Yellow Roses

On a snowy winter day, yellow roses. A gift from our neice Betsy who is staying with us for a few days. The lovely blooms were a thank your for clearing the driveway yesterday morning, enabling her to get her car up our hill. My wedding bouquet was yellow roses, a sweet sunny colour.

Caora

Meet Caora, a Blue Ribbon Scottish Blackfaced sheep, who has decided to reside in the Knitting Room. Caora was a Valentine/Anniversary gift from my wonderful DH Bill. She is enjoying her new lifestyle and has found a friend in Noir (our cat) who is intrigued by this none moving "dog". If you were wondering about her name Caora is the word for sheep in gaelic.

Tee's Socks

These lovely socks were knitted by Tee Flemming. They are knitted with the Sweet Georgia Chinois yarn that Tee was gifted through the yarn exchange organized in December by Connie at Pick Up Sticks.
Tee knitted the Fancy Silk Socks from Nancy Bush's Knitting Vintage Socks. Tee lives in a small town in Northern Ontario, and as you can see from the picture, knits beautiful socks. I am extremely envious as this September, Tee will be attending Lucy Neatby's knitting adventure on Salt Spring Island.

Blueberry Bunnies

Finished bunnies. I highly recommend Susan's Spinning Bunnies, it's a 3-ply 50% super wash merino and 50% tencel. It is a joy to knit with, the feel of the yarn, and the soft shine make is a pleasure to knit with. The colour is Blueberry Patch, they are dyed 3 skeins at a time in small dye pots, each skein contains 430 yrds., loads of yarn to knit a really nice pair of socks. I purchased the yarn from Connie at Pick Up Sticks. I will certainly buy this yarn again.

Some Snow, A Valentine, and a Wee Bit Burns

Winter arrived the other day, a little over a month late. Two inches of snow have fallen since yesterday and another two inches will arrive by tomorrow morning. A respite from the snow until Saturday but not the temperatures, it is bitterly cold, and we are now steadily moving through our wood pile and will be reording our second cord to get us through the winter.
Islay, our precious six month old shih tzu, has become the "outdoor dog", when we went to pick up her up Bill (in an attempt to be funny), was asking "is she a guard do", "will she run the fence line" and similiar unsuitable questions for a companion dog. Little did I know that his questions were a prophecy waiting to come true. She loves the great outdoors (or at least our back garden), romping with her two brothers (one large, one small), barking at intruding birds, blowing leaves, and errant snow flakes, and yes - she does run the fence line. I could not resist taking the camera out this morning and capturing our girl in the snow.

Wishfully I look and languish In that bonie face o' thine,

And my heart it sounds wi'anguish,

Lest my wee thing be na mine.

The Bonnie Wee Thing, Robert Burns, 1791

O wad some Power the giftie gi us

To see oursels as ithers see us!

To a Louse, Robert Burns,1786

I have been productive over the last few days, I have finised a sock mate (Bunny Blueberries), grafting the toe this morning and blocking the afternoon, and I have turned the heel on another. I have also completed my Valentine Exchange - I think it turned it rather well.

LIZARD RIDGE

My 12 completed

Lizard Ridge squares, and the yarn needed to complete the blanket.

The pattern is very easy to follow and actually fun to knit as the squares knit up rather quickly. It's short row shaping, lots of wrap and turn, although I am not picking up the wraps, my personal choice. When the squares are completed you join them using Cascade and pick up and knit a border all around. When you see the completed picture on Knitty you will have to knit this blanket, the colours and flow of the pattern are amazing. It can be knitted two ways, 24 individual squares or knitted all in one, pattern directions for both are on the site. I know that there a some knitters who are not fond of the way Kueryon knits up, the constantly changing colour, but for me that is the appeal. When I started during the summer I had enough yarn to finish 1/2 the blanket, I held off finising as only one of my LYS sells Noro, and it's about a 45 minute drive and they only stock a few colour choices. Early in January Rams Wool, had a 2 day 30% of everything in stock sale. I took advantage of buying the Noro and the Mission Falls 1824 that I needed to finish and start both blankets. I am almost 100% sure that I will finish the Lizard Ridge before I begin the Log Cabin. If you are interest in the Lizard Ridge there is also a KAL that you can join while you are in the process of knitting.

Sometimes out of the blue.......

.....the most unexpected happens. I had intended to post pictures of the twelve knitted squares for my Lizard Ridge Afghan, and the Noro I purchased to finish it, but that will have to wait until tomorrow.

I received an email from my Uncle Alex, who isn't really my uncle but my dad's cousin, which makes him my second cousin on my dad's side. He, my dad and my Uncle Tommy (another of dad's cousin), were the best of friends when they were lads. The email totally caught me off guard, Uncle Alex received a scanner for Christmas and is transfering some of his slides onto computer files. This is what he sent me. The lady in the blue cardigan is my great-grandmother Agnes Walker, the lady beside her is her daughter, my Auntie Chrissy, (Uncle Alex's mother), Uncle Alex is in the front holding his daughter.
I only have a few pictures of my great-grandmother so this is truly a wonderful gift. I am sure she took her glasses off for the second picture purely out of vanity. My grannie was very special to us, she and my Granpa Jake raised my dad, they were his surrogate parents, and because she had been a dancer my dad became a dancer and she paid for his lessons. By all accounts my father was a wonderful tap dancer and eventually became his dance teachers partner. She bought my sister and I party dresses to go to an Esso Christmas Party and took us to see Jack Milroy as Buttons in the panto Cinderella. She lived well into her 90's and never lost her sharp tounge (for she had one) or her sense of humor. These pictures have brought back a wealth of memories, on one of my trips back to Scotland she gave me her amber necklace, which I still have tucked away. When she was in her 90's and our son was a baby we took him to meet his great-great-grandmother, as she held him in her arms, tears came into her eyes, she looked at him and then she looked at me and said "I never thought I'd hold another baby". We all thought that she would live to be 100 and receive the letter from the Queen, but unfortunately she fell and broke her hip, this limited her mobility and she began to decline. She was a force to be reckoned with, she was little but she was mighty.
(the age of the pictures - at least 40 years)

One Sock Monday

Of late I have developed a pattern in knitting which, like a vacumm, nature abhors!

ONE SOCK WONDERS!

The sock on the left is my father's birthday sock (until the other one is knitted he will not have a pair). Lovely emerald forest colours in a very nice diamond pattern. The yarn is Mysical Creations, which has wonderful yardage. I was drawn to knit the center sock due to the wonderful sheen of the yarn. Spinning Bunnies from Pick Up Sticks, since it has turned out far to small for my feet it will be gifted to a great-neice. The sock on the right is waiting for a mate in order to be felted, they are gifted charitiy knits and will most definately be finished by the end of the month as they are to be posted.

I am not sure if this abhoration is due to my feeling under the weather or is it mearly the January slump after the holiday season. All that knitting leading up to Christmas, the task of knowing that I had presents to finish, block, and ship, now that January has rolled around and the weather has turned undesirably dreary am I also slumping.

I don't mean to say that I haven't been productive, for I have, but my productivity seems to wain when it comes to the knitting of mates. I have three one sock wonders completed and another in the progress however, I cannot spur myself to dive into the casting on of any of their mates.

Are they to remain dateless all their sock ridden lives,

only the casting on will tell?

Football Sunday

What a perfect day for playoff Sunday. Our weather is incredibly cold with intermitent flurries. We started the fire this morning and it has been blazing most of the day. My heart goes out to New Orleans, it would have been wonderful to see them go on to the Super Bowl. As you can see from the pictures that every member of this household is a football fan.

Banff likes to watch the game while sitting on the couch.

Islay likes to take in the game from the the floor, with her football by her side.

During half time she likes to take a nap.

LOG CABIN

I have been looking at the Log Cabin Blanket in the Mason Dixon book and drooling. I have seen the multitude of blogged Log Cabin's in various stages from center strip to finished and blocked and it was just a matter of time before I started one of my own. In my stash I had some wonderful Mission Falls 1824 Cotton that I had purchased two summers ago to knit a pleasant cardi, just never got around to it, then last month I saw Connie's finished Log Cabin knitted in 1824 and decided that was the impetuses I needed to spur me on. I ordered some 1824 from Connie and rest I needed from Rams Wool (they had a wonderful two day sale last week - 30% off everything in stock). The cotton arrived yesterday, along with 8 balls of Kueryon to finish the Lizard Ridge from Knitty (I am 12 of the 24 squares already knitted). Now I have to finish two pairs of socks, 2 charity hats, 1 pair of mittens, and two knitted hearts before I can start, will I last you ask, I doubt it and you will probably see pictures next week of started Log Cabin. I love my choice of colours - what do you think? I am still abiding by the Stash Knitting rule, this was yarn I needed to finish a project I had already started or was about to start.