The Months Are Changing

As August is changing to September my mind is turning back towards knitting.  Is it unusual to put down the knitting needles for the Summer sometimes and pick them up again for the Fall and Winter?  This summer I have knit very few stitches.  I've thought about knitting a lot, but I've actually done very little of it.  Now that August is preparing to vanish it seems as if I have suddenly come out of a long knitting slumber to rediscover my knitting needles and all of my stash and my books and kits and feel like a brand new knitter!  I just hope this doesn't happen every single summer.  This would really annoy me, and my husband, since he expects sweaters in the Fall and Winter, especially this Fall and Winter and he won't get them until the Winter and probably then until deep winter, i.e. January and February.

Last night I came up with a wonderful little idea for a gift for a friend of mine.  A cute little sweater that would just make her look absolutely adorable and make her so warm in the winter!  I'm hoping I can save up the money to get the money for the yarn for the sweater.  She is so very tiny I don't believe it would take very much to do the project for her. 

The yarn for Hubby's sweater I already have, I just have to make sure and just locate the stupid book or buy another one, which I really would hate to do because I've already had it purchased for me once before.  Having two copies of the same book would really make me feel silly, but, I suppose, it could come in handy in case a friend and I were working on similar or same projects and needed to compare notes.

I am ever so glad the knitting mojo has returned in its proper proportion.  :)

Books and Knitting ..... Perfect Birthday Happiness

 Tomorrow is my birthday. 

Most of what I have asked for my birthday this year has been Barns & Noble gift cards.  Can you guess why?

Finished Magic Bites a couple of days ago and simply couldn't wait to get it from the library or to see if Sniffles had it on her shelf so I went ahead and splurged and got the second book in the Kate Daniels urban fantasy series. 

I was SO impressed with this book.  It was just what I needed.  Now we have headed on to the second novel, Magic Burns. 

Casting Forward

Believe it or not but I've cast on for a new project and actually got a couple of rows done!  I'm so excited I could spit fleece!

Found Pups and Rearranged Knitting Baskets

This morning I was awakened with news that a pup had been found when Cheyenne and Jake had been out for their morning constitutional.  He is a beauty as you can see.  He looks to be about 4-6 months old.  A pitbull terrier and as friendly a fellow as you would ever wish to meet.  He is well-fed and appears to be kept mostly outside, although, of course, he had to come inside to meet my pack who greeted him and then accepted him as easily as possible.  I was a little nervous about how he would react to the wheelchair and wheels, but once he realized that I and the wheelchair were connected, well, he decided we were all right and since there was much pettings to occur from the woman in the wheelchair there wasn't anything bad to occur.  He especially decided it was a good thing since he discovered he could jump up onto the couch and be reached much easier for petting and playing, which made his eyes glitter with absolute joy.  Because we didn't know his name - he just had a choke chain and tether when he was discovered - we called him Buford.

Sadly, Buford had to go to the Humane Society until we discover if someone is looking for him and until Hubby could meet him and decide if he is possibly welcome into our home.  Part of me is hoping and another part of me is really trying not to to get my hopes up - mostly because he is a pitbull. 

I've done a lot of research on the breed today and most of what I've discovered is that if there is a lot of exercise, love and basically "a job" for the breed to do they don't turn like I've often heard people talk of the dogs doing.  You have to be very observant and keep the dog active and loved and disciplined.  The more I learn about the breeds of dogs the more I believe Cesar Millan has it correct - exercise, discipline, affection.  Give a dog a job, let him/her work, let the dog know who is boss without cruelty, and love the dog unflinchingly just as they do you, and everything falls into proper place for them as well as for you. 

At any rate, I've put my name on the call list just in case no one claims the fella after10 days.  Hubby can go meet him and check him out and see if he agrees on him and then we'll bring him home if all works out and I can start training him.  It was nice having three dogs again in the house.  Bu actually lowered his head to Gabby and let her sniff him and check him out without fuss.  I was quite proud of him.  Like I said - trying not to get too hopeful.  We'll see.

As for the knitting, well, I've gone through the knitting basket and moved a few things around and rolled up a couple of balls of yarn.  I should be spinning up the blue roving instead of blogging and preparing for knitting Christmas presents, but I am actually more interested in knitting up the neck pillow I've got in my head.

The first one is just going to be a simple straight felted tube.  It's going to be done out of wool, of course, felting requires wool, and it's going to be done out of purple yarn.  See it there?  It is very prominently seen in the basket.  It isn't balled yet because I haven't set myself down to doing that yet, mostly because I wanted to wait until Hubby got home and we kind of settled in for the evening and just hand a quiet few moments together before I dived into yarn and such.  The thought of knitting and making something for myself has made me smile some today, as well as a sweater for Hubby. 

I've decided on my own stitch pattern and a construction pattern out of a book I have.  Hopefully the two will mesh well.  Keeping track of stitch numbers, increases and decreases is going to be the hardest part for me.  I guess I could just go for a sweater pattern I have, but the sweater he wants I have misplaced the book, and I simply do not have the funds to replace the silly thing.  So, this means I do what I have decided and just go for broke with the yarn I have and let everything be as it should. 

If all goes well and this sweater turns out as it should - Cheyenne will end up with a sweater, too.  That will stop his bitching!  LOL!

Hope Awakens

There have been a few books between the last Patricia Briggs novel and this one.  There have been posts over at The News but no knitting.  Why?  Depression.  Serious depression and a loss of hope and the return of a fighting spirit and then...well, then came a different type of hope and finally the pain got better then worse then back and forth.  It's been an odd summer folks.

The long and the short of it is, over.  Yesterday my buddy moved my knitting basket, one of my knitting baskets I should correctly say, close to where I could get it and I picked up my drop spindle and spun a few inches and then I looked at the yarn that hadn't been touched in ages and my hands tingled.

They tingled and they twitched in that knitterly way, not in the pain way they've been doing for most of the summer.

There are tons of presents to knit for Christmas and promised thises and thats and I decided there are things I could actually make for myself that might actually benefit my neck and maybe help me sleep of a night much better than what I am doing now.  I could actually knit a nice felted pillow, fill it and make a couple of back-ups if needed and then make pillow slips for them and maybe that would help me support this neck of mine and then I could rest more peacefully and not have some of the pain and migraines I am currently undergoing.  PLUS I could also undergo some of the presents I need to make for Christmas before Christmas could even get close!

I kept looking at the basket and my heartbeat just eased up a little as if everything was slowly beginning to ease back into its place. 

Since I've never felted anything before but have always wanted to do so, and since I need to pick up the needles and start do my knitting again, everything is right about perfect to begin again.  It's wonderful, and I don't feel so lost any more somewhere inside.

Taking Up the Hubby's Challenge

Finished the previous book and have begun this one you see here.  I have completely fallen in love with the Mercy Thompson books!  I am caught up in the series and am seriously going to hate to see it end if it ever does.  Not thinking about this.  Not thinking about this.  NOT thinking about this.  LOL!

The pain is better in the left leg.  I believe it is due a lot of prayers by myself, friends, and family, qi gong, and the water exercises that were begun.  The water exercises seems to have helped my arthritic body more than they have helped the nerve pain, but I am taking the good in any form I can receive it these days.  The beautiful summer days are not hurting in the least of course.  Today it is just 84*F and not so humid with beautiful fluffy clouds floating blissfully in the most beautiful of blue skies.

A while ago the Hubby challenged me to knit a book in a year and make every single item in the book fit either me or him out of the yarn of choice of him or me.  Yeah, do you who knit see a problem there?  Well, in an argument that happened this weekend he called me a coward and said I didn't have the tits for the challenge and that I wasn't a true knitter.  So, now I ask you - How do you take a pattern that calls for two strands of fingering weight yarn and use worsted weight yarn because that's what the husband wants and make a sweater that fits?  He says its just numbers.  I'm not at all sure.  Anyone have any advice?

Hubby, Books, Knitting, and Friends Makes Me Happy

I am in a very strange place at the moment emotionally and physically: the pain is different and quite bad in the left leg these days.  Thankfully the A/C is fixed, thanks Rae, and the pain is better in spots.  So, I am knitting as it hits and I am reading.  Currently I am reading the book you see here and working on dishcloths because I need some in order to get the work around the house out of the way when I feel like doing any work at all that is - I am just taking one day at a time and being as positive as I can.

Sunday was mine and Hubby's 12 year wedding anniversary.  It was a sad one in some ways because I had  a migraine and so we celebrated it more on Memorial Day, which was yesterday, Monday, than on Sunday.  We went to dinner with some friends and a movie.  We saw Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time and, to be honest, we really should have waited until it was out on Netflix or something.  It needed something, like real Persians/Arab actors for instance, and real stunts, not CG.  I won't get into too much detail for those of you who haven't seen it - let it suffice to say I was disappointed.

Still, Hubby and I were together, and that's all that mattered.  We have been together through the good and the bad, and that, I know, is all that really matters.

I love you my darling.