Hey. I know that I’ve been missing for a while (again). In my last post I wrote about my upcoming trip to the cath lab to get a right heart catherization. This procedure involves having a small sensing device threaded into your heart to check (in my case) the internal blood pressure. Normal pressure in the right side of your heart should be about 14mm Hg; mine had measured 44 mm Hg in an echocardiogram so my cardiologist wanted to get a direct reading.
Here I am, rocking my scleroderma symptoms along with the cath wound. Puffy hands, bluish nose and lips, tons of little red dots on my face… That bandage came off the next day and the entry wound healed right up.
The procedure went well. My pressure measured in the low 20s, which was soooo much better than my cardiologist feared. The number was higher than the last time I had a direct measurement, so my pulmonary hypertension has advanced, especially since I am now on medication to treat my condition, but I’ll take it! It was, once again, a really positive experience and I felt well cared for by all the staff. I was pretty exhausted, hungry, but upbeat on the drive home.
Then I went into a flare… I slept for almost the entire week after the procedure. Seriously, like 12 hours a night and a couple of naps. I had to go back onto daytime oxygen. My hair started falling out again. I was dizzy and exhausted. My joints really hurt. A flare.
This week I’m finally awake again and I pulled out the blanket that I’m knitting. I knitted more hexagons and measured the blanket on the bed. I went out and bought more yarn. I have the hexagons to add another row and the blanket is slowly growing…
I think that I’m going to need more yarn… this is the Nectar Blanket by Ysolde Teague.
I’m really happy with the progress of the blanket, but I have to admit that it is becoming a little boring. I dream of other knitting projects as I sew the hexagons together. I have a serious urge to knit a new sweater in some fabulous colors.
Look at this little topper sweater!! It is called La Prairie (by Joji Locatelli) and I seriously want this sweater. I want to knit in cool colors. Did I mention that I live on the edge of the Great Plains? I long to wind yarn and to cast on and to start knitting those waves and bobbles…
I broke down and bought this kit to knit the sweater online a few weeks ago.
Don’t you love these colors?
The trouble is, I just have to dream and fuss about colors before I am happy. I’m not sure about the order in the kit yarn. I’m not completely a fan of the middle yarn, and I feel like the lavender should be in the middle. I’ve been digging in the stash and trying to image the finished product with other blends of color…
Here are three more spins on the yarn. I like the one on the left the most, with the yarn fading from dark purple to the light grey at the sleeves and bottom of the sweater, but I’m kind of interested in the middle and right versions. I have to ask myself… which version will have the most flexibility in the wardrobe? Definitely, it would be the first spin on the kit, the version with the light grey at the sleeves.
I also desperately want to buy yarn to knit a Soldatna Crop sweater, and some new arm warmers, and then there are those PICC line covers and hats to get done… Did I mention that I have been looking at more yarn online and dreaming of sweaters with lots of colors in DK weight yarn? I’m totally on a knitting drive, but my wrists are not on board with all this needle action. It could be that I’m not completely done with the flare…
Sigh. Guess I’ll just cast on another hexagon or two…
PS I’m still dealing with shortness of breath and low on oxygen; lung testing happens next month as my doctors continue to sort me out. 🙂
I’ve been knitting away on my Lace & Fade Boxy sweater in the evenings and debating my choices and decisions. I had 4 skeins of a special edition yarn that was a collaboration between Madelinetosh and Shibui in the colorway Ironwood. I really liked this yarn because it was a great neutral that would go with everything… kind of a smoky brownish/black with tiny hints of violet. I fell in love with the Lace & Fade Boxy pattern by Joji Locatelli and debated different strategies to knit it. Should I use another color for the lace insets? Should I buy the matching Shibui lace yarn for the lace insets? Um… I’m in a destash and I want to get rid of yarn! Besides, how rugged will this sweater be with that thin lace yarn? Knit the whole sweater in the neutral yarn and use some snazzy color in a I-cord bind off on the edges? So many possibilities…
In the end I knitted the whole sweater in the one yarn and color.
Here it is, late at night in my bathroom, just off the needles. The sleeves still need to be done, and there is also the neckline finishing to do.
I was pretty sure that the sweater would grow significantly after blocking, but it is also pretty darn saggy up there around the neck. I decided to block this puppy and finish up the neckline before making any more decisions.
Okay, here it is a few nights later.
The neckline is now finished, and the sweater is blocked; it is absolutely too short. I need to do something to add length.
I knit Swoon a few years ago from this book. I love the lace. This lace is knit on size 5 (3.75 mm) needles and the yarn is laceweight.
That lace was knitted and then sewn to the bottom of the knitted piece. The picot hemmed edge was a pain to knit, and I kind of felt that the edging would be too much to carry off at the bottom of this boxy sweater. I wanted functional and hard-wearing, not cute frippery, for this sweater. Obviously, this lace wasn’t quite right, but it would add the length that I wanted. I did like the garter in the lace and felt that it could be a nice flat panel for the bottom of the sweater. Knit from the bottom up, this original lace has peaks along the bottom. I decided that if I knitted it from the top down, which would reverse the decreases, it would create a straight bottom and the puffiness would block out. I worked out the stitch count that I would need, picked up stitches, and the sweater hack was on!
Look! A flat bottom edge.
This lace isn’t as open as the one knitted on the larger needles with laceweight yarn, but it works in this application. I fussed around with different bind offs until I found one that created the smooth edge and fit the lace: 2 stitch I-cord bind off. There was puffiness at the top of the lace, but after the steam blocking it settled right down and is playing nice.
Finished sweater!
I debated about how to handle the sleeves and finally decided to just duplicate the bottom of the sweater. I picked up the sleeve stitches, knit 7 rounds and then 8 rounds of the ribbing, did a slight decrease to get my stitch count, and I loosely bound off. (I know… I didn’t want the ribbing to stretch, and I had that puffiness of the lace to control, so I did it.) I picked up the stitches for the lace panel and knit it exactly like I did the bottom of the sweater. Look… I have 3/4 sleeves that work with my sweater.
So, there it is. My hacked sweater, made by modifying the Lace & Fade Boxy design and incorporating a lace idea from Swoon. I made the decisions late at night, gazing at what I had so far in the bathroom mirror, based on what I had on hand and what I envisioned for the final sweater. I wanted a sweater that would be warm, comfy, easy to layer, and hard wearing with some lace.
Nailed it!
I have just enough yarn left over to make wristers for cold days.
I’ve been helping the Mother of Cats with her knitting this week.
Hannah has been getting all of the attention for weeks and weeks while she was flying around on Sharon Air, so the Mother of Cats has been spending lots of time with me since Hannah came home from her adventures. She has been knitting and knitting on a smoky brown blob of yarny *something* and I have been extremely vigilant about attacking any stray ends that try to get away from her. I mean, I have sat by her side for hours watching intently… this is just exhausting! Finally, the Mother of cats got all of the stitches off the needles this afternoon and I could take a little nap while she tried it on.
Whew! She is pretty happy with how it is going, but she says that she needs to block it to see how long it will be. Whatever. All I care about is how long I get to nap before she puts this sweater monster back onto her needles. Oh, yeah. This sweater is called Lace & Fade by Joji Locatelli.
The Mother of Cats has also been busy sewing this week. Hannah decided to help her with this, which was totally okay with me because I think that the sewing machine is a little bit scary. Hannah kind of likes it and always spends all of her time in the sewing room when the mother of cats is busy in there.
Anyway, I hope that you can understand what this sewn stuff is. I think that it would be good if Hannah adds some notes here, so here she goes:
Hannah: Okay, here are my notes on the sewing we did.
The first picture is of the bedside caddy that the Mother of Cats and I sewed a few weeks ago. It is sewn to a towel that goes under the mattress (MY IDEA!!) and those nice pouches hold lots of things for the Mother of Cats.
Last week the Mother of Cats sewed the little caddy (middle picture) that is designed to hang from Command hooks on her bedside table. Isn’t it nice? The little pouches hold her glasses and phone, and the back pouch is exactly right for her Kindle tablet. It works great, but she is still thinking of how to improve it.
The last caddy is much larger, has two larger pouches at the bottom, and is kind of a mix-up of both bedside caddies. The Mother of Cats sent if off to her sister this week. The sister plans to do some trickery with grommets and stuff to hang it onto her bedside table.
Mateo: Hannah is asleep, so I’m taking over again.
The only other stuff that is going on around here is that trip the Mother of Cats took to the local garden and farm store. She came back with some crazy stinky roasted green chiles and also a funky pumpkin. Hannah and I stayed completely away from the kitchen while the chiles were roasting away in their boxes, but we did check out the pumpkin.
This is one ugly, scary pumpkin!!! Hannah and I don’t understand why this came home to stay with us. The Mother of Cats put it on the table with some other pumpkins and stuff. The Mother of Cats says that this is all about Halloween, but we just want our table back! Hannah likes to take naps up there, and now there is this stoopid, lumpy-ass pumpkin in the way…
It’s okay. I’d rather nap on the bed anyway. Also, soon there will be more knitting, too!
Happy Caturday, everyone!
This is Mateo, the CoalBear, signing off.
Notes from the Mother of Cats:
It is green chile season!!! Every year I get a bushel of chiles roasted and then I freeze them to use all during the winter. This year I bought two different types of green chile peppers and made two trips that netted me a total of a bushel and a half of peppers in the freezer.
If you’ve never done this, the process is really simple. The chile peppers are grouped by how hot they are… I buy chiles that are mild and avoid ones that have names like Ghost or Dynamite. This year I got a bushel of Ancho chile (the meaty green ones) and a half bushel of Marconi chile peppers. The peppers are washed, then dumped into a rotating drum that is turned over a flame until all of the skin is blackened and the peppers are roasted. They are then poured into a heavy plastic bag and packed into a box that is taken home to continue roasting for the next few hours. When they are finally cool enough to handle, I put 6-8 peppers into a freezer bag and then these are moved to the freezer when cooled. This year I froze 24 bags of chili pepper. I sure hope that’s enough to get through the winter. 🙂
When I use the peppers later on that blackened skin will just wash off, but the smoky flavor will linger. Green chile is good stuff; versatile, anti-inflammatory, and extremely addictive. I’ve already eaten two of my cached bags of chile this fall…
There were lots of adventures on the flight back from Japan (well, I slept through most of it because… I’m a cat) as Sharon threw a gobshite passenger off the plane (with a parachute, of course), discovered Chad that Golden-Bag-of-Cat-Treats-Thieving Worm hiding in the wheel well of the plane, took a nap in the catnip-scented oxygen of the cabin, and then finally tackled Chad off the plane in a butt-waggling zoom of epic proportions that allowed her to recover the priceless bag of cat treats while Chad fell through the clouds. She did throw Chad a parachute and an inflatable raft, but we kind of don’t care what happened to him because there was sushi and Meow Mix for all of us on the flight. Did I mention that there was catnip-scented oxygen in the cabin?
(Okay, Sharon did post a photo of Chad falling through the skies in his parachute, so he did get it on and hopefully landed safely…)
Anyway, the Mother of Cats finished the shawl, and I got my wings!!
I’m adding these wings to my passport!!
Now the Sharon Air MKAL is over and the Mother of Cats has returned to knitting a sweater that had been hibernating in a bin for the last few weeks. I still have my blueberry box from the flight, and since I returned in Cardboard Class I brought my blanket and all the wonderful yarn that I bought the Mother of Cats in Japan home with me with no problems.
Mateo: I’m helping the Mother of Cats with her sweater!
So now the Mother of Cats is happily knitting away on her new sweater (the Lace & Fade Boxy sweater by Joji Locatelli) with Mateo (the CoalBear) and I’m catching up on my sleep in my blueberry box. The Mother of Cats taped my wings to the box, and I’m still dreaming of all the places that I visited during the MKAL adventure. Cairo. New Zealand. Paris. Istanbul. Japan. So much fun!
Do I look sad? This is just my dreaming of catnip face…
Now it is fall outside and the flies seem to have vanished with the backyard robins but there are crickets and bunnies. Luckily it is cooler so I can play with the CoalBear in the daytime, and I’ve started sleeping on the bed with the Mother of Cats at night again. The Mother of Cats bought me and the CoalBear a lot of new toys, and we are playing chase-chase through piles of crunchy brown shipping paper. I’m returning to my old routines and I’m actually glad that my adventure is over. It is good to be home.
What a week it has been! I managed to get to 4 medical appointments on 4 different days which used up a lot of my available energy and time, but now that I’m vaccinated I have turned the Blue-Lipped Zebra loose again and it is absolutely determined to get to the bottom of what is going on! (What is going on, you ask? Check out these posts from the BLZ before it went quiet in lockdown: The Blue-Lipped Zebra Report! and The Blue-Lipped Zebra Goes on Oxygen.) This week I met my new pulmonologist, got some lung testing, saw the orthopedist, and started physical therapy for my hip. Whew. It was a rough week with lots of exhausting recoveries but also some great knitting action. Anyway, the BLZ is getting ready for some blogging updates and hopes to share what’s up soon.
In the meantime, here’s all the great stuff that was going on this week:
Knitting
Right after the start of the year I lost control and cast on lots of projects. You know, if you cast them on you have to do them, right? My head was just swimming with ideas and I want to make sure that everything was captured in yarn right away before I was distracted by the latest great potential project on Ravelry. A very dangerous place for people with huge yarn stashes, Ravelry… I’ve been steadily working on all of the projects depending on my mood and interests for weeks; this week several projects finished up at once.
My Goldwing is finished!! We had several rounds of snow over the last two weeks so I buckled down and knitted myself right off of sleeve island in just a few days to get to the final wearable product. There I am wearing it on its first outing to my pulmonologist’s office. Hey, they left me alone in a room with a full length mirror on the door with my new sweater? How could I let an opportunity like that slide by? I made some minor alterations to the pattern as I worked so that the sleeves and the body would be almost the same length and also used a smaller needle then the pattern called for in the sleeve colorwork because I wanted the sleeves to be wrist huggers. The end result was the perfect project to wear on a snowy drive across town. Here’s my notes on Ravelry.
This shawl is Age of Gold by Joji Locatelli; a simple garter stitch shawl that is easy to knit, has good coverage, and sports a showy lace edging. I *loved* this yarn when I bought it, but fell out of love while working on it sometime in February. Ugh. Light blue. What was I thinking. Maybe I was struggling with cold-induced depression, but I was not motivated to work on it at all. Then I realized a couple of weeks ago that it is exactly the color that my grandniece loves, took it back out, and got it finished off to gift to someone who will give it a great home.
The first mitt is done of the Mando mitt set. I’m making these for my exceptionally knitworthy niece who loves The Mandolorian. Of course, in my family I was immediately informed that the little green guy is named Grogew; the left hand mitt does feature Mando. Since I am mailing the shawl to California to my grandniece and think I should get these mitts done and mailed off to her mother in the same box, don’t you?! These mitts have been pretty darn challenging and I plan to post more about the journey later on when I get the second mitt done.
In the middle of the week my favorite LYS posted a message about having all of the assigned pooling yarns in stock. What is this, I wondered and went to Chasing Rabbits Fiber Co. to check it out. Oh, this is knitting designed to make use of skeins that are mostly one color with a section of another color inserted into it that is about 1/4 of the length or so. Chasing Rabbits is developing patterns to make use of the yarn with clever treatments of the color sections that are intriguing; in short, there is a specific stitch or treatment assigned to the short color strip. Here I was knitting some socks with yarn like that from Chasing Rabbits that were… boring and unimaginative (picture on the right). I ripped my sock out and reknit it with an assigned pooling idea that I would purl the colored sections and leave the grey knitted. The other idea that I had was to do something to force the color sections of knitted fabric to be more random so I threw in random PSS stitches to add some fun and change the length of the color sections. I learned the PSS stitch while knitting The Sharon Show in the section called “Catnip Garden” so these are obviously the Rainbow Catnip Garden socks. I’m thinking of using a bright pink yarn for the heels and toes so I can make two pairs of these!!
Gardening
Things are stalled outside because of the never-ending march of snow storms, but all is well inside. My orchids are in a second bloom that is making things really cheerful in the craft room.
The photo on the far right is of my monster orchid last year as CosmicKnitter asked me to show my orchid set-up and this picture did a good job of it. I like to keep the orchids in pots that “breathe” like unfired clay; I prefer the ones with holes in them but they are getting hard to find. It is dry here in Colorado so I keep water below the orchids with the pots suspended above the water on pebbles if the tray isn’t already designed with channels that keep the pot above the water. Anyway, the orchids seem to like the extra humidity and they are putting out more blooms this spring.
Books
I put off writing this post for a day hoping that I would get to the end of the book that I’m currently listening to while I knit: Hamnet. I still have three hours to go so I’m not there yet… but this is quite the book so I’m going to talk about it now anyway.
We learn right away that this is a book about a young boy, an only son, named Hamnet, who dies of the plague. Two years later his father writes a play called Hamlet.
So this is a book about Shakespeare and his family. Oh, that can’t be all that intimidating to write, right? I mean… Shakespeare. Did you every wonder what type of environment produced the man who had such an impact in his field and on his actual language that hundreds of years later we still celebrate his work?
I mean, if you write about this you need to make it kind of believable, and this book does that for me. It is mostly about Shakespeare’s wife, a gifted misfit with an eerie insight into the natural world, people, and the environments around her. The language is rich and descriptive, the story slow in the enfolding, and the events cling to me through my day. Shakespeare wasn’t alone in his extreme giftedness; at the heart of it was his wife Agnes and his children who provided the essential context to his life. Through chance these two found each other and the rest is quite literally history. Shakespeare’s wasn’t an easy life; he did not have a happy childhood and was basically viewed as a failure by traditional standards until he found his niche in London. How hard it is for those among us who view the world through a different colored lens and hear the sounds of music that no one else notices: this is Agnes and her husband. These people, some of whom were in my classroom or even my coworkers, can be viewed as “slow”, “underachievers”, or “at-risk” when the actual truth is they are processing information and viewing the world much deeper than we are. They don’t respond well to the usual pressures and deadlines, but what they produce when they are ready to show their work can be remarkable. The author captures this so well in the book; misfits and geniuses, aware of everything, and yet, oblivious to the obvious. Agnes and her husband.
The world in this book, so far from us in time, is also strangely familiar as international travel and the trade in goods has brought a deadly disease to Stratford on Avon. Shakespeare is hard to locate when illness breaks out because the theaters in London are shut down for plague season and they have taken the show on the road. There are strict rules about burial because… plague. The doctor wears a… mask. There are misunderstandings and lots of misinformation including bogus cures (as in… use this toad).
Well, that’s it. I need to finish the book because it continues to haunt me. Maybe I can get that second Mando mitt started while listening to it this evening.
Have a great week, everyone!
Read a little, knit a little, and garden like your heart can’t live without it.
PS: I got my degree in biology. I am a biogeek!! Please forgive me it I botched anything about Shakespeare…
Wow, the week just flew by again. We had lots of snow in the middle of the week, I had a great appointment with my new rheumatologist, and Hannah got the new toy of her dreams: an electronic flapping fish!
Almost a foot of snow arrived overnight in the middle of the week.
The medical center where I went for the appointment was in the heart of Denver and I had to drive fairly near my favorite yarn store on the way back home. Did I stop to look at the yarn? Duh… yarn addict here! I found the perfect yarn to replace the yarn I swiped from a sweater kit to make a new wrap, some fabulous blue speckled yarn for a fade, and more grey yarn because… I need grey in my life! Having scored more yarn again I buckled down and focused on the knitting to get at least one project done during the week.
I finished up Julie’s Wrap (Joji Locatelli) during the snow storm and it was really nice to throw on to wear around the house the rest of the week (and the weekend!) I used a dusty black cashmere blend yarn that doesn’t photo all the well, but it is extremely versatile and cushy to wear. The ribbed edging is slow to knit but very nice with the garter stitch body of the wrap. Can you make out the additional points built into the edging to give it some more interest and a little flutter detail? That would be the extra points at the top and bottom of the wrap in the right-most picture, but those little added-on points are also on the long edges towards each end. The points and bobbles make the wrap even more fun to curl up in to read a good book on a cold, snowy night. If a kitten joins in it is even better!
The other knitting that was going on this week was my pair of February socks. Okay, they didn’t quite make it, but they should get done in the next couple of days and my feet are totally waiting for them to enter service.
This is my own tried and true 64 stitch sock pattern using Hue Loco’s Phyllis Sock in the color #Trending from their 2020 Fall color lineup. I’m just loving how this colorway looks on these socks.
I polished off a couple of science fiction books that I liked but don’t feel up to discussing until I read another book in the series. I started a book last night, however, that I feel compelled to talk about right away…
Oh, my goodness! I’m three chapters (stories) into this book and it is so compelling and engaging that I am pretty sure that this is going to be the best book of the year for me.
A nice young couple lives across the street from me. Two summer ago they planted a little tree in the front yard of their house and babied it with deep soaks of water using a 5 gallon bucket with a tube to slowly siphon the water from the bucket to the roots of their baby tree. I have to be honest, this tree was kind of pitiful to look at: about 6 feet high, it had only a few bare branches on it. I would look out my kitchen window in the mornings all last winter hoping that this pathetic stick of a sapling would leaf out in the spring okay…
Spring came and the tree produced some hopeful leaves. I have to admit that I was a somewhat amazed. Then we had heavy spring snow that almost did the tree in, but a few leaves hung in there after the melt down, and a couple of weeks after that the tree produced immense white clusters of blooms. Look at that, I thought! This little tree, not too promising at the start of its life across the street, was a little rock star for sure. Those blooms on the stick of a start-up tree totally made my mornings!! One evening I went across the street while they were working in the yard to ask what the tree was: a catalpa tree.
World of Wonders has a beautiful drawing a biological organism to start each chapter/story. This is the drawing for the first chapter.
Unbelievably, the World of Wonders starts with catalpa trees; the author’s memory of sheltering from the heat under these trees, her mother’s place of work, the racism that her physician mother faced in her professional life, how social norms have changed over the last few decades, the immense catalpa tree on the university campus where she now teaches that she passes each day on her way to class, and the strong commitment and joy that she finds today in her work.
Just like that I was sucked into this book. The next chapter features fireflies, and after that peacocks. All of these have strong emotional connections to me and events in my life, and like magic as the author relates her sense of wonder and joy of nature interconnected with her family and life I am propelled into something of the same. This book is amazing, and I highly recommend it based on what I’ve read so far.
Have a great week, everyone!!
Read a little, knit a little, and garden like your heart can’t live without it.
The Kitten Mom is taking a nap now and left her laptop out so I will be filling you in on the week, okay?
The Kitten Mom and I spent most of the week hanging out upstairs because it was just stinking cold for most of the week! I mean, I hated to even go downstairs to the best window to watch for squirrels because my feet got so cold… and there were crazy noises in the night, too!! The Kitten Mom was startled awake twice by big bangs downstairs that didn’t scare me even a little bit. Seriously. Well, maybe my eyes got a little HUGE but I was totally cool. Really. I was so brave I went with her when she went downstairs to check things out…
The Kitten Mom left some pop cans in the garage and they exploded. She said that they went ballistic and flew through the air. I can fly through the air when I jump off the bookshelf. Do you want to see ballistic Hannah? Ballistic is my new word for this week.
We spent most of the week knitting and reading under the covers upstairs and the Kitten Mom also made two big pots of soup. I didn’t get any of the soup because it was made of really yucky stuff like green chili and baked potatoes… I like chunky tuna the best of all my kitty foods… maybe we can make chunky tuna soup next week? I will help make it!! I’m the best helper ever!!!
Anyway, here is the knitting stuff that the Kitten Mom did this week:
The Kitten Mom spent days and days working on the bobble bind off for her new shawl. This is soooo boring but I like to sleep under the wrap while she works so it could be worse. She got tired of the bobbles one night and started on a new shawl with nice blue yarn that is fun to chew on a little when she isn’t looking. She also started knitting a new sock in the middle of the week that was more fun for me because I like to whap the needles while she is working. Those needles are really a lot of fun!!!
We also worked on her new mitts that she is making for the lady in California who sent me the lemons to play with. I’m really helping with these mitts and they are coming out looking super good, don’t you think? I think that they should become my newest toy so I can drag them down into my box playhouse. Maybe the Kitten Mom can make them squeak when I jump on them?!! That would be awesome!
For some reason the Kitten Mom kept working in the stash this week digging around in the yarn. It has something to do with this other cat named Sharon from Security who is releasing a new pattern this week named Botanique. What ever. Is that like plants? I like to dig in the dirt of the plants in the indoor garden. Did you know that the orchids have wood chips in them that are great toys to bat around on the kitchen floor? Why do we need more yarn when there are wood chips? Anyway, she found this yarn finally and WE GET TO GO WIND THE YARN TOMORROW which is about my most favorite thing in the world. Next to having the Kitten Mom play with me using the red dot toy… that little red dot is the bestest toy in the universe!!
Do you think that these will make a nice shawl? I get to sleep on the Kitten Mom’s legs while she is knitting and these colors look like they will be soft and warm on my fur…
So that was the week. The only other thing that happened is that the Kitten Mom VACCUMMED the house today and took away all of my dusty paw prints on the tables. I was really brave and watched from under the bed while she worked but it was kind of stressful. Afterwards I got new toys and some kitty cookies!!
I think that the Kitten Mom is waking up and that means that my time at the computer is over. I want to go pull a bunch of clothes down off the hangers in the closet to make a little kitten bed for myself now, anyways. Laters!!
Notes from the Kitten Mom:
How cold did it get? It was -17 degrees Fahrenheit when the pop cans exploded. I looked outside while searching for the source of the noise and saw a lonely bunny huddled in the yard covered with snow. Tough night for bunnies and kittens.
The wrap with the bobble bind-off is Julie’s Wrap (Joji Locatelli).
The garter stitch shawl (blue) that I started this week is another Age of Gold by Joji Locatelli. What can I say. The bobbles were hurting my hands and I needed a nice break to work out the soreness… I should have the wrap finished in another week or so and the left over black yarn can be used to trim the new Age of Gold shawl.
The sock is just a homegrown pattern, but that yarn is Smooth Sock in the colorway #Trending by Hue Loco.
The mitts are the Mando Mitts (Natela Datura) and are an exercise in yarn handling as some rows use three or four colors. I am doing three at a time and planning on coming back to duplicate stitch in the missing details later.
The lady in California who shipped the lemons is my exceedingly knitworthy niece Melissa.
The shawl that Sharon from Security and Casapinka released yesterday is indeed Botanique. I bought the pattern and have the yarn all lined up to cast on, but I want to get something finished and off the needles before I do that. Must knit faster!!
I am currently in position 6, 231 on my health provider’s Covid-19 vaccine wait list. I have a whole bucket of medical testing coming at me in the next 6 weeks and the race to get vaccinated first is now on…
The worst disaster of the week? I somehow sliced some new yarn that came via squishy mail as I battled with the packaging to get it out, and I now have 15 pieces of this yummy pink yarn.
It is really, really cold here today! Right now it is 1 degree Fahrenheit outside and there is snow on the way; tomorrow will be colder. I’m wearing layers of knitted warmness and thanking my lucky stars that we are just catching the edge of this outbreak of polar wonderfulness.
Hannah: Since we are staying in you can play with me, Kitten Mom!!
I bought a laser pointer to play with Hannah and now she calls for me to come play with her a half dozen times a day… she loves that moving red dot even more than cookies!!
Let’s see… what else has been going on this week… I moved up 4,000 slots on the virtual Covid-19 vaccine wait list which means that I think I will get an appointment for my shot in just another couple of weeks. Yay!! My 23andMe results came back showing that I am ridiculously healthy (except for that little autoimmune thing…), I have elite-athlete type muscles (huh?), and that I have a genetic propensity to hoard unused items. Are you kidding me?! How did they learn about my yarn stash? Anyway, the ancestry results show that I am about half Swedish (which I knew) and about half British/Irish, which I wasn’t sure about as my dad’s family has been here in the US for over 300 years and the name is something… absolutely not British or Irish. There is a little French/German DNA in the mix, so I’m guessing the name came from that. This is kind of fun and I’m considering pursuing the family tree further.
No word on the systemic sclerosis study, but my DNA is now officially part of the data base. Yay!
Knitting
Knowing that the deep cold was on the way I hurried and finished my Tinsel Mitts so that I could wear them over gloves this week when I leave the house. The rest of my knitting time was spent adding the edging to my Julie’s Wrap which is pretty slow going as that ribbing uses twisted knit and purl stitches. That’s a lot of knitting through the back loop, people! It looks great and isn’t pulling in the way typical ribbing does, but it is definitely slow going. I have another inch or so to knit before I start the bobble bind off; maybe in another week I’ll be there.
Reading
I read the next book in the mystery series I started last week featuring a Roman doctor attached to a regiment in conquered Britannia. Once again he has arrived at a new posting just after a murder has occurred… I’m getting pretty fond of Gaius Petreius Ruso, the protagonist in these murder mysteries, and I especially like his disrespectful and independent slave Tilla who is quickly moving out of that status when it becomes apparent that she was illegally sold into slavery. There, I knew it!! I listened to this book on Audible as I knitted away on the wrap and there may be another book in this series arriving on my Kindle soon.
Did I mention that Hannah has perfected her cat loaf posture and hangs out with me while I’m listening to the book and knitting along on the wrap?
Hannah: all the best tuxedo kittens do this!
Have a great week, everyone!!
Read a little, knit a little, and garden like your heart can’t live without it.
It’s Saturday? Seriously? I seem to have spent the entire week taking naps and doing a little knitting on the side. I’m still circling the cardiology airport trying to get a slot to come in for a landing, but my rheumatologist did call them up and chatted with them this week, so I have hopes for an expedited appointment in the near future. (If you missed my previous post about this it is an issue with Covid-19 long haulers with severe heart complications competing with me for the testing that I need.) I became officially slotted on the Covid-19 vaccine waiting list this week, so hopefully that will be coming my way soon, too. Oh. I also bought some more yarn online…
The Kitten Mom is sadly lacking in impulse control when it comes to yarn…
Knitting
I have been knitting steadily all week between naps and I really am making progress, but the projects are so big it isn’t all that obvious. My Goldwing sweater is slowly growing, and my Julie’s Wrap is now into the third skein of yarn. The pictures, however, are kind of underwhelming at the moment.
See what I mean? That is hours and hours of knitting, and the results are less than stunning. Wanting some quicker gratification I started on my Tinsel Mitts and finished the first one in the middle of the week.
The fit of the glove is just perfect, and the flip top for the fingers stays in place on the back of my hand until I pull it over my fingers. Because of the ribbing on each piece, the mitt and the top, the top really snugs up and stays in place. I have extra room in the top around my fingers so I plan to pad the flip top with fluffy wool batting (from my carder) and then will knit a lining for the top to cover the batting and hold it in place. I’m still thinking out how to make it work… maybe a little duplicate stitch basting to secure the batting…
Garden
I have been giving the African violets fertilizer at the first of the month and they are still putting out new blooms! I’ve been looking at the amazing number of blooms on the wine colored plant and I ask myself… how does this plant know that it is summertime in Africa…? Of course it doesn’t; I think what is really going on is that in the summer I put the plants in the kitchen window where they get the afternoon light, but when I move them under the bright grow lights of the indoor garden for the winter they respond and bloom. They get about 10 hours of light in the indoor garden, and obviously they are liking it!
The African violets of February…
Books
I’ve been listening to an audiobook this week between naps and knitting, and I chanced across one that is fun to listen to. I am a fan of Lindsey Davis and her Marcus Didius Falco books; what’s not to like about a private investigator solving mysteries in ancient Rome? I loved the tone and setting of the books; an autocratic and scary society that is shockingly familiar (do you have a permit for that addition to your property?) and yet clearly foreign. I loved Falco’s wit and flexibility with legalities as he solved mysteries and traveled through the Roman Empire through the 20 books in the series. It was with real anticipation that I started another series of historical mysteries set in conquered Britannia under Roman occupation.
Ruso is a doctor working at the medical center of the Roman fort in what is now Chester, England. He is having some financial issues. He has just relocated to this posting from Africa and it has been a pretty bumpy landing so far. He has recently acquired a female slave who is a native and he is definitely having some buyer’s remorse and trouble managing her care and work schedule. There is also an issue with some dead prostitutes…
Hannah kept watch over me while I was listening to the audiobook this week. I think that the bookshelf is her secret spy place…
I really liked this book. It was fast paced with a snappy dialogue, but it also seems historically accurate in how the Romans of the time viewed themselves, medicine, slaves, and familial obligations. Did the Romans keep records of virtually everything and do extensive financial audits? I’m betting that they did. Ruso’s male Roman superiority is just obnoxious at times, but I’m guessing it is also accurate. In spite of that, though, Ruso is a caring professional who really is trying to do the right thing for his patients, his family, and his dependent slave. I’m so glad I found this series and am already into the second book.
Have a great week, everyone!!
Read a little, knit a little, and garden like your heart can’t live without it.
What a week, what a week, what a week! We saw our new president inaugurated here in the US, I went wild and set up a plethora of new knitting projects, I had issues with my health through the week, and yesterday I spent most of the day in Urgent Care getting some testing done. Whew! Let’s just unpack the whole week, okay?
But first:
I knew there was a chance that I might be gone from Hannah for a few days if my new symptoms spiraled out of control so I installed a new Hannah cam. Alright, that was a little bit of a struggle as I hunted for screws to mount the camera (Hannah, where did you put the package of screws…) onto a shelf in the craft room. Never finding the correct screws for the mount I hunted through the garage to locate alternative screws. Got them. Then the power drill was… out of power… so I found a screwdriver. Right. There is no way these scleroderma wrists can put a screw into wood without a hole already there. Back to the garage for nails and a hammer to put a starter hole into the shelf. Hannah was a huge help through all of this, by the way. As I hammered in a nail to make my starter hole in the shelf Hannah swooped the screws off the table and onto the floor, because… it’s a cat thing. “Why is everything so hard…”, I muttered to myself as I rescued the screws and got them into the camera mount. Hannah moved up onto the shelf so she could help me work better… that little paw can work magic, right? Finally, finally I finished and checked to make sure the camera was on the network and working correctly…
The first thing I see through the camera feed…
Knitting:
I have been doing pretty good keeping my knitting WIPs under control. Then the government sent me some money and I bought yarn! Hello, just doing my part to stimulate the economy and support other people, right? I am just rolling in creative ideas for knitted projects and this week I bought and printed patterns, organized knitting kits and cast on with reckless abandon. You might say that there was a small explosion of knitting projects.
Did you get all of that? Let me tell you what’s up starting with the pictures on top, left to right. (1)I lost my mittens, so I need to make those Tinsel Mitts before it snows again. They have a flip top to cover the fingers and I’m thinking that there must be some way I can line them for more warmth. Maybe with some fleece or wool batting stuffed into the lining to keep it all extra warm around the fingers? Hmm… (2) I moved the Goldwing sweater up my queue and want to get started on it as soon as a couple of little projects move off the needles. That sweater is sooo cute and I love the yarn that I just bought for it. (3) I bought lots of bluish yarns while I was sad last spring, and now I want to stay warm without putting too much effort into it. I know that the Age of Gold shawl has lots of soothing garter stitch with a nice warm drape and good coverage so I am making it again with this blue multi yarn. (4) The group of pink and grey yarn is going to be used to make a pair of arm warmers to match my Secret Handshake cowl that I made in that MKAL last fall.
That takes care of the top row of projects. The bottom row shows the two projects, left to right, that I worked on this week along with the WIP that I carried into the week, the Geology Socks. (1)I wanted easy, calming knitting to produce snuggly warmth early in the week and went to Ravelry to look at patterns. I decided on making another Age of Gold but there was a wrap that really screamed that it wanted me to make it: Julie’s Wrap by Joji Locatelli. Darn. That wrap needed more than 3 skeins of yarn to make. Wait, wait, wait… I had 4 skeins of a dusty black cashmere/merino fingering yarn lined up for a sweater that could be directed to this wrap… bam! That yarn instantly became this wrap as I frogged the sweater and decided to knit Goldwing first. (2) The yarn on the right is to make a pair of detailed Mandalorian mitts.
Having made the kits and decisions, I then got busy. Once again, the projects are lined up left to right in the pictures above. (1) I have finished my first Geology sock and am started on the second sock. (2) I am making good progress on the Mando mitts even though you have to use three colors at once in parts of the mitts, and I need to add more detail with duplicate stitch after I finish. I don’t think that English is this author’s first language as some of the written directions are a little shaky, but the charts are golden and I’m just using the force and charging along fearlessly as I knit these mostly ignoring the directions. (3) the dusty black garter knitting is the beginning of Julie’s Wrap coming off my needles. Right now I have over 2 feet of done with 2 more feet ahead of me before I start on the twisted rib outer trim and finally the (be still my heart…) BOBBLES! that are produced in what I think is the bind off. I love bobbles! I learned how to knit backwards just for bobble production, and if ever there was a time to utilize that singular skill it is while making bobbles on a wrap that is more than 4 feet long. By the way, now that I’m knitting that black yarn I’m glad it is becoming a wrap because it is pretty darn streaky. See, a good decision!!
Scleroderma Chronicle:
Sigh. Then there is my continuing scleroderma adventure. I’ve been experiencing some intermittent chest pain that has become more severe and frequent over the last couple of weeks. When you are chronically ill you don’t call in every new development because if you did you would wear out your doctors and you’d absolutely exhaust everybody involved in your life, but when I had a 45 minute bout of chest pain Thursday night along with blue lips and shortness of breath I knew I had to get some medical evaluation started.
The medical group that I belong to has a 24 hour online “chat with a doctor” to get advice. The advice I got was to head to urgent care to get a heart attack ruled out. Okay. I can do that…
When you show up at urgent care with shortness of breath and chest pain you get double masked and whisked into a sealed exam room where you are isolated from everyone else and the medical staff wears all the protective gear available to them. Whew, that was fun. After testing and 5 hours of waiting (and starving because I hadn’t eaten just in case…) I was told that this wasn’t a heart attack (YAY!!) but that there was an issue with fluid around my heart. It’s an autoimmune thing. I need more testing and evaluation and may need to be hospitalized to get it done, but since it was the weekend I convinced them to let me go. Actually, I think that I was lucky that I went to urgent care instead of an ER as it made it easier for me to escape. 🙂 Referrals were made, summaries were sent off to my rheumatologist, and I drove home with my chest still hurting. As soon as I got home I shot off an email to my rheumatologist and went back to bed. Bad scleroderma, bad!!
My niece sent me soup today using DoorDash!
Today I’m up and doing better but taking it really easy. Yesterday was just another chapter in my scleroderma story, but it really impressed on me that catching Covid-19 would not be a good thing at all.
Yarn, Books & Roses 