Sugar Bunny Boulevard

Some Happy Things

In no particular order.... Some Happy Things

My first and only large sunflower has finally begun to blossom and it's not just plain yellow.  The other sunflowers that I planted were quickly eaten by someone who thought it was a delicious snack.  This one is actually a rescued sunflower that was somehow broken on the stem during its first week of life.  Bamboo skewers work miracles in so many ways.

We are having tacos tonight by Emeline's request.  I hope I don't gain four pounds in one day.  If I do I probably will not tell you.  :)

There are less than 6000 people ahead of me in line for Ravelry.  By the time they get to me it'll probably be up and running for EVERYBODY.  I guess it's okay if I'm not one of the cool kids right now.  I'll get in there eventually.

The afghan mail has slowed down and I am beginning to develop and confirm plans for the seaming party.  Food.  Setting up tables and chairs.  Recruiting seamers.  I talked to the newspaper and they'll have it on the community calendar plus adding it to the front page in a small section about upcoming special events other than club meetings, etc.  I also talked to the guy with the City of El Dorado who does the PowerPoint presentation for our "City Channel" on cable which tells about upcoming events and information about community activities.  I think he's also including pictures (of squares).  Tomorrow I'll be doing an announcement about the seaming party at church with a lady that is also a knitter and church member.  I'm a little nervous about it but it'll be fun.  I'm going to put together a PowerPoint presentation with Benny on his laptop (handy!) that we can play during the announcement, showing pictures of squares.

Sockapalooza Sock #2 is in the final few inches of the foot and the toe will be a quickie once I get near the end.  You know how you suddenly get a rocket booster and can knit faster than ever when the end of a project is in sight.

The high temperature has been 90 or less for the past two days and it's even a little rainy here today.  What a relief.

I have begun to know enough knitters in El Dorado that I'm thinking about starting a knitting group and meeting at a restaurant or coffee shop here in town once a week.  I'm so excited about this but I really can't get started with it until probably October so I'm trying to have self control and not get ahead of myself with it.  I'm thinking about Tuesday nights but that's been one of my nights that I've been scheduling knitting classes soooo.... I don't know.  Why can't there be more than one Tuesday per week??

Brenda Dayne of Cast-On fame has begun her summer series with a "Camp" theme.  She's very inspired by her memories of Campfire Girls as a child and is taking the theme in that direction with ways to earn badges and honor beads for various activities.  The first bead to be earned is the orange bead for Home Craft.  She has shown the list of ways a Campfire Girl could earn the Home Craft bead.  I read over the very long list thinking of what a challenge some of the items would be - specifically regarding keeping house, grocery shopping for a week on less than $3 per person (not in this generation obviously), meal planning, cleaning floors, doing the laundry, etc and knew I'd be a horrible failure at keeping those things done for a long period of time (two months is a long time for me to mop the kitchen floor once a week y'all, I'm sorry).  The very last item, however, is #86: Make a set of practical play things for a child three years old.  Cool!  I have a 3yo and I've been thinking about this quite a lot lately.  So that will be my personal challenge for the Home Craft honor bead.  Even though I haven't listened to the podcast related to this challenge yet (can't wait for tonight with Brenda and my sock knitting in a comfy chair - YES!).... I'm sure that she isn't suggesting that you must do one of the items on the list.  She wants people to think outside the box and add a knitting or fiber slant to these things and make it your own.  I'm looking forward to the rest of the series.  It's what this picture was about... a list I wrote while listening to her podcast telling about the Camp theme.

I'll be washing and sorting squares soon.  I've wavered back and forth a million times about whether or not I would actually do a full immersion of 4000+ afghan squares and expect to dry them somehow.  I have finally concluded that I will be doing this and believe that actual washing with soap/detergent is not necessary but full water immersion will be the best most time effective way to do the task because I know a lot of these haven't been washed and will shrink a little or relax a little with washing depending on the fiber.  I'm going to soak squares in the bath tub and then spin the water out in my washing machine.  The squares will be dried and gently blocked on bedsheets and long pieces of fabric yardage (fabric stash is a very helpful thing) out in the yard and probably up and down the sidewalk outside on a hot sunny day. (Expect pictures!)  Finding a hot sunny day will be the easy part.  Finishing Wanting to finish the task.  Eh hem.  That will be the hard part.  I think about the Campfire Wish of "learn to finish what I begin" often as the afghan project progresses, but also as I work on the smaller projects in my life and I see myself analyzing my projects goals and activities with this in mind.

Kelly will be here soon - next Wednesday!  I wonder how she feels about helping with this washing and sorting?  :)

If you've been one of our many devoted afghan square knitters I hope that you're breathing a sigh of relief that you're finished with afghan squares and have begun knitting something for yourself.  I just got a few skeins of KnitPicks CotLin in the mail and look forward to seeing how it works up to make hand towels.  Doesn't that sound really nice?  Maybe I'll even finish them.

If you have squares made and haven't mailed them yet - it is NOT TOO LATE to mail them.  They aren't "late".  It will take a while to get these squares sorted so please do send your squares for inclusion in the project.  We'll be very happy and grateful to receive them. 

Have a wonderful weekend and take good care of every little thing.  XOXOXOXOX

More Life Candy Friday

My friend Marisol gave me a "bonsai pine" growing kit in a recent swap.  The kit comes with about ten seeds but I only planted two, not knowing how they might grow in the conditions I was starting with.  So after several weeks of waiting, one seed came up.  What a surprise!  I'm a very impatient gardener so anything that takes more than about two days to come up makes me think I'm a complete failure.  ha

So this pine seed came up and it still had the little seed hull stuck on it.  It's hard to resist the urge to pick that thing off but I left it alone.  And left it.  And left it.  And left it.  The thing took about four or five days to fall off!! 

The entire time I was thinking "I will not be there whenever this thing falls away."  So I watched it.  And took pictures.  And went about my daily life which involves... you know - everything in life.  Including parenting.  This seed hull made me think so much of parenting.  The kid is trying so hard to stretch away from you and you're trying so hard to keep them from growing too fast.  But you can't stop them.  And finally one day.... you have to let go.

Yesterday I knew the moment was near.  The seed hull would fall away some time when I wasn't there.  Then - late last night as I was cleaning up the kitchen and getting ready for bed - I saw that just part of the pine needles had come free.  I took a picture.  Surely the hull would fall off during the night.

Five minutes later as I finished up at the sink, I glanced up just as I saw the seed hull fall down to the dirt. 

Wow. 

I could not believe I was there.  What an awesome moment to witness in life and nature.

And I thought, Oh wow.  I hope that I am there and know the moment when my children break free from me rather than being too busy with my own life to notice.

The only problem with this picture is that now I cannot find the seed hull.  And I wonder if parenthood will leave me empty and I'll disappear into the soil once I'm through parenting.  I'll work on a happy illustration for that one, okay?  hehe  Isn't there a story where two seed hulls live happily ever after in their rocking chairs while the pine cone grandchildren come visit or something like that??  :)

Happy Friday!  Happy Weekend!  I'm BUSY with some things but I AM keeping up with the afghan mail.... I just need to do an update.  Hopefully I can get to that this afternoon - if not.... look for me on.... oh maybe Sunday? 

Take good care of every sweet little thing.  :)   XOXOXOX

Life In Pictures

My view of the table last night after opening Monday's mail.  The mail from six days prior is hiding behind that big double-stack!  Gotta have the cordless phone, scissors, pen, paper, and Diet Coke.

The garden this morning.

Benny helping hold the entire triple-tower of squares that came over the past week - because it was falling down!  He had just come home from conditioning camp this morning so yes, his hair is wet.  You can see through the doorway into the den.... squares aren't quite taking over the entire house yet but they're about to explode out of the den!

 

Squares in the den.  Ten 20-gallon zip lock bags of squares plus boxes and bags full of afghans, hats, scarfs, cloths, seaming yarn, and all the special stuff y'all have been sending along!

And last but not least.... My Mitten Model.  Mitten made as a store sample for a class I'm teaching in September at Michaels about using DPNs.  I find it funny-strange (not really funny-funny but I do still have a little nervous giggle about it).... I find it funny-strange that I have planned and scheduled a class to make something I had never actually made before.  heh  This is my first mitten.  I'm pretty proud of it.  And Lila Pearl likes it.  :)

Does it count as a Finished Object if I never plan to make a matching one??  Hmmm.....

Yard Work

Oh my goodness gracious.  Where to begin?  It's been a long day y'all!

I have all kinds of random thoughts in my head though I'm pretending to be organized about it all and I don't know of a good way to glue it all together into something sensible.

First, wow.  I got quite a few private emails and detailed comments about people's weight loss efforts and how they were inspired by me and that I shouldn't give up!!  Well!  Okay then!  heh  I wasn't giving up in the first place.  Just taking a moment for a bit of self-analysis.  One lady wrote and said that she was so inspired by me and my "coming out" about my weight, etc etc, that she started a diet and exercise routine at the same time I started the WLC and she has lost 25 POUNDS!!  Yes.  25.  In the time I lost 2.  Congratulations to EVERYONE who has been inspired by the Weight Loss Challenge and who has made changes!  That's EXACTLY what I hoped would happen.  I didn't want a bunch of people all trying to do the same thing.  I want a bunch of people to do the best thing for THEM.  And they have.  And I'm working on it.  Thank you for all of your kind words and encouragement and suggestions.  Every word is taken to heart and appreciated.  I'm TRYING to keep emails and HOPE to reply but people - the emails are backing up.  And if I don't get a personal reply sent, please please forgive me.

The current phase of WLC for me is to get RID of the nasty ugly fat five pounds that I gained in the past two weeks.  Actually I've already lost 2.5 of them.  It's amazing what yard work will do for you.

I have been taking a few "before and after" pictures of a very challenging garden space in our yard.  It's very challenging because it is taking a LOT OF WORK to clean out the English ivy, weeds, tree pieces and various other undesirable mess that you don't want in a garden space.  And I'm tellin you that English ivy is a PEST.  I went out there today when the babies went down for their nap thinking I would work (pull weeds and cut ivy) for 15 minutes then clean up (bag up the weeds and ivy and mess) and eat lunch.

Yard work seems to go about like knitting with hand painted variegated yarn.  You can't wait to see what's around the next corner and the more you do the better it looks.  I ended up spending an HOUR pulling weeds and cutting ivy and digging up little tree bits and at least twenty minutes bagging up the mess.  I just could not stop myself.  The soil is GREAT.  So wormy and dark and falls apart easily and full of old leaf mulch.  Awesome.  JUST AWESOME.  It was actually easy to pull the weeds.  English ivy is never easy to get rid of and I'm sure I will be fighting it until the day I die because I'm never leaving this house.  Unless we move to a better house in town with no English ivy and someone else unpacks everything for me.  It'll never happen.  So I worked.  HARD.  And I'm only about 1/3 of the way done with the task of cleaning out the garden spot.

When I did that yard work I got quite a work-out.  Whew.  My. Legs. Are. Killing. Me.  Back.  Arms.  Hands.  Breathing.   I also got a lot of sun.  And I also did some good work in the yard.  I think that was an awesome way to spend the babies nap time.  Of course then I had to shower, get dressed, and eat lunch.... then go to church after the babies were up and dressed.

All that means that I didn't open my afghan mail until after church tonight.  It's way too dark to take pictures now and there are some squares I JUST HAVE to show you.  And another fun surprise.... so I'll just say that we did receive 57 squares today!!  Pictures and names tomorrow - I promise!  That means we have received 881 squares and still need 239 to meet the minimum goal!!  Yay!!  Keep on sending those squares!! 

We're going to blast past the goal I set and really, I'm done setting goals because I don't want to limit ourselves to a certain number!  Please - if you are just learning about this project - PLEASE do knit squares!!  We want to make as many afghans as possible for Greensburg families.  There are a LOT of families wanting to rebuild in Greensburg and our minimum goal was only for 20 afghans.  We would be overjoyed to be able to send many more than twenty afghans to Greensburg families.

I am encouraging people to knit as many squares as they would like until August 1st.  At that point, finish up what's on your needles and get them in the mail by August 10th.  Starting August 15th I will begin sorting squares by size and putting afghan packets together for the Seam Teams!  We are having a Seaming Party on Saturday, September 15, 2007 from 10am to 4pm at El Dorado First Baptist Church.  I hope that the advance notice of this date and the hours will permit people to drive in from surrounding areas (I know there's a group coming from Kansas City!!) and still get home that evening.  My plan is for lunch to be provided.  Dunno the details on that yet but if you come we will feed you!  We're looking forward to having a LOT of afghans to seam up that day!  If you are planning to come please do email me.  I know a few have already mentioned it but I hadn't started a list of names and emails until now.

I'll be back Thursday with a FULL Square Report, pictures, and a surprise that came in today's afghan mail!  :)

It's Wednesday!

Hi everybody!  It's Wednesday and I'm feeling a little random - I have several things to mention that are completely unrelated and no clever segue in mind to bind them together so here we go in no particular order.....

Our finches are sitting on four more eggs!  Who knew they would have a 2nd batch?  Who?  I want a living plant up there but I do still like to see the birds.  :)

I took the babies in our awesome stroller (I really heart this stroller y'all) for a walk up to the church to see if we got any afghan mail.  Yes!  One new square added today from Sonya in Ozawkie, Kansas!  Thank you Sonya!  And look at this darling hand made card she sent.  It's a little picture cut from some fabric then somehow she glued it to the card paper.  It's really cute and a neat idea with the right picture!

I got a phone call from Ray Whiting of Knitivity in Houston, TX a few days ago.  Ray is a Hurricane Katrina survivor who has relocated to Houston and started a yarn dyeing company!  Ray organized the Bundle Up New Orleans afghan project and had already started checking around to see what he could do to help the people of Greensburg when he was given the information about the Rebuilding Greensburg - Block by Block project.  Ray is offering special sock yarn at a discount for anyone who would like to knit socks for people in Greensburg.  Ray has "been there" with his Katrina experience and knows that once winter hits these people still won't have a lot.  Please check out Ray's AWESOME yarn dyeing and wide selection of fiber types.  Anyone knitting socks, mittens, or whatever else for Greensburg residents can still send them to my attention at the El Dorado First Baptist Church and we will be sure that they are taken to Greensburg where they can be given to families who need them.

If you would like to read a little more about Abbie and her three raccoons Twister, Dorothy, and Toto - check out yesterday's article in the Wichita Eagle!

The flowers I planted on Sunday were inspired by the Mothers Day gift that Emeline brought me from her Bible class at church that morning.  It was a little pot of pretty pink impatiens.  Anyone who knows about impatiens knows that they are definitely a shade plant.  I have never been able to grow them well before because I didn't have a shady enough place to put them.  Not any more - I have the perfect place for them - no sun.  Virtually EVER!  In a flower bed at the foot of a nice little maple tree outside the dining room window.  So we went and got four more and planted them Sunday.  I hope they do well because they sure are pretty right now.  :)

My sage is blooming:

And so are the dianthus.  Nothing really special but it's so cheery to have them.  :)

OH!  I nearly forgot - I have a new FAQ!!  I have wondered this myself when knitting for other afghan projects.  Now that I'm doing it myself I don't have to think twice about the answer.

Should I weave in my yarn tails on the squares?
Definitely YES please!  That way the squares will be ready for seaming when they arrive!  :)

Everybody have a cheery day!!

Getting Ready

So here we are.  Friday before a 4-day holiday weekend.  Emeline has had a night time fever of 101.5 axillary* the past two nights and woke up with 99.1 in the ear this morning.  Experience tells me "possible ear infection".  Doctor's office won't call me back to let me know if they think it's important to see us today.  Nice.  Do you think by the fourth child maybe I actually know what I'm doing and can troubleshoot fevers?  I don't just jump on the "emergency room for a fever" bandwagon.  I will be having a serious discussion with this doctor if they don't see Emeline today.  Doctor's office just called - they'll see Emeline at 3:45 today.

*Axillary temperature (under the arm) is typically .5 to 1 degree lower than oral temperature.

No progress photo to show of Calliope because... well, she looks the same.  Oh, I guess I do have a photo.  This is when I was holding Calliope up to my favorite tank top to see how it compares in size.  I'm VERY glad I decided to do the next bigger size.  The pattern isn't generous with measurements but I have read enough of the pattern to see that the armhole shaping begins a little lower than it does on this red tank top but the overall length from the shoulder seam to lower edge is very near to the same as this tank top.

Here's the Calliope pattern photo.  I've decided I don't want the back neck area to come up so far.  After looking at this picture over and over I've decided I don't want the back neck shaping to be up so high - I want it to be lower like the tank top in the above photo.  The front is knit to exactly the same dimensions as the back (possibly with different arm hole shaping which I will check) so I will duplicate the front neck shaping but start a little higher in the back.  This will save me a little yarn and I think I will like the look and feel a lot better thah having the high back neck on Calliope.  Wish me luck on this part - I'll be starting it very soon.  I've finished the 9th pattern repeat on the body part so I only have 12 more rows before I start the armhole shaping which should happen later today I hope.

I think the pattern example is knit in a much smaller size than what I'm making.  *sigh*  One day maybe.

My progress at Curves wasn't bad this week when I weighed.  It wasn't great but there has been measureable change since I began.  It's just a very very very slow change.  I have lost a total of 6.5 inches and overall total of 1 pound, which doesn't tell the whole story.  When I went for my 1-month weigh-in I was 5 pounds heavier than when I started.  Does that explain why I waited so long to mention it on my blog? 

So speaking of weight loss, how about that ice cream?  I took a few photos of the making process and then my camera decided it was through for the day and we couldn't take any more.  Here's what we got:

We got this great ice cream maker at a flea market for $10.  I couldn't resist after searching on ebay for several years for a bargain and couldn't bear to pay the shipping cost it would take!!  All of the internal parts are perfect and it works very well if you have a strong arm or two.  :)

The ice cream was SOOOOO GOOOD.  Sorry no photos of the finished product.  Maybe next time.  This batch was vanilla.  I like to use the Junket mix we find at the grocery store.  With all the cranking I don't feel too guilty about using a mix instead of making it from scratch.

This morning I was finally able to get a picture of an eggplant flower from my little garden.  I've been waiting a few days for it to finally open.  I've grown a different variety of eggplant before which had small flowers that looked white though maybe they were a very pale lavender (or orchid in my mind) - these are a larger size and are definitely a pretty violet color.  And they point DOWN!  How do you take a picture of a flower that's pointing down?  It's not easy, I promise.

So, like the title of this post says, we're getting ready.  Getting ready for a long holiday weekend.  Getting ready for the kids to have their dad come visit for the first of two visits he has planned while they're with us for these short six weeks during the summer.  And getting ready for our attorney to draft the motion that gets this court thing going.  We're bracing for the day my X is served with the motion - hopefully by the end of next week when he has returned to Texas from his trip to Kansas.  Suzannah will be back here and won't have to deal with the initial heat from their anger and upset over getting served.  It's a scary nervous time for us.  The money for an attorney has come together though nothing less than a miracle, I'm sure.  On a related note, everything has been flying off the shelves of my etsy shop - time to dye more yarn for sure!!  Thank you to everyone that has been buying my yarn and stitch markers.  We appreciate it so much.

Have a wonderful and fun safe Fourth of July holiday weekend everybody!!  I might not post again until Wednesday or Thursday next week - let's hope for plenty of knitting progress and maybe a little 4th of July fun. 

Here are a few 4th of July photos from years past.  The first three pictures are from the 4th of July parade in Valley Mills, Texas in 1991 2001 (GAH!  No, the kids aren't that old now).  The kids were so little and my camera was so bad.  Suzannah's birthday is July 9 8th (what kind of mother AM I??) so two years ago we celebrated her 8th birthday on the 4th of July when my sister was visiting and Emeline was just a month old.