Marnie, speak! Good girl.

Congratulations, you are all new aunts or uncles, as the case may be. We just adopted a new pup. Her name, from the foster home is, Pearl. Miss Julia wisely pointed out that this was merely a misspelling of "Purl." She'll technically be Leo's little girl, since Panda is mine, so he will ultimately choose the name, but until he picks one, she is Purl to me.

Purl is a 16 week old Border Collie and Cattle Dog mix (same mix as Panda!) but she's been very well socialized and absolutely loves everyone and everything in this fine world. Panda is a little overwhelmed by puppy's verve and there will probably be some scuffles as they find their place together, but overall, Purl seems sweet and lovely.

I just got Purl her first collar so that's been a bit traumatic for her. We'll also be crate training her which will be new, but shouldn't pose any big problems for the bright little girl.

Having a puppy is going to be a lot of work, but who can complain with a face like this?

Panda is probably not speaking to me right now, but I think in time they will be inseparable.

So hopefully, there aren't too many of you out there who mind doggy pictures, because I now have twice the cuteness in one small house.

This phrase pretty much sums up the first 24 hours we've had with Purl.

Purl is a loving and eager little girl and she wants Panda to like her so so so much. It's really quite sweet. However, Panda is not convinced that this interloper deserves anything more than disdain. In fact, she has serious concerns about the fact that we have done nothing about the little girl; for instance, throwing her into a river. Consensus? Panda is a crotchety old woman and we never knew it.

I feel really good about Purl, though. She's exceedingly well socialized, thanks, I'm sure, to a good foster home she was in. She has already responded well to clicker training and can now sit on command. Crate training is going a little slower, but she's so food driven that giving her treats and meals in there has helped a bit. She basically cries for 10 minutes then goes right to sleep. In time, I think she will love her little house, but in the mean time, this is very manageable.

The leash and collar are a little more challenging. They are just beyond her comprehension, but I think she just needs a few days and she'll be all set. Plus, she's so tiny, it doesn't take long to tucker her out, so getting her leash trained will mean plenty of fun walks where she can play and interact with dogs who aren't snobs.

Don't you worry, though, Panda is getting as much love as ever and Purl is being expected to follow house rules. Panda is even helping with the training, albeit, unwittingly. I give Panda a command, praise her, then work it with Purl.

Don't worry, next post will have some knitting content. Lily is coming along beautifully.

This entry has also been posted at the Create Along.

Knitting has nearly slowed to a screeching halt now that there's a new pup in the house, but what knitting there has been has been good.

I've worked up to where I'm starting some neckline shaping on Lily

The fit seems fine, though it's always hard to tell before the neckline is done.

I will probably work a simple 2 or 3 stitch i-cord edging for the hem and sleeves. I think that will be the least disruptive treatment and will be OK both on the busy sleeve and the simpler hem.

As for the new member of the family, I think we finally have a name that everyone can agree on. The name is now, Theano Purl, Thea for short.
Theano was believed to be the wife of Pythagoras, (he who brought us the calculation for determining the hypotenuse of a right triangle,) and likely continued his work and ran his school after his death. We wanted a name that gave a nod to the sciences but which was also a cute doggy name. We considered "Evo" short for "Evolution" and "Jane" for the one and only Ms. Goodall. Neither name really stood out as exceptional names for a dog. Theano, though, very cute. I got to keep Purl as her middle name too so she can be little Thea-Purl, if the mood strikes.

See a bunch of pictures of the two girls by clicking the photo above, or clicking here.

I've been bracing myself for a month or two of unrest in the home. It's been manageable, with Thea being more than happy to persist at harassing her sister and Panda being even more than happy to tell her to shove it where the sun don't shine. Panda has occasionally agreed to allow the little one to sit near her and has moments where she forgets herself and plays with Thea for a few minutes, but for the most part, it's been mostly the cold shoulder.

Then I went out of town for a couple days, for some personal business. I came home, and something clicked, suddenly, the girls were playing...together...with each other even. I don't know if it was the excitement of having me come home or if about a week was all they needed. Either way, it's a beautiful thing to see them happy together.

To celebrate, we took the little fur balls to Frog Lake up in the Mt Hood region.

Border Collies + Snow = Good old fashion fun

See all the pictures of the trip to the lake here and see all the pictures of Panda and Thea playing, by clicking here.

Or, a long winded discussion of some swatches

For my swatching pleasure I brought along two items that were new to me. First was a Mary Thomas book of knitting patterns that I picked up at the Blacksheep Knittery sale, at Kat's suggestion. While the Barbara Walker books will always be my most comprehensive collection, they also represent the most ubiquitous stitch pattern selections and it can be refreshing and inspiring to try others.

For yarn, I brought a couple skeins of Tahki Stacy Charles' Dream.

This is a really unusual yarn and I feel like Tahki doesn't quite know what to do with it. Click that ball band to read the label. It recommends a US #8 needle for a yarn that I would classify as a very light sock weight. Of course, if you read the whole label, you'll see that it recommends doubling it.

What can I say? I love my girls. I haven't really been knitting much because of all the puppy distraction so, my distraction is your distraction.

The girls during training time:

Sit. Stay. Good!

Ms. Thea making faces at the camera.

Could those ears be any bigger?

Thea's favorite spot while I'm working.

What could possible go wrong?

I'm almost always a guest, never a host. Our home is small and lacking in furniture and it's not just anyone I'd subject to a single small (very small) bathroom shared between three adults. But when Julia said she'd be in town for work, I vacuumed up the dog hair and gave the tub an extra scrub. We had us a guest in town!

Recently, Julia has decided to learn crochet in earnest and her enthusiasm is infectious. On a recommendation we found our way to a huge Japanese market replete with...wait for it...a Japanese BOOK STORE. Great googily moogily! Their selection of crochet books was small but packed full of goodness.

There may have also been some shopping at a couple LYSs and the opportunity to meet a really great blogger and designer. Have yarn, will craft, and there was no dearth of that. In the 3 days that Julia and I spent together, not a single solitary picture was taken until the third and final day. Luckily for you, it was the most photogenic day of the lot.

Early that day, we packed the car up for a trip to Horsetail falls. If you read my non-crafty posts, you may remember our last visit, not too long ago.

The day was perfect for hiking. It was a little cool, but not so much as to require substantial outerwear. The sun was out but shaded by some light and poofy clouds. Didn't we agree they were Stradivarius clouds or were they igneous, Julia?

Leo was doggy wrangler for the day. It's no small feat to keep two dogs from intertwining on leash especially when one of them is just a pup. They were each other's yin and yang. Panda would duck every time someone would try to pet her. She wanted nothing more than solitude from everyone she didn't know. Thea, on the other hand, wanted to jump all over every person and dog we passed (and there were many people celebrating Mother's day by hiking on these beautiful trails). Between these two extremes was our handsome hero, dragging one girl ahead and holding another back. Me thinks we have some more training to do.

On the drive home, I crocheted from my new Japanese crochet book. This little wonder is chock full of sweet motifs. While the book is all in Japanese, everything is charted which makes them delightful to use. The yarn? My lovely peachy Merino/viscose handspun, from Chameleon Colorworks. The viscose gives a subtle sheen and the brilliant dyeing gives depth to the simple colorway. When you see the yarn, it's clear the spinning is average, at best, but the fiber was so beautiful to start with that I can't help but be proud of the final product.

Blocked, the finished pieces look like snowflakes.
What am I going to do with them? Perhaps a doggy babushka.

Perhaps not.
I have more — what's the word — sane ideas. I don't have enough yardage to do a whole garment in this yarn (unless I want to go particularly scantily clad) but it could be paired with another handspun or store bought yarn in some creative way. All that is still in deliberation.

After our long hike and short ride home, I took a marathon nap and then arose with ample time to join Julia at Lake Park for a photo shoot. I'll leave those pictures for her to post. Instead, check out the fresh batch of ducky goodness from the same outing.

They can give me avian flu, any old day. I just want to scoop them up and snuggle them.

And now, Julia is back at home with all her fur balls. And all that's left is the now deflated air mattress where she was set up. Thea payed homage to Miss Tuna in Julia's absence. I think that's Thea's way of saying she was glad to meet her.

It was a great weekend and I hope there will be more like it soon. And someday, we'll own a house with more than one bathroom and a proper spare bedroom. I'm dreamin' big, baby.

Well, Lily is on temporary time out. I don't like the look of the raglan decreases. They just come in too far and it looks off. I need to rip back to the base of the armsceye and reconfigure for either a much less angled raglan or a set in sleeve....what to do, what to do.

In the mean time, the motifs have become a mindless delight.

Six lovely motifs, half of which were completed in the last 24 hours.

No dogs were embarrassed in the course of photographing these pictures.

Thea is making herself quite at home. She sat by our feet last night and made cuteness at us.

Wouldn't you pet that little head?

+

=

Yesterday was Thea's first day at Puppy Preschool and we had so much fun. While I feel confident that, in time, we'd be able to teach Thea everything we'd want her to know, she definitely needs a lot of work in social settings. She's nothing like Panda, she loves everyone and everything and is happy to play all the time, but she has absolutely no focus and can't calm down enough to enjoy the experience. This class seems like just what she needs and it will teach me a lot about training.

When Thea saw this mastiff (who, by the way, is only about a month and a half older than Thea) she didn't know what to do with herself. She first gave a submissive pee and then spent the rest of the hour trying to play with him. I think she has a little crush. Both of us ended up with a lot of slobber on us, but no worse for the wear.

If you really love watching puppies at play or puppies in class, and you have QuickTime, I've loaded a couple of clips from class. There is nothing super incredible about them but they sure do make me smile.
Puppy Free Play 1MB
Practicing Sit HUGE! 47MB

Since we brought a certain little beast into the home, El Matchador has had to go into hiding. The girls accidentally knocked her over and the injury that could have come to any of the three of them, was simply not worth the risk.

Recently, a friend posted a bowl of deliciousness, and it had my heart aching to do more spinning.

I'm working on a few unbloggable projects now so this is a perfect diversion that doesn't make me feel like I'm ignoring my other responsibilities.

A teeny tiny skein of merino silk worked up on my Spindolyn.

Up next, some "Fudge Brownie" from Nistock Farms. I was never able to get this stuff to spin well on a drop spindle, but on the Spindolyn, it works up beautifully. This gives me hope that I'll also do better with the luxury fibers I have.

And finally, some silk/merino blend that I've had forever. I believe it's Ashland Bay. I'm spinning on my 0.6 ounce Golding.

And now for some proof that I shouldn't be allowed to have dogs, after the jump

This weekend is the annual celebration of the day a certain someone was born, though he doesn't like it spoken about so shhhhhhhhhhhhh. Certain someone requested we go back to the beach for some good family fun.

We've been to Manzanita Beach, and we have been to Ecola and Cannon Beaches many times but this time, we decided to try Hug Point, located between the two.

We arrived at Hug Point, around 11AM, and the temperature was cool, a nice change from the unseasonably high temperatures we've had in Portland, over the past week. There was a wedding reception at the beach, but we tucked around the corner and found a lovely area to play with the girls.

The beach is beautiful but explorers beware! One could easily get trapped when the tide comes in. I don't think the girls would have minded, but we sure would have.

When our tummies started to complain it was lunch time, we packed up to go back to Cannon Beach for a bite to eat. After filling up on diet food (read: fries, burgers, ribs, bacon, and guacamole) we talked about wandering over to the beach for another quick romp before heading home. As merely a whim, we thought it might be fun to head just north a bit and see if we could find another beach.

These are actually now hanging to dry, but while I had some defused sunlight today, I thought I'd snap some photos of my little skeins of handspun.

Firstly, off the Spindolyn, about 24 yards of Fudge Brownie 2-ply. The roving was from Nistock Farms. I'd say this is my most successful and longest skein off the Spindolyn so far. I am going to keep trying to get better with it. I really strive to have at least 50 yards of plied yarn off a single cop. Maybe that's just silliness, but I think it's enough yarn to actually feel like I can start to knit with it.

The fibers were spun quite fine but there's tons of loft in this stuff so it looks like a worsted weight. I suspect that after washing and drying, it will lose a touch of that loft. I'm estimating it around 18 WPI. My spinning is a little irregular so it definitely won't be mistaken for store bought, but it's really soft and the color is impressively rich.

Off my trusty 0.6 ounce Golding, just under 60 yards of 2 ply. This yarn is fairly consistent with a few "designer" moments throughout. She is about 24 WPIs.

A little closer, if you like.

While I was shooting these photos, Ms. Thea was giving me this look.

Nope, she's not growing into her ears, but I still think she's gorgeous.

The folks over at Golding just rock. At the Fiber Frolic, owner, Diane, offered to take my 0.6 ounce and 0.9 ounce, align the hooks and mail them back to me, complete with instructions for aligning, should I ever with to try myself.
A couple days after the frolic, she wrote me to say that they have updated the design of the smaller spindle, to have a thinner shaft, and would I like them to install that shaft on my 0.6 ounce. Well, that sounded just dandy to me.

A couple days later, my beautiful spindles were back in my hands, all buffed up and looking good or maybe better than new.

Pre-surgery, the old shaft, on my smaller spindle, was about the same size as the larger spindle. You can really see the difference now. It spins amazingly well.

While I was awaiting the return of my spindles, I was putting my new spindle to good use spinning up some beautiful fiber from Nistock Farms. The colorway is called "September Glow" and it's a cotwold and silk blend.

The color of the fiber goes from a soft cream-of-mahogany color to vivid oranges and pinks. It's like a more neutral version of the Autumn Spice colorway I spun last year. The silk shows up as lovely white flecks. They tend to form little nubs, but I like them. The batts are as light as air so it spins like a dream. I may even bring El Matchador out of hiding.

Speaking of Thea, hasn't she gotten big? Her spots are becoming more and more pronounce too. She's really starting to show her cattle dog side.

The two girls have also gotten really close. They play like puppies, and snuggle up with Leo, any chance they get.

Admit it, you want in on that pile of cute.

Leo told me today about this cute program called Comic Life. It has all the templates, colors and fonts needed to make your own fun little comics.

After taking a particularly silly picture of Miss Thea-Purl, I decided it was perfect for the cover of an imaginary comic book about twisted puppies and their evil thoughts.

Alas, creativity escapes me, and the inner machinations of her mischievous mind have not been revealed to me. Any thoughts?

Our little Thea graduated from Puppy Preschool, on Thursday. We couldn't be more proud of her. Admittedly, we needed only show up for class in order to graduate, but Thea worked hard these past 6 weeks and she had a great time, to boot. Thea did exceptionally well at the recall, down stay and tricks portion of the last class. Her sit stay is solid too, though she was so tired she schlumped into a down during the sit completion. Her loose leash work is bad enough that I suggest we move on to another topic.

From here, I just decide if I want to sign up for more obedience (something she definitely needs but not as much fun) or puppy agility (lots of fun, but probably not the the ideal focus for our little bag of energy.) I bet you can guess which way I'm leaning.

Well, El Matchador has been purring like a kitten and helped me produce another little skein of delicious yarn.

Specs

• Fiber: 90% Cotswold / 10% Silk (the white bits)
• From: Nistock Farms.
• Color: September Glow: Shades of gingerbread cookies with orange and raspberry sorbet.
• WPI: About 20. It's a little inconsistent, leaning mostly a bit lighter, though some areas are a little thicker. The silk also tends to form nubs.
• Length: Over 225 yards.
• Spun on: Schacht Matchless wheel (El Matchador to you)
• Plies: 2, plied off of two bobbins until one ran out, then switched to Andean plying to avoid waste.
• Impressions: I just love spinning this fiber. The batts are well prepared with only the smallest amounts of vegetable matter. The fiber is not too slippery, and has a lovely sheen. It's not really next to the skin soft, but it's not all that rough either. The colors are divine. I'm looking forward to spinning up more.

For the first time, I have washed but not weighted my yarn. This skein did get a rather good beating against the pole, but otherwise, she is unmanipulated. Apparently, there are two rather strong camps on this topic. Some people are weighers and some are not. I imagine there are good reasons for both. If I had to guess as to why you shouldn't weigh, it would be that weighing might give a false sense of balance that would then be undone the next wash the yarn (probably in knit or crochet form) went through. But that's just a guess. What do you all have to say? Anyway, after soaking in some warm water and Eucalan, and a couple thwacks before it dries, the yarn seems pretty darn balanced.

Recently June posted about Spinning Spider Jenny. If you haven't found her, and you are a spinner, go find her now. She's a wealth of information. Jenny happened to post about her method of 2-plying. Alas, I didn't read it until mere hours after I had completed my yarn, but next time I'm definitely going to try this method. It seems rather like common sense but it's sheer brilliance to me.

In entirely unrelated news, we found another great hiking site for the girls, and this is only 5 minutes from home!

There's a lovely place called MacLeay Park (I like to think it's a typo and should actually end in an "n" instead of "y.") in Portland that feels like its 100 miles from the closest city.

It was a gorgeous day, though perhaps a bit hotter than we are all used to. Thank goodness we've evolved so as not to be covered in hair. How do dogs do it? It's funny, though, both girls showed some unexpected personality changes that day.

Thea, our normally fearless (seriously) hero, decided that wooden bridges were the scariest thing EVER.

With a little coaxing and encouragement, she got a bit better, a good thing, because we crossed a good many of them, but she definitely wasn't loving them. Each time we'd reach one, she'd pull on the emergency break, I'd run across the bridge and call her and she'd muster up her courage and then bolt across. Silly monkey.

And Ms. Panda, our normally indifferent and withdrawn wallflower, suddenly decided she needed to keep an eye on Thea and defend her against dominant (not aggressive, dominant) dogs.

She was fine with this little ball of happiness, but Panda tried to get a little b*tchy with some other bigger dogs. That's definitely something we're going to have to work on. We definitely don't want a dog that's going to be picking fights. That's no fun.

But don't let those two issues lead you to believe we didn't have a great time. It was gorgeous. You can see all of the photos from the hike here.

Ahh, independence day, the one day when Leo's interests and Panda's are at complete odds with each other. Leo regales me with stories from his childhood that prove that the fates love drunks and children. When the words, "made our own" and "fireworks" are strung together, I can only shake my head and be glad he has, allegedly, grown out of that phase.

While California and Oregon seem to have similar limitations on fireworks; namely that the general public can't buy things that go flying off tither and yon, Southern California is far more flammable than Portland and I think people are more reluctant to send sparks about the kindling that is their back yard. Additionally, we now live in a quiet little suburb where there is very little nightly traffic. Throughout the neighborhood, one could hear and see the assortment of volcanic light displays and sparklers, individuals were setting off in the street.

So while this was not Panda's first 4th of July, it was definitely one of her worst. Add to the noise, the relatively warm temperatures (close to 90) and it made for one unhappy dog. Thea, on the other hand, seemed a little put out by the loudest noises but was otherwise indifferent to the whole thing.

And since lots of people will be posting fireworks today, how about some cute dog shots.

It's been hot, and Thea and Panda are shedding hair like they think their comfort depends on it. Wait, I guess it does. Anyway, it's hot, and when it's hot, doggies like to sleep.

Yes, I know, it's been a LOT of doggy pictures. Would it help if I told you I'm actually knitting?

It's a project I'm doing for Stitch Diva. It's coming along swimmingly though I've done a lot of ripping to get it to the point where I'm happy with it. Luckily, my time frame for the project makes it possible to get it juuuuust right. I like that.

In other news, I saw Ms. Kat Coyle's gorgeous Lace Style skirt on Knitty Gritty, yesterday.

It's so sad that it's styled better on KG than it was in the actual book. Oh how I pine for that skirt.

The heat eased off for the weekend and we put the great weather to good use. On Saturday, Leo lit up the barbecue and cooked us a delicious meal. The girls watched on as we filled our bellies.

Afterwards, we cut up a few little scraps and did some training with them. Panda shows her well honed skills by balancing a piece of meat on her nose until Leo gave her the OK to eat it.

Thea didn't have much interest in doing that trick.

Then we moved to some chores. I took the kitchen while Leo started the lawn mowing. After a few minutes, Leo said he needed some assistance and I met him outside to see him hosing off his bloodied-OHMYGODWHATHAPPENED-leg. While mowing, the lawnmower kicked up a spring that had been buried in the ground, honed it to a fine point and hurled it at his leg. He was wearing pants, which appear to have more tensile strength than his flesh as the pants are unmarred but he got himself a pretty fine little hole that bled like the dickens. He's fine and will be seeing the doctor tomorrow to be sure. Still, all that blood. Even if you think you want to see how it looked, you probably shouldn't click this. If you did, though, you can see the offending object as well.

But Leo is never one to let an oozing wound stop him from having a good time. Today, we made our way over to Manzanita Beach, but before we hit the ocean, we stopped into our favorite breakfast locale for some Eggs Benedict. Actually, we split one order of Eggs Bennie and one of Crab Cakes Benedict which is just like Benny but with a crab cake swapped out for the ham.

The girls did really wonderfully at the beach and are playing together more and more.

Panda made some great catches and Thea was her normal social and adorable self. You can click any of these pictures to go to my flickr page and see all the other shots.

Alas, condolences are in order. The poor faithful squirrel was lost at sea today. We all bowed our heads in respect before moving on, since, well, we have 2 more at home. I just hope that some lucky dog ends up getting it when it eventually washes ashore.

Goodbye Squirrel
2006-2007

Sachi sent me some absolutely beautiful fibers, recently, including some Carbonized Bamboo. I spun a little bit of it during lunch today and draped the remainder of the wad I was working on, over the top of El Matchador.

As many of you know, Thea is a great fan of the fiber arts and has shown much interest in my tools, before.

Today, she showed me an alternative method for predrafting. What do you think?

Thank goodness, Sachi sent me a bunch and I only had a small amount out on the wheel.

Thea, do you feel sorry?

Ok, no hard feelings. I can't be mad at you.
Anyway, look at your face, you are so cute and sweet and such a good little girl, I just love you to pieces and....

HEY! That just seems unnecessary.
Kids today.

So my last two posts have collected more comments, each, than I usually get in a week. WOW! I have tried to reply to each and every one of you but I'm a little behind. All I can say is that I really really appreciate every single comment.

To all of you who commented on the sweater, I'm now seriously considering revisiting it when I have my deadline work completed. I will likely use one of the heather Aurora 8 shades, perhaps green again, maybe in an oatmeal shade.

To all of you who have weighed in about parenthood, thank you. I am realizing that I need to not let crazy people get under my skin and that most normal people think you should do what feels right for you. I just hope that you guys out there represent a fair sampling of the public at large because there was a lot of very thoughtful feedback. It's especially nice to hear some of the personal stories. I may not want babies for me, but I love that other people are raising wonderful children, since, I hear, they are our future.*

Ok, back to normal posting, just as promised.
So, today's post is about the beautiful optim roving I got from Janel, some luscious carbonized bamboo, that Sachi sent me, and some great instruction from Spinning Spider Jenny, which I have employed rather poorly but enthusiastically.

The girls, of course, help me model my new yarn.

Everything came together for me, when Jenny posted about spinning from the fold. I've spun from the fold before and didn't have a problem with it, but I didn't really see why I would choose this method, over my normal method of spinning from the end of roving. It was when Jenny mentioned that spinning from the fold was a good option for very slippery fibers that I became excited. I had spun a bit of the bamboo before that, and had some trouble, but this changed everything. All of a sudden, my hard to control fiber was just gliding into place. I was smitten. Jenny, if I ever meet you in person, I may have to hug you. You've been warned.

After spinning up a bobbin of the carbonized bamboo, it occurred to me that I had a bobbin and a half of optim just waiting to be put to good use. I plied the two together, using Jenny's instructions for Plain Vanilla Two-Ply et voila, yarn.

I have about 238 yards of worsted weight two-ply yarn that should work up into a pretty, every so slightly variegated, tweedy gray fabric. The yarn is unbelievably soft to the touch and I'm pretty excited to knit it up into something special.

Tomorrow, Thea has her first Puppy Agility class. You can bet there will be pictures, if I can drag Leo along.

* Yes, I know that was corny, go tell it to Whitney Houston.

Thea had her first puppy agility class on Wednesday night. She is, at once, a keen learner and an unbridled maniac. The first class moved pretty slowly, with all the obedience refreshing and intro, but we did get to try the tunnel and the ladder on the floor.

I ask Thea to practice her beg up. She's getting better and better.

Thea did great, but wrangling her into submission between exercises has left me with quite the sore neck and shoulders. It's funny, because she's never such a bundle of excitement at home, but get her into a small space with lots of dogs and no chance to play and at nearly her adult size, she's a handful. I'm feeling it today.

Both of us listen intently to our instructor.

Our homework is to teach our pups to hit a target. This is in preparation for the obstacles like the teeter totter and a-frame, which require the dog to get at least one paw on a painted portion of the equipment. This ensures the dog doesn't leap off of the equipment from a dangerous height.

Queuing up for tunnel. I spent much of my time trying to contain her while we waited our turn.

I started training Thea, for about 10 minutes yesterday, followed up with training both girls today and they have it down, beautifully. I can throw the makeshift target on the floor, ask one of them to "mark" and that girl will touch the target with her paw. I love my smarty girls.

Thea had no trouble and gets a big cookie and lots of praise.

I'll be honing that new skill with them until Wednesday, when Thea will have to try to remember it in class. She hasn't had trouble generalizing training, yet. If I work something at home, she appears to understand that it applies everywhere, but we'll see. Sometimes the smartest dogs are the ones that throw the biggest surprises your way.

Thank you all for the concern and well wishes. We are all, thankfully, doing fine. We believe we've found a reliable mechanic (based on a couple testimonials from Leo's colleagues) and Stewie (the Element) is off to get fixed up.

It's weird sending your car off with a stranger. I am sure he thought I was insane but I decided to get shots of him and his vehicle and his plates, juuuuuuust in case he was a craze Element steeling maniac. You never know.

Between writing up my super secret Stitch Diva project and working on a couple other projects for a book, I've been putting El Matchador to work. Oooh baby.

While at the Fiber Frolic, I picked up 2 ounces of a cashmere and tussah silk blend from Fox Fire Fibers. This stuff is yum-ME (as in mememememememe give me more.) However, it is also a real challenge to spin. The silk fibers are substantially longer than the cashmere and, when spun from the end, all the silk gets drafted out first leaving a poof of cashmere.

I decided to try a 90 degree turn and see if that helped at all. Once again, spinning from the fold seems to have helped me coerce the fibers into submission. Instead of fibers flowing freely from the end, the folding seems to lightly link the fibers together, like those pop-up boxes of facial tissues. As fibers get drafted out, they bring more fibers with them. While the silk and cashmere may not have been perfectly distributed, with this method, they were far more so than when spinning from the end. That's as close to success as I can ask for.

The final yarn is luxurious and the color makes me positively hungry, it's so decadent.

Final Product
Content: Cashmere and Tussah Silk (quantities not specified)
Color: Summer Berries
From: Fox Fire Fibers
Quantity: 2 ounces/109 Yards
Singles: From the fold using a long draw technique
Plies: 3-ply using the Navajo plying method
WPI: Approximately 16
Results: The yarn is not perfect but I absolutely love it. The colors are rich and the feel is soft, silky and full of drape. I think this would make for a really fabulous hat, though if I had more, I'd gladly make a sweater from it. I'm curious to see how much the fabric pills and if the silk helps control that at all. The yarn bled substantially, when I washed the skein. I added just a touch of vinegar to the water, in hopes it might set the color a little more, but I can tell you, I won't be mixing this with any other yarn, in my finished knit piece, for fear of color contamination.

And in doggy news, guess what Leo got for the girls?

And hey, if we are ever homeless, this bed will be big enough for all 4 of us to sleep on.

So a friend of mine from many moons ago (hi Doug!), comment the other day that I should go look at the upcoming cover for Craft magazine, as I'd find something rather familiar there.

So wow, yah, it looks a lot like my Crime of Fashion scarf. Similar, but definitely different (the font, for sure, is different and the finishing as well.) I scratched my head a bit and went to their site, but couldn't determine if the pattern was inspired by mine or not and whether I should say something. Of course, only one thing to do, bug my friend Julia and ask her what she thinks, since Julia is always my sounding board, especially for all things knitterly. At the time, she found that there was already a link to MagKnits on their about page for the scarf, which suggested that they had seen my version, but no link to me. It's another week before the magazine is released so I wrote them.

Turns out that right before publication, they did, indeed, find my version and that I get a little shout out in the end AND, as you may now have noticed, they've added a link to me on that same about page.

How
Cool
Is
That?

I've also been spinning some more, while I work on my deadline projects. Remember that rather pathetic attempt at spinning Yak fiber? It was so soft and oh-so-ugly. While I was glad I was actually able to spin the fiber at all, I was hesitant to spin up any more of my Luxury Fiber of the Month goodies, for fear I'd just end up with 6 skeins of nearly useless novelty yarn. Well, I broke down and had my hand at baby camel down.

I spun 167 yards of of 3 ply, from the 2 ounces I have and am much happier with the results. I did slightly under spin it, so the yarn broke a lot as I was working the navajo ply. Pretty crazy, since I was using the super high speed whorl on El Matchador, but I guess those short, downy fibers, need a LOT of twist.

Even so, I'm happy and the camel down got itself a rinse and a royal whacking.

Final yarn pictures to come.

That's all for now, check out some pics of Thea's second agility class, here.

Thea sends a puppy kiss (or at least a cold nose in your ear) to each of you, Panda first.

Sure, my dogs live a good life. We don't bat an eyelash at driving and hour and a half to spend the day at the beach, just for them. And sure, we buy them high quality food and shower them with love and live with ungodly amounts of hair so that they might join us on the couch and bed, at their whim. Yes, it seems like the world is their oyster, but don't be fooled, these are some hard working girls.

Both Thea and Panda, showed their style, grace and excellent sit stays, in today's photoshoot.

That, my friends, is the unbelievably soft baby camel down of whacking fame.

Final Product
Content: Baby Camel Down
Color: Natural
From: Chameleon Colorworks
Quantity: 2 ounces/167 Yards
Singles: Spun using a long draw method, after gently fluffing the fibers.
Plies: 3-ply using the Navajo plying method.
WPI: Oh, 12-14. This is some lofty fiber, indeed. Fresh off the bobbins, the plied yarn was closer to 18 WPI, but everything just bloomed after the beating.
Results: I can't get over how soft this yarn is. Every time I touch it, iI want to drop everything and make something of it. The navajo plying didn't really go as well as I hoped. I don't think I put quite enough twist in the singles to carry it off successfully and I'm darn horrible at reattaching fiber when I've broken it. Something about controlling the loop, aligning the fibers and not losing all the twist in the singles, just eludes me. Does anyone have any handy dandy tips?

I don't think the yarn's a loss though. There are lots of good solid area and the little bits of ugly will be well concealed once knit up. I love this yarn.

If you aren't burned out on black and white doggies, you can see the pictures from our weekend adventures, over here.
Stewie (the car) is till out of commission, but we'd never let a little thing like that get in our way.

Today, I handed off the first draft of my super secret Stitch Diva project, which is a huge relief. Two projects down, 3 to go.

It's funny, when we got Panda, she was 9 months old and a very gentle and timid sort. You could give her a stern look and she'd tuck her tail and hide in a corner. Teaching her what is ours and what is hers was a breeze. She quickly learned, "leave it," and anything that was ever dubbed as such was unharmed.

Thea, she is much younger, much more confident and far less concerned with the repercussions of her mischief. She's a good girl, don't get me wrong, but she lives in the moment and runs a little fast and loose with the law of the house. One must be ever diligent to catch her before she slips up, which is why I have only myself to blame for this.

I closed the girls out of the office, during an important conference call, and when I came out, Thea had her handiwork on display. It's that delicious baby camel down that Thea so beautifully modeled, a little while back.

She tried to look sorry

But then something interesting passed by the kitchen window

As you can imagine, it was no small feat to untangle the mess, but the yarn was salvageable.

Only two breaks, leaving me with two small and one larger ball of yarn. So, while my three little balls might not be quite as good as my one larger skein, it could definitely be worse.

Now, tell me again about how lucky I am to have such well behaved little girls. I think I need a reminder. Oh wait, here's one.

Do you love mutts?

If so, LuvMutt is having a little contest for the best summer mutt pic. Both Panda and Thea are represented, but honestly, you should vote for whomever you like best of the bunch.

Head on over to vote now.

And if that isn't love enough, check out Goofy Dogs, a new site devoted to great pictures of dogs. Do you have a dog? Is your dog goofy? Send your pictures in and feel the love. Panda and Thea are there too!

You know I'm a happy doggy mum.

Our backyard is elevated slightly, and surrounded by a short rock wall. You can see what I mean here. Instead of taking the stairs up and down, to get to the grassy area, Panda likes to simply leap.

Well, yesterday, Panda misjudged the wall a bit and slammed her front paw very hard on one of the protruding rocks. She stopped dead in her tracks.

I called out, "Panda, are you OK?"

She looked at me, limped over to me, sat, and held her paw up. My heart just sank. She looked so so sad. Of course, I showered her with kisses and coos and scratched her head.

After determining that no bones were broken and that the cuts were largely just surface abrasions, I lead her back out, slowly, to do her business and then brought her in to take a closer look at the damage.

See those red marks? Poor thing. Just breaks my heart.

Leo suggested that this was as good an excuse as any to pack up the girls and take them to the beach. It would take Panda's mind off of any discomfort and they were really getting stir crazy, anyway.

Our first stop was in Manzanita. The wind was intense but that never phases the little ones.

We headed south, following the ocean, and ended up at Manhattan Beach. There was far less wind and we were able to find a nice spot to play fetch with the pups.

It was all fun and games until the little stink pot decided she'd rather run off and play with other people, instead of hanging out with us.

Leo had a talk with her...

But you know how adolescents can be.

After that, we decided to explore a bit more. We ended up at the Blue Heron French Cheese Company, which also boasted a petting zoo, wine tasting, chocolates and other sundries. We bought some cheese, wine and baguette, and headed back north, towards home.

But not before another detour to Manzanita...

As the sun was starting to set, Leo thought it would be fun to put some of our food to good use and suggested a picnic. We headed over to Cannon Beach, picked up a beach blanket, and caught the last few glimmers of daylight, over a couple sips of wine and cheese.

Since we had a bit of a drive, we didn't really have much wine, but we put a nice dent on the bread and cheese. YUM. And unlike So Cal, where you have to pay to use beaches that allow camp fires and late night picnics, Cannon Beach was alight with fires set by families keen to roast marshmallows and make the most of the gorgeous evening.

After it got dark, we reluctantly packed up for the trip home and we listened to Harry Potter XII doh! VII the whole way.

I would say that's a most excellent way to coddle a doggy's boo boo. See more pictures over at Flickr. Leo's already declared that we'll be doing many more beach picnics in the future.

I've been posting a lot of dog photos lately, mostly because I can't post much else, but look. I have crafting!

Remember those motifs I crocheted? I have been playing around with how to use them. I knew I didn't have enough of the motif yarn to make a whole garment, but I realized that the September Glow Cotswold and Silk yarn I spun, would look nice with the muted peach color of the motifs.

I think I want to make this into a skirt. I have quite a bit more of the Cotswold, that I can spin. I've played around with knitting and crocheting the skirt portion. Right now, the motifs are joined in such a way that they make a natural chevron, which is great for this subtly variegated yarn. I tried crocheting the skirt, but I wanted it to be a little softer and drapier, so I switched to knit instead.

It's actually really hard for me to post a this point, because I'm not totally sure I love it and I might very well rip the whole darn thing out if I'm not satisfied with the results, still, so far, it looks good enough that I feel I can share.

And aren't I doing well, not a doggy in sight.

Urm, well, yes, Thea did sneak her paw into that shot. You can see her little goth pinkie nail. But we aren't looking at puppies in this post, we're looking at handspun yarn working up into a skirt.

*Sigh* I'm sorry. I couldn't help myself. I mean, come on, that's funny, people. Even if you hate dogs. Plus, I think the color really brings out the pathetic expression plastered on Panda's face. Don't you agree?

Well, Thea had her last puppy agility class. The last two classes were the best classes she'd had. Instead of focusing on one obstacle and then getting back in line (waaaaay boring for a Cattle Dog mix) we actually worked a series of obstacles for each turn. Thea loved it. I think that being able to chain the obstacles, keeps her from over thinking it. It's just fun.

I'm not saying she was perfect, but she did a pretty darn good job for a 6 month old.

We're taking a short hiatus from school so that Thea can get spayed, but it was enough fun for both of us that I plan to sign us up for more.

I'm going to miss her classmates, some of whom you can see below.

In unrelated news, I'm thinking about redesigning the ol' website. My last redesign was in 2005 and while I like it fine, I've been thinking about a little change. I've done a couple of very simple sketches.

I think I want to go back to having a clean white background and simple graphics. I'm playing around now and will see if I can come up with something that makes me happy.

I'm guessing it's the latter.

Over and over again, I obviously need to be reminded that Thea is not Panda and probably won't ever be. In my nearly 6 years with Panda, I can think of only a couple of items she has destroyed before she learned that she could only have things that had been explicitly given to her, everything else was off limits. Brilliant, I know. We were spoiled.

Thea, she is loving and sweet and cute in so very many ways. But there are times.

That was 3 weeks ago. Except for an odd incident when I found her giving a hex wrench a taste, she's been as close to angelic as she's capable of being. Then, on Monday, Leo and I came home from dinner to this...

Brace yourself.

The Inox needle and clover stitch markers are destroyed. She seemed to mainly be interested in those and not the skirt itself. There are only one or two breaks in the yarn and areas where she has pulled out short sections of rows, repeatedly, down several inches, but not across the whole round. It salvageable but it'll be some time before I'm back to where I was.

I think the hardest thing is that my momentum for this piece has been (hopefully temporarily) quashed. A few hundred stitches, worked in stockinette chevron does not for exciting knitting make.

But just when I think I might actually be able to hold a grudge, she goes and makes cute at me again.

The yarn was broken in two places and all the knitting had to be ripped, but the skirt has been revived and I've even knit a few rows.

And lest you all think I hold any sort of grudge towards Thea, fear not. I could never be mad at her for my own poor planning. I do, however, love to give you all a good laugh, and I suspect that you all find Panda's guilty conscience even more humorous than Thea's mischievousness. If we could harvest just their best traits, we'd have one perfectly balanced pup and enough left over parts for one entirely neurotic dog.

Leo and I have put this labor day weekend to good use, if I do say so myself. Since we are renting a house, it's always a struggle to decide how much time and money we should invest in beautification of our humble abode. It's a great little place, but after years of being rented, there's a lot that has gone neglected. This is not the loving little first home, it was originally built to be, but a way point in the lives of folks like Leo and me. Still, never one to shy away from a little hard work, Leo has decided we should get things tidied up, so on Saturday and Monday, we shoveled, we weeded, we hauled masses of toppled brick and we planted a little flower garden that we hope we'll stick around long enough to see bloom once, and only once, before buying our own home. But Sunday, we put aside our shovels and spades and seeds and bulbs and packed up our car for a trip to Manzanita Beach.

On the way, we listened to Harry Potter and I got in a little knitting.

We were expecting some serious crowds at the beach, and places like Cannon Beach and Hug Point, were, indeed, crowded, but Manzanita proved to be an ideal spot. While there were many people, we never felt crowded or cramped.

The girls had a wonderful time and Thea is really starting to come into her own. Slowly, Thea is building her recall and we are able to keep her off leash for longer without incident. She's still so filled with social excitement that I wouldn't trust her implicitly, the way I do Panda, but she's proving to be a wonderful little girl.

After a quick stop over at Blue Heron to pick up some provisions, we went back to Manzanita and set up camp. We are currently conducting reconnaissance in preparation for a bigger excursion with our friends; Erica and Larry and Jackie and her pup Tulip.

See more pictures over at Flickr.

Leo won't call it, "getting her fixed," he calls it "breaking her." I call it, "getting her guts ripped out." You all probably just think of it as spaying.

Yes, we just dropped out sweet little Stinky McFartToots off at the vet and we are feeling the emptiness of the house and the little nagging anxiety that something could go wrong. It seems far too quiet and even Panda might admit she misses the little scamp.

Since Thea is a high energy girl who'll be laid out for a couple of days, we thought that it was an absolute necessity to give her a little fun on her last night before the surgery, so we took her to Puppy Agility.

We weren't able to go last week and the class dynamic has changed a bit, focusing less on individual obstacles and more on linking obstacles and handling tactics. Thea's feeling her adolescences and was a touch obstinate about the more boring bits and more focused on playing and running off and ignoring me.

Personally, that makes me feel the classes are all the more important for both of us, since it gives us a controlled environment to work through those issues.

And even though she wasn't perfect, we did have a great time.

Anyway, keep your fingers crossed for a complication free surgery and quick recovery. Keeping that little cattle dog contained enough not to pop her stitches may be an exercise in futility but luckily, I have tomorrow off and the weekend to do my best.

As you all knew would be the case, Thea is absolutely fine and shaking off the anesthesia as I type. We will be able to pick her up in a couple of hours and bring her home to convalesce.

Thanks for all the well wishes.

Panda and I both missed Thea something awful. She was sad and mopey, so I gave her lots and lots of kisses. She likes kisses.

Of course, Leo and I expressed our concern by calling the vet every hour for an update. Kudos to them for remaining pleasant each time. I like our vet.

Sitting in traffic and waiting for Thea to be brought out from the recovery area, was nerve wracking but just seeing her eyes, as bleary and unfocused as they were, was sunshine.

Leo carried the little one in from the car. Her pink bandage covers the spot where they put in her IV. It also matches her pink stitches. Nice touch.

Panda looked so happy to see Thea but realized right away that Thea wasn't herself and gave her space. We all went out for a wobbly potty break and Thea spent a little time trying to find a nice place to relax. She finally decided on the bed (with a little assistance up, of course.)

She stayed pretty quiet and calm through the night, though she's been a little rowdier this morning. The doctor prescribed her some sedatives, in case she needs them, but I'm still holding out hope she'll remain relatively calm. I'm a shameless optimist.

So thanks again for everyone's warm wishes and concerns. I'm still really new to having my dogs go under the knife and it's good to be reminded how commonplace it is.

Well, the same night we brought Thea home, she shook off the anesthesia and was ready to play. This was at about 4AM in the morning. We were only very slightly amused. Since then, it's been pretty futile trying to keep her calm. Even giving her a half dose of a sedative in the day and a full dose at night, she's pretty active. It seems to get her kind of high. That is, she walks a little goofy and seems pretty content just sleeping or obsessing over a raw hide bone, but it doesn't totally squelch her energy level altogether. She still will play at the drop of a hat. It looks like she's stretching the skin near her stitches a bit. I'm really really hoping she doesn't pop her stitches.

On the plus side, she hasn't been licking them. Small consolation, really.

It just kills me to have to sedate her, but since she'll hurt herself if she doesn't keep still, it appears to be the only recourse. Anyone have any good suggestions for putting a pup in suspended animation, while she heals?

One thing that does seem to calm her down is the sound of El Matchador. I've done a lot of spinning this weekend (more on that in a future post) and it usually lulls her to sleep.

She was particularly goofy after the first dose, I gave her. She was a touch wobbly, and then hopped up on the couch and reclined in this position for a good hour.

I figured that the dose was a touch too strong, so I cut her back to a half, for any daytime hours. The vet said that we might have to play with the dosage to get it just right.

In entirely unrelated news, we have a little mystery.

Leo found this leaf, with a rock and a q-tip on top of it, perched on the corner of our house. There's a little brick facade running along the bottom 3 feet of the house, that juts out a couple inches. Someone had placed the items there.

We are thinking that it was something the neighbor's kid made for us, but we haven't seen her around to ask. If so, it's a cute gesture, however, if it wasn't from a kid, the q-tip really creaps it up a notch, you know?

Here are the q-tip and back of leaf and rock. We placed them all in a bag, just in case.

We have no idea what the writing says, it's a little hard to read, but it sort of looks like the biggest words are, "The King."

Anyway, does anyone have any idea what could have been used, in conjunction with a q-tip (ie, a liquid) to produce the blue writing on the leaf? Hopefully, it's something totally benign.

You know how I said that spinning puts Thea to sleep? Well, that seemed as good an excuse as any to spend some quality time with El Matchador.

At first, I thought I'd just spin up enough of my Cotswold to have a skein ready when I run out on my skirt.

But once I plied the yarn and skeined it, I had, what appeared to be, a relatively small amount of fiber remaining, so I figured, what the heck, I'll spin up the rest.

The result is a skein that is 297 yards long and a second skein that is 217 yards long. Added to the 225 yards I already have, I have a total of [insert calculator here] 739 yards. That should be plenty to finish the piece.

Thea helped me with the photoshoot. It's nice that we can have both an out of focus AND poorly lit image. She's really an artiste.

I'm not going to do another whole round up of the yarn, since I've already done one here and it's the same, only different, or whatever. I will say that I continue to really enjoy spinning this yarn. It is well prepared, with only a little bit of vegetable matter and the colors are gorgeous.

In my next post, I start doing the spinning equivalent to making a gauge swatch. Good girl, Marnie, here's a cookie.

Quick question, would anyone out there be interested in some very basic tips for using Photoshop to adjust color and exposure in an image? I'm no expert and I sort of wonder if anyone who can afford Photoshop, already knows it well enough, not to need any help, but if folks are interested, I'd be happy to do a tutorial. Just leave a comment with your thoughts.

For the most part, when I spin, I grab my fiber, pick a whorl and go for it. I think this has worked out for me, largely because I tend to spin small quantities (generally around 2-4 ounces) and I have a pretty limited skill set and comfort zone with spinning. Even my last batch of fiber, which was closer to 7 ounces, came out pretty consistent despite my making little effort to check consistency along the way.

But, like the person who has reasonable success knitting patterns without making a gauge swatch, past successes do not mean future success. I've been holding onto a pound of fiber my parents got me, for over a year, awaiting a time when I felt I had the skill and patience to spin up the whole lot into enough yarn to make something substantial. I'm not sure that I've actually met either of those qualification but dammit, the fiber is gorgeous and I want to spin it.

Spurred on by Amy's great article in Knitty, I decided to try to approach this project with a semblance of a plan and, perhaps, some organization.

A while back, I ordered these Spinning Project Cards (I refuse to spell the last word with a "k" unless someone can give me a good reason for it being spelled that way) by mistake, thinking they were something else.

They are basically index cards with preprinted areas for information you might wish to include about your yarn. I don't think I'll be ordering them again. For the same price, one could buy a pack of 100 index cards and only include the info relevant for the project. I am not saying these are poorly designed. If you like the look of clean, unlined cards, and spin enough that you don't want to have to write out all the labels, this might be totally worth it for you, just not for me.

Even so, I had no normal index cards lying around and no need to waste these. Surprisingly, despite the myriad of fields preprinted, there didn't seem to be a spot to indicate the whorl used so I just slapped that info in wherever.

If all goes according to plan, I should be producing a 3ply yarn (off of three bobbins, not Navajo plying) that works up to, oh, 14-15 WPI. The fiber is corriedale in a beautiful deep olive shade.

So far, it's spinning up quite nicely. The fiber is well prepared and needs only minimal predrafting. We'll see how long I can spin a plain green fiber before I get bored. Luckily, I always have my spindles.

In doggy news, Thea seems to be healing up well enough. She's still a bundle of energy and I think I'll be as excited to be able to let her play as she will.

Our vet is quite awesome. Check out what we got in the mail yesterday:

They took a picture of the little girl, before her surgery and printed out this lovely award. If you click the image, you can go to flickr and find a higher resolution version. Check out the text below the Vet's signature.

We pulled the crate out of the bedroom for use when the two of us have to leave the girls unattended. Theoretically, the crate should be for Thea, when she needs some quiet time.

Panda, however, seems to think it's all hers. Could you say no to that face?

As for the Photoshop tutorial, it sounds like there's enough interest that it's definitely worth my doing it. Getting stuff together, I'm thinking I may have to break it out into a couple smaller, more digestible pieces. Hopefully, the first tutorial will be posted by the end of the week.

Our car, Stewie, is back home after being in the body shop for over a month. It's good to have him back, and the shop did a really fabulous job, both dealing with the insurance company and repairing the damage.

Thea has been healing up beautifully

When we give her meds, we wrap them in peanut butter. She finds it both delicious and infuriating, with its tenancy to stick to the roof of her mouth. I find this amusing. I might, possibly, maybe, tend to squish the peanut butter up on the roof of her mouth, maybe, just to make it last a little longer. I might also be a horrible horrible person.

Actually, we've taken her off the sedatives, but we do still give her a little peanut butter just because she loves it so.

Both girls got some extra special treats from Leo.

Both approve...heartily.

However, not to be indelicate, but we have been experiencing a steady flow of eye watering, paint peeling, make a grown person cry level of excess "air" from the little one. I really can't express just how bad it's been. I'm declaring an embargo on all future purchases of this treat. While the rawhide/pork combo appealed to the girls more than almost any treat we've gotten, the consequences have been too brutal to re-live.

Your mileage may vary.

It seemed about time to move the skirt to some waste yarn and see how it's coming along. I have mixed feelings

• The crochet: I think the motifs are cute and hang nicely.
• The colors: While I don't usually buy these colors for myself, I think they are lovely and the colors compliment each other nicely.
• The chevrons: Who doesn't like chevron? It breaks up the horizontal nature of the subtly variegated yarn.

Things I don't like:

• Yarn choice: I feel like the main yarn should be a little drapier. I don't feel there's enough weight to the piece to pull off the effect I'm envisioning


• Skirts: I don't wear skirts. What the hell am I thinking?


• Shape: Would a-line instead of straight have been better?

I'll probably finish the piece, just to see how it comes out, but I'm starting to think there may have been a better project for these yarns.

On the plus side, I should have 300 or more yards of the main yarn leftover when I'm done. What will I do with it? I dunno. I'll have it nonetheless.

I've been spinning bits of the Corriedale, here and there. It's been quite relaxing and mindless.

I'm annoyed, though, with my Woolee Winder. It's great, don't get me wrong, but it really upsets my sense of balance that it doesn't load the yarn evenly. Some of it appears to be that the whorls from Schacht aren't perfectly machined. There's an ever so slight gap, but I'm realizing that it's not enough to account for the severity of the imbalance.

Has anyone else who has a Woolee Winder seen this and if so, is there a way to fix it?

Oh and Thea had her stitches taken out and has been taking full advantage of the ensuing belly rubs.

It's so nice to be back to normal. We went for our first hike since Thea's surgery and it was beautiful.

The air in Portland has gotten a nice coolness that makes exercising and hiking, a real pleasure. The leaves are just starting to turn and the skies have been partly cloudy, which suits my light sensitive eyes, just fine.

We decided to keep our adventure local and hit MacLeay park again. On our last hike there, we hit the lower trail. It's a relatively easy hike down and then a mostly flat hike to the end which is paved and handicapped accessible.

On this trip, we hit the Upper MacLeay trail which intersects a myriad of other trails. I have a feeling we could do a month of weekend hikes and never take the same route twice. The trail proved to be a nice little workout for the lot of us.

The girls were antsy to get started.

And Leo needed to get the GPS set and grab the bear grade pepper spray

But once we got started, we all admired the sights.

There was one moment when Leo thought he was going to have to actually use his pepper spray.

I'm not sure if their intention had ever been to do more than make a little scene, but it all could have ended pretty unpleasantly if we hadn't diffused the situation. Leo and I both got between her dogs and ours and Thea eventually won everyone over with her cuteness.

The owner never did bother to come over and get her dogs, she just stood a block away and called them. I find that rather disconcerting, but perhaps I'm a touch over protective.

In the end, it all ended up fine and Thea was more worn out than we've seen her in weeks.

See the rest of the pictures, over in my flickr set.

When we moved into this house, just over a year ago, the garden was in pretty bad shape. Take a look.

Since then, we've done some serious work. We removed the flower bed wall that had fallen down, leveled the dirt, and put in a little black fence.

We also planted tons of bulbs and wildflower seeds. Unfortunately, a lot of what we planted over the past couple of months, appear to be annuals so we're not sure how many flowers we'll see before they're all gone. There are some perennials too, which should hopefully flourish after winter.

After much hand wringing our first buds have appeared.

The plants obscure a little of the view out the front window, but that didn't stop Panda from seeing a trespasser. Can you see him?

The rosebush in front has produced a second round of blooms for us. And you know what looks great with pink? A little black and white.

Now, THAT'S purdy.

A little while back, I posted this picture and lamented that my WooLee Winder wasn't filling evenly.

It's going to take some fine tuning, but I'm definitely seeing improvement.

The skirt is progressing. After taking this photo, I threw in a lifeline and am now deciding how I want to work the chevrons into flat stitches. The key is not only making smooth transition from the zigzag to flat, but also adjusting the gauge which changes from 8 stitches per inch in chevron to 6 stitches per inch flat.

And look, my garden gave me another bloom. I am pleased.

I don't know how obvious it is to you, but I think we have two different varieties of Cosmos here. The smaller flower actually has slightly different shaped petals than the bigger one. I may be totally wrong but since we dumped several different mixes of seeds here, I think it's possible.

And finally, I'll be posting an interview with Donna Druchanus at the end of the month. I'm day 23 of her blog tour. I'm about halfway through the book now and gathering my questions.

I've worked with Donna before and am really looking forward to the interview. Expect lots of questions about the book and her travels and maybe some little tangents into her other interests. I just hope that I'm able to come up with questions she hasn't already answered a million times.

Boy do I love life lines. I've used this one a couple times, but by Jove, I think I've got it. Some of the mishaps may have been caused by watching an episode of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Man, that show is funny, and distracting.

Here's a closeup of the lifeline, subsequent filler stitches and Thea's paw.

Here's a view of the whole skirt so far. There's only one spot in the house that gets much natural light and it's where Thea and Panda's bed resides. They seem to find it curious that the spot also becomes my photo studio, some days.

Tomorrow, I fly down to the greater San Fransisco area for a quick meet up with the owner of Stitch Diva Studios. We're finishing up another project together. That's all I can tell you for now, but I hope there'll be a sneak preview up in the near future.

It was rainy most of this morning so I thought I'd only have crappy indoor shots to show you.

Or pictures of the piece being blocked

A closeup of the waistband facing might be interesting

But we got a bit of sun and I was able to take some better shots.

With a little help from my friends

Thank you all for your very kind words, sympathies, stories and thoughts. I've read every comment twice and they make me remember how lucky I am to have family that loves me and whom I love in return.

It's the wet season, here in Portland and the weekend was mostly rainy and overcast, interspersed with beautiful sunny moments. It suited my contemplative mood.

On Saturday, we took the girls for a walk around our neighborhood and enjoyed the fall foliage. I think the cost of having dogs should be covered by medical insurance. Panda and Thea never cease to make me laugh, no matter the circumstances.

On Sunday, we headed to Cannon Beach, for a breakfast of Crabcakes Benedict and a long run on the beach. It was a bit cold and rainy, which didn't make for great photos, but the girls couldn't have been happier and the evening of quiet and calm snuggling on the couch meant that everyone was feeling peaceful.

I guess for me, losing someone ultimately makes me more resolved to value those who are still with me and I think this weekend suited that goal.

I have lots of less depressing stuff to blog soon, including a new knit in progress, and interview with Donna Druchunas, and some more photos of Giselle.

Lots more pictures of Giselle, including the cropped version, over here.

See some beautifully retouched photos here.

Leo has been making jack-o-lanterns and I have been toasting the seeds.

The pirate is getting a little long in the tooth, after a week outside. The orange one is new. It weighed almost 40lbs before being gutted. That's how much each of the pups weigh.

If the weather stays relatively mild, we'll be getting a lot more cosmos.

The bees like em

Is there anything sweeter?

It is probably obvious that over the last year I have worked on some rather time consuming projects. I have several as yet unveiled ones as well as the Poet Coat and Giselle.

Something hit me this weekend and I just needed to knit a sock. As a general rule, I'm not much for knitting socks, though there are obviously some exceptions, but this weekend, it just felt like the right project and it is more portable than my larger secret project has become.

Stats

I did a few things that might not be totally standard. I worked the toe in a smaller needle than the rest of the sock because the gauge of the stockinette toe is so much wider than the twisted stitch pattern. The smaller needles weren't to match the gauge, just to make it a little more even.

And I decided to forgo the reinforced heel flap that most people like. I realize it's more functional to do a standard slipped stitch heel flap, but I just never liked how it interrupted the flow of the stitch pattern on a sock.

Both motifs, on the sock, can be found in Barbara Walker's stitch dictionaries but I made some modifications to both. The main motif required a substantial overhaul while the side motif was just changed so that it would have the same number of rows in each repeat as the main motif.

I think my only concern with this design is that anyone with even slightly shapelier legs than my own, will need some shaping at the calf. Luckily, I've thought about how to handle that and will be putting shaping instructions in the pattern.

Oh, did I not mention that I plan to write a pattern for this? Yah, I do.

I haven't posted any doggy pictures in a while. Shame on me.

Ms. Panda looking gorgeous.

Thea bringing the puppy eyes.

Both girls playing in the backyard on a foggy morning.

Thea in her Total Recall class. Lots more pictures here.

And on an unrelated note, check out this spider web I spied waaaaay up in a tree in my front yard.

We drove to Mt. Hood today.

A truly fabulous outing.

See all the pictures here.

With puppy chaser at the end.

I recently posted the shameful state of a piece I was working on, for a book. When last we saw this project, I had detached the sleeve, from below the cap, held it on a spare needle and ripped back the sleeve cap, so that I could remove the extra rows from one of the front sections of the garment.

After fixing the front, I picked up and reknit the sleeve cap.

I cut a tail long enough to go around the sleeve about 4 times. Aligning the sleeve with sleeve cap, I started grafting.

Every few inches, I took a look at the row of grafting to assess the tension.

To fix, I just use my tapestry needle to ease the yarn out towards the unworked stitches.

The work went pretty quickly. Here, I'm nearly done.

Once all was done, the work looked pretty much good as new.

Let's close this out with that puppy chaser I promised.

See all the pics from our trip to the beach on Sunday, here.

The other day, we went to the grocery store to get t-day supplies. The thing is, the meat section smelled liked an outhouse. We decided not to get a turkey there. We meant to get one elsewhere, but that didn't happen.

That's OK, because we didn't really think we'd be cooking on the holiday. Instead, we made plans to meet up with some of our friends for some fun on the beach with the pups.

The day was perfect. The sun was shining, the air was crisp and cool and without any wind. Lovely day. The only problem is that Panda was getting over a cold and Leo decided that we couldn't risk her getting worse.

Larry, Erica, Leo, Thea, and I, made our way to the Oregon coast. We started our day with breakfast. I, of course, had the Crabcakes Benny.

Then, we headed over to Seaside for a bit of fetch.

Larry threw the squirrel.

Leo threw the squirrel.

Erica threw the squirrel.

Thea started to slow down some, until she met this beautiful dog, Cocoa.

We headed up to Ecola State Park and saw an Elk along the way.

At Ecola, we enjoyed the scenery.

I don't think it gets much more beautiful than this.

Before we called it quits, we dropped by Manzanita, to ensure a thoroughly pooped pup.

We met the first dog ever who didn't fall madly in love with Thea.

There are tons more pictures over here, if you want to see them.

After a little more play, we all headed home, with a quick stop for coffee and pie on the way. Once home, I cooked up some mashed potatoes and stuffing, to round out the day. Hey, I told you it was a totally traditional Thanksgiving.

Hope that wherever you are, you had as lovely a day as I did. Next time, though, I want Panda there too.

There really are days when I want to trade her in for a guinea pig or maybe a German Shepherd, heck, there are days when I'd probably trade her for a nice piece of chocolate. For instance, you could have gotten a very nice deal on a slightly used, definitely broken, Cattle Dog mix, last week.

The scene:
Green cream filling everywhere. One might assume it's another eviscerated toy.

One would be wrong

Nothing to do but break out the sewing kit.

Poor franken-bed.

I guess I'd never appreciate just how good Miss Panda is, if it weren't for her devilish little sister.

Of course, it's always the bad girls who get all the love. You can see some of Thea's other handiwork over at Goofy Dogs.

And lest you think I'm boxing her up and shipping her back to the factory for a refund, fear not. She'll always be my sweet little demon.

One might be a basket case

I wanted to sit next to Panda but there was no room on the bed.

The other is channeling her inner long haul trucker.

Breaker Breaker 1-niner. Just passed a brown paper bag by the chew 'n choke in Cow Town. Don't feed the bears. Catch ya on the flip flop. Over and out.

And feel the love.

Panda is today's Grown-Up Daily Pup.

*Sigh* I had so much fun this weekend that I'm all the more sad it's Monday. On Friday, Leo and I watched bad movies while I spun up my batt of sparkly BFL that I got from Amy back at the Fiber Frolic, in Maine.

Photos never do sparkly things justice, so take my word for it, when I say it looks lovely without being garish, almost like it was lightly sprinkled with silver dust. I spun the singles up and then plied it into a 3-ply using the Navajo plying method. The photos are pre-wash and thwack. I have about 98 yards of approximately DK weight yarn. I will definitely work this into something, but what, I'm not sure.

On Saturday night, we celebrated a friend's birthday by going out for dinner and playing pool...very very poorly. If any of you watch the American version of The Office, it's like when Kelly and Pam played ping-pong. That certainly didn't take away from the fun.
Actually, it probably made it more fun. The best part is, I got to flip off a hummer.

Awesome.

If that weren't all good enough, on Sunday, we packed up the girls (who were feeling plenty stir crazy with all the rain we've gotten) and headed to Mt. Hood for a good hike in the snow.

See all the pictures here.

I finished Astoria.

If I hadn't flubbed the sleeves, the first go around, I probably could have finished this baby in a week.

Most setbacks slow my momentum substantially, and this was no exception, but since this piece is one of those ubiquitous top-down raglans, there was no reason not to finish it up. Almost all the work was already done, and having tried it on, I was sure it was a design I'd enjoy wearing.

The finished piece looks just like I hoped. The body darts allowed me to get a good custom fit and I think the wave motif pops nicely against the deep gray and purple.

And for all of you voyeurs, here's a look at the garments naughty bits.

I ended up with plenty of leftover yarn, after the piece was done. I could have made the sleeves much longer but I didn't think it would look right with the length of the garment. Like Goldilocks would say, this seemed "juuuuuust right."

For those who might ask, and several of you have already, I'm not sure if I'll offer a pattern. Right now, I'm just happy to have a deadline associated with this. We'll see. It's simple enough that it might be worth it to write something up.

On an, arguably, unrelated note, you see those jeans up there? I like them. They fit me well. You see how, in that top left shot, they sit on my hips, near the hem of Astoria? Those are considered a high waisted cut. Can you believe that? When did our waistlines get so low that 3 inches below my belly button is high waisted? Or is my torso so freakishly long that there isn't a mom-pant alive that can pass my hip bone? Let me tell you though, it's nice to wear a pair of pants that doesn't threaten to show the world my knees from a bird's eye view. You know?

All that merry and happy stuff for whatever it is you want to be merry and happy about.

The girls, Leo and I will be enjoying a Merry Christmas of no obligation and, perhaps, a little hiking. Who could ask for a better present?

Christmas day, we slept in late, then donned our winter wear for another trip to Mt Hood National Forest.

But our first stop wasn't for hiking, it was to put chains on the tires.

We found a trail we hadn't been to before and began our hike. Leo and the girls went bounding off the trail for a little run and all found themselves hip deep in snow.

But Thea and Leo had a bit more struggle with it.

I don't think these other pictures need captions, except to say we had a most wonderful time.

See lots more pictures here. Hope your Christmas was just as lovely.

Some of you might remember a certain little beast doing quite a job on my old niddy noddy. The poor thing was cut down savagely in the prime of its life. I probably could have sanded it down, refinished it and put it back to use, and, who knows, maybe I will someday, but it certainly hasn't happened yet and I don't see myself doing it anytime soon, so I've been using my leg as a niddy noddy since then, or just winding right off the bobbin, onto the ball winder.

But between you, me and the lamppost, I'd been wanting a longer niddy noddy. The short one is fine for what I can spin off a spindle, but off the wheel, I knew I wasn't getting an accurate yardage count because I'd have to wrap the yarn around the noddy so very many times, that it would bulge out substantially.
Plus, these Kromski niddy noddies are really a pretty good price.

And what's that pretty skein up there, you ask?
Why, it's some more of the fiber from my Almost Solid Sampler pack. I grabbed three shades in two fibers,
BFL in Hosta
Corriedale in Delphinium
and
Corriedale in Juniper Berry

The camera doesn't show the blues very accurately. The middle bobbin is like a dusty indigo color while the outer bobbins are a little less saturated but similar in hue to what you see.

I got about 130 yards of all three colors combined and then another 20 or so yards of just the two outer bobbins combined and maybe 3-4 yards of just the green yarn. You can see the streak of very green color in the finished skein.

Embiggening the photo should allow you to see the individual colors of the skein a little better.

Also

Have you all missed me? Well, you probably haven't quite noticed I was gone, but I have been. Last Friday, in the wee hours of the morning, we packed up the car, the dogs and plenty of provisions, and headed out for a road trip.

ROAD TRIP!

I decided it would be a bad idea to announce, for all the world to see, that our house would be vacated for 5 whole days. I would have loved to have blogged along the way, but wiser heads prevailed.

When I have the energy, I'll upload our photos and regale you with some stories. But, for now, I'm too tired to put it all together into something coherent. Until then, I'm sending warm new year's wishes to all of you. Here's hoping yours was even half as spectacular as ours.

In the oh-so-wee hours of Friday morning, long before the sun was even thinking of rising, we packed our last few items into the car and headed towards the Oregon Coast. This would be Thea's first and Panda's longest road trip and we wondered how the two girls would fare. Both had been known to suffer from motion sickness and Thea still struggles with her house breaking. This could turn out to be a messy trip, indeed.

For the month preceding the trip, Leo and I plotted and schemed. We knew we wanted to spend New Year's Eve in San Francisco, and Leo had the week of Christmas, and the following Monday and Tuesday off. How best to use that time without breaking the bank? We decided to do a two day, scenic drive to San Francisco, 3 nights in the city and then the fastest drive home on Tuesday. For accommodations, while on the road, we'd rely on our ample supply of camping gear and our boxy little car, Stewie.

We arrived at the Oregon Dunes, just as the sun was rising, exactly as we had hoped.

Of course, we let the girls out for a run.

The weather would be the best we'd see that day, overcast and a bit chilly, but not more than a mist of precipitation.

As we continued to work our way down the coast of Oregon, we found many lovely little spots to stop and take in the scenery.

And whenever we could, we stopped to let the girls run around.

As we crossed the border to California, we entered the first of several Redwood forests. Redwoods, if you aren't aware, are rather large trees, overall. This sign seemed redundant to us

But who could ignore it?

Guess what we found at the end of the short trail?

A big tree! No kidding.

As the sun set, we found ourselves in Eureka, California, which, incidentally, doesn't look anything like it does on that TV show. Much like my last road trip with Julia, we were between several redwood forests and we had to carefully weigh the benefits of making more time versus the disappointment of missing the beautiful sights. With Julia, though, our problem was that there were no open motels when we were ready to quit. With Leo, it's that none of the stops were just right.

Finally, after much poo-pooing we found a place that was just right. A sweet little RV campground with several festively decorated cabins.

We rented an RV spot, and I took the girls for a walk while Leo struggled through torrential rain and pitch blackness to get the car set up for the evening. Thea has never pottied on a leash before and despite much coaxing and encouraging, she wasn't in a mind to start that night. For Leo's part, he was doing his best to avoid getting everything we owned soaked while attempting to set up the car for the night. Normally, in an Element, you can lay each front and back seat flat to produce two long single beds. We had an air mattress to lay over it and a doggy bed to put on the side. However, having over packed and with too much rain to leave much outside, only the back seats could lie flat, which meant Leo had to place the air mattress over much of our stuff. A little unlevel, but better than sleeping sitting up.

With a passable sleeping arrangement in order, we threw in two wet dogs and a few blankets, and were in business. Yah, try to contain your envy. As we dug out some snacks and put a DVD into the laptop, something happened and we heard a hiss.

I think you know what's coming. We popped a hole in the air mattress. Thea's crate, in it's broken down mode, had some sharp little points, which, having done their business with the mattress, were now digging into our legs. This was an unexpected turn of events. We figured we would simply have to face the long night ahead, until we remembered that Leo is always prepared. Queue the MacGyver theme music.

A few snips to a vinyl glove, some super glue and a minute's wait and we had a perfect fix.

As long as Thea managed to hold her bladder for the night, we just might get a half decent sleep.

Find out if we did, in the next installment.

After making a very painful attempt to watch I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry, we tucked everything away, and curled in for bed.

The rain was relentless, drumming on the roof without pause. And it was cold. Not frostbite cold, but definitely cold enough that we all huddled together. And who was the star of the huddle? Thea. Seriously, that girl should come in every camping survival kit. She didn't care how much I tossed and turned, all she wanted was to sleep curled up, like a cat, in the crook of my stomach and she was like my own little furnace. At one point, I woke up to her shivering and I tucked her in under the blankets with me.Cute little monkey.

We all woke up a little achy but totally rested and no one had an accident. Awesome. Heck, I'll take smelling a little of wet dog over the possible alternatives.

The sun was just peeking through the heavy cloud cover, as we arose. It was pretty spectacular watching the scenery unfold through Stewie's sunroof. I took the girls for a walk and, we even got an on-leash pottie. Will wonders never cease?

With the car packed, the sun up and the family rested, it was time for more scenic driving. According to our map, we were quite a bit more than halfway to our destination. Our goal that day was to continue following the ocean until we reached San Francisco, and then head straight to the hotel, unpack and get us some of the crab that Leo has been pining for.

The rain had lightened a bit and left behind a thick shroud of fog. Dreamy.

We were peckish, but decided to hold off on lunch when we reach this sign.

Ooh, a drive through tree. I've heard of this. Relieved of five of our dollars we made our way to the tree.

Hmm

Yah, we don't fit. This sign appears to have employed some artistic license.

Still cool tree.

Off we go to find the girls a place to run off some of their pent up energy.

The great thing about bad weather is that we get the beaches nearly to ourselves. The girls, they were happy.

Slowly, the lack of blood sugar started to sink in, and I began to become, let's say, a bit touchy. I was ready to find some food. We were hoping for a nice sit down meal, nothing that comes from a drive-through. We passed several perfectly acceptable little cities and I grew increasingly, er, touchy, but Leo assured me that those exits simply wouldn't do. When I had nearly reached the point where I was considering lobbing his arm off and consuming that, we saw a sign for a "business district" for a town we had not heard of before. It seemed as good a place to turn as any, and so we wound our way into the quaint little city of Mendocino.

This place was perfect. Exactly what we wanted.

We sat down at a cute hotel restaurant, ordered some soup and sandwiches, and a touch of coffee, and felt renewed. On the way to the restaurant, I had even seen a little LYS. Everything was 20% off so Leo and the girls went for a walk while I went for a little spend. I was surprisingly restrained, all things considered.

Still, we assumed, very much on scheduled, we headed off for the last leg of our trip.As we cruised down the 101, we looked forward to the point when we'd meet up with Route 1 and get to the really beautiful sights.

Now, Leo and I have driven every inch of the 101 and 1 from Mexico to San Francisco. We are well aware of the fact that much of 1 winds snakelike through canyons, yet we had still convinced ourselves that the 800 miles down the 101 were a good means of estimating our last 200 miles on Route 1. We had visions of arriving in San Francisco, even before our 3PM check-in time. Awesome.

We soon found ourselves creeping carefully around the hairpin turns and soggy roads. The car seemed to sway, just tempting the girls to expel their full tummies. The sights? Oh, gorgeous.

But the sun soon began its decent, and those foggy and twisty roads proved quite the white knuckle slalom towards what I simply KNEW was certain death. With 100 miles left to go, minimal visibility and top speeds of 30 mph, it began to feel like we'd never get our crab before the restaurant closed shop for the evening.

The girls never made a peep, never had an accident and remained absolutely angelic the whole time.

We did stop to give them a break

But they seemed as ready to get to the hotel as we.

Finally, at nearly 8PM, we rolled into the hotel parking lot and began unloading and setting up. The girls just seemed happy to be on terra firma again and Leo and I were happy to get a shower and change of clothes.

We even made it in time to get some dinner. Fried artichoke hearts for me, and Leo, well, he got crabs, no cream required for this affliction.

YUM. And did you notice a certain hat making a cameo?

A little live music at Joe's and then we went back to walk the girls and go to bed. Ahhhh, what a day.

Can you stand some more? Another installment soon.

Ahh, San Francisco. If we could pick any city in the US, in which to live, it'd probably be here. This is not to say that we don't love Portland, because we do, but there is just something about San Francisco.

We arrose relatively early on Sunday morning and decided to reward our good little girls with a walk in the park.

We spent a couple hours frolicing in the park and the girls had a fantastic time. Even Panda let loose a little in her own reserved way. The folks in the park were just delightful too.

Once we'd exhausted the girls throuroughly, we dropped them off at the hotel, and went out for lunch. Guess what Leo wanted.

There's only so much butter and garlic soaked, and fried food I can handle, so I opted for a salad instead.

Mmm

Oh, and look who joined us for lunch

It's good ol' COF. San Francisco is a great place for knitwear.

Being Sunday, we didn't have grand expectations for nightlife options, but it turned out that riiight down the street from where we were staying was a cute little bar called the Voodoo Lounge. We ordered a couple filthy martinis, and, to Leo's delight, we got to play some poker.

We both lost. The big winner was the bartender.

After losing we headed back to the hotel, all of 100 feet away, and tucked into bed. The girls seemed glad to see us.

The next day, New Year's Eve, we decided to devote solely to relaxation and spending time with the pups.

It looked a lot like this, plus some walks and a quick breakfast at a neighboring cafe. There might also have been some knitting. More on that in a future post.

When evening rolled around, we showered and got purdy. There was a moment of panic when I realized the shoes I brought to go with my dress were busted, and that we forgot to pack my wrap, and the nylons I had gotten came with a hole. Oy! Luckily, I'd brought a more casual, but still appropriate alternative outfit. Rolling with the punches, baby.

We made a reservation at a restaurant we had passed a bazillion times but never entered, called Bobo's. Turns out it's owned by the same folks who make his favorite crab AND they specialize in Leo's other favorite food, steak. I appologize to all my vegitarian friends out there, this may make you queezy, but for us, this meal was extrodinary.

We started with iron skillet roasted muscles and some lobster soup, and followed it with a petite filet for me and a bone in filet for Leo and a crab. Great googily moogily, so good and so much food. We finished the meal with a cup of espresso and then popped back over to the hotel room to brush our teeth and give the girls a little taste.

Happy New Year to THEM.

For the celebration, we headed over to Leo's favorite Cigar Bar for some live music, mojitos and, of course, a cigar. When midnight rolled in, we had a big smooch and a glass of bubbly. Perfect.

But the night wasn't over. We made a quick walk to the waterfront to catch a few fireworks, caught a cable car, and then walked back to the hotel.

And the walk back? Only the better part of about 4 miles...in heels.

We were good, and kept the alcohol consumption minimal and ended the evening relatively early, so we could check out and start our drive back home the next morning. We took the 101, up to wine country, crossed over through Napa Valley to catch the 5 in Scramento, and made it home in 12 short (ha!) hours. I think we were all glad to be back home, even if we were pining for more crab.

I can't wait to do it again.

I'm embarrassed to admit that we have not done a doggy outing since our New Year's Eve road trip. And weather has been quite rainy here which means we really haven't done much of anything outside. The girls? They were pretty stir crazy.

We were long overdue for a run on Cannon Beach, but not before stopping at our favorite breakfast locale for some crabcakes benny. Mmmmm, tastes like heart disease. Some folks can't turn down sweets, I can't turn down hollandaise sauce.

Next to our booth was placed an interesting little item. What do you think?

For the low low price of $195, American, you too can own this ceramic center piece. We decided to pass on it.

Once we were sated, Leo brought a little bit of bacon and eggs out to the girls while I settled the bill. We were off to haystack rock.

Because it was such a beautiful day, the beach was just teeming with happy people and lots of pups. The waves were churning and the squirrel was a-flying.

Thea fell in love with Cocoa, a cutie with a penchant for, um, let's call it "asserting himself" upon her. This was her first time dealing with such a pushy pup, and we were pleased to see that she handled herself well; setting boundaries without holding any grudges.

Cocoa and Thea played for a long time, and Panda begrudgingly allowed him to join in with fetch, though when he attempted to get too friendly with Panda, she didn't hesitate to put him in his place. He didn't try that again. I'm pretty sure he said something about a "party poopers."

Eventually, Cocoa's parents had to leave, but we continued to enjoy the gorgeous day.

If you aren't going to be able to get to the beach every weekend, you gotta make the visits count.

It was wonderful having sun after so many rainy weekends.

When the girls were finally showing the merest hint of slowing down, Leo decided we should walk over to Haystack Rock and do a little tide-pooling

The anemones were all vivid pinks and shocking greens, and if you looked really carefully, you could find a few starfish hiding under rocks.

But all good things must come to an end, and as the clouds darkened the sky a bit and the temperature started to drop, we knew we'd have head home.

Our last sight, before leaving the coast was a few elk grazing lazily along the side of the highway.

The girls slept the whole way.

There was some knitting too. I'll post about that soon.

Lookie what one of Santa's elves delivered the other day.

Belated has never been so fantastic. Great googily moogily, I've been pining after this book for a while. It's no small feat to track this little gem down and to get a signed copy to boot, just makes me all the more lucky.

In the simplest terms, the method described has you configure your wheel and position your hand and fiber in a certain way so that the tension and twist coming from the wheel, simply pulls the fiber from your hand. The resulting yarn has just enough twist to hold together. This offers the most softness and works best done very quickly. Speed and Softness!

Of course, reading about it and executing it are two entirely different things. To start with, you are encouraged to find a good, medium length fiber with impeccable preparation. After learning the fundamental one can respond to other types and preparations of fiber with additional techniques, but first, I needed to unlearn what I've been doing.

I started by predrafting some Cotswold. I bought my fiber from Nistock Farms, who send lovely lofty batts of beautifully dyed fiber. After about 20 minutes, I had this.

Soft? Yes. Speedy? Si. Well spun? Non.
But not too bad for a first attempt. This is about 30 yards of two ply thick and thin yarn. I really had to ply this yarn because parts of the singles are so under spun, they couldn't possibly hold up on their own, to any sort of knitting or crocheting.

For attempt number two, I decided to try a bit of my Almost Solid Sampler. I used some wool blend, in colorway, Merigold.

This time, things didn't go so well. The singles were so underspun, they wouldn't even hold up to being worked into an Andean plying bracelet. It was fast and very soft, but definitely not successful.

After talking with the elf a bit, she mentioned my hand carders. At her suggestion, I carded up some rolags with another wool blend from my sampler.

The colorway is Azalea, and it's a pretty purpily mauve shade. Working with carded fiber made the process loads easier.

The resulting 68 yard skein is more even, a bit finer and just as soft.

I still have a long way to go with this technique, but I'm happily drinking the kool-aid, here. I can see how this would be a great method to master.

In other news, two pups can fit in one wee little bed, if they put their mind to it.

Leo got us snow shoes in hopes they'd help us keep up with the girls. You know what that means, right? It's time for another hike.

We couldn't have picked a more challenging day to try out those snow shoes. The temperatures were just around the freezing mark, maybe a little bit warmer, so the snow was sticky, wet and great for such activities as snowball fights, snow men building and fort construction. Still, it produced the most unusual snow formations atop the trees. Check this out.

Could that look any more like a bird's head?
For some reason, we found it exceedingly entertaining when Leo would risk his own safety and shake some of the smaller trees.

And when I didn't properly catch the first dense block of compacted snow, hitting him on the head, he thought we should do it again.

And check this out.

Panda and Thea walking right OVER Leo as he sticks his torso through a hole in this snow formation. Yes yes yes, we know that's not the most brilliant of plans, but it does make for a good picture.

We may have found it hard to hike this wet snow.

It wasn't all laughs and good times. We've been up to the trails of Mt Hood a few times, and we've found that Oregonians are pretty welcoming of happy dogs. It's not unusual for playful pups to come careening around corners to play with our girls and vice versa. Unfortunately, this Saturday, we met the first person who did not share that puppy goodwill. Apparently, her dog was a little aggressive, so she had her dog on leash and when Thea went over to say hi, it caused the woman much consternation.

An angry woman in red, mutters as she walks by Leo and Thea.

Leo grabbed Thea, to restrain her and as the woman walked by Leo, she let off with a string of colorful language, leaving no doubt about how she felt about me and my puppy parenting skills. I'm not saying I fault her, I can understand that she wants everyone to be in full control of their dogs at all times, it's just that we are used to people being a bit more lax with their pups. We decided to keep Thea on leash for a while, for good measure. That is, until this sweet lab came over to play.

We let our little troublemaker off leash and she had herself a proper playful tussle. That's more like it.

We hiked a bit more and arrived at Twin Lakes, which is completely frozen over and covered in snow.

It looks like such a barren wasteland, after hiking through the thick forest. I bet it's just gorgeous in the spring and summer.

We had ourselves a little lunch and played fetch with the girls' water bowl.

Hiking back to the car was as much fun as hiking to the lake. It's hard work, slogging through the heavy snow, but we aren't the type to let that get the better of us. We just break out our thermos of hot chai and sit for a spell, when the mood suits us.

Or lean back and watch the snow fall on our faces.

In the end, the whole lot of us made it home exhausted, but happy.

While I'm still feeling the hike today, I can't wait to go back. Next time, I hope the snow's a little more powdery, but even if it isn't, this sort of workout beats the gym, any old day of the week.

See all the pictures here.

And since someone almost always asks, the harnesses that Panda and Thea are wearing, can be found here.

If what doesn't kill her, makes her stronger, Thea should indestructible by now.

If you don't know Chappy and his mum, you might want to take a moment to go over and read this post.

Whenever I post about Thea getting into something she shouldn't (@#!%@$@), I can count on Deb to regale me with a Chappy tale, sure to give me some perspective. Go ahead, ask her about Chappy's taste in drywall.

So when she posted that Chappy and coiffing had collided, I thought for sure that Thea and he must be long lost cousins.

See, Sunday night, Leo got it in his head that he was going to give himself a buzz cut. He had about an inch of curls that he quickly zipped off with his electric trimmer.

As Leo checked his work in the mirror and made minor adjustments, he heard a sound, like lips smacking. He turned around to find Thea looking up at him, licking her lips.

There was a moments pause. There's nothing edible in the bathroom. What had she gotten into?

And then he saw it, or more accurately, didn't see it. The hair. Every last hair was gone. GONE! She had hoovered up the clumps of locks that had been so carefully caught in a towel, on the floor. I heard only, "What did you do?" and came running.

On the one hand, come on, that's just funny. I mean, we know she'll put just about anything in her mouth, but hair? HAIR? At the same time, dread engulfed us both. Is she going to end up with a giant felted mass in her stomach?

We called the vet, first thing, the next day, and after bemused surprise, the receptions conferred with the vet and suggested we wait and see.

A few days later and Thea still seems fine, so we are tentatively optimistic that this is a humorous situation. Do feel free to laugh in our general direction.

If only she were good like her sister.

Well, after claiming that I would need to use the pink or orange yarn and after an overwhelming majority suggested the pink, as the best option, I went with...

...mint green.

Once I completed the brown portion of the garment, with most of the 4th ball left, I realized that the two balls of mint green should be just enough. I really like the pink yarn, but I'm going to use it for something different.

I knit and reknit the green portion, a few times to get just the right effect.

When I was finally happy with the results, I debated doing the straps in brown, but decided green, with brown trim would be better. After three days of obsessing over the piece, the knitting and crochet are done.

The sun poked her little head out today, so I decided to get some shots while the shooting's good. The piece is just lousy with unwoven ends, right now, but the nice thing about having a mannequin is that I can easily tuck them away, and she won't move around and set those ends loose.

So here it is, all done, but for the weaving.

I don't think I'll keep that particular ribbon at the bust, I'll swap it out for something simpler, but I wanted something there to complete the look.

Here's a back view and a view of how I'll most likely wear it; layered under a jacket. If I had more yardage, I think I would have done short little flutter sleeves, terminating in the same lace as the hem, but a tank is nice too.

My birthday is right around the corner (the 18th if you're curious) and, true to form, Leo presents me with a gift, the moment he decides what it is.There's no wrapping and waiting around these parts. Who cares though because I got an iTOUCH! Squeeeeeeeeee!

Image copyright Apple Computers

I leave for a business trip, tomorrow, so I'm filling her up with music, podcasts, videos and photos. Yay for toys.

Thea just had her first agility course since November. I thought, for sure, she'd have forgotten everything, but she did great.

Well, when she wasn't on the course, she was still a big ol' floozy...

This is her new BFF, Rio. I think they would have run off and gotten married, given half a chance. More than a few people felt they should go get a room.

So, yah, Thea had fun, but check her out on the course. She was doing great considering she hadn't been in a class for months. That was a pretty easy course, but I was happy to see her doing so well. Go Thea!

What a great weekend. It was really wonderful of the US government to make my birthday a national holiday, this year.

My birthday, itself, isn't much to talk about, unless you think it's fascinating that our washing machine is oozing some sort of oil and we went to Home Depot and bought a replacement. Also, there was some grocery shopping. But Friday and Saturday were many shades of good times.

It started with my dear friends throwing me a birthday party. There was homemade chili and guacamole....oooooh guacamole. I could write poetry about that treat, but it couldn't compare to the delight itself. Why more food isn't accompanied by guacamole, is beyond me.

What was I talking about?

Oh and there was a giant chocolate cake. Oh boy. Yah, it was a good party.

As the fete was coming to a close, my friends mentioned that they were going to the beach the next day and invited us to join.

After conferring with Panda, it was unanimous

We arrived at the coast, a while before the rest of the crew, so we hiked and played a bit, in hopes the girls might be a bit more manageable, when the rest of the folks arrived.

Panda is a super star!

When our friends arrived, they were looking no worse for the wear, despite the fact that half of them were subjected to my amateur salsa lessons, the night before.

Thea greeted the group, as she does best, cooter displayed for all to see.

Larry and Thea had a little game of "catch me if you can."

And then it was back to the business of walking around the beach.

And walk we did. For hours, we explored tide pools and rocky outcropping, and, at one point, a local bakery.

We walked so much, we did this...

We wore out a herding dog. Someone please alert the media.

Those Canadians are good.

Also, apropos nothing, I decided to learn how to tat

It was a little tough for me to get the technique to start, but now I'm finding it really enjoyable, and delightfully portable.

Anyway, see all the pictures of the beach trip here.

About a year ago, I bought a sweater's worth of Elsbeth Lavold Cotton Patine. It was on sale at an LYS and it was so soft and squishy, I just couldn't pass it up.

Well, despite the fact that I've had it tucked away in a dark corner, in a bag, the yarn is showing definite signs of fading from exposure to sun. It's subtle enough, that I can't seem to capture it in photos, but when I try the garment on, I see obvious bands of fading at the start of each new ball of yarn I add. The effect is one of belly cellulite. I'm quite sure that this is not a look I want to go for.

But, even though I noticed this a while ago, I didn't stop knitting it. In fact, I'm plowing along. Why? Because I have a really sweet mum. She's going to over dye my piece, when I'm done, to even out the coloring. She's been dying natural fibers, at home, and graciously agreed to throw turn my brown eyes garment, blue.

I'm sort of giddy about it. I think that the end result will look even better than if my yarn had been perfect to start with.

I didn't have a chance in my earlier post, to put up a picture of my Inspir(al)ed hat, but now that I'm back home I can show you this picture of Inspir(al)ed, having a moment with Thea and me.

It's good to have an assistant.

And finally, more tatting

I'm back to using the size 8 pearl cotton (the finer stuff). I just love how delicate it looks, next to the size 5 cotton. I'm a painfully slow tatter. That image above shows several hours worth of work. But I have these visions of trimming projects in tatted lace and I get so excited, I just can't put the project down. By the way, thanks to each of you who sent me resources and suggestions. I've been trying to take it all in and I know I'll be coming back, again and again, to revisit your comments and links.

I may have ordered myself some more tatting goodies from an online resource. I've used this site for purse handles, and now it's becoming my go-to place for tatting supplies.

Leo has been sick...icky sick, since Wednesday night. It seems like it may finally be passing, but for a while, he was in rough shape.

Luckily, I didn't have to tend to him alone.

Panda monitored his vital signs.

And Thea...

She made sure Leo got plenty of sleep.

If you haven't already, I suggest you get one of each for yourself, in case you get sick.

When they weren't tending to the sick, they helped me get a few shots of the cowl in progress.

I actually knit about a skein's worth of cowl and hated what I did. I got a little too creative with it and it wasn't pretty. We are ripped back to this point.

Two pups napping.

A little more progress on the cowl.

With the patine cowl finished, I am now fully immersed in an unbloggable project (or two). But I think I can still find some useful blog fodder. I have some plans to do some more Excel for pattern writing posts, if that's something you guys like. And if I make good progress on the piece, I'll probably be doing some serious swatching for another personal (that is, blogable) design.

In the mean time, I leave you with some beachy cuteness from this weekend. See all the pictures, over on Flickr

Panda: "Do I want a cookie? What sort of question is that?"
Thea: "Happy happy happy happy happy happy happy happy."

A refreshing dip on a gorgeous day.

Pogo dog.

Thea looks uncharacteristically serious.

The girls at a down-stay, waiting for Leo to throw the squirrel.

Exhausted puppies snuggle up for the ride home.

A couple of my online friends have already sent me congrats on my shawl write up in Spin Off. In fact, Deb saw it before I even got my copy.

When Interweave contacted me about including my shawl in a "gallery of shawls," I imagined a couple of page of a dozen or more baseball card sized boxes with a photo and a short description. Even after filling out the questionnaire, I simply assumed they wanted enough material to be able to cherry pick what they printed. When I saw that I got a whole 2-page spread I was floored...and pleased.

One thing I discovered, while filling in the details, is that I am still a real neophyte at this spinning thing. How many twists per inch in the singles? I dunno. What drafting method do I use while spindling? Anything that keep the spindle from going plummeting to the floor, I'd say.

But still, it was fun to revisit this piece and I'm still proud, of the fact that I produced so much yardage on a little hand spindle.

Sunday, we decided to head north on I-5, up to Washington state and pop over to the coast and see what we could find.

There was a bit of driving before we found a beach but our patience paid off.

Thea nearly twists her own head off, playing tug.

The girls lay on the cute, to get Leo to throw the squirrel.

Then Leo chased Thea around while Panda played with her toy.

We got back in the car and headed to Long Beach, WA, where we hoped to find some dinner. Dinner we found and it had it all; high prices, slow service, and abysmal food. After all was said and done, we'd spent more on two appetizers, two entrees and some iced tea, than we normally spend on a fancy dinner and a bottle of wine, and it was so bad we left hungry. But I'm not bitter.

After that we had to wash down the shame and disappointment with another romp on the beach. What do you know? You can drive onto this beach too. Is this a Washington thing?

The girls didn't care, they were just glad to be able to run around some more.

And Panda had a proper shake-n-bake, leaving with her with a thick crispy crust. Don't worry, she managed to shed most of it before we got home and shook off the rest on the way into the house.

For the rest of the way home, we listened to an audio book, and watched as the sun set and a the light sprinkle formed a most lovely rainbow.

Not even a horrible and overpriced meal could ruin such a great day.

It's one of those Mondays that feel like it needs brightening up. I'm a bit tired, the sky is overcast, work is crazy and I'm trying to sort out an issue with my taxes (don't ask.) So what's my remedy?

How about knitting a little handspun into a vivid scarf.

I'm about halfway through the scarf, and thought I'd give it a little bit of blocking to see how I like it.

I used the Spinning for Speed and Softness method on this yarn. My technique is still a little rough so the finished two ply has a lot of personality. I wanted a stitch pattern that had a bit of an organic feel to it to highlight those thick and thin areas and I think this one fit the bill.

From the looks of it, this stitch pattern is a half sibling to one used in a really gorgeous piece you may have noticed in my knitting neighborhood. The version I'm using is in one of my Japanese stitch dictionaries under the leaf heading, but blocked out it's really pretty abstracted.

The yarn is some of Amy's BFL in the colorway Poppies. I have enough yardage that I'll be able to knit an entire scarf and a hat to match with plenty leftover.

This is just a brief little break from the knitting deadlines I have and after I crank this little project out, I'll be back to the grind, but I do think I'll work you up a quick freebie pattern for this, as a thanks for all the support for both Astoria and Crime of Fashion.

Out of curiosity, could you guys let me know your preference. What do you like; PDF downloads of patterns or HTML pages that are printable?

I have my opinion, but I'd like to see what other think.

And for those of you who wonder what a dog does on a day when it's too cloudy to go out and play, I have your answer right here.

Sleep

And enjoy treats

It's real torture.

On Saturday we mowed the back lawn, and by "we" I mean Leo and by "back lawn" I mean an this...

Thea loves it when Leo mows the lawn. The sound makes her all frisky and silly. Though she does miss the salad bar, when it's no longer so long and luxurious.

After hours of backbreaking work, Thea was nowhere to be seen, but a wee little leprechaun had made her way into our yard.

We thought it best to ply the lass with an appropriate libation.

Panda is not so much a fan of the mowing. It didn't help that I was vacuuming inside. She was feeling pretty sad for herself.

To make it up to her and to get the green off the demon, we decided to go to the beach on Sunday.

Saturday had been gorgeous and sunshiny, while Sunday was a little more overcast with bits of rain, which was perfect, because the beaches were nearly empty.

You know that edition of Spin-Off that has my shawl in it? Well, it's evil, EVILLLL!

Why, you ask? Because it has a writeup about Cormo fiber that will make you drop everything, sell your possessions and buy gobs of it. I'm not necessarily saying this is a bad thing. If you get properly prepared fiber, you'll probably be over the moon with your purchase, but still, evil.

It doesn't help that Aoife left me a comment saying how she had picked up some Cormo herself and was really enjoying it.

So with a nearly nonexistent degree of arm twisting I ordered myself a pound of creamy white roving.

The fiber has a bit of VM in it...maybe a bit more than I'd normally like, but based on what I've read, the more gently the fiber is treated at the prep stage, the better, since aggressive carding lead to a snaggly mess.

With just a quick fluffing of the roving, I was able to produce a pretty decent singles using an unsupported long draw method on El Matchador.

After spinning the singles, I chain plied them into a soft 3-ply yarn. It's a little thick and thin but I would say it averages about 15 WPI overall.

The yarn was so amazing to spin that it was hard to stop. Even more fantastic is the sproing of the finished product. When you put your hands in the skein and stretch it out, it's got an amazing elasticity to it.

I was having so much fun with this fiber that I decide to take it for a ride on a spindle. My go-to spindle is my 0.9 ounce Golding Tsunami (though, jeeze louise, there are some seriously gorgeous new designs that are making my wallet itch. Must. Resist.) Spinning this fiber on a spindle makes me feel like I'm the greatest spinner ever... BOW TO MY AMAZING POWERS OF YARN PRODUCTION FOR I AM A SPINNING GODDESS! Ahem, sorry about that. Anyway, like I was saying, this fiber seems tailor made for spindles. It has enough crimpy grabbiness, to make it really easy to control the fiber and you don't need oodles of twist to keep it all together. Except for giving me an overinflated sense of my own skill, It's a darn near perfect fiber for spindling, as far as I can tell.

After spinning super fine singles, I used the Andean bracelet method to create a 2ply yarn.

The finished yarn is about 24 WPI and I have about 46 yards total.

Both batches of finished yarn got a bit poofier after plying, washing and twacking, than the wound singles would have you believe. I would bet this yarn would have great insulating properties when knit up.

This shot is a little nod to Mary-Heather's adorable photoshoots. This sweet little tea cup was a gift from a friend whose mother collected tea cups before she passed away. I think it's a delightfully graceful way to drink tea and a cute way to show off a delicate handspun yarn.

My friend, Erica, directed me to a local pet photo contest, and I'd love to enter, despite the fact that I use a relatively cheap point and shoot digital camera. I have a feeling that folks with nice SLRs and lots-o-megapixels will be able to outshine my humble collection but all the entry fees go towards a great cause so I think I'm going to try.

So I was hoping that, perhaps, a couple of you could help me decide what photos to enter. I think I'd be willing to enter up to 10 pictures (I'll have to spend some money to get good prints done, so I don't want to go crazy) but since I love the subject matter so much, I'm don't trust myself to pick the best shots from the lot. A cute expression is far more appealing to me than a nice composition.

There's one caveat, all "companion pets" must have visible tags and collars, so I can only use shots from our hikes and beach trips. All of the shots at home, when the girls are collarless, are not allowed. Poo. Panda is floofy enough that you can't always see her collar even when she's wearing it, which may actually exclude some of the shots in this post.

Anyway, almost all my pup shots can be found here. I've peppered this post with a few of my personal favorites, but by no means would I consider these the only possible entry shots.

Resolution is also a factor, so some pictures I love are out because I can't print them at the required 8" x 10" dimensions.

So anyway, if you have any thoughts, leave me a comment here with a link to the picture or pictures you like, or just comment on the picture in Flickr. And thanks so much!

Edited to add: The contest has lots of categories including ones for people with their pets, and funniest shot. But really, this edit is just an excuse to add a couple more shots.

After all your sweet encouragement and suggestions, I decided to order pretty much every photo you guys recommended to me.

And, actually, I also got this shot printed, but when I laid these out to take the shot, I was being so gentle handling the prints that I didn't notice it was sitting right behind one of the other shots.

So that's 18 pictures printed and I think I'll enter them all and just round the donation up to $20, since it all goes to support the Humane Society. Yay.

I'm definitely not expecting to win first prize, but I think I have a shot at one of the 2nd or 3rd prizes, which would be nice.

Meanwhile, we're having some seriously summery weather up here in Portland right now. Yesterday, I decided to play hooky from work (is it hooky if you ask your boss if you can take a vacation day, last minute?) and spend some time knitting and playing with the pups.

We went on over to Lost Park and played a little fetch in the sun.

That's right girls, you run, run like the dickens.

Oh at first, Thea was all kinds of frisky, running around, playing keep away, and tug-o-war. But it wasn't long before the hot hot weather had her tuckered out.

Sooo tired, must put head on ground

They had themselves a nice long drink of water after that. Of course, as soon as I picked up the squirrel again, they were sure they wanted to run some more, but I thought it'd be good to give them a little rest.

On our way out of the park, we got a nice surprise. Leo had stopped by to give the girls a kiss. He was out to put some gas in Leela (the bike) and took a little detour to see us.

Sexy! A great way to end a nice run in the park.

This, from my non-knitting friends.

I know, madness.

Still, I'm nothing if not accommodating.

moar funny pictures

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I ran these by a focus group (Leo) and apparently they went over a like a lead balloon. Since customer satisfaction is key here at Marnie, Speak! I thought I'd made a special LOLdog just for him.

moar funny pictures

I know, big surprise.

A few of you have asked if Thea ever gets to catch the squirrel. Well, if Panda's playing along, generally not, but if it's just Thea, heck ya!

Here she is having a little bit of fun while we take a break from mowing the back yard. She doesn't have the muzzle-eye coordination her sister has, but she has tenacity to spare. Even in the blaring heat she would have gladly played all afternoon. She's happiest when she's playing.

Panda, on the other hand, is my patient and reserved girl.

A super quick lunchtime post to show you some handspun yarn.

Spunky Eclectic 100% merino in Sage.

There are about 272 yd/248 m of two ply, slightly thick and thin yarn. I used mostly a supported long draw method combined with the spinning for speed and softness technique I've been practicing.

This is thick and thin partly because I did a little experiment with this fiber. For the first bobbin, I predrafted and spun, as usual, producing a softly variegated and relatively even yarn. For the second bobbin, I didn't do any predrafting at all, I just spun directly from the wad (technical term) of fiber. The roving is pretty wide, so I carefully directed the drafting zone back and forth across the expanse of unspun fiber, to ensure that each color change was worked completely before going to the next color.

The result is that bobbin number two has more intense colors and less gradual color shifts. I found it harder to spin an even yarn, but my technique got better as I practiced. From the picture above, I think it's easy to tell which ply came off of which bobbin.

There's something to be said for the instant gratification of just sitting down and spinning without any prep or much agonizing over a perfect yarn. Still, I think my technique could do with some serious fine tuning and my goal is to produce yarns that, if I saw it in a store, I'd want to buy it. I like this yarn, but it's a little thicker than I normally like to knit with, so it doesn't quite meet that expectation.

The singles were spun fairly lightly to keep their softness and were plied together with a little extra twist to help control pilling (I hope.) After that, I just gave the whole thing a wash and thwack and hung it to dry with no weight.

If Panda kills me in my sleep, I doubt anyone would fault her.

It's Independence Day, here in the states which Panda would probably call, "the worst freakin' day of the entire year, which sucks donkey balls and makes me want to pee myself." Or something along that line. With the holiday falling on a Friday, we can expect a weekend of fireworks and a truly miserable dog who is completely inconsolable. Well, the panchetta offered a brief (very brief,) distraction, but she was entirely uninterested in the peanut butter, which should tell you something. That whole "try to make something scary positive" tactic just doesn't work in this case.

Thea is fine, thanks for asking.

Leo, is on a weekend motor-pickle ride up near Fork, Washington, where he is doing reconnaissance for future camping trips with the rest of us. This left me to catching up on loads of knitting, pattern writing and some cleaning that are all sorely in need of my attention. In case you are wondering, it was my idea that he go solo, since I just wouldn't have the time to join him.

But, my friends Larry and Erica offered to make me homemade waffles for breakfast today, which is about as fantabulous an offer as I could envision. So, bright and early, after my first full night's sleep in, probably, 2 weeks, I took the train to the Pearl district to see them.

When they opened the door, they were wearing...

PANDA!
They are way too cute for their own good. And, no, they don't walk around town in matchy matchy get-ups, they donned them in unison for my benefit. **squee!**

Then Erica gave me gifts for the girls, from Canada, which Chewie (short for Chewbacca) promptly bonded with.

After that, Larry got down to BIZ-NIZ!

While enjoying warm fluffy waffles (is anyone else feeling hungry right now?) Erica mentioned a glass spinning wheel at the local craft museum, and I knew exactly what she was talking about.

So, of course, even though the museum was closed, we had to go walk by and get my classy mug in front of it, because I had no idea it was hanging out right in my little city.

Then I started hamming it up.

There's a far far less flattering picture (ok, maybe a few pictures) as well, and my friends are likely to chime in about the obvious omission here, but that is one of the great benefits to having full editorial control over the content of my site.

Anyway, it was a lovely little break from what is likely to be a pretty busy weekend for me, so yay for that.

It's been in the 90s which was toasty when we were acclimated to life in LA, but is downright miserable now that we've become accustomed to Portland weather. The beach seemed a perfect way to cool off a bit.

Another weekend day trip to our beautiful Oregon coast.

See all the pictures here.

Our little rental house doesn't have AC, which, for the most part, is fine and dandy with me. I really don't care for the feel of AC and it's expensive to run, especially in this house. We have a window mounted unit that we've installed, as needed, but it tends to drip water into the house and ends up being more work than it's worth, so this year we've vowed to keep the thing in the garage if possible.

The past week, though, has been stupid hot. I mean, it's been so hot that my brain has just shut down by mid-day, which makes working from home laborious. Don't get me wrong, I'd rather roast in my own house than commute to downtown LA, any day of the week, and I like being able to keep an eye on the girls in this hot weather, but I can't say it was fun.

When Saturday's weather report said triple digit temps again (around 40 degrees C for the rest of the world), Leo didn't really have to twist our arms when he asked if we wanted to hit the beach.

So, while it might be poor blog form to do this two posts in ar ow, I've got you some more dog photos today. I promise, I'll have something crafty to show you, very soon.

A first roll in the sand, after a first dip in the ocean. This is what happiness looks like.

Leo and I switched off taking the girls to the water line. We brought all the amenities necessary to stay the day, which means one person had to hold down the fort, while the other wore the girls out.

Leo mans home base. I'm returning from a brief errand.

I didn't get that many action shots because I had to both throw the squirrel and take the pictures, but I got several of the girls just looking lovely against the shimmering water.

It's all fun and games until your dog tries to french you.

As you can plainly see, Leo is very popular with the girls.

The girls basking in the glow of the setting sun.

Leo has the pups work for a little treat.

The sun sets a bit more.

Family photo!

A roaring fire kept us toasty after the sun had set.

See all the pictures here.

Last year, my friend, Mary-Kay gave me some gorgeous fiber and yarns. I'm just now getting around to spinning the roving and I love it.

The roving started out like this:

Once spun up and plied using a chain (Navajo) plying method to maintain the stripes, the finished yarn looks like this.

Extreme close up

I think the yarn is plenty pretty enough on its own, but throw in some pathetic doggy faces and it just gets better.

I love the finished yarn. I had some worries that the colors wouldn't blend well, especially where opposite colors abutted, like where cyan sits next to orange. But I didn't get muddy colors, probably because there's so much negative (white) space in the colorway, instead I got really rich tones in some areas and soft almost iridescent transitions that just glow from the silk content. I can't wait to see how it knits up.

The Stats

Colorway: One Wild Night.
Fiber: 50% Merino / 50% Silk
Weight: Approx 4 ounces
Yardage: Approx 260 yards
Plies: 3-ply via chain plying method to produce clean stripes
Weight: Light to heavy worsted
Finishing: Wash and thwack

I just finished reading The Alden Amos Big Book of Handspinning and by "reading" I mean "felt my brain ooze slowly out my ears." Don't get me wrong, there is much that is useful and splendid about this book, but I wasn't expecting to need a slide rule and protractor to learn how to spin yarn well. I wouldn't recommend this as a learn-to-spin book, and I feel, perhaps, his opinions lacked nuance, but I did learn a lot and have found myself joined at the treadle to El Matchador.

Along with the One Wild Night fiber I spun up recently, I have two new skeins of yarn to share with you.

The blue and white is 100% cotton from A Verb For Keeping Warm

The colorway is called Kyoto, and it was far less scary to spin than I thought it would be. I used a long draw method and plied it from both ends of a center-pull ball. I just made sure to add in loads of twist to the singles and the finished yarn.

Weight: 1 ounce. I have another ounce to spin.
Yards: 154
WPI: Approx 24
Plies: 2

The other yarn is a Pygora/Silk blend from Rainbow Yarns NW

This colorway is called, First Love, and it's a luscious, deep, rich red. I made this a two ply from two bobbins, since this fiber is sold as two floofy little batts. Of course, I didn't spin both bobbins perfectly evenly so I andean plied the last little bit from the bobbin with more singles.

Weight: 2 ounces
Yards: 224
WPI: Approx 22
Plies: 2

I bought both fibers at the Black Sheep festival this year and am very pleased with both purchases. Kristine Vejar of A Verb For Keeping Warm was so gracious when I wrote to ask her if I had to boil the cotton after spinning it. In case you are wondering, no. Before dying the fiber she had to remove the wax that boiling is needed to remove. If you are not a spinner, her yarns look lovely too.

And if you have been waiting for an excuse to try Pygora you won't find a nicer example of it than the stuff from Terry and Susan, over at Rainbow Yarns NW. When Leo first touched these batts, I thought he was going to dive into the bag and make a nest. This stuff is luscious and these women really stand by their product. I've loved pygora since I first spun it but I've never spun any quite as nice as this.

I'm hoping to spin up the Blue Moon roving next.

I'm sure it'll look great on the girls' heads knit up.

Who doesn't love a long weekend?

Saturday was all about relaxing and spending a bit of time with friends.

Sunday, we hit the beach.

And Monday we rode our bikes around our neighborhood. I have a Springer on my bike, but we've never tried it with Thea. Isn't that absurd? Leo wanted to make sure that she wouldn't pull too hard, so he rode my bike a bit and I rode his.

Frankly, I think it takes a very manly man to ride a Hello Kitty bike.

Though, admittedly, he feels more at home on his own bike.

Still, who can hold a grudge with such views.

I refuse to call it a "stay-cation" or, as John Oliver put it, "holi-stay." But what I will say is that I have nothing planned (other than the improv class I'm taking with my friend, Erica, on Mondays) and I'm happy to keep it that way. Oh and there may be more pictures like the ones below, that I took on Saturday.

It was a perfect day; not too cool, not too warm, and absolutely sunshiny beautiful.

The car went home a little heavier than it left. Panda brought the sand and Leo found the tire iron we'd lost a month before. I kid you not! We used it for leverage to screw the girls' leash stake into the ground, and we lost it when we were packing up in the dark. There it sat, a few feet from where we had been, just waiting for our return. I love Oregon.

Kites.

Lots of running and being generally cute.

I tried to take a nice shot of the girls in front of the ocean.
First Thea won't look at the camera...

Then Panda won't look at the camera...

Then some women stop to take pictures, right behind the girls. You win some, you lose some, I guess.

All the pictures here.

Recently, I picked up Evelyn A. Clark's Knitting Lace Triangles. It's a lovely little book that gives you lots of tips for knitting, well, lace triangles. She gives four lace patterns and combines them in a myriad of ways, working them either in stockinette or garter, alone or in combination, with or without transitions.

Everything is so clear and simple, I just had to cast on. With some beautiful Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock that a dear friend sent me, recently, I quickly worked up a few repeats of the ripple lace motif. But after that, I knew I wanted to go my own direction. Heaven forfend I actually follow a pattern, huh?

On our way to the beach, I knit away on my little shawl.

The colors of the yarn made me think of the autumn leaves just starting to show, on our route to the ocean. The ripples make me think of the sea lapping at the shore. As we passed by lovely little Nehalem Bay, I knew I had my shawl's name.

This morning, I moved my stitches onto longer cords and did a little steam block to see how it's looking.

I just started my second of two skeins, after nearly finishing 2 repeats of the feathery leaf pattern. The piece blocks out to about 48" wide right now. After I add another repeat of the feathery leaf, and then the border, I think I'll have a shawl that's another 6 to 8" wide, which I feel will be a good size to work as either a scarf or a small wrap for date night with Leo.

As for the beach trip, you know that went great.

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See entire set here

Created with fd's Flickr Toys.

We tried riding our bikes on the beach, but the sand was either too dry (thus too soft) or too wet (thus too soft) to ride on. We'll try again at lower tide, though, because bikes + beach = a darn good run for the girls.

I finished the Nehalem Bay shawl a couple days ago but it took me a little while to get it all blocked out and modeled. The lighting was pretty poor, so the shots aren't great, but you get the idea.

Created with fd's Flickr Toys.

Stats

The size is also a good one for my intended use. I like the idea of a shawl, but I get a lot more mileage out of scarves and I expect to use this that way, a lot, this winter. The best part is that even when I get to my destination, the scarf converts back to its shawl role if it gets too chilly in the building. This makes it all the more appropriate to use a good sock yarn, since it's likely to get lots of real world wear and tear. I have to thank Julia for gifting me such fantastic yarn.

Who knew people wanted to knit hot pants? You guys are awesome. In the 4 days the pattern has been up, it's been downloaded over 300 times, which I think is pretty fabby. A few folks have also made donation, which is generous and wonderful. Thank you so much.

This is part of my download stats page from Ravelry. If you are wondering why there are two Assets of Evo files it's because the first version had a missing hyperlink in the resource section. It wasn't important enough to make an announcement but I thought I'd update it nonetheless.

In doggy news, Leo found us a new little stretch of the Oregon Coast. As always, we hit Manzanita, which is great because it's beautiful, plenty of room to play and Thea gets to socialize. But after, Leo wound his way through some back roads and landed us at a secluded little stretch of where only one other person and her dog were playing. All in all, a great day out.

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Created with fd's Flickr Toys.

See all the pictures here:

It's been a tough couple weeks around these parts, with Leo having to rush off to Uruguay to be with his family. The whole routine is out of whack and the girls end up spending a lot more time alone. Unfortunately, Leo's dad passed away, after Leo returned home, and a bit of melancholy seems to permeate daily life, but it also makes us more conscious of all the good things we have.

After two weeks of obligations and stress, the perfect antidote was a trip to the beach.

The drive there revealed the first hints of autumn colors. I bet, in a week or two, the drive will be spectacular.

This shot makes me laugh. Thea was being a wee bit over zealous, trying to grab the frisbee from Leo. He requested that she talk to the hand.

And Thea does a very cute hand shake.

Panda isn't too shabby either.

For all the pictures from the trip, click here.

If you knew how badly my housework were suffering, you wouldn't think this blog seemed nearly so neglected.

Luckily, what's keeping me busy is all interesting stuff. I'm doing some work for Twist Collective including a little behind the scenes stuff, which is challenging but satisfying. I'm, of course, designing some knits. I'm taking some improv classes with my friend, Erica. I'm even taking a few (non-improv) courses over at a local university. So, with all that going on, blogging has necessarily taken a back seat, to ensure those cutie patooties I live with, get a little time with me too.

I hope, for now, you'll be satisfied with a few more doggy pictures. They certainly make me smile.

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Entire set found here.

Created with fd's Flickr Toys.

Some years, we put a lot of thought into dressing up for Halloween and some years, we just wing it. This year was mostly the latter.

Leo went a little Clockwork Orange, thought without the fencing outfit.

I went standard issue goth.

It was a little deja vu, taking me back to my very late teens and early twenties, when I'd get all dressed for dancing at Man Ray in Boston.

For Leo, we did the eyelashes, around one eye.

Then I rimmed both eyes with lots of black eyeliner and shadow. By the end, he and Thea were looking pretty matchy matchy

The end result:

Yah, he's pretty darn cute.

From there, we had some wine and coffee at Gilt.

Then some dancing and general people watching at Embers.

We tried to check out a few other clubs but the lines were so long that we settled on filling our tummies with a few munchies at the Living Room Theater, instead.

A seriously fun night.

See all the pictures here.

Hope your Halloween was filled with lots of fun too.

It's the rainy season here in Portland. Like all other weather, the girls consider it perfect for a trip to the ocean. Who are we to disagree? It was chilly, overcast, but with unexpected patches of blue clear sky.

With such unpredictable weather we had almost the entire beach to ourselves.

The tide was really high but shallow

A little slice of heaven.

How does the most graceful and demure puppy respond? With grace of course. She appears wise:

Holds her head high

And she keeps all four feet planted firmly on the ground

But Thea wasn't the only one expressing herself.

Today topped out at about 54 F/12 C, not exactly bikini weather.

Yah, that about covers it.

See all the pictures here.

This weekend, we made a long overdue trip to the beach. It was a little cold (thought not too cold) a little rainy (no one here minds the rain) and foggy like you wouldn't believe.

Check out these shots.

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That's the same stretch of beach we almost always go to. We would have spent all day there, but the rip current was pretty strong and Thea is not the most buoyant dog around. Visions of her being pulled into the briny deep made us uneasy.

We thought the day might be shot, after about a half hour, but we decided to do a little hiking to make the long drive worth the while.

Off we went to Ecola State Park, where we had nearly the whole trail to ourselves. The fog made the view look like a fantasy.

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By comparison, this is how it looked the first time we went.

But I think there's a pretty good reason why we had the whole trail to ourselves. By the end of the hike, the four of us were coated in mud.

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We learned that Panda would make every effort to go around giant puddles of mud, while Thea would aim for them. Either way, there was no keeping clean, but we definitely appreciated Panda's efforts to stay clean.

We had to put the girls in the car, however we decided that a dip in the ocean before we leave would be much preferred to a bath, when we got home. So we headed back to Seaside and played a wee bit of fetch.

It was good to see their beautiful white coats again.

As we were clipping on everyone's leash, someone nearby said, "Did you see the elk?" and pointed to the hill ahead. I looked up and saw three little heads, just showing above the ledge. Leo had the the good sense to go put the dogs in the car, and I walked over to where a small crowd had formed, a safe distance from the herd.

We've seen our share of elk at the coast, but never this many at once. Such a great way to end a fantastic ocean trip.

Our day wasn't over with the ocean, though. My sweet guy treated me to a delicious meal to celebrate our 8 year anniversary.

It was a great meal, beautiful view and, of course, perfect company. And for the toast, he said "Here's to 8 years, 8 years more and nothing more."
Of course, I refused to toast to that nonsense, so he said, ok, well, what if we lay the second 8 on its side?"

Cute.

There's a reason I keep him around.

It's a shame to have this lovely long weekend end, but it was great while it lasted.

You know, sometimes I talk all knowingly about how there isn't one right needle and you should swatch and blah blah blah, but you know what? I love metal needles. I use them almost exclusively. I like that they are smooth and fast and many have sharp little points. It's all about efficiency to me. Wood needles seem slow and plodding to me, like swimming in molasses. Plastic needles range, but are often just too grippy for my taste and certain brands are all wobbly bendy.

But you know what? I've been hating this sleeve I'm working on for a particular pattern. It's lace, worked in the round, on a small circumference. The lace requires working 3 stitches together, and every other row, those three stitches shift, which means that stitches have to be moved between needles. Worse, it's laceweight black yarn worked on big ol' needles.

I tried two circulars, but the problem with this method is that it's nearly impossible to move stitches back and forth between needles at such a tight circumference. One, essentially, has to use a cable needle or spare DPN. Talk about inefficient.

So then I moved to some metal DPNs. I'm sure there'll be gasps of disgust but I have absolutely no issues knitting with Susan Bates DPNs. The really small ones are a bit bendy, but anything above a US#1 seems to work fine and they come in pretty colors. Who could complain? Unfortunately, working with laceweight yarn and these heavy needles was almost as bad as the 2-circs. The weight of the needles was so great that I couldn't maintain a comfortable tension on the yarn. This got even worse between needles, forcing me to maintain a constant death grip on the yarn while also fearing that the needles would make a run for it. I finally had to admit it, I was using the wrong needle. I'm a stubborn woman.

I went over to the local craft store, picked up some cheapo bamboo needles, and it's been smooth sailing since. The wood's grippiness keeps all the needles in place and the weight is light enough that the thread isn't pulled from my fingers as I work. I'm not a convert, I'm just reminded that sometimes I have to step out of my perceived comfort zone.

And since my 1970s ripple afghan has received so much attention, here she is again, albeit a bit rumpled. Oh, there are also a couple of dogs next to her.

This is my third winter in Portland. From what I can tell, winter is a lot of rain. We get an occasional bout of hail that leaves the yard looking like you just murdered a bean bag chair, and there might be a little flurry of flakes, but it rarely lasts long and almost never accumulates.

Well, this weekend, we got a little taste of some of the winter I remember from my childhood in New Hampshire. Of course, if I still lived there, I'd be holed up in a hotel until my power returned. This is way more my speed, for winter.

Can you see the couple in the background, trying to build a snowman?

The girls get seven kinds of frisky when their paws touch snow. Panda loves to roll in it and Thea wants to eat it.

These shots are from early in the day, so you can still see the grass peeking through, at the park. By nightfall, the roads were compressed into solid ice and there was about 5" of snow everywhere else. Anyone without chains on their tires were finding themselves struggling to stay on the roads.

I guess it's a testament to how rarely it snows here. I don't ever recall having chains on my car, in New Hampshire or Massachusetts. Roads are plowed and sand or salt are applied as needed. It took most of the night for that to happen around here.

Man alive, I love working from home.

Luckily, Leo's a real boyscout, and had his chains on before the sun set, yesterday, which means he just had to do a quick preflight check before leaving for work, and he was good to go.

Thea oversaw the process.

1. Red berries covered in snow, 2. Bush in our back yard, 3. The last of our bachelor's buttons, 4. Pine needles

As you can see, it's a winter wonderland here in Portland. It's great knitting weather but I have a feeling I'll start to be a little stir crazy by Christmas. You should hear the local news, we're all doooooooooooomed.

The girls couldn't be happier, though.

Still working on unbloggable items. Don't think I'll have anything crafty to post for a little while. You'll have to make due with dog photos until then.

Till next time, a Happy Festivus to all of you. May your grievances be aired and your feats of strength be impressive.

On Christmas eve, we noticed a bit of swelling on the right side of Panda's face. It wasn't too bad, and she was in great spirits, so we didn't worry, but we kept an eye on it.

By Christmas day, she was very lopsided

Still, her mood was great, she was eating, playing, and generally feeling fine. We called off our plans to go hiking, just to be sure, and decided to closely monitor her for any signs that might suggest an emergency. We'd gladly eat the cost for an emergency vet visit on Christmas, but if we could avoid it and go to her normal vet, that was definitely preferable.

I consulted with a friend who works with dogs, and she assured me that it was something that could wait and an emergency visit wasn't necessary. It was a little nerve wracking but we kept a close eye on her all day.

Panda seemed happy enough that we walked to the neighboring park for a little play in the snow.

1. Leo and the girls, in front of his snowman, 2. Happy girls, running in the snow, 3. Thea goes all Exorcist with her head, 4. Rolling a big snow ball, 5. Tug-o-war, 6. Rolling the second snow ball, 7. Just added snow ball II, 8. Rubbing a sore face in the cool snow, 9. Refining his artwork, 10. Adding the final snow ball, 11. shaping the head, 12. Almost done, 13. Romp in the snow

Throughout the day, her swelling increased, until that evening when her cheek started draining. The pressure was off but by morning, Panda was a little less bright eyed and bushy tailed. The vet was able to see her first thing, so we packed up the girls and headed to the doctor.

Little miss squishied face

After checking her out, the doctor decided that it was probably her cracked molar and that it had abscessed. He gave her some meds for the swelling, infection and pain, and we are scheduled for an extraction next week.

Thea helps her big sis stay brave at the vet.

But we didn't let Thea off the hook, on this trip, while we were there, we had them expel some of her, *ahem* glands. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, I will spare you. If you know what I'm talking about, you KNOW what I'm talking about. Apparently, she let out quite a little squeal of displeasure when the procedure was being performed. This is a new thing for us. Panda is far too proper and clean to ever have stinky gland problems. Somehow, it just seems appropriate that the little stinker would.

We took Panda to the vet today, to get her abscessed tooth extracted.

Thea came along to see Panda off, mostly because if you leave the house with Panda while Thea is home, she bangs on the door of her crate and screams like she's being tortured and it breaks my heart. I'm such a softie.

On the way home, Thea seemed really sad not to have her big sister there.

I know the feeling

I spent the next 6 hours fearing that the doctor would call me and tell me something went horribly wrong and he was so sorry.

But my fears were unwarranted.

Panda did great, her teeth look lovely, and she couldn't have been more happy to come home. She even seemed happy to see her bratty little sister.

Thanks for all the well wishes.

Above is the Health Record I received when we adopted Thea. They estimated her birth date to be January 30, 2007, which means that the little stinker is now 2 years old.

Like a really rank camembert, she just keeps getting better with age.