Knitting – Page 2 – Yarn, Books & Roses

Thoughts on the Night of the Harvest Supermoon

The supermoon has been slowly building over the last few evenings. Enormous and bright, I have been watching it slowly grow in fullness all week. I’ve been looking forward to watching this moon, the Harvest Supermoon of 2025, rise this evening, but of course it is raining and cold. I know, even though I can’t see it, that the moon is there, just out of my sight.

Tonight’s moon pretty much matches my mood this evening. There is this beautiful shining thing, just out of sight, but just knowing it is there, I am buoyed up and happy. I’ve been thinking about recuerdos and glimmers all day as I cleaned out boxes of things connected to my sister and son: bits and pieces of things that they valued and were stored, or sent, to me over the years. Nestled among the junk and ancient clothing there are objects that instantly transport me to another place and time: recuerdos.

Those two big tubs are full of my sister’s fabric stash. And unfinished projects and quilts… things that she loved and had plans for.

My mom was raised in Argentina during her teens and early twenties, and she was bilingual and somewhat multi-cultural in her approach to life. Every important trip or event required a recuerdo to help capture and preserve the memory of the event; she would insist that we select and keep something. Recuerdos are like souvenirs, or memories, but richer and more transformative, returning you to an important experience. That’s what I’ve been finding as I go through the boxes: pictures, trophies, knitted items, old quilts, a college diploma, stuffed animals, and marching shoes. Every single item rich with memories, returning me to the time when I visited a national park with my sister, or watched my son from the bleachers in a fencing tournament at the US Air Force Academy. Like tonight’s supermoon, something great and shining is right there with me, out of sight, but real all the same, and I am happy.

I found three unfinished quilts in the tubs. All the fabrics bundled together, a lot of the cutting already done, everything organized to create the quilts that she dreamed of. I was instantly transported to her favorite fabric store in San Diego, picking out fabrics with her on a beautiful summer afternoon.

Grief is a difficult thing to deal with, but I’ve learned some lessons over the years as the universe kept shoveling bad news in my direction. It helps to write. It is important to acknowledge what has happened, and to allow your support groups to… well… support you! Honor the good in the people (or life) that has been lost. Focus on what you can do, not what is no longer possible. Make sure you are getting enough to eat; remember to rest. Reconnect with your friends, and get out of the house. Create purpose and beauty from the loss whenever possible.

What to do with all of this… stuff… in the crates?

My sister loved autumn colors. Orange, yellow, greens, and browns. I found almost 20 skeins of ORANGE yarn in the crates, and as luck would have it, Halloween and Thanksgiving are right around the corner. All of that yarn is going to be transformed into chemo hats. I’ve been making 2 a day and hope to get them all to an infusion center by the middle of the month. Can you feel the glimmer? I’m looking forward to driving them to a Kaiser infusion center up north next week through the fall foliage; maybe there will still be some sunflowers in the fields. Glimmer.

Then there is the fabric. Oh, boy. There is a lot of fabric there! I’ve been sorting through it and pulling out nice colors to make into zipper pouches (filled with hygiene products) for the DART program at Denver Health.

This week there was an article in the local news about an organization that provides comfort quilts to trauma survivors. They take in donated fabric and unfinished quilts: what a great place for my sister’s unfinished quilts to go!! I’ve been sorting my own fabric along with my sister’s to get the donation ready, and I plan to drive it up to the organization next week. Can’t you just feel the shine of the supermoon just out of sight? It’s like there is a glimmer hiding right behind my shoulder, raising my spirits and centering me again.

So, this is life. I’m pulling myself back together while surrounded by items that my sister gifted me through the years, sorting the fabrics, yarn, and projects that she once had big plans for, reliving our time together, and taking her dreams into the future with me while mindfully watching for the glimmers of peace and joy that are there for us.

Shine on, Harvest Supermoon. Shine on.

P.S.

These are my son’s cats: Jonesy, Gabriel and Liam.

I was able to successfully rehome my son’s three cats all together two weeks ago. This week, as I worried about how they were doing, I followed the story of Francine’s loss and the resulting successful rescue operation. Yesterday when I heard that Francine had been returned to her home, a Lowe’s store where she is the resident cat, I heard from the new owner of my son’s cats; they were out, sleeping on her bed, and chomping tuna. Glimmer time!!

Hannah and the CoalBear: Updates from the Catio

Hi. I’m Mateo.

Don’t I look handsome? I’m keeping a close eye on a dragonfly…

I actually had my jaws and chompers on that bug, but the Mother of Cats chased me around the catio until it got away. Then she sat outside with us to make sure it stayed safe until it was time to come in for our nightly tuna treat. WHY does the Mother of Cats do this? She has gone to huge lengths to keep me from having any fun.

Look at what she did to the downstairs window that was my secret escape route to the great outdoors. Now there is a new cat-proof screen and a safety gate across the window. Sometimes I get a little frustrated with the Mother of Cats.

We have been spending lots of time out on the catio because the Mother of Cats like to drink her morning coffee out there while she reads her books. She keeps the birdfeeder stocked and there is lots of fun wildlife in the yard. Do I get to play with the animals? No, I do not.

Obviously the animals miss me because you won’t believe what happened this week… When the Mother of Cats let me out in the morning there WAS A BUNNY IN THE CATIO!!!! I got to chase him all around, the Mother of Cats was making some crazy noises while she chased me, and the bunny ran like you wouldn’t believe. Did I get to catch the bunny? No. I did not. I ran back into the safety of the house (the Mother of Cats was really making some concerning sounds) and the bunny was released back into the yard.

The Mother of Cats is calling this bunny “Death Wish Bunny”.

Anyway, that’s all that is going on around here. The Mother of Cats has been working on some little projects (mending the catio net and sealing the gap was one of them…) and I’ve been chasing Hannah around the house when not out on the catio.

Guess that is all for now. Would you like to see my scar?

Bye for now.

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats:

My tendonitis is back in full swing and I’m in braces again. It is really cramping my knitting style.

I have been cranking out fingerless mitts using my little Addi knitting machine, so I’m still getting some knitting done. I’ve also been reading books, and I’m slowly getting a series of posts put together.

Am I a little frustrated to have wildlife appear inside the catio after going to heroic lengths to keep all cats and wildlife safe. Yes, yes I am. I am sure that swinging a hammer and replacing window screen is contributing to my tendonitis.

Did I just buy pet insurance for both of my cats? Why yes, I most certainly did!!!

Have you missed seeing Hannah?

The Emotional Support Chicken Story, Continued…

Last year, right about at this time, I blogged about my nephew, my sister, and the Emotional Support chickens that I had knitted for them. You can read that blog post here, if you wish. Here is the very short version of that post: my sister asked for support chickens when she learned that her son was suffering from terminal liver failure. After his death the chicken that I sent her became a lifeline as she slept with it, took it to her son’s memorial services, and then to his interment of ashes. That knitted chicken, a small thing, became an important symbol of love and support in a time of grief.

Here’s the chicken, looking sassy, on the morning that I sent her off to my sister.

The chicken moved on with her when she moved to Cody, Wyoming. It was with her, in her bedroom on Monday, June 16th when she took a bad fall getting out of bed that resulted in a broken leg and a serious cut. The chicken was left behind as she was rushed to the nearest hospital.

Thus began a sad, long list of problems and complications as my sister was stabilized, taken to surgery, moved to the cardiac unit, and then scheduled for more surgery. My cat went down a few days into this downward spiral of medical disasters, and by the time I got him home from the Vet Saturday night it was clear that my sister was in trouble. Sunday, we learned that she was being transported to another medical facility in Montana that was better equipped to treat her. Her daughter in California grabbed the first available flight to join her mother and her sister at the new hospital. Somewhere within this time frame the emotional support chicken caught up with her.

Here she is, ready to go to work, in the waiting room of that Montana hospital.

And that was it, the beginning of the end. My sister was moved to hospice care, and her last days and hours were as peaceful as the staff could make them. To the end, the chicken was with her, hard at work, a surrogate for me at her side.

Do you see the chicken tail sticking up out of the covers? That quilt is one that I sewed her years ago to be a cheerful addition to her hospital bed when she got a hip replacement.

Tuesday morning my sister slipped away, with her daughters by her side: it was exactly one year and one month after the death of her son.

Emotional support chickens are just… cute little knitted chicken shaped pillows to hug. They are also symbols of love and support when you need those things desperately. They are something to cling to in bad times. Sometimes they are all a knitter can do for another person in need, and sometimes they are just what that person needed.

It’s just a little chicken. It can be everything.

Knit on, my friends, knit on!

My snarky, supersmart, indominable sister Selma. Gone too soon, part of me forever.

The Scleroderma Chronicles: Thoughts on the Night of the Strawberry Moon

There it is, the Strawberry Moon. I snapped this shot around midnight last night while the kitties chased moths on the catio.

It’s June. I can hardly believe it. June is Scleroderma Awareness Month. June is the month of thunderstorms and tornado watches. June is the month of the miller moth migration (Mateo’s favorite time of year!) June is the month that Hannah came home to live with me. June is the month, year after year, that my scleroderma begins to improve after a long, cold winter. This year June has been just great! After a very rainy May hot, sunny weather finally arrived this week and the yard began to burst into bloom. First, let me show you the weather…

Crazy weather May!! That is hail on the catio, all of that rain appeared in my pot on the deck (you can see it in the first picture… the pot was partially covered by the table above it…) in just 48 hours, and then there was an exciting outbreak of tornados just east of me. Whew! In the breaks between the storms I managed to give the lawns their first mowing of the year, and I made great progress pulling weeds out of all of my gardens. I kept thinking of a saying someone said to me recently as I worked in the yard and gardens: How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. How do you clear a weedy wilderness? One clump of grass at a time.

Look at how great the yard is starting to look! The grass is growing like crazy after the deep soaks, and there is lots of wildlife. I managed to get the catio all finished, and the cats and I are outside every day now enjoying the show and soaking up some sun.

Mateo is enjoying the emergence of a new, tiny baby bunny!

So, here is the crazy thing. I have been struggling big time with my symptoms. I have been unable to knit (or type for that matter) for several months now. I rely on the knitting to help me keep my hands functional, and also for mental health reasons; the loss of knitting has been hard. Even cranking the knitting machine has been too much for my healing ribs and sternum. My other joints are so bad I have spent most of my time moving a heating pad from joint to joint trying to manage the symptoms. My heart has been misbehaving again, and my lungs have been unhappy. It has been a hard winter, and I have to admit, I’ve been concerned that I may be through the tipping point and on the downward slide of my scleroderma journey.

Then June arrived.

Like magic, after every morning in the sunshine drinking my latte, after every afternoon clearing out a small section of the gardens, I have been getting slowly better. My joints are recovering. My heart has stopped having tachycardia events. My oxygen levels have improved. My hands and wrists are much better. I am writing this post. I am better. I am knitting again. I’ve started a simple summer tee in a happy pink yarn, and my wrists are letting me knit for an hour a night. I usually bristle up when people suggest that I can just get better with some sunshine and exercise, but in this case it did help.

Other fun that I’ve been enjoying on the internet is the journey of Sunny and Gizmo, two Bald Eaglets that fledged early in June from their nest by Big Bear lake in the San Bernardino mountains in California. Sisters, the two have remained with each other in various trees and have returned to the nest several times. The other fun was the adventures of Ed as he ran free in Tennessee for a week. Yay Ed!! You know that I had to cheer the zebra running wild!!

I do hope that you saw the strawberry moon. It was a happy, bright object in the sky, lighting up the back yard and the bunnies chasing each other over the lawn. The moths entertained the cats, and I sat in the dark with them on my swinging patio chair last night feeling pretty upbeat. This full moon was the last of the spring; what is coming now is the heat of summer. Usually, I kind of dread the summer heat, but last night I felt absolutely sure that I was up for the days to come. How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. How do you knit a sweater? One hour at a time. How do you face down the scleroderma monster? One beautiful day in the yard/catio at a time.

This is scleroderma awareness month. I went to a scleroderma conference in Denver last month, and this Saturday I will go on a fundraising walk with all of my sclero-friends. I plan to rock the teal! Bring it sclero-monster! I am ready for you!!

Friday is Hannah’s gotcha day. She is now 5 years old.

Last night I started reading the latest edition of Scientific American Magazine. The cover article is about new research that shows… wait for it… sunshine can suppress the immune system and make autoimmune diseases improve. Look at that! I’m kind of thinking that happened to me over the last few weeks. Evidently, it is a balancing act: sunshine can also make things worse. Yay! Once again, I get to use myself as an experimental animal as I figure out how much I can tolerate. 🙂

Zebra running wild!!

Hannah and the CoalBear: Shipwrecked (on Sea Glass Island)

Hi. I’m Hannah,

It has been a long time since I’ve given an update on the Mother of Cats. I know, I know… things have been going on that are hard to explain, and the Mother of Cats hasn’t been fun AT ALL lately. Let’s start with the strange things…

The house got painted! There was complete chaos around our house that went on for days! Do you see my expression when I saw one of the worker men in the window? They put plastic over all of the window, and there were all of these bumps and strange noises, and I totally was exhausted keeping the CoalBear calm through all of it. Whew. Then the painters finally went away, and the next problem became apparent…

THE CATIO WAS GONE!!!!!!

A cat tantrum is an ugly thing. Mateo is just a little cat, but he can be a little heartbreaking too when he doesn’t get his way.

She works really slowly, but the Mother of Cats has been constructing a new Catio for us. I keep urging her to work faster, but does she listen to me? She takes a day off for every day she works, and at the rate that she is making progress, it will be snowing before this gets done. The baby bunnies will be grown up and gone. The baby robins will be grandparents. I will be too old to appreciate my days out in the sun…

Mateo really, really wants to go outside to have a chat with this baby bunny…

With all of the outside work going on the Mother of Cats hasn’t been knitting very much. She did manage to get one pair of socks done, and then she made a new chicken that she took away with her on one of her trips to the doctors. Here’s the chicken.

The chicken and a couple of the babies went to the Pulmonary Function Testing lady to use with her patients. Mateo wanted to keep it for us, and I did mention that it would be kind of nice if she stuffed the little chickee with catnip, but did she listen to me? No. No, she did not! They went out to the car with her, and they stayed with the PFT lady. I sure hope that those silly patients appreciate the chickens, and if they throw the little one around that would be great! I’m pretty sure that they would like catnip, too.

So, that’s what’s been going on. NOT MUCH KNITTING! The Mother of Cats is still unable to cast on her new sweater, and while she spends time moving yarn around into interesting combinations, she hasn’t cast on her sweater. Shipwrecked. She is shipwrecked. When she isn’t fussing around outside (and we’re stuck INSIDE looking at her through a window) she is laying around with a heating pad on her knees and braces on her wrists, dreaming about prednisone, and looking at yarn to buy online. Shipwrecked. She isn’t even using her knitting machines, which at least was a little fun. This is so bad even I’m dreaming of yarn. And tuna.

This is Hannah, signing off.

Notes from the Mother of Cats:

Yep. My hands are total crap at the moment. My rheumatologist ordered some x-rays and the word “severe” appeared several times in the report. My wrists are the worst.

My knees aren’t doing very well, either, and my rheumatologist is exploring options with me. MORE DRUGS!!!! I’m a fan right now. Hannah wasn’t kidding when she said I was dreaming of prednisone. Steroids injected into my knee sound really good right now. The good news is that my lungs continue to improve, and the red flags that were raised at the time of the car wreck CT scan in December have resolved in favor of nothing serious. Yay! The changes in my lungs have disappeared, and the growing “mass” in my thyroid turned out to be a cyst. The bad news is that the follow-up CT scan in March showed that my broken ribs and sternum (fractured after all… not a shock) were struggling to heal, and I was told to lay off the knitting (and especially the knitting machine) FOR A FEW MONTHS!!!! Obviously, these medical professionals don’t understand that I need these things for my mental health. Sigh. Mateo isn’t the only one wanting to throw a tantrum lately. I don’t think that my doctors would be happy about the catio construction effort, but it is kind of an emergency!

The emotional support chicken was a huge hit at Kaiser pulmonology, and they will let me know if I need to supply them with more of the little chickees. My pulmonologist mentioned that the kids with asthma who come in for testing would love a little chickee… heal faster ribs!!! The chest pain has stopped even though I have been swinging a hammer this week, so I’m pretty sure that knitting again is right around the corner.

So… I can cast on Sea Glass, right?

<Hannah: send tuna!!>

Hannah and the CoalBear: Stuck on Sea Glass Island

Hi. I’m Hannah.

The Mother of Cats has been a handful lately. Ever since she finished her last sweater she has been mooning around the house, reading books, and sadly sorting through her yarn stash. Seriously, she has been pulling out all of her yarn, making lots and lots of little piles with different colors, and then she carefully puts them all away (and I want to emphasize, she is really ignoring my needs while this is going on!!!) to only take them out a day later. WHAT IS GOING ON WITH THIS MOTHER OF CATS!!!! Seriously, I think that she may be a little broken right now.

She started out by taking out these yarns that she JUST LOVES and thinking that she could use them to make a Sea Glass sweater.

I have to admit, those are nice colors. The Mother of Cats has lots of yarns that will go nicely with those colors, and she decided to pull them out of the stash and group them together. Then the trouble started: how much pink. Where did all the dark wine-colored yarns go. How much gold should go into the piles? Is this yard dark or light? Should there be purple? How much white is too much…

This is more than a little exhausting. Even Mateo is upset with the constant trips into the yarn stash!

Then she went out and bought some more yarns that go nicely with the inspiration yarns…

Now she has finally made two big piles of yarn that are sorted into piles that are dark and light. Sounds like progress, right? No. This is the illusion of progress, because she is still worried about how to create a balanced sweater from all of those colors, and maybe she should put in some more crazy colors as pops, or… WHERE IS MY TUNA!!!! This is completely out of hand.

You have to admit that there is enough yarn here to make more than one sweater, but is she casting on a sweater? No, she is not…

She has been making little Sea Glass hats to color swatch different color combinations. To be frank, I think that she just likes to knit and knit, and she is having so much fun with the hats that the sweater is now in limbo. Eventually she will get through this (I hope) and move on to the sweater, and I think that she is slowly calming down and getting more confidence in this whole “mixing up lots of different colors from the stash” thing that is required by the sweater.

I am carefully monitoring her progress on the hats, and I think that is helping her too.

Last night she mentioned that there is a Sea Glass tee that would work better for warm weather… she thinks that she can use fingering yarn for the tee without using any of her PRECIOUS DK yarn. I don’t understand what the problem is… isn’t one catnip mouse pretty much the same as the others? Whatever. I do have some concerns about how this simultaneously out of control but also stuck on Sea Glass Island, wracked with indecision, phenomenon is progressing. Why can’t the Mother of Cats do anything the simple way? With her everything is so dang complicated!! Eventually there will be a sweater… I hope. And more catnip mice.

Look at what she has done with my boxes!!

Sigh. I’m going to see if I can get the Mother of Cats to give me some kitty cookies. Bye.

This is Hannah, signing off.

>^..^<

Note from the Mother of Cats: The Winter Albina sweater finally got blocked and I’ve been wearing it every cool day for the last two weeks. This may be my favorite sweater for some time!

I’m off to cast on another Sea Glass hat… this is what happens when you love your yarn stash too much…

Hannah and the CoalBear: Sweater, Storm, Moon.

Hi. I’m Hannah.

I’ve been supervising the Mother of Cat’s knitting while she listens to her audiobook. My newest favorite spot is in front of the television!

The Mother of Cats has been knitting like crazy lately while listening to Erik Larson audiobooks. She just finished The Demon of Unrest and is now deep into Isaac’s Storm. She says that the books are interesting, and I guess that they are because she sure listens to them a lot. She should spend more time running around the house and letting us play outside (and giving me TUNA), but nope, she has been knitting. Look at what came off the needles yesterday…

She finished casting off her sweater last night! Look at how nice it looks on the catio carpet.

She really like the sweater, and wanted to write a post about all the little nice features in the construction, but I said that I was more than able to do that for her. I’m not just a pretty face with sharp claws, right? I have skills!! I have spent hours and hours watching her make this sweater, and I know what I’m talking about.

So, hang onto your tuna treats and chirpy toys: here is the grand tour of nice things about this sweater. The first picture (top left) show how the color of the yarn has some subtle changes in intensity that kind of softens the strips. That was a feature for the Mother of Cats, but I personally couldn’t care less because it all looks nice with cat hair on it. The picture in the middle of the top row shows the nice decreases that show off the neckline. (Yawn… the Mother of Cats spends too much time appreciating things that aren’t important, right?) If you thought she was kind of silly with the neckline, then you will love the shoulder seam at the top right. Look at how smooth the seam is!! This is the first time that she has picked up stitches to start the front of the sweater where if looks… perfect. Even more perfect is the fact that there are several short rows in that knitted work that I absolutely can’t see because they are just PERFECT!! While we are talking about perfect, can I mention how much I like catnip? A little catnip right now would just set me up…

I get my catnip served on a pink donut. How do you prefer yours?

Now we are up to the very best parts of the sweater.

The bound off edges of the sweater were all done with hand-stitched tubular bind off. The whole time the Mother of Cats was sewing the edges the yarn was flipping all over the place and I… just… had… to… grab… it a little with my claws from time to time. Just a little bit. Look at how nice the finished edge of that sleeve is!! I’m positive that my contribution really helped make it look that nice. Finally, there is the huge ribbing at the bottom of the sweater. The sides of the ribbing aren’t supposed to sewn together, but the Mother of Cats has decided to stitch the two sides together anyway. Yay. More flipping yarn to chase!!!!

Mateo: Hannah isn’t the only one who helped with the sweater.

The Mother of Cats has been really working steadily on this sweater for over a week. Why you ask? Because there are lots of exciting things on the way for the end of the week and she wanted to be able to wear her new sweater when it gets cold again. Can you believe that there is a Bomb Cyclone on the way??? And a Blood Moon?? At the same time?!! Doesn’t that sound kind of thrilling?

Maybe I’ll get extra tuna in the excitement!!

This is Hannah, signing off.

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats:

The sweater is the Winter Albina by Caitlin Hunter; I altered the pattern to make it crew necked. I’m both ecstatic to have it off the needles and morose that the knitting part is over. I’ve spent part of the day hunting for a new sweater to knit, but I do have a blanket that I should get back to first. But… there are so many pretty sweater patterns… and pretty yarn possibilities…

The coming storm is a problem because the air pressure will drop really rapidly when the low comes over. As many of you know, low pressure means painful joints; it also means swelling in my lungs and low oxygen levels. Here’s the projected pressure graph and what happened to me in the last low pressure event.

At almost the exact same time that the pressure starts to drop like a rock the blood moon will arrive. That’s not ominous at all, right? Hopefully all the finishing work on the sweater will be done before then! I do have to mention that it is a little eerie to be listening to an audiobook about a massive hurricane as this thing forms up just due east of me…

Hannah: I forgot the most important thing: it will also be my birthday on the 14th!!! I like to party in style!

Hannah and the CoalBear: Lazy Mother of Cats

Hi. I’m Hannah.

I would like to lodge a complaint against the Mother of Cats!!

The world outside has changed over the last couple of weeks. The sunshine is bright and warm; I love to sleep in the sunshine, don’t you? There are more squirrels than usual chasing each other through the trees out front, and sometimes they even come right up to the windows. The bunnies are spending lots of time in the yard where the CoalBear and I can see them, and there are birds again. Lots of birds!! All of this change is really exciting, and the CoalBear and I just want to spend all of our time playing. So, is the Mother of Cats spending all of her time entertaining us? Giving us tuna? Letting us outside to play in the sunshine and delivering the kitty cookies right on time?

No. She is not!

The Mother of Cats has been sleeping more than usual (and I’m a cat, so believe me, that is a lot!), reading her books, and knitting. Knitting isn’t too bad if we get to play with the yarn, but nope, nope, nope… once again she is not sharing her toys with us like she should.

Mateo the CoalBear is doing his best to play anyway! He loves the needles, I perfer the yarn myself. He is kind of a weird kitty…

The Mother of Cats has been listening to an audiobook during some of her knitting, so I get to listen along with her while she knits and I help with the yarn management.

This is the book that we listened to last week.

Imagine a man who dreams of waves of energy zooming through the air from a spark of electricity to a device that can detect the waves; the device is like magic, letting messages travel from one place to another without wires. He dreams of all the changes that the wireless messages can make in the world, and also about how much money he can make from the business that installs and runs the devices that make this possible. His name is Guglielmo Marconi. Pretty cool, right. (Can I have some tuna now… all this typing is making me hungry…) At the same time in history, there is a man who works creating and selling “cures” for illnesses. He is married to a woman who is very bossy and demanding (CoalBear… I’m looking at you…) and one day he snaps, kills her, and tries to escape with his true love to America on a ship. His name is Hawley Harvey Crippen.

I have to be honest; I played a lot with toys and this fortune paper from a Chinese cookie while the whole book thing was going on…

Are you tired of the story yet? It gets really exciting now. Chief Inspector Walter Dew of Scotland yard finds the reminds of the murdered wife. The hunt for the escaped murdering husband with his girlfriend becomes a big deal in the newspapers, and the captain of the ship realizes that two of his passengers are the people being hunted by Scotland yard. The captain sends a message back to shore using (what else???) his Marconi wireless device. Chief Inspector Dew boards a fast boat and the chase across the Atlantic Ocean is on, with coordination between ships made possible because of … wireless messages using the Marconi system. Marconi messages keep the press updated, and suspense builds as the public hangs onto every new update and intercepted message reported in the news. Whew! My whiskers were just a tingle listening to all of this! Chief Inspecter Dew overtook the ship with the murderer, and he was apprehended before he could land in Canada. Because of the publicity, Marconi’s business was secured. What a story. What a book!! I absolutely need some tuna right this minute!!!!

Look at how much the Mother of Cats got done while she was listening to the book and knitting.

So that has pretty much been the last two weeks. Sleeping, knitting, and listening to really interesting books. I like the yarn and the books, but I do hope that the Mother of Cats will stop being so lazy… Mateo and I have needs, right?

I’m not lazy… I’m a cat. I’m supposed to sleep all day.

This is Hannah, signing off.

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats:

The sweater that I’m knitting is the Winter Albina sweater by Caitlin Hunter. I’m really pleased with how it is working up.
I’ve already started another Eric Larson book: The Demon of Unrest.
I’m in another scleroderma flare, and I did go see my rheumatologist for help. I am now in possession of an emergency pack of steroids and narcotics. Whew. It’s good to have an emergency pack!
I’m doing better lately, but the cats are still kind of disgusted with me.
What was that Chinese cookie fortune that Hannah was playing with?

Friday, February 28th, was Rare Disease Day. I found that I was ~~too lazy~~ unable to write another post for the day, but here are some nice ones that I wrote in previous years.

Hannah and the CoalBear: Winter Albina in the White City

Hi. I’m Hannah.

It has been cold for days and the Mother of Cats has been knitting and knitting on her new sweater called the Winter Albina. I’ve been helping her tremendously with only a little yarn whapping. The CoalBear likes to chase the needles which drives the Mother of Cats a little crazy, but I’ve been a really good girl except maybe when the Mother of Cats gives me a little catnip… anyway, the sweater is starting to look pretty good! Look at how much progress she has made.

The Mother of Cats is now knitting below the armholes. Pretty good, right?

The Mother of Cats has been listening to this book while she knits so I’ve been listening to it too.

I have to tell you that I prefer books with lots of action like… birds, bunnies, mice, TUNA!! and lots of cat chases, but I guess this book was okay. It tells the story of the World’s Columbian Exposition in 1893: there sure was a lot of stuff going on like… creating this huge city for the exposition with all the buildings painted white, and a man who is even more crazy than the CoalBear who shoots the Mayor of Chicago, and a man named Ferris who dreamt of a huge wheel in the sky, and another man who took advantage of all the new people in the city to build a hotel where he kills lots of young women…

Mateo the CoalBear: those parts of the book were kind of scary!!

So, I guess that was the week. We knitted, we dreamed of life in Chicago, long ago, and Mateo ran around in the snow hoping to see some bunny tracks. A good week, all in all.

Don’t you love winter? Knitting, books, and catnip. What could be better, right?

This is Hannah, signing off.

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats: The Devil in the White City was a book that caused lots of reflection and led to more than one “aha!” moment. Here’s some of the takeaways from the book:

The buildings of the World’s Fair were of neoclassical design and the many architects involved in the construction agreed to uniform standards/guidelines that created a well-planned “city” that was augmented by deliberate landscape design. The effect was astounding for the time.
I kept thinking about the pictures of the “White City” and how they were familiar. I started thinking… they just copied the layout of Washington D.C., and even the downtown Civic Center of Denver looks like this… Buildings like that in a formal layout are really impressive… I remember how awestruck I was sitting on the Lincoln Memorial’s steps in Washington, looking down the long stretch of the reflecting pool towards the Wahington Monument one hot summer, or how impressive the structures of Denver’s civic center are when I walked among them with my children… I had it wrong. The World’s Fair (AKA the World’s Columbian Exposition) was the original.
The Lincoln Memorial was built after the World’s Columbian Exposition, and its neoclassical design was influenced by that World’s Fair.
Denver’s Civic Center was influenced by exhibits at the World’s fair, and it was later designed by planners who were directly connected to the architects who built the fair.
At one point in the book as the layout was being described, I thought to myself… “Oh. This is like Disneyland!” You guessed it, Walt Disney’s father was one of the builders of the World’s Fair.
The Chicago World’s Fair’s answer to the iconic Eiffel Tower in Paris was the Ferris Wheel. Who knew?
The Ferris Wheel was located on the Midway, the strip of engaging attractions located along the route to the fair. Among those attractions was Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show, a huge hit. To this day, all children in America know that the exciting rides are to be found on the Midway of every fair…
Buffalo Bill‘s real name was William Cody. He is today buried on Lookout Mountain, looking over Denver and the plains beyond. Forever a showman, you can still buy tickets to visit his grave.
William Cody founded the city of Cody, Wyoming. Part of my family now lives there.

The Chicago World’s Fair was quite the event: planned and built over a few years, open for only a few months in 1893; the influence goes on. I really enjoyed the book, and I’m ready to launch into another book by the same author, Thunderstruck.

My grandmother’s souvenir from the fair is still in my family; my cousin has it in her kitchen where it holds toothpicks she uses to check if her bakes are done.

Hannah and the CoalBear: We’ve Been Knitting!!

Hi. I’m Hannah.

Do you see this new blankie? The Mother of Cats and I have been working on it all week!!

During the really bad cold weather the Mother of Cats took out a blankie that had been hibernating for months and months and laid it out to see how much was done…

There is kind of a lot of these knitted flowers! The Mother of Cats calls them hexagons, but I call them comfy!! The Mother of Cats has been making one or two of these every day and I keep a close eye on her to make sure she doesn’t make any mistakes. She has to make about 6 more of these and then she gets to sew them all up together. I plan to take lots of naps on the blankie while she is sewing the little units together!! The Mother of Cats ordered some more yarn to use with this blankie as there is even more knitting that has to happen after she is done sewing all the little pieces together, and I can hardly wait for that to happen! Do you know how much fun it is to chase this yarn? It kind of is my favorite!! The Mother of Cats said that the extra yarn is for the border, whatever that is. Maybe it is something that Mateo the CoalBear can chase? He’s getting a little bored while we are working so hard on these hexagons… Poor CoalBear. He wants to go out onto the catio because all of the bunnies have been playing in the yard every evening.

Mateo: That’s a nice looking bunny!!! Don’t you think that this bunny wants to play with me?? Here bunny, bunny…

Mateo still wants to be a SnowCat, and I have to admit, he is still growing winter hair like crazy!!! Does he know something that the bunnies and I don’t know? Is there colder weather on the way? Look at how crazy hairy he has been getting! No wonder the Mother of Cats doesn’t encourage him to sleep on the blankie… besides, it is MY BLANKIE!!!

Enough of Mateo the ~~CoalBear~~ SnowCat. Let’s get back to the knitting. The Mother of Cats also finished up another one of the unfinished projects that had been hanging out for months and months, a hat, and I was with her every single step of the way.

Pretty good job, right? You can hardly see the cat hair on the hat from here…

So, that was the week. The CoalBear and I went out onto the catio every single day this week to watch the bunnies, and then we spent the rest of the time helping the Mother of Cats crank out hats on her little knitting machine in the afternoons, and then we knitted in the evening. That’s a lot of knitting, right? She has 25 hats to donate to Frayed Knots (but NOT THE FANCY HAT!!), she almost has all of her little hexagons knitted up, and before you know it that blankie will be all put together and we will be doing the border. Yay. Maybe then she will make me a little knitted chicken to sleep with on the blankie.

Or maybe I should go chase Mateo around a little… I can hear him crashing around downstairs…

Time for me to get some exercise and then some tuna. Laters!

This is Hannah, signing off.

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats:

I’ve been listening to audiobooks while working on the machine knitted hats and the hexagons. Right now I’m in Chicago getting ready for the World’s Fair, and there is a killer on the loose…

This book is really interesting because my grandmother’s family is from Chicago, and all of this was happening while she was a toddler. I wonder if she was taken to this fair…

That hat is Alpine Bloom by Caitlin Hunter. It fits me perfectly and I am keeping it! The blanket is a huge version of Nectar by Isolde Teague.

I’ve almost cleared out all of the old projects that have been hanging around the house. I still have some little emotional support chickies waiting to be finished up, and then I will be ready to start another big project… like a sweater…like the Winter Albina sweater by Caitlin Hunter…