Autumn update

I've been knitting. I hope that's not news to anyone who might read this. I have been working on several things lately. I've made some progress on a baby sweater that is for my great granddaughter who is due in January.


I've also done some work on my 10 stitch blanket since the end of Stash Dash and made a little progress. (The stitch marker on the left side is where I left off at the end of Stash Dash and the needles are where I am now.)


I got sucked in to the Beekeepers Quilt and have about a dozen little hexagons made and gathering in a bag. I finished another one today who didn't make it into the photo op.


I've been working on a project that I can't show pictures of and have been having a time with that one and gauge. I have restarted different parts of this project two or three times each. Some of it was just that the parts of the project are small enough to be swatches themselves so I haven't been swatching. That means I have been ripping back and starting over. I'm really good at that part.
I finished the Monkey Mitts for my granddaughter. Word is that she loves them. I certainly hope so.


We got 17 3/4" of rain during Lee. My back yard was a lake. It's not a lake at the moment. The hawk sat on the start of a burn pile and scoped out breakfast. There are several bunnies that live around our property. I didn't see one become breakfast, but the hawk was awe inspiring.

The pile below is from when our property was cleared. We are taking care of it a little at a time. I wanted to use a chipper on most of it, but that isn't feasible. In our area they cost about $450 to rent for a weekend and that pile is taller than I am and part of it is too thick to go into a chipper anyway so part is getting burnt and we are thinking of buying a chipper in the future.

We have been building new raised garden beds and planting in them. We have onions, broccoli, cabbage, lettuce, carrots, and sugar snap peas in the beds now.

I'm getting ready to transplant the strawberries to a different bed so that I can put plastic under all the beds. When we moved out here we did a quick job of moving our beds from the other place and it is time to start organizing the garden and getting it ready for a big year next spring. Although we are getting peppers from the garden I think this year was a fail in that regard. Peppers and cantaloupes are all we've gotten.

My citrus trees survived being put into the ground and the two lemons that I had on one of the trees are starting to turn. Looking forward to more citrus next year.

Rain, rain, go away

We are geared up for the busiest time of the Hurricane season here. Historically, September is the height of the season and we have a depression sitting in the gulf that isn't moving at the moment. It seems that unless something changes that it will be a rainmaker more than anything. If that's the case I can't help wishing that it would go in to Texas where the whole state is in a serious drought. Here in my little corner of the world we could use the rain, but not 10 to 20 inches in 72 hours. It cannot soak in or drain that fast and will cause flash floods. That's not good for anyone.
I feel so badly for those in the northeast who have had to deal with Irene and the aftermath of that storm. I know how they feel.
I have been knitting and crocheting since my last post. I've made a pair of Monkey Mitts for one of my granddaughters and am crocheting some simple scarves for the granddaughters too.
I also got caught on the slippery slope that is the Beekeepers Quilt by Tiny Owl Knits. I looked at it and thought that it was pretty and interesting and that I should turn around and walk away immediately. Then I wondered if I could figure out how to make those tiny little hexagons and if I was as crazy as I thought I was since I had already played that game with the Sock Yarn Blankie by Shelley Kang. So I did. I walked away. No, really, I did. What got me was wondering if I could figure it out without the pattern. Now I think the pattern is lovely and if it was in my budget I would have bought it, tucked it away, and left it be for the foreseeable future. Now although I am not scrounging pennies for gas and milk (been there, done that), since my husband is currently on disability until he recovers from surgery, I do not have the cash for patterns. Especially patterns that I have no intention of making. But to use my mind to see if I can figure it out on my own is a worthy challenge. I now have two and a half of those lovely little hexagons in a bag in my craft room. They don't take a lot of yarn and they are a change from the Ten Stitch Blanket by Frankie Brown that I am also working on a little at a time.
Like I said, slippery slope.
On the home front I will be battling Morning Glory vines. They are along the side of our property and have found their way to my roses and my raised garden beds. There will be much pulling of vines so they don't take over. They are pretty, but I don't want the yard filled with them.
I also found some Cypress Vines that the butterflies love and something that I'm not sure what it is that the bees love.

The rain has started and it's coming down steady. I will update later with how much we have. It's now time for a cup of coffee.

I really did it

I actually got through 5K of knitting and spinning for the Stash Dash. I was surprised to say the least. I finished a baby sweater, two pair of socks for the husband, a shawlette, a pi shawl, 6 bunnies, my first Clapotis, a Josephine cloche, and about 800 yards of spinning. I feel lucky that Tour De Fleece and the Stash Dash overlapped.



I have been working in the yard too and learned how to take the mower deck off the Deere and put it back on. Not a big deal unless you have never done it before.
There is actually a pomegranate on my bush. I was amazed. I just wasn't sure if it would produce or not. My yard is beginning to come together. We heard the other day that the sewer system is getting ready to come through our area. We knew it was coming, but had been told that it would be anywhere from two to seven years. The county health department wanted us to put in a $10,000 septic system instead of the $5,000 one that we did put in. Now they say that they will start hookups in November of this year. I would have been seriously upset if we had paid $10,000 for a system we would use for less than a year. They have mandated that if you live in this area you have to be hooked up to the system. The only surprise for me has been that they said there will be no hook up fee if you let them do the hook up when they come through with it.

Elmer had surgery again on Monday and we are hoping that they fixed the problem this time. I am tired of spending time in the hospital and I'm sure he is too.

I'm also teaching my granddaughter to knit on my Bond knitting machine. So far she loves it. She is eleven and I'm not sure how long her fascination will last, but it will be a skill she can come back to later if she wants. As for me, I'm still hand knitting almost exclusively lately. It's just so much more portable than my machines are. I'm still spinning on my spindle and I have a couple of scarves in the planning stages for my weaving looms. I just can't seem to get motivated to spend any time in front of my knitting machines. Ah well, it will come back. It always does.

They"re multiplying like, well, rabbits

It's been busy around here. We are still working on the yard.
There is a lot still to be done. I have plants to get in the ground and trees to trim up and poison ivy to get rid of.
We got to watch a hawk land in one of our trees the other day. Unfortunately, by the time I got my camera he had left. Maybe next time.








I've been making more bunnies. I have three complete now and another one on the needles.
It is an easy pattern and will be useful tomorrow while I'm in the waiting room at the hospital.












I'm about half way with my stash dash 5 K, but I don't think I will make it to the goal by August 15. There is still a lot of yardage to go.
I've completed my goal for the Tour de Fleece. I didn't really think I could do four ounces on my spindle in the time allowed. I was wrong. I have about 200 yards of a very pretty (I think) 3-ply yarn. It still needs a bath and I need to see what the WPI (wraps per inch) is so I can see what I have. I think it's about a sport weight.














I'm going to be a great-grandma in January. There are baby things to be made before then and it also explains the beginning of the bunny craze. Once I made bunnies for the two babies we are expecting in our family, I got asked for several more. They are definitely multiplying.

The temperatures here are in the mid to upper 90's with heat indexes in the 110 range. It's hot here and in a lot of the rest of the country too I know. It definitely makes you wonder about how people managed before air conditioning. I know that it's a matter of what we are used to and I for one am thankful for the AC.

What I've been up to

It's been a while since I wrote anything here and I'm not even sure what I was doing last time except that I'm sure we were moving. The move is complete. I am so thankful. The organizing and yardwork and making the new place a home is not complete yet.
I have been knitting. I've finished my Blueberry Pi shawl.














I've made a bunny and have the second one almost done. I have to finish his ear and sew it on and put a face on him. They will have more friends since I have had requests for three more bunnies.














I've been playing with my spindles for the Tour de Fleece. I am just about where I wanted to be in my spinning, but really ahead of where I thought I'd be. Nice.














Mostly I have been working around the house. We planted four blueberry bushes.
We got the citrus trees planted.
The roses are sitting waiting for me to put them in the ground. The garden is growing.
I made my own mulch by using a chipper to chip up some of the trees we had taken down on the property.
I've got my rain barrels set up and collecting water (when it rains). Unfortunately we are over 18 inches below normal on rainfall this year. It's sad and scary and I'm actually collecting the water from our AC unit as it pulls the humidity out and putting it in the barrel. It is adding up. I get about a gallon of water that way every three hours or so on average.
We set up a deck out back and get to enjoy watching the birds and the squirrels.
I will see about some more pictures next time around.

We have Power

I'm doing the happy dance that we are back on commercial power. I periodically jump up and do a little dance singing "We have Power, we have power." This is not really a big deal unless you have been living for two weeks on a generator and in the middle of that time your husband has surgery. As for the surgery, well, the device failed. We have an appointment tomorrow and will see what it next on the list for what to do to hopefully make him healthy again. He's not really unhealthy, but the issue is with his colon and it needs to be taken care of.
The house is moved. The code office passed us. The power company put in the meter and we start work on the yard this weekend. Up til now we have been doing what is needed to pass the inspection and keep the code office off our backs. now we are done with them and can work on making this our home.
In the meantime, I have been knitting to keep my sanity. I finished a pair of socks for Elmer,













then finished a baby sweater,













and a Wendy Johnson shawlette














and topped it off by finishing the spinning and plying of some fiber I got while I was in Texas way back in October.













I have plans to use my Kundert spindle to play during Tour de Fleece in July. I have plans for some Abstract Fibers roving in the Knitmore Girls colorway. The plan is to spin up all four ounces of this fiber.
I'm also playing in the Stash Dash 5 K with the Knitgirllls on Ravelry. So far I'm at 938 yards. That is nowhere what I need to have done, but when I finish Blueberry Pi I will add another 1500 to 1600 yards to my total. After that I plan to do a little weaving and work on my 10 stitch afghan to make up some yardage. I need to do 5K by August 15th. Can I do it? Who knows. I do know that the spinning counts too and if I knit what I spin during the challenge then I get to count it twice. Sweet. And a good reason to knit with some of my own handspun.
Back to the knitting, spinning, and yard work now.

Moving still going on

I haven't posted in what seems like forever. It's been a little crazy making around here. The move is, well, moving along slowly. We live in a mobile home (at least it was when we bought it, but I think now the term is manufactured home) that is in a trailer park. It's ours; well, it's ours and the mortgage company's for a while longer. We bought a piece of property and cleared part of it. That's when the fun began. I knew nothing about prices of things like the use of a track hoe or dirt or wash out (the stuff they wash out of concrete trucks). I also didn't know how much fun it is to deal with the code office, the zoning office, the environmental health department, and all the other things that need to be done. Every time one or both of us have been to the code office they say we need something else. Every time. Shouldn't there be a list that they hand you with what you need? Why yes, and there is. The problem is that they keep adding to the list. Apparently, it depends on who you get at the code office. I went yesterday, having everything that was on the list I had, and they informed me I needed something else. This was after they informed E. last week that we would have to have a different type of foundation "Stacked block foundation isn't allowed. You will have to have a permanent foundation with concrete, concrete filled blocks and re-bar." And they couldn't have told us this earlier? Ugh. This, of course, makes the move more expensive, time consuming, aggravating, and a host of other words that aren't all nice.
I could live with this except for two tiny little things. E is out of town most of the time for his job so most of this falls on me. On top of that we heard that E needs surgery again. I have about hit my limit on what I can handle.
I have been knitting to keep my sanity. I'm holding my own. I have a Pi shawl on the needles still. I'm working on a baby sweater and socks and will soon have a shawlette on the needles too. My 10 stitch blanket is not making any progress at all at the moment and my knitting machines are sitting idle and waiting to be packed for safety for the move.
Time to go do something semi- productive.