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Yesterday, I was reading that clever Geane's entry on machine-stitching the shaping into her latest WIP, and it sounded like such a great idea to me that I'm going to borrow it, and machine-stitch out the bit of extra material I've created in the Giant Latvian Mitten Cardigan remaining sleeve. From yesterday's entry, you can see that the motif enlargement isn't significantly visual, so I'm gonna finish that sleeve up and correct it via Geane's method. Plan B, of course, was to rip the thing out and restart it, but I feel ready to move on. I want to finish the whole thing over the long weekend, and since, after the sleeve, all that's left to do is crochet the front steek and then work a round of EZ-applied I-cord around the whole thing, I expect I'll be able to. Yeah!

Isn't the knitting blog-ring wonderful? I love it that knit-bloggers are so generous with their information. I'm sure knitters on e-knitting lists are too, but I seem to find what I need much more readily from knit-bloggers. Thank you, Geane!

Bug News

Elizabeth identified the creature from my backyard (and now in my nightmares) as an Assassin Bug. Ewww. Thanks, Elizabeth, for your research.

Pup News

The pups are still adorable! While Mike and Jack have been as tentative as I about our new surroundings, Della is thriving on it. She has most definitely elected herself Queen of Texas Backyards. Here she is, talking very sassy after an afternoon romp:

Do you have a long weekend in store? We do, and we intend to make the most of it. We'll be wishing you a wonderful one! See you next week!

Unbelievable

It's the Sleeve That Refused To Be Finished. Despite my best efforts, we are still working on that final sleeve from the Giant Latvian Mitten Cardigan (from WoolGathering #67). I noticed yesterday evening that my gauge had inexplicably and noticeably changed: can I have gone from being an uptight East-Coaster to a laid-back Texan so quickly? No. I have knitted the top of the sleeve with a full size larger needle. That accursed plastic purple Susan Bates needle. I'm going to have to think about this. In the meantime, you can admire the Mysterious Uninterrupted Motif that runs across the body of the sweater down to the needles. Lovely, isn't it!

Warning! Not for the Squeamish!!

The following contains a graphic image of a Horrible Monster Science Fiction-Sized Bug. Lock your cow!

Yesterday, without warning, a Texas-sized Bug appeared on my computer screen, right at the same moment as I was dealing with some email. I think I might have preferred a virus-type bug. What would your choice be?

Gack!!! Did you ever??? I never!!! Luckily, I was able to seal the room off from the rest of the house until Sister could come over and escort it outside. Do you have a sister who would do such an heroic and herculean task? My sister is the Best.

EEEK! I'm overcome just by showing you the photo she took of the bug. Heebie-Jeebies!!! See you tomorrow! Have a bug-free Thursday!

Is It Finished Yet?

Mikey has just about given up hope that the remaining sleeve to the Giant Latvian Mitten Cardigan (from WoolGathering #67) will ever be finished.

I myself have been curious about what is taking so long on this sleeve. I've put all other projects aside, including mice, socks, and unpacking, just to finish, and yet it still seems as if it is un-knitting itself at night while we sleep.

Could this be the culprit?

This is an ancient Susan Bates plastic circular needle; resurrected from my knitting basket when I broke the Susanne's ebony I was using (moving van casualty). I didn't think I was a needle snob, but it does seem to have a lot of drag. I'm going to have to search out an Addi Turbo today, I think, and I'm rather vexed about that, since I still tend to get lost while running errands and each errand turns into a two-hour driving marathon. Yes. I do have a poor sense of direction.

Oh. Well.

While we wait to see the finished cardigan, Della would like to share her impression of a squirrel with you.

Have a lovely Wednesday, all! See you tomorrow!

Moving Right Along

Why are the normal rules of time and space suspended when you are working on the final sleeve of a cardigan? The more I knit on the remaining sleeve of the Giant Latvian Mitten Cardigan (WoolGathering #67), the shorter the sleeve seems to remain. Time-warps notwithstanding, I am determined to finish the cardigan this week, because I have a number of projects that I want to start. Oh! Unexpected synchronicity tidbit: Turns out my GLMC colors are the same as the University of Texas' colors . . . in particular, the rusty orange. Cool! If it is ever cool enough to wear this here, I'll look tres Longhorn-ish.

Signs of Life as We Knew It

Yesterday, Sister took me to an excellent place: Austin's Central Market. This place is the most similar to my favorite store in the NE, and so I am happy at last in my new city. When we arrived, fresh Hatch chile peppers from New Mexico were roasting, and the smell was divine! I splurged on Hatch Scones, tender savory delicious scones full of tiny Hatch pepper bits.
Luscious, simply luscious.

Blathering

Hmm. Lots of blathering in today's entry. Look for a photo update on the Giant Latvian Mitten Cardigan tomorrow. I think I'll go stuff some mice now, while I wait for Central Market to open.

Wishing you a very good Tuesday! Mike, Jack, and Della say, Have a Puppy Party Today!

Busy!

The pups and I had a satisfyingly busy weekend; how was yours? Perfect in every way, we hope. After taking five hours to run errands on Saturday, owing to much getting lost driving around while trying to figure out access roads, I decided I was too frazzled-looking to meet local knitters at the LYS. I hope to appear, in a more presentable manner, next weekend. Need some knitter contact! It is taking me awhile to get the lay of the land here. Luckily, with an entire roomful of stash yarn, there have been no yarn-emergencies.

So. I worked on the sock:

I worked on the Giant Latvian Mitten Cardigan (from WoolGathering #67):

And I worked on a heap of mousies:

That plus walking the pups around the new neighborhood in the heat left me pretty exhausted . . . can it be that I was too old to make a major move like this? My transition seems to be taking longer than I expected. For instance, where I lived before, in the NE, I could go to the market, drop off cleaning, do my banking, visit the post office, and have coffee at the diner, all in one city block. Here, well, not only is everything bigger, it's farther apart, too. Much farther apart.

Luckily, the pups have been very resilient. Here's Della supervising Everything this weekend:

and Mike looking Goofy from the heat:

Actually, I went around with this same expression of Mike's most of the weekend . . . too much heat. Nevertheless, we are wishing you a wonderful and not-too-exciting Monday. see you tomorrow!

Friday? Yeah!

Hiho dear knitters and knitbloggers, isn't Friday the most wonderful invention ever? Even though I'm not working yet, Friday still signals an end to a work week, and as the empty boxes can attest, I've been working on getting settled in. Curiously, it's affected my knitting; can't seem to get back in the groove. But since shortly it's the weekend, I'm hoping to legitimately sprawl in the a/c and knit away my cares.

In the meantime, since idle hands are, well, you know...I found a ball of Muskoka merino in the stash and started on my pile of Mousathon mice for Lucy. Mike, Jack, and Della think this is an awesome project, and I agree. Here's my nice little wooly stack so far.

Pre-stuffed, they rather resemble some of the bugs I've seen flying around here. However. I figure from this one ball of Muskoka, I can make a gazillion meece. Wish me luck, because the rescue-kitties all deserve a mouse. Wendy's received over 100 mice so far . . . what's your total?

In Sock News, the flourescent Opal sock rumbles along, and this weekend is my promised GLMCardigan knitting-time. Also, I'm hoping to be able to meet up with local knitters at the LYS on Saturday...that's probably just the tonic I need to feel a little less scattered. I hope you have a restorative weekend awaiting. Drink plenty of water! And send virtual belly-rubs to the pups.

Happy Day!

My birthday was practically perfect in every way; thank you for your birthday wishes! The weather was fine, my mom came to visit, and my nephew took me to dinner at his favorite restaurant (accompanied by his charming parents), and I had awesome cake! Plus pie for breakfast! Such riches!

Here's where Geoffrey took me:

and here's Geoffrey with his parents:

Am I lucky or what? Not only does Katz' "never klose" but they have something rare in Austin: chopped liver on rye! A totally blissful meal was enjoyed by all, especially me.

Sock News:

I had time while waiting for Mother to arrive to finish up the gusset on my nearly-dayglow Opal.

While the self-patterning has been very consistent right up through turning the heel, suddenly, at the top of the foot, the patterning broke, and I now have a big blue and acid-green Rorschach pattern.

Very curious. Opal does this now and again in my experience; I guess my expectations were raised with the perfectly matching Fortissima Colori socks I finished earlier this week. I could break the yarn and and reknit, but what are the odds the pattern would still be broken? I'm just going to enjoy as is.

Pup News:

The heat! Amazing! Here's how the pups look in the middle of the day when we go outside to survey the backyard:

They can hardly wait to get back inside, where we have the a/c cranked to a comfortably arctic temperature. As each day passes, we are able to stand more and more of the sunshine, but our primary forays are still very early in the a.m. and late in the evening, when it's only about 94 degrees.

Sister made me the most extraordinary gift; it's a re-purposed book that is filled with her memories of me. Since she was only four when I left home for my adventures, it's a real treasure. I tried to photograph it this morning, since it's hard to imagine, but the photo was too dark. I'll try again when it's sunnier, 'cause I'd like you to see it. It's marvelous.

Speaking of marvelous, the pups and I hope you have a completely marvelous day. It's nearly Friday, and this weekend is my designated free-time to return to the Giant Latvian Mitten Cardigan. Oh! The excitement!!!

Tra-la, Tra-lee

Happy Birthday! Oh WAIT!!! It's my birthday too!!! Happy birthday to us!

No matter how old I get, I can't help loving my birthday and the solar return to my particular time of being born into the universe. And the solar-stuff is pretty spectacular here in Texas. My, yes, lots of sunshine. The pups and I are more and more acclimated to the incredible heat every day, my sister is only a few minutes away, and therefore, I pronouce Life is Good! Let the mariachis play!

Sock News:

Here's the Opal sock that grows on me the more I knit.

Pretty festive, eh? Well. That's it for sock news. Would you like to make some paper trout to decorate your cubicle? Oh go on! Do it!

Mikey wishes you an excellent day. We're off to the diner to eat pie for breakfast. Enjoy, and we'll see you tomorrow!

Coming Along Nicely

The prodigal Giant Latvian Mitten Cardigan has returned! At least, I know how to get to it now. My helpers last week put the box---right! you guessed it!!!--on the bottom of a 8-foot tall stack of boxes. Boxes full of books! Today's task is to empty those boxes so that I can recover my knitting, along with my ball winder, swift, extra skeins of GLMC wool, and the book I was reading. Okay! Things are definitely looking up.

Nephew News

Last night I was invited by Sister and my excellent nephew to ride along and observe Geoff's boxing class at the local Y. I was thrilled, because having been away on the East Coast for so long, I hadn't been able to see exciting stuff like this. I went to bed thinking there was nothing better than being able to watch your very own nephew doing his thing. And doing it very well, too.

Cool. Stuff like this makes the past three weeks seem like they were nothing. Nothing at all.

Pup News

The pups met their new neighbors yesterday; and the neighbors were not completely charmed by our three dachshunds. Much barking ensued.

Knitting News

I can stop knitting compulsively on that acid-green Opal sock since the GLMC has nearly turned up! The color is starting to grow on me, though...I'll show you a picture tomorrow morning.

Until then, stay cool and have a most enjoyable Tuesday. And as always, thank you for your wonderfully supportive comments.

Slo-o-wly Adjusting

The pups and I are slowing adjusting to our new digs; my goodness! moving this far has made me feel rather old, although my 29-15th birthday is only two days away. . . maybe that's the reason instead. Sister has been a big help in making us feel more at home here. I can find my way to the grocery store all by myself now, for example! I feel extraordinarily lucky to have such an excellent sister. And I only live a few blocks away from her now.

A move like this seems to require more adjustment than I previously thought, however, and we've been busily gathering g ourselves together for an entire week now, with only a few complaints, mostly from Little Jack.

He's still ticked off because they don't allow pets at Graceland.

The pups still seem rather uncertain about it all, but as of yesterday, they'd begun to be a little more curious about exploring their new backyard.

I'm curious about my new backyard, too, but there is still quite a bit of unpacking and organizing going on inside the house. For one thing, the box with the Giant Latvian Mitten Cardigan inside it has still not surfaced . . . I hope it turns up in today's festival of arrival. I'm hoping, too, that I can visit the LYS next weekend, where Cyndilou reports there is a Knitting Circle from 2 to 4 pm. It will be grand to sit with some local knitters! In the meantime, while not much too much knitting has been happening, I did finish the socks for Walking in Central Park for my colleague in NYC. I'm going to search out a Post Office and mail them off today. Here's a photo of the finished socks (looking remarkably similar to Anne's).

Mine look a little oddly stretched, compared to Anne's, because mine were still on the sockblockers when I took the photo:

I've cast on some more socks, this time in an acid green-ish Opal, to stave off the growing distress I feel while I search for my GLMCardigan, which is only missing 1/2 a sleeve to be finished, wherever it's hiding.

So! It's still dark here! On the shore in NJ, we'd have been up in the daylight for an hour already . . . the pups and I wish you a sunny bright day wherever you are this morning! Have a great Monday, and we'll see you tomorrow.

Hi-ho, Knitpals!

Hello knit-bloggers, I'm finally back online, and catching up around the blogosphere . . . my goodness! What a lot of pretty knitting has been happening while I've been moving!

The pups and I are still up to our asters in boxes and move-in stuff, and our knitting output has woefully suffered while we transition to our new home. But we're here! Safe and sound! And looking forward to resuming knitting and blogging and blogging and knitting on Monday.

Thank you for all your kind thoughts! The pups and I send hugs and woofs and will see you bright and early on the 18th.

Happy Friday to you, and our best wishes for your most wonderful weekend ever!

See you in about a week, knittin' partners!

Box by Box West

Hey! I already have an offer on my house! and I'm not even out of it yet! On the market for less than eight hours, and I have an adorable young couple who just love it, and they even have a dog! I hope this works out.

While my son and I were busy packing up the remaining boxes yesterday, the pups got haircuts for Texas:

They want to be able to blend in with the other Texas dogs. Think it will work?

In knitting news, I got my sock back on track; as Rachael mentioned in her comment yesterday, I too had forgotten to turn the heel before picking up the gusset stitches. She turned hers into a cat-toy; mine are for a friend who walks in Central Park every morning, and I don't have a cat, so there was nothing to do but rip it, rip it good.

Happy Wednesday, everyone! Tomorrow's entry will be the last one until next week. Della says Get a Haircut!

Momentum

Things are really speeding up on the moving front; this is how Della greets everyone and every new thing:

The dachshund universe is spinning wildly out of control despite my best efforts, and so we have lots of barking and lots of teeth showing here throughout the day. Poor pups! Everytime they hide under a piece of furniture, someone picks that piece of furniture up and moves it--not to annoy the dachshunds, but just to move whatever it is into the truck.

However, they're a sunny bunch, so luckily recovery time is fast. And when it's not raining, they play outside, hunting for cicadas and the occasional catapiller.

Owing to a knitting bungle on my part, we have no knitting news today. Well, we have some news, but it's the wrong kind...for the first time ever in my prodigious sock knitting career, I actually bungled the gusset! So if I want these socks to continue matching, I need to knit back and correct an historic error. In other knitting news, the box with the Giant Latvian Mitten Cardigan inside it has refused to surface...it's around here somewhere, missing only half a sleeve.

This blog entry is the second-to-last I will be making this week, until the move is accomplished. I expect to be back on line toward the middle of next week (around the 13th). So until Thursday (7 August), let's look at one of my previous favorites in the pups-photos dept., where Mikey checks the Yellow Pages for the local SPCA number:

Happy Tuesday, everyone...have a stress-free day!

Sock the Casbah

When I finished the first sock of Fortissima Colori #9070, I broke the yarn after grafting the toe stitches and cast on with the new end for the mate. Check out the matching stripes:

What clever yarn, eh? Who knew? It seems practically magical to me. And yes! I am easily entertained! I had planned on taking these socks on the road, but want to finish them now that I have some exciting new road-knitting to happily anticipate.

Pack the Casbah

Mostly, we're up to our asters in boxes here in preparation of the move. But there's always time for goofing off on the Internet! Did you know that when you go to Mapquest and request a map, the map returned has a tab at the top for an aerial photo? Cool! Here's a photo of my new neighborhood:

I think I can see Sister waving to us . . . wave to Laura, everyone!

The pups are staying pretty calm and collected while we pack up their fiefdom; Jack even manages a smile:

We send our best wishes for your Happiest. Monday. Ever.
See you tomorrow!

Mmmm....Friday

Isn't consistency wonderful? I'm always happy when the workweek comes to its inevitable end and it's Friday once more. Consistency in our scheduled lives is a great thing, and sometimes I think I'd happily stay in a rut for Routine. On the other hand, things that are growing change, and there's nothing like the feeling of a fresh adventure.

I've been leaving some clues for you in my Cryptic Dept. blog entries for several days, but the countdown has begun here, so I'd like to reveal some personal news. Thursday next, this blog is relocating!

The pups and I are breaking up with the Jersey Shore and embarking on the pursuit of some excellent personal opportunities that (Oh! What glorious good fortune!!!) are located only a few minutes from Sister! She and I haven't lived within 3000 miles of one another in 30 years, and so I'm deliriously happy with the prospect of being near her. I'm planning on knitting socks, hats, and whatever else her heart desires to match her Skull Vest. And, I'll get to be a soccer-auntie to my nephew! Awesome!

I'll be making entries right up to Thursday, and then will be offline for a few days. More details will follow, of course, as will more knitting. But I wanted you to be the first to know.

Have an excellent weekend, y'all, and remember, change is good! As soon as I remember what box I put the Giant Latvian Mitten Cardigan in, I'll work on the remaining sleeve and give you an update photo. See you Monday!