Knitting – Page 2 – Yarn, Books & Roses

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…

Look at the squishy mail that came today!!! Winter Albina, here I come!!!

Hannah and the CoalBear: Snowcat Interlude

Hi. I’m Mateo, the CoalBear.

Do you see me giving the Mother of Cats a seriously evil-looking glare??

I was trapped in the house for days and days while the Mother of Cats played on her computer, cleaned out some files in her office, and made hats on her knitting machine. Usually I like the knitting machine, but I HAVE NEEDS!!! OUTSIDE!!!! NOW!!! Finally, the Mother of Cats relented and let me out. Yay!!

I have lots of fluffy fur and it is even on the bottoms of my feet. I went out every day this week; Hannah, that wimp, did not go out even once. She is kind of a baby about the cold. Okay, she doesn’t have the fur on the bottoms of her feet like I do, but still, she could try, right?

Hannah: that would be a huge NOPE little black guy… while you were out in the snow, I got double portions of kitty cookies!! Ha!

As the Mother of Cats worked on her hats this week she started to notice dropped stitches in the knitting. It happened a few times, and then it started to happen with every single hat no matter how careful she was. Then she realized that the yarn feeder had been worn down by the yarn and that it couldn’t catch correctly anymore… poor Mother of Cats… she was cranky and sad at the same time… what should she do with herself…

The groove is worn into the feeder inside that marked circle.

Luckily the Mother of Cats found a replacement yarn feeder for her Sentro machine for sale on Amazon and it is already on the way. There is even a YouTube video that shows how to replace it so she won’t even be needing my help. Unfortunately, the part won’t be here until the middle of next week, so in the meantime, she is back to knitting on some arm warmers that she is making to match her Scrunch Socks.

Pretty cool, right? I helped her with these too, but personally I think that the knitting machine is more fun to whap.

So, that was the week. Today the snow has returned, it has gotten really cold outside, and I’m trapped indoors while the Mother of Cats completely ignores my needs. It’s like she doesn’t even remember that I am a SNOW CAT at heart, even if I look like a little CoalBear.

Sigh. Guess I’ll just sleep until it warms up again.

This is the ~~CoalBear~~ SnowCat, signing off.

>^..^<

Notes from the Mother of Cats:

The armwarmers are on 2.25 mm needles (Size 1) and I cast on 72 stitches for the top of the arm and then slowly decreased 16 stitches as I worked towards the wrist. To mimic the rolled knit top of the sock/armwarmer pattern I bound off with 4 stitch I-cord.
I’m seriously fighting the need to buy more yarn for a new sweater. It’s cold, there is this cute-beyond-all-words new sweater by Caitlin Hunter that I want, and I’m pretty sure that I totally deserve it after two weeks of cold and extreme weather changes. I want squishy mail!!!!
My knees basically hate me today after yesterday’s huge air pressure change. Look at what happened!

I think that this is another reason why I deserve that yarn to knit a new sweater!!
What do you guys think about these colors?

These colors are (left to right) Dirty Panther, Elizabeth Taylor, and Elven Dark. I’m kind of set on Dirty Panther (MC) and Elizabeth Taylor (CC) because that resulting sweater will have the most flexibility in my wardrobe, but the Elven Dark is really tempting… All of these yarns are Tosh Vintage worsted weight yarn.

Hannah and the CoalBear: Trapped Indoors

Hi. I’m Hannah.

Do I look unhappy? I’ve been trapped inside ALL DAY LONG!!!

Deep cold has made its way into Colorado. It started Friday with an overnight snowstorm that descended with frigid flakes that piled up in the catio along with dropping temperatures. The stars broke through as the snow ended, gleaming unusually bright in the frigid air, and the temperatures continued to drop. Tonight, a new storm has arrived with more snow, and the falling temperatures and wind will make things truly dangerous in the next couple days for anyone outside without sufficient protection. The Mother of Cats says that applies to cats, too. She is so mean to us!!

Mateo’s winter coat is now in, but the Mother of Cats says that it isn’t up to the new cold that is pushing into the state. Mateo, the CoalBear, has been throwing a cat-tantrum over his restricted access to the catio. It is exhausting. Really exhausting!!

Here’s the warning alerts that arrived today on the Mother of Cats’ phone from the local news station:

Those temperatures are Fahrenheit, by the way. Luckily, the Mother of Cats had lots of time to prepare for this; her windows are wrapped, and she has a blanket over the largest one in the family room. The fridge is full of groceries, she got all the tuna, and she has yarn wound up and ready to go onto the knitting machine. Take that, cold weather! We are going to have days of chasing yarn while the Mother of Cats makes her little hats on the knitting machine.

Speaking of the knitting machine, the Mother of Cats took some action to make it easier to work with it. She loves the Sentro machine, but it wobbles around, and it is a little bit of a battle for her to handle the yarn, the machine, and the cranking all at the same time while a certain little black CoalBear tries to whap the yarn as it races into the machine. Ugh. I told the CoalBear to be a good boy, but he never, ever listens to me!

Anyway, this is what the Mother of Cats did yesterday to the knitting machine. She attached the machine to a small unused shelf that was lurking behind a bookshelf downstairs. She used the sticky strips that come with Command hooks to attach the feet of the machine to the shelf, and then the shelf with the attached machine can be clamped to MY coffee table. Why did she have to put it onto my coffee table right where I like to hang out in front of the space heater. The Mother of Cats never talked to me about this before she did it. So far things are going well with her setup and the worst problem that she is dealing with is a certain cranky, under-stimulated little black cat. I prefer to hang out under the coffee table where I catch the best heat from the space heater. Now that the knitting machine is easier to work with, The Mother of Cats is making a couple of hats a day, and she is also getting some handknitting done too!

Look at these fun knits!! The Mother of Cats got the new DK weight arm warmers done just in time for the cold weather, and she also knitted up some more of the emotional support little chickies. I think that the new chickies make good cat toys, but she put them away to donate to her community knitting organization.

So, that was pretty much the week. The only other thing that has been going on is my new wooly blankie. Look at what the Mother of Cats gave me!!!!!

Okay, it isn’t really a blanket. This is a shawl that she knitted a few years ago. Isn’t this the perfect blanket for me?????

I really love my new blanket. Like, I really, really loves it!!!! I’ve been grooming it all the time and it is gradually getting nice and soft and fluffy. PERFECT!!!! Okay, the Mother of Cats was a tiny bit upset when she first saw what was happening, but she loves me so much she is letting me keep it. Also, Mateo has been pulling out strands of yarn with his teeth, so it is ours now!!

The Mother of Cats says I can keep the blankie as long as I leave her sweaters alone. Hey, it is a deal. Do you see how much I love this blankie!!!

So, that’s it for the week. I’m still trapped indoors with the CoalBear, and he is really causing a lot of commotion as he wants to go out onto the catio really, really badly. I stuck my face outside yesterday, and I do have to say, the Mother of Cats is right about this one. It is too cold for any CoalBears, no matter how fluffy they are. Maybe I should go chase him around again for a few minutes to give the Mother of Cats a break. Then we are going to make another hat. That will cheer Mateo up for sure.

Note from the Mother of Cats

If you are wondering what the pattern for the arm warmers was, I kind of wrote it up in my last post here.

All the New Things

It’s been a little more than a week now, and so far things are looking up in 2025. Here are the highlights of the week:

That’s right. A new pattern came out for Emotional Support Little Chickies that are just the right size to put into your pocket to take with you on the go. Yay!! I bought some cheap multicolored yarn to make a bunch to send off to the organizations that my community knitting non-profit supports. These guys would make the day at one of the cancer infusions centers, or maybe at Ronald McDonald House, or they can even ride along on the ambulances that respond to mental health crisis calls.

Then a present came in the mail from a sister. A Pink. Zebra. Striped. Furblet. It makes noises. It has one little CoalBear pretty darn concerned…

Isn’t that the cutest thing? I burst out laughing when I opened the package and saw what it was. Mateo, however, is not laughing!

Speaking of new things, do you see this new winter coat that Mateo is sporting?

I also have been ignoring the few little knitting projects that were still active at the end of the year. It’s a new year, I need new things!!! I casted on and started a pair of new arm warmers that are coming right along. New is good, right? Look at how bright and happy these colors are.

I found this yarn in the stash, and these warmers will be soooo cute with all of my grey sweaters.

I kind of used a pattern to get me started on these arm warmers, but after I had looked at the notes to see what size needles were used and how many stitches were cast on I just took off and did my own thing while checking for the size from time to time. I mean, look at those things: how hard does it have to be? If you crave some of your own, those needles are size 4 (3.5mm), I cast on 48 stitches using DK yarn, and when I got close to my wrist (these are knit from the elbow down towards the wrist) I decreased twice to get the stitch count down to 44 stitches before the wrist ribbing. I put a marker in the decrease rows so that I can make the second arm warmer match. See, easy!! But fun. And new.

The other big new is the new car! I took an Uber down to the Subaru dealership the second day of the new year, and after 5 exhausting hours I drove home my new Subaru Forester. Yay! New car is good!! Exhausted and stressed to the max, I made the last turn towards home in the dark of the early evening, and there ahead of me, enormous in the western sky as it just began to tuck itself behind the Rocky Mountains for the night, was the new moon.

I took this picture the next evening. The moon is a little bigger than the tiny sliver of a moon that I saw when I brought the car home, but you can see how new it still is. That is Venus right next to it. New Moon, new car.

It’s been a pretty good start to the year, don’t you think? I went yesterday to get some medical testing done, and everything is looking pretty good. Yay! 2025, let’s do this!!

My African violets are also starting out the year right.

The Garden Moves Indoors.

The new season is hard upon us now in Colorado. The leaves are gone from the trees, there is snow on the ground in the shaded areas along the back fence, and the only birds around lately are pushy doves at the front feeder terrorizing the squirrels (the squirrels deserve it, in my opinion. Go bad doves!!). The cats are suddenly friendlier, and Mateo, now very soft and fluffy, is growing in his winter cat.

The picture on the left is the summer version of Mateo. His tail is thin, his ruff gone, and I always worry that he is losing weight. Nope. He’s just missing a ton of fur! The other two pictures are examples of the winter, full-coated little furry monster. Right now, Mateo is eating non-stop and getting fluffier by the day. Obviously, winter is right around the corner!

I’ve been slowly bringing in all of my outdoor plants that I thought I could overwinter in the house, and after spending some weeks in the garage, the last of them moved in a week ago. (Why did they have to languish in the garage for a few weeks, you ask? Well… hopefully, some of the bugs gave up and moved on. I want to mention that my garage door has windows in it, and protects the plants from frost, so it is a suitable transition zone.)

Here’s my craft room with the grow light mounted shelves. Happy plants! The largest plants on the left are the lavenders. They are just hanging out and I’m not sure if I should prune them, or what. I may have to do some investigations on the internet…

Most of the plants that were on my deck outdoors in pots are now in the craft room on shelves equipped with grow lights. The plants adjusted pretty well after their move, but I’d like to unpack what happened with them a little.

The geraniums decided to go to sleep for the winter while they were in the garage and most of the leaves turned yellow and started to drop off. I let them adjust to indoors for about a week and then pruned out all of the yellow and sad leaves, which removed more than half of the leaves on the plants. I could see that the plants were putting out blooms before the pruning started, but to my surprise I discovered lots of new growth emerging on the stems down by the base of the plant. All right then! A week after the pruning (and some fertilizer) there aren’t any new yellow leaves, and the plants seem to be thriving.

I pruned the miniature roses right after they came into the house about six weeks ago, and after that they put out new blooms and filled out with lots of growth. Yay. Looking good! Umm… where did those aphids come from!!!!! I had looked at the roses carefully before bringing them in, but to be truthful, I was looking for Japanese beetles. Who knew that aphids lay eggs and go dormant in the fall? To make things worse, those little guys can reproduce like crazy if there is even one because they can reproduce asexually. Bad aphids, bad!! Even worse, these aphids had wings and could fly!!!

Operation Dead Aphid immediately commenced. My mother used to have us whip up soapy water and then put the suds onto the rose plants, which does work pretty well, but since my plants were so filled out, I went with Neem oil. The cats don’t munch on the plants, so I felt pretty safe using this, and there was an immediate drop in the aphid population. I have to respray every week as new growth emerges, but I’m happy with the dramatic drop in population. After the current round of blooms are gone, I plan to prune back hard so I can get a better spray onto the plant. For other insects that came into the house with the plants I have the little bug catcher that going. If you haven’t seen one of these before, it is a fan with an ultraviolet light that attracts insects that then get pulled into the device where they are caught onto sticky paper. Yay! No little flies or gnats. No!! Just no!!

This jade plant was grown from cuttings off a plant I bought over 20 years ago.

My jade plant was pretty overgrown last spring with heavy leaves pulling the stems over sideways. I pruned off the growth that was causing the problems, staked the stems, and then put the plant out onto my front porch where it braved the weather over the summer. I brought it back in a few weeks ago, pruned off new growth that was, once again, pulling the stems sideways and then then removed the stakes. Look! A plant that can stand up on its own now. Maybe someday it will bloom…

I almost left the bougainvillea outside to die because it didn’t bloom even once all summer long. I left it so long the leaves began to yellow and drop before I had a change of heart and brought it in.

The plant has continued dropping the summer leaves, but there is new growth emerging at the ends of stems and along their lengths. Okay. I guess we will go with this. Maybe it will bloom? It’s another adventure. The blooms, if they ever happen, are a really cool pinky-orange that will look great in the room. Do you hear that plant? Bloom or die!!!

So that’s it. The plants that made me happy last spring and summer and now inside with me for the cold seasons. Take that winter!! Bring on the wind and snow.

I have secured an endless summer for myself and the cats.