On Stories, Dogs and Knitting: And Tea

I posted a new story on my ‘Thrill or Shiver’ blog last night. Like some of my stories, ‘Mack’s Room’ is a fabrication based on an experience I once had. I hope you like it.
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My knitting of unfinished objects, UFO’s, is coming along again. ‘Interruptions’ seem to be the call of the day. Among other things the dog, Sir Laidback, had an allergic reaction to something and his face swelled up. Meds and fussing on him fixed the troubles, but it took time away from the things I wanted to get done like my knitting yesterday.













Right now I’m working on a purple and gray stripped scarf I started back in May. I didn’t have the mojo for knitting a scarf in the late spring, even though I was loving the yarn. So it sat in my UFO box until now.

The Yarn is Reynolds’ Odyssey 100% Merino Wool 50 g. balls. I picked it up when I went to Boston last spring to visit my daughter. The color in the picture doesn’t do it justice. No color name, but it is a variegated gray and variegated purple, and the pinks and blues really stand out in the purple. It is a lot more colorful then it looks in the picture here. In the daylight you can see the striping contrast so much better.

And the softness of the yarn is like melted butter, a cloud… When I first touched it I didn’t know it was wool. I thought it was some kind of non fluffy angora.
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Some people will be having their Thankfulness Tea Parties tomorrow and I will be having mine on Sunday. (Mountain Man has a prior commitment on Saturday and I want to include him in my Tea Party.) I have collected and readied all the things I will need including the flowers for the table.

Have a good time with your parties and remember the small things you are thankful for too.

On Tea and Knitting:

The Thankfulness Tea Party is coming this weekend. So you only have a few days to collect what you are bringing to the tea or want on hand.

I cut out scraps of paper from magazines with pretty pictures and paste them to the corners of my pages. I also find a special pen to write with.

This year with Mountain Man and I being sick, I have already sent a package to the friends who where going to be here with me, so that they can have a illness free tea party without me coughing on their goodies.
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On to the knitting:
I have so far, in my quest to finish the UFO’s or ‘unfinished knitting’ during the winter games, finished my gray sweater.

It is just a simple top down Feather and Fan patterned sweater. I cast on the neck, increased every other row until I got to the arm holes, separated the sleeve stitches for later and just went with the yarn I had. Leaving just enough yarn to sew on the buttons. Five balls of Patons, Classic Wool Merino 3 1/ 2 oz. or 100 g. in the color Gray Mix for my large frame. I went with three big buttons because I like the look.

The pattern I made up is very similar to the Liesl pattern shown here. My button band is more substantial and my repeat in the pattern break is in the solid part and hers is in the lacey portion. So, I won’t be making up and posting a pattern for this because she has done the work to have all sizes. But feel free to ask me any questions.



I feel like Molly Weasley from the Harry Potter Movies, but with a little more class. I’ve always liked the Feather and Fan pattern because it reminds me morticians drapes. I think I’ll wear it to tea.

On Aging Computer Controller:

I recently acquired a used computer for my mother. I had it checked out and fitted with the programs she needed and today delivered it to her, set it up, and got her started.

Now, I don’t know if you have ever watched as a senior citizen learns how to work a computer for the first time, but I was pleasantly surprised at how fast she did pick it up.

She knows how to turn it on, find and work the work processor, play her music that we put into it, Play with the game she picked to practice her mouse skills on, watch her DVD’s and she can also shut it down.

She was, of course, overwhelmed at first. So much to learn and understand, and there are so many ways to learn to do the same thing in the beginning. Icons, start menu, enter, escape, right click, left click, keyboard, mouse. Programs, oh so many programs!

I watched as she made her way from holding her mouse in a death grip to finding the curser doing what she wanted it to do. She made choices and went ahead with stilted confidence which further grew.

I wrote up a little ten page instruction booklet to leave with her. Explaining wording and actions on her screen, what the buttons do and where to find things she will want again. She will easily try to and get better at it tomorrow and the days after that.

I will call her on the phone and field her questions, guiding her in the exploration of this new larger then life toy.

I may have to nudge her to practice so she will be ready for the big day.

Next week we set her up with the internet. Email and My Space here she comes.

On Too Sick to Say Much:

I woke the other morning with a wracking hacking cough. The kind that hurts down to your toes. And it was down hill from there.

I’m up today, but only barely.

I have been doing a little knitting.

And I wanted to remind you about the Thankfulness Tea Party on this coming weekend.

On Pulling Together Loose Ends:

The Winter Games and the Knit Olympics are about to start. And I find myself in a bit of a pickle.

I would love to start a new and challenging knit project along with all the other knitters joining in this year. But I do have a problem. A good portion of my knitting needle collection still have projects on them. I’ve turned into a starter not a finisher of late. And I just don’t have any more room for another project in the process. (Five bags with started projects in them in this room alone.)

So, there is only one thing to do. I won’t be sending my name and info to Yarn Harlot. I’ll be here by my lonesome doing a much harder thing for me. Turning stitches around from Combination so I can knit Continental and finishing as many UFO’s (Un Finished Objects) as I can before the winter games are over. And as a further goal for myself I will not start another project until the games are over or I have finished all the UFO’s in the house.

I know of a large bed throw, a scarf, a pair of mittens, a pair of socks, two sweaters, and a toy that I can think of off the top of my head, and I know that there are other things in plastic boxes out of sight.

I’ll keep a running total on the side of my blog and post pictures when I’m done with something.

By the end of the Winter Games I intend to be a winner. And get some of this heavy old UFO guilt off my back. Who knows, I may even loose a few pound of fat off my butt at the same time by keeping busy.

If you are not joining the Knit Olympics and would like to join me in a UFO ‘Finish Off’ Olympics instead, just let me know.

On Playing Leap ‘Frog’:

Yes, I have been missing from the blog for a few days. I have been concentrating.

If you have been following my blog for a while you know I have memory issues. And that after I went through Chemo for breast cancer four years ago, I was suddenly a Combination Knitter after being a English Knitter all my life. (I still don’t know how that happened.)

There is nothing wrong with either method. Most all patterns are written for English/Continental Knitters and Combination Knitting is much faster. The basic difference is the coil of the knitting around the knitting needle is clockwise for one and counter clockwise for the other, but the outcome is the same. (Don’t ask me which at the moment or my head will explode.)

Well after a self imposed vacation from knitting for a few months, I tried to learn how to knit English/Continental again.

This was for no other reason then some knitting patterns just can’t be made into Combination very easily and I was getting tired of transposing them. Some times it meant learning a new stitch in English then learning how to change it to Combination then re-writing the pattern to accommodate the change.

So for the last few days I have been knitting, making mistakes, frogging (or tinking, unknitting, pulling out my work), doing this all over again repeatedly and concentrating very hard to learn how to knit in Continental. (The knitting itself is English, but the holding of the yarn coming into the knitting is Combination.) The knitting itself is not as fast as Combination, but I don’t have to take days to learn a new pattern either.

I have finally turned the corner in this relearning and have gotten 9 1 /2 inches or 24 cm done on a simple, neck down, feather and fan patterned sweater without having to frog some or all of the stitches in each row. At this rate I just may be ready for the Knit Olympics to start on Friday.

Now all I have to do is pick a difficult pattern, get the wool, and do all this in a record breaking snow storm. Maybe this year I’ll just keep on practicing at this knitting for now.

Here is a website with videos of all three kinds as well as knitting for the left handed if you are interested. (Although she does make it harder to purl in Continental then it has to be. I use my thumb there.)

On The Tea Party is Coming:

I came up with this Thankfulness Tea Party some time ago. But there are people asking if it is one of those protest things. No it is not.

It is a simply nice way to remember that we have some things to be thankful for in our lives and that life is not all dull and/or bad.

Some people stopped worrying about things long enough to watch the Supper Bowl today and I offer a Tea Party on the weekend of the 21-22.

The rules are here if you want to look at them. But in a nut shell, you have a little tea party, by yourself or with others, and write down the things you are thankful for in your life. You can keep it privet or share, that is up to you.

Nothing complicated just nice clean fun and enjoyment.

I hope you can join me along with Ms. Mousie and Black Crow.