Cats – Page 20 – Yarn, Books & Roses

MacKenzie Speaks: Snow, Yarn, Orchids, Quilt

Hi. I’m MacKenzie.

The Mother of Cats has been going crazy lately. Busy, busy, busy all of the time, and she is pretty much ignoring me. Okay, she does remember to pet me and feed me and give me cookies (she CRUSHES them up between two spoons before I get them), but is she letting me go outside into the yard any more? NO! She is not! She says it is too cold now.

Oh. That’s why the floor of the garage has been hurting my feet. It is cold. Also, for some reason the outside has turned all white.

The white stuff is also covering up the Thanksgiving wreath that the Mother of Cats and I put on the door. Okay, she put it on the door while I hunted for trouble in the front yard; we still did it together.

Anyway, we are hanging out inside all of the time now, and the Mother of Cats has just been going crazy getting lots of little things done. I mean, literally, that she has been knitting all of these little things that are too small for me to sleep on. Look at this!!

The Mother of Cats has been mass producing little items that she can carry around with her. Last week she lined them all up and did all of the finishing work. I hung out and helped her with all of the little ends of yarn. She really likes that!!

By the end of the morning all three of the mitts were finished.

And she sewed up these fun wash cloths. Did she give me these washcloths and mitts for my bed? No! She did not. They have all been packed away where I can’t get to them. Why does the Mother of Cats do these things?

You would think that the Mother of Cats would have calmed down after getting all of these little objects knitted, wouldn’t you? Instead of settling down to pet me for the rest of the afternoon she went digging in the stash to find more scraps of yarn to make another pair of mitts.

The new mitts had three different colors of yarn. What is wrong with the Mother of Cats?!! Three different balls of yarn at once?

I helped her with all of the yarns while she worked, and really kept an eye on her work. She did take the yarn off of the needles and ripped back last night… Wow! So much yarn! She let me take care of it for her while she knitted it back in. Sometimes the Mother of Cats can be kind of fun.

Tonight we got the mitts done. Look at what a good job I did with the Mother of Cats!!

Between knitting sessions the Mother of Cats and I got the sewing room cleaned up and started working on some of the many quilts that have been waiting (and waiting and waiting) for her to work on them. While it snowed this week we started quilting one of the projects.

What do you think of this? The Mother of Cats works at the machine while I sleep on the cutting table under the grow light for the plants. I love the grow light!! Why doesn’t the Mother of Cats have one of those over my cat bed? Why does she treat the plants better than me?

The Mother of Cats loves her plants almost as much as me! This plant has responded by growing stems that the Mother of Cats says will have blooms someday. Whatever. It’s not like I can eat the blooms, so who cares?

The Mother of Cats has been spending a lot of time fussing over her plants. She makes sure they get lots of light, orchid food and she even ran the window fan in the late summer to make the cold air come into the room with the plants. I don’t like the window fan, but does the Mother of Cats pay attention to my needs the way she should? NO!!

So this has been the last two weeks. Cold white stuff. Lots of little bitty knitted things that I don’t get to play with. Orchids that are no good to me that the Mother of Cats makes a big fuss about. Sewing in the evenings when the I should be getting major attention. It’s amazing that I have survived with all of this going on while my needs were being neglected.

I’m such a good boy.

Can I have some (crushed) cookies now?

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats:

MacKenzie is getting better but I’m keeping him on jaw rest, which is why he is getting crushed cookies and I’m moving him to wet food. He won’t eat his food unless I put crushed cookies on it…
When the cold weather arrived a few weeks ago I became consumed with the the need for more fingerless mitts and arm warmers/wristers. I dug around in the yarn stash to find leftovers from socks, and there were so many cute yarns that I just began mass producing mitt after mitt. They are the perfect carry-along in the car and I am finding them easy to do while listening to audiobooks in the evenings. I’m having fun, and if I need a quick gift in the future I am all set!!
I have 6 babied orchid plants. I heard that the trick to make them bloom was to subject them to significant swings in temperature in the fall; I live in Colorado where temperature extremes are a norm so I decided to try to make it happed for the plants. I closed off the sewing/orchid room overnight for a couple of weeks with the window fan blowing in cold air and this week I discovered that 5 of the 6 plants are going to bloom. Woohoo!! One plant is putting up 4 blooming stems, and I can see at least 2 stems starting on two other plants. Success!!
The washcloth is the Almost Lost Wash Cloth, and is one of my favorites for Christmas giving.
The mitt pattern is a simple one that I’ve developed over the years that works well for my cold Raynaud’s hands. I’m working myself up to publishing the pattern in a future post. Please let me know if anyone is interested.

MacKenzie Speaks: Fifteen Years, Nine Months

Hi. I’m MacKenzie.

What is making all of that noise? I didn’t know birds came that big!

This has been a terrible week for me. Sunday night I had some type of terrible accident with my jaw: it got stuck, it hurts, and I couldn’t swallow right! The Mother of Cats did everything that she could and was putting me into the cat carrier to go to the emergency room when I finally got things under control and we stayed home for the night instead.

But she called the vet the next day and made a few suspicious trips out in the car during the day.

Wednesday morning a whole flock of crows (The Mother of Cats said it was a murder of crows. Right. That’s what I would like to have done to some of them…) descended on the trees in the yard and made lots of racket. Crazy. What is up with the crows? I was so busy watching them through the window I didn’t really fight when the Mother of Cats slipped a pill down my throat, and then missed that the Mother of Cats had gotten the cat carrier in from the garage.

OH, NOOOO!!!!

I think that the crows were trying to warn me. She put me in the car and took me to the vet’s office!

The Mother of Cats, the vet, and the vet technician all ganged up on me to take blood out of both of my legs. Unbelievable!!! I was assaulted by a pack of uncaring women who were dismissive of my needs!!! Why would the Mother of Cats allow this?

The Mother of Cats finally brought me home but as soon as we got there she gave me icky medicine that she squirted into my mouth!! NOOO!!!! My jaw hurts, why would she do something like this!!!

Oh, wait. I feel better now.

Time to nap.

This has been the worst day ever! I’ll just take a little rest on my blankie.

Yesterday the Mother of Cats left me AGAIN and came back with even more pills and medicine to stuff into my mouth. My jaw hurts!! Why is this happening. She even followed me to the cat box and took samples of my private business to take to the vet. The Mother of Cats is really acting strangely!!

The worst thing is, she says that I can’t have any more cookies. From now on I have to eat soft baby food from a can. What is going on here!!!

I do have to say that my jaw feels better and that I was able to eat most of my breakfast this morning.

I’m such a good boy.

Can I have some tuna flakes instead of cookies?

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cat:

Yep. I drugged MacKenzie up with a sedative to take him to the vet.
I was absolutely shocked to see his age on the check-in sheet at the vet’s office. Fifteen years, nine months. How did the years go by so quickly?
MacKenzie has kitty TMJ and his jaw literally got stuck open while crunching his cookies. It was pretty horrible at the time; drooling, bewildered stare at me, pawing at his cheek with his tongue working like crazy to fix the problem, and then getting more frantic. The vet showed me how to massage his jaw to release it if this happens again and I’m being really careful about what he gets to eat. Right now he is on pain killers and an anti-inflammatory drug to get him over this current episode.
I have TMJ myself (thank you, scleroderma!) and was placed on jaw rest for months while I recovered, and as it turns out that this is what we are going to do with MacKenzie. No more crunchies for him!! His dry food is very tiny so we will continue it and he also gets wet food twice a day. He isn’t a fan of wet food, but he is trying.
The problem can be corrected with surgery, but because of his age and ~~hatred~~ strong dislike of medical personnel we won’t be doing that.
The blood work shows that my geriatric cat has hyperthyroidism and will need to start meds for that. Oh, boy. As it turns out, cats with hyperthyroidism are basically ~~assholes~~ jerks, and MacKenzie’s personality should mellow out some once he is on drugs.
“He’s a jerk?” you ask. Sadly, he is. He greats people at the door and rubs on their legs, but then bites without warning if they try to pet him. He scratched my grandson, and plasters himself onto the only member of the family who is allergic to him. He yowls to be let out into the garage at 3am and scratches the door jam like a dog to make sure I come. Lord help me if I forget his cookies! A jerk. But he loves me, and life would be really hard without him.
Today I’m going to hunt for some soft treat that might work for him. There must be tuna flakes or some nice salmon out there that would tempt him. He totally turned his nose up at the soft cat treats. What a strong willed kitty.
He has to go back for another blood draw next month. The vet told me to double up on the sedative next time…

MacKenzie Speaks: My Blankie, My Blankie!!

Hi. I’m MacKenzie.

Do you see this nice yarn that I am rolling around in? Something wonderful has happened this week!

Well, actually, something wonderful happened this week because things have gotten just awful outside. I blame the Mother of Cats totally for what has happened this week.

Look at this! Almost a foot of this stuff is spread out across MY YARD and it is so cold I can’t even put my paw into it for more than a second!

That’s right. It started snowing three days ago and the cold and the snow just kept on coming day after day after day…

If the Mother of Cats really cared about me she would put a stop to this white madness, but NOPE! she did not. Monday morning she did go digging into the yarn stash and found some yarns that are the kind that I like a lot.

The Mother of Cats decided that it was an emergency to make me a cat blanket, so she started knitting with all four of the yarns held together at the same time.

Hey! This knitted stuff is really nice and warm. I can use my claws on it all I want and it won’t fall apart! The Mother of Cats is really acting nice. I think that she is feeling guilty about all of that cold white stuff.

Since the Mother of Cats was making some knitted stuff that was truly excellent to sleep on I decided to hand out with her all day yesterday while she worked. Okay, it was really cold out in the garage, and there was no way I could frolic around outside, so I had to stay in the house. Of course I stayed with her and helped her knit all day.

Don’t you think that these yarns look nice with my fur?

Because the Mother of Cats was holding 4 strands of yarn at the same time the knitting went really fast. I mean, she must have gotten a couple of inches done between breaks for cookies. I got lots of pets and I held all of the balls of yarn while she worked, and she gave me all of the extra balls to take care of too. The Mother of Cats is so lucky that she has me to help her.

Look at how nice and big this blanket is! It is a perfect sleeping pad for me on the bed.

She even put tassels on the blankie!! I love tassels!

Now I have a blankie to sleep on while the Mother of Cats does stupid stuff like cooking and sewing. I just love my blankie. Yay! For once the Mother of Cats has put my needs first, but it certainly took her a long time to pay attention to how badly I needed this blankie.

I’m such a good boy!

Can I have some cookies now? Can I have them served on my blankie?

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats:

The finished blanket is really warm, thick and sturdy. It should be able to standup to claws and chomps for a long time.

The finished blanket is 3 feet long from point to point, and fits nicely on the bed, chairs, and of course the floor. MacKenzie prefers to have his blankie on the bed, of course! My project notes for this blanket are here.
MacKenzie is visibly struggling in the cold and I am sure that he has some type of arthritis. I’m hoping that the warm cushy wool is comforting on old bones; it is in weather like this that I remember that he is a 16 year old cat.
I also did the little bit of finishing on my last sweater and got a not-great photo of it since I had to stay indoors. Ta-daa! Here is my Understated Sweater (Joji Locatelli).

I am considering making the sleeves wrist length, but am test driving the shorter version for a few weeks. I am making matching socks and may have enough yarn left over to make wrist warmers that will extend the warmth on my arms on cold days. I love the endless individuality that knitting my own stuff gives me.

My project notes for the Understated Sweater are here.
MacKenzie is not kidding about the cold. We broke a record here in the Denver area this morning with a new low of 3°F this morning. Brrr!
The blankie ate up 7 skeins of yarn! The destash project is looking good!

MacKenzie Speaks: Massive Slip and Panic Knitting

Hi. I’m MacKenzie.

Do you see this knitting that I’m trying to get a claw into? There is a story about this hunk of wooly goodness…

The Mother of Cats has been staying indoors for the last couple of weeks avoiding the cold and babying her ill behaved hip, knitting like crazy on ANOTHER sweater. It is almost like she is on fire to get lots of knitting done. Whatever could have set her off?

The Mother of Cats had a MAJOR SLIP and bought all of this yarn last month for her birthday. She needs to get 50 skeins of yarn out of the stash and she did something like this?!!

Bad Mother of Cats. How could she be so undisciplined and go shopping for yarn for herself? She needs to buy stuff for me!!! More cookies! Another little cat for me to chase around!! A new blankie for me to sleep on. She is so thoughtless and self-absorbed.

Of course, as soon as she got this yarn home she began to knit even faster than ever and started neglecting me more then she should. She never lets me go outside anymore, and I am positive that I haven’t been getting as many cookies as I used to. Where are my new toys? I can hardly cope with this lack of attention.

She did leave one skein unwound until the very end of the knitting so I could sleep with it. Do you like how this yarn looks with my fur? This is Chasing Rabbits Merinolux DK yarn in the colorway Colorful September.

The Mother of Cats has been really selfish about sharing her knitting with me…

But when you get down to it the Mother of Cats really is no match for me. I try to keep a paw on the knitting at all times.

The Mother of Cats finished the sweater today and then washed it (WHY does she do these things? That nice yarn absolutely did not deserve to be dumped into water in the sink! I watched it closely and it never did anything that would warrant just extreme measures…).

But then the Mother of Cats spread the wet sweater out to dry on towels on the floor. Oh. I really like wet wool. Maybe the Mother of Cats did this for me. Maybe she does think about me a little bit.

Would you believe that the Mother of Cats put another layer of towels on top of the sweater so I couldn’t got to the wet wool? WHY DOES SHE DO THESE THINGS? Now we need to wait another day or two before we can take the picture of the finished sweater. Oh wait… maybe we will get to go outside to do that!! Things may be looking up.

I love to go outside.

I’m such a good boy.

Can I have some cookies now?

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats:

I have been making really good progress on the yarn destash project, and by the end of September I had used up or removed 49 skeins from the stash. Feeling really confident on my ability to make the 50 skein goal I went wild and bought that fabulous navy/blue/green yarn from Chasing Rabbits.
I also decided to make this cat for a Christmas present and bought some yarn for that too…
I needed an assortment of mohair and alpaca yarns to build the buff tabby cat that I want to knit. Because the designer combined three yarns together to create the texture of the cat’s fur I needed several skeins, but the knitting will consume them fairly quickly because… knit three strands at once. I also bought some dark brown and black yarns because… MacKenzie. My cousin, who had just gone to Peru, also sent me alpaca yarn. When the dust settled I had acquired 8 more skeins of yarn for the cat.
Suddenly I had put another 16 skeins of yarn into the stash. Oops! Panic knitting time!! I cranked up into overdrive and began on an Understated Sweater by Joji Locatelli last week and cast it off today. My project notes are here. 6 skeins polished off just like that! My skein count is now 39 removed from the stash and I am again hopeful that I will make the goal. I do have another sweater that I want to start soon that should consume lots of skeins, so I am hopeful. Then there will be the Christmas knitting…
It is cold and snowy here today, but hopefully I will be able to get a picture of the finished sweater in the next day or two.

MacKenzie Speaks: Crutches, Mountains, and Squirrels

Hi. I’m MacKenzie.

Do you see this ball of yarn? This is my most favorite yarn at the moment. So soft. So nice to cuddle with. The little flecks of color are my favorite.

The Mother of Cats has been somewhat difficult to work with lately. She has been limping all around the house, and yesterday her physical therapist finally told her she needs to use crutches for the next few weeks. HER CRUTCHES KEEP GETTING IN MY WAY!!! What is up with that? She doesn’t go outside as much as she used to, and she started knitting this simple sweater with just one color of yarn instead of the Koivua sweater that I just love. There are more colors to chomp in the Koivua, and it is now so big she can’t keep me off of it while she knits. Is she working on the sweater that I can sleep on while she works? No! She is not!! She says knitting with the one color is easier to stuff into a bag to haul around with crutches. Whatever. What is up with the Mother of Cats? A little adversity and she totally folds: I’m so disappointed with her!

Except I do really like this new yarn so I’m starting to forgive her for putting the Koivua into time out. This sweater is called “Climb Every Mountain.” What is a mountain?

Today the Mother of Cats finally let me go outside while she took pictures of all of her knitting and we watered all of the outside flowers.

Look at what happened to the blooms on the hydrangea plant over the last few days of cool weather. The flowers have turned pink again! The Mother of Cats was really happy to see the flowers. I was like… meh… laters… I have to go have a chat with that squirrel…

While I was chasing the squirrel around the yard she took these pictures of the new sweater. It is starting to look pretty good, isn’t it? It is kind of nice to sleep on…

She is now below the sleeves and getting ready to use her last ball of yarn.

Oh, yeah. Look at the new stitch markers that she made to use while making this sweater. How cute are these? She should use these to play with me!!

Now it is late in the afternoon, the squirrel has left to do whatever squirrels do, and the Mother of Cats, the crutches, and I are back in the house. I just got some yummy salmon to eat and the Mother of Cats is getting ready to knit again. Hmm… that new sweater is getting pretty big now. Maybe I can sleep on part of it while she is working. I’m so handsome and the yarn really looks nice next to my fur. Maybe she will be reasonable for once and will let me do that. IF she loves me I will get a quality nap on yummy yarn.

I’m such a good boy.

Can I have some cookies now?

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats:

The sweater is Climb Every Mountain by Heidi Kirrmaier. That yarn that MacKenzie loves is Tweed DK by Western Sky Knits, and it really is nice to work with. My Ravelry notes are here.
How ironic is it that I’m knitting a sweater called “Climb Every Mountain” while trying to master walking with one crutch?
The hip has become even more challenging. I met with the physical therapist yesterday who had printed out the notes from the hip specialist that I met with last month. Things are worse than I realized. I have IT band syndrome, inflamed tendons associated with my hip adductors, and then there is the severe hip bursitis. I need to rest the tendons as much as possible as I stretch the IT band and use the topical anti-inflammatory gel that we hope will get the swelling down. Since I can’t walk without limping and the adductors need a rest I’m on crutches for the next three weeks at a minimum. I’m truly a mess as I can’t use a cane (bad wrists), ice (thank you, Raynaud’s), or work in a pool (Sjogren’s, I really hate you right now), so things are challenging, but I’m really motivated since I want to stay mobile as long as possible and I’m a poor candidate for a hip replacement.
MacKenzie is learning to stay out of the way of the crutches, but he is taking the whole thing personally. Poor thing. I have started giving him more cookies… I have NOT surrendered any of the sweaters to him.
Koivua is waiting for the first snow fall as I rush to finish two transitional sweaters. Winter, take your time…
Finally!!

MacKenzie Speaks: First Day of Fall

Hi. I’m MacKenzie.

The Mother of Cats says that the seasons changed today and that fall has arrived. Whatever. Is that a type of cookies?

The Mother of Cats and I went outside to water all of the plants today and I must say that the flowers all look the same to me, and the squirrels are as frisky as ever, but there IS something going on with the trees…

I’m not sure why fall is a big deal, but the Mother of Cats is knitting faster then ever. She says crazy stuff like Winter is Coming! and I need more sweaters! The Mother of Cats can be really confusing sometimes… Anyway, she worked like crazy over the weekend and look at what she got finished:

That’s right. Soft fluffy cashmere blend mash-up socks.

If the Mother of Cats loved me she would let me have these socks to put in my bed, but NOPE! she won’t take them off her feet. Why is the Mother of Cats so very selfish? She says that they are for her to sleep in on cold nights, but it isn’t even a little cold and she is wearing them right now. Selfish Mother of Cats!! I want my own cashmere sleeping socks, too!! Well, I want them to sleep on, but you get the idea.

I’m such a good boy!

Can I have some cookies now?

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats:

These socks are a mash up of three other socks patterns. The details are on my Ravelry project page.

Check out the garter stitch heel on these babies. They aren’t sturdy, but boy are they soft, comfy, and warm! Look at that cashmere halo on them!

To MacKenzie’s disgust I haven’t started knitting the second sleeve on my Koivua sweater. I went crazy and cast on another sweater. It’s too soon to talk about it, but here’s a teaser showing off the knitted fabric and one of the stitch markers I made to go with it.

I had to start this sweater right away because it kind of screams “Fall!” Seriously. I need this sweater immediately. I’ll get that other sleeve finished before the end of the month…

Happy Fall, everyone!

MacKenzie Speaks: A Sleeve and a Sock

Hi. I’m MacKenzie.

I have been really helping the Mother of Cats with her knitting this week. Look at how carefully I am inspecting this sock that she is working on. We have been listening to an audiobook every evening while she stitches away on the sock, with lots of breaks to give me attention, of course. I think that she would get bored and fall asleep if I didn’t keep standing on her and head butting her work. It is a hard job, but someone needs to do it.

See how much progress she has made? This is what you get when you have an attention-to-detail cat helping you out.

The Mother of Cats is calling this another Mash-Up sock that combines elements of three other socks that she has made in the past. Whatever. Like I would remember details like that?! What I do remember is that I sent her to the store to buy me tuna flavored cookies and she came back with some kind of substandard chicken flavored ones. This is just typical of the Mother of Cats. So thoughtless. I don’t know why I exhaust myself helping her when she doesn’t treat me the way she should…

Especially when I helped her knit this sleeve this week too!!

I can’t believe how exhausting all this knitting supervision has been. Luckily the sweater is now so big the Mother of Cats can’t keep me off of it any longer. Which is pretty nice since I need a nice place to nap after all of this work.

The Mother of Cats needs to share her things more often!!

Last night the Mother of Cats started ANOTHER SWEATER before she was done with this one. Something about the second sleeve syndrome… Whatever. I think that she just wanted to let me nap a little longer. I deserve it after all. Maybe the Mother of Cats does think a little about my needs after all.

I’m such a good boy.

Can I have some cookies now?

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats:

The sweater is a Koivua by Caitlin Hunter. My project notes are here. I made modifications to the sleeve to make it less bell shaped at the bottom and am pretty happy with how it came out. I put the details into my project notes if you want to see what I did.
Oh, yeah. That sock is a total mashup masterpiece. The top is the edging from the Geology socks. The ribbing is kind of an Emily’s Favorite socks deal, and the garter stitch heel and toe are inspired by the Om Shanti Bed Socks.
Yep. I did cast on another sweater last night. I also had to made a new set of stitch markers to use with it because a) they had to all be different from each other, and, b) they had to coordinate with the sweater. What?! Doesn’t everyone do this? There’s no problem here, people. There is, however, another post brewing…
The book that MacKenzie and I are listening to is A Better Man by Louise Penny. I love these books!!

Have a great (knitting) weekend, everyone!

It’s the Little (Mash-up Knitting) Things…

My hip is in full rebellion these days and I am spending a lot of time off my feet trying heal up. For reasons beyond my understanding MacKenzie views this as an invitation to make constant demands: Pet me! Feed me!! More cookies! Let me go outside!! I must be on your lap!! You exist to serve me!!!!!

He stands next to me as I knit crying sadly, trying to move onto my lap and into the yarn and knitting. It is sad. So sad. Right up to the point when the yarn chomping starts and the claws start flashing. Sigh.

There is nothing for it but to put the knitting aside, gather the cat up onto my lap and deliver unto him all the hugs and attention that he is craving. Then some cookies!

Caught between a ill behaved hip and a demanding cat I have abandoned the sweater that I’ve been working on and switched to small projects that are easy to move away from chomping teeth and flashing claws. Projects that can be worked on in bed, outside in the garden swing, and downstairs by the television. Projects that can be easily moved to safety or stuffed into a project bag.

Ta-daa! I finished these cashmere blend yummy socks to wear while lounging around and in bed. These socks are knit a little loosely and sport garter stitch heels and toes, so they aren’t suitable for daily wear, but they sure are perfect for my cold feet while babying my ill behaved hip, and were easy to complete while evading a cat.

The socks were knit from the toe up and have cleverly shaped garter stitch heels and toes. I added the garter band to the top of the sock before putting on a K1P1 ribbing at the top. Please ignore the little gap there in the ribbing… I took the picture before the final finishing as I was losing the light. Here are my Ravelry notes. The sock pattern is Om Shanti Bed Socks by Alice Yu and the yarn is Serenity 20 from Zen Yarn Garden in the colorway “Burning Bush.”

Do you remember the light blue ribbed socks that I made a couple of weeks ago? They were just simply ribbed socks based on my rote 64 stitch vanilla sock that is basically the Dave sock by Rachel Coopey with a different rib that I liked when I knitted the No. 5 Union Street socks and then saw again in the Emily’s Favorite Socks pattern in the book “Knits About Winter.” Hey, when you are immobilized by a cranky hip and hounded by a demanding cat, you start to just invent new combinations of socks, right? In this circumstance it is just frankly impossible to have any charts or patterns involved in the knitting, so it is “have some fun” time. Anyway, there was some yarn left over from the socks, so I kept knitting…

And these simple wristers (short arm warmers) just fell off my needles.

To make the wristers I just kept expanding on my theme of stealing design ideas from other projects and smashing them together to make something that works for me. I had made some Geology Socks recently, and the top edging was a nice use of the feather and fan pattern, so I re-used it for the top of these warmers. Then I knitted the body of the wrister using the K3P1 ribbing and finished off with an I-cord BO.

I kind of like to wear these with the I-cord edging down by my hand.

But I think that they look pretty good with the lace at the wrist also.

These wristers will work well this winter under sweaters and over long sleeved shirts in my usual struggle to keep my fingers warm, but I’m wearing them alone right now whenever I get exposed to air conditioning. Pleased with my sock pattern inventiveness I cast on another sock last night…

This is another mash-up of ideas and patterns that grew from my earlier projects. This yarn, Fancy Monkey sock, is another cashmere blend for my cold feet. The edging is the same one used for the wristers, but I’m making K3P1 ribbed socks again once I’m past the edging. I’m debating putting on garter stitch heels and toes like the Om Shanti socks. It will be fun! It’s a knitting adventure, I tell MacKenzie.

Who has been watching me steadily from the foot of the bed, waiting for an opening to move onto my lap, computer or no computer. He resents the computer even more then the knitting. Let’s not even start talk about books and reading…

Isn’t it cute that MacKenzie still likes his mouse? The tail has been chomped off at this point, but he still likes to bat it around.

Hopefully my hip will start behaving better in a few days, MacKenzie will become less needy, and I will be able to get back to the Kouvia sweater. I’m getting adventurous with that project, too. I can’t wait to blog about the sweater, and I’m working myself up to a couple of hip/scleroderma posts as I’ve been racking up adventures in that part of my life also.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

MacKenzie Speaks: She’s Casting On Again!!

Hi. I’m MacKenzie.

The Mother of Knits and I have been working really hard lately and we have been making progress on her projects.

She whipped up a simple pair of socks with this yarn that she really likes: Concrete Sunset sock yarn dyed by Western Sky Knits. Her project notes are here.

I’ve been closely supervising her work on the Koivua sweater all week. This is starting to look pretty good, huh. Will the Mother of Cats let me sleep on this stunning and fluffy new cat bed? No. She will not. I keep trying to explain it to her, but she is so self absorbed! Always, it is about her needs and she never leaves it out for me to nap on.

This week the Mother of Cats realized that she had NOTHING to knit in bed while listening to audiobooks. There was a panicky search of the yarn stash (woohoo! I love helping the Mother of Cats in the stash room!) and a search for patterns on the computer and in her pattern notebooks. I helped her look for patterns by plopping my body down on all of the ones that I thought looked good. Why does the Mother of Cats get so emotional while I’m helping her? I only scratched her a little bit while scrabbling through the papers… Anyway, after finding the yarns and patterns we were ready to wind the yarn and get going on casting on lots of new knitting fun. I love winding yarn!!! The Mother of Cats needs to do things like this that I like more often. She can be so boring sometimes…

We picked these two yarns to make a Mount Moran Lace Cowl. I can’t wait to make this!

The Mother of Cats’ feet get cold all the time now. We decided that this yarn would be perfect to make her some yummy cashmere bed socks. Oh. Now that I look at this again it would also be good to make another Mount Moran Lace Cowl. Hmmm… maybe we need to go look through the stash for some more yarn for socks. Woohoo! More play time!!

The Mother of Cats and I decided to make another Suburban Wrap by Joji Locatelli with this yarn. I can’t wait to get started on this one!

But the project that got started right away was another simple pair of socks that can be knitted while listening to audiobooks in bed in the evenings. I always sleep on the Mother of Cats legs and help her keep track of her rows while she works. It is my favorite time of the day/night.

Do you notice that any of these projects are for me? No, you DO NOT!! Not one of these projects is for me after all that work I did to help her find patterns and yarn. There is no mouse here! Where is the new cat bed or kitty blanket? Why is the Mother of Cats so very, very selfish!!

Okay, I’m calm again. I do love knitting with the Mother of Cats. Okay, it isn’t as good as going outside to play in the yard, but she does remember to pay attention to me in the evenings. I get my favorite cat food for dinner, she pets me while we knit, I usually get to chomp yarn, Little Miss Pitty Pat comes out to play and eat her dinner, and I get to sleep on the down comforter on the bed. Life is okay with the Mother of Cats.

Why does she do these HORRIBLE THINGS to me?

That’s right. Today she crammed me into the pet carrier and took me to the vet’s office for SHOTS!!! The horror. The betrayal. There were dogs there!!!! Why does the Mother of Cats do these things to me? She did give me some kitty cookies when I got back, but it was just AWFUL!!!

I have been sleeping since getting back from the horrible adventure this afternoon, but I’m going to get up in a few minutes to demand that I have another yummy serving of cat food and then a trip outside to play with the bugs and squirrels. She owes me! Then it will be knitting time and I’ll be chomping yarn overtime because… she owes me!!

I’m such a good boy!

Can I have some cookies now?

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats: I’ve got nothing, MacKenzie said it all! Let’s hope he stays sleepy from his vaccinations so I can cast on a couple of new projects this evening because this yarn is too stupendous to ignore. 🙂

MacKenzie Speaks: Snapshots From My Garden

Hi. I’m MacKenzie.

The catmint is re-growing after taking a beating in the July heat. Perfect for a little cat nap! This is one of my favorite spots in the garden.

August is here and the days have settled into a nice little pattern. Mornings in the garden with the Mother of Cats. Afternoons inside with little Miss Pitty Pat. Evenings knitting and knitting and knitting. It’s hard to say what my favorite time of day is, but today I want to show you what has been going on outside in my garden.

There is a bunny hanging out in the front yard! It ate some of the Mother of Cats flowers, but she still won’t let me out to show it what’s what. Why is she so mean to me? I’m just positive that she doesn’t love me at all!

Luckily the bunny can’t get into the back yard to eat the flowers growing in my garden.

There are a lot of young squirrels racing along the fence and fighting in the trees in the back yard, and some of them are getting a little too pushy about my outdoor water dish. I told this squirrel to STAY OUT OF MY YARD but he didn’t listen to me. Bad squirrel.

I spend a lot of time hanging around next to the water dish waiting for squirrels, but I still haven’t caught one. Hey, they are pretty fast!

The wasp nest is still growing. Where do all of these wasps come from? These guys make me nervous and I stay away from them.

Yesterday while we were outside a dragonfly landed on the Mother of Cats’ book. Wow! She was as stealthy as a cat a she tried to ease her camera out to take a picture of him; I was almost impressed by her skill. Nope! Even I can’t catch a dragonfly, Mother of Cats. What made you think that you could do it? You don’t even have claws, and your reflexes are really inferior…

In the afternoons I hang out with Miss Pitty Pat. She is kind of my best friend these days. Last night she broke her hamster wheel, so the Mother of Cat is heading out this afternoon to get her more toys. I can’t wait to see what she gets us.

Well, it is getting close to the evening so the Mother of Cats will be knitting soon. Woohoo! Yarn chomping time!

I’m such good boy.

Can I have some cookies now?

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats:

- The cottontail bunny has been in my yard for weeks now. She sleeps in the grass, explores the flowerbed, and somehow has avoided the cats who roam my neighborhood unsupervised. Very sweet, and evocative of the days when I used a photo of a bunny like this to anchor my online biology course.
- Sadly, the wasps began to chase MacKenzie and me, so I finally sprayed the nest with insecticide this week. Intrepid wasps, they have started a new nest in a safer location.
- There are many dragonflies in the yard now, and the butterfly bush is heavy with blooms waiting to open. Yay! I’m looking forward to more airborne visitors that won’t threaten to sting me.