cats – Page 10 – Yarn, Books & Roses

Midnight Story

You all know that I am the Midnight Knitter; some of my best work gets done between midnight and 1am. The house is peaceful, the world (and the cats) are asleep and I descend into the calming meditation of smooth knitting while watching the late night talk shows.

So last night I thought it was really nice when Yellow Boy cuddled against my head on the back of the knitting chair while MacKenzie was asleep on my legs. He never does that…

Cat — He was so cute I snapped a picture of him. Look at the sweet face…

Cat — MacKenzie: Wait…what is that smell…

Cat face — Ugh! Not again!! You know what this means…

Yep, while the world was peacefully asleep I had to give this cat (and his poopy bottom) a bath at 1am this morning. It was just horrible. There were shrieking wails at horrific volumes. MacKenzie, the cat not in the sink, cried too as he paced the counters trying to intervene. Crashing, clawing and hissing happened. I got bit (not badly) and there was also a scratch. By the time it was over there was a lot of water on the floor and we were all just exhausted. Strangely, Yellow Boy doesn’t mind the blow dryer too much, so I was able to get him semi-dry before he got cold.

Toy mouse in the water bowl. — This boy recovers quickly. I know that he played overnight because this is what I found in the water bowl this morning.

The trouble here is that Yellow Boy is very furry with lots of “feathers” on his rear end. He has a tiny, but very furry, tail that looks like a bunny rabbit’s; he can’t lift his tail out of the way. He eats my plants and every bug and spider that he can catch; sometimes he has litter box accidents that create these horrific cat-bath events. I’m on immunosuppressants and really can’t risk scratches and bites anymore. I decided to take action!

Clippers — Behold the cat trap that I plugged in by his food bowl.

Clipped Cat — and here he is after getting trapped and clipped: Yellow Boy with all of his butt feathers shaved off and a bob-tail cut. This went a lot better than the bath!

Buddy cats — The traumatized boys even cuddled together this afternoon…

Sleeping cat — and hopefully we will all sleep well tonight. Sweet dreams little guy. 🙂

Cats, Mitts, and Baby Booties

The weather continues to be cold here. It is too cold (and snowy) for the cats to go outside so they have been hanging out upstairs on my bed. OK, the truth is that these two boys aren’t really the best of friends. Yellow Boy (AKA the PuffMuffin) steals all of MacKenzie’s kitty treats and hogs the toys. MacKenzie beats up Yellow Boy when he’s feeling grumpy. When he is cold and can’t go outside he is grumpy a lot. Life is tough for Yellow Boy on snowy days… And yet, here they are huddled together on the bed looking miserable together…

Cold Cats — Only these two would sleep back-to-back trying to stay warm. That little red feather comforter just isn’t cutting it anymore I guess…

Happy Cat — So I went shopping for a new warm throw to put on the bed for them. Instant hit!! Can you feel the purr through the screen?

Happy (and warm) cats means that I got lots of knitting done without them trying to get warm laying on my legs and shedding clouds of fur. Here’s the week’s accomplishments:

Finished Mitts. — What a shock: I made another pair of the Sugared Maple Mitts (by Melissa Schaschwary ) in the last skein of Zen Yarn Garden Serenity DK. I think that these may be my favorite. They are mine, mine, all mine!! Here are the Ravelry notes.

Baby Booties — I also got an order for baby booties this week. The new mother requested that they be black (!!!) so that is what I did. The lace doesn’t show as well as it would in a light colored set of booties, but they are still soft, squishy and should work. Look!! Almost all of the snow has melted away because today was windy and warmer. The cats came out to run around while I was taking these photos. Everyone is happy again. This pattern is our family pattern from days of yore but can also be found on Ravelry. The yarn is Anzula Squishy.

I think that I have worked my way through the immediate urge to make mitts. I sent a RSVP for the Scleroderma Holiday Party today and it dawned on me that perhaps I should finish up on the Christmas presents. I have knitting (a shawl and a hat) and some quilting to get finished.

And cookies to bake…

And the decorations to put out…

And I will never hear the end of it if those cats don’t get a Christmas tree to play in…

Good thing I bought them a nice cuddly blanket for the bed. 🙂

Mitt Madness

My son has a beautiful Maine Coon tuxedo cat. The family joke is that she controls the weather.

Here she is, Maya Isabella the Weather Queen. She actually considers herself a princess and demands regular attention from her main subject, my son. Kitty treats now! Come run my drinking water for me! Come pet me now!! Time for me to go outside to catch bugs!! She also takes instant ownership of any knitting left unattended…

Snowy yard — Bless her heart. Tuesday she sent me a blizzard, the first official blizzard in the Denver area in several years. The wind howled and shook the house overnight and this is what the backyard looked like in the morning. My cats were not amused. I should note that there was almost no snow at Maya’s house!

The cold weather and previous snow storms had already launched me into some serious mitt knitting, but this week’s storm really pushed me into mitt knitting overdrive. Here’s what happened during this week:

Mitts — I actually finished these mitts before the big snowstorm and took the picture as the first little pellets of snow arrived. These are Sugared Maple MItts (designed by Melissa Schaschwary) knitted in Zen Yarn Garden Serenity DK. Love the cashmere!! The knitted texture was really easy to knit and kind of reminds me of the waffle pattern in Henley shirts. These are really comfy mitts. If you yearn for more details here are my notes on Ravelry.

Pur;ple MItts — The first mitts were so much fun to knit and wear I just cast on and started another pair. This is Zen Yarn Garden Serenity DK again, and the purple is actually as intense as in the photo. I have a cousin who can’t get enough purple so I already know where these are going when they are done.

Mitts with Cable on Top — My sister let me know that the mitts I gave her for her birthday last year were flawed: the cable just didn’t stay parked on top of her hand the way they should. My first impulse was to tell her to stop being so persnickety, but upon reflection I decided that she may have a point. I made some changes to my generic rib and cable mitt pattern that would allow me to make her mitts that have the thumb moved over to place it under the index finger.

Underneath of MItt — Here’s the palm view of the mitts. The gusset has been moved over 4 stitches and starts at the wrist. I’m hoping that if her thumb can move without tugging on the body of the mitt the cable will behave itself. This yarn is Malabrigo Rios which is one of my favorite hand-painted superwash wools. I wrote notes to myself about what I had done and they are here on Ravelry.

I’m still not completely happy with the new mitt design. What would happen if I added more ribbing at the top and bottom of the mitt? What if I changed to a smaller needle to do that ribbing at the top? Should I make the top so long it can be folded back in a little cuff? Hmmm… I have more Rios to play with (well, duh! Yarn Stash Queen here!!) and I’m itching to CO and get started on another pair. I have some more Zen Yarn Garden that wants to be mitts, too. I try to not overthink this compulsion to create mitts. I just knit them up and put the little guys into my mitt bin where they can all hang out together and pretend to be the ultimate cool knitted items.

Box of MItts — My box of mitts: last Saturday I took the bin to my scleroderma support group meeting and gave away or sold 11 pairs! I’ll be taking the bin back to the next meeting as several people thought they might want more pairs for Christmas presents. During the week I handed out business cards to more customers who admired the mitts I was wearing and asked how they could get a pair.

Looks like things are picking up in the mitt business. All of a sudden mitts ARE the ultimate cool knitted item. Must be all the snow; it is snowing again this evening and there is ANOTHER snowstorm predicted for Thanksgiving.

Thanks Maya!

Maybe I should knit her a little something too.

Wednesday: Six Inches of Knitting Weather Arrives!

Sadly, cats do not knit.

Cat in Snow

Wednesday Update: lots of work, very few words

I would love to do a Wordless Wednesday. It would be so cool. I think that I should set a goal for myself to work up to it slowly and to capture the best picture that displays the struggles/successes of the week. Since I didn’t do that here is an almost wordless Wednesday update of my current projects.

Om Shanti Bed Socks socks by Alice Yu. Here are the Ravelry project details.

Roving — Strips pulled from the long edge of the giant batt and rolled up ready to spin. The spinning wheel rattled his double treadles in excitement the whole time I was doing this…

Singles on bobbin — Singles spun using a supported long draw that will eventually make a fluffy 2 ply worsted weight yarn. Happy spinning wheel.

Cat on spinning chair — You wanted to spin? Whatever…

It’s raining outside and will change to snow overnight. I have the flowering plants that I want to keep inside and I am ready to ply this yarn tomorrow. Sure wish my bed socks were done. Have a great rest-of-the-week everyone.

Drachenfels: Making Progress

It has been a really good week knitting-wise. The weather is cooling down at last, I’m caught up on most of my major projects, and the new season is starting up on television. I find myself knitting outside in the garden, at the doctor’s office and even during the football games (Go Broncos!!) The leaves are turning at last and I am churning out my Drachenfels shawl.

Shawl — I’ve made the transition from the charcoal grey to the slate gray yarn. It’s subtle but should look better when I get to the solid slate portion of the shawl. I put in one black garter ridge at the midpoint of the charcoal/plum section of the shawl. Later on I will use the black to do the I-cord bind-off. Here are the project notes on Ravelry.

Cat on shawl — Of course as soon as I put the shawl down for the picture MacKenzie moved in. One of my favorite shows to watch while knitting is the A&E production of **Pride and Prejudice** by Jane Austen. You know that quote from the book/film: “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.” MacKenzie believes that it is a truth universally acknowledged, that an unattended knitted object must be in want of a cat.

Cat chomping yarn — and loose yarn is made for chomping. He especially likes this cashmere blend Smooshy by Anzula Yarns. He and I have had several conversations about this over the last week…

At this point I removed him from the picture shoot.

You can’t see it in the pictures, but this yarn is knitting up really soft and should have a great drape when done. I am using a smaller yarn than the pattern was designed for (fingering instead of sport) and moved down to size 4 needles (3.5mm) instead of size 6 (4 mm), but this shawl is coming out plenty big!

The forecast is for cooler weather and rain showers this weekend, and there is a Broncos game Sunday. I plan to really crank out some knitting over the next couple of days. The shawl should be big enough both for me and the cat soon. 🙂

Knitting in the garden

Yesterday was a quiet day for me; I was recovering from the long days in the heat at the alpaca ranch last weekend and had entered basic slug mode. What could be better than to take some finishing tasks out to the garden swing to finish off. 🙂

Mitts without thumbs — Why do I keep doing this? I have 5 pairs of mitts all ready to go except… the thumbs need to be finished. Ugh. Basic boring knitting. Here’s the project page for these mitts at Ravelry that also has the pattern written out in the project notes.

Luckily it was a nice day. All my flowers in pots continue to bloom like champions. Both cats moved out to hang with me. I started the sprinkler on the lawn which always draws birds. There was a lot of wildlife that stopped by to entertain me. OK, since I was bored I snapped some shots. Here they are!

Spider — This orb weaver spider had set up shop between two of my trees! I really like these spiders with their huge elaborate webs and insect catching habits. I had one on the deck last year that spun her web every evening and then took it down in the morning. OK, I’m a geek, but I was a biology teacher so what did you expect?

Squirrel — I ate some pumpkin spice mini-muffins with my latte while I was knitting. This squirrel started barking at me from a branch above the garden swing. I guess he felt that he was entitled to the muffins too!

Cat — Yellow Boy was snoozing in the garden swing with me. When the squirrel came down the tree trunk he finally chased it off. Sometimes he can be brave.

Buterfly — I haven’t seen many of these lately but as the morning warmed up more a Swallowtail stopped by the lantana. I love these guys. Luckily Yellow Boy was busy with the squirrel and left this one alone.

By noon is was getting too hot to stay outside. My mitts were done and the wildlife was disappearing. The cats and I headed inside.

Woohoo! Time to knit the Drachenfels shawl. I’m making progress on it and hope to show it off at the end of the week.

Have a good week everyone.

Farewell Summer, Hello Drachenfels

Yesterday was the last day of summer. Wow, how did that happen? I woke up, headed out to the garden to drink my latte, and there is was. The first changed leaf on the maple tree. It’s so hot outside I can hardly believe it, but the cooler weather of fall is on the way. Really, eventually it will get here.

Red leaf in green tree. — There it is! Fall’s first leaf.

Time to think about warmer clothes and shawls. Alexand has been driving me nuts with her posts about her Drachenfels (by Melanie Berg) knitting journey. It is just beautiful. Check out her post about knitting on the go here. There is just no way around it… I am suffering from Drachenfels envy in the worst way. Fall is here. I have finished all my other knitting projects. No more excuses. Time to get started on my own Drachenfels effort.

One of the best things about Ravelry is that you can poke around and check out the projects other knitters have made of any particular pattern. I found a project (by fineknits, one of the test knitters), that was done in three colors and a highlight color. Perfect!

Yarns — Here are my yarns. I will knit the body of the shawl using the two greys with the plum as the contrast color in the middle. The black will be used as a highlight color in the knitting and for the bindoff. All of these are Anzula Squishy and the cashmere in the yarn make them feel great. Here are the project notes at Ravelry.

Saturday night I visited one of my sons and cast on while watching him play Destiny after dinner. It was kind of fun watching him destroy alien creatures using a sword of fire (it’s a Destiny thing…) while I started on a shawl called Drachenfels. There were even some creatures in the game that were kind of dragon-like. It’s a sign!

Close-up of stitches — and here is the close-up of the scale stripe pattern. This is the darker of the two grey yarns. I’m saving the lighter one for later on in the shawl where there will be more plum. The yarn is extremely soft and, well, squishy. (See what I did there?) This shawl should be a joy to wear.

Did you see the cat hair in the middle of the picture? No matter how careful I am everything that I knit has CAT HAIR ON IT!!!

Yellow cat — Yellow Boy: your point would be?

OK, I’m over the little cat-hair related rant. The shawl is starting out great and I’m really excited to finally be knitting it. The weather is still nice even though the leaves are changing so I plan on doing as much outdoor knitting as I can.

Bye summer.

FO: Garden Swing is Done!!

Cool weather with thunderstorms arrived this week and I headed out to the back yard to finish up the garden swing. I had crocheted the largest part of the seat a couple of weeks ago and gotten it sewn onto the frame of the swing; a good start but still not usable. What I needed to do now was to remove the seat from the rest of the chair so that I could crochet side panels to attach the seat onto the sides of the frame. I attacked the bolts with my handy little tool kit and got the part holding the seat off and onto the lawn where I could work on it in the shade.

Cat on chair seat. — As soon as I got that seat off the rest of the chair frame Mr. Helpful moved right in.

MacKenzie helping. — The help just kept on coming as I crocheted side panels to attached the seat to the sides of the frame. I used my foot to put tension on the twine while I worked which put the working materials too close to MacKenzie the chomper.

Even with all the help and a break for a thunderstorm I got the side panels crocheted and sewn onto the frame after a couple of mornings. Today after lunch I reattached the seat to the swinging frame and then I was back in lawn chair business.

Completed seat. — Here’s the completed seat with the sides attached to the frame. A little on the ugly side, but functional.

Cushions on swing. — Yeah! The swing is done and the cushions are back on it; I pulled the ties for each cushion through the crocheted mesh and then knotted them in the back. My outdoor knitting spot has been restored.

I’m still not completely happy with the tension on the seat of the swing so I’m going to use it for a couple of days and then will take in a tuck or two on the seat fabric to make it more taunt. Still, things are looking up; I am back outside for my morning latte. Happy, happy day!

Cat on the finished swing. — Final product is cat approved. 🙂

Outdoor knitting, here I come!

FO: August Socks are done!

August! This is my favorite part of summer. The flowers are blooming like crazy, the monsoon is cranking moisture up to Colorado for afternoon showers, and the hummingbirds and butterflies are cruising through the backyard every morning. The cats and I have been outside too for knitting and bug chasing.

I finished my August socks while sitting out in the garden this morning. Since the cats have been hanging out with me the entire time I was knitting these socks I thought MacKenzie might enjoy posing with them.

Cat and Socks — MacKenzie is my good boy. Usually if I just slowly ease my knitted items into his personal space he’s OK with things. Today that back foot came right up…

OK. Message received. Having been denied assistance by the cat most likely to cooperate I decided to pose the socks on one of the garden tables. (I know; very boring but no teeth!!) Look at how great the Seafoam Stitch shows off the yarn!!

Finished Galvez Socks — I decided to stop the seafoam pattern at the top of the foot because I usually wear socks inside of lace-up shoes or boots during the winter. I lightly steamed the seafoam portion of the sock with my steam iron to set the stitches which really calmed the knitting down.

Socks on my feet. — The stockinette fits my fat little foot better too. I’m really happy with the way these came out.

These socks are the Galvez Socks by Debbie Haymark. The pattern is in my copy of Lace One-Skein Wonders edited by Judith Durant. Here are the project notes on Ravelry.

Gosh, I finished those fast. There’s lots of August left before I need to think about socks again. I promised a friend to help out during Alpaca Farm Days next month. I feel an urge to knit lots of little fingerless mitts (out of alpaca of course!!) to show off (and sell!) to visitors to the farm… 🙂

I can feel the midnight knitting coming on!