Just in Case...

 ...you haven't had enough of winter yet, I am still enjoying it, and look what we are getting today!  I was sent home from work early this afternoon because of the weather.  During the drive home, there were times when visibility was down to maybe one-quarter mile.  It is just beautiful out there, and coming down even harder now than it was when I was driving.  The pictures can't begin to show how lovely it is.

It is a very good thing that I enjoy this sort of weather, living where I do. So many folks here are absolutely miserable when it's cold and snowy, and I feel badly for them. 

The little taste of spring we were given last week was nice, but anyone who has lived here for any length of time knows that we are nowhere near being close to the end of winter in February.

Hope you like snow as much as I do!

Gazebo and dining area, Breadbox Bakery and Cafe

Snowfall at the shop

Old barn along the way

Ice on the trees

The Thomas Road bridge

Barn in Snow

View toward the marsh

February Odds and Ends

Girly-girl socks for Andrea and Layla.  The cuff pattern was adapted from a design by Janet Rehfeldt. Her pattern was called "Bubble Yum" and I found it in SOCKS! Digest, March, 2003.  I cast on double the required stitches to make a little ruffle at the top, and knit a turned-down cuff instead of knitting the pattern down the leg.  The yarn was a mixture of special small bits from my sister's sock yarn stash.  All four socks were knit at the same time on two circular needles.  I think they turned out very pretty, and they're certainly girly!  I knitted all four at one time on two circs.

 My cousin Jeanie's gift socks had a dropped stitch, so she returned them to me for repair in an enveloped addressed to the Sock Hospital! :)  I just love Jeanie! Chuck, what a good choice she was.







Nearly all of our snow melted off in the thaw last week, leaving just a few stray patches here and there.  Today we got fresh snow, and in HUGE flakes. I wish you could see how big they were in this picture.

The big SPLAT on my arm was all one snowflake until it landed.

The sunshine last week and warmer temperatures were most welcome, and better than medicine for a winter- and stress-wearied soul.  Now for a few more weeks of winter and then spring once again.

 Random things

A pair of socks and another pair of mitts for some friends.

Two pair of fingerless mitts for my brother in Canada, mystery yarn from my sister's stash

Another pair of gift socks, this time in an old self-striping Opal colorway

SNOWZILLA 2011...our first blizzard of the year

I have little to say this time.  It's been a difficult winter in many ways, and there's been enough sadness shared here lately. 

I did have some lovely times this past weekend, though.  I took my son, his wife, and three of their children to the Davis Mercantile in Shipshewana, where I used to work. The merchants of the Merc were hosting a special benefit for a very nice young couple who own and operate a restaurant on the top floor of the building.  They had a house fire last summer, lost everything in their home, and she was very badly burned.  After several months in the hospital and much pain and suffering, she is finally able to be back to work at least part time. 

The couple's church baked hundreds of marvelous cookies.  We began by buying a box at the restaurant, then visited every shop in the building to fill it with cookies, a different kind of cookie at every stop.  It was my daughter-in-law's first visit to Shipshewana, and she had a great time exploring the different shops. 

Of course, no visit to the Merc would be complete without a ride on the carousel and a fresh, hot, soft pretzel at JoJo's.

 

Guy Thompson entertained us with a special performance of his wonderful marionettes.  A free-will donation was taken, and all proceeds donated to the benefit.  Guy and his wife, Christine, used to run the Mousetrap Puppet Theater on the top floor of the Merc, but I'm very sad to say economic considerations caused them to close the theater a couple of years ago.  He currently does shows at WanaWaves, the indoor water park in Shipshewana on Saturday evenings at 7:00.  Don't miss it when you're in town!

Mercantile merchants donated a portion of their sales for the day to help with the family's medical and personal expenses.  It's good to work in a small town, where people still care for and reach out to help one another.  

A Touch of Winter

 As I've often said, I love winter.  It is such a quiet time.  The snow muffles the sounds of the world around me and covers the debris and detritus of the rest of the year with a fresh coat of white.  It's a time to reflect, to slow down, to burrow deep beneath the covers...to breathe.  We must consider each step in the winter, look about us for slippery spots, drive a bit more carefully, make sure to dress warmly and prepare for extreme temperatures.

We put suet cakes and mixed seeds out for the birds.  They add a touch of color and busyness to an otherwise stark and quiet landscape. We get a wide variety of winter birds here: cardinals, blue jays, chickadees, phoebes, woodpeckers, titmice, grosbeaks and others.

 Fresh, untracked snow is the main reason why I don't like snowmobiles.  Of course, they are also noisy machines, and their ruckus interrupts my winter peace.

If you look very closely, you might see a cardinal perched in the branches of the tree.  When I first looked out, there were three males, all in bright-red plumage, but I wasn't fast enough to get that picture or, for that matter, close enough to get a good image here.







It's very cold here today, below zero early this morning, and not warming up very quickly at all.  The furnace is working hard to keep the house comfortable, but the sun is shining brightly so it doesn't feel quite so chill.  There was a lot of snow near us yesterday, but we got just a few inches.  A niece who lives a few miles to the west of us reported that at one point yesterday, they got nearly four inches of snow in a half-hour period.  There is also snow falling and predicted to fall all over the South, so there will be many children there who may be experiencing their very first snow!  I hope that they'll get enough to have some fun in it.

More on Christmas
I got two boxes of chocolates from my kids and grandkids for Christmas...click on the image at left for a better view of the tags.  The little ones were up and around before their parents on the day before Christmas, and they opened a few of the gifts before they were supposed to. They also helped themselves to my chocolates.  The other box of chocolates looked very similar to this one, but with more empty spaces. = ) 

My friend Shelly is deployed to Germany at the moment, and she sent this MOST excellent polar bear hat for my grandson.  Robby loves it, and has been wearing it almost constantly since we gave it to him.  I have some wonderful friends.

And so, for 2011. 

I am not a believer in new year's resolutions as they are rarely kept, but there are a few things I would like to aim for.

1. Acceptance of things I can't change

2. Not letting the bad things upset me

3. Being happy with what I have instead of sad about what I don't have

4. Shedding fifty pounds

Well, that last one is my doctor's plan for me...skinny little dude that he is (sigh).

Happy New Year to us, every one.  Let us hope for a better year to come.  If you see me without a smile, lend me one of yours, and remind me that I need to find one of my own.

 Christmas, 2010

It was time. I hadn't had my mom's Christmas cookie cutters out since our grandson was born, four years ago. When we were kids, baking the cookies was a huge deal.  Mom would make as many as five or six triple batches of cookie dough and spend the whole day baking.  Then the family would gather and help with the decorating.  We'd make the entire Nativity scene in cookies as well as dozens of Santas, trees, stockings, stars, holly wreaths, and bells.  We would load and wrap plates of cookies and drive around our town, delivering them to friends and teachers.  It was a wonderful time

I only baked Santas this year, and only mixed up one batch of dough.  The Santa cookies are everyone's favorites.  There is a method to eating them, too...you have to eat the pom pom off the hat first, then the hat, then the hat brim, then Santa's face, then the beard.  I think there may be a law that says all that.

 This is the all-important 'blob'.  It's what's left when you've rolled and re-rolled the dough and cut out all the cookies you can from it.  The little, too-small-to-make-a-cookie bit that's left over is a 'blob' and you get to eat it as soon as it's baked.  You only get to eat the 'good' cookies if they break or burn.

Here is the Christmas tree that almost didn't make it up this year.  We were finishing and painting the drywall in the living room and dining room, and only got the mess cleared away a few days before Christmas.  I considered not putting it up this year, but I'm glad I did, now.  It does bring a great deal of cheer and it's always so pretty, with all of the ornaments collected through the years.  My angel stopped lighting up this year, after twenty years of use.  I hope that we'll be able to repair her, but if not she'll have to be replaced. 

 Robby in his goofy hat...

 Ethan in his new hat and mittens, knit by Grandma...

 Layla modeling her new tam and mittens, also knit by me...

 Opening presents and showing off some of their new goodies....

 

Christmas really IS for children, isn't it. = )

My Christmas was topped off by a visit from my oldest brother, who lives in Canada.  He's been here since Saturday morning, and may be here through the first of January.  This is about the most time I've spent with him since we were kids, and I am so enjoying every minute of it. My family has become so fragmented since my mother's death in 1998.  It's good to still have this one close connection.

A Happy New Year to one and all!

A bit of this and a bit of that...

I'm not nearly ready for Christmas, but that's nothing new. I have, however, finished a few projects.  

A couple of years ago, I knit five pairs of socks for some of my chat room friends.  One has yet to wear his, as his wife says 'They're too NICE to wear."  Another, however, wore his so much that they were already through at the toes last winter.  These lovely blue socks will, I hope, take the place of the worn-out pair.  While working the heels and toes, I knitted in a strand of mystery yarn from my sister's stash in the hope that it will help them last longer.

New socks in the mail tomorrow, Kevin!

What a beautiful day I had today to photograph them.  We had high winds and a couple of inches of fresh snow overnight, but the sun is out today and the sky is really THAT blue!  I do love winter. :)

This little hat and mitten set is in Robby's favorite color.  I used one strand of Opal Uni-Color in orange for the hem and then added one strand of Opal Rainforest in "Schmetterling" for the rest of the hat, holding the two yarns together.  I divided the skein of Schmetterling into two balls, both beginning at the same place in the pattern repeat, and alternated knitting one round with one ball and the next with the other, so that the self-striping pattern would be longer.  He loves them!  Next time, though, I will make the hat a bit deeper, as his ears peek out just a bit.

These are the two pair of fingerless mittens that I showed in a previous post, now finished.  They are very nice for keeping my hands warm at the keyboard.  Next time, i think I'll try knitting the individual fingers.  I think they look like turtleneck sweaters for one-armed Barbie dolls! 

This was my 2010 entry in the Shipshewana Merchants' Association annual scarecrow contest.  She wore a dress that my mother sewed for me when I was in the eighth grade, that closed with buttons from my great-great grandmother's button box.

A bout of hormonally-instigated depression took away my Christmas spirit last week.  I had difficulty finding any joy in my heart for those days, but I think I'm on an uphill run again now.  For those of you who may not believe in depression, it is real, it is painful, and it is very, very hard to deal with.  I have lived with it for forty years and I've learned how to work my way through it, but this episode was a particularly bad one, and I'm glad to be able to see the sunshine again.  

This is a terrible time of year for those who struggle with depression.  Keep watch on your loved ones.  Give a hug when you see it's needed.  Try to understand that it's not a sign of weakness, it's not your fault, nor is it theirs, it just is.

Just love them.

  In Appreciation of Small Pleasures...

Two pair of fingerless mittens, and a little boy peeking from my computer monitor

"My" new store

A pair of antlers and a red nose to make people smile

 

A snowy day

Learning how to wink

 What a wonderful world this is!

A long treatise on chat-room friends...
I have a friend in The Netherlands who once told me that in his country when you have a birthday, you invite all of your friends, put out food, and celebrate your day. I think planning one's own birthday party is a splendid idea! In that spirit, here is my birthday celebration.   The friends I choose to invite this year are my friends from the gl1800riders.com chat room, a place where I probably spend far too much time. 
These people are an amazing and diverse group, representing many different walks of life.  In my six or seven years of chatting with this bunch, I've met a road builder, a wireless communications whiz, a chemist, grocer, tool-and-die maker, public servants, computer gurus (and many who were computer-challenged), a shoe salesman, truck drivers, postal workers, car salesmen, maintenance workers, photographers both amateur and professional, an electrical engineer, nurses, musicians, farmers, and more. 
I have chatted with folks from nearly forty states and at least seven countries outside the USA.  I have met many of them at various gatherings in various places, several have visited me at my home, and I have visited a few at theirs.  I've met up with them in Arkansas, Indiana, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Alabama, and Tennessee.  I've logged many, many miles riding with them, and countless hours in the chat room with them.
Most of them use screen names: YellowWolf, Snoopy, Fuzzy, Transformer, MCMom, Galute, Brobubba, and so many more.  Others use some variation of their real names: TBeck, Jon, Robeth, and of course, RickMays. Poor Rick used to get so upset that we all had 'fake' names that everyone changed their screen name one night while he was away, and left him to figure out who was who when he came back. :D 
We talk about everything in chat, and nothing.  The only real rule is that we try very hard to leave politics and conflict outside.  We have had nights where we quoted Seinfeld and Monty Python episodes, nights when we played trivia games, and nights when no one said much of anything at all. Some nights the boys want to talk about boobs, always boobs and then they get sent to the corner until they can behave. = )
We have had acronyms and catch-phrases. GANBY? was asked frequently a few years back when a chatter had wrecked his bike and was waiting to replace it (Get A New Bike Yet?).  "Warmhogs" became a regular salutation one evening when  self-admitted poor speller Fuzzy was leaving and meant to leave me with warm hugs...we used to give spelling scores for things like that;  -1 for a minor infraction. 
One chatter calls us his 'secret friends' because that's what his wife calls us. Two others enter and greet one another, "Hey Goat roper!" "Hey, Hillbilly!"  Another greets everyone by the initials of their user name, "B!" "G!" "Uncle T! "
With the joining of FrigNbored, the prefix FrigN became used for many things...the FrigNditch he rode into on one ride down Push Mountain in Arkansas, the line of protective gear he was going to develop and market: "I'm wearing my FrigNhelmet on my ride today. Has anyone seen my FrigNgloves?", and still is used frequently to describe my FrigNdialup connection. 
One chatter used to greet me with "BITE ME", to which my reply was "As always, Rick, no thank  you!"  One ill-fated evening I learned from the Southern boys the meaning of "shakey puddin'" and that phrase continues to reverberate in chat on a fairly frequent basis. 
We have discussed the merits of fresh Road-Apple pies and whether to farkle one's bike or not with useless and unnecessary chrome items. 
We have celebrated marriages, births, and anniversaries, retirements, new homes, new jobs and new bikes, and mourned the deaths of siblings, parents, spouses, pets and even children.  On one tragic evening, we sat late into the night with a chatter from Minnesota, as he watched the lights from emergency vehicles a mile or so from his home while rescue workers pulled the bodies of kids from a school bus that had been smashed and overturned by a careless driver who did not yield at a stop sign.  We grieved with him as he prepared the meats and cheeses that were delivered from his little grocery store to the funerals of children he knew by their first names. 
On another evening, two men sat at their computers in two different states, tracking tornadoes in a third state and communicating the safest routes by phone with a chatter who was trying to dodge the storms and get home to his wife.  He made it safe and sound that night, by the way.  Another night that same man rode home on his motorcycle through a tornado and when he entered the chat room, he told us how he was passed by a tree AND a chicken coop along the way!
Through the journaling skill of that tornado-defying rider, Rickey (Galute), we traveled vicariously with five friends on four motorcycles from Florida, Georgia, Arkansas, and Oklahoma on an odyssey to Alaska and back.  We held our collective breath when one of the group became gravely ill along the way and had to be flown home.  We were sure we'd lost him, and he spent months in the hospital, but now he is riding once more. 
We followed in amazement as another of our group, Sheila Winney, also known as MCMom, rode more than 125,000 miles in twelve months on her purple Wing, suffering two crashes along the way.  The poor Wing completed the ride, its fairing patched together with heavy plastic and duct tape, and Sheila survived her wrecks with minor injuries.  The chat room waited every evening for updates from Rickey and Sheila, worrying when they didn't show up in chat for a day or two, and always asking the same question when they did make an appearance: "Where are you tonight?"
There is a surprising number of men in chat who also like to cook.  One evening, several of them were comparing favorite recipes.  Finally, in frustration because I am married to a man who does NOT cook, I asked, "Where were you all when I  was looking for a husband?" to which Frig replied, "Well...I was thirteen..."  Ouch.
We have had Mardi gras incidents, bike tip-overs, wrecks and close calls, bikes lost and bikes gained, HUGE laughs and a few tears.  We've had such good times together, and I truly consider these people to be the very best friends of my life, bar none.  They have listened and commiserated and celebrated with me during these very difficult last few years, through family problems and family illnesses, the building of a new house and new life, the birth of my grandson, the loss of my sister to cancer. 
The group has changed over the years, some have left, others have joined. Lives have changed and taken some to other interests.  Black Pirate, oh Jerry, our Jerry, was killed on his trike awhile back, and I believe the sun dimmed on that day.  Newbies are welcomed, and usually greeted with, "Where are you and what do you ride?"  We teach them the basics of chat, then sit back and get to know them.  I miss the ones who don't come in any more, though, and wish you would drop in every now and again.  Our lives are poorer in your absence, you know...

And so, tomorrow is my birthday and I invite you all to come.  I will put out food, and we will celebrate.  Next year, don't wait for November 24th, just come any day, and we will have a party.   Until we meet again, in the words of NJREF:

'Be well, my secret friends!'

Well, this is cool!

After I finished the lovely Kroy FX Clover Colors socks, I emailed Kroy, telling them about the gauge difference I encountered from one ball of yarn to another:

To: Patons Inquire

Subject: Small problem with Kroy Socks FX

I love your Kroy Socks yarn, and have used it for several projects over the years. I recently had an odd problem with two balls of Socks FX in Clover Colors. You can see the finished socks at the link below:

http://tinyurl.com/2g5rgyz

if the link doesn't work, go to www.sunnybookyarns.blogspot.com and scroll down to the Oct. 30 post.
As noted in my blog post, the dye lots were different so the socks are very different in color, but that's not a problem for me. However, I use the 2socks/2circs technique always when knitting socks, so they were knit at the same time on the same needles, but came out with very different gauges. You can see the difference in size in the two socks pictured. Is this a common occurrence with the FX line? I hate to think (because I despise swatching!) that I will have to start knitting gauge swatches from every ball of Kroy Socks yarn.
Once I noticed the difference in the gauge, I simply knit one sock a little longer than normal and one a little shorter than normal, and they came out ok. Both socks fit acceptably well, and I LOVE the colors.
Thank you for the feedback, and lets see MORE of those gorgeous FX colorways!

Becky Yoder
 

This was their customer service rep's response:

Dear Becky,

Thank you for contacting our company. With regards to your concern about the pattern in the Kroy FX yarn, there is no perceivable problem with the yarn itself the FX is a random patterning yarn. It is meant to create an interesting ‘effect’ – hence ‘FX’ and the socks will not match exactly in terms of the patterning-colors remain the same but the way they flow together creates the effect.

This product is a 4 ply yarn and it is combined of four different strands of a variegated yarn which is all different as well and they are spun together making each ball a little different and unique. That is why two socks will not be identical. Remember, every project will be a special one-of-a-kind treasure, so have fun creating your very own knit or crochet design.

If the two balls are the same lot and colour they should be the same gauge, we sincerely apologize for the difficulties you have experienced, and appreciate your comments. Please forward your mailing address and we would be happy to send you some complimentary yarn.
Once again, we thank you for taking the time to bring this matter to our attention and thank you for choosing our products.
Yours truly,
SPINRITE INC.
Leah Cherrey
Customer Service

Ok, I thought, that was nice, they're going to send me a couple of balls of yarn...but nooooo....

I arrived home from work today, and this was waiting for me    --------->

Three balls of Kroy Socks Jacquards in Turquoise!

Three balls of Patons Stretch Socks in Licorice!

Three balls of the ever-lovely Kroy Socks FX Clover Colors!

Holy cow!  Complimentary yarn, indeed!  Sooo...if you're using Kroy Socks FX, be sure to get the same dyelot number OR swatch every ball!  Oh, and I checked...the dyelots are the same on all the colors they sent me. =)

I love good customer service!

And now for something completely different...



Pumpkin photgraph by Suzanne Collier.
For more information:
http://thruthebugsonmywindshield.wordpress.com/



You may remember me saying that our little garden produced just one pumpkin this year.  It got picked yesterday, and I roasted its seeds and used its pulp to bake two fairly decent pumpkin pies!  I started with this recipe from cooks.com REAL Pumpkin Pie.  I didn't have rum or raisins in the house, and I had already started baking the fresh pumpkin to cook the flesh, so I did a little fiddling with the recipe, which then became:

Drunken Punkin Pie
To make two pies
Pastry for two 9" pies, fitted into pie pans, with edges fluted and bottom of crust pricked with a fork so that steam can escape
4c. cooked pumpkin, mashed or pureed
2 T flour
2 c. sugar
* 2 tsp cinnamon
*1 tsp nutmeg
*1/2 tsp cloves
*1 tsp ginger
  OR substitute 3 1/2 tsp Pumpkin Pie Spice for all ingredients marked with *
2 T Molasses
2 T butter, melted
1 tsp. vanilla extract
2 egg yolks, beaten
1/2 c Maker's Mark bourbon
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.  Mix all ingredients together, stir until well combined, and pour into pastry-lined pie plates.  Bake at 400 for 15 minutes, reduce heat to 350 degrees F and bake until done.  I checked my pies the first time after thirty minutes at 350, but they were not even close to being done.  It was closer to an hour and a half before they were set up enough that a knife inserted near the middle of the pies came out clean and they were baked.  You will want to check them about every ten minutes or so, and may need to protect the edges of the pie crusts with strips of aluminum foil.
Let the pies set on a rack to cool, and serve with whipped cream.
Yum!