WIP Wednesday- The First One of 2011

It's the first WIP W of 2011 already.  Christmas knitting seems like a long ago memory, hard to believe it was just two weeks ago.

It's warmed up just a bit and I've been feeling better this week.  So many posts about New Year's Resolutions and goals.  I hate to make year long goals for my crafts.  What sounds like a good idea in January will be tossed out the window in June, I can guarantee you that.  So much is going on, I do need to make some sort of half organized rotation for January.

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It has been awhile since I've worked on any crochet.  My swap partner back in October sent me some Rico Cotton Essentials so I could make African Flower pattern.

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There is a couple more colors I would like to add.  A Google search and I found a UK store that will ship to the US.  I'll do that eventually.

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In the meantime, I'll play around with the colors I already have.  There are so many other things I need to work on this month.

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Just six more rows to go on the The Guy Next Door Cowl.  This should be finished tonight.  Then I'll wash it and block tomorrow.  Hopefully, the guy next door will let me take a picture of him wearing his Guy Next Door Cowl on Friday.

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I started Abby cowl for the French neighbor across the way.  This was supposed to for Christmas, but we all know what happened with that.  I'm using lace weight alpaca that I dyed and spun awhile back.

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Monday night, D had me order a pound of BFL/silk fiber that I've been wanting for awhile.  I think it should be here by Friday or Monday.  I'm planning on dying it a light sky blue with a touch of grey.  Which means I need to finish the BFL I have on the spinning wheel.  I had split this two lengthwise to make two Navajo plied skeins for socks.  I'm reconsidering the socks and thinking I might want to pair it with a semi-solid medium violet or natural colored BFL for a fair isle sweater.

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Blurry photo of the babies today.  I notice that the oldest one is getting black on his wing like his Daddy.  He is around two weeks old today or tomorrow.  I'm really sure.  The youngest one was born on New Years or the day after.

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While I taking a picture of the birds, Nippit hopped and demanded an audience.  Literally, she kept nudging my leg with her nose.  I wonder what she's trying to say.

The fix that Intense Debate suggested knocked out Intense Debate and brought back Blogger comments.  I'm going to leave it and just respond in the comments.  I thought about Disqus, but that one hates me and won't let me post a link to my blog when I comment on others using that platform.  Hopefully, Blogger will make a better commenting system.

TUSAL Time January

It's the New Moon so time for a picture for TUSAL.  It's a Totally Useless Stitch A-Long hosted by Daffycat.

This one that even I could keep up with.  Just take a picture of my ort jar and post it every New Moon.  Don't even have to have anything added to it month to month.  Because I may be Rosanne Connor's lost baby sister, my jar is a Ragu jar, I bought and made spaghetti just to have a jar.

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In there is the yarns bits from Hat Hell, some floss from the tree skirt that I stitched for all of two days, some size 30 threads and some pink stuff that I don't know from what.

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Birdie picture update as of a few minutes ago, 10pm Tucson time.  D took the picture, he thought you all should have a daily update.  Ladybird is spending more time out of the nesting box now.  The big one seems to keep the others warm for her.  D is calling that Huey Jr aka Herbie.  I'm really quite thrilled as it looks like they are going to make it.  Unlike those canaries when I was five.


I did e-mail Intense Debate Help today.  They weren't much help.  I didn't really think they would be.  They blamed it on my theme, then on the fact I had too many pictures per post.  Please click on the title of the post if came to the main page and comments will show up.  Now, I have to put my blog back together and decide if I want to keep Intense Debate.  I do like being able to respond to the comments left.

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Mama's really quite a mad woman, you know.

Welcome To The Funny Farm

When I was very young, my mother used to sing, "They're coming to take me away, ha ha, ho ho, he, he. To the funny farm, where life is happy, weird and free."  (Yes, I swapped weird for gay.  She said gay back then.) Except, the funny farm kind of grew up around me.

I thought of the title of today's post as I was going to bed last night, because the pets were being weird, well, weirder than usual.  Then tonight as I sat down to upload pictures and started typing the first paragraph, the people right above me had their quarterly (I guess quarterly, as it's the third one since last February when we moved in) episode.  The irony wasn't lost on me. I thought funny farm, this is the freaking loony bin.  Cristi from Turtle Girl will know what I'm talking about.

J and D were playing video games in the back room when it started so we went out to join the block party forming in front of our patio.  It wasn't really a party, but most of the neighbors came out to see what the hell. I actually feel safer here than I did in the really nice suburbs back in NY, because when crap happens many of the neighbors come out to do something, or at least be witnesses to the crap. It's a pretty tight knit community here.  So that was our excitement for the night.

Last night, I found an egg in Myrtle and Emily's cage last night.  We knew it was coming.  D took my Kleenex   box and fitted in the cage for a makeshift nesting box.  Myrtle promptly kicked out all the wood shavings and tonight I found the egg broken in the food dish.  That takes care of that for now, I guess.

While looking for bird supplies I found the bag that had the Christmas presents for the animals.  D gave the cats their mice, catnip and Feline Greenies 3 oz. Package Salmon.  The Puttins as we called the two tuxedo cats were first to the pile.

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Bootsie is on the left.  Tennessee aka bedroom cat aka catnip hog on the right.

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You can't see the mice because Tennessee has all six of them under her.

Butterscotch sat by my chair looking on longingly.  I think Bright Eyes was still sleeping in the closet.  I felt bad for Butterscotch so, I gave him a small pile, which Tennessee ran over grabbed up.  So, I gave him another small pile.  Finally, the girls tired out and Butterscotch got his chance with the goodies.

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More than anything, he loves to play with mice.

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(action shot)

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I got you now, little mousie.

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You will be my minion.

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The bunnies were given yogurt drops.  Then Betty and Dammit came out and gave me a show of leap bunny.

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Then some bunny tag.

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All four eggs have hatched.  I took this picture this morning.  As you can see the oldest one is starting to get some downy feathers.  He looks so big compared to the others.  Funny too, with his bald head.

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I know, this is supposed to be a needlework blog.  For now I'll show you the Guy Next Door Cowl.  It's almost finished.  I think I going to do one more pattern repeat then bind it off. It's a pain to knit on the way it's rolling up like a jelly roll on both top and bottom.  I'm going to try to do Jeny's Stretchy Bind Off  only for stockinette stitch.

I've been feeling better for the most part and been busy trying to clean most of the things.  There is something about the New Year that always puts me in the mood to clean and organize.  We'll see how far I get.  Other stitchy things I've been working on, I'll reveal on WIP Wednesday.

Because, I am lazy, I still haven't sent an e-mail to Intense Debate Support.  If you came to the main page and would like to comment, just click on the title of this post and the place to comment will show up under this post.  I will respond to all comments, eventually.

Happy New Year

Hope you all have a happy and healthy New Year.  I've been pretty quiet this week as the weather has been cold and crappy for Tucson.  There are three things that will take me out of commission.  The first is a migraine headache, and I get cluster migraines since I was 14.  Thankfully, they are only once or twice a month and not several times a week.  The other is any kind of gastric upset.   Third is nerve pain, that is the worse or equal to a migraine.  I don't like to be a moaner, so I keep to myself.

Firstly, as of last night we have three little baby birds and one egg left.  The little peeps are getting louder and more frequent.  Huey the daddy bird hops around on the perches chirping loudly when he hears the peeps.  I imagine him saying, "Hey, settle down for your mother."  "Hush now"  Then he looks up-side down into the box, "Don't make me come in there."  Then he goes in and they settle down after a bit.

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D had to work both New Year's Eve and day.  So, I thought to myself how can we have a good dinner.  He loves to cook the big fancy meals.  I came up with the idea let's have our big meal at midnight.  We could have snacks while we were waiting.  Thursday, despite pain and cold temps I braved the outdoors and proceeded to make a few trips on the bus to the store and back to haul everything that we needed.  Our tradition is to get the most expensive roast we can reasonably afford.  Fry's I got a rib roast for a dollar cheaper per pound than what was quoted on the phone.  I ran to the check out and bus stop before they could change their mind.

D called as he always does when he gets off the bus to see if we needed anything.  He said he would pick something up for dinner, but I told him it was already in the oven ready.  Yes, he usually is gone 12 hours a day and still comes home and makes dinner.  His voice really perked up when I said I had dinner waiting.  It was just shake and bake chicken with rice.  He also does any dishes on his days off.

He took tons of pictures of his masterpiece.   I'll spare you and only post a few.  That roast was $4.77 a pound!!!  As much as I miss Wegman's,  there is no way Danny would have given that great a deal.  I kind of wish he had today off and did his dishes.  Sometimes, I think he tries to see how many he can get dirty.

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Today, I was feeling better.  I made homemade shrimp eggrolls.  Well, I had them already for him to fry up.  They were so good he had about five and I think I ate four.  Which is saying something.  I usually don't like to eat my own cooking.  Not that it's bad.  I'm just so sick of it when I finish I'm not in the mood anymore.  I like to spin other people's dye jobs too.

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The leftovers, that we'll freeze for later.

Finally, on the way home tonight, D stopped in at Walgreens and found this for me for what he said was a ridiculously low price.

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You're a really big guy.

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Maybe you'll think about being my body guard? I will be your long lost pal.

No, 2010 recap here.  It's been a long strange year and I'm glad to see the backside of it.

I still haven't found a fix to get the comments showing on the mainpage.  Just click on the title and the comments will show at the bottom of this post.  Thanks for visiting me.