Sunday, July 19, 2009

Why hello there!

Thanks to my six die hard followers who keep up with me even when I'm less than faithful about posting. You'd think nothing noteworthy was happening, but well, that's just not true!

Summer is in full swing here and (shhh don't tell anyone I said it) the last few days have been GORGEOUS. Warm but not hot, breezy, not too humid... almost like an LA summer! We've been enjoying time both indoors and out.

This weekend has been a quiet one. Wes was gone all day with friends, which gave me the time to wash and block quite a bit of what I've been up to lately. It also gave me time to tend to our garden, clean the house in anticipation of a houseguest next weekend, and of course, catch up on more t.v. and knitting.

So here are the projects:


The Pattern: Transition Hat, my adaptation of the Transition Gloves

The Yarn: Dale Baby Ulli in Black, Collinette Jitterbug in Salty Dog

The Needles: US 3's

The Verdict: Love it! This was a work in progress forever, and this month I finally just sat down and did it. It goes with the Twilight Mittens I posted here.


The Pattern: Clapotis

The Yarn: Collinette Jitterbug in Salty Dog

The Needles: US 6's

The Verdict: Another from the Work in Progress pile that sat forever, but was done in just a little over a week. Now I have a matched set with the two projects mentioned above.


The Pattern: Pooling Scarf, mine with a little help from Barbara Walker

The Yarn: Socks that Rock, Mediumweight, Colorway: Chapman Springs

The Needles: US 4's

The Verdict: This one took a little finesse. The scarf is knit width-wise so the first trick was figuring how many stitches to cast on (and in what pattern, on what needle size) so that I could get the colors to stack. I had some great help/guidance from the Ravelry community and I'm happy with this for my first try. Next up... a pooling stole!


I also had a 4th project, but leave it to me to ruin it in the washing. (It wasn't pretty... I don't want to talk about it).

What's next? Oh yes: the garden!

We have a variety of green peppers:


Several Jalapenos:


And we harvested our carrots! (They're kind of small but tasted great!)


Otherwise we've seen Transformers (Punk ass decepticons!) and I've caught up and finished Harry Potter Book 7. I've got a new shawl and a new sweater on the needles, as well as a second sock and a wrap in the works. And I've re-vamped what I'm doing for our wedding afghan (which apparently won't make our first anniversary either!). Otherwise we're loving summer and the extra daylight.

More soon!

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Sunday, July 05, 2009

Independence Day


This weekend we headed down to my in-laws' place to celebrate the holiday. We started out by making Friday a lazy morning, and headed out early afternoon. After purchasing a new kayak for Wes, we drove over to Manhattan, Kansas.

On the way there, Wes suggested that we stop in Wamego, a town best known for housing THE Wizard of Oz Museum. Thought we didn't tour the museum, we visited the yarn shop a few doors down, Settler's Farm. I'm trying not to buy but I did come away with a few goodies. We also visited the Oz Winery. We got to taste a few wines and came home with a citrusy white, "Witch Gone Good," and two bottles of an excellent port, "Lion's Courage."


On Saturday we waited out the clouds and mid-morning headed over to Millford lake to take the boat out. We cruised through several coves, and boated around Mrs. Goose Island, where Wes and my MIL were itching to climb aboard and search for a geocache (they went back this morning and nabbed it!). Although it was cloudy, the water and the day were warm and it was a fun ride.


Towards the end Wes decided to give the new kayak a run. I stuck with letting the motorboat do the work!

After the lake we headed out for some BBQ. Then we hung out at home until late in the evening when we set off fireworks and became mosquito food.

Now we're home and conquering Mt. Laundry. I'm knitting and trying to get a handle on my unfinished works in progress. I could use another day of vacation... how about you?

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