One Down...

Chart A of Mystic Waters is done. I've found some dental floss and will insert a lifeline and then start B. It feels good to have no mistakes so far... 7 more charts to go...

Third Time Better be the Charm

Or I may go nuts. Mystic Waters has whupped my a$$ again... I found a major oops of too many stitches on the left side so I couldn't tink just that area. No lifeline so out it all came and I've started again. I'm almost finished with chart A. I am very determined to get this thing done! I love all the photos I've seen - and one lady who has knitted two so far. Amazing!

Right now I've been knitting to Parking Wars (?). This takes place in Philly - home to DSIL's family. Love it when a guy went to tear up a ticket for the camera and it wouldn't tear. Guy looked like a goof fo that. This is actually a pretty funny show. It's also amazing what people have on their cars and the stories they come up with. It's also kind of funny that so few of the people have the accent I associate with the Philadelphia area.

PK stands for Psycho-kat. She goes tearing through the house, leaping into the air and attacking almost everything - but then she turns around and looks like this:
Miss Pretty Innocent Kat.







"Who Me??? I did WHAT?????? No Way!"

Stash Enhancement Experience (S.E.X.)

I've been enhancing my stash - actually in anticipation of at least one Mystery Shawl starting in March. Mystic Light has been described by Anna as the light coming from fire or stars. I bought some yarn from Loopy Ewe, first this: Cool Fire from Dream In Color Smooshy. This seemed to me to be the colors when the fire is dying down including the blue-ish flame colors.

Well, I was happy but then I was browsing another day or two later and found the following:

This is called Sugar Maple and is from Cherry Tree Hill's Sockittome. It does hit the colors of the sugar maples in New England but also the intense colors of fire, except for the blue fire when the wood burns to coals. That's ok. I think I like these warmer colors a bit better.

The final purchase was this:
This is Spring Frost, also from Cherry Tree Hill. Again, hits the colors I envision from the name. This will be a pair of socks for me.

Speaking of socks...

This is the first in a pattern called Azure from Knitty. I'm doing it in a Teal Green from Cherry Tree Hill yarn. It's a nice knit. The camera showed more detail when I was looking at what I was going to snap a photo of, but the detail seems washed out. There is no sun outside today so I'll have to wait for a good stitch detail photo. Or go to the Knitty site and see what the original looks like. This is being knit on size 2 needles.

I'm waiting for my LYS to get some more Addi size 2 needles in and want a 16 or 24" size. The 32" that I'm using is a big temptation to PK.

She is learning what she can or cannot play with but I really don't want to tempt her and then have to say no. Her other thing is to pretend she's a Kilroy character by peeking over the staircase edge.
If you tell her you can see her, she'll dash up the rest of the steps and hide around the corner.

Tagged again!

One of the blogs I read is by Dani in Canada. She was tagged and tagged Claire at Blarney 'n' Grits. I thought that was funny - and then Claire tagged me................. so here I go:

4 Jobs I've Had

• Cashier in a grocery store
• Mother Nature at a day camp
  
• AFDC/Food Stamp worker (welfare)
  
• Material Planner (manufacturing plant)
  

4 Movies I Watch Over and Over

• Sweet Home Alabama
  
• Hunt for Red October
  
• Backdraft
  
• any Pirates of the Carribbean
  

4 Places I Have Been

• Seattle Washington
  
• New York, New York
  
• Cadillac Mountain, Maine
  
• Vancouver, British Columbia

4 Places I Have Lived

• Watertown, Wisconsin
  
• Weston, Connecticut
  
• Corpus Christi, Texas
  
• Chattanooga, Tennessee

4 TV Shows I Watch

• Good Eats
  
• NCIS
  
• Shark
  
• History Channel (various)
  

4 People Who E-mail Me Regularly

• My DIL
  
• My sister
  
• People trying to make things bigger that I don't have
  
• People commenting on this blog
  

4 Favorite Foods

• Lasagna
  
• Cheeseburger
  
• Fried Chicken
• Mashed Potatoes

4 Places I Would Rather Be

• Ireland
  
• Sweden
  
• St. Petersburg
  
• Switzerland
  

4 Things I'm Looking Forward To

• Visiting with Grandkids
• Finishing Mystic Waters
  
• Finish remodeling home
  
• Using Handspun for sweater project
  

4 People to tag

• Peggy
  
• Brigitte
• Joan
• April

This is kind of fun - but off to knit some more.......if PK will let me.

Decisions, decisions

I've decided to set aside Spring Shawl Surprice and finish Mystic Waters first. I'm making stupid mistakes (because I can't count to 3) and getting frustrated. So I'll finish Mystic Waters then do SSS then we'll see. I have yarns coming for two more stitch alongs... One will be Mystic Light, a companion to Mystic Waters, this one being fire. I had purchased some yarn but then read more of Anna's view so changed to a color called Pale Fire. I'll post photos when it arrives (late next week?).

This past week I went to a Tuesday night Knit group at a coffee shop downtown. First of all, I'll have to remember not to drink cappuccino after 6 pm. I was wired until 4 am. Secondly, I met some very interesting people. Only one "knitter" other than myself showed up but the shop is quite a gathering place and a very eclectic group was there. There was an interest in knitting expressed by one man who sews now and wanted to know how much I'd charge him to knit a ski cap. He said he could do a little crochet so I told him he could find oodles of patterns free on the internet and YouTube has loads of video how-tos. Lots of questions that showed thought and curiosity. I loved it! Back in 2 weeks for more and I'm so looking forward to it.

I was told today that I've been tagged so I guess I'll have to find out for what and answer that one in another entry.
PK has declared war on the bottom step and now jumps over that step on her way upstairs. Considering she fell off that step while trying to be cute - and doing well at that - I can understand her frustration with that step. I'll see if I can get a photo or two of her attacking the step - it's really funny to watch.

Enjoy!

SSS Clue 1

I've finally completed clue 1 of the Spring Shawl Surprice. Today Clue 2 was released so I have more knitting to do today. I know I've made some goofs in the center section but I believe I've found what my problem has been so will just continue. It seems to be a busy enough pattern that the errors won't show.















I have one photo of the whole thing and another of the detail. The yarn is Zephyr 2/18 which is a wool/silk blend and I'm stitching on 3mm needles.

I'm going back to knitting now along with sipping some tea.

New Year, New Starts

Welcome to 2008. We actually had some snow last night. Enough to turn cars white - but mostly gone by early morning - at least in the sunny areas. I got a raspberry (aka Bronx Cheer) from DD when I called her. She lives quite north of me - and has no snow. Youngest DGS really, really wants snow but he's been disappointed most of this winter.

I think my most favorite gift this holiday season was a conversation with my youngest GD. She talked and talked and even sang a bit to me. For a child with autism who has been mostly silent for 5 years, this brought tears to my eyes.

Most people make resolutions as to what they want to accomplish in the new year - mostly being behavioral changes. Well I'm so tired of breaking those resolutions that I'm not making any. No, I'm not resolving to make no resolutions - I just skipped the whole thing.

I did make a new start for the new year. Spring Shawl Surprice (the spelling is the designer's) had the first clue released at midnight designer time. I'm knitting it in Jaggerspun Zephyr in Cinnabar on 3 mm needles.

I'm at about row 10 out of 50. A few fellow knitters have finished the clue and their photos show this to be an interesting knit.

The designer is the same lady who designed Secret of the Chrysopholis (spelling is mine and may or may not be correct).

I'll post another photo when I finish the clue.

I've renamed the cat to PK from Angel Eyes. She actually seems to respond to this name a bit. C is the one who came up with the name - even before he met her. One thing interesting about her is a medallion or prism on her head.
She also does seem to have the M on her forehead. My MIL says this indicates a cat who can be a good mouser. The best mouser I had was black with a white bib - no M visible on her at all.

I'm also fascinated with PK's eyes. In the following photo, you can almost see me in her pupils. She's adjusting quite well to her new forever home and is becoming quite a talker.