The Ice Storm Cometh, and Leaveth Soon I Hope

It's been so long since I've blogged, I wonder if any of you are still out there?

Can you believe, it's freezing here? All night long I heard the sound of frozen rain falling. Good coating of ice on the roads making for some spectacular (and spectacularly stupid) wrecks shown on the morning news. Schools are closed. It looks like this outside.

The squirrel baffle on the bird feeder looks like a tasseled lampshade. I did fill it and shortly thereafter I had trees full of birds waiting in line, some I hadn't seen in a while. Two sorts of woodpeckers, chickadees, cardinals, titmice, doves. I couldn't thaw out the birdbaths, though. I poured in warm water, but it was frozen solid in minutes.

It is quite pretty though. The ground is white, but it's an inch of ice, not snow. The squirrels are clawing at it to get to their food. It should melt off this afternoon, but no driving for me until it does. I live on top of a steep hill and there's really no good way down as long as it's slick.

What did I do last week-end you ask? Well, perhaps you didn't but I'll tell you anyway. I went to the CFA cat show in Mesquite. We are down to the one "local" show a year and I hadn't been to one in ages.

My friend Anita was grooming up this gorgeous little girl for the ring, kitten class. She did very well indeed.

She's a rare chocolate tabby out of a regional grand champion, Jude's Rocky Road, FIRST CHOCOLATE CLASSIC TABBY EVER TO GRAND IN CFA. FIRST CHOCOLATE OR LILAC EVER TO BE CFA'S SECOND BEST OF BREED NATIONALLY.

And here is Judy grooming up Jude ROCK THE LINE OF DREAMZ aka Linus. He's a Chocolate Lynx-point Himalayan and just out of kitten class.

Here's Linus ready to go into the ring. Wow! Judy's grooming is peerless.

And here he is with some of his ribbons of the day.

And this little bit is Jude's Wave, a Tortie Lynx Point Himmy also out of Rocky Road. She was the tiniest kitten in the show at 4 months.

Judy has decided I need a kitten to cheer me up and has picked out a precious 8 week old boy, blue tabby and white Bi-Color out of that same famous Rocky Road. I'm rather delighted because all of the Rocky boys have the sweetest temperaments imaginable. It all started with Rocky Raccoon, a champion who sired Rocky Road, a not quite two year old who has sired multiple champions including the adorable Chip off the Old Rock (aka Chippy). These cats are all such lover boys that they kiss the judges and roll over on the show table for tummy rubs. They are quite famous for this. So I shall need a name for the new boy, ideas welcome. There's nothing like a kitten to make you smile. Just waiting another month or so. He needs to be weaned and learn to eat. His sister is doing well at the eating bit, but my little boy just wants his Mommy still. His photo is probably in the kitten section at Jude Persians if you want to take a look. I just checked and indeed he is at the top of the kitten page 2 with his black and white sister.

The caption is "He's not heavy, he's my brother."

OK, let's hear some names. His Father is Rocky Road and his mother is Tallulah. My other boy is Galatoire and another we had was Tujagues, both New Orleans restaurants. Somewhere I made a list of restaurants, but the only one that comes to mind right now is Yuglesitches (sp?) and I just don't think this little boy could wear that.

Knitting? Well yes.

This is the Nancy One Skein Shawl from Schaefer in Julia Child. Quick and a delight to knit, and wonderful to wear because of the curved neckline and the tails. This was my second one.
Here is the first one that I finished at Christmas. The colorway is Dian Fossey.

You can see that the back is not long and pointed, but makes a gentle curve. Just love them both.

And here is a cowl in Schaefer that I did a year ago, but forgot to document or photograph until now. Actually it was lost, but now it's found. It's a made up pattern and is really perfect for this weather.

And here is a sock I started a couple of days ago. It is the Leyburn done in STR Chanticleer Mediumweight on size 2.5mm needles. I reduced the stitch count to 66 and knit cuff down, so I suppose they are Leyburn in stitch pattern only. They are quite thick because of the slipstitch pattern, but so far are fitting quite well. To be honest, they didn't fit at all at first, but I kept knitting and suddenly the Knitting Fairy waved her magic wand and they fit beautifully. I've finished the first heel and am picking up for the gussets, so we shall soon see if they fit over my arches. Sure hoping they will. I got sucked into these as a KAL where people are trying to knit up as many colorways of STR possible in the Leyburn pattern. Worth a look on Ravelry. Pretty amazing colors and interesting to see all the different ways knitters went about making the same pattern.
Another KAL is with my Sisters of the Wool group. Several of us set about knitting SOHO mostly with yarns we bought at Kid n Ewe. Most are from Plain and Fancy in their incredible DK weight that resembles Malabrigo. Susan is using Brooks Farm Solo Silk, Grace is using up some glittery stash and I can't remember what Angele is using. They all look wildly different. And you should hear the cursing about the pattern. It is really quite simple, only the instructions are confusing. My main problem is simple sloppiness. But I think that will soon be a thing of the past as I'm nearly off the mitered center section.

Here it is looking like a grand lump on the circulars, but with one more row, I'll bind off and start knitting the sides, so we'll be able to see what it looks like.

And here is a Thorpe that I made for my niece in freezing Brooklyn. Love Thorpe. Here I've used Noro's Big Kureyon with a Highland Wool edging. Yes, that's crochet. In this photo you can see my edging choices. Were it me, I would have gone with the pumpkin color, but for my niece, I decided the brown heather was the safest choice. The colors are showing too bright in these photos. Here's the finished hat.
And here is Taya modeling the finished version. My niece is quite thin and tall with micro short hair, so it will look quite different, but equally good I hope.

Some sad news, our lovely LYS, Yarns Ewenique, is closing after only two years. They have done so well, but one of the partners has to move to California and the other wants to move to a cabin at the lake. They had a wonderful atmosphere in the shop, a good selection of yarns in good quantity and a wall of knitting tools and needles that was matchless.

More to come, hope you are all warm and toasty.

All the News That's Fit to Print, and Then Some

Where have I been the last month you might ask. On an emotional roller coaster would be the answer.

First the good news. Steven received an amazingly good report on his first bone marrow biopsy. Donor system 100% of marrow and they don't see any leukemia cells for now. His doctor said it is a miracle. He has put on some few pounds and gone out in public. After seven and a half months in the hospital, a trip to Sam's Club is totally exciting. He is still dealing with extreme fatigue, tremors and unbelievably bad mouth and throat ulcers, but that is a small price for what he has been through.

And yes, I am still knitting, sort of. It is more knit one row, tink half a row for the moment, when I can keep my eyes open long enough to do so. I started a Manos pattern, The Blues, in their Stria cotton. It is a lacy wide cropped top which I am hopeful can be worn in Texas in some season. Here is the pattern:

And here is the back:

And here is a close-up of the lace:

And here is what a skein of Stria looks like when you break it at each knot and hand wind it. Six knots in one 116 yard skein is bloody annoying. Look at that little piece that is not much more than a yard long. Working in all those ends on a lace pattern will not be what I would call amusing. These darn knots, which they cut very short, are the main reason for all the tinking I've done while knitting this.

The Manos pattern is cryptically written. A newbie knitter would be very frustrated. I seriously scratched my head at one point, but after knitting and frogging a couple of times, I came up with a solution. Unfortunately at my current slow pace, a sweater which should take only a couple of weeks has required almost a month just for the back. Oh well. I've got to pick up some speed if I'm ever going to use up my stash.

What I am really being tempted to do at the moment is make jewelry. Some of you may not know, but I have a background in precious jewelry design in France and Italy. Of course at the moment I'm dreaming more of stringing seeds and glass rather than setting rubies and diamonds. I could make a hundred parures in the time it takes me to knit a sweater, or a pair of socks for that matter. Think I might set aside the knitting for a week-end and see what happens. Of course, I should also be painting the entry hall and the guest bathroom and the cabinetry that was eaten by the Irish Wolfhound Katrina refugee. Though putting my office back in shape should be the priority at the moment. Decisions, decisions, decisions.

The Leukemia Society is collecting donations today. I should have taken a photo of the piles of bags on my front porch waiting for pick-up. All I can say is I wish I had managed at least twice as many.

Now for the sad news. This week I lost my adored cat Tujagues. He was an Exotic (short-haired Persian) only barely four years old and totally healthy. My friend Doreen, an emergency room doctor, had just come in the house. Tujagues came up to be petted, then walked away a few feet and had a seizure of some sort and was gone instantly. Thank goodness Doreen was with me and she really took care of me as I was simply in shock. And thank goodness we had just gotten the good news about Steven. I wanted to mention this here because of how important Tujagues was in keeping my spirits up these last difficult months. He could put a smile on my face no matter what was going on. Here is the little guy's baby picture and yes, he had attitude with a capital A.

Jo called him the Beautiful Bowl Cat. His absolute favorite place was in this Mexican bowl. He was a splendid little representive of his species. It is way too quiet around here without him.

There is still a report to be given on WWKIPDay, but that shall come next time.