California Girl in Oz

Can you believe that before we left Australia I didn't get a photo of the completed quilt? Here's the best I can offer...it's all pinned together and laid out on the queen-size guest bed, so at least you can see how it fit. The quilting was a trial, but fun...I have such trouble stuffing large quilts through my home machine. I get stuck, then it all pops free and I get great big stitches, and other fun stuff. Still, Katie has now received the quilt and tells me she really, really likes it, and THAT's what's important! And here's what I've been up to lately: Kindle! With reassurance from some good Blog Buddies, I took the plunge, and I am totally in love... Of course, as usual, here's the first thing we did when we arrived in Oakland. Can you see that happy smile? TACOS! There has been knitting going on, too. This plain ribbed sock, made with gorgeous merino sock yarn from Piedmont Yarn Shop, knit on 2.25 bamboo DPNs. It's such a luscious

It was a productive week, I'm happy to say! Realized at some point that there's no floor space that's safe to pin on and large enough for a queen-size quilt inside the house. So...a couple of days ago I set myself up in the garage after carefully sweeping up any dust and dirt. It was freezing out there! Worked out pretty well, though. Here's "Life is a Promise, Fulfill It", and all the layers stretched out and ready for pinning. Before I started the layering process, I decided to try to get one shot of the entire quilt top, for posterity. Not easy...had to perch on a ladder and it still isn't really satisfactory. I need a design wall! Back in the house, after all the hours of pinning, sore knees, sore fingers, but that quilt is all pinned together! Here's how I reworked the top border to balance Katie's name a bit. Y.esterday and today I cloistered myself in the sewing room and got the entire top quilted! Hooray! Also got the binding s

Well, woo-hoo! Yesterday I finished piecing the words for Katie Rose's quilt, at last. I forgot to take a picture of the entire center section when it was spread out on the guest bed, and we've got company coming any moment, so a pic of the full center will have to wait until tomorrow...but here it is with the center section folded up and pieces of the light pink border fabric laid out around the edges, so I could make sure the phrases are going to fit along the sides. Looks like they will! I'm hoping all these words in the border won't make it looke like it's from the Ransom Note School of Quilting! Now the hard part comes: sewing each letter to its tiny piece of background fabric, allowing for extra space between words, and then adding the extra border strips to top and bottom of the phrases so the overall quilt size will be correct. Not to mention deciding what to do about the backing...and THEN there's the actual quilting. Keep your fingers crossed that I c

So we are home, after an uneventful flight. DH still has a wretched cough, and finally went to the doctor yesterday -- secondary infection, following his bad cold of two weeks ago, resulting in the need for antibiotics and rest. Since the swine flu fear is everywhere, he is to avoid socializing until he is feeling better, and if he gets worse we must have a throat swab taken at the local hospital, just to be sure. No fever, though, so it's doubtful if it's anything but the result of overdoing work duties while he had a cold. Add to that the fun of jet lag, and this is probably not our best week ever! Still, as you can see from the above photo, autumn has landed in Exeter big time. This is one of five big buckets of leaves that had accumulated outside our back door. Nice mulch for the perennials... Not much sewing or knitting at the moment. Hope to be feeling more like doing something in a day or two.

I have postponed writing this because there is so much sadness for DH and me. We got news a few days ago that our beloved Spike was found dead in her kitty condo a few days after we left for California. This is a pic of Spike taken in 2002, when we lived in the Sierra Foothills in California. She spent most of her time in DH's office, so we called her the Secretary Kitty. A word or two about her name might be called for. Spike and her sister, Rosebud, were born under a house in Ione, CA in 1996. A predator took several siblings, so the people whose house it was rescued the remaining kittens and looked for homes for them. We adopted these two adorable furballs in a flash. A visit to the vet for first shots and a general physical inspection was called for, during which the veterinary assistant said, "Well, this one is a girl, and that one is a little boy," (indicating Spike). So we duly named them Rosebud and Spike, and a few months later were shocked when Spike cam

For some reason, I've been feeling like knitting instead of working on "the" quilt, so I thought I'd share the most recent FO: This is Hypoteneuse (Rav Link), by Anne Hanson of Knitspot. It's really large, and very drapey and soft. Knitted with KnitPicks Swish DK, a really lovely, soft, altogether wonderful yarn. The pic below shows how long it is...it was windy today (surprise, surprise!) and you can see it flipping around in the breeze. And I realized I never posted a pic of the pink alpaca shawl (also Rav link) in its full glory, so here it is. You may remember the disaster of the big hole that appeared in one corner as I was blocking it. Fortunately, I don't think it's too noticeable, but just to be sure, that corner is at the BACK in this pic. And the obligatory close-up, to show off all the lacy detail. The yarn is Misti Alpaca Laceweight, and it's light as a cloud. Still provides a bit of warmth on cool evenings, though, because it

Well, the journey has begun for Katie Rose's quilt. Here is a shot of the first quadrant of blocks with their sashing and star cornerstones. I've laid the first pieced letters on top: Katie Rose. As you may or may not be able to see, I'm going to have to go back to the drawing board for the "OS" of Rose...the O is too big and clunky, and the S is made from too busy a fabric. Try, try again! I do like the "Katie" part, though. I'm finding there's a little learning curve to come back to the free-pieced letters after a few months away. My brain needs to readjust...kind of like with paper-piecing, only not quite as "backward and upside down," if you know what I mean! You can see the actual blocks and stars better in this upside down shot (taken from the other side of the ironing board. I like the look of the dotted sashing, and the deep pink stars. I'm kind of rushing to get a bit of something together for this quilt, becaus

Here we are in the boarding lounge at SFO (San Francisco, for non-Californians), having had our flight cancelled last night, after four hours sitting on the tarmac with no news and nothing happening. After scrubbing the flight at around 2AM, they put up in hotels those people who didn't have a place to stay in the Bay Area and told everyone else to go home and come back at 9AM for an 11AM departure. We could have gone to our apartment by taxi, but we didn't like our chances of getting to the apartment, sleeping a couple of hours, and and then making it back to SFO on time, given that it's raining and we'd be in rush hour traffic, so we spent the night on the benches in the terminal. Keep your fingers crossed that this 11AM flight actually goes...our kitties NEED us at home! Wow, looking at the grammar and syntax of that first paragraph, I can see I'm sleep deprived (or maybe just crazed!)... Next post from Oz, one hopes...

Well, I'm back from Stitches West, which was unbelievable. I think I wandered around in a daze for the best part of four hours, unable to focus on anything in particular. Feeling like a kid in a candy store, I just couldn't bring my mind to what I should buy...amazing! Eventually, I did find some gorgeous things. Here's Tactile Superwash Merino Sock Yarn in Aventurine: And, feeling adventurous, I bought some Habu Wool Stainless Steel (75% wool, 25% stainless steel): And a skein of Habu Superfine Merino: My friend Margaret, in Oz, had contacted me this morning to see if I would bring her a couple of bits of Blue Faced Leicester so she could try spinning it. That helped focus my mind a bit, and Lynne ( Yarnivorous ) was a big help in keeping me on track to accomplish that goal. Thanks, Lynne! Here's Lynne admiring some gorgeous yarn in just "her" colors: And here's the BFL I chose for Margaret...first up, A Verb for Keeping Warm, in Color #9: Next,

What fun! Having 3.5 wheels of leftover Unspun Icelandic from Schoolhouse Press in the great color, Sumac, I decided to try Elizabeth Zimmermann's Stonington Shawl (from Knitter's Workshop, maybe? I left my book at home). Actually, this was my illicit airplane knitting: you may remember the great Bamboo DPNs Scandal of last year...well, this time I decided to be smarter. I took my KnitPicks Harmony 5.5mm tips, tucked into my briefcase beside the pens and pencils. The cable resided in an outer pocket, all on its lonely. One wheel of yarn was tucked into my rollaboard. Once settled on the plane, well after takeoff, I assembled the needles, cast on, and during my sojourn in California I have been knitting. Today I paused to admire my brilliance in attempting a picot bind-off on the completed shawl/blanket, and here's what it looks like...cool, eh? And here's the unblocked shawl...er, blanket. We're going to leave it here in Oakland at the apartment, so we'll have

Well, dang! Looky-looky...see that blue bow? As I started blocking the wet pink alpaca shawl, I found a very large hole, getting larger with every gentle pat of the shawl. It was such a sickening sight, I couldn't stand even to take a pic of it for you to see! Instead, I grabbed a yarn needle and some yarn, gathered up every open stitch I could find, and pulled them into this bow. Now I've gone ahead and blocked the thing, and I'll worry about somehow sewing that spot in some not-too-obtrusive fashion when I'm finished. Grrrr! Can't even feel too sorry for myself, because I remember Bells had a similar experience recently, and someone else, too, but I can't remember who it was. Anyway, here's the nearly finished piece -- sorry for the poor pic. It's a very grey day outside, and pink alpaca doesn't show up very well against the pale blue sheet on which it's being blocked. In happier news, here is the scene when we visited our friends in

Look what jumped into my shopping cart at KnitPicks...two skeins of Imagination in the color Looking Glass, and two skeins of Felici in Tyrian Purple. These were supposed to be for socks, but...Imagination just wanted to be a scarf... And then, and then...my Peace Fleece (in Volgasippi Blue) and Beaverslide (in Dusty Clover) arrived. Peace Fleece will be the Acer sweater, and Beaverslide I'm not sure...was thinking of the Amanda cardigan from A Fine Fleece , but now I'm uncertain. I did also succumb to this DK weight Swish in Ash, because I've been wanting to make something in a superwash wool. But wait...there's MORE! The Yubina Cashwool and Cashmere I'd ordered arrived, too. That's the Cashwool on the left in the silvery blue (it's maybe a shade lighter in real life), and the gorgeous cashmere laceweight in the red violet on the right. Too cool... And, can you believe it? I finally got my blocking wires. Now all I have to do is find the intestinal fort

Thought I'd check in, anyway. Guess who forgot to bring the camera to California. Grrrrr! Fortunately, DH will fly up tomorrow, and he's bringing it along, so I may have things to show soon. Having a great time just lounging around the condo, taking naps, going for walks, EATING OUT! And I've had a chance to see the grandsons three times...they are leaving for India with their mom tomorrow for three weeks' holiday (DS is staying home to take care of their kitties and keep the home fires burning), so I was lucky to have the time with them. We made bread together the other day -- the No Knead Bread recipe that's been all around Blogland lately. Have you tried it yet? Absolutely wonderful. In fact, since I learned to do it in mid-December, I haven't bought a single loaf of bread. And I've been shopping, of course. What have I bought, you ask? Well, my Yubina Cashmere Lace yarn in a silvery pale blue arrived and it's gorgeous, as well as the Cashmere-Si

And here it is, in all its glory! Amazing how hard it is to photograph this color. It's not actually quite this red, but a rich mahogany browny russet. Hard to photograph, too. I stood on the bed to try to shoot down on it, and then scraped a huge piece of skin from the back of my heel when I tried to step down without standing on the blanket. The trials of photography! So now, I need to get serious about what's next. Nothing too complicated, since I only have a few days before I take off for California.