Life just keeps happening

The house is chaotic again with noise from a 2 1/2 year old, questions from the adult children, whining from the dog, and meowing from the ancient cat.


My wip's are piling up and I can't seem to stay focused long enough on any one project to finish it.


The cardigan for my grandson has 1/2 of the back done, which has been a long and tangled mess. Doing fair isle/intarsia to create Thomas the Train on the back has finally paid off. I'm going quicker now and only have to work with green and white for awhile and then on to shaping the armholes in blue for the sky. I'm dreading the two fronts and have considered knitting them plain, but I want to make my grandson happy and he loves Thomas the Train and friends.

I've woven in some of the ends, but it will take me hours to totally finish the back of this cardigan, but my grandson is thrilled each time I show him how Thomas is actually being created. I have told him that when he is about 5 I'll teach him to knit. He now can handle his child chop sticks very well, and since he can manage those, I don't think needles should be too much more work for him to learn.

I have three shawls on needles and have been trying to do a few rows each evening, but between trying to concentrate, being interrupted, losing my spot on the chart and having Millie wanting to go for a walk, means that my knitting time is hard to come by on certain occasions. I did take some knitting with me to the dog park yesterday and managed to get one row done before it was time to leave.

Millie loves to run and play with her buddies at the dog park and we had to stop going there for over a week because she developed kennel cough. She is well now and of course back to requiring three walks/day or at least two and one long play time at the dog park.

Millie is almost 15months old and is definitely my best buddy and the delight of my life. She lies quietly at my feet as I'm knitting and has never gotten into my yarn or projects. She doesn't like it when the yarn happens to lie on her head, so I move it, give her a pet and she just lies down again in comfort.

Yarn change rather than a yarn mistake

Today I was sitting and watching The Dog Whisperer with Millie at my feet. She'd had a good walk and run earlier so it was the perfect time to work on the Storm Cloud Shawlette. I did wonder why it seemed like I had more than 205 yards of yarn and that what I thought was Lorna's Lace in an aran weight was a fingering weight, but I just kept knitting and dropping YO's on the even rows and doing the increase rows without really thinking very hard.

After deciding that I should do some much needed housework, like clean the master suite bathroom and change the sheets on our bed plus put clean ones on our eldest son's and daughter-in-law's bed for when they return next week, I was tired of housework. Besides our air conditioning isn't working properly and it was warmer inside than out. With my husband, we took Millie to the dog park as she'd tried to help me make the beds and was getting under my feet for real.

It was a nice day outside and she sniffed, played, and milled about which is what she is good at doing at the dog park when she doesn't see any of her regular playmates. It is the Victoria Day long weekend and a lot of people are out of town or at the rodeo, which is in our small town.

When we returned, my youngest son was actually fixing dinner! I of course let him continue and sat down to work on the shawlette. Then I looked at the second ball of yarn that had been wound at the same time as the one I was using and realized that I was actually using Handmaiden 2 ply cashmere/silk for this shawlette. Since it was a 300meter ball, I was definitely going to have some leftover.

I wasn't about to frog all my work, so I decided quickly that I'd probably have enough leftover to make a lacey cowl. I had to laugh at myself. At my age, it's the best thing to do. Also my husband and I are trying to be positive about everything in life these days. If I'd gotten frustrated and frogged the entire project, I'm sure that I wouldn't have made this shawlette at all.

Killing Time

I could be working on the Shetland Triangle shawl that I decided I wanted to work on this evening, but I had to restart it and I'm now back where I was. At row 7. Not going very fast with this shawl and even though it is a very easy chart to follow, the malabrigo yarn that I'm using is delightful, I just couldn't sit still.

We're waiting to pick up our youngest son from Mexico at midnight. He did change his flight so they aren't going to have a 2 hour stop over in the airport in Mexico City, but he still will need to wear a mask. His sister has to stay with friends for a week as she does work in an independent living facility and if she stayed at home, she wouldn't be able to work for a week.

Our son will be wearing a mask at home and his boss phoned on Friday and said he can work from home for a couple of days. He and his friends are all fine, so all of this is just a precaution.

I did finish the Newsboy Cap today and I'm very delighted with how it fits my head like a baseball cap and that is how I wanted it to look. I changed the number of increases and that helped it to fit my head as I wanted it to. Of course my daughter loved it, so I'm sure I'll be making one for her.

I may be used to staying up until 11:30, but the thought of having to go into Vancouver and then driving home again isn't sitting well with me. I'm learning that being a parent doesn't end when children become adults. Some aspects do end, but since they are all living at home again, we are very involved in their lives. Well, as much as they are willing to tell us.

I'm going to sit and knit or maybe read for awhile.

Spring is finally here

Even though Spring actually began on March 20th, it felt like our Spring was just more of our Winter. Then it felt like we went from Winter directly into Summer. The last week has been more Spring like weather, yet it felt quite hot outside today. Hotter than I remember it being on the last day of April.

My days have been very busy with little things. Walking Millie at least twice a day takes up some time, and I usually try to get her to a dog park in Langley so she can play with dogs that she knows. I'm still waiting for the dog park in the Clayton area which was begun in 2007 to finally be finished. I don't understand how difficult it is to lay down grass, put up a fence, and actually have it finished when it has been two years. I guess I'm just tired of spending money on gas so Millie can play with her friends. Yet, I find so much pleasure in watching her run up to a dog that she knows and the both of them just greet each other and begin to wrestle. Her current best friend is Shilo. He's about 9 months old to Millie's 13 months of age, but he's a border collie and they are about the same size.

My knitting has been very slow lately. I've finished a couple of projects, but like a true obsessive/compulsive knitter, I'm constantly casting on new projects. Currently my favourite project is the Newsboy cap. I'm venturing out of my comfort zone and am using Taiyo yarn, cotton, wool, and nylon and am making it smaller than the pattern so that hopefully it will fit my small head. So far it seems to be fitting me. I'm going to do 4 repeats of the cables and then I begin the decreases. I definitely needed my calculator for this pattern. However, I did get gauge and I did do a proper swatch.

The BSJ that I made for one of my niece's unborn baby is finished except for buttons. I'm also making a simple cap to match. Now my other niece is pregnant with her third baby so I need to make another BSJ. I do wish they'd find out the sex of their babies because it would make it so much easier for me to decide on a colour.

I do find it overwhelming at times to have so many UFO's but then I can pick up and knit whatever I feel like knitting in the evenings. The Thomas the Train cardigan for my grandson is going very, very slowly. It is basically fair isle knitting at this point with some intarsia for the background, but I'm constantly unwinding the smaller balls of yarn. My good friend, Karen suggested that I put them all in sandwich bags and shut the bags and leave a small opening for the yarn. That helps, but it is a project that I definitely need to focus on.

I still prefer mindless knitting for when I'm out and about and actually got some knitting done while waiting in traffic the other day. And my love for lace knitting just keeps growing and now I have two shawls on needles.

The house is so quiet with my eldest son working on Vancouver Island and my daughter-in-law and grandson in Japan until the end of May. Youngest son is in Mexico right now and he's trying to change his flight home so he doesn't have to sit in the airport in Mexico City for two hours. I did get a proper mask for him to wear but hopefully they will give him and his friends masks before we pick them up.

It's time to stop rambling and sit and watch some TV and work on the cap that I want to wear this summer.

Not very focused these days

My days seem all the same so I decided to make some changes. Instead of taking Millie to the dog park 4 days a week, hosing her off afterwards as she gets all muddy when she's playing with other dogs, drying her with the hair blower, doing a load of doggy towels and being exhausted, I decided that she is social enough. Three or even two days at the dog park are enough for both of us. She walked very well with me yesterday and we ventured out further than we usually go.
The Dog Whisperer says that dogs get bored with the same walking route, so I took him at his word, and Millie got to see different things and also walk along a busy road. She did fine and she wasn't muddy and didn't have to endure a cold hosing off.
My daughter-in-law and grandson were out visiting other Japanese women who've married Canadian men and also have two year olds, so they had a good day. And I got a break from my grandson. I love him dearly, but trying to keep him from either falling down the stairs, crashing into doors, or breaking something that he shouldn't is a full time job. His parents are good at watching him, but they also need a break.
I can't seem to stay focused on one knitting project these days. However, I'm making myself do at least 4 rows of my husband's sweater each evening. Doing both sleeves at one time makes it seem longer, but they will both be done together.
I keep going on Ravelry to see what I can make out of my stash yarn, printing out new patterns and then forgetting all about them.
I have several UFO's and do try to work on at least 3 of them each day. I just can't get into the mood to stay focused for long enough to make much of a dent into these projects.
I joined the Cindy Swap at Ravelry and am excited about finding small things or a special yarn to send to my secret person.
The knitting guild that I basically began is beginning to grow and come together. I've taken the role of graphic person as my husband can do all the fliers, name tags, etc for free for us and he does a very professional job as he is a graphic designer.
I switched to taking Mum out on Tuesdays but I decided to return to Thursdays again. Millie can have a good walk before her dog obedience class and I will have Tuesdays free to do what I want. It is about the only day I have where I don't have to be somewhere.

I did finish the spiral fingerless gloves that I made out of brown Debbie Bliss Cashmerino and of course as soon as I'd worn them once, I found my pink cashmere ones. At least I now have a pair to wear out walking Millie and I don't have to worry about mucking up the cashmere ones.

2009

2009 is here and I'm so behind with posting anything on this blog that I wonder if it is even worth my while to continue doing it. But I don't give up easily, so even though I may only write every few months or so, it is a good outlet for me to keep writing.

I don't have the time, energy or patience to try to figure out how to add pictures within the text so they will just be spread either at the bottom or at the top. Guess all my previous years of doing HTML have been deleted from my brain.

Christmas was simple but nice. We didn't spend as much money as we've done in the past and yet everyone got gifts, there was plenty of food, chocolates and snacks. My grandson, Heagen loved Christmas morning. Of course, he got the most presents, but it is hard to resist buying a 2 year old a gift.

My den which was my room for quilting and storing some knitting yarn and supplies has now been taken over by a jungle gym, trains, balls, and Pooh, Tigger, Piglet, and Eeyore. Gifts that my dear mother-in-law had crocheted for Heagen since he was born. I've tripped over the trains as they are at the entrance of the room but it is easier to deal with that then try to navigate around the jungle gym. I have suggested to my eldest son that he sell his pool table in the rec room and then his own son would have more space, but obviously that isn't happening right now. At least my son found a job and is in training right now so we don't know how much longer they will be living with us.

As much as I'd like my space back again, I know that I'm going to miss seeing my grandson every day and spending time with him. His English is coming along great and his mum works on his Japanese and he knows to speak English to us. He is definitely bilingual and hopefully it will continue.

He is very good with our Golden retriever now. Today we went to the dog park and Heagen kept calling Millie to come to him. Millie was playing with another dog and having a lot of fun so she ignored Heagen. But when she stopped playing for a bit, she'd come running to Heagen. Heagen loves to tell her to come to him, sit and give her a treat. It is nice to see that he isn't afraid of most dogs at the dog park. The bigger ones do scare him a bit, but his mum is there to pick him up and he just says, "Big dog."

I'm finally finished knitting the front and back of my husbands sweater and have started the sleeves. I told my daughter-in-law today that I will never make a sweater out of grey with 4mm needles again. I taught her to knit and she took to it like a fish takes to water. She catches her mistakes and comes to find me before it gets too messy for either of us to deal with. She's making a ribbed scarf out of some brown Classic Elite yarn that I'd purchased years ago and hadn't used it to make a sweater. Now she can go through my stash and see if there is something she wants to learn to work with. Except for some yarn that I do have specific plans for.

Speaking of that, I find that I keep changing my mind about projects and what I want to make out of a particular yarn. I can spend hours looking up one of my yarns on Ravelry and seeing what others have done with it.

I still have several UFO's that I'm determined to finish but I keep adding smaller projects to work on when I'm bored with my husband's sweater. I did make the instant gratification scarf because I had some of the yarn and needed something that was pretty mindless. It is blocking now.

I've finally begun a Baby Surprise Jacket by Elizabeth Zimmerman and hopefully it will be the right size for my niece's baby that is due in the Spring.

My days are filled with playing with Heagen, taking Millie to the dog park or walking her, cleaning her after she rolls around in mud, doing laundry and trying to keep the bathrooms fairly clean. My daughter-in-law does the vacumming which is a big help as with fibromyalgia and a bad back, I was told not to do it. And she does a wonderful job. I only have to cook on Monday nights and do try to make something simple that Heagen will like. He is a good eater so I don't really have to change much for his tastes, but his dad hates cheese and that creats a problem for me as a lot of my simple recipes have cheese in them.

We had a lot of snow over Christmas and it is still on the ground but mostly it is dirty snow now and not as pretty as it was.

Having all three adult children home again has its ups and downs. Things are going fine right now so I don't want to rock the boat. I'm learning to deal with interruptions and very little free time to myself.

Heagen and I watch Frosty the Snowman and we've been watching Pooh and friends when he's allowed to watch something on a screen. He is slowly learning to play by himself for short periods of time but he and I play trains and I try to teach him new things or new words when we're playing.

I did finish the Wisp that I'd made out of Malabrigo sock yarn and got the buttons on it but I'm waiting for Yuka to model it. I'm giving it to her. She is breaking out of her wearing mostly black, grey, brown or white and something with colour makes her look even more beautiful.

My daughter is back at UBC, but she finds time to help with meals, run with Millie on the weekends and work part-time and have a social life.

I'm quite content yet I do long for more privacy. But it will come with a price. No little boy to want to sit on my lap to watch Pooh or Frosty the Snowman or no little boy to say, "Good morning, Gramme."

Life is an Excitment of Possibilities, Not a Series of Obstacles

Again, I have no time to post here. If I were a tad more organized, I'd be adding patterns that I've changed or created, not that there are that many or at least post something that might help someone who actually reads this.

My eldest son, daughter-in-law, and almost 2 year old grandson moved from Japan over a month ago to live with us. Now there are 6 adults, one toddler, one very old cat and one almost 7 month old puppy in this house.

It is amazing that things are running so smoothly. I credit my wonderful daughter-in-law for a lot of it because she helps with meals, cleans and does anything she can to help out. My daughter is at UBC full-time now but she still manages to cook dinner 3 nights a week. I'm down to only having to cook dinner on Monday nights, so life is good.

I have finished some knitting projects, but still need to find time to work on the alpaca grey sweater for my husband. I made two more Christmas stockings and will probably make a third one as I did the heel backwards in the first stocking. I'll use that one for our dog, Millie. She won't mind.

I still have to add decorations and names to the stockings, but they didn't take me very long to make, and the second one was much easier since I actually read the pattern and figured out how to do a regular heel. I'm used to doing socks toe up, so now I can do a cuff down sock on two circulars if I choose to do so.

Millie is now in dog obedience and at her third session today, she was the star pupil with the instructor. I think I finally have a clue as to how to get her to walk beside me much better. She loves to go to dog parks and just runs and plays with other dogs. She is quite submissive so she knows how to protect herself from bigger dogs who are running fast. She does a duck and hide.

My grandson is delightful. He's teaching me Japanese but his mum has to help me as he's just barely learning it. His English is good. His poor little brain must be confused with growing up bilingual, but it will be to his benefit.

We're have his 2nd birthday party this weekend and we did buy him some shelves and containers for the bedroom so he can put away his own toys. All of their belongings haven't arrived from Japan yet, so Yuka is able to borrow my coats or my daughter's.