W is for Winter Wonderland

Well maybe not a wonderland but the view from my back door this morning. The second snow of the year, roads are closed, traffic is a mess, even the Lincoln Tunnel is closed. I'll be a bit late for work. It's supposed to end soon.




Happy New Year to all my on-line friends, stay safe tonight!

S is for

Socks of course! These are Sunshine, my third from the Cookie A. book. Nice, easy to memorize pattern but they run BIG. Really big in the ankle. If you knit them you might want to leave out a repeat, or two. Just saying.







I used Classic Elite's Summer Sox and while it was pretty nice for a cotton blend, one of the two skeins had three knots, not good. Also this pattern used almost the entire skein for each sock, almost nothing left over. Which may or may not be a good thing.








S is also for Susan, that's me. With my Daddy. A very long time ago at Grandma's house which I just realized has almost the same floor plan as my house now. But not the wallpaper.

R is for

I was going to do R is for ripping out. A whole sweater. Wrong fit, wrong pattern, just wrong.



I thought about recycling, something I really believe in.




But then I realized R is for Ravelry. Something that in the last two years has become such an important part of my life. And something that has enriched my life in so many ways. I've learned so much, laughed a lot, cried a bit and met some wonderful friends.

Rhinebeck 2008

Q is for Quiet

When I was little, since I was an only child for a very long time, I spent a lot of time by myself. I was always busy but I was quiet, my games didn't involve a lot of noise. I still enjoy the quiet sometimes. I never turn on the radio or TV or even listen to my ipod in the morning. I enjoy hearing the birds and bugs and the far off traffic, the occasional hum of the fridge and my neighbors leaving for work. A few weeks ago we were walking the dogs along the bay and we gradually made our way past all the other people on the beach. It was so quiet, just the crunch of our footsteps in the sand, the little laps of the waves, and the dogs sniffing. The little sandpipers up ahead of us made more noise than anything else.

P is for Pirates

Olivia, Evan, Mr. Truck and I were pirates for a few hours on a Pirate Cruise. Great fun if you don't mind getting soaked and having your mustache wash off.

O is for Orange

O is for orange, that's really obvious but it's not a color that I would ever say I like. I just don't think about it much. But when I started looking around, I actually have a lot of orange things. Some of my Fiestaware is orange, there's a cutting board, the sweater I was wearing, some socks and a sweater I knit, my purse, and some summer tops. Who knew?




But this is my favorite orange of all.

J is for Jam, Finally!

I've had no J for my ABC Along. But last week, it just happened. Olivia and Evan spent the afternoon and night because their parents won tickets to a concert. They always love to pick the raspberries when they come over. I inherited these plants and they are really invasive but they fruit twice a year and we love them. I spend a lot of time trying to whack them into submission and it's not really working too well. Every spring they're marching across the garden again.


The kids did a good job of picking all the red ones so there was enough to make a batch of jam.



Evan loves to cook and he's a really good helper but he was stirring so fast I couldn't get the picture focused.




For this one I made him stay still, very hard when you're seven and want to lick the spoon.




I just use the recipe from the back of the Sure-Jell package and we make freezer jam. Delicious! So this year J is for jam.

M is for Mine

When I was a very little girl "THE" Christmas present was The Little Red Spinning Wheel and I really wanted one. It was the only thing I asked for that year. And my father, being the best father, searched and searched and searched, and there it was under the tree on Christmas morning. I was so excited. We put it all together and I thought I could spin straw into gold. And then I realized it made icord, it was a spool knitter and I couldn't spin. I did make miles and miles of icord though.






Ever since then it's been in the back of my mind that someday I would get a real spinning wheel. I've looked at them everywhere we go and even Mr. Truck knows a lot about spinning wheels now. So when I, just by chance, came across a wheel on ebay that was from the town that Reese lives in and was in my price range I was so tempted. I called Mr. Truck and he said buy it so I put in my bid and watched and waited and I won. And it's mine.





Ashford Traditional, almost new, spins really well. I can't spin. But I can learn because it's mine. Finally.

H is for Home

When we first looked at our house in 2001 it looked like this. Not too promising, but I had a feeling. We had already sold our other house and didn't have a lot of time to find a new one. Mr. Truck and I drove around the towns we were interested in and wrote down addresses and Realtor phone numbers. Then we came up with a list to go see. This was the last on the list.



Undeterred by the Sleeping Beauty bushes, we walked in and I immediately knew this was our house. It took Mr. Truck a bit longer but he finally said, "I can live here." The kids, especially the girls, were not as sure. They were worried about the location, the landscaping and, with good reason, the paint. I could only see the front porch, the chestnut trim, the rope pulley original windows and the breakfast nook, the floor plan that was so much like my grandma's house. Later I noticed the 1958 pink bathroom. Well, we still have the pink bathroom but a lot has changed. The Sleeping Beauty bushes were the first to go. And we love our home. It may not be our forever home, but for now it is just right.

Craftsman Style Bungalow c. 1929

F is for Fun in the Sun

And that's what we had in Antigua. We stayed at the Jolly Beach Resort and it has the best beach in Antigua. It was beautiful and warm. The water is the most amazing blue and warm enough even for me. We brought home shells and even some sea glass for my collection and we rescued a starfish. We swam and lounged and drank a bit. We saw shows with singers and dancers and ate a lot. I knit a bit on a sock, too. And best of all, we were all there for BDE's wedding which was so beautiful. And now we're home, but I do believe we'll go back because four days just wasn't enough.

E is for Evan

He just turned seven and he just started wearing glasses. He was such a tiny baby, he scared us all just holding him but he's a tough one. We call him the class clown and we despaired of his ever being good. But he's a sweet, funny little boy and I can't remember what life was without him. We tell him he's our favorite grandson and he hasn't figured out that it's because he's the only one. But he loves coming to Grammy and Opa's house for sleepovers and he goes straight for the fridge when he gets here. I've never read a complete book to him, he would never sit still long enough and now he can read all by himself. He likes tools and cars and burping and annoying his big sister and he is very gentle with babies and once when he was very small he dialed 911 and the police came to our house. We love our little man.

D is for Darning

I think I've mentioned Mr. Truck's sock issues before and how his goal is to have 365 pairs of socks every year. A long time ago we had this running joke about darning socks, something I swore I'd never do. You see, my Grandma darned socks and I remember them being lumpy and uncomfortable as well as funny looking. But I did buy this darning egg at an antique store as a gag gift. We've been using it as decoration ever since.


It opens up to store needles and thread. As you can see, mine is empty.





But now I have holes in my hand knit socks. These were knit out of Wool-ease sport weight that was left over from another project about four years ago. I've been wearing them as house socks and shoveling snow socks. And I'm actually considering darning them or just throwing them out. What do you think?

B is for Bread

Back when I was a young mother with small children I stayed home with them all day. And I knit. But I also baked all our bread. Since I was still a bit of a hippy then, I put all sorts of things in the bread, sprouts, wheat germ, oatmeal, to get the children to eat something that was good for them. I also put that stuff in the cookies, but that's for another story. I learned from a book, no internet then. And I found that kneading the dough and watching it rise and serving it to my family was soul satisfying, something like knitting. Now the children are grown and I go to work and we have a bread machine and I don't bake bread so much anymore. But it snowed a couple of Saturdays ago and I though bread would warm our house and my soul and I made the easiest bread, Italian. The smell of the yeast and kneading the dough and watching it rise then punching it down were so rewarding. And the bread was delicious.







My recipe, such as it is.
Mix one packet of dry yeast in one cup of very warm water with one teaspoon sugar and one teaspoon salt. Put one tablespoon of olive oil in a bowl and add about two cups of flour (the whole loaf takes about four to six cups of flour depending on the humidity) and mix in the water mixture. Stir and stir and stir adding more flour until you just can't stir it anymore. Dump it out on a well floured surface and knead and knead and knead for about ten minutes adding more flour until the dough is smooth and shiny and not a bit sticky. Put it in an oiled bowl and let it rise in a warm spot for an hour all covered up with a damp towel. Punch it down, that's fun, and roll it out into a rectangle sort of shape and roll it up pinching the ends closed. Make a few slices in the top to allow for expansion and let it rise (covered) again for another hour. Bake at 400 degrees F for about twenty minutes. It will sound hollow when you tap it. It's good warm with real butter. Better with home made soup.

A is for the Agony of the Tech Support

It all started with this last week.





I broke one of the last two coasters we own. Being a knitter I thought I'd just knit some, so I found these. Now just print out the pattern with the new wireless printer Mr. Truck gave me for Christmas. We had set it up and printed before and it was a beautiful thing. No more running up the stairs with the laptop and plugging everything in. (Mr. Truck is very worried that I'll fall down the stairs and hurt the laptop.) But this time it didn't print. Somehow the printer had lost it's connection. After six hours with tech support, it printed two pages and never printed again. Back to the store it went.




We got a different printer but it wouldn't connect to anything. Best Daughter Ever's fiance (who is an IT person for a very famous something you would recognize) spent hours here and couldn't figure it out but we ended up with three routers because now we couldn't connect to the internet without being plugged in. We called the router tech support, the internet tech support, and finally the computer tech support. We reset everything, restored some things and did config ip a lot but it seems that the laptop has lost it's ability to connect to the internet wirelessly and needs some sort of a transplant at the laptop hospital. So I can only connect by plugging in and now I'm stuck upstairs in the office. But we have a diagnosis and hope.

Mr. Truck gave me this, too.




And again, I needed tech support. This time it was in the form of two teenagers. Great niece and nephew (they are really great, in more ways than one, their father is our nephew) showed me in less than five minutes how to work my shuffle. Much easier kind of tech support. "Aunt Sue, just do this. See? It's easy." And it is.




I've even downloaded a book for a little read along/knitalong in preparation for our next Outlander swap and I've cast on the Dragonfly socks. And, inspired by Amanda, I've knit a mitten and part of the other one, too. But I have to say that calling tech support all the time does interfere with the rest of my life including the knitting.





And if you're wondering about the fiance part, the wedding is in March.

Y is for a Year of Hats

Reese was 11 months old on Christmas day, and it's hard to believe. It seems just yesterday that she was born and yet I can't remember what it was like with out her. Anyway I've been thinking of all that I've knit for her and how much fun it all was. Mostly how much fun it is seeing her wear everything. So without further ado, here is Reese in a year of hats.

Baby Santa Hat

Jive Turkey Baby Hat

Easter Bunny Hat

Pea Pod

Top Down Bonnet

Just a hat I made, no pattern

Pompon Beret

This one has been Cherry Pie's favorite. My favorite is whatever Reese is wearing.

X Marks the Spot

I eat while I knit, well actually I snack while I knit. And sometimes I spill things on my knitting. This time it was iced tea. And if you look really closely, you can see the x on the picture. It took a lot of soaking to get it out. And I'm not really sure it is all out. So if anyone knows a cleaner that works on wool, let me know. I'm sure this won't be the last time, I know it wasn't the first.

Pattern
Dragon Skin Wrap by Angela Hahn
Interweave Knits Holiday 2007
Dale Baby Ull