m.o.M - mother of Michael

What's the Worst That Can Happen?

For God's sake! I live in Florida! Not should I not have to scrape ice off my windshield, but I can't even reach my windshield!

I know...I know...sure as the sun will rise tomorrow, summer will come and my family will be pleading with me to turn the AC on. In the meantime though, I'm going to whine and complain about this friggin' cold weather. (And for those of you who live where there is snow piled up to your eyeballs, I apologize for all my moaning.)

All this kvetching leads me to the topic at hand...What's the worst that can happen?

This neverending cold snap has left me with little incentive to do anything other than knit.

After over two years of on and off knitting on my Fair Isle cardigan, the time has come to

Cut. My. Knitting.

I have read and reread the directions until my eyes have bled and my brain has dripped out my ears and still, I don't get it. I have done exhaustive research online to see if anyone else has had this problem and of the nearly 100 knitters on Ravelry who have knit this sweater, exactly ZERO seem to have had this issue. This can only lead me to believe that I am an idiot. Oh well, every village has one and for now I'm it.

The whole thing may unravel or even worse, go wonderfully and then not even fit!

For God's Sake! I live in Florida! Do I even need a wool cardigan when a tank top and flip flops really should suffice?

 

This Little Piggy's Ringing in the New Year at Home!

Piggy - Before felting.

 

Piggy - After felting.

Happy New Year to all and to all a good night! (I think I have my holiday's crossed)

That's What I Call a Day of Knitting!

Sometimes all of this blue sky and sunshine becomes monotonous, so when rain was forecast for last Friday, I decided to tuck in and get some knitting done. (Along with a marathon watching of Desperate Housewives episodes!)

Drum roll, please!

Cat Gak (aka The Mandala) is Done!!!! It kicked me to the seventh circle of hell and back, but I tamed the beast and completed it! The border alone was over 20,000 stitches! Yikes!

Here it is on my king-size bed:

Blocking this baby was quite the adventure. All that round and round and up and down made my legs hurt for next two days!

 

 

But wait! There's more!

While that dried, (another drumroll, please!) I steeked the second sleeve on the Palette Fair Isle sweater!

 

Go me!

My New Favorite Place

Have you ever lived somewhere for years and driven past a road hundreds of times, always wondering what's down that road? Yep. Me too.

Each time I have driven out to our beach, which has been quite often in the course of thirty years, I have seen these roads disappearing to the north and the south. Until last month, I have never driven down any of them. These gravel roads lead to paradise. I probably shouldn't even be blogging about this fabulous find, but what I found is a mecca for exploration for any seven year old boy.

These roads lead to the hidden coves, inlets and estuaries of what is our beautiful Indian River Lagoon.

With water that is often only inches deep, there are large snails, horseshoe crabs and fish galore. The herons and egrets wade about in search of a meal and migratory birds sing in the bushes.

Of course it's also paradise for the adults as well because while the kids play, run, jump and explore, there is fishing from the canoe and knitting on shore.

I'm almost glad summer's almost here because I see a lot of hours being spent finding new spots down my new favorite hidden road.

Oh, and by the way, that's a sock even though it looks like a willy-warmer!

Monogamy Sucks!

If familiarity breeds contempt then I "contempt" this sweater. I will finish this if it kills me.

Once this bout of monogamy ends, I'm going to have some wild and crazy flings. Especially those "Nice to meet you. How 'bout a quickie?" kind of flings.

A Good Giggle

 A man and woman had been married for more than 60
 years. They had
 shared everything. They had talked about everything. They had kept no
 secrets from each other except that the little old woman had a shoe
 box in the top of her closet that she had cautioned her husband never to
 open or ask her about.
 
 
 
 


For all of these years, he had never thought about the box, but one
 day the little old woman got very sick and the doctor said she would not
 recover .
 


In trying to sort out their affairs, the little old man took down the
 shoe box and took it to his wife's bedside.
 
 She agreed that it was time that he should know what was in the box.
 When he opened it, he found two knitted bunnies and a stack of money
 totaling $95,000.
 
 He asked her about the contents. 'When we were to be married,' she
 said, ' my grandmother told me the secret of a happy marriage was to never
 argue. She told me that if I ever got angry with you, I should just keep
 quiet and knit a bunny.'
 
 The little old man was so moved; he had to fight back tears. Only two
 precious bunnies were in the box. She had only been angry with him two
times in all those years of living and loving. He almost burst with
happiness.
 
 'Honey,' he said, 'that explains the bunny, but what about all of this
 money?
 Where did it come from?'
 'Oh,' she said, 'that's the money I made from selling the bunnies.'


A Prayer.......
 Dear Lord, I pray for Wisdom to understand my man;
 Love to forgive him;
 And Patience for his moods;
 Because Lord, if I pray for Strength,
 I'll beat him to death, because I don't know how to knit.


The Post That Has Me Speechless

READY?




SET!




STEEKED!



That was SOOOO scary!

We All Live in a Yellow Submarine

As if buckets and buckets of rain isn't enough, school is canceled for the rest of the week! As Lizzy said, "Last Monday was just a dry run. Next Monday's the real start." How lucky am I to get to be that happy two Mondays in a row!

At 10:30 last night I was merrily knitting away, listening to the wind howl and the rain splash when all of a sudden there was that sickening pop and flash of a transformer blowing. Instant darkness. Out came the lanterns, on when the candles and since there was now absolutely nothing to do, I continued knitting.

This morning we fired up the generator and supplied coffee to neighbors. Nothing else to do but watch the rain and knit; that's definitly the upside to weather like this, but it is getting ridiculous!

Good deeds must pay because mid-afternoon our Angel of Mercy arrived in his chariot of silver bearing the initials FPL on the side. In no time we were up and running again!

As always after a power outage, I am struck by how much electricity we can absolutely do without and how very much we use without thinking.

 

Fay Fay Go Away!

So that's the bad news.

The good news is that I finished the Helena sweater which was my Ravelympics challenge! The fat lady can now sing!

This just in! 12:50 pm: Titusville in the eye of the storm!

Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

At the time it seemed like a good idea. Isn't that how it always begins?

Way, WAY back in June, I joined Ravelympics. The idea seemed good: Cast on a project with the opening ceremonies of the Olympics and complete that project by the closing ceremonies. I was actually going to use the 16 days to complete the long languishing Palette Fair Isle Sweater, but now that the temperatures average in the mid-nineties outside, the thought of a wool sweater draped across my lap is itchy, to say the least.

With that plan out, I have had to chose what to cast on.  A pair of socks? Haven't made any of those in a while. Another pair of fingerless mitts? My neighbor has asked for a pair. A tank top for myself? I've been wanting to make one.

At last I hit upon a project. Helena - that baby sweater dress! I have yet to make anything for my husband's beautiful little grandbaby, Ava. I don't consider myself "Grandma" personally, although I wouldn't not be too adverse to being "Grandma J" as in "Grandma J! In da house! Yo yo!" It's my rapper persona.

Good. Okay we're getting somewhere now. Let's look at the yarn stash. Lots of lace weight; no good. Oddles of sock weight; that won't cut it.
DK, DK...there's got to be some in here somewhere!

AHA! The KnitPicks Twist that I bought to make up Grumperina's Picovoli. That ought to do the trick, now to find just the right needles...

So I swatched:
I liked the sparkly colors, but the texture was a little rough. I was pleased at the thought of using yarn from my stash, but it wasn't quite baby enough.The finished sweater would be pretty, but it would have to be hand washed.
The gauge was off and both my #5 circs are tied up in Cat Gak.

Whine, whine, whine and off to the store I went.

I was torn between hoping for #5 circs and hoping for a Wal-Mart version of DK weight yarn that would be acceptable.

No needles there, but a machine-washable soft acrylic (is that an oxymoron?) that had potential was quickly in my cart.

And I swatched:
Soft enough. Baby enough. Machine washable. Guage correct. (Jeez, I sound like Goldilocks.)

Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a winner! Let the games begin and I'll knit until the fat lady sings!