Like The Queen

2010-10-10T16:46:00.002-04:00

Time for a Cool Change

In 2003 I created LikeTheQueen, and for the first 5 years I made almost daily posts to it. In those days I had no digital camera and only a flatbed scanner so I tried to paint word pictures for people to see what was happening in the Life-0-Bess at TheCastle. You have read with me through my AdventuresInSpinning, A Trip to England, the early years of the Knitters Review Retreat, Maryland Sheep and Wool, and a host of other fiberish travels. You've know how I met BD, you've seen pictures of LD, you've been with me through weddings and funerals and you all know about the Wheat Dolphins.

By the time Blogger moved to the New Blogger - LikeTheQueen was so big it wouldn't transfer to the new format. And this newer, supposedly easier to use format turned out to be NotSoEasy for me. I've fiddled with it on and off for the past year and haven't yet figured out if I like it or not. But lately some faithful readers have complained that the old blog triggers a virus warning when they log on. The e-mail account I used to start that blog was compromised many times and I finally abandonded it for a @gmail address. I believe it is time, now, to lay LikeTheQueen 1 aside for the LikeTheQueen2. I believe, my friends, that it is time for a cool change.

Come see me at the NEW CASTLE

CLICK HERE

2010-09-23T06:56:00.002-04:00

FO

Here is that completed lace sock I knit for Spirit Trail. You can see it at her booth in Rhinebeck next month.

Now it's time to finish up that shawl collared vest - and the other two summertime UFOs in my bag-0-shame. But after that I believe I will use the lace stitch in this sock to make a pair of gloves. I've been wanting to try that i-cord glove technique of Meg Swansen's. I've got the yarn, I've got the stitch, I've got the needles, thanks to a wonderful BD who bought me the entire set of StitchBerry wooden circular needles for my birthday.

Btw. The size zero join is not as smooth as all the other sizes ... but lawsee - they go up to something like size 15!! all with silky wooden tips and smooth joins. There is a winter full of comfortable knitting up ahead.

Ta!

2010-09-21T15:13:00.002-04:00

It's My Birthday

and as of 3:16 in the afternoon, I am having the best most splendid one ever. There have been phone calls and cards and presents. There has been some productive work (always makes a Virgo feel good to have a bit of productivity in her day) but I am also skipping out a wee bit early to play with loved ones, of the 2 legged variety and the 4.

And just in case you want to see where I am when I am just about to go home from work - on a birthday - Here is the view from my desk.

J has 10 on Tuesday blogpost today and it's about birthdays - that led me to Carol who's 10 are surely worth reading.

But my 10 on Tuesday Birthday list would include

Have some Great Coffee first thing in the morning
Be present - be where your tribe is - and give them a chance to wish you Happy Birthday - because, hearing the words makes it so Make sure you've bought yourself a treat - because you ought to love yourself at least as much as you love everyone you also give presents to
Dress up. Wear something that makes you feel sparkly
Hug someone you love
Don't cook - unless you want to
Remember the things you did the past year that you are proud of
Think of something wonderful you'd like to do while you are this year's age
Thank your mom (or your parents)for giving you birth
Eat Cake
Come back next year for another one

2010-09-19T07:34:00.003-04:00

Lack of Knitting Progress

I find it odd that I will start a project, knit away on it like a fiend, get almost done and then come to a crashing halt. It isn't strange to me if I know I've skimped on the KnittingMath and am making something for a smaller, slimmer version of myself. Waiting for that splendid day when I am the size I want to be - the size that fits the garment I've knitted. Sure. That makes sense. But to just crash to a halt on something that's almost done and will be exactly what it should be is a little puzzling. It reminds me of all the homework I didn't do as a child. I could do the homework. It was neither hard nor even onerous. Often it was fun. But it was required. I had to do it. I believe that, for the ENFPers out there -those of us who really get no glory from completion - crashing into those last 6 inches of knitting is a constant and ubiquitous danger.

I did get the heel done on the green lace sock that is due by Friday - you will see it at Rhinebeck if you go there - a sample sock for Spirit Trail Fiberworks. but I don't have photos. Yet. I promise one will show up before the week is out.

Birthday gifts have begun showing up in the mailbox. The package from Schoolhouse Press that was delivered on Saturday has to be from LD because it was addressed to Bess Haile and when I have to use my own credit card I have to use my given name by which I am known to the IRS. Nicknames are always such a conundrum because they are nearly always who we think we are, who all our friends think we are and yet - they are never on any official documents to prove that we actually are who we think we are.

Ahh well. Obviously when I get down to nattering about nicknames it is obvious I have nothing valuable to say. And since I have no knitting progress photos to make today's post interesting I would do better to go knit instead of write. Or vacuum. Yes. That is probably more necessary than even lace sock knitting. But there will be Finished Objects to display within the week. Till then - how about a cute kid taking a whack at it photo

2010-09-16T06:53:00.002-04:00

P R O C R A S T I N A T I O .... oh I think I'll finish that later

If I have a besetting sin, it is procrastination. Hmmm. Perhaps others might say I have other flaws, but I am talking about a defect that gets in my way. I am not talking about other people's happiness. My bedeviling imp is procrastination and I have been giving some serious attention to it the past few weeks.

In the back of my head I hear Carly Simon singing

Procrastination, procrastina ay tion

Is makin' me late

Is keepin' me waitin'

And I think about how much of my life sits on hold waiting for me to get going - and not getting going. It happens in my work life, in my household management, my physical health, my knitting ... I am positive that procrastination is what makes us amass so much stash. If I knit as much as I shopped I would probably have a wardrobe of sweaters and an empty chimney.

I've been working hard in my job to follow Ivy Lee's advice to Charles Schwab - to write down, at the end of the day, the 6 most important things I have to do to get where I want to be in work life and the next day start with #1, and work only on that till I finish. Then move on to #2. At the end of the day, whatever is still on the list goes to the top of the next day's list.

I have to say -that is helping me get a LOT done and moves me to new places where I get to do new and different things - until

Until, that is, I hit something I know needs to get done and I don't want to do -or am afraid I will fail at. and boy - then can I procrastinate! And boy is it stupid to do that - because the suffering of procrastination manifests itself in anticipation ... of the ax falling on my head. It always looms heavier than it really is - that Dread Activity. Yesterday I punched through that paper wall of fear and went out soliciting donations for a project I'm working on and the ease with which I succeeded really made me feel stupid. Acting instead of procrastinating also helped me see that I really had wasted 2 beautiful fat rich days of productivity. Had I acted instead of cowered, imagine how much I could have accomplished this week.

Ah well. Interesting place to be, right here, feeling good about accomplishments and foolish about tossing away rich hours of my life by playing with fake fears.

Let's hope I slowly (but surely) wean myself from the procrastination bug.

Now - where is that green lace sock I want to finish by next Friday .....?

2010-09-13T07:54:00.002-04:00

Progress

Here are some photos of that shawl collared vest. I was surprised to see how little I got done this week till I remembered how freaking hot it was the first half of the week. I had Other Knitting to do - well, who doesn't always have OK2Do? - so I was busy enough, but I would really really really like to cut those steeks tomorrow. Can I knit 5 inches today & tomorrow? If I pack my lunch and knit through lunch hour? If I stay up late? get up early? Well. we'll just have to see.

But for now - voila!

Here's a profile view. You can see how the decreases for the V-neck are making it narrower and note how the right side bulges forward like a nice fat barrel? That's caused by the short row bust darts.

A front-on view shows the extra fabric those bust darts created

With a bit of newspaper stuffing you can see a more realistic view of the whole shape

Here's a side view against the background of the screened porch - since BD was so kind as to sweep it.

So. Rather than chatter here some more, I will see if I can knock out a few more rows of this sweater before I go to work. Happy progress this week, now that Mercury is no longer retrograde.

2010-09-12T07:31:00.005-04:00

Hitting the books at Schoolhouse Press

Warning - Long Post

It's September, and along with it being TheBirthdayMonth!!! it's back to school for vast numbers of folk and it feels like it should be back to school for many of the rest of us. Only over the past year or two have I begun to loose that urge to buy New Notebooks and Pencils, a fresh box of crayons and new shoes. And I've only begun to loose it – it's not all the way gone yet.

But with the change in routines, and this year, with the advent of crisp days (after a summer of unimaginable heat and drought) my knitting juju has surged to the forefront. First came the stash winnowing, the upstairs bedroom stash winnowing, that is. Then came the familiar and oh so pleasurable longing to get to know my knitting library again. Like reuniting with classmates after a summer spent at Camp Far-Away, opening up these old friends was joy filled, intriguing, and stimulating. I rarely knit something in a book or magazine but I will use elements of other people's work in something I've adapted or even created myself. I have a fairly substantial library divided into three sections:

Techniques and stitch patterns,
Strictly Pattern Books, and
lordy – 4 feet of back issues of knitting magazines.

Whenever I need to prime the pump of my imagination, I've got the supplies. An afternoon spent perusing these treasures will have me soaring with creativity.

I've never kept a wish list of books I want to buy – trusting to serendipity to reveal to me ThatWhichMustBeBought, but a chance comment on KR prompted me to peek into the book list at Schoolhouse Press and Oh My. So many opportunities to indulge! And so, perhaps I shall list these objects of desire and ponder out loud about them.

Starting from the top – with New Titles:

Knit One Knit All (January) Elizabeth Zimmermann's garter stitch designs
Well. Oh. Dear me. Meg promises that there are EZ geometric miracles that we've never seen before. These will not just be new interpretations of her already revealed masterpieces. This will be a Must Own – although I am not a big fan of garter stitch. Not because I don't adore how it looks. I think it's gorgeous. But it is slow. Not as slow as seed stitch, which, as a combination knitter, isn't all that slow. But it is slow. The rows are just so short compared to the stitches that to knit garter stitch in anything smaller than worsted weight yarn takes forEVER. Ah well. I shall buy this for the library and later, if I must own it, I shall.

Diagonal Knitting by Katherine Cobey

Oh. Well. There is nothing more to say except that it will be delivered to me as a slightly late birthday gift from me to me. It won't be out till October but I can wait. I have a lust and longing and passion to explore diagonal knitting more deeply. I have already got the yarn I intend to knit into a diagonal sweater with plain sleeves. This was an irresistible no-brainer.

Spinning Around: spinning, dyeing & knitting the classics by Jeannine Bakriges
There were a couple of buzzwords in that title that got me itching to turn the pages: Spinning, knitting classics – yeah – I'd really love to have a look at this book, but I will probaby resist purchasing it. Mostly because I have a LOT of solid material about classical knitting and shaping. But I will look through it. My mind is quite capable of being changed, given the right stimulus.

The Complete book of Traditional Knitting by Rae Compton.
As above – I probably could resist this, but again – there is a tempting statement in the description “classic knitting books are being reprinted in such great number”. Goes in the curious about pile.

Norwegian Patterns for Knitting – Mette Handberg
oh. well. I am a complete sucker for norwegian knitting – I so seriously heart stranded colorwork, be it Norwegian, Faroese, Shetland, Turkish, Peruvian or my own home grown designs. I just drool at the thought of lavish all over stranded patterns. But, I peeked at some inner pages on Amazon dot com and wasn't sure there were enough patterns that I ached to own to justify buying it. I'll look through it at some autumnal woolish gathering and decide then. I already own a LOT of stranded colorwork knitting patterns – including Alice Starmore's Fair Isle Knitting. I don't own a LOT of bookshelves.

Portuguese Style of Knitting – Andrea Wong
The cover photo is of designs in knit and purl stitches a la Gansey knitting. I am alwayslooking for ideas, patterns and stimulation about simple knit and purl designs. This may have to come live here in VA with me, but I will have to look through it first. Many a cover photo lured me in to a disappointing purchase.

EZ's Tomten Jacket – gang at Schoolhouse Press
I want, first, to have a look at all the EZ/MS books I have easy access to. If one of their hardback books has an adult Tomten Jacket knit in something smaller than 3.5 stitches per inch I will pass on this. But that option to knit this for any size in any yarn is a great temptation and if I don't' have that information elsewhere, I will buy it.

Omas Srickgeheimnisse – Erika Eichenseer et al
Okay – these are the Bait Words in the description: “Not new, but back in stock after a long lapse! This wonderful book contains some spectacular and unique stitch patterns for both lace and texture; some of which I had never seen before” HA! If MS hasn't seen these stitches ... they must be unique. Who cares about how tricky the charts are. New stitches! I mean – New Stitches. Yeah.

The Haapsalu Shawl - from Estonia
Well now. I have already put in a birthday present request for Knitted Lace of Estonia to the sort of friend who will actually buy me what I asked for. I am not sure I need this shawl book – but I certainly want to look it over.

Twisted-Stitch Knitting — Maria Erlbacher
I love twisted stitches and I do always think of Austria and Switzerland and Tyrolean elves on mountainsides when I see them. And Meg & Amy Detjen have worked to make the material in this book American Friendly. Very tempting.

Sweater 101: How to Plan Sweaters that Fit —Cheryl Brunette
Glorious knitting and magnificent patternwork aside, fit is, in fact, the most important part of knitting a garment. If I look like a lumbering troll in a garment I will never wear it. I notice that people are willing to cut an unflattering garment a lot of slack if it's handknit – especially if it is elaborately hand knit. I will not. No amount of artistry is enough to make me display myself unflatteringly. I've seen Cheryl Brunette's video on finishing and I am completely confident that she can teach me things I don't know but need to. In fact, I believe there is a Perfect Angel Baby Darling Only Son who would like to buy his mama a birthday present. I think an email is in order.

Flawless Knit Repair —Rena Crocket
If you wear clothes you must mend them. If MS recommends this I'm pretty sure I could use it. It's also very inexpensive. This might ought to be (don't you love colloquialisms?) in the library.
Whew. Well. This thing is already almost 3 full pages of lust-inspiring chatter about knitting books – I believe I will stop here – although I have not even touched the Arans, Guerenseys and Fair Isle section, nor the Norwegian nor Lace sections and I know there is at least one lace book I must own – which I will use to close this long blog post.

Knitting Lace —Susanna Lewis
I've read through this book, which I had to borrow from a distant library. I knew then I had to own it. It will have to go on the Christmas Wish List. And oh dear – now that I've opened up the lace book section of SHP's catalog... oh la! Too many books! Too many books! But I will stop here because the coffee has perked and I think it's time for me to put the credit card down and back away from the computer.

2010-09-08T10:09:00.003-04:00

The right tools make all the difference

Just a quick panegyric about tools - especially when you switch from an adequate tool to the right tool. I've been putting off knitting a promissed bit of contract knitting because I really struggled with the first half of it. Tiny dark needles knitting thin dark wool into twisted stitches made a project irksome. I was using KnitPicks size 1 Harmony needles to make a pair of socks out of some deep forest green yarn. I never gave the dark color a thought since it's summer time and I often knit on the porch where there is great light.

Only - I haven't been knitting at all on them because it was just too hard to see the stitches even with bright sunlight. On Monday I dug through my jumbled needle stash I uncovered a lovely size 1 Addi Lace needle just waiting to be freed from it's packaging. I've zipped through most of the cuff and will start working on the heel flap tomorrow.

Cuff

Cuff stretched a little so you can see the lace pattern

2010-09-06T19:11:00.002-04:00

Progress shots

Here is the body of my Shawl Collared Vest (yes. I have decided it is to be a vest, not a sweater) with the short row bust darts knitted in. See how much it slopes upwards on the right hand side? This is one full cable's worth of short rows - 8 rows or 4 pair of short rows. I always have to add extra length down the front so sweaters don't ride up on me.

Here I have put 15 stitches on a holder and cast on 5 steek stitches for armscye which I am informed by a young scholar I know who has spent several years on Scotland ... armz-eye.

On the same row I made the armscye (have to use it now I know how to say it) I also began the decreases for the V neckline.

I knit a little bit more on this and then set it aside to work on a sock I promised to do for Jen at Spirit Trail Fiberworks. I want to get it done quickly so I can take it to her later this month.

So. Knitting is going on apace - this vest is moving so quickly I'm surprised. I believe I just cast on last weekend and here I am working on the second half. It's used about 3.5 skeins so far. Fast project, not much yarn, pretty cables I would say this is a complete winner.

And now it's the end of the last weekend of the summer. May we all enjoy the lovely autumn season.

2010-09-03T06:45:00.002-04:00

Needled

Friends and acquaintances of TheQueen know that I knit almost exclusively on circular needles. I have a small collection of double point needles around 8" long which I don't mind slipping into a pocket to take to a fiber festival, but I have gotten rid of all the long straight needles of yester-year. The only reason I would own straights would be for artistic purposes - since there are some very beautiful art-object knitting needles out there - of glass, of beautifully colored metals, of polished woods. I also own a blown glass spindle. It's very pretty - I'm too scared to use it even over a queen sized mattress. It's for admiring - not touching.

When it comes to knitting, though, I am a CRCULR-Grrrl and even with circular needles I am very very picky. At the moment I will tell you there is nothing I'd rather have than another Addi Lace needle, 40" long in pretty much any size between 3 and 9. Of course there are still times when the blunt tip of an Addi Turbo is what's called for and I am fond also, of the KnitPicks needles. In all cases, the smooth and perfect join is the first reason I prefer these needles and after that it's the supple cables that win me over.

But though I have my current favorites, that doesn't mean I am not willing to give something else a try. I have a beautiful rosewood circular (size 7) that has the sweetest long smooth tapered tips - though it's join is not quite up to my standards and I have a lovely ebony circular with equally delicious tips but a downright lumpy join. The rosewood was a gift from LD so it carries extra good juju with it and the ebony needle has a very lovely texture. Both of them have rather thick cables that took a little getting used to.

Recently, though, I stumbled upon something new - to me, at least.

I haven't been able to find out much about these needles. They're not listed in the Fall 2010 Vogue Knitting article about knitting needles. I've only found a few on-line sources for them. But I have bookmarked that $15 set of 40" circs and plan to send it to Someone who might be wondering what to buy me for my birthday....

Because I love these needles. The wooden tips are smooth and warm and pleasant to hold. The cable is the most supple thick cable I've ever worked with ... really as pliant as a KnitPicks cable, and the joins are perfection. The tips are blunt but not dull, with enough taper to keep a stitch from sliding off too soon. And it's very very cheap. This needle is about 28" long. It cost me retail $5.99.

I'm using this needle to knit my shawl collared vest (that might get sleeves) and thoroughly enjoying the knitting process. Yes. I know. Some folk won't like it because they're made in china. Well. That is a political decision and this is not a political blog. As Meg Swansen says, "Knitters Choice".

2010-09-02T10:55:00.005-04:00

Fame and content and Yarn P**N

Oh my! Thanks to Missy C this moribund blog is getting lots of visitors and, alas, I suspect they are all looking for gorgeous photos of kid mohair and silk blend yarns, knit up into drop dead lace shawls and clever patterns using luxurious stash.

Alas - I am under the gun at my Day Job and haven't got a lot to show off. But I do have a bit of yarn porn in the shape of this gorgeous skein of Yarn Goodness from Spirit Trail Fiberworks.

It's one of Jennifer's superwash merino/cashmere/silk blends and it is my first birthday present. Thank You Jen!

If you are a newcomer to TheCastle you will find that I have been a dreadful slacker here for the past year - and in fact, the best posts are between 2003 and maybe early 2005. That's where I introduce you to the Wheat Dolpins - that's where I will take you down the lane that I call my Praying Place - tthat's where the really good cartoons are, including my favorites:

Biker Eclaire

The ThinMint guy (I really did eat a whole sleeve of those darned things, trying to find the mint flavor that the Girl Scout Bakery had left out of my batch of cookies)

Me, surrenduring to Flidas, who had imprisoned all my creativity until I finally figured out how to do those knitted on set-in sleeves:

And my take on the Dream of multiple socks on 2 needles

... and the Reality of it:

I'm glad you stopped by - please say hello - and come back soon - for I am making progress on my Shawl Collared Vest - that Might Get Sleeves.

2010-09-01T07:08:00.002-04:00

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MONTH begins today!

And it brings me this:

We are the third little yellow river up the left side of the Chesapeake Bay. Will we get wind? Rain? Wash? Downed trees? Power outages? Well, I hope we get the first 2 and I hope the empty ocean gets the last 3. hmm. well. I guess the empty ocean can't get either, so let us think only of better things. Let us think we get Friday off but don't lose power.

I am prepared though - with lanterns and jugs of water and canned food and knitting. Here is a progress shot of the Shawl Collared Vest.

Pretty? and soft? oh la! it is softsoftsoft! and at this point, surprisingly light. I am using a new needle I bought at a brand new craft store in Warsaw (little town across the river from us). I lost the label and keep forgetting to call the owner to find out what it is but I will be over there tomorrow night and I'll find out. It's a wooden circular with a thick cable that is very supple. The join meets my Addi-Turbo-fed exacting standards of smoothness. The price is very, very low - I'll track the info down tomorrow and share.

Yup. Looks like a tad over 5.5 inches as I start the 6th cable.

So - happy birthday month to you too. and Happy Hump day too!

2010-08-29T07:36:00.010-04:00

Tossing the dross, keeping the gold **I will NEVER buy yarn again!**

My cyber twin is moving from a house she's lived in for more than a decade and she's going through the hard task of winnowing the golden kernals from the wheat chaff, and the book chaff, and the yarn chaff, dishes chaff, and all the other chaff that seems to filter down into the crevices and cranies of one's house. And I am filled with envy of the freedom she will have when she settles into her new place with only the cream of her crop.

And Inspiration! For, though she hasn't yet experienced the freedom of drosslessness, she is inspiring me to seek it in TheCastle. From which I do not intend to move untill medicare pays for it.

I want that clean swept house that has useful spaces, not doors and drawers that hide all the times I've been too weak, too lazy or too forgetful to throw out, say goodbye to, give away the things I no longer use. Not only does nobody want fortylevendy bottles of almost empty body lotion - it is ALSO not a crime to throw that little bit away. And so I dove into the bathroom cabinets - the ones beneath the sink, that had spilled out onto the floor one day last month, refusing to house the excess. I actually had to leave one tray of junk on the floor beneath the ironing board.

Happily nobody but me cares about that sort of thing .... my own particular Prince doesn't notice; kids don't either and we've only had younglings as guests this summer. But I notice and I was unhappy and I was envious of CyberTwin. And as a reward, I tackled the - um - let us call it the Spare Bedroom Stash, not the junk room.

I swear - behind that jumble there is an elegant walnut desk. I would like to use it sometime before its owner (LD) asks for it back.

Among all the stash I knew I had this Trendsetter rayon ribbon in a QueenlyGreen color. Purchased at Hunt Country Yarn - the most friendly and elegant yarn shop I know - I've only ever swatched with it. I've learned over the years that I really don't like ribbon yarn but as I was rewinding this slippery yarn, I thoroughly enjoyed the way it slid through my fingers. By the time I'd wound it all up ... I gave this stuff another chance. It should be a basic tank top for summertime. It has one year to become one and then it goes.

As evidenced by the label on the box. it has an expiration date.

There is 1,000 yards of this very thick happy yarn ... A Stitches '08 purchase that makes a very casual chunky fabric - I see I've done a guage swatch but I think it's too tight and will rip it out and try a bigger needle. this one too, though, has an expiration date. If I don't make something by the end of winter 2012 (that's 18 months away, give or take a few weeks) it goes to a new home too. I'm already pushing it with cunky yarn on my chunky body and these purples seem to dominate even all THAT orange and gold.

This other gorgeous stuff - another Stitches coup - has an unlimited lifespan. These are Queen colors. It's alpaca - so soft I could serve it up with a spoon. I just have to find the right thing to make with it. Even if it IS a chunky yarn. So there.

There is a bag of yellows and

a Box-0-Blues

Mink colored lace weight yarn (and a red and a pink lace weight, too)

Gorgeous blue and orange Malabrigo that is destined to be Somebody's Christmas gift.

And a gift of red cashmere yarn from MissC - fingerless gloves, I swear it - before December. Pour moi, vraimant.

Not just socks but a whole BOX-0-SOX yarn. Skeins and balls and twists of it! One of those cardboard file boxes jammed packed.

Shetland from Jameson and from my own spinning wheel

Un-photographed there are 10 balls of JoJoland Rhythm in coordinated colors, an enormous bin of mixed balls of yarn, enough KintPicks pallette to knit another KipFee all over agin and a Shelridge Farm Sweater Kit (that I paid an arm and a leg for and have yet to cast on the first stitch!!!)

There are, I am ashamed to admit it, also 9 UFO's - some near completion, some half way there. And that doesn't count this:

My Shawl Collared Vest (or jacket) which is motoring along nicely, thank-you. I'm about done with the ribbing and it will go even faster.

Well. So. Hmmm. I think I better leave the check book and plastic at home this fall during festival season.

2010-08-28T11:35:00.002-04:00

Stash Diving

I knew it was there somewhere - thank goodness not in the bins in the attic, since the sweet cool dry weather that flirted with us all this week has departed till some more auspcious day in the future. It's sticky and humid and it is going to get hot again.

Happily I am still in the startitis mode of New Fall Sweaters and, having worked the math for the shawl collared vest, [k3(these are steek stitches), P,Kb,P,K6,P,Kb,P,*Kb,P 28 times,Kb,P,Kb,P,K6,P,Kb,P,*Kb,P 28 times,Kb,P,Kb,P,K6,P,Kb,P,K4(these are steek stitches)] cast on and knit a few rounds, I began wondering if there was enough of this stuff. It is from an amazing yarn shopping coup I made at Stitches 2008 where I bought more yarn than should be legal ...only I did. I checked with the booth owner

and she said it was okay. Obviously brown through tan and orange are not popular colors in her neck of the woods. Their loss, my gain.

But I knew I'd bought an awful lot of alpaca in that haul ($15 for all you could cram into a bag) but I couldn't remember the details.

Uh.....

Details

Yeah

There's enough. In fact .... I am thinking ...... This could becocme a shawl collared cardigan. What do you think?

2010-08-27T07:36:00.003-04:00

Shawl Collared Vest

Way back in the days before TheBlog I knit a Meg Swansen Shawl Collared Vest for ThePrince, custom fit with short rows to go over a tummy. I thought this would be the perfect garment because he works so often in the cold office - with that nice curving collar snugging up against his neck. His comment after I finished it and he'd tried it on - "It's nice except I don't like this collar". I didn't have the heart to rip it off - and since his only other comment when I bring up making him a sweater is "I already have a sweater." (who can understand men) - I wear the vest around the house in wintertime.

But it's shape is so big and so rounded where I really don't need any extra that I don't ever wear it out in public. I've always intended to make one for myself and with this change in weather - and with a full bag of Elsebeth Lavold's Chunky Al sitting on top of the first stash bin ... the easy one to peek into, well .... I think it's time to cast on a gauge swatch.

Looks like I'm getting 4.25 stitches to the inch.

And 6 rows

So. Stay tuned. Actual knitting is happening in TheCastle.

2010-08-26T06:34:00.004-04:00

Fall Knitting Magazine Season

Oh la! I found the Fall Vogue Knitting magazine in Walmart yesterday (remember I live in the sticks - that's our only store) and I knew it was really the end of summer. I was also very taken with the cover sweater - so much so that I bought the magazine without flipping through it. Fall issues are almost always the best issues of the year - when it comes to knitting magazines anyway, so I wasn't too concerned about getting a lemon. So. Just in case you haven't been to your local walmart or better knitting magazine location, here's my First Impressions Review of this issue.

First off - that cover sweater. Oh la it's gorgeous. It's a cabled cardigan in the most vivid blue you feel like you can reach your fingers in there and just scrunch it up. I don't usually think of deep royal blue as an autumn color but this cabled lovely with it's flipped up collar and raglan shaping with plenty of purl space between the clearly defined cables is perfect.

The text on the cover promises two new or newish knitting adventures. First is designs by Irina Shabayeva, of Project Runway - I saw that series and read about her in a previous magazine. I'm at least going to like seeing what she's come up with. Second is the promise of knee sock patterns. I've long wondered why there weren't more of them because the greater length gives so much more scope for design.

So let's flip the pages.

Lots of color right off the bat in the front page ads is always uplifting. On the table of contents there is a photo of opera length lace fingerless gloves - nicely designed with a familiar stitch pattern - looks like one of the Barbara Walker stitches, maybe with a tweak.

The Debbie Bliss ad that's opposite the editor's letter is absolutely lush - a zippered cardi with a glorious collar in something typically Debbie Bliss - lush, plush, I'm prompted to look up the yarn. GLEN it's called

Ahh - I didn't know - Vogueknitting LIVE! - I guess it's their answer to Stitches. This January. ALL your favorite designers and teachers ... Clara Parkes, Meg Swansen, Melissa Leapman Fiona Ellis, Nicky Epstein - dang - In January - in NYC - :( - too far away for me.

I often think the ads in the knitting magazines are better than the designs and woo la la - there's an ad for Bergere de France with a sweater I could so totally wear. It's a basic yoke sweater (easypeasy design) but there's this darling off center collar with a tie that so totally transforms this garment. Bummer. Can't find a photo on their website but I like a lot of other designs I found there - give it a peek.

Something I will complain about though this may be just my old age issue, is the typeface in their text. It's too pale. too grey. It's really difficult to read. The font is clear and it's spaced well enough apart: both the letters and the lines. But the ink is so pale. C'mon Vogue - spend a little more on the ink and make it easier to read. It's all interesting but I skim if my head begins to ache from eye strain.

I always enjoy the upfront news about new knitting books but heck. Wendy Johnson's book has been out forEver. I'd hardly call it a new book. Just sayin'. That's all. And while I don't need to read Meg Swansen's articles about the EPS sweater - I think it's good to reiterate that info because there are always new knitters coming along and they ought to have this basic knitting shape in their repertoire. Besides - I've always enjoyed Meg's writing style.

Nicky Epstein is also another designer who always intrigues - though I would not ever wear those ruffle spiraled gloves. Just wouldn't do it. I love me some embellishments but these didn't do it for me. Subjective comment here. and the news that she has ANOTHER book out there (the ad is on the opposite page from the pattern) will have me pulling out my plastic.

I also really liked Patons Lace ad just as an inspiration page. There's a nice long article about Kristin Nicholas, who's another favorite of mine - I can't wait to read it. outdoors. in bright sunlight. and a lengthy guide to knitting needles. I love to collect different needles, but I almost always just knit with Addi Lace. eh. some of us are just plain faithful.

Okay - enough about the front matter - let's get down to the patterns. Because this post is already long beyond most folk's endurance, I'll just tell you about the designs I like. I've already told you about #1 - the blue cardigan that I am still drooling over no need to say more about that

Next comes this colorwork hat - very nice and again in blues - colors I can't even wear. But this is so well done. I really love the variegated rib and the vine design.

This lace jacket looks to me like a Sleeves-in-your-Pi type jacket though it's basic shape is pentagonal instead of round. The technique for making it will be similar. I've been deep in the lace mode for about a year now and this design really tempts.

I was very intrigued by this asymmetrical cardi. I'm not quite sure it is for me, but I really like the way the designer conceived everything and of course - I am a sucker for the Hollow Oak Cable (of Flidas fame)

I really can see this sweater worn with a slim black wool skirt at a business meeting.

This cardi, otoh, is just cozy looking. I like the smocked detail. I like the mossy green variegated yarn. I like the collar and I like the hems on sleeves and sweater body. It's girly without being fussy.

This last sweater really floats my boat. I love the colors. (very Queen-ish) I totally love stranded colorwork anyway and the tiny dots in the upper body give the impression of texture without actually having to knit it in. I love the 3/4 length sleeves. I love the collar. I really love the set in sleeves. This is another Play-to-Work look I would adopt into my own wardrobe.

So. That's what TheQueen thinks about the 2010 Fall VogueKnitting magazine. Hope you enjoyed reading.

2010-08-25T07:26:00.004-04:00

That Knit-a-Sweater feeling

Yup. I'm getting that feeling again - time to cast something that has long sleeves on to size 7 needles. It's been too hot to even look into my stash but the weather dot com guys are promising me 85 degree days and 60 degree nights - I can open up the treasure chests on Saturday and start doing some serious planning. Photos will be shared.

But just from what's in my memory database (I know, I ought to create a yarn database but I am entirely too lazy) I know there is:

Heavy worsted weight camel colored alpaca - a cabled cardigan with pockets ?

Light worsted weight JoJoLand handpaint - a whole bag of it

Worsted weight gold tweed to replace Flidas (remember that old beloved lost treasure from 2003??)

That bag of brick colored merino I bought to knit Bricka the Aran -

this is the sweater that taught me that I hate to make intricate cables - not because they are hard but because I find them boring. I doubt I'll ever make that sweater... I could rip it and cast on anew.... something a little friendlier

Then there is the Shellridge Cardigan I bought at MS&W 2009!!!! It sits beside the television in it's clear zippered bag, the glowing colors mocking my laziness.

Well - that is about enough yarn to fill one large 20 gallon tub and since I know I have 4 of them full of delicious things - just imagine the treasures I'll unearth. I believe I will have a photo heavy post in a few days.

In the mean time - Happy Hump Day to you. Get outdoors and enjoy this gorgeous weather.

2010-08-23T07:13:00.002-04:00

Some people have too much free time

But I am not one of them. I use my time to see to it that little naked dolls have clothes. Here's another garment for those darling 5" dolls (that my niece swears do evil things at night when we're asleep)

Doesn't he have that Huck Finn look?

Here's the pattern - written in my favorite pithy manner - a little more succinct than my muse EZ but not much.

Knit in the round using your favorite circular technique and distributing the stitches in whatever way you like best.

With a #3 cotton or substantial sock yarn and a size 3 needle(s)

Overalls
cast on 28 stitches.
Join, being careful not to twist This join will be the center back.
Knit one round
in next round, P2, YO, P2tog, P6, P2tog, YO, P4,YO, P2tog, P6, P2tog, YO, P2
K one round
P one round
K one round, increasing 8 stitches evenly distributed
K 12 more rounds
K 18 stitches put remaining stitches on a holder – with such a small project, putting these stitches on a loop of yarn is the best option, but feel free to use the holder of your choice
Join those stitches, pulling the working yarn as tight as you can and knit 5 rounds on 18 stitches
P one round
K one round
Bind off in purl.snip yarn
Pick up 18 reserved stitches. With new yarn knit 18 stitches and join.
K 4 more rounds
P one round
K one round
Bind off in purl.
Use the tail of the joined yarn to sew up the gap between legs.
Weave in all ends

Straps
Make 3 stitch i-cord about 28 stitches long. Sew a knot in both ends using about 6 stitches for each knot. Strap will be about 14 stitches long. Measure against the doll to be sure.
Use knots as buttons to go into the little one stitch YO buttonholes, crisscrossing the straps in back.

2010-08-22T08:06:00.003-04:00

End of the summer

The reunion has come and gone but it was a grand one. More than 70 people gathered at this quaint brick church

It was a gathering full of cousins

followed by water play

I always feel like summer is over when TheReunion has come and gone but there really are still a few weeks left of vacation time. This year I was determined to fulfill an ancient childhood dream to visit Tangier Island, VA. As far back as elementary school I was jealous of the children who's parents or Nana and Pop took them on the cruise to Virginia's smallest seaside village. You take the boat from Reedville, Onancock or Chrisfield to get there - or you may be lucky enough to have your own sailing craft and can get there on your own. We took the Chesapeake Breeze and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

Tangier is a crabbing village - all the income comes off of the water, with crabs in the summer and oysters in the winter - or at least - that has been it's history for many years. It's a charming little place of egalitarian working folk with a strong community spirit ... they turned down Warner Brothers as the film location for the movie Message in a Bottle because they're a dry town and don't condone alcohol in any fashion.

In stead they're a town of narrow streets

A pretty white church

and crab shacks (dozens and dozens of crab shacks)

Oh yes - and beaches!! 2 miles of pristine sand beaches where I could go skinny dipping after dinner on Thursday. Honestly - this place was mine all mine and the water was delicious.

It's a grand place to sit and sketch and be quiet.

It's a place to walk and eat and sleep and walk some more. Here you're on Island Time and even though I was only there 2 days, I came home so rested. this is not fancy living, mind you, but quiet and slow and gentle and very friendly.

And now - now it's the last full week of August. Time to pull out yarn and think about winter knitting. Time to gear up for all the busy work that will be Fall 2010 - because my goodness I'm going to be busy. Work is crowding in on me like so many buzzing bees. Holiday festivities are just over the horizon and there is a BIRTHDAY MONTH coming in 8 days.

Hmmm. Now what do I want for my birthday .....

hugs to you all

2010-08-10T11:49:00.002-04:00

Not enough time? Let's look at that another way

So. On the day I post in my facebook status about how cramped for time I am, along comes this horoscope from MsHoroscope:

"Resources – time and money – are in focus as Venus, Pluto and Jupiter form a rare alignment. You may be feeling the pinch, in terms of your budget or your time. You have more resources than you realise, it’s simply a matter of prioritising - authentically – what to do with your money and your days. If you want financial security, trade time or skills for money. If you want more downtime, trade some income for better life balance. All the pieces are in front of you, you just need to find a new way to put them together. Today’s New Moon energises your hidden, resting zone. Give yourself some quiet uninterrupted space in which to put your analytical skills to work. "

It is true I am really rushed for time. There are a zillion things to do this week and I want to do each and every one. My work has suddenly become very busy and very interesting OR I have suddenly become very inspired to find interesting productive things to do to get me someplace I want to be. oh . Uh. Red Flags flapping and Whistles blowing?

I've been reading James Arthur Ray's book Harmonic Wealth and in it he says that it's not about the goal, it's about becoming a person who can reach the goal - which feels very good to me. He also says that to have a bigger anything, be it life, salary, job, circle of friends, you have to become a bigger person. Not a better person, mind you, just a bigger one.

I'm all about books that help you go places - starting with Julie Morgenstern's organizational advice

to the Hicks' books on the Law of Attraction

to Rick Warren's "The Purpose Driven Life"

And of course Martha Beck and her 4-day Win and Steering by Starlight books

And one thing all of them tell us is that when you ask for more and get it - things don't end there. We're not in a race to the finish - be it a dream house or a top job or a perfect weight. We are ever expanding beings growing into the person who can live the life we are creating.

The only reason I'm so busy is because I have thought of a better library than the one we have and to create it I have to manage lots more things. The only reason I'm so busy is because I really want a close loving relationship, not just with my aging parents, but with the sister who lived so far away for so many years, and is now close again and doing an enormous lot of work to ease my parents final years. The only reason I'm so busy is because I want to take that trip with Himself next week AND spend Friday with my cousin getting things ready for the huge family reunion on Saturday.

It really is about priorities. For every advantage brings responsibilities. Not a price, mind you - but just added items. And the way to enjoy the advantage is to believe it will work out. To believe that every problem that arises comes with it's solution - or solutionS and that is where the real reward is. Not in achieving the better job or the bigger salary or even the smaller weight - but in becoming the person who has More Solutions to Life's Issues.

I'm reminded of a day in January 2009 when I came to work to find our library's internet access completely shut down. The problem was convoluted and the solutionS were myriad, diverse, weird and amazing. And we implemented every one of them in a single 8 hour work day, changing our domain name, our internet provider, our method of connection, getting help from 3 institutions not even connected with the library and the following day we had internet access. The whole day I felt like I was riding on some light beam across the universe, picking answers out of thin air. I was in the zone. I was on my game. It wasn't even that I had to get it all done in a single day. I just knew we weren't going to fail and we didn't. We did better than that. We solved it all in a day.

Sorta makes me wonder how much time I actually fritter away NOT riding on a light beam and plucking answers out of the air.

The good thing about a day like that January Monday is that it proves to me that I can go light beam riding. I can have miracle days where everything happens. I just have to keep my consciousness on the happening, the doing, instead of the troubles and difficulties. They ALWAYS look bigger than they are and the answers are always closer than I had imagined.

2010-08-08T07:43:00.003-04:00

Miniature Elizabeth Zimmermann Baby Surprise Sweater

Here you have a blog that's almost all about knitting. I told you yesterday we had the most perfect 8 year old visitor in July. She came for the very first time with her parents, aunt&uncle, cousins and grandparents (who, in good old Virginia fashion are also distant cousins of BD) for a 4th of July picnic here. Mostly that sort of fun is outdoors and swimming and fireworks but of course I had to introduce her to The Bird Family

(you remember these guys)

and while I was explaining about them she gave me a look that said "Oh. You understand. You're my kind of person". We were thrilled when she wanted to come back on her own for a week - a bit of a stretch for someone not yet 9 who only met you once. And so I present you with Cousin F!

While she was here we explored all sorts of fun things. I do have the best toys.
It was also the week my knitting group meets, and since CousinF also knits, we were both fascinated and jealous when a friend brought this little doll she'd found at Ben Franklin. She planned to make wee little doll clothes for it as part of a Christmas present. CousinF and I both had extreme doll lust and had to make a mad dash to Mechanicsville to buy some dolls and cotton yarn. The results are above - and CousinF made doll hats and knit on the dresses some too.

I, too, know 2 little girls who really ought to have these little dolls, all dressed up and ready to go, moving in this Christmas, so I have been fiddling around with wee doll things. I also was knitting on a real EZ Baby Surprise sweater for a shower gift and got to wondering if you could knit a miniature version for these dolls. It would be a great way to make a little sweater with sleeves for these tiny arms. Here is the result - after a passable but, ultimately unsuccessful, first attempt.

Cute, huh?

Cast on 46 stitches and start the double decreases on stitch 12 and 34.

Knit in garter stitch till you've made 4 pair of double decreases,

knit one ridge without decreasing, doubling the stitches across the center portion on the second row of that ridge,

then start the increases. After 2 pair of double increases, bind off 2 stitches at the beginning of the next 2 rows

then knit a couple ... maybe 3, more ridges with double increases.

Bind off.

This means leaving off the part where you knit only on the back for a real baby surprise. These dolls don't need it.

Sew up the sleeves. Voila! minibabysurprisesweater!

2010-08-07T07:50:00.005-04:00

A month without a post?!?

This is the worst ever. What has happened to the famous Queenly Loquacity?

Ah well - perhaps it is the antiquity of this blogger format - for Like The Queen was created long ago and doesn't have any of the easy features and clickable widgets that newer fancier formats offer. I'm on facebook where I can leave quick catch-up notices and easily post pictures - and there is another blog I'm ~~cheating on~~ keeping that has to do with weight issues and some other stuff. And of course summer is my busy time and this particular summer has been wickedly hot and dry (80% crop loss in the soy bean fields).

I have a real thought to creating a new Like The Queen blog that's easier to keep up. The back story here is that the original LTQ is so text heavy that it can't just be moved into a newer shinier RSS feed type of Blogger blog and honestly I'm not that enamored of the other blogging formats to want to learn all their buttons. Like switching from a Cannon camera to a Panasonic ... some steep learning curve for something so simple.

anyway - if I do bring out the Mach III version of LTQ I will surely let you know. And in the mean time - here's the quick and dirty rundown of what the summer's been like so far:

July:

more 100 degree days in Virginia than ever before

Family picnic on 4th of July

Met a soulmate of an 8 year old who spent a week with us while we created these!

Found a darling little lost dog

Lost the darling little lost dog to a better owner (He just would not get along with Jack)

Bought the most fantabulous hat!

Planned a short vacation to Tangier Island ... I promise - there will be photos - we go in a few weeks!

oh - and yes

werkwerkwerk

(heh heh ... dont you wish you had my job?)

So - that's the status of TheQueen. I just couldn't let this long silence last another day.

2010-06-30T17:24:00.003-04:00

Knitting content - almost an FO

Here it is, in almost all it's splendor - the Egyptian Collared cap sleeve tank top - modeled by L's daughter and looking MUCH prettier on her than it does on me. Oh to get those 20 years back again - and lose those 20 lbs.!!

I like the drape in the back too.

I'll be back and edit this with More Thoughts soon - but I wanted to show off a little today.

2010-06-22T07:13:00.002-04:00

Crazy Busy

As you all know I live in a vacation area and summer is my busy time. It's go go go all day long, especially this week, when we start up our special programs for children to keep them reading all summer long. Over the past few years this has coincided with our little town's summer festival and this year I was helping with that, as MC of the beauty pageants for just about every category of cute little child and pretty young girl you could imagine. This is small town america and every girl got a crown or a ribbon or flowers.

I know there are folk who hate beauty pageants but my own condemnation is reserved for the kind of thing where mothers doll their daughters up like prostitutes and tell them to shake their booty. There is another sort of pageant that isn't too different from playing dress up - where girls put on their prettiest dresses and come show their grandma and - call me shallow - but a cute child in a pretty dress will always melt my heart. I am a true babyslut. I think they are all the prettiest. Since half of them have been through my story hour program for toddlers, they were very comfortable with me and 100% of the parents were sweethearts, though I hold out my own first place ribbon for the daddy who brought his 2 year old up on stage with balloons for all the little ones and spent the next 10 minutes leaping to the top of the tent to bring them back down, after wee hands had let them go. Talk about a melt your heart moment. Think Lake Woe-begone and you'll have an idea of what Saturday morning was like.

Of course I had to take in the fair afterwards and since the weather was the ubiqutous hundred degrees in the shade that the town council must order up every year for this street fair, I was utterly wiped out on Sunday. Did nothing but eat watermelon and blueberries and drag myself from one shady spot to another. It is Hot Hot Hot here in Virginia 2010 and if we make a corn crop it will be due to genetic experimentation to make a strain that grows without water. We haven't had rain in 10 days and each of those 10 days has kissed the 100 degree mark. Even wire grass is crisping beneath this relentless sunshine.

Barely back on my feet again Monday morning I had to jump in with the final preparations for the kick-off program for our summer reading club. We always start the program with a magic show, if we can find a good magician and yesterday's was a real treat. He not only managed to use books from our collection in his program, but also let slip how good he thought the collection was - an unexpected little compliment that topped off a stellar program with a capacity crowd. You know you're doing something right when you forget to put the advertisement in the local paper but still get a sell out audience.

Today it's all about pirates and the audience is 6-10 year olds. There will be stories and a pirate song and a pirate craft and a treasure hunt in the library that requires reading and using the catalog. And there will be a treasure chest waiting for them when they get back to the meeting room. Tomorrow is the wee ones' story hour that goes on year around. And by golly, after that I am going to crash.

At least - I plan to crash on Friday with a Spa Day in Williamsburg with my girlfriend. We are big Colonial Williamsburg fans anyway but we've been talking about doing a day at the Williamsburg Inn's Spa for almost a year now and, by golly, THIS is the week to do one. This is the package we're going for - the June Vacation for a Day. Wicked expenditure of $$ but I've been saving for it since October. It's already bought and paid for - woo woo!

Oh - yes. and some of my staff and I are doing a self conducted drawing class on Monday's at noon. I work in a really really fun place. Oh. I am the boss in a really really fun place.

KNITTING? you say?

Of course I am knitting - though that cotton top, with only a few rounds to go till FO status, has really worn out my thumb. I will reserve cotton knitting solely for lace from now on. And I can't wait to start knitting socks, since I have several new, and newly discovered skeins of sock yarn. But the Big News is a new STORE that has opened up in Warsaw. Hear that Jayne? It's called Espe D's (no web site yet) and it's tag line is "For all your crafting needs". And the owner, Hope Jackson, dropped by the library yesterday and asked if I'd be interested in teaching knitting. Woo Woo. The answer is Yes. And there will be a picture of the Egyptian Tank Top in the next few days.

Thanks to anyone out there who is reading this - because you are true friends to this wicked bad blogger. And there are Lots of Photos of the street fair on my FB page.

2010-06-12T09:51:00.003-04:00

35 Years Ago Today

I have always loved stories so it was the greatest disappointment in my young life when I started school and found I couldn't read. This was before anybody diagnosed learning disabilities in an exploding baby boomer world where good little girls who paid attention and answered questions in class were promoted anyway because there wasn't room in one class of 49 children to add another. With hope and a prayer I was promoted for 2 years while my wise kind mother coached my reading through endless horrible afternoons of School in Summer. Then suddenly, at about 8, all the neurons made the necessary new pathways in my brain and I could read. I went from not reading at all to chapter books, bypassing the easy picture books completely. And the first book I read was Laura Ingalls Wilder's LITTLE HOUSE IN THE BIG WOODS.

I am sure if the first real book I had read was MELISSA GOES TO THE MOON I would have become a rocket scientist but instead I spent most of my childhood fantasy life wishing I, too, had been a little pioneer girl. I read those books. I wrote fan mail to the author, (who, alas, had died the year before) and I made up games about riding my covered wagon across prairies, taking my dolls and animals along with me. And I wished wished wished I'd been born in 1852 instead of 1952.

I met BD in college - he had had a country upbringing and the stories he told of his adventures and freedom, and the confidence he carries with him to this day, that he gained from knowing his environment was a safe place, only cemented my belief that In The Country Is Better ... for me, at least. After a few years of city living one of us confessed to the other that we wanted to run away and live in our own little house in the big woods.

And so we did.

With no jobs waiting for us and no rural skills (though he always spoke so confidently about things that I believed he knew ALL about doing EVERYTHING. ) we picked a spot in rural Virginia, along the river, near where his mother had grown up. We camped in the woods for 2 months in the WWII buddy tent my father in law landed on Normandy Beach with. With hand tools and a campfire we built a cabin and cooked our meals. We had such adventures to rival Laura Ingalls Wilder herself; though there were no hostile Indians there were two escaped bank robbers "last seen walking north along Highway 17" which was scary enough to thrill the most fantasy filled mind. It rained for 40 days and 40 nights. We lost about 50 lbs between us that summer, since frequently the rain put out the cooking fire before the food was cooked and we sat in our car then, smoking cigarettes and working crossword puzzles.

But slowly and surely BD built us a wee little round cabin and I learned how to bake bread in a dutch oven over a campfire. And by September we had a floor, walls and a roof AND an old wood burning cookstove he'd found in Bertha Hayes' old cow shed and brought home to me in triumph. Though I come from many many MANY generations of city dwellers, I've never once regretted the move to the country. One year later we had our darling son. Three years later I was hired by the library board to type catalog cards. 35 years later we are here in our cozy home on the banks of the river with dogs at our feet and lives that enrich us and, we hope, our community.

I would love to go back and live it again, but I hardly think there's a thing I would change. Here's a photo of us, half-way through finishing that little house - with cousin Peter in between us.

and a few more

2010-05-29T08:50:00.002-04:00

3 Days of Vacation Left

And I plan to make full use of them. It's been a busy active happy time with a ramble around the Northern Neck, some yarn shopping therapy, a Day at the Beach (woo woo), a day with my parents and some at home time. BD and I are reading ... well, he is reading, I am listening, the ancient potboiler Clan of the Cave Bears - yes - I skipped the whole saga when it came out - I'd just read too many saga novels at the time and I've never gotten around to it since. He reads. I knit. Good combo there. When he isn't reading, we like to work crossword puzzles together. It can keep us up in the big bed with dogs for hours and hours.

On the knitting front there is just More Brown Stockinette - so nothing to show yet. Oh - some short rows and a little extra shaping but it's still all brown. I promise - I'm only a few rounds away from color knitting and then there will be photos.

What is still up in the air is how I'll handle the colorwork. I can do stranded colorwork and have even charted out some ideas.

But - and it's a big but....

I'm not sure if I want to do stranded work with cotton yarn. I'm concerned it will be too heavy when I'm done, with those extra layers of yarn in the back. I'm also a little concerned the carried colors will show through on the other side.

I don't have to do a pattern. Stripes will work. I just... I guess I'm just always going to do fancy before plain.

Then there is the question - if I do just plain stripes - will I make them garter stitch like the hem or stockinette like the sweater body.

Ah well - we'll know soon enough. I don't have enough experience with cotton knitting to be able to tell ahead of time but I certainly have strong enough opinions once I see what I'm creating. We'll start fancy and back into plain knitting and see where we end up. I'm going to try to get it all finished by a week from Tuesday. That's my knitting group day and I'd love to show off a Finished Object and I would like to feel free to cast on something new.

So. That's where things are at TheCastle today - with 3 more days of vacation up ahead.

Hug a veteran today if you can.

2010-05-26T07:06:00.003-04:00

Yes! She lives!

Though it may not seem that way from the paucity of posts emanating from TheCastle. For months now work has been a juggernaut of activity and blog posts haven't been high on my list of TTD. Then there was a scare one week, deep in the throes of Mercury in Retrograde, when I actually deleted the whole place - including my access to it. I couldn't have been the only one to eliminate myself during this recent astrological regression because the Google folk were able to restore TheQueen, TheCastle and TheAccount in a twinkling. But I was truly still too busy to post.

Happily I am on vacation this week and though the days have been full, they aren't so full I can't, at last, bring you up to date on at least the state of my knitting. Which is moving, if slowly, towards the completion of what may be the only cotton garment I ever knit.

Yes. It is brown stockinette. with a colorful garter hem, of course, but mostly - brown. I'm nearing the end of this plainness - there is the section of short rowing to be done across the front to make a bust dart and there will be a little short rowing across the back shoulders to lift the collar area - perhaps 3 or 4 more inches of brownness.

Then begins the Egyptian cap sleeve collar area. I think I will have 60 rows to work with. I'm leafing through the art books to decide what the color sequence will be and I will have to find some graph paper to block it out but I am inspired by the (heavily copyrighted image of a) collar worn by the woman depicted here, only, of course, I'll use green instead of turquoise.

So that is the state of TheQueen's knitting. I am still not a fan of knitting cotton, although I have at least accustomed myself, a bit, to it's unyielding nature. I'm knitting this stuff up on #2 needles. It took something that small to even approach a gauge tight enough to hold up to cotton's insistence upon stretching. I may not banish cotton forever if it holds up under wear but I will be deeply happy to get back to nice springy conforming pliant wool again.

Maybe this delicious sock wool,

picked up at a darling little shop in Irvington VA, The Bay Window, where BD and I stopped yesterday, on a ramble through the Northern Neck. We had planned to go to the ocean but it was just too rainy yesterday. We'll head off today - and even if it isn't very warm, I am going into the ocean. Too many years go by between one dip and the next. This will not be one of them.

Another discovery we made was a source for magically delicious coffee! Locally roasted by the folks at Mobjack Bay Coffee. Yum. We picked this up at a darling little sandwich shop in Deltaville but I forgot its name. Cafe on ___ ____. dang. Had the best ham and pineapple sandwich for lunch, sitting on the beach looking across at Windmill Point.

In Kilmarnock we stopped at The Book Nook (isn't it nice that we are both book hounds?) where BH got a book of poetry and I got a birdsong identification book. I'd been leery of buying one of those because most portable digital animal reproductions are pretty dreadful. This one is not. In fact, it's very realistic and I've been playing with it already this morning.

2010-05-03T07:20:00.004-04:00

This IS a knitting blog

And I am a knitter. Just not a very chatty one these days. As proof of what's going on in the Life O'th Queen, here is a photo of cotton yarn that I indulged in as a sort of last fling at trying cotton knitting. I have dreams of a hand knit cotton cap sleeved top - like I had dreams of one in a rayon ribbon a year ago. I simply hate that rayon ribbon and it will become a gift to someone soon. But the geometry of the top is one I truly love.

You get the idea, and if you knit EPS sweaters you see it's nothing but the yoke sweater sans sleeves. But done with colorwork of some sort around the yoke I think it has an Egyptian collar look to it and in fact I've been inspired by this:

So when Elann dot com had a sale on their cotton yarn I thought .... well... why not give it one last try.

I like the colors - they look so much like the ones in the necklace.

I'm not feeling the love though, of that yarn. Not that it is bad cotton yarn. It's just that it IS cotton yarn. To get the gauge, which is supposed to be 5.5 to the inch, I have to use a #2 needle. Feels mighty strange to be knitting such a thick yarn on such tiny needles. I've put a garter stitch band around the bottom and it is tediously slow to knit. I hope the straight stockinette stitch will go a tad bit faster .... or even a whole lot faster. But I don't like the fabric I get knitting it up at any looser gauge.

The sad news is that I cast on for a 40 inch sweater, forgetting how little stretch I'm going to get from this yarn. ALL the snap back and give will be in the geometry of a stitch - zero in the fiber itself. I am going to have to rip out everything I've done and cast-on fewer stitches because this thing is going to be too big otherwise. Flaring flapping loose knitting will not look good in a cap sleeved top like the one I've sketched above. I don't want it too tight either, mind - but definitely not too loose. Baggy is never beautiful on me.

So to the frog pond I go.

In the den, though, was a rather pretty round hatbox that had sat all winter on a little stool.
I had to peek inside, and here's what I found.

Ooo la la - more wooly goodness. Those 3 hanging over the edge were a gift and the yarn is something nice and wooly by Classic Elite. It just cries out to be stranded colorwork.

So. That is the State-0-TheQueen who did not get to go to MS&W this year. She was on parent dooty while her hard working sister took a well deserved break. I will go next year.

2010-03-29T07:35:00.003-04:00

Yup. A very grey rainy Monday here - the sort of day that would make staying in bed till 10 o'clock such a treat. In fact - if it weren't this particular Monday I would call in asleep. But it is this particular Monday and it's going to be a truly fun day at work. We're getting a lesson from the website guru on how to make our library website Good and Fun and Better and Workable. I've been waiting a month for this day and would get there even if all this rain were snow!

There has been knitting sighted at TheCastle. I'm at the tip of the traingle with my border stitches.
The instructions are a little different from what they usually are when corners ane tips and points are involved. Usually they'll say DJ or TJ for double join or tripple join - which makes perfectly good sense to me. With this shawl they say to ... bah. don't have the book right here - but it has something to do with every other even row do something and ... well. really ...

I have posted a cry for help on Ravelry's Victorian Lace Today group so let us hope someone responds. Otherwise I am going to just wing it. The edging is a double six repeat (12 rows butyou join only the even rows to the shawl edge) and there are 3 stitches at the tip so I may just do what looks logical and forget the instructions.

Real photos will come when I've finished this thing. I have, it seems, at last memorized the pattern so this other side of the triangle ought to go a little faster.

And now it is Monday and I must hustle to get ready for work.

2010-03-22T07:22:00.003-04:00

Halcyon Days

Isn't it funny how you never know how strung out you have been till you are suddenly released from the mental bonds that had been tugging on you. I had one of those days yesterday - a day of utter and blissful calm. There was nothing my lizard brain was telling me I had to do - and I would not have listened to him anyway. All essential chores had been done on Saturday, BD was happily playing with his new boat and the day was mine, all mine.

In February, when I was suddenly barred from exercise of the calisthenic sort, I finally succumbed to the lure and allure of yoga. Yoga has been whispering to me for over 30 years, ever since Himself bought a Hatha yoga book and tried to do sun salutations. There was something so foreign and so antipathal to TheQueen about that book that even watching BD try to perform them made me uncomfortable. Fast forward 3 decades and yoga has been both feminized and westernized enough (think pastel yoga costumes from Gaiam dot com) to make me feel more welcome. Now it was just finding the time since I had lots of yoga videos in the library and there is a class offered in town. That last was too advanced for such a rank beginner, especially of the hyper flexible type, like me, but the Yoga for Beginners really meant what it promised - and I spent a week poking through it. Short end of a long story - I am now a yoga convert. The transformation was almost instantaneous and the results have been amazing. Balance, calm, focus, and strength all in some fairly low stress movements. I have pulled a hamstring because I really am hyper hyper flexible. I could still put my foot behind my head only it looks disgusting so I quit doing it some years ago. as the yoga instructor said "ahh 40 ways to do it wrong"

So, after a leisurely morning with a favorite breakfast in bed, some gentle chat with Himself, lots of dog lovin' and the relaxing pleasure of Not having to have a fire in the stove, I spent a blissful hour on my yoga mat. I have recently managed the easy version of Tree Pose. I can actually pull my heel into my groin but I can't lift it that high yet. So I balance my foot on the inside calf of my other leg and oh my .. what a thrill.

One of the things that always turned me off about yoga books and magazines was the stupid smile on the faces of people standing or bending in the most contorted positions. Imagine my surprise, one day, when I finally stood in some position or another - each part of my body balanced on top of it's supporting part and suddenly my whole face relaxed and then spread into a softened smile. I am sure to a non-yoga observer I would have looked bizarre but I understood then that A. we go around all the time unbalanced and in cramped posture and B. when everything is Just Right one can't help but smile. It is the natural position of the face! wow.

So. There was yoga yesterday and then there was a walk with the dogs to photograph the Daffodil Walk (viewable on facebook) so that next fall I will know where I need to plant more bulbs ... and I know what I will ask for for my birthday too. And there was fiber play. I ripped out a hat that I hate .... to get at the yarn I want to use when I have mastered that Brioche stitch ... and there was lace knitting. I was happy to discover that I'm almost at the apex ... the half way point ... of the lace edging. Maybe this thing won't take so long after all. and Pride & Prejudice on the video. And luscious shepherd's pie for dinner.

The only thing missing was wheat dolphins and it's really too early for them. They won't come along till mid April when the wheat is taller.

And the week? this week there is absolutely nothing on my desk that I don't want to do. It should be a blissful happy week. I think, if anything un-blissful comes along, I will just put it in a box and save it for A Different Week. In 2049.

Ta.

2010-03-21T08:22:00.004-04:00

When good knitting goes bad

Ahh - that cashmere shawl. Yes. Well. Poor thing. That was one of the knitting projects that gave me trouble and I've put it in time out. First off, I couldn't find the chart and didn't feel like figuring out the pattern. Second, I forgot how to join the lace edging to the shawl body. The final cut came when I realized that people who live in houses heated with wood should not knit white cashmere. Not in winter, anyway. Poor thing, it began to grow so dingy I couldn't tell if it was grey or if the winter light bouncing off the snow outside the window was just making it look that way.

I expect my knitting to get a little dirty and I expect white knitting to get a little more dirty but I didn't want to ruin this lovely project just so I could knit through the worst winter we've had in years. I believe we'll be talking about The Great Snow around here till ... well, till the next one. Let us hope that is not for a good while.

It was odd how much I dreaded this year's snow and ice and snow and more ice and more snow. Normally I really HEART snow and an excuse to stay home from work and cozy up in my favorite knitting spot but this winter hit me hard. At first I was puzzled about why I was so cranky but in retrospect I realize it was because of a health situation that kiboshed me the end of January and left me shaken. I am okay now but for a long time, certainly throughout February, I felt on very shaky ground.

Anyway I am positive that is why I had such a difficult time finding a project that clicked. I'll pick up the cashmere when I'm done with this present shawl, which, btw, is being knit in Prism Yarn's mohair and now that I'm looking for it, I can't find the ball band. It came in a big 900 yard skein so I knew I could get a shawl out of it. It's nice to knit with, though of course, no mohair is nice to tink back and in lace knitting one tends to do a good deal of that.

Both these shawls have enormously long borders and finishing them is going to take hours of knitting that seems to progress not at all - but then one day I'll look down and see I'm almost done and feel a little wistful. The great pleasure of knitting shawls is that you never have to worry about fit - a shawl doesn't have to fit too closely and of course - it's a shawl - it is not intended to show off curves or hide lumps. A shawl is intended to put you in a new mental space - half way between still wearing your pajamas and ready for the prom.

What is new though, is this book.

Wow! Who would have thought there was that much to know about a single stitch! I am staggered. I bought this for the library (after securing the promise to check it out from all my knitting friends) but I see I shall have to own my own copy. This is the Barbara Walker of Brioche stitches. A warning - to enter into this realm you will need to learn a new language and new chart symbols. I suspect the learning curve will be fairly steep at the beginning, but it is chock full of photos, written descriptions, good definitions and chart explanations. For those intrepid enough to start the journey I believe the treasure of knitting knowledge achieved will be worth the effort.

Even if you are not tempted to start the journey I advise you to stop by knit shop or book store and have a look. There really is a lot to see.

And now - it is breakfast time at TheCastle and the daffodils are singing to me to come out and admire.

2010-03-20T06:08:00.004-04:00

Return from the deep

Deep winter, that is. I can't believe I let the entire month of February and most of March drift by without stopping in even once, but that is what I did. Evidently the snowy winter of 2010 shut me down rather deeper than I would have expected. There has been knitting, though - so I shall celebrate the First Day of Spring with some Proof of Knitting photos.

This is the cover shawl from Victorian Lace Today, done in KnitPicks lace weight merino. This was my first attempt at a large lace project with a knitted on lace border. The shawl knit up fairly quickly - maybe took a month of my desultory knitting - but the edging took quite a bit longer. Not because it was difficult - it was surprisingly easy - but because there were forty million miles of it to knit. And Christmas Knitting interrupted everything for about a month. And of course, November was the pits in my life.

I loved everything about this shawl except grafting the edge of it together ... the very last thing I did. By this time I was more interested in finishing it than in making it perfect, so the seam is ... how shall I describe it ... it is rough. It is also insignifigant so I blocked it, admired it, folded it and put it away. It is intended as a gift - at some future date.

Then came that wonderful moment when I could legitamately start a New Project! And there I was stumped. Nothing I started worked out right. The yarn fought me, the pattern threw me, I didn't have size 4 needles - or at least, I couldn't find any . There was a good week of fruitless snow bound knitting done before I settled on another VLT project: The Shoulder Shawl

The body of this shawl was an even swifter knit with even more miles of edging to attach. This is a trickier edging though - what is called "Real" lace because there are stitch manipulations on both the knit and purl side. I've completed 10 repeats and I still haven't learned the pattern - but I bet I will before I'm done.

And so. The First Day of Spring marks the Return of TheQueen. I am also blogging about my glacially slow weightloss efforts over on Spark People so if you are ever curious about what else I am doing, you can read there.

Welcome Spring!

2010-01-22T07:28:00.003-05:00

Eurika!

I discovered that missing chart for my cashmere shawl!

This is as far as I'd gotten on it and then Other Things stepped ahead in the line. Then Christmas loomed and all projects not essential to gift giving and holiday decorating were bundled off to nooks and cranies. Last night I went poking around in a dark corner and sitting on top of a box of MoreLaceYarn was the missing chart.

I have about 6 inches of blue lace border to knit and then I believe I shall pick up this beauty and finish it. I would like to take at least one Saturday afternoon nap this winter, wrapped in the softness that is cashmere lace.

As you see, blogger is letting me upload pictures today so here are the missing illustrations from the last time I took a lovely walk in balmy sunshine with my beloved Socks, my little nurse dog who comforts me when I am sad or frightened.

"Don't worry Mama, I'll take care of you"

Here's the original Blue Sky of Winter

And here is a Monet-like reflection down below.

Honestly, sometimes the reflections are prettier than the original.

2010-01-19T07:15:00.002-05:00

First FO of 2010

I finished that lovely cashmere/mink scarf last night. I didn't block it because I'm not sure it needs to be blocked. I had pre-washed the yarn because it came with a fairly heavy coating of the oil used in spinning and I wanted to get a real feel for the texture and gauge it would knit at. I used #7 needles and did a simple seed stitch lace pattern, multiplied over 6 stitches. It hangs flat and has the loveliest halo to it. It's the natural color which is a sort of warm taupe - not a favorite of mine but it will be very nice as a gift to a friend who owns only neutral colors in cool tones and who has a birthday in about 2 weeks. Now that I know how nice this yarn is and how far one skein will go, AND now that Great Northern Yarns makes it in colors, I will buy some more for me.

I can hear the gasps of indignation even as I type this and am wondering if I ought to make a blog post about this at all. I'm not really interested in being controversal and I don't really have to Tell All about the Life-0-TheQueen. But this is my blog and it's my knitting blog and this is a knitting project - a finished knitting project. and then I remind myself that very few people are reading this anyway.

The website, and Clara Parkes of Knitters Review, who talked at length with the owner, assure me that the animals are sheered, not killed. Till I hear further I am going to act on faith and continue to enjoy this simply marvelous yarn. And that is as far as I intend to step into the debate about man's place in the chain of life.

So what is next on the knitting agenda? I am not sure. I still have about 6 inches of knitted on border to apply to that lovely Melon Shawl and of course there is my cashmere project, lying abandoned, mostly because I can't find the sketches of the lace edging patterns and I don't remember which stitch combinations I used and am way too lazy to work my way backwards with book and project. I have some lovely alpaca lace that will be a shawl for me and some lovely other lace yarns that will be lacy projects for Other People. They are not Bess Colors.

And my precious PABDOS gave me a skein of delicious Madil Kid Seta ... distributed by Cascade as their version of kid silk haze - in the loveliest spring green - as part of a knitting mama's Christmas present. I am so enamored I've decided to order several more skeins and make a lacy cardigan of it. Evidently 2010 is the year of YO's for TheQueen. I can think of nothing but lace opportunities. That may be my next real project.

Yesterday was one of those glorious warm sunshiny days that January throws us as a sop to the otherwise long slog of winter. Here are some very pretty pictures that make me wonder if the reflection is better than reality.

or maybe not. Blogger doesn't seem to want to open up the photo loading link. Ah well. I shall post them later, then.

It's back to werkwerkwerk now. Long week stuffed into a few days.

Ta

2010-01-10T08:33:00.002-05:00

Where has she beeeeen?

Well - mostly I've been on Spark People dot com working hard to turn this fluffy flappy fifty seven year old body into something that takes up less space. Long time readers know that some years ago I took of substantial weight using Weight Watchers. Alas, over the past 7 years a good bit of it has come back to live at my house - on my body. And while I think there is much that is good about WW - in my particular situation there seemed to be too much emphasis on how to fit cookies and chocolate in and not enough on how to fit nutrition in. This is not WW's falt but more my response to the stimuli I as getting. My perception. I needed a switch and C tipped me off to Spark People which had the right mix of discipline and flexibility I was looking for ... and it is FREE!!!

And I can ignore all the advertisers - after all - I use google and hotmail and weather dot com and who has more creepy adds than them?

There's a blog feature on Spark People and that's where I'm doing most of my daily posting just in case you've missed me.

But I have also been knitting and doing other things besides workin' my butt off ... soon I hope!

Here are some pictures:

do you remember late last summer when Clara Parkes reviewed a mink yarn? Did you succumb? I did. And I finally cast something on. Needing a mindless knitting project and wanting to know what this stuff was like I started an easy lacy garter/seed stitch scarf.

I may not have enough to knit a full fashion length scarf but it will be long enough to wrap around my neck and fold across my chest beneath a coat. It's a lot like knitting cashmere or other non-crimpy fibers. It also has a lovely fuzzy halo.

And here is the almost finished Melon Shawl from Victorian Lace Today. Talk about "hearting" a project. I love this shawl.

This is turning out to be the coldest winter we've ever had - this is our third snowfall!! I have feeders around the edge of the yard too for the shy types, but this window feeder, a Christmas gift from BD a few years ago, hosts daily entertainment from these fellows and the little white throated sparrows.

So you see - TheQueen is alive and well even if she's somewhat silent.

Happy New Year to you all!

2009-12-31T14:15:00.003-05:00

HAPPY ONCE IN A BLUE MOON ECLIPSE NEW YEAR

I'm working on my Let-It-Go list today ... much shorter than the Gratitude List I sort of composed in my head yesterday. Today, on this once in a blue moon ecliptical day, I'm thinking of things I would like to flush out of my life. There aren't too many of them, but they trip me up and keep me from doing the things I want to do – and doing the things I might want to do when I think of them.

And what would TheQueen like to let go of this year?

1. Unhealthful food - in unhealthful proportions
2. My sedentary body and it's accompanying aches
3. Grumbling while doing housework
4. Multi-tasking and it's evil twin
5. Auto-piloting
6. The mother of #4 & 5 ... Frittering away my time slash Procrastinating

So. Hmm. Well. That's a bigger list than I thought. In fact – if I were to really let all those things go out of my life – why – I'd be just about perfect.

Still and all – these are the things I want out of my life, in no particular order. I am not going to talk about whether a person can let go of these self defeating traits or if resolutions towards that end are good, because they spur you even if only for a little while, or bad, because if you stop trying you feel like a looser, or indifferent because ... what difference does it make anyway? I'm just stating that I would like these things to flow away from me and go live somewhere else – preferably at the bottom of the ocean.

What I will say is that just thinking about these defeatist behaviors flowing away from me makes me feel lighter, cleaner, somehow.

Other than that .... well ... I'll think about the rest of this tomorrow – at Tara. In the mean time, here is the last bit of Christmas Sparkle from my house to yours

2009-12-20T10:46:00.003-05:00

Who's got Christmas?

We do! And Christmas snow!!

Yep. That's me out in the frosty midwinter - well, not mid but early winter. This is deep in the woods on the path between the mailbox and the house.

Everything is shut down today except, blessedly, the power. And if it hasn't gone out yet it isn't going to - so we here at TheCastle are blissfully happy. I woke up early Saturday to 6 inches of snow and quickly vacuumed the rugs because .... white blankets of snow are beautiful but white blankets of dog hair are not. Hustling slowly - if one can do that - TheQueen got her pretty little Christmas tree decorated, took the above doccumented walk through the snow, a hot bath, and settled down for an evening of Christmas present sock knitting.

Today the air is crisply cold and the sky is glittering blue and the spigot outside is frozen!

Good thing we don't have to use it.

Today will be more Christmas knitting and perhaps some marmelade making - there are an awful lot of oranges and grapefruit in this house. And speaking of Christmas cooking .... I succumbed to the most amazing dream I had last week - a dream of making and eating a cookie called Pecan Butter Balls. Now - since I had never heard of nor eaten a Pecan Butter Ball I was intrigued and went sleuthing the net for a recipe. Obviously a shortbread type of cookie, the recipes are all fairly similar. This is the one I baked last night.

1 1/4 cup flour

1/4 cup sugar

1 stick butter

1/4 tsp. salt

3 tbs flavoring (I used Jack Daniels, but vanilla would work just as well)

3/4 cup chopped pecans

preheat oven to 350

cream butter & sugar

add salt and flavoring

add flour

add pecans

roll into little teaspoon sized balls and place on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 20-25 minutes. Gobble up.

2009-12-09T08:31:00.002-05:00

Those missing pictures

This is the view from Robert's Landing - isn't it stunning? To the immediate left is Farmer's Hall Creek which winds its way up past John Allen's old home site. The next arm of water is Occupacia Creek, which gives its name to to the whole Bay. It goes up past the Bairds, the Ellises and up to Highway 17 eventually. Occupacia is the old Powhatan name for this creek. There is a thin brown line of marsh grass just to the right of the tree, barely visible. That is more Occupacia creek on its way to the river. the next arm of water that stretches to the right to those dark trees is Jacob's Gut - where we live and the bulge on the right is Dividing Creek which is just a little stream that divides our property from Robert's.

This is the wheat field last week - it looks even wetter today. Wherever there is brown there is dead wheat. :(

But when it isn't raining, we have gorgeous views like this walnut tree beseeching the moon as a pink dawn creeps up the sky.

Maybe next time there will be actual knitting content!

2009-12-06T16:28:00.003-05:00

Pneumonia weather

After long silence, to borrow a literary phrase, I feel almost embarrassed to come back and post anything. But that is only when I think of this as a public place. If there is still any public out there wondering, I apologize for my long absence. As for the private space of this blog ahh well - here is a bit of an update on the Life-0-Bess.

After a splendifferous Thanksgiving holiday with a party every night, with precious guests, with constant cooking, eating, cork popping and drinking, TheCastle suddenly emptied out on Sunday morning and BD & I were left with silence and a sort of tiredness that surprised us. "Let's go for a ramble" the wise consort suggested and with cruise control set at 25 mph, we puttered around the back roads up at our end of the county and across into Caroline. I was utterly amazed at the difference in stamina between TheQueen of even 5 years ago and the 2009 version. (not to mention TheQueen of the 1980's - when she hosted weekend guests for 26 weeks in a row!)

We were tired. And maybe a little stupid with all the emotional upheavals of the past 2 months. Monday dawned gloomy and rainy and a slight sore throat began to prick me at lunch. By the end of the day I knew I'd be staying home on Tuesday - which was gloriously blue and fresh. Wed brought even more torrential rains while Thursday gave us shirt-sleeve temperatures. Friday started out sunny only to decay into More Rain which turned to snow on Saturday. The old folk around here call this Pneumonia Weather and though I've kept serious chest issues at bay - both BD and I are still coughing descretly.

The constant and often torrential rains have been the big surprise. I'm glad we aren't going into 2010 with a drought, but obviously - no crops are going to grow in those fields.

(should have been a picture here - huh - can't load it)

Today dawned bright and sunny, belying the ice on the road last night (when I was on my way to a Christmas party. No. I turned around and came home, calling in regrets. I had no desire to spend Saturday night in a ditch.) There was morning sunshine to dry the laundry and it was still nice out when BD and I took a stroll out to Robert's Landing - to have a look at the river in winter. It's a spare kind of beauty I particularly love.

(should have been a picture here - huh - can't load it)

There used to be a large white pine out here that dropped the prettiest cones. I would collect them for Christmas decorations. Alas, it went down in 2003 during Hurricane Isabelle.

Knitting? Fiber? you want to know about my knitterly activities? Silly me.

or rather

Silly you. It's Christmastime and I am doing gift knitting - so I am not posting photos. My fabulous cashmere shawl is waiting for January. My Other Secret Lace project coming along nicely but it will be a gift and I'm not posting photos of it till it's given. There are socks - and I am thinking there will be a hat. And I will photograph them all before they're wrapped up and put beneath someone's tree.

But since it is impossible for this Queen of ENFPs to live completely in the present, Future Projects are making noises, claiming my imagination and even a bit, my attention. I do want one sweater finished this winter. There is a Happy Yarn sweater I'd like to knit - and the Shelridge Farm Cardigan I plunked down bow coo bucks for last spring. There are some very lovely lace yarns that would like to be knit into More Shawls from Victorian Lace Today.

And I promise that these knitted projects will be well photographed and shared lavishly. That is - if blogger will let me load them.

This week I am less tired, more ready to give quality time to my job, and even more in the mood for Christmas. I have a lavish holiday this year, from the 24th through the 3rd and I intend to enjoy every moment of it. Already making plans to get up with friends, baking holiday goodies and working on another Christmas card. So - TheQueen is in a good place and hopes each of her three readers is too.

2009-11-27T06:33:00.003-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving to one and all

The food was delicious.

The company was delightful

We ate to repletion and talked till 9 o'clock ... you wouldn't believe how swiftly we could rearrange the room from dining to living. That's the reason I don't have a dine in kitchen.

And Best Of All - there will be 3 more days of ease, friendship, food, and relaxation. I love Thanksgiving.

2009-11-19T05:53:00.002-05:00

Time is your friend too

And time has passed since I made that last awful post. We have plodded through the week, attended to dooties, fulfilled obligations, nursed grief and shared love. Those are the things that fill up time and blot out the black holes of sadness, ease the sting of pain. Especially the love. There has been a groundswell of love for so many people - love for our lost cousin, love for his sister, love for those who are still here.

My big public event of the weekend went off remarkably well considering it had had minimal attention during the critical two weeks leading up to it. We had a warm and generous author who shared so much with the community and who, I believe, took something valuable home with her as well.

But on Friday morning, as I drove in to work, I was hit with a wall of longing to be with my own parents - my mother, who still cares about the beautiful world of art: my dad, who softens when his daughters dress up to come visit him, and my sister, who carries the heaviest of loads without complaining ... at least, without complaining beyond reason. So on Saturday, when we were finished with all weekend events, I drove on over to spend the rest of the weekend with my side of the family.

Sister and cute little cousin.

who had made plans to go see the Lipizzaner horses and who got a ticket for me too.

This was obviously a show for the horse aficionado's but I have enough horse history packed deep in my childhood to know something about the skills involved.

And I was pleased my little point and shoot camera did such a good job capturing images from so far away.

One week from today we will sit down 10 to Thanksgiving dinner. There is a lot to be thankful for this year, in spite of recent sadness, and I am looking forward to the long holiday.

2009-11-11T15:55:00.002-05:00

Friends will get you through hard times - and exercise!

First I want to thank everyone who left me encouraging comments on yesterday's post. It's simply wonderful to feel the kindness of your thoughts - the sympathy and understanding. Thank you so much. I am substantially better today than I was yesterday.

If you have ever taken a Myers Briggs Personality Test you'll know there are E people and I people. Extroverts and Introverts - and the defining attributes aren't sociable friendly people vs. unsociable unfriendly sorts. The difference between an E and an I has more to do with energy levels and problem solving styles. E's are energized when others are around and solve problems in groups. They make superb committee people. I's, otoh, find their energy sapped by crowds and are the type to go off, like Jack Horner, into a corner, and come out with a plum of a solution to any problem. I am married to an I who can focus for months at a time on a project, in his corner office and come out with a 900 page book! I am an E. I never try to tackle a problem by myself. If I don't have a committee, I'll scoop up strangers and pump them for their opinions and viewpoints.

My job takes me out into the public every day - the random public - which means not just friends and co-workers, but anybody who walks into the library. But it was those friends who came in yesterday who helped me so much as I wrestled with my sadness, my mortification, and my worries. Each one of them got to hear me puke out my story and as each one listened, nodded, cooed sympathetic sounds and patted me or hugged me they lifted some of the pain out of my heart, carried it away with them, and, since it wasn't their pain, tossed it in the trash on their way out of the building.

My favorite minister just happened to walk into the library while I was standing in the foyer. My knitting group met for lunch at the library. A Virgo Sister Friend called me out of the blue and we commiserated over how the world had suddenly grown unfriendly. You - dear friends - posted encouragement here on the blog. And by the end of the day I was able to stop hunching over my aching heart and stand up straight.

And after work I went to the gym and began walking around the indoor track. I didn't want to pump it up too much because I had a speaking engagement later in the evening and I didn't want to get too sweaty. But after a few laps my blood began to flow - and then surge - and after maybe a half a mile I suddenly felt the endorphins kick in. My eyes felt awake - felt like the light had gotten brighter. My shoulder blades began to pull together, lifting my chest even higher. By the time I'd done 2 miles I could smile brightly at people as I changed and checked out.

ding ding ding ding ding

That's the Duh Bess Bell going off in my head - saying "Earth to Bess. Earth to Bess" - Don't ever underestimate the mental health value of exercise. When your heart is in pain - walk - or run or swim or use the elliptical machine - but whatever you do - MOVE. Move your body and you'll end up moving it away from heartache.

I knew that. I was just testing you.

Love you
Mean it
Thank you for reading and thank you for commenting.

2009-11-10T06:39:00.003-05:00

Calm or numb - as life crashes down on me

I always tease ThePrince and tell him that the best wedding gift he gave me was his cousin H. She was just a little girl when I came into the family as a 19 year old girlfriend-with-staying-power. I'm in between the generations of his precious, but proper and somewhat stolid family. I bridged the gap between parents and children - the "glamorous big girl" who played with the little ones.

And yesterday one of those little ones died of a massive, unexpected heart attack. He was the brother of my best friend and best gift H. He was 46. We are still trying to wrap our brains around this devastation because nobody plans for something like this. To our knowledge he had no heart disease symptoms, though heart disease runs strong in his family on both sides. Every man in his mother's generation has had a heart attack and two have died from it. It looks suspiciously like the DNA is active in our children's generation too.

When a death comes suddenly and to someone who hasn't yet moved into the "old" category ... a category which seems to be extending further into the future every year I add to my own Not-Yet-Old category. I laugh at myself sometimes when I remember how utterly ancient I used to think 60 was and how, when my brother in law died at 69, of a HA, I was horrified that Someone So Young should actually die. Especially someone who ate properly, exercised, was smart enough to get good health care and who had enough money to pay for it. How could he die so young in this day and age?

Imagine the difficulty in coming to terms with losing someone 11 years younger than I?

Swirling all around this personal tragedy though, are all the Other Things that life was planning on, demanding and expecting of me, marching inexorably towards me . Things I am scrambling to do in my darling H's stead because she is the next of kin and must take on more pressing matters. Things I was supposed to have done yesterday, last week, two weeks ago, but put off because of our own health surprises and sojourns in hospitals and doctor's offices. And worse than these things - there are mistakes I have made in my haste, distractedness and sadness. Like - forgetting to name an important sponsor of a festive community event I am hosting this Friday and so angering him that he withdrew his sponsorship. No apologies will satisfy him and for that I'm deeply sorry. But the event still must go on as planned. I will plaster a glassy eyed smile on my face and plod through the weekend - it's only gift for me now the fact that, come Monday, it will be behind me instead of looming up ahead.

And so.
And so. I am going to use a trick I figured out some years ago when I had some dreadful thing I had to deal with in the public arena. I asked myself - what will be the final result if everything goes wrong. The answer? I would come home. My husband would wrap his arms around me. My dogs would wag their tails and lick my hands. My cozy house would smell like love inside 4 walls. My work would be there on Monday morning. Somewhere out there in the world there would be people who didn't like me - who thought I was worthless and stupid. But they would be only some out of billions of people and right here at home there would be people who loved me anyway.

And what would be the result if everything went surprisingly right?

I would come home. My husband would wrap his arms around me. My dogs would wag their tails and lick my hands. My cozy house would smell like love inside 4 walls. My work would be there on Monday morning. Somewhere out there in the world there would be people who didn't like me - who thought I was worthless and stupid. But they would be only some out of billions of people and right here at home there would be people who loved me.

So the end result is pretty much the same. Out there in the world I may blunder or I may step deftly but I can always come home to warm hugs, licked palms, and cozy walls. I guess there isn't really that much to worry about after all.

2009-11-04T06:47:00.002-05:00

Promised Stash Photos

Okay - today blogger played nicely with my computer and here are shots of what came home with me from Williamsburg and the wonderful shop Knitting Sisters.

Good yarn shops are not so rare now as they once were, but this is one of my favorites. Besides having lovely things to sell you, the staff is really really welcoming. They just make you feel like you're one of their sisters ... or brothers, as the case may be. Anyway, here is my haul -

The Berroco (familiar label and blue yarn on the lower right) is alpaca and will be matched with the Crystal Palace Mochi Plus in coordinating pinks and blues to make a hat. Ditto the olive green Lambs Pride and coordinating Mochi Plus - dimly seen on the needles and already in progress.

the Prism Custom Dyed Mohair didn't show off so nicely in the photo - dim morning light - but it will be Something Lacy but maybe not a shawl. There's over 900 yards in that skein and it could become a sort of lacy bed jacket with ruffly elbow length sleeves. Maybe. We'll have to wait and see.

Below is some overkill knitting. This is that twisted braid stitch where you knit a row in alternating colors - you know *K1 in MC, K1 in CC repeat from asterisk. Then you purl the next two rows in the same P1/P1 repeat but you twist the two colors from right to left with every stitch - then do a final purl row twisting the colors back again from left to right.

I think it's extraordinarily pretty BUT ... would show off more in more vividly contrasting colors. to follow it up right away with the multi mochi plus diminishes the effect. eh. It's done now. I just wanted to know how it was done and ... now I do.

Oh, and the blue Hefty bag? That's the Melon Stitch Shawl waiting patiently for me to finish the last long run down the side with the knitted on border.

2009-11-02T06:36:00.002-05:00

Well Dang

Mean old blogger won't let me load my photos. I'll try again later - but be assured - some knitting was done yesterday while the grey skies rained down on our cozy little house. Lawsee how I love a rainy Sunday

2009-11-01T08:13:00.002-05:00

November 1 - A gift from the stars

I plan to come back later and post lengthy text and photos but here is the word from MsHoroscope - news I've been waiting for for a long time:

While Uranus will retrograde back and forth from Aries to Pisces until he settles in Aries for good in 2011, you're about to see the light at the end of the tunnel - a stressful phase that begin way back in 2003 is about to come to a close.

So - isn't it just like a Virgo to worry that now Saturn's moved out of Virgo I'm worried that I won't have his help keep me werking away at it? Other people would think "whew, not so much work to do" but a Virgo never thinks that way. She thinks - werkwerkwerkwerkwerk.

So. Big Question. Can TheQueen take it easy or will she drive everyone crazy hunting for Something To Do with a Deadline on it?

Promise. Be back later today with photos of shopping therapy results.

2009-10-26T07:20:00.002-04:00

As Promissed

Here's the photo of the blue lace edging turning a corner. The yarn is merino so it wants to scrunch up right now but it will flatten out when it's blocked.

Here's a closeup.

The color is somewhere between the two photos - a little brighter than the first but not quite so loud as the second. And I am sorry to say - although I have been as proud as punch with how the pattern has worked out so far - I am now at that Daunting Moment when one finds a - gasp - Math Error. Although I believe I have followed this pattern exactly - I have discovered as add the edging to the short side of this shawl that there are two extra stitches lurking up ahead! This is the cast off part - the part that I couldn't have done wrong or the center part wouldn't have worked out. These were live stitches too, so it's highly unlikely I would have skipped a stitch. At the moment I can't figure out what I did wrong. I just haven't felt the love enough to go back and Count Carefully. I will. And if I can't figure it out I will rip back some of the edging and do a little fudging. But dang. This is a mystery.

I expected, if I did anything mathmatically incorrect it would be along the long edges, where one picks up selvedge stitches. But when I hit the first corner with no math issues I figured I was home free.

Well. Guess I figured wrong. Ah well. I'll leave it till tonight - who knows? the Knitting Fairy might come along and fix it for me while I am at work.

Happy Monday to you all.

2009-10-25T09:35:00.003-04:00

Where have she been?

Thank you my friends, for the compliments. Honest and true, this is an EASY -no - an E A S Y pattern. And I'm pleased to say I've rounded the first corner (my first knitted on edging corner) and am heading to the next one - should get there today. Photos in the next posting.

But where have I been? ahh well. I have been playing on SparkPeople's website. Sent there by my friend Bossy Little Dog's bossed around C, after she heard me whine and complain about how fat I'd gotten over the past few years. And I have been sucked into the vortex. And they have a weight loss blog feature where, as you have learned to expect from MsLoquacity, I have been pouring my heart out about fat grams and that other kind of fiber we all know about and oh this and that. And alas, there is really time only to make one long loquatious post a day in most people's lives, so I have neglected TheCastle dreadfully.

In order to fill up the empty roomsof TheCastle, I will offer up my SparkPeople blog post of today, so, unless you're interested in that part of my life - not much point in reading further. Just know, I will photograph the thrilling blue lace corner today and post it tomorrow.

Ta.

Goals goals goals

I have had the worst time coming up with goals for myself – with health and fitness and body and weight and dress size goals, that is. Oh – it is easy to say I want to be fit, I want to feel better, be stronger, look better - even that I want to get off blood pressure medicines. But what does that actually mean? Where is the measurable objective I need to get where I'm going. (ha! can you tell I work for the government?) And, can I even get there? I might be at my optimum weight and still need blood pressure medicines.

For that matter, how will I know what my optimum weight is?

Mind now, I am a classic ENFP on the Myers Briggs scale. For me it's the journey, not the destination. But worse than the fact that I never seem to have any goals is how easy it is to stray off the path on any given journey because the classic motto of an ENFP is “Hey! Look! A Bird!”

I can't think of anything I've ever wanted badly enough to say .... “By ___date I will achieve ____”

This doesn't mean I haven't wanted things and worked hard to get them. I spearheaded a million dollar building project and it happened. I had the fanciest garden you've ever seen because I worked 20 hours a week for about 5 springs and summers and in the end Wow! You can see the results on the Queen's Garden link in my sidebar. But there was no ticking off the items on the checklist about that garden. I just dove in and worked my little heart out and one day I looked around and thought “hey, this garden is too beautiful to keep to myself” and invited 100 people to a party.

I know that if I enter into something with joy and passion and concentration I will go far. It's really the only way I know to achieve something. Yet, like having 100 guests in my garden, I would like something I can point at to say “Hey – look! A goal – achieved!”

So. I've really been thinking hard and eventually, digging deep into my past I found a goal I want to achieve. For 20 years I stayed slim and trim and I had a great wardrobe. As time passed and the dress size went up, I held on to one special dress – one beautiful simple classic cotton sun-dress that, when I wore it, always made me fell like a princess – like a beautiful woman. I know I weighed about 143 lbs. when I wore that dress and so I have set that weight as my target weight. But the goal? The goal is to be able to wear that dress again.

I ought to be able to get there by mid-May, so I've set a single goal of wearing it on Mother's Day 2010. I may be able to wear it sooner. I am sure there will be other victories along the way – both Scale Victories and Non Scale Victories. But, like the day I had 100 friends in my beautiful garden, I will know I have arrived when I can button up that wonderful dress and wear it someplace. And when I wear it, I'll have my photograph taken and post it for all the world to see. .

2009-10-19T07:48:00.003-04:00

Pictures

This is the Melon Shawl from Victorian Lace Today and that's about all I'm going to say except - it's easy - and no more boring than your average shawl or scarf (La! 62 repeats of the same pattern? Ugh!) and it's beautiful and .... I am in love with knitted on edgings.

You can see the dog hairs in the edging. Eh. They can be plucked out.

I am in love with fagotting.

2009-10-18T08:12:00.002-04:00

Thank you, V, L, K, and M. It really is an adventure - this twining of two lives over a long stretch of time. Sometimes there is this wonder that I, the ethnic Yankee catholic, could mesh my life with BD, the old Virginia episcopalian - I the Heinz 57 American, he the Pawpawdidindoitlikethat southerner - somehow found common ground. At other times, well, it was as if we both were escaping from Wrong Backgrounds into the custom fit of the life we've created for ourselves. But most of the time I just count my blessings and move on from there.

Today though I will be merely moving into the attic to dig out some warm clothes. Cold Weather and Wet has whomped down upon us and suddenly there isn't anything to put on besides tank tops and shorts. Last spring I did a major clean out of a lifetime of clothing but it's still daunting to me to venture into the darkness that is my attic. And it is dark because of one of those Challenges that M referred to - since there are now no functioning light fixtures up there and I must carry up a camping lantern .... but we won't talk about that, right? (oh where are the laughing smiley faces when I need them?)

And in the afternoon we will go to a wake for my dear friend L who died a week ago. There will be lots of people there because she was truly beloved and we'll all be smiling because she left us with more of happiness than of anything else.

Oh la! And I promise to post a photo of Blue Lace somewhere soon and let you know where it is.

Ta.

2009-10-16T07:27:00.004-04:00

It's Anniversary Time Again

You have heard it before, but I never get tired of this story:

Long long ago there was a cheeky teenager, just past her 19th birthday, who was studying music at a big city university. One Friday, as she walked into the orchestra room, the flute player spun around in his chair, looked her straight in the face and asked her if she wanted to drive to North Carolina with him the next day.

“Sure” she said, desperate for anything to do on a weekend, when most of her friends split for home, leaving her to rattle all alone in a monolithical dormitory. Besides, he was one of the really good looking guys she and Robyn had decided were “cute enough to take us out”. And he had such a voice - deep sonorous basso profundo with the most delicious country southern drawl - not hick, in fact, very cultured, but oh so Southern. And startlingly blue eyes. Blue like autumn skies. And he was big - not fat or anything - just big with a big aura, a big presence. Nothing hesitant or shy or effacing. This was a man, not a boy, and he was inviting her to spend all day with him.

“Right.” he said. "Meet me at my house tomorrow at 10 a.m." and he gave directions to a row house in the Fan district, a few blocks from school.

Poor thing. Little did he know that he’d just arranged a date with his exact opposite in the GreatClockUniverse. She was no ditherer. No lingerer. No procrastinating late comer. She was an EarlyBird - always 15 minutes before hand, sometimes more. For this important assignation she was a full 30 minutes early, knocking on the dark and silent door of his first floor apartment.

“Stood up!” she thought. “Impossible” Nobody stood up this girl, no siree. And she stomped the four blocks back to school, snatched her fiddle out of her locker, slammed the practice room door shut and began to saw away, muttering imprecations, curses, indignant affronted descriptions of what is expected in this world, and other dark and damning words. But ...She was also innately fair and as she scraped away at Kreutzer, she had to admit that the man had said come at 10. Perhaps he was out filling up the gas tank. Or perhaps he was renting a trailer. After all, the purpose of the trip was to retrieve his piano, waiting for him in his old place in Chapel Hill, NC. And so, at 10 o’clock for sure, she rounded the corner of Lombardy and Floyd and there he was, waving an arm, smiling happily and calling out “Hey Baby!”

She crossed the street and he invited her into his apartment. He offered her a beer, and though she hated the stuff - still does, in fact - she was also aware of what is cool and for a still-teenage girl at college, drinking beer at 10 a.m. was truly cool, so she said yes. He was back in a flash with a mason jar full of the most delicate, most mellow drink she’d ever tasted. His own home brew. There were gallons of it in his little bachelor kitchen. Now, be it gallons or pints, this stuff was potent and it was only moments before she was definitely in the mood to be entertained. And entertained she was, with music, books, ideas, and talk talk talk, tumbling out of this delightful man with his shelves full of books, boxes full of sheet music, head full of poetry in three different languages and kitchen full of nectar. Best of all, he was happy. Neither cynical, sarcastic nor jealous of another’s musical ability or progress, he was ready to share, to learn, to listen and to admire. In the highly competitive world of performing arts, here was someone with a blend of such innocence and courage there was nothing to do but laugh with pure pleasure and maybe fall in love a bit.

After a while the two of them tooled off in search of a U-haul place. Across the Lee Bridge at an Esso Station on Cowardan Ave., where Caravatti’s Junk Yard used to be, he stopped and went in to arrange a rental. Minutes passed and when he returned he stoood right in front of the car and grinned at her through the windshield; one of those beaming, sunshiny “Ain’t this Grand?” grins. And as she stared up at him, suddenly he turned into an old man, still standing there, still grinning. She blinked. Gawped. Stared again. She looked down at her own hands and they had turned into an old lady's hands, the skin papery and spotted with large brown freckles, sunk down between the tendons. They were her grandmother’s hands. And she thought “My god. I’m going to be riding around in a car with this man when I’m an old lady.”

For some reason he had decided to rent the trailer in NC. Probably the Richmond outfit didn’t have what he was looking for. They motored on down I95, past the tobacco plant and warehouse district of south Richmond, past Petersburg, through Emporia. They talked the whole time, chattering, discovering, opening, sharing. At one point he said “well, there’s a lot you don’t know about me” and she thought “oh boy, there’s a lot you don’t know either”. And at that, there were some surprising points of contact. He had graduated from the same high school her dad had gone to. She had played a concert in Chapel Hill that he had gone to hear. He had taken lessons in Winston Salem while she had been a student at the School of the Arts. At Herndon, NC they stopped for lunch at a Kentucky Fried Chicken place. She had never been to one. In fact, fast food then consisted almost entirely of hamburgers, cheeseburgers, milkshakes and fries. Fried chicken was a real treat and, of course, to a 19-year old, it didn’t threaten the diet doom it was to present later on.

The October skies had been gray all day but they grew heavier and more threatening as evening approached. Rain began to fall. At a Carolina gas station he picked up a small box trailer and two ice cream sandwiches. “How did you know ice cream is my all time favorite treat?” she cried and, to his question of “Then don’t I deserve a reward?”, she answered with a resounding kiss. Of course, this was in the days when, first off, girls worried about being thought forward or even worse; fast! It was also at a time when she was very wary of anything that would cause boys to sidle away from a touchy feely woman. Of course, this was no boy. 28, he’d told her. But when it’s the right guy, with the right gift, only a kiss will do.

It was harder to be chatty on the long dark wet drive home. Especially when the passenger was one of those Superior Morning Persons. For an SMP, darkness means it’s time to close one’s eyes. She still didn’t realize she was dealing with one of those Stubborn Night Owls. SNO’s think SMP’s are silly, especially the types who creep out of cozy warm beds before the sun is actually above the roof tops of the houses across the street. All those delightful discoveries were waiting up ahead for them. On that day, in the hypnotic glare of headlights on raindrops, she grew pretty drowsy. “I like to drive. Go to sleep” he told her and eventually she did.

It was too late to get back into the dorm when they reached Richmond. She’d known it would be and had signed out for the weekend. He gallantly put her up for the night. She was there the next day when other friends came around to help shove the piano down the narrow hallway and into the apartment. It was well into the afternoon before she made her way back to her place, to pace the dormitory halls till her girlfriend should show up and she could tell her the exciting news about the upcoming nuptials.

There have been many more rambles, in half a dozen different cars, since that October 16, thirty three (now 38) years ago. In 1991 the two of them took the trip to North Carolina all over again, even to starting at 1617 Floyd and to looking for some sort of U-haul place on the south side. They found the KFC in Herndon had moved a block but it was still serving up the original 11 herbs and spices recipe. They even went off on a ramble today, the two of them, getting older, but not yet quite as old as the geezers in her vision.

But that is the story of my anniversary. We also celebrate a lovely wedding anniversary in April. It’s important, but not more important than October 16, when my favorite cute couple started out on life’s journey. Sometimes it’s hard to believe I even had a life before that day, although I can tell stories from that Mesozoic Era. It’s as if 10/16 were my real birthday; the day I began living my grown up life. BD, who had a head start on me, says he feels the same way.There are a lot of stories in my bag of tales, but this one is my favorite.

2009-10-11T06:35:00.003-04:00

Oh la. It has just been ages since I've felt chatty enough to post. There has been a general struggle to get back into werk mode after my NYC fling. It seems I forgot how to be an employed person while wallowing in the excitement of Life as a Sophisticated Tourist. And then I returned home to find a beloved friend had taken a sudden turn for the worse. She was diagnosed with the C-word in late July and on Friday she stepped through the portal and went on to her next journey.

It was the most beautiful death I have ever witnessed, full of peace and rest and comfort and surrounded by the sweetest family and many devoted friends - devoted and kind enough to be sure to visit but not to crowd around the family at the last. She had had no treatment, was on no pain killers and seemed to be in no pain, merely drifting away in a beautiful blue and pink and bright white aura.

Honestly, if you could choose a way to leave this world, this is one of the best around - with some months to make sure everything was in order, have a last beach vacation, be with all your immediate family and then ... just let go.

Oh Lucille, I will miss you so much, but oh my goodness, I bet you are having a grand time where you are now.

Speaking of death at the beginning of a post sort of leaves all the rest of what I might have said today relegated to irreverent, if not irrelevant, only of course L would not have thought so. And yet, posting anything else without mentioning something as big in my life would be ... well, in some sort of way, dishonest. Besides, L was a knitter - one of the knitters who actually lured me back into the fold. She had more of the most amazing sweaters I have ever seen. The last 8 years or so she had stopped making them because, as she said, she already had so many of them, but she continued to knit little gift bags that she filled with sample cosmetics and donated to the local woman's shelter. She had a network of traveling friends (including me) who would scoop up hotel soaps and shampoos to bring home to her.

But her knitting really was noteworthy. Entrelac, fair isle, patchwork - she did it all. And she was always graciously interested in whatever I was working on. Her eyes would twinkle and she'd remember some long finished project that she had stitched some long ago winter - for she had seen 92 of them! She had many memories.

So it is alright to post, not just about L, but about the life of this knitter, here on this knitting blog.

Only

Uh.

I am in the midst of a surprise project that I don't want to talk about. Not yet, anyway. And it has sucked up my knitting time in a way that has crowded out every other knitting thing - including the Cashmere Lace Shawl for TheQueen.

Of course, Her Royal ENFPedness would have found a way to Not Complete that shawl in a timely manner anyway - after all - that's what we do, we ENFPers. We mourn completion and let UFO' s linger on into the future so we don't have to say goodbye. Eh. Our curse. I will get back to it once I come to a clear understanding of what I am going to knit for Christmas gifts. I am contemplating socks, but when I think about them ... lawsee ... there are so many of them this year. 4 for sure, possibly another, and then ... another pair? Oh la! and a pair for P? 7 pair of socks between now and Christmas? I don't think so. Could I switch to hats? Hmm? there is no such thing as Second Hat Syndrome.

Well, I am still undecided about what to knit for Christmas, which, my dears, is only 74 days, 17 hours, 56 minutes & 13 seconds away!! But for sure, everyone else on my gift list is getting this white fruit cake soaked in spirits.

I gave them last year and they were such a hit that I plan to make Lots of them this year. Little cakes, not too damaging, no matter how many calories in them, because they are small. I believe I made 12 of them last year but this year there will be More.

In fact, I believe I shall go dig out some cookbooks and see what else this turning of the season prompts me to make. I have a little pie pumpkin. Perhaps pumpkin soup would be just the thing on a brisk October evening.

And knitting. Yes. Soup and knitting - a fitting way to say farewell to my dear friend Lucille.

2009-10-07T20:43:00.001-04:00

Knitting Occurs

I'm just dropping in to assure everyone that I am knitting on things but they are Gift Things and I don't want to show them off here. As soon as Gift Knitting is knit I will start posting information about the Life -0- TheQueen.

2009-10-05T06:58:00.003-04:00

Fall Fiber Festival 2009

I wasn't sure I'd even make it to the festival this year but at the last moment I had wheels and a clean house and a tiny bit of cash I'd saved in the Spend It Like a Man jar. (I'm so tempted to call this the SILeMan Jar but that's a little mean, now, isn't it?) I knew I was going to buy something but I wanted to buy something unique and happily, I found it.

Boucle yarn, yes but not just any sort of boucle yarn.

It's Alpaca boucle!!!

I bought 8 ounces - just shy of 800 yards. Not enough for a sweater but I don't know if I'd want a whole sweater out of it. I am thinking of a shawl, perhaps one of those dropped stitch shawls. And then I thought ... shimmery opalescent silk ribbon or thread carried along with it and worked into a fringe. And then I remembered the tan Adrienne Vitadini alpaca yarn upstairs in the upstairs stash. The stuff I bought for $15 a bag last fall at Stitches. A tan swetaer with creamy boucle collar and cuffs?

Well.

Lots of ideas. Here is a glamour shot. Alpaca boucle with silver.

Of course, there were lots of cute animals at the show.

And even cuter dogs - which we all know are not animals, but a superior form of human.

And while I'm adoring this precious dog I want to reccommend a movie. Mist
the tale of a sheep dog, a live action movie narrated by Derek Jacobi ( a major crush of mine with such a voice). I watched this on Saturday and fell absolutely in love. Yeah yeah, it's a sort of human story that anthropomorphises dogs, but it is so well done. This is a family watch. And there is a whole TV show devoted to Mist... check here.

There were true materpieces in the skein and garment show. This was the hardest one for me to resist touching:

This was inspiring - I have GOT to make me some fair isle gloves on tiny needles with super fine yarn.

This was the most inspiring of all and had I been the judge, I'd have given it the Best of Show.

Just look at that fringe!!

It was a beautiful day with blue skies and perfect outdoor temperatures, but this year the crowd seemed mighty thin, so I hope for the dear and faithful vendors, that there was a lot of money being spent. I love this little festival and hope to be attending it on into the future.

2009-09-30T07:05:00.019-04:00

TheQueen goes to TheCity

TheConsort: For your birthday let's go to see B&M in New York City

TheQueen: Oh I would love to! I've been wanting to go to NYC for ever!!

2 days before we leave

TheConsort: I've talked to B. We'll meet them on Long Island at 5 o'clock on Tuesday

TheQueen, looking puzzled: I thought B&M were going to show us around the city for my birthday......

And beneath the hot breath of words that include sailboats and hate-the-city and other things that mean nothing and represent only I wanna do what I wanna do, TheQueen thinks to herself "What is the answer that love would give?" and the answer was "don't pick up that bone, just let it lie", which she did and thus began a delightful trip nawth that included a sailboat ride she didn't have to take and lots of sky scraper forests for her to walk through.

And so here we are, saying goodbye to VA on the 301 bridge

Hello MD - and Morgantown Power Plant

There were lots and lots of bridges. What many people don't know, though, is that TheQueen has a morbid and irrational fear of bridges - the higher, the more superstructure, the more afraid she is. When she is riding, she just keeps her eyes on the knitting in her lap. When she is driving she glues it to the driver-side rear wheel of the car in front of her. But she was mighty glad to see the last of the big bridges, going into New York.

And landing in a pretty little yankee town.

We took the Goethals Verrazano bridges across Staten Island ... where we encountered our only traffic jam as well as a misty hazy grey glimpse of the Manhattan skyline. We then drove (and drove and drove) around the Brooklyn along the Lee Erickson Dr. Of course, that part of Brooklyn looks nothing like the only Brooklyn in my mind - Francie Nolan's crowded red brick tenements from Betty Smith's A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. Instead, it was all parks and green signs telling you how to get to Coney Island or Rockaway. In my head, Barbara Streisand was singing "I'm Private Schwartz from Rockaway". Sometimes the imagination is stronger than reality.

We were headed to Cutchough, durn near all the way out to the tip of Long Island, where our friends B&M were waiting with fresh tomato tarts and more good wines than I've ever tried in a single sitting. In fact, delicious food and delectable wines punctuated every evening, threaded through with laughing conversation and all round pleasure.

Wednesday dawned grey and still and was obviously no day anyone except Himself would want to go sailing. Instead our hosts drove us around the whole tip end of LI - from Nassau Point to Riverhead, through the Hamptons to Montauk (yes I brought home some Montauk daises).

Here is BD with hosts at Nassau Point.

and here is TheQueen with LD at the ocean! We really did have that much fun, all the time.

After the most perfect lunch of lobster bisque we took the ferries from Shelter Island

Still having fun!

To Greenport

And back home again to Cutchough

Where a man can dream about sailing - and even go sailing on Thursday when the girls parted company with the sailors and drove (over another bridge) to TheCity.

Well, first we went up to the outer suburbs to B&M's house. We had the afternoon free do a little fancy shopping in the city. Now, I really only know one city - Richmond, VA - and a smattering of Washington DC. I suppose one could call Fredericksburg VA a city but really it's a mass of suburbs squeezing a small southern town into obscurity. Living such a provincial and deeply rural lifestyle any cluster of buildings hugging a sidewalk feels exotic to me. But M took me first to Arthur Avenue - which is the Italian market street somewhere "in the city" and my goodness - what a shopping adventure that was!

The magic word is cheese - my favorite food, in fact, my chocolate. Just look in the left hand corner.

But the butcher shops! Oh My!

The choices!

Even the cigars. This fellow was rolling them up and wrapping them with dark and light leaves in chevron patterns. Made me want to buy one just to use as a decoration!

M told me this market was bought and built in response to Mayor La Guardia ordering the vegetable carts off the streets. Probably a good idea anyway, since now they're out of the weather.

I wonder if this kitty is for sale too?

There was a sausage shop, not much bigger than a large closet, that had sausages in front of you and sausages behind you and to the left and to the right and when I happened to glance up at the ceiling ... it too was completely filled with sausages hanging over your head.

Sadly, few of these shops of delectables took credit cards and I had not come to the city with a lot of cash ... or perhaps I should say happily, because otherwise I would have been paying off the VISA bill for the next 3 months! I did buy one small sausage, though, because that is something we really can't get down here.

The evening was well on to darkness before the guys came in from Long Island, but they'd had a grand sail and were full of plans to go look at More Sailboats the next day .. on City Island? I'm not sure. But with a native guide, BD was sure to find whatever he was looking for.

M and I went to the city. I am sure she had as much fun as I, since she was showing a complete novice, ready to be pleased, her city. M is a first generation Irish girl from Queens. This is truly her city and she knew exactly where to go and when to be there in order to catch the next train or see the next sight. It was a glorious blue sky day with puffy clouds and breezes, and there was so much to see, and I was so longing for the "city experience" that we elected to skip going inside. This was an outdoor tour of city landmarks and with 2 brief exceptions, we stayed outside.

Of course, we took the train in to .... Penn Station? Yes. I think that is the one with the beautiful blue ceilings painted with constellations.

And then we were In TheCity - with its hustle and bigness and all these people I don't know!!! You can't imagine the excitement generated by hundreds of faces you've never seen before, when you live in a place where, not only do you know everybody, you're kin to them!

Of course, no librarian would go to NYC and skip this important landmark.

A nice fellow from Canada took our photo in return for us doing the same. I never did ask him if he was a librarian, but I wonder now. I bet he was.

This was one of the few places we went inside. I had to have at least a peek. And who should I meet but the most famous ... the original Pooh family!

Did you ever wonder why Disney made Piglet look so strange in the cartoon? That little tiny butt always puzzled me because, well, pig hips are where the hams come from - they tend to be pretty good sized. But here you see the original Piglet and it all becomes clear. I wonder which grandma made this little toy?

I suppose Tigger was a snow tiger.

Pooh looks just like the bear my older sister had when she was a girl - and she called him PoohBear too.

Eyeore is the most moth eaten - as befits his personality.

Of course, no trip to NYC is complete without views of my own personal favorite ski tower ... the Chrysler Building

but I would surely have loved to have had time to dine here at this restaurant in Bryant Park all covered in vines. I read the menu outside the door and the prices were very reasonable... especially since I assumed everything in NYC would be at least 3 times what it was down home.

The park was full of greenery and chairs and loveliness but the neatest thing of all was the gilded merry go round.

The energy you feel in Times Square is throbbingly delicious. I couldn't live in such a high speed place but it filled me with exactly the pumped up feeling I was hoping for. I haven't even any idea what is inside any of these buildings, because the outsides are so riveting.

Here is Parson's School of Design - famous to any of us who love fashion and clothing.

I fell in love with this sculpture and photographed it several times. There is another statue of a man at a treadle sewing machine and imbeded in the sidewalks are round plaques honoring famous New York fashion designers.

No gorilla's here today.

We only walked through Macy's to get from one street to another, and to get the feel of the real Macy's. But if I wanted to shop at Macy's I'd just go to Richmond.

But from Macy's we took the subway down to Battery Park to take in the Famous Lady herself, Ms. Statue of Liberty ... and to enjoy the lively park life. There were dozens of these charicture artists drawing people and if we'd had more time I would have loved have sat for one of them.

And lots of opportunities to have your photo take with the cooler version of the SoL.

and walk along the espeland

We headed back into Manhattan from the park where this lovely wroght iron cross-walk caught my eye.

It takes people from this side of the street

across to Trinity Church, the only other place where we went inside.

It's nestled like a little green and brown jewel, among the grey steel towers

and most of the graves are from the 18th century.

No trip to the city for me would have been complete if we hadn't gone by Ground Zero. Even though it was really just a walled off construction site, I had to weep some and hold the memory of those innocent people and that terrible day close in my heart. I can't help but imagine the neighboring sky scrapers looking down like mourners at a funeral.

We didn't go into the museum that is across the street - though lots of folk were filing in. So many, in fact, that there was a line outside. But what I did photograph ... being the girl from Essex County ... was this.

Not a land mark, but enough of a coincidence to tickle me out of my sadness.

Lawsee - a week ago I remembered what this pretty little church was called, but I've forgotten now.

But here are More Beautiful Tall Buildings against Brilliant Blue Skies -

and here is the crowd around Union Square where there were more vegetable carts than Mayor La Guardia could ever have ordered off the streets. I wonder if he's turning in his grave.

But by the time we got here it was late in the afternoon and our feet were tired. I'd had pleanty of Big City Rush and M suggested we head home. We had time to pick up a drink and snack in the station and take it to the train where we got the last spot where we could sit together.

It was a glorious Day In The City. It was everything I'd hoped for and I am sure that my own enthusiasm made the city sparkle for the home girl in a new way.

Friday night is Pizza Night at B&M's, served up with copius glasses of Chianti. I was really pooped and headed to bead about 10 o'clock, leaving the guys looking at sail boat ads on the computer. And early the next morning we loaded up and headed back to Paradise ... er ... home.

It was a perfect trip. A perfect introduction to TheCity. A perfect time with congenial friends. I feel sooo cosmopolitin now - so sophisticated - so ready to go back for another visit. Happily, they will be visiting us later this month so the friendship, the best part of the whole trip, will get another boost, and we will have our opportunity to return, if only for a little while, the hospitality that showered onto us for nigh on to a week.

I'm so glad I got to go to the city and I am so glad I am home - because, east or west, home is best.

2009-09-28T07:08:00.005-04:00

Someone's been to the Big City

(Hey! Isn't that a library?)

Someone had a splendid time and someone plans to write all about it but someone is so far behind on Other Things she hasn't had time to share.

But Someone is so chatty that you just know she will soon.

For today, though, the first day back in the office in almost 2 weeks!!!! Someone only has another Big City photo to share. Yes. Times Square.

2009-09-17T07:38:00.002-04:00

Oh No! More UFO's in the offing

Who do I think I am anyway? Lily Chin's long lost twin? Am I really thinking I shall knit three lace shawls for Christmas presents? Do I even know three people who would want lace shawls? Aren't I already making a cashmere lace beauty that is past the half-way point? Am I crazy?

Well. Hmmm.

The answers are:

The Queen
No
Yes
No
Yes
Probably

But who could resist a lace yarn sale? And I have been lusting over these shawl and scarf patterns in Victorian Lace Today ever since the book came out. And after all - I need some mindless knitting for the coming few days. Something I won't need a pattern for. I don't want to knit More Socks till I have some guy colored sock yarn. I'm going to be sitting for long stretches at a time over the next 2 days and maybe in a car several days next week. I need lace. I Need lace. I NEED LACE! And by golly - I got me some.

Must dash now but a health update reports that TheQueen's meds are working, her new wedge pillow puts her to sleep (and keeps her there) at night, and she has more energy now than she's had months. Just in time to celebrate the BirthdayDay coming up on Monday. Happy happy queen.

2009-09-14T07:36:00.002-04:00

Something pretty to start the week

This is intended to counteract the dreadful effects of the planets laid out for this week. Doom and Disaster and Oppositions of Saturn and Uranus and enormous catastrophe are all promised this week by all the astrologers. I make a point of only reading the ones who manage to wring a positive note out of these gloomy words, like MsHoroscope in Australia (who is always half a day ahead of me anyway).

This week holds a powerful link between Saturn and Uranus which is going to hit you square in two very sensitive parts of your chart. And believe it or not, even if that doesn't sound like something to look forwards to, it actually is! Big time, in fact. Why? Because (as I've written elsewhere so forgive me if I'm repeating myself) it's Push Comes To Shove Week all over the world and in your world, all this goes double. If you have the feeling you're stuck in a rut, it's time to break out. You've put in the hard yards.

Now isn't that nice? The only rut I've been in has been the ill health rut and last Friday the charming and capable, but infant doctor who is now our family physician (can you believe it? his name is Ryan?!? I mean - Ryan is the name we grownups gave our children! I never knew a single Ryan born in the 1950's!!) gave me a combination of meds that seem to have broken me out of the juicy chest rut and for that alone I am rejoicing. If Other Things are going to happen this week - at least I can breath during the day and sleep at night. I am content.

Other Things might include sudden changes in plans for BD who's eyes began bleeding again on Saturday night. They might involve my dad who is crankily imprisoned in a (very grim and crowded) rehab center, complaining to my sister every day (with some justification) without lifting even an eyelash to mitigate it's grim, crowded gloominess. He is not confined to his bed but he stays there all day ... 40 square feet of bleakness - no wonder he is cranky and depressed. They might involve two personalities that are clashing on a board I sit on too. This Virgo so hates conflict she suffers even when she has to witness it between others.

Interestingly enough, Other Things do not include the current round of budget cuts from the State. Although they hit my library the same as they hit others, they have been expected for so long it's a relief they finally got here. At 5% we got off as lightly as possible and since we've never used state money for staff, we will feel it less than many.

Other Things also do not involve our failure to find a new car last week. New to us, of course. We are used to the ordinary used care market where only people with no self esteem attached to the year or make or even color, so long as it's got low mileage, of their cars. The Blue Book guides Himself on his quest and usually he comes home in a day or at most in 2, with something I can drive for another 10 years. Naively, we decided the Haile Family needed a second car, so while the little white Nissan is still running (276,000 miles and heading for 3K) TheQueen sent her consort out shopping.

Nada. Not only is there very little out there, what is is priced firmly at retail and nobody is willing to come down. We have scaled back our expectations, but that threw us out into the private market which, while it may have something we're willing to lay down cash for, requires a lot more phone calls and driving around. Ah well. That is why god gave me a husband. So I can let him take care of this.

And Other Things are not going to interfere with Birthday Celebrations. At the moment plans include dinner with family at a new restaurant and a visit with old friends and some time off next week. But.

But if Other Things intrude, if they send us all in different directions, if all plans gang aft agley, we will find a way to have fun with whatever is left. After all. This is Birthday Month. That alone is a happiness to cherish.

2009-09-09T07:46:00.002-04:00

7 Diamonds Down, 30 To Go

Thanks everyone for the nice words. This was a progress shot taken Monday night.

Very little progress has been done since then, even though I had a knitting group meeting last night. We never do make much progress on knitting group night anyway. Mostly we have show and tell when we get together. We ought to call this Inspiration Night, because that's really what we get together for. We're all impressed with the other's creativity but lots of our friends sort of roll their eyes at the energy we pour into our fiber related pursuits. Once a month we like to be with people who squeal and stroke and gasp and ask and touch and encourage and advise and admire.

I really want to finish this shawl up now - because there are several big projects I want to jump into this fall so I believe I will have to set up a schedule. One pattern a night on weeknights and 3 each weekend day at a minimum. More is okay but less is not acceptable. Even at that rate I won't finish this baby till the very end of September but that's acceptable. That would still give me time to at least cast on my Shelridge Farm sweater before knuckling down to serious Christmas knitting. Because, my friends, Christmas is only 106 days away. Just have a look here if you don't believe me.

Happy Hump Day to you all.

2009-09-06T15:11:00.004-04:00

Proof of Cashmere Knitting

After a week of struggling with this border I am at last seeing progress. The first border I planned to use - (see French Trellis Border on page 98 of Victorian Lace Today) - proved beyond my counting skills. It was also a surprisingly heavy border for such a lacy looking scarf. I am guessing the yarn and gauge I'm working with contributed to the heaviness but it really was the counting that defeated me.

I looked for a lighter, more open border pattern. I found several in the same book that came in as multiples of 8 or 16 rows and combined them to create this border.

Much lacier. Much more open and, though it, too, tried to crush my enthusiasm with multiple counting errors, I eventually got in the mathmatical knitting groove and I'm almost at the point where I can knit this by reading the fabric instead of following the pattern. It's "true knitted lace" which I am told is called so because a hole is created on every row - that is - there are YO's and some form of K2Tog on every row. Trouble is, it's hard to see what you should do next when you're on the purl side.

I'm not sure if my ultimate success came as a result of the many times I knit (and ripped) this pattern or because I finally put stitch markers in. Likely a combination of both. Someone on Ravelry suggested I knit swatches of the lace pattern and, in a way, that's what I did. Many swatches knit onto the shawl with the same strands of poor tortured cashmere.

Which should be a testimony to the reslilliancy of Hunt Valley Cashmere Yarn. It seems to me I will have to go to MS&W again next year if I want to peruse her stock. Alas, she has no website. Here is a somewhat closer view of the yarn - keep in mind that it was knit and ripped at least 8 times.

2009-09-03T08:02:00.002-04:00

You would not believe the hoops Blogger is making me jump through to get in here. Grumble grumble grumble. Still and all I did want to post a word or two about my shawl and it's as yet unknit border.

You may remember that the first border wouldn't play nicely with my brain and after a while I decided, in spite of sounding like sour grapes, that it wasn't the right border for this shawl. Too heavy. Too many knit stitches, not enough yarn overs. I then found a combination of lacy borders that together looked to make a pretty outer rim for this shawl but requiring Lots More Stitches - 64 instead of 51. I charted it out on a spread sheet and it took 1 and a half pieces of legal paper. Long! Someone wisely advised me to knit a sample border to get to know it but I didn't take her sage advice. Instead I just started knitting it and even though there were many more stitches, I made far fewer mistakes. I knit the first 11 rows, attaching it to my beauteous cashmere circle and realized the thing was way too long. Way WAY too long. 15 inches - when I really only want 10.

My cobbled together border consisted of 3 repeats of an 18 stitch diamond, hemmed on one side with two extra garter stitches for joining and a 7-10 stitch pointed border on the outside. I prefer odd numbered repeats to even numbered - the balance feels better to me when there is a fulcrum. But in this case, that extra diamond added far too much length. And so. I am once again starting over with the border. It is now 45-48 stitches and that is where I hope to settle for the next month as I knit all 25920 stitches!

Ta.

2009-09-01T09:10:00.003-04:00

Happy Birthday Month

Happy Birthday Month – Day 1! Lord I love September and how perfectly its first day dawned – with crisp fresh air and a golden sun slanting through the trees to leave fluttering emeralds in the forest canopy outside my bedroom window.

I am happy to report that on the eve of the Birthday Month TheQueen at last achieved success knitting a border onto the cashmere shawl. I have 5 rows attached at this point and expect to be able to post a photo of my progress in a very short time. What more could a knitter ask for on the first day of her Birtday Month?

But it's terribly late in the day and so I can only wish you all a Happy Tuesday and may you too have emeralds in your forests.

2009-08-31T09:38:00.002-04:00

Flummoxed. Stymied. Halted in my tracks.

Thanks, KathyR - I do seem more like my old self. I am going to put my crankiness down to a summer of sickness.

As for that shawl border, for some reason I just can't seem to knit it onto my shawl. I can't seem to knit such a long pattern without making errors - or worse! - seeing errors that aren't there and ripping back anyway. After a weekend of trying I have nothing to show for my work.

The French Trellis border that looks so lacy on the blue shawl in the Victorian Lace Today book is, alas, I think too heavy for this project. It's heavier and thicker than the shawl itself and I rather think borders ought to be a bit lacier than the shawl body. A perusal of the book found some lacier borders that still fit mathematically in both row and stitch count. Combined, they're a little longer – 62 vs 51 stitches, but longer is not a problem. The problem is – this is an easier border and I'm still making errors in my knitting or else my counting.

I was also struggling with the actual knitting because it seemed I had only the one #6 circular needle and trying to knit the border with the same needle that held all the shawl stitches was quite difficult. Around dinnertime on Sunday I packed that shawl up and walked away from it. I'll pick it up again, maybe this evening, maybe later in the week. But I know well, the seamstress' Rule of Three: After 3 mistakes, put it down and do something else. It stood me in good stead for decades of fine sewing. I'm sure it applies to knitting as well. And happily, I found another #6's circular in a box in my stash, so when I do pick that shawl up again, I won't have the ergonomic issue to deal with – only the brain-o-nomic one.

Also – I'll chart out the entire pattern on a large piece of paper. I can tell that my problems stem from a mild dyslexia I've suffered all my life. Finding things with my eyes has always been difficult. How I wish I had someone to read the pattern to me. I do so much better with my ears. In fact, I am seriously thinking of reading the chart out loud into a recorder and then playing it back to myself.

So. It is Monday again. The Monday that begins the last week of summer vacation for most folks, but it is also Birthday Month Eve. Already I can feel my spirits lifting and my body responding to the song of the crickets, the nip of cooler air (weather dot com guys are promising us perfection all week, after a little rain today) and the energy of the Holiday Months of Autumn. I wish I could stay home all day and play with toys – but more important, I wish us all the joys of a fresh new day, a fresh new week, and a fresh new month coming tomorrow.

2009-08-30T08:08:00.006-04:00

Wide Open Sunday

That's just what today is - open and free and delightfully cool. We had rain like God's faucet was turned on Friday night - so heavy it made the view of the fields a blank white screen. Yesterday dawned hot and hotter and humid and humid-er (humidier?) and altogether beastly. Every spider in 4 counties had spun a cobweb between any two points they could find in my house. I was determined. This was turning out to be the first weekend I've felt well enough to clean house in weeks and weeks and by golly, I was going to do it.

Happily, BD was out of the house all day helping the New Boat Owner and his friends pack up the sailboat. Happier still, my birthday camera ( Oh didn't I tell you? A new Panasonic Lumix ZS1 with a fast shutter and a 12x zoom) was on a FedEx truck coming from Ashland. I had no idea they delivered on Saturdays or I might have put my home address down for them to bring it to. But staff was on duty and had instructions to sign for it and call me when it came in. So. With everything set, I began with broom and mini-vac (for the window sills) and vacuum and static cloths and soap and water ... in my bedroom, which is at one corner of the house... and scrubbed, swept, vacuumed, and cleaned all the way to the den ... which is the diagonal corner. Of course, I will always be finding More Cobwebs ... in fact, I see one now, between the back of the printer and the back of the computer ... but I got 80% of 'em and that is enough to fool people, including me, into thinking the house is clean.

It started out wickedly hot and damp and I'd decided to eek out the last of my clean underwear and do laundry in the middle of the week, when suddenly a dry cool breeze wafted through the house. Whoa! Brought me up short and before I could begin to doubt, the clouds broke up and the breeze grew stronger and within an hour the whole world had been transformed into a bright blue day with puffy clouds and playful breezes. Into the washer when the dank stuff that didn't get dry last Saturday. Eventually three loads made it to the clothes line, by which time the sky was pure celestial blue with nary a cloud in sight. What a transformation! What pleasure! as if the gods had decided to reward me for Doing My Doooty.

Of course, all this took all day - at least, I wasn't ready to go to town to pick up my Brand New Birthday Camera till about 2:30 and while I was at it I slipped across the river to get some good fruits and vegetables from the folk who have a stand in Warsaw. I had not bothered to clean up after the sweaty Saturday chores and sure enough, a friend was at the fruit stand - but since she is a friend, not just somebody who recognizes the library director in all her scruffiness, she just laughed when I pulled a plastic bag over my head...too late to protect my identity but not too late to be silly.

So you are all thinking, well and good, but what about the shawl and the wide border and knitting? And I am getting there, I promise. Because you are not to think that I was using housecleaning as an avoidance technique. TheCastle really was in desperate condition. But - and there always is that but, no?

You see, a 51 stitch lace border pattern is a lot harder to knit than a 48 stitch pattern that has built up slowly and is easy to read. I actually cast on the border on Friday night - about 6 times - using provisional cast ons - first the ones in the book and then my own, which is a long tail cast on with waste yarn. Maybe not the most elegant, but surely the one that gives you the most stable foundation. Of course I was thinking I would want to knit with the needle that is already holding the shawl so that as I came back in from the outer point I would pick up the shawl stitch hanging on that left needle and K2Tog.

Well - that is as clumsy as it can be. I may learn, after a while, to do it with ease but I haven't done so yet.

So I cast onto a #5 double point and knit the first row.

Ugh! It took me forever to knit those 51 stitches. I kept losing my place on the chart and having to count stitches and graph paper boxes and I am sure I started that row over at least twice. and then it was time to knit back. And that's when I realized that there are shaping stitches on the purl side too.

Now - I can shape in knit and in purl and on front and on back - but not when it's a dank Friday night after my first full week back at work after a fried fish supper. No. That is just asking TheQueen to do Too Much. I set everything aside, promised myself I would enlarge the pattern (which I did on the library copy machine yesterday) and wait until I could be in a calm, tidy, clean pretty comfortable setting - in other words - after the house was clean, on Sunday.

And so - today I have the whole long day in front of me with no other demands on my time but to eat delicious fruit and knit delicious cashmere. It is my intention to have Border Lace Photos tomorrow, taken with a Birthday Camera - but for today - here are the first experimental pictures, taken on the automatic setting, from the Birthday Camera.

First off - here is the true King of the Castle - Captain Jack Haile.

"What do you mean I'm covered with seed ticks?"

Here is TheCastle on a misty Sunday morning.

This is a close-up using the macro button but still on automatic.

This is a close-up using the marco-zoom function. I'm standing maybe 20 feet away from these Four-O'clocks who's inner timepeace is way off. They're not supposed to bloom in the morning!

And here is the lace border pattern - enlarged so I can follow it more easily.

Off I go right now - to knit border to shawl. Happy Wide Open Sunday to you all.

2009-08-28T07:01:00.002-04:00

Thank You

Well my dear friends - Thank you for the kind and encouraging comments. I really wasn't fishing for them but I admit that yours have helped me as I work out my issues with blogging in general and Blogger in specific. I tried logging onto Blogger at work with the newer faster better machines and the speedier Internet access and had no trouble at all - which meant I really owed it to LtQ to see what I could do with my home machine. A bit of time fiddling with the computer's settings and lo, this morning the page opened up with all options, including the photo posting options.

It still doesn't let me cut and paste text into the box - but I am able to load photos, format text and, most important of all, check my spelling. If you ever saw the raw input of one of my posts you might wonder if I was even literate. The curse of the aural, dyslexic Virgo - born to talk under Mercury's influence.

Which is the other heavy weight on the scale balancing the question Should One Bother To Blog at All? - in this age of Twitter and Facebook. There is only so much computer time available to the normally healthy person, but MissLoquacity is probably incapable of not chattering on somewhere and only on a blog is there enough space in the text box to say everything that wants to gush out of her mouth - or off the tips of her fingers. I had forgotten that the reason I started a blog to begin with was that it seemed I was hogging enormous space on a knitting forum and I began to be a little embarrassed about it.

Blogger and I may not be able to repair our relationship - but if we can't, I will simply move to another host and put a link between the OldCastle and the New.

But as a reward for your continued interest - Photos!! Of the Sleeveless Sleeves in your Pi Shawl - at the point where I shall begin the knitted on border.

Here is a somewhat fuzzy closeup of the traveling stitches reversing between the diamonds. This was something I added to the design, along with turning the triangle into a diamond to begin with. While knitting it I was worried that the extra design element was overkill but now that it's done I like it a lot.

And so this weekend I begin the knitted on border. I haven't been this excited about knitting since I cast on Flidas. (not the part where I had to struggle to complete Flidas - but the first happy knitting part - in what? 2001? - in the Pre-Blog era)

It is supposed to rain this weekend - and cool off a bit. now - doesn't that make for a perfect opportunity to knit a cashmere lace border onto a cashmere lace shawl?

Again, my friends, thank you for your input as I wrestle with technology, rural Internet access and that greatest partner of all - Time. You are very kind and I appreciate your encouraging words so much.

Happy Friday to you all!

2009-08-22T07:12:00.000-04:00

Moving On

No lace progress to report. Not even any lacy sock cuff progress since I made a mistake the first round out and will have to rip back on that sock I was working on Tuesday. Instead, I worked 3 8 hour days this week and on the two half days I was quite physically active. Of course, this is good - to think I could be physically active at all. But the ensuing tiredness did put a crimp on lace progress. Would you believe it? I fell asleep while Elizabeth and Meg were discussing the Pi are Square shawl on television last night - sometime around 7:30!

No lace progress means no photos, alas, but I can't get the photo loading option to display in blogger anyway - which brings me round to a discussion on blogging that has long been forming in my head.

It seems to me that fewer and fewer people are blogging these days and those of us who do are sketchy posters at best. Some of my very favorite bloggers have just ceased to post at all and I find myself writing less and less. I always suspected that the interactive/comment/connectivity aspect of blogging is what kept me inspired. My blogging seemed to connect me to a greater society, mostly made up of other fiber folk, in a way that made sharing what was going on both fun and worthwhile.

I felt like I had something to share. I felt like there were people who were interested. I was inspired to post, to reach out, to continue sharing. Lately though, I haven't felt any of that - and as I have found myself starting to repeat thoughts ... after all, how many elegies about the turning of the seasons, the serenading of crickets in the hedgerows, the pale fog of autumn becomes too many? ... I've begun to notice that only the famous bloggers are still blogging and I don't read them. I read the blogs of folk who connected with me and those folk, with a few exceptions, aren't posting any more.

Have Twitter and Facebook and other mini-burst communication formats taken the place of blogger? I certainly keep up with most, if not all, of the folk who used to follow TheQueen on Facebook. Twitter continues to elude me, refusing to let me log in or register, and in a way I'm sort of glad. My goodness, Facebook sucks up enough of my time as it is.

And now - Blogger just doesn't want to let me do anything any more. It won't let me cut and paste from a .doc file. It won't let me load photos. It tells me repeatedly that it's "Done with Error on Page" but it never lets me know how to correct the error. It is too big to move to Blogger's newer format so it is difficult, if not impossible, for peole to link to it via RSS feed or any other of the mysterious connectivity tools out there. It constantly wants me to log on with my google account but of course, LikeTheQueen was made with a different email address so I can't post from that.

This blog is over 6 years old and I am wondering if it is time to bid TheCastle adieu and either start a new blog (maybe somewhere else) or cease entirely. I have always liked the name of this blog, which is one reason I've been reluctant to shift to a newer or easier blogging option - but I think technology, and I'll admit it, the lack of interest from others, has pushed me to the point of decision. And so - over the next week or so I will do just that - come to a decision and move on.

2009-08-17T13:39:00.002-04:00

Is Blogger wonkey today or is it me?

I can't get the posting page to display editing options or even photo uploading. I uploaded these photos yesterday and saved the post to write this morning. Still and all, I'm going to take a chance to show Progress Into Uncharted Knitting.

Here is a detail photo of the Pi Shawl. Notice where the diagonal fagotting changes direction and the diamond begins to narrow to a point. That is New To This Pattern. This part actually looks pretty good. What is not so elegant is where the pattern repeats begin - another straight fagot that has an unbalanced bit of stockinette stitching. eh. Nobody will notice. All anyone will want to do is scrunch her fingers into the lofty cashmere. This is not for competition - since I've come to know that competition knitting has gotten so good you have to add Original Design to your entry to win a prize.

I will read and study and even chart some more and learn how this is done so that the next time it's Closer to Perfect.

And just for fun - here is the Other Lace Project I'm fiddling with. It looks awfully loose to me - especially compared to the photo on the KnitPicks webpage. I may block this just to see. That's the fun of knitting, isn't it?

2009-08-16T08:03:00.002-04:00

Lace on the Brain

I must thank all of you for your kind words of sympathy, posted and emailed to me over the past week. Each of us in my family is finding her way through this door, but I have had the help of friends and I count you all among that list.

Another great boon for TheQueen has been her knitting. Taking a cue from Elizabeth Zimmermann, I have been Knitting on, with confidence and hope. And not just any knitting either - for I am in the throes of Lace Fever and can't stop knitting it, thinking about it, looking at books on it, borrowing More Books about it and even charting my own lace.

I've knit a little lace over the years - slipping in bits here, a cuff there, and last summer I began exploring Evelyn Clarke's lace triangles (Thank you Clara) I found that knitting lace in August is particularly pleasant. There's natural daylight long into the evening. Lace is lightweight, even when you're knitting wool, so it doesn't fill the lap with heat. And lace is just plain fun to knit. Much like fair isle and other stranded colorwork, it is always changing - there is always some surprise floating off your needles if you just knit one more row. Well, alright. Maybe two more rows.

At my first Stitches event in 2007 I registered with Hunt Valley Cashmere for their Great American Aran Afghan square of the (every-other) month club. I had admired their yarn for a long time and I had thought I'd like to knit that afghan. Turns out I LOVE their yarn but am indifferent to the afghan so I just began stockpiling the yarn as it came in every 8 weeks, figuring there would come a time when inspiration would inflame my passion and I would cast on the right project.

Lace shawl kept floating through my brain and Knit Lace in August thrummed beneath like a basso continuo. August drew near and, though I had intended to knit Only Socks this summer, I told myself, finishing 3 pair of socks was enough. Knitting is not supposed to be something I punish myself with but something that thrills me with pleasure. Discipline has no virtue in and of itself - but is to be used as a tool to make your life better. And there was this beautiful Sleeves in your Pi shawl (see August 3 post) and I cast on and here are a few photos:

Here is a closeup of the center part of the pattern.

As I mentioned earlier, the cashmere knits up much smaller than the yarn used in the original design so I'm going to have to enlarge it - and a few weeks ago I fiddled with charting an additional outer ring. I am now only 4 rounds away from beginning my own chart - I plan to get there today. I'm still on self imposed medical R&R this weekend, with great hopes that I will be well enough to do a full day's work tomorrow.

I can't say enough about the joy of knitting lace with this yarn. Normally I am a springy bouncy merino fan and rather avoid inelastic yarns, but this yarn is different. It is pure joy to work with, it makes me happy when it touch it, it inspires me to keep on knitting. It stays put on the Addi Lace needles and if it splits, a gentle tug in two directions after fixing the split restores it to smoothness.

It also seems to hold up well as a fabric. Mind now - I am well aware this is cashmere. It's a delicate fiber and is expected to pill over time. But even knitting with these delicate fine fibers can sometimes create signs of wear and I am seeing nothing on my shawl yet. This shawl is going to be heavenly to own and to wear. And buying the yarn slowly, over time, has made it affordable for me. I think it comes to $22 a skein (though I don't have an invoice before me - there may be a shipping charge) and that is something I can afford every other month.

Another interesting thing about this yarn is how it knits up on different needles. Here is a project I started because I am a true EN - look a bird - FP and can never resist TheNextThing. While pouring over discussions of pi shawl techniques (needed if I am to expand a spoked pi shawl) in Meg Swansen's Gathering of Lace I got to wondering if this cashmere yarn could be knit up into those lace gloves .... and guess what! It can! See?

Not sure I'd do this more than once, because I find that when I knit an inelastic fiber on size 0 needles I grip them so tightly I bend them. This is definitely not relaxing knitting, though it's not tense knitting either. I just grip too tightly. I wish I had wooden zero's because, though I might still grip tightly, I wouldn't bend them. Of course .... I might break them - so I have resisted ordering More Needles.

The happy surprise is that this yarn, knit so tightly (a photo of the palms would show this, but alas, I don't have one) is still supple, soft, a delightful texture and a pleasure to feel. It will make the most luxurious gloves I will ever own and I'll probably wear them only for dress-up. (remember "dress up"?)

And lest you fear I successfully resisted purchasing any new lace knitting treasures, I assure you that an order went out to KnitPicks for Anna Marie Jensen's Rona Lace Shawl and a couple of skeins of their Gloss yarn in a color called celery. Well. I had to try those new acrylic needle tips, didn't I? And once I had an order started, what's a pattern leaflet and a few skeins of laceweight?

And yes. I cast it on and have knit about 25 rounds. Just a bit of knitting. Just to see. Because that's the way it is when you have Lace On The Brain.

May you all knit on, with hope and confidence, and find rest on the other side.

2009-08-12T06:43:00.002-04:00

Time Is Your Friend

It has been a difficult time at TheCastle. A week ago, at the height of the eclipse, my young nephew let go of life, unexpectedly. His had not been an easy one but it had its richness and its deep value. We are still trying to find our way through the veil of sadness, each of us on our own pathway.

Life, though, that pulsing wave of EverythingElse thrumming all around us, continues - as anyone who has suffered great loss knows - and we aren't oblivious to it. There were several Other Events that crowded into a weekend underlined with grief and TheQueen and her family muddled through them with determination. They helped because they made demands on me, blunting the first piercing of grief, but now that a week has passed I am glad they will diminish and eventually fade away and it will be just the immediate household of TheQueen and BD and her dogs.

And perhaps her health - which seems to be returning at last after a month's absence. The third visit to the doctor began a different course of medication - this time for asthma - which, after a week - is finally kicking in. Last night I slept for 3 hours straight and did not wake up coughing out my lungs. A first in a month. This is good. It may be I will be All Fixed before you know it, because the funny thing about getting well is that you feel rotten for so long that when you finally feel good it seems as if it happened all of a sudden. At least - that is what I am counting on.

The other comfort I have had over the past week has been my knitting - which has proved to be enormously soothing. Two projects - a little cashmere - a little cotton/lycra - soft but resilient. Yes. That, too, has been good.

I am into the wind-down of summer now that The Reunion is over. Even if the days are hot, the nights are longer so they cool us down more. People are away, trying to fit in the last bit of vacation time before school and autumn and holiday activities crowd in. Tappahannock, my little town, is something of a vacation place. The county falls along a wide tidal river and there are lots of vacation cottages. In June and July, the vacationers who show up at the library are kicking back and want books to read. But in August, the vacationers are more frenetic - in the water more, swimming, boating, doing - and the traffic at the library slows down a bit. August is when staff an take vacations. Not This Staff since I've been out so much sick that I now have a backlog of paperwork on my desk. But other staff - so I'll be out front more, chatting with folk, helping people find things.

The turning of the seasons makes itself felt in other places too - goldenrod is blooming along the road and the sweet gum leaves are turning orange. They're always the harbingers of autumn and I will begin to daydream about colorways and fair isle sweaters and cuddling up in the big green chair to knit scrunchy warm things. One day there will be a flock of geese overhead, calling out instructions and directions to their mates and I will know that it's time to get the winter clothes out of the attic.

Right now, with the loss of my nephew, I don't want to see the circle roll around, but eventually the sadness and loss will tamp down into my being and synthesize with the essence of myself. And then I will again savor the fact that we are always moving and flowing and circling and I will be glad. I once knew a couple who loved to argue about time. Is time your friend or is it your enemy? They played this game throughout 50+ years of happy marriage. The first time I heard about it my reaction was "Oh it's your friend!" and as I sit here today I know this to be completely true. Eventually, time smooths everything and as I still feel the prick of grief, I am glad I know this. Thank you Time. You are my most welcome friend.

2009-08-07T06:16:00.002-04:00

James Franklin Kaye
July 12 1985
August 5 2009

It's a lesson too late for the learnin'
Made of sand, made of sand
In the wink of an eye my soul is turnin'
In your hand, in your hand

Are you going away with no word of farewell
Will there be not a trace left behind
I could have loved you better, didn't mean to be unkind
You know that was the last thing on my mind.

by tom paxton

Oh God, it hurts.

2009-08-06T06:36:00.003-04:00

Thank you both for the compliments. Those socks are warm and they're really not difficult to do. Diann - I am in awe of you for knitting intarsia. I love it so much and have been daunted by its complicated handling. But even as I type that I realize that I could do an intarsia garment. I am always just doubtful about my own ability to finish what I start. Knitting that KipFee sweater on #3 needles did a lot to boost my confidence in actually coming to completion with big projects. I bet an intarsia sweater would be the same type of challenge ... I should just do it.

I will not, of course; at least not any time soon. I am knitting away on the shawl and the baby gift. I did succumb to temptation yesterday when I had a chunk of knitting time with no obligation to please anybody but me and cast on the lace gloves in Meg Swasen's book Gathering of Lace. I just wanted to see. to see if they were tricky. to see if the 4 ply Hunt Valley cashmere yarn would knit up on size zero needles (it does and the fabric is still silky soft). Just to see.

And here is what I saw - and wondered about ....

1. The cashmere does make a luxurious fabric even at this tight gauge
2. I am gripping hard on those thin metal needles which makes my hands tired
3. It also bends the needles. I wish I had zeros in wood, but I don't.
4. I don't think I'd make a bunch of luxury gloves for friends with this yarn because of item #2 above
5. I wonder what some of the thinner sock yarns or springier lace weight yarns would look like knit into these pretty gloves
6. I wonder if springier yarn would be easier to knit this pattern with

Well. I am only going to fiddle with this project this month. Just to see. Just when I am looking for something different to do with sticks and string. My true concentration will be on the baby gift and the shawl.

And the reunion - which is Saturday. And the girlfriend - who flies in on Monday. And the parents - who are missing me. And the sister - who I want to play with at least once this summer.

So - Happy knitting to you and may all your ponderings lead you into New Adventures.

2009-08-04T12:31:00.002-04:00

Fair Isle Socks!

Here they are .. or at least, here it is. My first... oh I just remembered. I once did a stranded colorwork pattern on a sock cuff. I used a plain wool, though, and eventually it felted to small to wear any more.

Anyway - here is the sock. The heel flap and it's join are very rough. I'm at the heel flap section right now on the second sock and I'll do a better job of that one. When I pick up socks again - later in the month.

I'm still not well yet and this is the beginning of the 4th week so I pushed my dr. to give me an appointment tomorrow early. We will have to find Something Else to deal with this awful chest thang. Hope there is New and Better Medicine for me tomorrow.

2009-08-03T06:58:00.003-04:00

Sigh. No Photos

And yet there is so much knitting to brag about. Ah well. I will have a camera soon enough and in the mean time I shall try to paint word pictures.

I spent all my free time this weekend knitting - blissfully industriously knitting away on two projects: the Pi shawl and the baby outfit. I am determined that these will be FO's by September - so after I post this I am going off to put in a little knitting before work.

First the shawl. It's my first circular shawl and I'm using the pattern from the Sleeves in your Pi shawl, only I am not putting sleeves in. Since the yarn, Hunt Valley Cashmere 4 ply, wants to be knit up at 6 stitches to the inch, 5.5 if I stretch it, the pattern only knits up about half a shawl. I've spent a week pondering how to extend the design, somewhat daunted by charting a big lace pattern of my own. I've charted out little 6 and 10 stitch repeat patterns, but this one will begin with 36 stitches and go up to about 50.

Also - I am too lazy to go read anything about either making pi shawls or charting lace designs. I have the urge to KNIT, not to do knitting math. So I sat down with some graph paper and began filling in the little blocks, extending the triangles into diamonds and making the traveling stitches go in a different direction. It works out okay, though I have to add a LOT of traveling stitches to get enough circumferential stitches to divide evenly by 16 ... the number of rows in the lace edging pattern.

So I am thinking of adding More Triangles to the outer rim. But as I began to chart it out I lost count of the stitches and their directions. This is a spoke shawl so you increase 2 stitches every 4 rows. Every row is always an even number of stitches, too, so it's sometimes difficult to "see" the center stitch of any segment. My flighty ENFP brain and my kinesthetic fingers grew restless once I'd turned the triangle into a diamond and refused to focus on doing the math needed to add the new triangles.

"What's the point in this. Just start knitting. You'll see what you need to do when you get there"

"I am bored"

"When will we get to knit?"

That's the sort of thing the old brain was doing, and since I do understand that what I am naturally inclined to do I am likely to do well, I gave in and began knitting. After all - I'm still knitting the part Gayle Roehm designed. I'm finishing up the last round of 330 stitches and have about 18 more rounds to do before I start knitting TheQueen's design. Here's a rough schematic of what's going on. The black is the original design, the red is the part I know will work, the green is still a bit iffy:

As for the baby sweater, the back is just about done - so I have a 13" square. I'll do the shoulder shaping before work today. I couldn't bring myself to knit the 6 month size, even though the sweater is looking awfully big. But the baby is due in September. This is really a cool weather outfit. When winter comes it ought to fit.

I never did get gauge. I figure "It's a baby and a boy. He won't care that much." Besides the yarn is extremely stretchy cotton/lycra blend. It's Elann.com's version of fixation and it makes a rather plush fabric. Boring to knit right now, but the result will be very cute.

And now it is Monday. I am coughing less, dripping less, sniffling less - but I am still coughing, dripping and sniffling. I will be SO glad when all this allergy stuff has moved on down the road. In the mean time - happy knitting to you all.

2009-08-01T07:51:00.006-04:00

Sifting my stash, Indulging in dreams, Coming to conclusions

I have been out sick with severe allergies for most of this month. Now and then I've dragged myself in to work when there were things only I could do, but the rest of the time I've slumped around my house listlessly. Since I cough less when I'm upright there has been a lot of knitting going on and this down time has also given me an opportunity to have a look at (some of) my stash.

On a productivity scale, this summer has been up there. 3 pair of socks are off the needles, releasing 3 pair of Addi Turbo's from captivity. I also started a 4th pair (though there are 4 more unfinished pair lingering in zip-lock bags behind the big green chair). My first fair isle socks, photographed below. I've finished the first sock - though it shows all the rough edges of a First Timer, and am ready to start the heel flap of the second. It was while knitting that sock, though, that I realized in an even more profound way, that stranded colorwork is the type of knitting that fuels all other knitting inspiration in my fluttering little knitter heart. It was what got me knitting in the first place, lo those decades ago - it is what has brought me back to knitting time and again, and it is what totally thrills me now. I can always "Knit One More Row" if it's stranded colorwork. It doesn't have to be fair isle, or Norwegian or Estonian or any other ethnic version, just so long as there are two colors of fine yarn looped over my left index finger. It completely, totally and fully satisfies my hunger for color, pattern, texture and design.

I'm so grateful I actually finished that KipFee 2 years ago because that has given me the assurance I need to go ahead and start other fair isle projects, but what I have discovered in my stash is ....

yeah.

Lots of worsted weight and even some heavy worsted weight yarn. Sweaters and sweaters' worth of it, in glorious fibers: alpaca, Blueface Leicester, silky soft merino, scrunchy bouncy new wool - each cache of yarn with a design already in my brain, waiting to be knit up swiftly on a good #7 needle or even a #9. In short - yarn I am not yet ready to sell or give away.

And have I mentioned ... I live in the south? And I am, as Alexander McCall Smith would say, "a traditionally built woman". A bulky sweater on my traditional build is not going to be the stuff of chic stylishness. Of course, I am always promising myself that This Month I Will Lose that 20 lbs and now and then, I actually do. Probably not a good thing. Had I never succeeded, perhaps I might someday quit trying. But I am sure there is a slimmer Queen waiting to wear that Happy Yarn cardigan knit of purple and orange and lime green alpaca and ready to chase away the worst winter doldrums. I think I heard her whispering to me to put down that third taco last night.

Of course, just looking at stash is enough to make me imagine, in addition to the Imam Body,

(Queen with Iman Body waiting for those bulky knit sweaters)

that I have infinite hands and endless hours and the sort of stick-to-it-iveness of an ISTJ, instead of the flighty personality of an EN- look a bird-FP. I am prepared to cast on all 20 projects stashed away and knit them all this week! ... or at least I am lusting to.

Fortunately, I am capable of overriding my natural tendencies. I have not cast on any of the sweaters waiting patiently to be knit up. I am a little tired of the endless sock knitting and since I've finished so many pair I don't feel obliged to keep on knitting them when I don't want to. I have a baby gift I want to finish this month, for a girlfriend's' October baby which I began this week. I also began some inspiring knitting for TheQueen - a cashmere shawl.

Yes. I am making myself (the lady who lives in a wood heated House-0-Dogs in the country) a cream colored lace cashmere shawl. I joined the Hunt Valley Cashmere Great American Aran Afghan Square of the (every other) Month club almost 2 years ago. I knit the first square and fell passionately in love with the yarn, but was left sort of uninspired by knitting a bunch of squares. I've tried to pick another one to knit and just haven't felt the love. Instead I decided to stockpile the yarn as it came in and when there was enough, to make a shawl.

I've cast on a Sleeves in your Pi shawl by Gayle Roehm from the winter 2000 Knitters Magazine.

Of course, that is knit in a bulky mohair and I am using a sort of dk weight on #6 needles. I'll have to either add another big section after the shawl is done or a very very deep border. I'm inclined towards the latter because it will be easier. I'll just have to wait and see how big this thing is when I've knit all the pattern.

It's a pleasure to work on because even though this is summer, the cashmere is very light and feels like nothing on my lap. The soft silky fluff of it against my fingers is a sensual delight. It requires a very light hand which makes for very relaxing knitting and the 12 segments make it easy to keep track of the stitches.

So it turns out that July has been a wonderful month for this knitter. August looks to be much busier and more social, so let us hope I can lick this allergy stuff soon. And when I am done with some of my already purchased sweaters, this is the garment I plan to cast on.

2009-07-25T17:45:00.005-04:00

Don't you believe the date above. I wrote this thing today, Monday, July 27th!

HRRM. I hate typing the same thing over again but there's nothing for it. I can only get into blogger through the back door and it won't let me cut and paste from the nice tidy text doc I wrote this on yesterday - but here goes.....

I truly did not intend to to let my poor blog drop off Loquacity Cliff into the Pit of Silence
I'll admit. I have wondered if I had said all there is to say about the Life of TheQueen but there hasn't been any desire, or even intention, to make some sort of Grand Announcement about the End of Blogging. I have just needed a hiatus. Work has been utterly demanding. We've had a spate of delightful guests. 2 weeks ago I was felled by an allergy attack after triple exposure to the things that do me in. Let us hope this Sac-0-Pills will detoxify me. I've been home for a few days and am taking today off too. BD says the coughing is less but it always seems to be worst at night, robbing me of sleep and making me unfit for the public during daytime hours.

I have been singularly cursed with cameras too. My new camera was lost on a trip. The old camera worked a while till the little door that hides the memory card jammed. Even the library's Brand New Camera - bought so we don't have to keep remembering to bring our own in - has stopped responding to its' miniature buttons and it's making a little whirring sound, which is somewhat awesome, considering how tiny the thing is ... what could be inside that is big enough to whirr? At least it's still under the 30 day warranty with the shop. But cameraless blogging is not as much fun as blogging avec appereil photographique.

Still and all, I am in the mood to play catch-up. So. What has been going on since July 8?

On July 9th we had our wonderful Weekend With a Writer Summer Luncheon (means not the whole weekend long) with fabulous guest Sheri Reynolds of Rapture of Canaan/Oprah Book Club fame. She came up the day before and we had her up to our house for dinner, where she fit right in with the dogs and the eagles and the yurt and the Friends board on our back porch. She was an absolute darling and when she spoke at the luncheon the next day she lead that audience out as far as their imaginations could stretch and then softly, gently, brought them all back into the center of the room. She teaches at Old Dominion University and man - I am so jealous of her students. She was enthralling!

On July 10th LD came home to drive my Dad and me up to DC to visit dad's old stomping grounds. Traffic was appalling. I never thought there would be so many people driving into DC on a Summer Saturday but I hadn't taken into consideration Kings Dominion, south of F'burg. that, at least made sense, but who all those folks were north of Woodbridge heading into hot sticky down town DC - I will never know. We got off 95 there and took the stop light trip up Route 1. thank heavens for Sons and their portable GPSs.

Dad and LD at his childhood home.

Blessed Sacrament Church ... the family church

It was a long day but we're all still smiling about it.

Thursday the 14th M, BH, and TheQueen ...

went to Richmond to attend the book launch of our friend Emyl Jenkin's newest book The Big Steal. This is the second in her series of mysteries set in the antique business, which, given Emyl's own background, is thorough and entertaining.

Emyl was our first WWW author and has been instrumental in helping us get other authors to give up a whole weekend to enhance the literary world of Essex County. I love her mysteries because they're kind stories, not gory. The people main characters are not unduly flawed, but rather, more humanely flawed, like I hope that I am. Quirky, but not twisted. I didn't make this comparison first, but I agree that they are far more like Precious Ramotswe's Botswana mysteries than Stuart Woods' gritty city crimes.

We girls had a splendid time which is good because the very next morning I woke up with the worst allergy attack since '02! Bad enough to hie me to a doctor last Monday to get on Zyrtec and codeine and back again on Friday for bigger stuff. I'm almost better but still coughing enough to sound like a consumptive so I shall stay home today as well. There's no pressing dooty on my schedule for today and I'll be better for one more Day of Not Talking.

And tomorrow - perhaps I shall feel up to sharing with you Thoughts From A Knitter Who Has Spent 5 Days With Her Stash.

Ta.

2009-07-25T17:41:00.000-04:00

hmmm. Blogger why won't you let me cut and paste?

2009-07-08T06:48:00.005-04:00

Finding ways to take the afternoon off

Without using up vacation time, that is. Our Friends of the Library summer author is Sheri Reynolds, of Rapture of Canaan fame. She speaks tomorrow to a gathering of book loving locals. But she comes tonight and she's invited to dinner at my house ... a casual dinner for the 12 members of the FOL executive board and the author. The idea was casual homey country picnic with a view of the river and a look in on Mr. and Mrs. Bald Eagle.

Only it's been so long since I've had dinner guests who weren't blood kin relatives who have to ignore my housekeeping flaws I feel like a new bride entertaining her husband's boss. Everywhere I look are Things I Would Like To Fix (Clean or Change or Hide). Eh. I will have to depend on the hospitality of Jack, Priss and BD to cover for me.

But this is just a little pricking feeling. I know I can entertain people and I know I will be fine. This is one time when Mind really has to take over from Emotions.

Besides, it's hump day. The weather is lovely. There is actual grass growing in the yard. The garden is full of blooms, even if you have to view it from afar. Blackberries are ripening. Truly - a perfect summer day. And there is something fun to look forward too.

This Saturday LD is going to take my dad and me and possibly another friend, up to DC to see my dad's old stomping grounds. La! I haven't seen that old Harrison Street house in decades!

So. Who remembers when all grownups looked like this?

2009-07-05T15:58:00.001-04:00

Full summer begins

Thank you all for the kind comments about my socks. Much progress was done over the weekend and now I have another pair completed, allowing me to cross off 3 of the 14 on my list. There are photos of the Finished Objects at the end of this post. What follows next is a little catch-up of what has been going on at TheCastle.

Prepare to be sprung from your prison. Expect, soon, to be given the key to your cell. But be ready too, for a reluctance to leave the familiar comfort of your old environment. You have been unhappy with a situation for a long time. You are in the habit of complaining and of getting nowhere. Shock may be your first reaction when the door that you have been pounding on opens up. You may suspect a trap. But, slowly, you'll come to like the inspiration and the opportunity that presents itself to you this week. It's going to be an amazing month...

Thank you MrHoroscope. You have been promising me a pleasant change for a long time. I've been waiting for this since oh... January? Yeah – about that long. I am completely ready to be “released” and looking forward to an amazing month.

I am also pretty doggone relaxed after 3 and a half days of doing exactly what I wanted..... which wasn't much, barring a marathon cleaning burst on Saturday. I'd cut out early on Thursday, a day of perfect summertime weather: sunny, breezy, clear and dry. Somehow, I just couldn't make myself stay at work till 5 and with a bank of vacation days saved up and plenty of staff on hand ... well there. What would you do?

Well, what I did was go buy enough groceries to make it through the weekend, pick up the first 2 Harry Potter movies from the rental place and zip on home about 2:30. The air was so sweet and tempting I convinced BD to join me on a walk out to Robert's Landing and, for me, at least, a swim. Oh how the water felt – so silky and sweet as it flowed past me on its way to the sea. Tide was going out and little leaves and floating bits slipped past me as I dug my toes into the sandy bottom. BD is not much of a swimmer but he never minds sitting on the bank and talking while I'm playing in the water. Virgos may be earth signs, but I must have many planets lurking in the water signs. Water is my medicine of choice for whatever ails me .... drinking it, swimming in it, bathing in it ... I adore water.

Friday I rented the Rug Doctor from a store in town and cleaned the rugs and upholstered furniture. It's exhausting work because the heavy rugs have to be vacuumed, flipped, vacuumed on the back, flipped and vacuumed once again, all the while the year's worth of dirt tracked in off the farm by man and dog must continually be sucked up off the floor too. That is a heckuva lot of flipping and vacuuming. Then you start using the wet vac. The products that go with it are remarkably effective, though, especially the pet odor remover which you can use as a spot treatment or dump in with the soap and hot water. In particular, that is needed on the blue couch in the den where three dogs think they are welcome to lounge no matter what swamp they've been sloshing through.

I went to bed Friday with aching limbs and stiff fingers but the rest of the weekend it was fun to wander from room to room, sitting on clean furniture, lying on clean floors and saying “No No Out” to begging dogs at screen door. I will relent after Wednesday, when we have guests coming, for dinner but for now, no dogs in the house.

But after all that effort I just didn't have it in me to do another thing all weekend. At least, not another thing that required getting dressed. I've been in my pj's for 2 whole days and it has been delicious. I didn't even take a walk! I just knit and read and watched the first 2 Harry Potter movies and the second disc of TLC's What Not To Wear. What a fantasy that is. $5,000 to spend on a new wardrobe with fashion experts to tell you how you really look in what you're picking out. Yum! Also, I really like the guy who does the hair for the victim's makeovers.

BD wanted to be close all weekend and the best way for us to do that is to let him read to me while I knit. I had recently picked up Mort d'Arthur on tape, read by Derek Jacoby. Oh what a grand job he is doing too – with his perfect classically trained voice. Ahh I wish there were more Brother Cadfael DVD's out there. I, alas, have seen them all at least twice. A discussion with BD about Mallory lead to talk of Spencer and his Faerie Queen and the next thing you know I'm listening to this complex and sexually latent tale as I knit socks. What fun it's been, especially since I know I'd never read it myself. I have enough dyslexia issues with normal spelling as it is. I could never plow my way through the secret code of Spencer's Spelling. BD, with all his years of 17th century research and also his perfectly visual way of reading, can breeze through the strange pronunciations and keep the elegant pace of the poetry.

Much knitting was done as these photos will attest:

I finished these plain jane stockinette socks for me. This is a beautiful Spirit Trail sock yarn knit on #3 needles.

This is a Trekking sock yarn I bought at Stony Mt. Fibers ages ago ... it's what I call a "guy" color and these socks are intended for BD. I'm not sure what happened since I bought this stuff at least 4 years ago, but I don't think there was a full skein here. Fortunately, this color, #66, is still available. Neither BD nor I care if the dye lot matches all that well. These are, after all, men's socks. They will be felt, not seen.

Again, plain stockinette sock knitting.

Of course, I like to have an upstairs sock and a downstairs sock going and though there are still at least 4 more half knit pairs in the queue, I couldn't resist starting something different. This is another Spirit Trail sock yarn combo - an almost solid green with a beautifully coordinating handpaint. I've been waiting for just the right inspiration to knit these two yarns together. The yarn is still from the downstairs stash I inventoried a month ago so it's legal to knit it up this summer.

I'm using the first reticulated pattern from Sensational Knitted Socks. It's the blue and yellow pattern - but look at the color match between the book cover and the sock yarn! Pure coincidence, but isn't it ... coincidental?

I chose the other pattern because this particular yarn isn't truly self striping and I wanted to be sure enough bits of the handpainted colors showed up.

And now it is Monday and it's back to work. A busy week with a guest author, dinner guests at my house as well, and prep for the coming library board meeting. Yes. It's July again.

Happy Monday to you all.

2009-06-29T07:15:00.003-04:00

Summer of Socks progress and some Garden Photos

Knitting up front this time. I have completed the green cable cuff socks for BH.

Her birthday is July 24 so I'll wait and give them to her then. I really enjoyed this cable pattern but it's too small for my leg. I'd have to put in more stitches.

This is that decorative heel stitch. (I think it's called 'Bird's Eye' or 'Eye of the Partridge') It's very pretty, particularly in these lighter toned handpainted yarns.

BH wears a 6.5 narrow and has slender ankles so these socks are quite small.

I am knitting now on a pair of plain vanilla socks for BD. Beautiful dark blue yarn with a few other dark colors seeping in now and then, adding richness but not changing the overall hue. That is my upstairs sock, though. I may start working on a downstairs sock too.

That is it for knitting, but for your delectation, here are some garden photos. You must keep in mind that I have abandoned my garden for nigh on to 8 years. I had intended to plow it under this spring but a broken finger and lots of rain postponed that task till later.

I was once fond of claiming "I garden with invasive plants", largely because I thought it sounded clever, but also because it was true. I have always had limited funds and even at that I poured $$$ into the ground out back. To fill in the gaps I would let spreaders do their thing among the more prissy perennials. These sturdy things have several things in common. they come back year after year. They're resistant to diseases and insects. And evidently - they are all either lavender pink or vibrant orange:

This stand of ecanacia is a surprise - I had thought they had all died out. The double daylilies were a gift from a woman who used to live around here - I am not sure where she moved but I remember her vividly. She also painted silk scarves.

It took me forever to get sweet peas to grow in the garden but my goodness they have taken over now!

Double daylily - up close and personal.

Horse Thistle - most people would call this a weed - but its blossom is so pretty! I haven't the heart to dig it up.

Phlox - a gift from Penny Dudley lo these many years ago.

Sweet peas up close - alas - these are unscented.

Obedient plant has obediently spread all over the place.

A sweet scented favorite of mine - a native wildflower called Bouncing Bett

Yes. there are other colors of bee balm but this is the one that survives my humid hot summers.

2009-06-26T06:19:00.001-04:00

It's in the stars

Today marks a turning point within a professional situation that has a lot to say about you personally and your own sense of identity. You may be in two minds about how you should proceed but I suggest you dig deeper to find the source of your indecision. If you feel blocked, ask yourself if it is not your own self-imposed restrictions that may be getting in the way. It's one thing to strive for perfection, but recognize there is no such thing. Focus on your dedication to a great dream that fuels you forward even in the face of your most raging fears. Find your own sense of integrity and allow it to lead you forward in confidence of your own strength to see something through to fruition.

Sometimes one of these horoscopes is so uncannily on the mark I really begin to wonder if there isn't some hidden force trying to prod me in the right direction – a guardian angel, one of my departed beloveds, cosmic truth – I will not presume to say. What I will say is that I know that the above advice is something I truly need to take. I'm looking at a situation at work that I did not devise, that is not on my personal time table, an opportunity that I'm not sure I want to take on. I am finding all sorts of “less than perfection” excuses for avoiding making a decision at all. It has hung like a pall over my life for the past 6 weeks. It's one of those things that is laced with opportunity but which demands enormous amounts of work to bring to fruition. I'm glad to work hard, but I'm not sure this is the hard work I want to do.

It's funny how, not choosing, not deciding, not either leaping into this or politely declining, has made me deeply unhappy, somewhat frightened, and constantly anxious. Funny – since in this economy, most people are being asked to give up opportunities or at least post pone them and I have been offered several choices. It's time to search my soul and plot my personal course and quit imagining the expectations of others, and their possible disappointment in me, have such power over my choices and even my emotional state.

Hmm. Too Much Information. I ought to have said, above, that MsHoroscope hit the nail on the head today. Which she did. Or ... her substitute astrologer did. Ha! But I shan't erase the above either since this is my blog and I actually go back and read it now and then. I'll be glad, in my incipient senility, to remember what it was that had me so cranked up.

What is not TMI is that I'm motoring down to the end of those pretty green cabled socks. I plan to finish them this weekend. Photos on Sunday. I know the next socks I want to work on are the red lace ones .... the ones I had to rip out because the heel flap was too short. After that? Probably some deep blue socks for BD. Then there are two simple socks for me and then I will tackle my first pair of knee socks. Yes! I am going to explore calf shaping in socks. ... Or I may take a hiatus and knit a baby gift for the sweet girl who gives me manicures every other week.

Happy Friday!

2009-06-25T05:51:00.003-04:00

I'm back at last - with photos at the bottom

The past 10 days have been so demandingly busy I hardly have time to remember what I have to do next. I like to have plenty to do but this is not my idea of fun – this crazy busy time with nothing wonderful to show for it. This is frenzy for routine stuff, not scrambling around to throw a marvelous party or put on a fantastic production or preparing for some exotic trip. It's budget design, it's loading quickbooks with invoice numbers and then shifting funds from here to there to cover them. It's sitting, gratefully, but bored, in doctor's offices. Truly, not the stuff of read-worthy blogging. I'd have bored myself before I could finish a post, most days the past week or so and since the readership of this site is so low these days I'm likely to be the only one stopping by TheCastle anyway, there seemed little point in chronicling daily dullness.

Not that every moment has been so stultifying. There have been some sweet moments in the past 10 days , including a visit from a dear cousin who remembered not only being terrified of our grandmother's attic (for me, spooksville was the basement) but also being saved by my dad when she choked on a marble as she lay laughing on her back on my bedroom floor.

It's a funny thing about memories, because as she told me this story there was a slight tremor in my chest, a shaking from somewhere deep within ... who would have thought the memory lived in the body though if it had been so deeply buried in the mind I couldn't bring it to the surface even as I heard the story told? But I do remember a proposed overnight stay or weekend visit when I was very very young, a pre-schooler, I'm sure, that was suddenly canceled because my cousin began to cry and wouldn't stop. I am sure that was the occasion. My god – if parents knew how many ways children would risk their lives none of us would ever have gotten born.

In addition to seeing beloved family, we got super news at the doctor. BD does NOT have to have surgery on his good eye! The dr. said if he didn't have the proof of identity on BD's chart he would have thought a different patient had walked in the door. Happy happy news, that this could be taken care of with medicine and not invasively with knives and needles. There will be another surgery but it is less invasive and won't take place till late in the fall or early winter. Some things are such glorious gifts there really aren't words to describe how grateful we are for them.

I had a hot date last night too – with my neighbor, a rising 4th grader who simply had to introduce me to Transformers II – an animated crash and bangfest that was almost as entertaining as the audience. I remember when LD began collecting Transformers more than 20 years ago. Any of you remember the TV theme song? “Transformers....More than meets the eye!” The movie is everything a boy would love – trucks and fighting and a hot girl who changes into a robot. And a nerdy hero with the ultimate in weird parents who are still lovable, if embarrassing. The 20 somethings sitting both behind and in front of me, the target audience for the kissy parts, (my date and I closed our eyes at those bits) were primed for every battle, explosion and transformation. Truly, it was complete entertainment and my neighbors have invited me to come over and see the dvd of Transformers I anytime I want to.

Another magnificent treat has been the weather. Baring a Saturday of unimaginable heat combined with the sort of humidity that melted your face off, we've had lovely weather. Father's Day was simply beautiful – and combined itself with my cousin's visit ... after I'd vacuumed up 3 weeks worth of dog hair. Monday, the long doctor's day, was equally lovely if a little warmer. I've had several crack-0-dawn meetings that got me to work early enough that I skipped out early yesterday to just go home and enjoy perfect summer weather. It was so beautiful I took photos so, come join me on the lawn, in the deep emerald green of a perfect June afternoon.

Won't you sit with me in the garden?

A bit of rustic architecture.

Step into the woods for a bit of cool shade.

Or join me down this path to view Mr. and Mrs. B. Eagle

2009-06-16T06:50:00.003-04:00

Summer of the Sock Spiritual & Snapshots

Yes. Well, I am feeling particularly silly I suppose but how's this for some lyrics? (Think Paul Robeson)

Go down, go down,
Way down in TheQueen's stash
Tell that
Knitter
To let those Addi's go

Thank you Cathy for the inspiration. And here are the promised photos – since the $13 card reader from Walmart did the trick and now I can load pictures again. Here is the completed pair of socks, knit in the springy Spirit Trail sock yarn, in a wonderful pattern of knits and purls.

I hope you can see the difference between the sock knit on #2 needle and the one on #3. It's always difficult to photograph dark yarn.

This, alas, was a candidate for the frog pond – at least, half of it. I knit the heel flap too shallow, although I did knit it the requisite # of rows (I think. Now I will have to go count. This is the sock I knit while BD was in surgery a month ago)

See how it bulges out below the ankle bone. Not a pretty thing. Ugh. Those toes are not so pretty either, but both of them, sock and toe, can be fixed.

Here is the sock I am concentrating on now. This lovely yarn was purchased in July 2008 – a birthday present for BH. She will get the socks in July 2009. She has tiny tiny feet and slender ankles.

This is a First Sock, though – lots of knitting left to do on these. Can I finish them by next weekend? We shall have to wait and see.

2009-06-15T07:12:00.001-04:00

Play before Work

Every now and then I like to remind you that having Saturn in your sign has its good points. They come when you get some kind of pay off for the hard yards you've been putting in. And looking only SLIGHTLY ahead in your chart, I can see that one of those pay offs (or even two) are just around the corner for you. So remember the Saturn 2009 Rule: "Thy shalt not regret the hard work thy putteth in now, for foorsooth, soon ye shall prosper!" In other words - keep nose to the grindstone, rewards lie ahead.

Okay, MsHoroscope. I shall putteth mine nose to said grindstone.

Sigh.

Besides – I had the most perfect day yesterday to buck me up. The dry air followed us home from the mountains and gave us crystal blue skies, even if only briefly. It is grey and rainy again today. “40% chance of rain” say the weather dot com guys. I wonder – does that mean it will rain 40% of the day or over 40% of the scattered shower area. Right now it is what I might call a heavy mist outside. You'll come in wet, even though you may not feel any raindrops.

But yesterday! Oh! Yesterday was so beautiful. The air felt like a caress on my skin. Every living thing in the fields, forests or sky was busy about his business and chatty about it too. It was all chirps, tweets, keees, snuffs, peeps and croaks as we walked through the woods, down the lane, over to Roberts Landing. And yes – I got in my first swim of the summer before noon. That first plunge was chilly but it took less than a second to get accustomed and then the swimming was delightful.

There was knitting too – I did complete that pair of socks – the purple one with the pretty designs. I also took photos but the jack in the camera is truly disconnected, inside the camera body and I can't download anything at all now. I'll be off to see if I can find a media card reader that takes the old large size cards – I think I've seen pictures of them on-line but I am going to have to see one in person to be sure.

I also had to rip out an entire sock foot after I tried it on and saw I had made the heel flap too short. I know I made it the “normal” number of rows long ... as many rows as there are stitches in the width ... but it was still too short and the sock looked ridiculous. (took a photo of that too – you'll see, maybe tomorrow) So though there was one step forward, there was one step back too. Ahh well. Happily I am a process knitter and besides, D had the wisest thought of all – that it is fun to discover so many beautiful projects that are almost done!

So. Progress was made. And crossword puzzles were completed (BD and I do them together and laugh a lot at the puns, the puzzles and the silly definitions). A second walk was taken. Dogs were petted. Meals were consumed, all to the accompaniment of talk and talk and talk. Evidently we were as chattery as the rest of the animals here on the farm.

And now it is Monday and we must get back to werk – werkwerkwerk. But we have yesterday to remember and smile about and be glad for.

2009-06-14T08:06:00.003-04:00

Cousins, Socks, KALs?

Oh La! Classic Queen post - long, wordy, gushing, interesting, (at least, to herself)

These are the things at the forefront of my mind right now - the wonderful visit we made yesterday (lots of driving through the lush Virginia countryside) and socks of course, because I have a ton of them to knit, and Knit-A-Longs.

Yesterday we left early to drive west from here - west along my favorite stretch of highway in the whole wide world, Rt. 60; west of Powhatan Courthouse. West west west to my favorite small town in all the world, Bedford Virginia. Mind now, I deeply love my little town, which is also a Virginia town, and an old one at that. But it is not Bedford. Bedford is the fantasy town. It's the small town people really dream of living in when the think "I'd like to live in a small town". It's got about 6 or 7 thousand people in it - which is enough to really do something. It's along a divided highway that's not an interstate. It is also not the only road through town (says the gal who works in a town with only one road through it and knows about congestion), for there are many other smaller roads that lead in and out. This means speedy driving but not congested horror driving. It's the county seat of Bedford County and is halfway between two bigger cities so there is the option of commuting. It's nestled at the foot of the beautiful Blue Ridge Mts. Intrepid walkers could actually walk up to the mountains, but the town just has some gentle slopes supporting its sidewalks.

The folk in Bedford have worked hard, and cooperatively, I am sure, to keep their downtown vibrant and active. There are shops and businesses and banks and grocery stores you can get to without having to drive into the thousand acre parking lots around walmart ... but there is a walmart too for those who need or want that option. It's just that it's out on that divided highway that's not an interstate. (460 for the curious). There is a Yarn Shop!!!!! in Bedford. Need I say more?

I know there are all sorts of houses in Bedford but I when I think of Bedford I see our cousins' houses - all 19th century and early 20th century set back in big green lawns. Our beloved Aunt Anna lived in one that faced the mountains and had a history with a scandal, which she shared with me one long ago summer morning after I'd spent the night (on real linen sheets, my dears). "They eventually moved over the mountain to Alta Vista, but I heard they were never happy".... oh la I can still hear her telling me.

Aunt Anna loved me and loved BD because we so adored her brother, BD's father. I had wonderful stories to share with her of his last years, the only years when I knew him. She gave us the blanket chest he made for her as a wedding gift in the 1920's. She knew we would treasure it and we do. It is full of yarn. Some things are truly truly sweet.

Well. goodness. I sound like the tourist bureau. I guess I am in a way. For sure, though, if I ever had to leave here I would fly to Bedford. And not just because it is the perfect fantasy small town - but because there are Cousins!! in Bedford. Cousins we love. Cousins who watched a precious son graduate from high school yesterday. Cousins who welcome us whenever they see us. Cousins who love us. Cousins with a wide green lawn on which a surprise awaited us! LD had driven up to see W graduate. There was a party and there was delicious food and there were more hugs and some hastily made plans for fun later in the summer.

And then BD and I drove home through the cool evening - dry in the mountains, dank and humid here in Tidewater - and got home to hungry dogs who wondered where we'd been. I am so glad I went. It was just the pick-me-up I needed. Thank heavens for Cousins. And Bedford, VA. If I can't live there, at least I can visit.

Well. All that gush drove thoughts of socks right out of my mind. Let me see if I can reel them back for a few brief words. I promise. Brief!

First off - there is that pair of socks I want to finish this weekend. I did finish the second sock, which was hanging on a size 3 Addi circular needle. I tried it on as I knit it and it was longer than the finished one. I had not looked closely at the actual knitting, only at the length on my leg and the fit around the heel. I am constantly growing bored with the last bit of sock knitting - the foot part - and knitting them too short and this was the case in the First Sock of this lovely purple pair. Sometimes I just wear the socks anyway. Sometimes I pull out the toes and knit a little more foot. Since this short foot actually made the whole sock a good bit shorter than the other I pulled out the toe, picked up the stitches with the now freed up #3 needle and began working on the toe. And that's when I remembered.

I remembered what I was thinking and doing when I began these socks. I had knit the first sock on smaller needles - a #2 or #1. And I had wondered if you could use this tightly spun bouncy sock yarn to knit a bigger sock without changing the stitch number ... because the pattern would look good with either men's or women's clothes. And yes. This stretchy bouncy yarn knits up a nice, if loose, sock that would fit a bigger foot. Alas, if one were hard on socks, as, for example, BD is, then I would have to recalculate the numbers. If one weren't too hard on them, as, happily, TheQueen is, one could wear this looser sock a long time. Since they're for me anyway I'm glad but if/when I write up the pattern, it will be for standard woman's sizing.

But

isn't there always a but?

I had to pull out the new knitting on the First Sock toe - because on #3 needles it looked simply horrible. I must now find a smaller needle (or pull one from another sock project) to finish up the toe of that sock. Which I will do. Because I will will will finish that pair of socks today!!

I'm also thinking a wee bit about a Summer of the Sock Knit-a-Long. I'm not actually much of a knit along type but I have joined one or two when I wanted a little extra support to keep me on task. Reporting back to Others helps me do DOOTIFUL things and while I love all my sock yarns and want all the socks they'll turn into, completing them still carries with it a hint of Dooty.

And so. And so. I wonder if anyone would want to join me in a KAL. I know One person does - the person who suggested it to me. I will ponder this a day or two more and then Make an Announcement. But now - the needles call. so does a lonely BD, who would like company with his breakfast. I am off. Happy Sunday.