Momma's got a brand new... umm... log

Well, my friend Joy actually calls it a stick, but it's mine now so I can call it a log if I wanna!

So late last month the busiest quilter I know (I swear her middle name is Whoosh) had a giveaway for her stop on a blog hop.

Since the theme of the hop was sunshine, she made the sunniest, shiniest, sunshiny pincushion possible, and guess who was the lucky winner?

Yes, me!!!

Thanks so much, Joy!  I'm going to enjoy this little log of joy!

(I may have to buy some fancier pins, though.  They have a lot to live up to now!)

Friday Adventures

I've been living in an adventure-free zone lately, but today I had two.
The less interesting one was driving around town in a dumptruck with my dad, with a pallet of sweet corn and a dead alpaca in the back.   (Sometimes life is just weird)
The more interesting adventure was meeting one of my long-time imaginary friends and finding out she's not imaginary at all!
I'd long suspected that she is a thoroughly delightful person, and damned if I wasn't absolutely right.
And now I'm kicking myself, because though I brought my camera, I had total camnesia.  Really really would have liked having a picture of the two of us, thus proving imaginary friends are real...

We've brought another one over to the Dark Side...

Check out this blog of a brand new knitter. While you're there, please say something encouraging.
Oh, and tell her Mom sent you and sends her love.

Cutting Edge

As I was saying to my friend Becky the other day - I think she, Erika, and I are the wave of the future. It used to be that a knitting blog had to have a cat to be official.
Now?
It isn't a real knitblog without a chicken or two...

If I knew you were comin' I'd've baked a cake

Howd-ya do, howd-ya do, howd-ya do

Or I''d've at least put on a pot of coffee...

The Great and Powerful Norma linked me this morning. There've been people milling around the living room ever since.
Welcome! Pull up a chair and visit for a minute.
I'll be in the kitchen, baking a cake.

Of Chicken Guts,Twitchy Fingers, and Imaginary Friends

Since I had today off and Madman is feeling more mobile, we butchered a couple of chickens this morning. They were some of our remaining meat birds that had gotten a reprieve when Madman slagged his knee, due to the fact that neither one of us was capable of carrying a madly-flapping well-over-10lb bird*. These are some big honkin' chickens at this point. Picture a blimp with feathers. Picture a blimp with feathers taking 5 minutes to turn around 180 degrees, with little tiny shuffling steps. Big honkin' chickens.
One is in the freezer and the other is in the oven. Full of stuffing. The house is starting to smell really good...

The twitchy fingers are due to this:


I soooo want to cast on. This very minute. Like in now. If I could type and cast on at the same time, I'd have needles in hand.
(I'm still trying to decide if I want to let my innate stubbornness win and finish the Frosted Ferns that I've started (and tinked and knit and tinked) or if I should let my sensible side reign and just chuck the whole project out the window.)
The Great and Powerful Cookie took pity on me as I beat my head on the chartless Niebling and passed along a Niebling that is less likely to land me in the Loony Bin.
She's one of my very favorite Imaginary Friends... (I was once trying to explain to my mother about friends that I'd made on the internet, whom I've never met in person, and she said "So, basically they're your imaginary friends then." Never argue with your mother. (You won't win, anyway))

*These birds dressed out to over 10lbs. Picture a small turkey. We have no idea what they weighed before we removed all the unnecessary bits...

Okay, so I lied...

I fully intended to play with the book I mentioned yesterday, but when I heard that Norma was headed for AnnaMarie's, how could I stay home? I bustled through my errands and the things that absolutely had to be done around the house, threw my knitting in the car, and hit the highway.
AnnaMarie had lunch ready for us - she made an amazing split pea soup. (Note: if AnnaMarie ever offers to cook something for you, just pull up a chair at the table and wait quietly for Nirvana. Seriously.)
We sat and knitted and talked and laughed. Spinning and spindles, blogging and bloggers, food and farms, books, yarn, pets, patterns, festivals, tv shows - we covered a lot of territory in conversation. The woodstove made the room cozy, and the company made it cozier.
An afternoon of food, friends, and fiber? Balm for a weary soul.
Naturally, I forgot my camera...

I wish I'd thought to take pictures...

We had our first workshop for the Transition Caledonia group today - Madman gave a talk on non-hybrid gardening and seed-saving. It was a small, but interested group, with lots of lively discussion. Madman always shines when he's in instructional mode, especially when the subject matter is near and dear to his heart.
Of course, the high point for me was that AnnaMarie and Wes came down south for it. We got to show off our garden, our hoophouse, and our critters. They brought their little Corgis along, who acted like perfect little ladies for the entire visit.
Now, I had not known that Corgis were sheepherding dogs until AnnaMarie told me. (And seriously? I thought she was joking... Those short little legs? Herding sheep? Yeah, right...) She directed me to some videos of Corgi show trials, and sure enough, they are sheepherders!
Though when we tried introducing them to our sheep, I think we would have had dogherding sheep if we had put the dogs in the pen...

Seriously...

The more I think about this, the more I'm behind it.
She has a Voice. She has an Eye.
And dudes, she's taking her knitting to Antarctica.
How cool is that?
She's a sock knitter. At the South freakin' Pole.
Imagine it.
Let's get the word out. Tell your family. Tell your friends. (Hell, tell your enemies...)

Knitting. At the South Pole.

Anyone know the Harlot?

We need to send Bullwinkle to Antarctica

Seriously.
Go here for details. And beautiful pictures.
I love her. Besides the fantastic pictures, and great sense of humor, she uses even more parenthetical remarks than I do. (And that's a lot.) (Not that I'm counting.)

I Just Wanna Ply

(Put your arms around me, baby. Put your arms around me, baby...)


Ready or not, here I come... As soon as I hit that "Publish" button, the wheel will start turning!


In the good news department: I got to meet the Extreme Gardener and her husband tonight.
Turns out they're literally our neighbors - only a couple of miles up the road. Madman and I gave them the grand tour of our little crazy acre. They scritched our sheep and smiled at the chickens, and we talked garden, garden, garden. We compared notes on plant varieties, swapped stories of gardens past, and shared plans of gardens yet to be. Incredibly nice people! Looking forward to seeing them again.

And now for something completely different...

Just to please AnnaMarie, and because she asked so nicely.
I've never done a meme before. And I need something different to take my mind off life for a bit.


1. What time did you get up this morning?
Woke up at slightly before dawn to the sound of sheep blatting. Sheep just outside your bedroom window will do that. We may be able to throw out the alarm clock altogether.

2. How do you like your steak?
Rare. Off the grill. Meat + Fire. I may have been a barbarian in a previous life.

3. What was the last film you saw at the cinema?
Oh, my. The Fisher King. In 1991. I hadn't realized it had been that long since I went to the movies...

4. What is your favorite TV show?
No TV, but I do watch House and Bones on the computer.

5. If you could live anywhere in the world where would it be?
Still in Vermont, but a little further north. And deeper in the woods.

6. What did you have for breakfast?
Home Made White Toast - I'm not much for eating breakfast.

7. What is your favorite cuisine?
No favorite, really. I pretty much like everything.

8. What foods do you dislike?
I loathe lima beans. Truly loathe. And bleu cheese. And turnips.

9. Favorite place to eat?
My own kitchen. I love to cook. Though the King Buffet in my Dad's hometown is a great place to go - lots and lots of Chinese dishes.

10. Favorite dressing?
Ranch, without question. Sometimes I don't even need the salad...

11.What kind of vehicle do you drive?
A Subaru Forrester that usually smells of hay. And occasionally of sheep poop...

12. What are your favorite clothes?
Jeans and t-shirt in summer, jeans and sweatshirt in winter.

13. Where would you visit if you had the chance?
I want to go back to Scotland and spend more time there this time. Three days wasn't enough. (AnnaMarie's answer to this one made me cry...)

14. Cup 1/2 empty or 1/2 full?
1/2 Full. And sometimes I'll talk myself into seeing it as 3/4 full.

15. Where would you want to retire?
Right here. I'm looking forward to having more knitting time.

16. Favorite time of day?
All day long.

17. Where were you born?
Topeka, Kansas. Yes, I am a Flatlander.

18. What is your favorite sport to watch?
My answer is the same as AnnaMarie's: Chicken TV right after you pop a plateful of table scraps into the midst of the flock.

19. Who do you think will not tag you back?
I don't tag so don't expect folks to tag back.

20. Person you expect to tag you back first?
Same answer.

21. Who are you most curious about their responses to this?
I'm pretty nosy, so just about anybody.

22. Bird watcher?
I'll watch them if they come to me, but I won't chase them. Though I used to enjoy sitting out in the yard with my grandfather watching birds - he knew a lot about birds.

23. Are you a morning person or a night person?
Oh, night, for sure. In the morning, my eyes may be open, but the brain isn't necessarily switched on.

24. Do you have any pets?
One little cat. And the sheep. The chickens and rabbits are more livestock than pets. And we're down to one fish in the aquarium.

25. Any new and exciting news you'd like to share?
I'll just skip this one, may I?

26. What did you want to be when you were little?
A major-league baseball player. But I'm old enough that in my day girls weren't allowed to play in Little League. I also wanted to be a singer - unfortunately I can't carry a tune in a bucket...

27. What is your best childhood memory?
Building an airplane with my brother. Out of scrap lumber. We're lucky it was so heavy - if we could have gotten it up onto the shed roof like we'd planned, we would have launched ourselves in it.

28. Are you a cat or dog person?
Cat person. I like small dogs, though - they're just oddly-behaved cats.

29. Are you married?
Yes! Eleven years next week.

30. Always wear your seat belt?
Of course! Though when the state passed the seatbelt law, I was sorely tempted to unhook it everytime I saw a cop. And possibly make finger gestures. Luckily I am a model of self-control.

31. Been in a car accident?
Yes. Seriously off the road in a blizzard. The universe rescued me - four men, all strangers to each other, stopped and helped. They formed a team, winched my car back up onto the road, made sure the car and I were both okay, then one of them had me follow him into town so he'd know I was all right. I've always tried to help people out where I can - and now even more so.

32. Any pet peeves?
Can't stand liars.

33. Favorite pizza toppings?
Bacon. And mushrooms.

34. Favorite Flower?
Used to be lilacs, but now I think it's lupines.

35. Favorite ice cream?
I'm Lactose-intolerant. I just don't like ice cream enough to bother with it.

36. Favorite fast food restaurant?
Not a big fan of fast food.

37. How many times did you fail your driver's test?
Once. I didn't even get my license until I was 41. The first time I took the test I got locked in the "Oh, man!" Syndrome - where you're so busy saying "Oh, man!" over one mistake that you make another. I may have set a record for number of points taken off.

38. From whom did you get your last email?
AnnaMarie

39. Which store would you choose to max out your credit card?
If I had a credit card, it would be Keepsake Quilting. Serious fabric addiction.

40. Do anything spontaneous lately?
Bought 2 sheep instead of 1?

41. Like your job?
Yes.

42. Broccoli?
Yes!

43. What was your favorite vacation?
Any of the canoe camping trips we've taken on the Saco River in Maine. Haven't gone for a couple of years now, though.

44. Last person you went out to dinner with?
My husband.

45. What are you listening to right now?
Sheep. Of course.

46. What is your favorite color?
Purple keeps grabbing me.

47. How many tattoos do you have?
None.

48. How many are you tagging for this quiz?
Not gonna.

49. What time did you finish this quiz?
11:21 am.

There ya go, AM!

Good food, good friends, good times

(Yeah, a pretty prosaic title, when you consider how much fun I had...)

My favorite way to spend an afternoon is with my good friend, AnnaMarie, knitting and spinning and talking (and eating! In addition to all her other talents, she's an expert at tasty!), so yesterday I braved the monsoon rains and headed up to visit.
The only thing better than an afternoon with AnnaMarie is an afternoon with AnnaMarie and Norma...
I don't know if I contributed much to the conversation - I got so fascinated listening to those two that I might have forgotten how to talk. And I was laughing so hard that I was only capable of a word or two now and then, anyway.
I took my wheel along (I had planned to take only my knitting, but when I opened the car door, the wheel hopped in and stuck its head out the window in joy. How could I refuse?) and finished the singles of the lovely sparkly purple batts AM had invented for me. Luckily I brought my lazy kate along, just in case, so I got most of the plying done, too.
Of course the picture doesn't do the yarn justice. Lovely dark and light purple, with sparkles.
I'm in love with this yarn. I've got 300 yards of (roughly) sportweight. (I was trying for worsted. Still having trouble with the thick yarn...)
Must get more batts...
Maybe green next time. Or red.
Life can't all be purple...

I believe it's called Camnesia

Or being a dumbass. Maybe both...
I took a camera to NH S&W. I even took a couple of sets of extra batteries.
The only thing I didn't take was pictures.
*sigh*
Luckily I had a fabulous time, so memories will have to serve in lieu of pictures... I grabbed my fabulous MIL bright and early this morning, and we did the festival up right. I swear we looked at everything, fondled the fiber, patted the lambs, snogged the alpacas (just for you, AnnaMarie!), watched the sheepdogs, and enjoyed the hell out of all that was offered.
I met Gale (one of us spells her name wrong - guess which one?), and Judy (who is practically my neighbor when you consider the size of the planet.) I somehow managed to miss Norma, though. Rumor had it she was around somewhere, but apparently not wherever I was at any given moment. And I met Manise, though she pointed out that we had actually met at VT S&W last fall, but I was so excited that day that my brains fell out of my head and, what with the general dizziness and drooling, I didn't remember at all...
And Laurie and I finally caught up with each other, with Judy's help. (Thanks, Judy!) We got to have a nice visit, chatting about knitting and spinning, showing off our newly acquired treasures, and she had lots of good advice for me in my continuing struggle to quit smoking. (She's a wise one, my Laurie!)
Every festival, it seems, is the best one ever - and I think this one left all previous ones in the dust. My brain is brimming over with new ideas sparked by all the wonders I saw today, I've got a new sock book (my dad is so getting the piggie socks for Christmas this year...), and my spirit is refreshed by talking to friends old and new.
Best. Festival. Ever.

Loot!!

Norma destashed in my general direction...
Now, when she said destashing, I somehow pictured a skein of sock yarn. Possibly with a half-knit sock dangling off it...

Little did I know:

Loot! Woot! And not a dangley-bit in sight.
Two skeins of Happy Feet in glorious colors! (Can't stop nuzzling...)
A Tongue River Farm Sock Collection kit (Icelandic yarn! Six, count 'em, Six patterns!)
And a wonderfully snarky notepad - it says "funny... I don't recall asking for your opinion" Love. It.
Love. All.
Woohoo! Thank you so much, Norma! I'll caption your photos anytime. (Does that sound odd? Or is it just me?)

Now to not cast on socks. (I've had to declare a moratorium on casting-on. Otherwise my house will explode.)

But socks don't really count on the WIP list, do they?

A Perfect Day - except for the shoe-shopping

I hate shoes. I hate wearing shoes, I hate looking at shoes, I hate shopping for shoes, I hate even thinking about shoes long enough to type this sentence.
I have short wide feet with a high arch and a high instep. The shoebox fits my foot better than the shoe. Shoe shopping involves trying on an excruciating number of shoes, looking for just one pair that doesn't make me walk with a limp. To make matters worse, my feet are slightly different from each other as a result of a horse tromping on one of them when I was a teenager. So, just because I find a shoe that fits my left foot, it doesn't necessarily follow that its mate will fit my right.
So I buy as few shoes as possible, and wear them until they're dead. Since the pair I wear to work every day had reached the point where there was no tread left and the uppers were falling apart, I had to bite the bullet and replace them.
Mission accomplished. After trying on umpty-two pairs, growling up and down the aisle, I have a new pair of shoes. I don't have to think about shoes again until these fall apart. *whew*

Now, I say all this in order to illustrate how the rest of my day more than made up for this level of misery.
I had lunch with my favorite Princess! Live and in person! And meeting her was even better than I had hoped - and my expectations were pretty damned high, I tell ya. She's even more fun in person than she is in print. I think we must have warped the space-time continuum in order to fit all the conversation into the actual time we spent together. I'm very happy she came home to Vermont.
Next time we get together, I'm bringing my wheel. If we can fit in all that talking, imagine how much spinning I could get done!

Honk if you love Norma!

My normal morning routine is to check my email while I'm waiting for the coffee to brew, then check my blog stats, then hop over to bloglines to see what's up out in the world.
This morning, however, when I checked my stats, I was startled to see that I already had more than my normal number of hits and it was only 8 o'clock in the morning! WTF? I checked to see where on earth all these people were coming from...
Ah! Norma sent them!
(Thanks, Norma!)

Honk! Honk!

As long as I'm pointing fingers this month...

I'm pointing this one at Laurie. She's running the NaBloPoMo gauntlet. I'm all admiring of her courage, and inspired by it, and all that.
In an email to her earlier this week, I said I was going to try it, too, but I was taking the coward's way out and not declaring till I'd gotten a bunch of posts out.
But! No more Cowardliness!
I'm thinking the self-discipline will be good for me. (We likes us the self-displines, oh yes, we does) So, here goes nothing...

NaBloPoMo!!!!!!

But I've probably screwed it up already - I didn't get my November 1st post published until November 2nd. Though I did publish twice on November 2nd, so my count is okay.

So, can I get a ruling on this? Who's in charge, here, anyway?

I'm with ya, Laurie! If you can do it, so can I!

OMG! OMG!

Just got back from Vermont Sheep and Wool - and OMG!
I met bloggers!
Norma! and Jessie! and Sandy! and Etherknitter! (who told me her real first name, but it went right out of my brain as soon as she said Etherknitter...)
They were all so nice, and shook my hand and didn't start edging away from me - which was brave of them since I'd gone into full-tilt Total Babbling Dork mode. With a smile so big it's a wonder the top of my head didn't fall off...
It was like meeting Rock Stars. They're My Heroes!
And did I use my camera? The one that was dangling right off my wrist?
Nope.
It stayed right in its bag.Doh!
I'll have a larger update of the festival after I get done pounding my head on my desk.

Thud...