Easter Egg Socks

I finished up another pair of socks for me. Wow! Two pairs in a row for me, albeit just plain vanillas, nothing fancy. These ones I call my Easter Egg Socks cuz the colors look like Easter eggs. They were started September 17, finished the 26th, made with Patons Kroy in lavender jacquard and knit with 2.75mm needles. My standard vanilla recipe of 60sts, although I did use a larger needle. It's usually 2.25mm or 2.5mm, but I find the Kroy so much thicker, so I go up a bit more. I tried to knit them a little tighter, and they seem to fit okay. Ravelry details here.

Not a fan of inside pictures, but its been rainy outside lately, and I finished these once it was dark, too. I guess the color isn't off too much. It was a gorgeous day today (eventually), but I had to work and couldn't reshoot. It was like summer, actually, hot and muggy. I think it's going to stay that way but be rainy til the weekend, and Sunday temperatures are to go down to a normal seasonal temperature. (Today must have been at least 25C plus humid, Sunday is only supposed to be 14C.)

Happy knitting!

Visitor

We had a visitor yesterday. A very good friend of mine who I went to high school with and community college was home for a visit. She moved to Australia probably 10-11 years ago, it must be, now. She`s travelled all over the world, lucky gal. She hasn`t been here since 2007, I think. Plans are in 2012 when I hit a milestone birthday (one which I am NOT looking forward to, it`s going to be one of those it`s-my-party-and-I`ll-cry-if-I-want-to birthdays) to go to her place for a visit. Anyhoo, she has this little guy, Sid, who goes everywhere with them. He`s very well-travelled, been to South America, The Great Wall of China, New York City, Paris, Europe... He got to meet Nala and Pumba yesterday.

And of course Jewel tried to eat him. (Bet no one else tried to eat him in all of his travels.)

So I found him a girlfriend-from-afar. Awhile back when I went to one of the local grocery stores they were giving these out for free. I named her Bernadette, and she hopes to be worldly-travelled in the not-so-distant future, too.

And Jewel tried to eat her, too.

So the Oldest One is infatuated with planes, he`d like to be a pilot someday. My friend`s husband is an engineer for Qantas. They brought some stuff for the boys, they were tickled pink. The pajamas are miles too big for them, but they`ve been wearing them anyways. And I don`t have a picture, but T at work went to New York City last week, and he brought me a t-shirt.

Soon finishing up another pair of vanilla socks for me. Should have those ready for the next post.

Happy knitting!

Tutti Fruitti

I made myself a pair of socks for the first time in awhile. They are just plain old 60 stitch vanillas in a discontinued Kroy colorway called Tutti Frutti. Started on September 5, finished on the 16th, Ravelry details here.

We had some construction work going on last week. We finally got the materials to shingle our roof. I got three quotes on the labour, and I went with a friend I've know since high school who has done this kind of thing forever, and he also happened to beat the other two quotes (also two guys that I just happened to go to high school with), one by $430, the other by $300.

Before. (Look at Maggie in the window! She loves to lay in the bay window. Probably 90% of the time when I come home she's laying in the window.) You can see the big square of tar that my Dad did to stop the leak we had til we could get the roof done.

Most of the materials, I put the small stuff in the garage so it would walk or blow away. We had gotten 39 bundles of shingles but needed two more. Dad overestimated on the other stuff, but that's okay. We have to do the garage roof in the spring, and now all we need are shingles.

They started in the back.

The final product. I went with a different color. The old shingles were black, the new ones are weatherwood.

Trying to get a closer look at the color, but it had just finished raining, so it was a little dark and gloomy outside. And the finishing time was perfect - he added the peak on Thursday, and Friday it absolutely poured.

This is the garage, and you can see that the roof is pretty nasty. I know when they strip it down there will be boards to be replaced. It does leak in places, and some of the boards are kinda black down where the roof meets the walls. But we don't live in the garage, so it has to wait.

Happy knitting!

Earl

Last weekend was a long weekend, but a pretty quiet one for us. Except for early morning/into the afternoon on Saturday, when Hurricane Earl passed through. More on him in a minute, but first up I finally finished up the Par 5 socks. Started August 16, finished September 5, no changes to the pattern. I did three 24-row pattern repeats to the heel, then from the gusset pick up to the toe did 2.5 repeats. Usual toe to 20sts. I did the 2x2 rib down the heel, but if I do them again I may do a regular heel. I find this one kinda loose. The yarn is On Your Toes 4ply in cream. Ravelry details here.

So Earl ripped a big branch from one of my trees, much as I expected. We've had this house for nine years. The man we bought it from had cut all the branches basically off of all of the trees in the yard. (He didn't like raking leaves, but after he ruined all the trees he realized that 90% of the leaves in the yard come from the graveyard across the road.) Anyhoo, they've filled in nicely over the years, kinda silly looking in the winter when there are no leaves on them, but still. I love my trees. But these two by the side driveway always end up losing limbs in high winds.

This is one of the neighbor's trees across the street.

And this tree is two houses up from mine. It was a weird shaped tree to begin with, and the wind just hauled it right out of the ground. I took a drive around on Saturday night, and there seemed to be a lot of tree damage and not too much else. I know there were a couple of power poles snapped, too.

Today was the first day I've had off since the kids went back to school. I had to run to Bridgewater to do some errands. Not too much else was accomplished today other than a bit of housework before I left. Tomorrow I have to wait around for my roofing materials to be dropped off. Ga, the expense. We bought the materials, now we're getting quotes on the labour. The one I got today was really quite high. Well, probably not too bad, but it's a helluva lot more than we're willing to pay. Hubs was talking to his brother, so I'm thinking that maybe he and our nephew may end up doing it. They're cheap labour, BIL used to do that for a living and now just does it on occasion, and nephew has been working for a roofer for a couple of months now. We'll work out a small fee, and I'm sure some beer and supper will have to be thrown in.

I'll leave with a little clip of Earl that I took. Happy knitting!

Bluebell

I finished up a little cardigan for the store. It's knit with Bernat Baby Jacquards in the bluebell colorway. The pattern is from the booket Patty Cake, all patterns for the Baby Jacquard yarns. Started this one August 19 and finished it on the 28th. The only thing I really did differently from the pattern was omit the picot edge on the buttonbands. I didn't have enough yarn, and I didn't want to get another skein just for the sake of a few yards. And I used 3.5mm and 3.75mm needles. Ravelry details here. Got the yarn to make the boys version, too.

So we've been having an incredibly hot heat wave here the past week. It's been unbearable with the humidity. Today was the first day of school, poor kids. No air conditioning in the schools and all those bodies. The Littlest One is now in the same school as the Oldest One for the next two school years. There is new playground equipment there this year, so they got to check that out for a bit today, but I don't think they were allowed outside as long as usual because of the heat. And the Littlest One said something about getting ice cream or freezies or something.

But this evening it's actually cooling off. Earl is on his way and is set to hit here through the night and into tomorrow. After he passes through the temperatures are supposed to drop by 12-15C to a nice, comfortable low 20sC. (Instead of 35C feeling like 42C with the humidity!) The boys and I spent the past couple of days at the beach all afternoon, but the only relief we got there was to jump in the water (which was abnormally warm for here). I took knitting with me both days, but it was just too hot to touch it. I haven't knit hardly a stitch this week, but I think I'll sit down this evening and try to get the heel finished on my sock.

And on a sad note, remember this post from early August. Our dear friend and one of our best customers at the store passed away yesterday. His granddaughter (who has a daughter my Oldest One's age) called and said he wasn't feeling well, so they took him to the hospital where he peacefully passed away. All I can say is if I can make it to 94 and go quickly and quietly like that I'd be a happy camper. We sure will miss him. He hasn't been able to drive for the past couple of years, but when he still did drive he was at the store pretty well every day, sometimes for hours. I'd say, "See you tomorrow, Ralph", and he'd always say, "Well, at my age I'm not making any promises!". He liked to argue at times, too. You could tell if he was in the mood, lol. But I was thinking yesterday, he argued with all of them at the store except for me. We never had an argument, not once. (And don't get me wrong - he wasn't arguing to be nasty, that's just what he liked to do sometimes, and we all knew it.) Once in awhile he'd arrive with cards for us all with lotto tickets in them (he loved the lotto). He couldn't remember when it was all of our birthdays, so he'd do that once in awhile for us. He had a ticket one time, he gave me the ticket to look at and one of the other girls the list of winning numbers. He had her call off one number at a time while I checked his ticket. Sneaky devil knew he had every number except for the last one. He would have won $1 million, but with only 5 numbers he got $649. (It was the Atlantic 649.) He talked about that for ages and even years later he'd mention that time he was one number away from $1 million!!

Happy knitting!