Thursday, July 28, 2005

Spiral Scarf

The spiral scarf is completed. A bit of advise here, the pattern I used called for 90 stitches cast on, but because the daughter I made it for likes scarves long I cast on 109 - it's a bit overkill. Unless the person wearing it is very tall I would stick to the 90 stitches called for.

Here to model it for you is our great-neice Kaylee who proudly announced today that she has a birthday soon and she will be four.

Two other scarves are now on the needles, and the wool bag has been frogged past the design I'm struggling with. I've enlisted the advise of a couple of people who have much more experience knitting than I do so I'm hoping to be back to the bag soon.

Wednesday, July 27, 2005

New MSN Group

I've just started an MSN group called "NorthernCaliforniaKnitters" with the plan that it will become a valuable resource tool for those of us in the area, and those who plan to visit the area. One of my first tasks will be to start a listing of yarn stores in Northern California. This is not intended to be free advertising, rather a source to help us find stores to visit as we travel as well as to find yarns not available in our immediate area.

I'm not familiar with MSN groups, so bear with me as I learn. I considered using Yahoo groups but found there were so many groups there already I felt the group might be lost in the shuffle. However, I noticed that MSN doesn't have a listing at all for knitting groups (which I've brought to their attention) thus we may not be easily found there. In any case, I'll give it a reasonable amount of time and if we don't pick up enough members, or if their site doesn't give the group what it needs I can make a decision at that time what needs to be done.

I hope you'll visit us, even if you're not from Northern California. Please spread the word about this new group. The more members we have the more resources we can share. You'll find us at;

http://groups.msn.com/NorthernCaliforniaKnitters

Tuesday, July 26, 2005

Monday, Monday!

The time was, back when I retired that I thought Monday would be like any other day of the week. I retired in 2001, just over 4 years ago, but still Mondays cause me to want to crawl into my shell.

Today started out lazy as a result of last night's weather not really cooling down thus making it very uncomfortable to sleep. It continued at the grocery store as people dawdled in the middle of aisles, in front of the yogurt, in front of the eggs. It seemed everyone was too hot to hurry, and too many of us were looking for the same or similar items. Mind you I've become quite patient with others, after all I have no place to rush to, and even when I do I usually have more time on my hands than money in my pockets. My only reason for bringing it up was to point out that Monday's don't seem to change all that much just because one reaches the age of being eligible for retirement.

Retirement does give me time to knit more than the average number of hours a working person could spend. Tonight the needles kept me from being bored out of my mind as re-run after re-run of my hubby's favorite shows came on. I finished the last increase row of a spiral scarf I'm making for one of the daughters. She chose Lang's Fox in a mixed color and Filatura Di Crosa's Saint Tropez, color 103, to be held together through out. Pictures will be added soon.

Tomorrow I must get back to the bag I'm making for a "knit exchange". I've tried something I've not done before and I'm not happy with the outcome. I don't think I'll go so far as to frog it, but I need to do some pulling and pushing to get it the way I want it! I've put off working on it for a few days, but can't continue to procrastinate!

The kittens next door are adorable. There are 3 calico, 2 black and white, and one orange tabby whose feet look like they're going to be white. The calico's won't have as much color as ours calico girl, but they'll be adorable anyway.
Meet "SweetPea". We got her as a stray someone advertised in the paper as "black, white, and orange cat needs home!" Knowing full well she would be calico we went to look at her and found her to be very standoffish. Her coat was rather ragged, and she was thin, with a sore on her foot that wasn't healing properly. I'd barely opened my mouth to say "I think we'll pass on her" when my hubby said "We'll take her!" We immediately had her immunized, fixed and put on a quality dry cat food and she's as healthy as can be. Though she suffers with ear mites continually, so if anyone knows any great remedies, my ears are open. She's been with us now for about 5 years and she's a sweet as her name. Though don't rely on the local blue jays for references. They've been giving her a very difficult time these days.

It's nearly morning so I'll head for bed.
Sweet dreams and God Bless you one and all.

Shelly

Saturday, July 23, 2005

Other CO's

I began knitting on March 1 of 2005, thanks to the able instructions of my friend Laurie. I've made several scarves, a pair of socks (though they're more like slippers), a shawl, and a felted purse so far. This multi-color scarf is my very first project. The colors in this photo aren't accurate, it's much more muted when you see the real thing.

I'll share a few pictures with you here. For more you can see them in my Yahoo album at this link. http://babyurl.com/s66ISU

This one is made with Crystal Palace Waikiki Painted Iris. I love this yarn and have made other scarves with the same yarn in different colors.


The scarf above is a ribbon yarn called Aquarius. The one on the right, shown in progress, is made of black acrylic and fancy fur held together throughout.

This purse is a felted one made from Cascade 220.

Cell phone cozy




I just finished these. I wanted a cell phone cozy for my new cell phone. The picture on the right is the back of the cell phone cozy, where I added a kangaroo pouch for the earpiece. It's my own creation, made to fit my Nokia 6010 cell phone. The top of it is crocheted and the strap is made from three strands of 1/8th inch ribbon in different colors braided together. The yarn is Lily Sugar Babies 100% cotton in baby blue.

The eyeglass case was made from a children's knitting instruction book by Anne Akers Johnson. It's made from Red Heart supersaver in Pinata colorway.

Bear with me! I'm new to this

In the next few days I'll be setting up my new blog. Please check back!