Fuzzy Love

Yikes

The wood for the floors is here, and there's loads of it. It smells good too. It has to sit for a week before the work can begin, but thankfully by then we'll be on vacation in Nova Scotia (for a few days) and Prince Edward Island (for a whole blissful week). So that means we have a bit of work to do a-sap and it's all making me a mite bit stressed.

Let's see what has to happen by Tuesday, shall we:

• clear out the entire main level of our house (kitchen cabinets excluded, thank todd) and also enough space in our garage for movers to stack all the big furniture on Tuesday morning
• pack up two adults and two kids for a ten-day trip out of country (and presumably the clothes we pack should be clean)
• take a uncooperative cat to the vet since he has to be kenneled and it turns out he's now open for rabies
• nurse a small boy who is mysteriously sick with some sort of virus (?) that gives him a fever and causes him to vomit every few hours (poor sweetie)
• stay up at night worrying that Olivia will catch said sickness and a) cause us to stay home b) throw up on the plane making us wish we had stayed home, or c) have a swine-flu-like fever at the Canadian border causing us to be sent back home
• track down a specific rare brand and shade of ballet tights (the wrong kind would ruin everything) to replace the ripped ones Olivia is supposed to wear in her three onstage minutes of a 2.5 hour dance recital on Sunday Yay! Jenn has a spare pair!! (Still must glue-gun the other parts of her costume that are coming loose)
• return library books because they're about to come after me (again)
• celebrate Father's Day in there somewhere.

Oy. My head hurts just thinking about it.

Toes

Since I've never done a toe-up sock before, I am really impressed with the following little piece of knitting:

It's the start of the Lace and Cable Socks (Ravel it) in Wendy Johnson's new book.* Just the very start; I've only just got to the part where I begin the stitch pattern, but I feel accomplished enough with just the toe. It's like all the hard work is out of the way already.

I used Judy's Magic Cast-On and many thanks to Jody-with-a-y, by the way, for pointing out the Knitty tutorial. The cast on is really very simple even with DPNs, but I found the Knitty article much clearer than the one in the book (even with fewer pictures). Once I read that, and after a first try during which I strangled the hell out of the yarn, and with a little bit of trouble keeping the computer screen from timing out as I worked (with no hands to spare), and with a few dodges of some rogue needles (some coordination is involved, unfortunately) everything went very smoothly. After I find some stitch markers (where do those things go?) I can knit on.

And Livvy has some new toes too. Blue-ty Call anyone? She dug through what I had and rejected them all as being too pink. (My three-year old is hipper than I am.) I got me some new polish too--in pink, of course--that's perfect for the stylin' Canuck. Nice Color, Eh?

*Some of the pictures in the book are cracking me up. Brush off your Russian accent and say with me, "I am sock model."

Love When a Plan Comes Together

I just got to be part of a big surprise. My friend Kelly (in the black shirt) turned 35 on Friday. Her husband had the fabulous idea that other friend Jenn (on the left) and I should fly in to her town of Seattle(ish) and surprise her and celebrate with her local friends (represented on the right). So we flew in on Saturday morning--just to be extra tricky--and snuck up on her in Subway, of all places. Surprised the pants off of her, I'd say. Now how fun is that, to be a big surprise for a great friend?

In the interest of full confession, a whole night of drinking and dancing has a bigger impact on me than it used to. Two days later and I still could use a nap and a glass of water.

Big Plans

Hmmm. Now that I look again it's not so exciting when it all looks just....beige. In my defense, that wall is in the front entry of our house, which means that it continues up the stairs and all over and can basically be seen from every room. Those pillows sit on our family room sofa and so I thought the lovely camel on the stripy pillow might do the trick, but now I'm torn with a desire to add more color (egged on by Liam: "Let's paint it every color of the rainbow! Except for pink.") tempered by a basic need for calm. So I swatch and stare.

But that's not all. We're going to have hardwood installed on most of the main level. That has always been a little dream of ours; we love the look and our lifestyle is not really compatible with carpet anyway. (Seriously - why is carpet in almost every house?) So now we're jumping in and actually doing it. Well, technically WE aren't doing any of it, except the part where we pack up an entire floor of our house and move it to the garage. But the funny thing about getting wood floors is that you need soft things to put on top of them. Which leads me to...

floor pillows!! Who doesn't love a floor pillow? I've had the Amy Butler sewing book for a long time now, but have never made anything out of it. The fabric (in a thrilling brown) is actually a set of cheep-o curtains that hung in our old living room. But they're 100% cotton and, of course, free, so I figure they're perfect for repurposing, even if I'd really like something more colorful.

But I do have some color in my house, really. See?

See the red, back there, behind the panda?* In the midst of all that colorful cream?

No wonder my knitting is getting brighter - I do love me some Spring Tickle. (Now that sounds like something more exciting than yarn, doesn't it?).

Any minute now, as soon as I finish the clapotis for me that's on my lap (Ravel it), I'm casting on for some more socks. A brave and completely non-knitting friend took a shot in the dark and sent me Wendy Johnson's sock book for my birthday - that was a pleasant surprise, let me tell you. There are a few patterns in there that call for DIC Smooshy, one of which is my favorite in the book, so hopefully I'm going to cast on for the Lace and Cable socks before the day is out. The only thing is that I've never done toe-up socks before, her directions are all for two circulars, and I'm firmly a DPN girl. Hopefully I'll be able to muddle through.

Well, I hope you all have sunny and relaxing weekends. I need to get packing.

*The panda, who we affectionately call Big Fat Panda, was a gift from my brother who knows that kids long for giant stuffed animals but that their parents will never ever buy them.

I'm not quite sure what Livvy is up to there.

Sheesh

It's been a while AGAIN. I'm sorry, I really am, but there's just so much to be doing this time of year. It's Colorado's best time, actually. Our Spring is like a New England summer: warm and breezy, with a touch of rain, and everything is green and beautiful (unlike August, when a dry brownness sets in). I can't get enough. Plus Liam and I both had birthdays, he graduated from kindergarten (sniff) and we're into baseball season and gardening...

The blog suffers.

At least I've been productive and that means I do have some projects to show.

A nightgown for Olivia.* The fabric is Heather Ross's "Underwater Sisters," which Olivia and I both loved, so I bought a bunch thinking of....well, nothing in particular, really. But it turns out the Natural colorway is really sort of see-through, rendering it most useful for sleepwear. Since Olivia is a princess and princesses only wear dresses (didja know?) I picked out a nightgown that said easy--Simplicity 9292--and here we are. I am learning so much with each project that I usually want to make the same thing again right away, just to apply what I've learned. So different from knitting.

For the record, ruffles are a bitch.

But totally worth it.

The sock knitting is sticking too. Kudos to Cookie A, who I hear is coming to Colorado and I am seriously contemplating driving all the way to Boulder just to look at her.

This is Glynis, from her book. Beautiful pattern, but not the most fun to knit, what with the k3t bits and whatnot. So I have cast on for a second but my fingers need a rest.

But the sock thing is sticking.

* See the tag?! I've wanted those forever and finally got some. It makes things look so....professional (amazing the little mind games I can play on myself, isn't it?).