Christmas is upon us

Wow, a lot has been happening in my life this year.
I have been knitting a lot off and on. I have some projects on the needles for Christmas gifts, hoping to have them done in time. My knitting has slowed a lot since my Dad died in August. I am trying to get back to a daily habit of knitting but it just isn't happening some days. When I was staying with my Dad and taking him to appointments and such I took my knitting with me all the time and made great progress. It amazed him how much I could get done in a day. It was fun knowing he was keeping track of what I was doing. Then in August he was gone and my knitting stopped entirely. I didn't knit for weeks, I was just too busy and distracted to pick it up again. But eventually I did pick it up and started new projects. I am still really busy on weekends taking care of his estate and winding things up. It has been hard.

I love spinning as much as I do knitting. Maybe I should spin a while and it could help settle things down, but I say to myself wait till after Christmas knitting is taken care of. Spin after the first of the year. I thought about taking a spindle with me to Christmas Pageant practices, but they have changed the way we do that, there is not much sitting idle time anymore so I really would not get any spinning done, just for the first few minutes while we are waiting for everyone to show up and get started, so that did not happen this year.

Rickreall Christmas Pageant had it's 72nd run this year. It is over for this year, last night was the final show. When I moved back to this area I looked them up and joined the group again. I have been in this off and on over the years doing different parts and jobs. It is a community project and I got started in grade school, the 6 grade girls of Rickreall Elementary get to be the little angels in the Shepard scene. When I hit 6th grade I did not get to be one of the angels because I had pneumonia and the doctor did not want me exposed to the cold night air and possible wet feet, so I sat out. Then as the girls become seniors in high school they get to play the part of the water girl in the neighbor scene. Well my senior year came and there were more girls than nights of the pageant so my best friend and I sat out but in the Choir. Two years later my sister was a high school senior and there was just her and one other girl to play the water girl, trouble is the girls were also on the basketball team and there was one night that they could not be the water girl. I was volunteered for the part and got to do it two years late.  Then I was away from it for a few years, I got married and moved away. When we moved back my Mom, the pageant director, asked if I would be interested in helping put makeup on people, I said yes that sounds like fun, so I did that for a couple of years. Then more children came along and I was not free in the evenings to run out there and do makeup anymore, now 20 years later I live in Rickreall again and have joined the cast. It is fun and I recommend it to anyone, if there is a community Christmas activity in your area look into it I bet they need volunteers of some kind. It is a good way to connect or re-connect with your neighbors, friends and community. Enjoy yourself.

I like Ravelry.com

http://badges.ravelry.com/rectangle_32.png I am a member of an online group called Ravelry. It is all about knitting and spinning and crochet a little. There are thousands of people in the group that all love fiber related projects. I find it a great resource and compliment to my addiction to knitting and spinning. You will find patters galore and lots of them are free, my favorite kind. when you pick a pattern you will find pictures of other people's project made from that pattern and yarn suggestions and technique help and so many people to answer your questions. It is a wonderful place and.... the best thing is it is free. Go check it out and join.

OK, I may have some new people coming in to see my blog; so I thought I would share some photos of what I do. Such as spinning fiber into yarn with a spinning wheel. I also use drop spindles to make yarn.

I then knit the yarn I make or purchase into items for myself or family.

I have been known to crochet, but haven't done any lately. In this blog I also talk about fiber festivals and State and County fairs, and I also talk about my family. I am married for 37 years, I have 3 Kids and 4 Grand Kids. We currently have 2 roosters, some cats and a dog. We used to have sheep and chickens. I was raised on a Dairy Farm so having animals around is normal for me. Animals need care but they make great companions and are good listeners. 

Well if some one new does show up, Welcome, if not, that is a short summary of me.

Wow! I did not realize how long it has been since my last post. So many things have happened. The biggest change in my life is the death of my Dad on Aug 22nd. I have been caring for him since January, staying with him for a few weeks after he had heart surgery and then once he was able to live by himself again, I was his wheels and we had lots of Dr appts and trips to the pharmacy. My sisters took care of his grocery shopping and visiting him on Sundays, helping him with things around the house on weekends. So he has been having health problems but he was getting better. Then that Wednesday night one of the firemen called us to say Dad did not show up for the fire meeting and they wanted us to come to his house with a key so we could check on him. Well, he had fallen asleep in his chair watching his favorite western channel on the tv and never woke up. He is with Mom again and I am sure they are very happy to be back together. I miss them so much.

I did a lot of knitting while staying with my Dad both in and out of the hospital. I haven't been doing much knitting since Dad died but I am getting back into it. I need to finish my Bigger on the inside shawl, I only have 6 rows at most to finish the tardis bank and then will do the ribbing band and it will be done. I have started some of my Christmas knitting. An infinity scarf for an Aunt and I have plans to make new mittens for the Grand Babies, older grandson some fingerless gloves and older grand daughter maybe a new hat or fingerless gloves just so all the Grand kids get similar things.

The last time I did any spinning was in July for the Tour de Fleece. I made at least 3 different kinds of yarn. A merino/silk blend, one that is 100% silk and another that is romney and BFL blend. I entered the romney blend or a skein of it in the Polk County fair and got a blue ribbon on it.  I also entered a poncho for Lucy and a shawl for me in the fair and got red ribbons on them. I got a white ribbon on a pair of fingerless mitts I had knitted. If I had looked at them really well before I entered them I would not have entered them as the thumb gusset was kind of messed up a little. It still got third place though.

Things are still kind of weighting on me, but it is getting better. My sisters and I will get Dad's estate settled soon and then I will be moving into Dad's house. Moving is never fun, but this should be the last time ever or for a long time at least. So some time next year I may find my new normal. In the mean time knitting, spinning and family will keep me going.

Till next time, you all need to stay well.

Genealogy, TDF and knitting

http://gallery.mailchimp.com/6a13a38a955e01499f3215f48/images/TrophyBadgeNEW_en.png" width="200px" alt=""/ I am one of the volunteers who are indexing the 1940 census records into a database at www.FamilySearch.org. We reached the half way point last week and they set a goal to see if we could do 5000 records in 24 hours. Well when you challenge a group of volunteers ...the game is on. We entered and verified over 10,000 records in 24 hours. So above is my trophy for participating in this event. I only did 100 records in the 24 hours, but I did help. There are lots of other records to enter into the databases, so if anyone has any desire to help it's never too late to join. In case you don't know what the databases are for, it is so people can research on their family history. I use the site myself for family research and need to get on there and search again, new information is being added daily so if you don't find someone today, try again in a month or so. Tour De Fleece is started, so far I have finished spinning some merino/silk roving I bought a year or two ago so I will soon be able to knit a shawl with it. It is on my to do list of knitting. :) Next I have started spinning silk hankies on my wheel. It is an adventure, fun and interesting I am getting it thicker in most places than what I spun on my spindle. I have another hankie to spin when this one is finished and then I want to ply the three of them together. I will still end up with lace to light fingering weight yarn and the yardage of the finished product will determine what I knit with it. If the TDF is still going when I finish that I have some natural grey roving to work on, I have about 9 oz of that so should be a shawls worth out of it. On my needles, I finished Lucy's poncho and need to get back to Bigger on the Inside shawl. It is my KAL for July with Salem Area Ravelers as a Dr Who project. I am over half done with the knitting of it but this stage is slower as it rows are over 300 stitches long. Well thats all the news here, take care and enjoy this picture of Lucy's poncho on my stuffed penguin.

Well, this is the weekend of Black Sheep Gathering in Eugene, Oregon. I have been attending this wool festival for 5 or 6 years, I think. It was the first wool festival I ever attended. I did not get to go this year, I was planning to and even signed up to play "Black Sheep Bingo". Black Sheep Bingo is a bingo game you sign up for ahead of time and let the organizers know if you want to be a player, a square or both. The last two years I signed up to be both. You are emailed a button and a square to print your self and take with you to play the game. The button is customizable in that you can add your "Ravatar" and Ravelry name to the button and then wear it to help people find you if you are a square or just to identify you to other Ravelry members. The game is played by keeping your eyes open while strolling around BSG for the people or booths on your playing card. When you find someone on your card they will either initial it or put a sticker on their square. It is not important to make bingo, the point is to meet other Ravelry members and if they have a booth check out the booth of a Ravelry member. Any prizes are donated by members of Black Sheep Bingo or people who just want to sponsor the event and get their product out there. The prizes are given out at a meet up the afternoon of Saturday by random drawing. This year I found out I would not be going to BSG and I wondered if I was supposed to let them know that I would not be participating in bingo after all. But they had already sent out the cards so it was too late to make changes. I just sat back and let it happen, as my son would say. I was actually at a family picnic with out of town family members while the bingo meet up and drawing was going on. After I got home from the picnic my cell phone rang and it was my friend Helen who was calling from BSG. Seems I had won a prize at the bingo drawing and she had it in hand to bring to me. I am so grateful, to Helen for transporting the prize so I can receive it quickly and for winning a prize of spinning fiber even though I could not go in person.

On my needles, I have had start-itis. I have a coffee mug cozy about half done with leftover worsted weight yarn, I made a swatch for a mystery shawl KAL, don't know if this yarn will work for the shawl, well it would work not confidant I have enough yarn. I have the second sock on the needle for flip flop socks, which sound funny but I will like them if I can make one that fits well. I have let my Bigger on the inside Shawl KAL sit for a while, it is a Dr Who themed shawl that has a border of Tardis along the bottom. I am letting it sit because the KAL lasts all summer and in July my knitting group KAL is Dr Who themed, so I am far enough along that I think I can finish the BOTIS during July, killing two KALs with one bind off. :) One more project I have going is a poncho for my little grand daughter. I made a poncho in the spring for her twin brother and started the poncho for Lucy then let it sit. I looked at it the other day and the majority of it is done so I picked it up and got going on it again. It is made with bulky yarn in shades of pink and has a pocket on the front and a hood. This week I finished knitting the front piece and then sewed it to the back at the shoulders. I made the pocket and sewed it to the front panel. I then picked up stitches around the neck for the hood and knitted a few rows of the hood. I think I will take the poncho and mystery shawl project with me to a knitting meet up in Salem this afternoon. I want opinions about the yarn I have that might work for the mystery shawl. The mystery shawl is a pattern by Wendy D Johnson, a favorite blogger and pattern designer of mine. I used one of her patterns to make my first pair of socks. I have made two of her shawls and some day I want to own pattern books she has written. She is a member of Ravelry and has some free patterns that you can download from Ravelry.

Family stuff this time covers the picnic I went to yesterday so I could see my sister in law who now lives in England. It is always fun to visit with SIL and her DH, who is English. They always have good stories to tell, this year they are excited that the Olympics are in London and they will go to Olympic village to explore and take pictures when they get home. I am hoping they share a lot of the pictures, I have never seen anything Olympic other than what is on TV. We had our regular family gathering last weekend and I got to see all the grand kids. We were celebrating my oldest grand sons birthday, he is turning 16. I pooled $ with my Dad and we got Grandson a remote control airplane. He was excited to get it and put it together and took it outside to make it work. It took a few tries to get it to fly and I would not say there was much control. The first "good" flight took it to the house roof and the next "good" flight took it over the house around the back yard and into the cedar tree. Part of the problem was the wind was really blowing harder than it should have been for  the little plane. So we tried all we could from the ground, mostly we just looked at it and tried to use our Jedi force to bring it down. The wind would blow and we would all cheer for it to fall. After about the second hard gusts went through the plane finally fell to the ground and it was not damaged. It has been a week now and I have not heard any news about any more flights. I hope if he tried it again that he was successful.

No spinning to speak of this time, next weekend starts the Olympics and Ravelry's games that go with watching the Olympics. Then also in July, I think is Tour De France and Ravelry's Tour De Fleece. I will be spinning for the Tour De Fleece, I have a project on my wheel to finish and a couple of spindles have projects that need to finish. I hope to get as much done as I can as long as my arm holds out. I seem to be having tendon problems in my left arm, knitting bothers some, spinning can bother a lot, so I have to be careful and not overdo.

Well I think that is enough chatting for now. Till next time, take care and enjoy your summer.

What have I been up to?

<img src="http://fch.ldschurch.org/fsinformation/images/50percent.jpg" alt="I helped index the first half of the 1940 US census">
I don't remember if I have mentioned this, but I have been volunteering as an Indexer for www.familysearch.com. What the heck does that mean? Well Family Search is a genealogy site hosted by the LDS Church for people to do research on family trees. Indexing means you download images of historical documents, such as census records, military draft cards, marriage, death or birth records and then you type what you see into an online form. What you type is verified by another volunteer and then the data is posted in searchable databases where people can research their families. I have been working on my own genealogy off and on for years and to be a volunteer putting more information out there so everyone can use it is a real honor to me. I know that I have been frustrated that my ancestors have been hard to find, come to find out not everything is online as yet. So I can't wait to do more research and see if the info I need is out there yet. I mean out there as online, I could go to an LDS church that has a family research library and look up info on micro film, which is fun to do as well. But it saves gas and is easier if I can do the research here at home. Genealogy, it's fun and you can share it with family, try it.


Well onto knitting and spinning. I have been working on spinning some merino that I purchased as a braid at Oregon Flock and Fiber Festival, one of my favorite wool festivals around. I purchased the wool probably 3 years ago and started spinning this on my Jenkins Turkish spindle last year some time. It is a great shade of blue and will make something soft and wonderful. It has been a little of a challenge to spin as sometimes it wants to fall apart instead of spin and so my drop spindle drops. So far no damage to the spindle. I am down to the last bit of spinning singles and then plan to ply it on my wheel. The plying will go much faster on the wheel than a spindle. I know this from experience, as I spun 8 ounces of wool and plied it with spindles and it took years. I finally have that yarn done and am currently knitting it into a shawl which I will talk about in a minute. To enhance my spinning pleasure; Tour De Fleece is coming up, I think it is in July. Tour de Fleece takes place during the Tour de France, it is supported on www.Ravelry.com where people form teams and goals and you spin on days the cyclists are "spinning" and you rest when they are resting. Its a fun thing to do and a good way to get some spinning done that you have been putting off. I need to finish making the yarn for my Multnomah shawl and I have a bag of natural colored light grey wool to spin as well. If I am really ambitious I will tackle the rest of the alpaca wool I have as well. Will have to see what the "old" tendons will allow. 


Wait I should look up Tour De Fleece and see for sure when it starts, because it dawns on me that July is when the Olympics start and Ravelympics runs with that. Ravelympics is Ravelry's fiber related version of the Olympics, once again Ravelrs form teams and compete in "competitions" or personal or group goals and there are events to enter that have names similar to Olympic events. You set a goal of a project that you want to complete within the time constraints of the Olympics, some people actually work their project while watching the Olympics. I did this last the Olympics were going and it was fun.


On my needles is still the "Bigger on the Inside" shawl, I got distracted by some small and fast projects, which I believe I spoke about last time. Knitted rose and rose pen. I am working on another rose pen and have started working on hats for Preemie babies and chemo patients. This is a project our Knitting group takes up periodically. I am also working on a knitted hand grenade as I think it would be funny to see my cats running around the house with a grenade in their mouths or batting it around and throwing it up into the air. I plan to put catnip in the handle to make sure they pick it up. :)


I am back to only seeing my Grand Kids once a month. This really sucks as I miss them terribly. The older two used to play Facebook games with me on the computer but seem to have lost interest in the games and they rarely post. I wonder if this is because they are too busy doing something else or if their grades are not good and they are banned from the computer/internet so they can do homework. Sigh, I miss them and look forward to their moving back to this area. The people who regulate the price of fuel should be made to live like the majority of people who have to buy the gas and then maybe they would have a heart instead of super greed.


Well, till next time, you all take care and stay safe.

The beginning of Summer and Festival Season

Well what do you know; it's Memorial Day Weekend, the unofficial beginning of summer. My weekend has been uneventful, I am happy to say. We are at home, not fighting traffic or trying to find a leftover camping spot. I love camping and this used to be our first campout of  every year. Gas is just too expensive to use on fun anymore. If I  could have gone camping this weekend or any weekend this summer I would take my knitting with me and possibly a spindle and some wool to go with it. Sitting near a body of water surrounded by trees in the fresh air with my knitting and spinning and my family really sounds like fun to me.

What is on my needles these days? I am involved in a knit along, a bunch of us are making the "Bigger on the Inside" shawl. It is based on the PBS show "Dr Who". It's a nice little shawl with lace at the neck edge and half way down starts a border that includes a row of "Tardis". This is a blue phone booth looking building from Dr Who. Since I have never seen the Tardis on the show, I can only tell you that I have heard this Tardis looks like a phone box on the outside, but inside is Dr Who's time and space travel vehicle and laboratory. Thus even though it is small on the outside it is bigger on the inside. Needless to say it looks like a cute shawl and is a size and shape that I like. I have the lace section done and am slowly working on the Tardis border. The transition from lace to border on mine will be different than anyone else's as I did not notice right away that it should be purled on the right side, so mine has a few rows of stockinette stitch and switches to purls near the peak of the Tardis roof. I will also be able to tell mine from anyone else's because I spun this yarn myself and it is Teal instead of Tardis Blue.

Also on my needles is a hooded poncho for my Grand Daughter Lucy. I made one for my Grand Son Frankie last month so I just had to make one for his twin. I have it over half done but have stalled on it for a while as I have been distracted by the KAL and some small fast projects that sneaked in as well. I found a cool pattern on Ravelry.com for a rose bud that I think turned out nice, so much so that I took the idea and using I-cord I knitted a stem that fit over a Bic pen and constructed a rose on the end of it. I now have a rose pen. The I-cord cover on the pen makes it just a little fatter and squishy making it more comfortable to write with. I would make more of these, I really like the way it turned out. It still needs some leaves but I have used it a little and like it.

My spinning wheel has been parked for a few months, my excuse is that our cat had kittens and I did not want to injure a kitten that might try to climb into the spinning wheel, then my Dad had heart Surgery in January and I have been spending a lot of time at his house. Dad is on his own most of the time once again and the kittens are 9 months old now, so I suppose it could be safe to get the wheel out again, I do miss it. What little spinning I needed to do so that certain projects could progress I did on a spindle. On another spindle I have silk that needs to be worked on again. One silk hankie is almost spun up and I have two more that I want to spin and then ply all three together. They are shades of teal, yellow and green and since it is silk they are shinny. I suppose I will make some type of scarf from the silk as I don't think there will be enough for a small shawl. I was told on the day we dyed the silk that there should be enough to make mittens, so maybe I will make mittens or finger-less mitts which I dearly love.

I have been to a couple of wool festivals in the last few weeks, the first was at Willamette Heritage Center in Salem, Or and it is called Sheep to Shawl. I love this little festival in down town Salem for it's uncrowded outdoor atmosphere. At this annual festival you will see all kinds of fiber animals in person and you will see some of them sheared. For the first time this year I witnessed two alpacas being sheared, to this date I had only seen sheep being sheared. You will also see people spinning, knitting and weaving with natural fibers. There are always a few fiber vendors and jewelry vendors as well as the usual shops in the Mission Mill Museum building. There is a nice cafe on the grounds and live music. A wonderful festival.

The next week I attended the Linn County Lamb and Wool festival in Scio,OR. The little town has a big parade and sets up a fairgrounds with games and vendors all over town. There is a quilt show and lamb and goat show and a hall that was full of yarn and fibery goodness. There was a spinners circle outside the hall with several ladies with spinning wheels and spindles showing how it is done. The town is small so it is nice exercise to walk from one end to the other in order to see everything. One of the highlights was the book sale at the library. We got in on the last hour of the sale, where they sell you a paper bag for $2 and you can put as many books as you can fit into the bag. I bought a bag and Sean's girlfriend, Megan, each purchased a bag and between the 3 of us we filled both bags. A few of the books I found were for my Grand kids, even 3 books for the babies. A good time was had by all. Look for this festival every year.

Well that's all I have to say for now, I will attach pictures of the flowers I have knitted. Until next time....

Irregular blog

Google+:Well, it's been a while again since I was on the blog. My life is full and not always in a happy way. My Dad had heart surgery the end of January and has been having a hard time getting well. He has been in and out of the hospital a LOT. My sister stayed with him 24/7 the first two weeks he was home then she had to go back to work. I took over the 24/7 spot for 2 or three weeks and now I am there 24/7 half the week and my daughter is there the other half. Dad is finally showing improvement and I can now see that he will be strong enough to be on his own again...someday.

Despite the scary moments I have had at Dad's a good thing that has come from me spending so much time over there (away from internet) is the amount of knitting I am doing. I started out taking unfinished objects with me and have finished a few old projects that have been laying around. I started and finished toddler size socks, two pair for the grand twins. I have finished a couple of shawls and started another one. I finished a pair of anklets for myself and started another pair. This is helping me keep up with a KAL with my main group on Ravelry.com.  Bouncing back and forth from Dad's, to hospital and home has kept me from relaxing with my knitting group at The Ike Box in Salem. I miss the group, but just don't have the energy to go visit, even though I know it would do me some good to get out and do something different.

Things will settle down one of these days and then I will find a new normal and a new routine. There is always hope, there has to be hope.

Till next time, stay well.

Some of the projects I have finished while knitting at my Dad's.

LaVelle

'via Blog this'

Let's Try this again

Well I have been remiss in my blogging. Life takes a turn and next thing you know...
In my life my Dad has become the center. He had heart surgery in January and that has been the main focus of my time. We have been back and forth to the hospital so many times. After 5 weeks they finally figured out that his breathing problem was inflammation of the lungs caused by the heart surgery. They treated the inflammation and now he is on the road to recovery. He is still weak and someone needs to be there 24/7 but he is coming back to himself. My sister took time off work and spent the first two weeks he was home with him and she spent the week before that with him in the hospital, she has gone back to work so I spent the next 3 weeks with him. A lot of my first two weeks he was in the hospital so that is where I was. Now my daughter and I are taking turns staying at his house and it is nice to have help with that.

On one hand, I am taking UFOs with me to Dad's house and I am finishing a lot of knitting projects that have been on the back burner. I started a couple new projects as well, like a pair of toddler size socks and toddler size poncho. Currently I am knitting a cell phone scarf and will start a new pair of socks for me. When I see my oldest daughter this weekend I will have yarn to make another toddler poncho and possibly another pair of toddler socks. As my grand babies are twins, I make things in twos. :)

Because Dad has been recovering we have not had our usual family gatherings, so it has been TWO WHOLE months since I have seen any of my grand kids in person. My daughter keeps me up to date with pictures which I really appreciate, but seeing them in person is so much better.

I leave you with pictures of recent finished objects.