So many hobbies!

Random Thursday

Random thoughts for the day:

• the stockings are cut and awaiting assembly
• I hope they're big enough
• I have no idea how I'm going to put them together.  Hmm, must find tutorial...
• I'm getting 10 stitches to the inch on my socks with size 1.5 needles.  A tight knitter?  Who me?
• I found 3 potatoes, 2 paper wads, a milk ring and a piece of styrofoam under a bookcase
• The cats have been busy
• I hope I don't forget to bring the turkey with me to my sister's
• In lieu of having a holiday party, my department at work gave us gift cards.  Cool.
• I've had oatmeal with raspberries every night for dinner this week.  Is that weird?  It's really good oatmeal.  Honest.
• I found a small project bag on Etsy that I want.  I may get it for myself after Christmas.  Or, I might cave and get it earlier.  It's a toss up.
• I ordered this fabric in a fat quarter pack and it came today.  I'm thinking kid's quilt:
  

• How is it that it's just over a week until Christmas?  How the heck did that happen?
• Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays everyone.

Progress

 

I started cutting each square into quarters Friday night and with my very first cut, cut in the wronge place, ruining two squares.  It takes much less time if you cut a stack of two or three rather than one at a time.  After uttering words that would make my mom say, "Rebecca!" I decided that maybe I should wait until Saturday after a good night's sleep.  So after remaking the two squares I screwed up, I started stacking and cutting, which gave me this:

 

Arranging and piecing will have to wait until next weekend.  The rest of the weekend I spent stitching down the binding on my contest quilt.  Honestly, I'm really tired of blind stitching edges.  I've got about a side and a quarter to go so I'm getting close to finished.  Of course, then I'll have to use one of those sticky rollers on both front and back to get off the cat hair and the fuzzies from the batting.  While I was quilting and manhandling the quilt, little bits of batting came off and got all over the quilt. 

And now a bit of random:

1. I really hate the time change!
2. I'm Team: Jacob all the way.
3. There are bulbs coming up in my front garden!
4. I bought fabric to make myself a Dr. Seuss pillowcase.
5. My dad's birthday was yesterday.  He's 82!  Happy Birthday, Dad!
6. And a kitten shot:

 

What is up with Blogger?

I've been having an impossible time trying to leave comments on blogs hosted by Blogger.  It either tells me there's an error or it navigates away to an error page.  If you use Blogger, I've been trying to leave you comments but it's just not letting me.  Frustrating!

Fortune Cookie Wisdom

A few days ago, I got the following fortune from a fortune cookie:  "Only the educated are free."  I think it's brilliant.  Think about it.

Random Friday

1. Guys who drive Corvette convertibles should not be driving 10 mph under the speed limit!
2. Due to a misspent youth, I know all the words and can sing the song Sir Robin's minstrels sang in "Monty Python and the Holy Grail."
3. Did you know you can sing nearly all of Emily Dickinson's poems to "The Yellow Rose of Texas?"  Try it.
4. August in Michigan is supposed to be hot, sunny and humid, not rainy, cold and damp.  We're getting gypped out of a sunny, warm end of the summer.  It's supposed to rain all weekend.  We are not amused.
5. This has been the worst growing season I've seen in a long time.  My tomatoes have had green fruit for over a month.  They're not ripening.  My zucchini gave me 5 or 6 zukes and between going to work one day and coming home in the evening, died.  Only the beans were happy this summer.
6. It's possible that, in addition to being a Magpie in a former life, I was also a squirrel.  I'm really into stash building to prepare for lean times.  That might also explain my compulsive need to can and freeze summer produce.
7. When it's rainy, cold and dreary outside, all I want to do is stay inside, turn all the lights on and either knit and watch movies, work on a quilt, or bake something sweet and yummy.  Possibly all of the above.

I'm not dead

Hi, guys!  I'm not dead, I'm just on vacation.  I was planning on posting regularly but my parents' laptop is on the fritz so I'm at the library at the moment.  Anyway, I'm in northern Michigan at my parents' cottage and I'm having a great time.  I've worked on two beading projects, done a little spinning and I just cast on for Shawl that Jazz this morning... after helping Dad stack wood for the winter. 

The spring/summer canning season has opened with a bang.  So far I've picked about 13 lbs. of strawberries and 6 lbs. of rhubarb and made 2.5 batches of strawberry jam, 1 batch of strawberry-rhubarb and 3.5 batches of strawberry-rhubarb sauce.  It's been so cold her the strawberry season has been late so I'm hoping when I get home this coming weekend I'll still be able to pick more strawberries and rhubarb for more jam and sauce.  Next will be cherries, both sweet and sour, and the little chest freezer my brother gave me will start filling up.

I'll try and post again before the weekend.  Have a good one everyone.

Random Monday musings

1. No matter how many times I hear "Goodnight Saigon" by Billy Joel, it still gives me chills.
2. I got stung by a bee yesterday when I was deadheading the pansies.  Little bastard!  It hurt like hell!  On the plus side, my throat didn't close up so that part was good.  I drove to my parents' place with my finger stuck in a glass of ice water.  The damn thing hurt all day.
3. I've now been stung twice, but by two different stinging bugs, with no reaction.  Does that mean I'm not allergic to stings or do I have to be stung twice by the same kind of bug in order for my body to have an allergic rection?  Anybody know?
4. I can't seem to do Judy's Magic Cast-on correctly and I can't figure out why.  I get the initial stitches right but when I start knitting, it seems like I get something that looks like garter instead of stockinette.  I have no clue what I'm doing wrong because as far as I can tell, I'm following the directions correctly.  I'm clueless!
5. I think I may have freaked out the Yarn Zombie.  I left her a couple of comments saying I'd love to visit and dye yarn and wool.  She lives in Ohio... I live in Michigan... we're not too terribly far from each other.  She didn't comment either time and now she doesn't reply to my comments at all.  Looking at it from her perspective, I suppose someone who's pretty much a stranger asking to come visit might be a concern.  I'm sorry if I freaked you out Jacki.  I promise you I'm not a weird blog stalker person.  I just thought keggle dyeing looked like oodles of fun and we had enough common interests that we'd get a long.  Oops!  My bad! 

Nine random things

Tonight was pretty much a slug night for me.  As usual, I haven't been getting enough sleep so when I got home, I crashed.  No knitting.  No spinning.  Just Seli and me, watching Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.  Well, I watched, Seli slept.

Tonight is basically Random Thursday:  a list of miscellaneous oddments.

1. There are few things that can compare to taking a nap with a cat curled up in your arms.
2. My condo is in serious need of a good vaccuming.
3. Oh, my God!  Torchwood!
4. Ginny Weasley kicks butt!
5. When my sister and I were in Maryland for the wool festival, we called our mom to let her know we were misbehaving (she's always telling us to behave in public - as if!).  We got Dad instead.  His reply to our announcement was, "I'd expect nothing less from you girls."  I love my dad!
6. I really hate flossing.
7. I'm not terribly fond of vacuuming, either.
8. I have a vague fear in the back of my head that we have some tough times ahead of us here in the States and I know I'm not ready for them if they come.  I don't like not being prepared.
9. My new Ashford Joy has been ordered and with luck, I'll be able to pick it up on Saturday.  Once I have my Joy, on Mondays I'll be taking the bus from work to the Art Center for spin night.  It'll be one less trip in my car.