fun and had great food and ended with a trip to see the movie. This year they had it in their soon-to-be loft. No furniture, but we managed. The best part was getting to see the whole place by following clues. Too hard to explain here without pictures and for some reason I didn't take pictures of all that. I did manage to capture pictures of some of the goodies we had to eat that evening...

That's the great chef & friend Andy washing up after putting out some fantastic crumpets with Stilton cheese and other crunch goodness and "devils on thestral back" (which were prunes stuffed with chutney wrapped in bacon and cooked then served on pumpernickel bread...oh wow!) There were other goodies, and as usual we all enjoyed the food. We did manage to play a game, which I was miserable at I might add, which resembled charades but instead of movies or books or other more mundane things we had to act out the side effects from eating one of the Weasley brother's concoctions. Let me just say, it's not easy to act out having a giant squid on your head! (I'm not bitter, but my team lost and we would have won if I could have done a better imitation of said squid on said head.)

Sat. brought morning, or what passed for it and more food, stitching and general hilarity at Vicky's. We also managed a trip to a frame shop to get some great deals on frames and then to Abecedarius (hey, it was just across the street and Ann needed some Mill Hill beads and well it was there...) Yes, I found a couple of things that I couldn't do without and yes, most had a bunny on them. That evening we did our exchange of kits for last year's ornament issue. As Heather said on her blog "It's Christmas in July." Having made up my share of kits to give out, I received quite a few myself. I didn't take a picture, I was too busy looking at the magazine to remind myself which one's I was getting. Very happy with them all. Vicky had put up a small tree in her living room and we put the ornaments we managed to stitch on the tree. As you can see some are "finished" and some are "FINISHED", but no matter, they were all beautiful. I couldn't wait to start on another ornament, so I started the "Pear Tree" which I received from Jean. I'm almost finished with it, so I'll post a picture soon. I think everyone enjoys getting them, although I'm not sure how many of us actually stitch them up. For me, it's stash that's easy to go to. In fact, I've had them in the cutest box, but with this year's haul I had to move them to a new, larger box. No complaints though.

Sunday was a lot more lazy day kind of thing, but still there was stitching and eating. We tried to eat up the left-overs, but didn't manage to finish all of them. There are some really great cooks in this group and we had some fantastic food that weekend.

My flight home was uneventful, but it did take me well over an hour to get through security at Hartsfield Int'l Airport. That's the longest line I've ever seen outside of Disney!

Other then work, some stitching and a bit of not feeling all that wonderful, the rest of last week passed along quickly and finally it was time for the final HP book. I didn't go stand in line for mine on Friday night, didn't feel up to it, but managed to get it around 11 Sat. morning and read it all. Finished around 1 AM Sun. morning. Since I don't want to spoil the fun for anyone who hasn't read it, I won't say anything except that I enjoyed it and I'm kind of sad we won't be hearing more from our wizarding friends.

And on that note....until next time...

Another Happy Dance!

Yesterday was fairly productive. I managed to finish my HP socks for the Hogwarts exchange! That's great news for me and my pal. Have to pick up a couple of things today and get the package ready to drop in the mail. When I do I'll take a picture.

The other big thing was I got as many of my ornament kits completed as I can. I am waiting, fairly patiently, for my box from Dreama at Needlecraft Corner to come. It has the last of the NPI silk I need to finish the last few kits. I'll have to take a picture of all of them too. Pretty impressive sight if you ask me. This weekend they'll find new homes when we exchange kits in Atlanta.

In other news...I'm running out of time to get everything done before I leave for Atlanta...scary. So, cutting this short until I have pictures to show everyone.

1 Finished, 1 so very close!

Happy dancing at my house tonight! Finished the last of the ornaments for the exchange. Since it's the "surprise" one, they'll be no pictures until after this weekend and the exchange. I will say it's very cute, at least I think so.

I thought I might pull off a double dance, but came up a bit short. Taking mom to the dentist today helped me to almost finish my HP sock for the Hogwart's Sock Exchange. I'm ready to finish the toe, then weave in all my ends. Then it's just getting everything together and in a box...oh and I need my pal's actual address to give to the owl who'll carry it to her.

All in all, a very productive day. Tomorrow I'll be working on getting kits made for the ornament exchange and finishing the sock.

Catching Up

One of the signs of passing youth
is the birth of a sense of fellowship with other human beings
as we take our place among them. Virginia Woolf

I'm a bit behind with my posting, but there was this holiday yesterday around here that I decided to take and enjoy since it was in the middle of the week.

Tuesday was "Virtual Birthday" with my friends Christine, Joan, Kathy & Michele. Since every time I say this people look at me oddly I'll just explain. We've been friends for several years, some of us for more then 15, although we try not to think about it. We all worked together for "a large telecommunications company in the credit card division before it was sold". At some point we ended up in the Technology area and someone there said something about us having the opposite of a "boy's network or club", so we decided we'd name our nights out "meetings of The Girls Club" or something along those lines. It stuck, as have our friendships. About 3 or 4 years ago, maybe more, we decided that attempting to get together 5 times a year close to each person's birthday was driving us crazy, every has busy schedules and we all don't work together any longer. So, we decided to declare 1 day out of the year our "birthday" and exchange all our presents then. Hence "Virtual Birthday". This year, July 2nd was the default day, mainly because we had let it go so long and felt like it was now or never. We met at Christine's house, watched some TV, hung out, had some dinner which her lovely husband Ron went to pick up for us, then opened presents. The best part is seeing what we all got each other. I think I enjoy seeing what everyone else gets as much as opening my own presents. I love everything I got again this year.

From left to right you can see the travel size body sprays and the cool pottery piece from Kathy. Then from Joan a great book of knitting stitches and a bag of my favorite tea (Jasmine Dragon Phoenix Pearl blended with Rooibos Tropica) from Teavana so I can make a cup and sit and read through the patterns, her idea was I'd pick and create a design of my own. Then a Lampe Berge and some oil for it from Christine & Michele. All items I adore.

Started working on kitting my ornaments for the exchange next week. Found I'm short some NPI silk but I think I've gotten it taken care of and will have full kits put together by the time I leave next Thur. evening. Still need to finish the "surprise ornament", so will try to work on that this evening after my meeting at church. I've also been knitting on my HP sock. It's coming along much faster then the first one did, which doesn't really surprise me. I'm hoping to have it done this weekend. I have to make my stitch counters, but that shouldn't take me all that long. If I could get that mailed out before I leave for Atlanta, that would be great. It's a goal at least. And since I have a few things to get done, I guess I'll go work on them!

One down, one to go!

That's right, I've finished a sock for the Hogwarts Sock Swap. My only fear is it won't fit. I've measured and measured and I think it's right, but since I've never done this before I'm scared it won't fit. I was scared my pal wouldn't like it, but so many people who've seen it have liked it that I've begun to think she'll have to like it. For those who were wondering, yes, this is from the Six Sock Knitalong group. It was a pattern from a while back, but since I'm fairly new to the group, I'm a bit behind. Well that and I really thought it was perfect for this swap. The blue is a little darker then it shows in this picture. I bound off the toe tonight and started the second one while watching the final episode (season 1) of BallyKissAngel on DVD.

In other news...still no blooms. Tomorrow is a full moon, or at least pretty close, so the watch will continue then. Have to be up bright and early to take my dad to have yet another test run to make sure they found all the little places where he was loosing blood in his GI tract. Hopefully the weather will cooperate tomorrow when I have to drive into town.

Back home

Made it home all safe and sound. My trip was short, but I had a great time. I'll post more as I have time, but I thought I'd share a few things.

1. It really is summer time when flights are delayed for no apparent reason as was mine on Thursday. It was supposed to leave JIA at 10:44 AM, I think we finally left a bit after 12 noon. Luckily I had the phone number for the airline and was able to call from the airport to get a seat on the next available flight from Charlotte to Greensboro (which I know is in NC and I was going to WV, but if you were to price plane tickets to WV you'd understand why I asked family to drive 3 or so hours to come and get me there.) So, all was not completely insane, but I did arrive at the final airport about 3 hours after I thought I would. That put a bit of a crimp in the drive home, not to mention the fact that all I'd had to eat all day was a sausage biscuit from McD's and a Pria bar. There was some serious hunger going on by the time we made it to Wytheville, VA.

2. I absolutely LOVE family reunions where you feel the need to have a "taste-off" between 2 pots of chicken and dumplings! And let's not forget the other excellent food of which there was enough to feed at least a small army detachment. Yep, love family reunions!

3. The HP exchange sock had a great time! He was quite a hit at the family reunion, everyone wanted to see and touch. Unfortunately, the camera didn't seem to be around when all this admiring was going on to get pictures. I did, however, manage to get it's picture at a few other places on our Sunday outings.Me, the sock and my Uncle Jim, took a walk at their farm. This is one of the hay fields. We were standing under some beautiful trees, hence the shadows. Should have asked Uncle Jim to hold the sock and get his picture taken with it, but I didn't want to press my luck. I think he thought it was pretty silly I was taking pictures of a sock I hadn't even finished knitting!



The path we took on our nature walk, not much of a path, but it worked. What you can't see are the aromatic ceder's to the left and the different pines to the right that line this "path". There are some beautiful views from the farm. Maybe they'll make an appearance later in the week.

Here it is at the Dairy Queen in Hinton, WV. Everyone eats there. We tried to get the owner, who is also a former state senator (or is it representative, I can never remember) to have his picture taken with it, but apparently he thought my aunt had finally lost her mind. So, we just took the picture outside. (That's my mom, getting into the fun!)
This is me and the sock outside Tamarack in Beckley, WV. If you're ever in the area, I highly recommend it as a great place to browse and eat. (The mountain trout and fried green tomatoes from the Greenbrier restaurant inside Tamarack are wonderful!).
Finally, the sock spent some quality time with my cousin Steven back at my Aunt's house. Poor Steven was quite tired, having driven to PA to drop off a table and benches he'd made for someone he knew and then home. Not all in one day, but over the weekend. I think he also took some classes, but don't quote me on that part. I do know he was pretty tired, but since he's a good sport, he was willing to go along with the sock and the picture taking.

The best news is I'm ready to bind off the toe for this sock. I just have to make sure it's the right length. Then I'll have to work non-stop on it's pair so I can get my package in the mail to my secret pal. I really hope she likes them.

I think that's all I can manage tonight. I was staying up to see if my Night Blooming Cereus would actually bloom tonight. When we got home, I found 4 buds on it. I don't think they are ready to bloom tonight, maybe tomorrow. When they do, I'll have pictures to share. If you've never seen them, they are amazing, so stay tuned.

This is what happens...

...when you go to your favorite knitting store and have had a couple of "difficult" days.
That's right you purchase yarn to make socks. The yarn on the left is some lovely Rowan Calmer for a pair of socks I found in a British Knitting mag, Knit Today issue 9. They used a lovely lavender shade, but since I'm more a blue person, I went with this light blue. In the picture it looks a little more teal then it is in person.

The yarn on the right is some hand-dyed from HandKraft. All of them were lovely, but I'd seen the pictures on her blog and I was fairly sure I was going to like the "Say What!" color-way best. It turns out I was right. So home it came. I'm going to be a sock wearing fool at some point. Or all my friends are going to have lovely handmade socks for presents.

I think I'm about "packed" to leave in the morning. I have some things I have to do before I can leave, but I think I'll have time. I'm looking forward to the family reunion Saturday. I don't know as much about that part of my family, so it's great to go and meet and learn about everyone. Hopefully when I get home I'll have some good news to report about my HP Sock and my final ornament!

Time flys....

When you're doing other things instead of blogging!

I'm sure you've all be wondering how the remodel has gone. I'm happy to announce it's pretty much completed, as you can see in the pictures I've posted. The first shows the island with the new cooktop and new set of bookcases at the end to house at least some of my cookbooks. Also, that black blob beside the cream colored refrigerator, that's the new double, wall ovens! They are fantastic!



The view towards the new sink. Love the new sink! It's one of those that has a small side that's not as deep and then a big side that's really deep. See....

I like that it's all one piece with the countertop, so it makes it very easy to clean. Had a hard time finding what we wanted for the faucet, but like what we finally decided on. Now to figure out what to do about the backsplash. As you can see, it's not been done yet.

With the backsplash to be decided on, we also have to figure out what to do with the wood parts that are new. Do we try to match the current stain? or Do we decide to paint it something that will go with the rest of the kitchen? My aunt suggested we paint, she said a lot of what they are seeing in the magazines shows that look of paint mixed with stain. It's under discussion. I also want to change the hardware on the doors and drawers. Found something we all liked, so that may be coming soon. And, the more I look at it, the more I realize we'll have to change the wall color a little. I'm thinking it can be done with a glaze or some other paint treatment. I'll work on that later though.

In other news...I finished the 3rd of the 4 ornaments I'm stitching for the ornament exchange. I love the way this one looks, even if it does have TONS of the dreaded RG silver and gold braid. I don't like the way it was finished in the magazine, so I'm going to do something different, just not sure what. Have too much to do now to think about finishing. I'm taking it with me to Atlanta next month, and if I haven't finished it by then, it might get left with the master, a.k.a Vickie B., for her to work her magic.

Very little knitting going on. I'm working almost exclusively on the HP Socks for the HP Exchange. Almost finished with sock 1! Now, I'm sure some are wondering if I'll finish the 2nd in time. Oh yeah of little faith. Of course I will. I'm a deadline person. It will happen. My plan right now is to only take the HP socks and orny 4 (the "surprise" orny) with me when I fly up to WV for a family reunion later this week. Can't really stitch at the reunion, but knitting will work. So there's plane time, car time and reunion time to knit! I foresee great progress.

A Hint of Summer

Today was one of those days in my part of FL where you begin to think about what summer means. The temperature made it's way to around the 92 degree range. (For those of you who are in Europe, that's closing in on 33.) But the best part is the humidity. Today it was fairly low, from what I can tell in the low 40% range, so what it felt like, was just a few degrees over what the actual temp. was. This weekend they've said...they being the people on the news who attempt to predict the weather...that our temperatures will hover around the same, maybe a few degrees hotter, but that the heat index will ease into triple digits. Yes folks, it will feel like at least 100, and with that, we will know that even though the calendar says it's Spring, Summer has arrived.

On the home front, my aunt & uncle are headed down here to bring the new kitchen cabinet tops. I'll be posting pictures of what it looks like now, hopefully some of the in action look, and then the finished product. Stay tuned.

On the knitting and stitching front, there isn't much to report. I did work on my HP sock exchange sock Monday when I went with Mom to the doctor. Stitching wise I managed to work on ornament #3 a little. Tonight, if I can manage, I'm going to pull out a project for "Jumpin' Jehosephat" month. I'll take a picture when I decide what to work on. It's probably going to be one of Martina's projects that are wallowing...I mean waiting patiently in my stash box/shelf.

All in all, an interesting, if not hot day.

Tuesdays for ornaments?

Well, they are supposed to be, but last week didn't work out that way. I'm hopeful that this week will be better. I have two more ornaments to finish before I venture to Atlanta in July for a weekend of Harry Potter (the movie that is), stitching and perhaps some knitting. I am sure I will finish the stitching, not so sure about the actual finishing portion. But the important part is to get them finished so I'll know how much materials they take and can put the kits together for those receiving from me. The good news will then be that the rest of the year can be devoted to finishing some of the MANY ornament kits that I have collected over the last few years we've been doing this swap/exchange. Seriously, I have a lot.

In other news, I've been working on my HP Sock exchange socks. They are looking very interesting, if I do say so. I took them to knit-in on Friday and showed them around. I think everyone there liked what I am doing, so I'm hopeful others will like it as well. I did not, however, get time to work on my idea for a surprise item for my pal. Hopefully I'll find some time soon.

Finally, for those who may have been wondering...my father is doing better. We went to see his GI doctor yesterday, who ordered a couple of more tests to be run to make sure there are no more little places where he might be loosing blood. Daddy had to go today to have a blood test run, to check his levels, make sure he's building blood and not loosing again. I'm very grateful for his doctors who have been so thorough with this whole thing. It was scary and they were very quick to do what was, and is, needed to figure out what was going on.

And on that note...I'm off to stitch!--- I hope....

I present some finishes

Finally something to show for all the work I've been doing.

I found the right size of dpn's to complete the knitting of "the hat". I love the colors and I just know it will be so cute when I get around to doing the felting part. I need to felt a couple of other things, so I may have a "day of felting" soon. I just love how this pattern, from Pick Up Sticks, does the brim. Even though it looked like a really simple pattern, it did teach me a new technique, so I was really happy with that. Making the "tuck" is really cool and I think when it felts will really add to how it is shaped.

Second, I finally have a picture of my completed Monkey socks!!!!! Made from Jitterbug in the Jay colorway, I just love these. If there weren't so many other sock patterns I want to try I'd probably sit down and make another pair of these. When I was making them I wasn't quite sure if I'd have enough to make 6 repeats of the lace pattern on the leg, and when I measured it on my leg I wasn't sure I wanted the socks to be quite that high, so I did change the pattern and did only 4 patern repeats. Works wonderfully on me, so I'm happy. This was also my first experience with Jitterbug and I really liked working with it. It's got a great feel. This skein was a gift from my dear friend Jill, but I'm sure I'll be purchasing more in the future.

Finally I leave you with a glimpse of the socks I'm working on for the Harry Potter Sock Exchange. My pal is in Ravenclaw and I finally recieved my yarn on Friday. I sat down and started right away, so you see a bit of where I've gotten to. I have hit a snag. I had designed something to do at this point in the socks, but it appears I miscounted. (Really I do know how to count, but sometimes....) anyway, I've had to go back to the drawing board, so to speak and no progress can be made until I figure out what I want to do. The yarn is Louet Gems and I think it's very appropriate for Ravenclaw colors. Notice I went with the movie colors as my pal said she didn't care either way and I love the silvery color with the blue best. I really hope she likes them.

Speaking of the HP Sock Exchange, I've had an idea for a little extra something for my pal as she's an avid reader. I'm hoping to have a prototype made this weekend. If so, I'll post a picture and see what you all think.