Knitamazoo(tm)

I’m thinking that maybe I should put down my knitting long enough to build an ark. It began raining around midnight last night and hasn’t stopped. I checked our rain guage before work and we had gotten 2 1/2 inches already! This is the remnants of tropical storm what’s her name . . . Arlene or something. Who knew Michigan could get tropical moisture? But at least this has broken the heat wave we’ve been having. Melt or drown . . . melt or drown . . . difficult choice.

In knitting news, Soleil is still being punished. I did not have the patience to try to work with it yesterday so it still sits in the corner while I glare at it from time to time. My sock #2 of the second pair is coming along quite nicely though. I finished the leg, heel flap and turned the heel last night while watching Troy. (MMMMMM . . . Brad Pitt and Orlando Bloom . . . total eye candy!) I picked up stitches this morning and started on the gusset. So this one should be done in another couple of days. Of course it helped that I was able to knit while at work on Friday. Yes, I said knit at work! And I don’t mean on my lunch or break either. I finally figured out how to do it. The network went down around 3:30pm and by 5:00pm it hadn’t been restored. Whoohoo! I got to knit at work for 1 1/2 hours! Now if I could just get the network to go down every day I’d make lots of knitting progress!

Well boys and girls that concludes this installment. Tune in again tomorrow . . . same knit time . . . same knit channel. (OK, that was pathetic . . . I’m going now.)

Soleil hates me and is determined to drive me to insanity! I was so happy to pick it up last night when I got home and was knitting along merrily. When I got to the end of the round I was short a stitch. Hmmmm . . . wonder what happened there. So I started backtracking to see if I could find the mistake. No such luck. I got frustrated with it and put it in the corner again to think about it’s incorrigable behavior. This morning I had some time before work so I thought I would look at it with fresh eyes and see if it was ready to really behave itself. So I counted the stitches in the round and would you believe that I’m short around 20 stitches! I was devistated . . . how could the lovely Soleil do this to me? I was meticulous in putting a stitch marker every 20 stitches when casting on so I wouldn’t have to keep counting my stitches. I was sure I had the right number. My first round of lace came out the way it was supposed to. How did I lose 20 stitches? Apparantly the beating had no effect on this monstrously evil Soleil. I will probably end up letting it rot in the corner until Sunday when I’ll frog it and start yet again. This time I will put markers every 10 stitches and leave them on while doing the lace so I am absolutely positive that it is coming out right. Until then maybe my sock will love me . . .

After being properly chastised and beaten, Soliel has wisely decided to behave itself. I managed to get into the second pattern repeat last night while watching tv and I am really pleased with my progress so far.

Well no storms last night thank goodness. We got around an inch of rain the night before and just south of us got 3 inches! But it’s a gorgeous day again today although it is supposed to be ridiculously hot yet again. Here’s to the air conditioned house in which to do my knitting!

Speaking of air conditioning, ours is on it’s last legs. We had a repairman out last week and he got it running but told us it could up and die at anytime. So we set it up to have it replaced next week along with our furnace which apparantly has a crack in it and leaks small amounts of CO2 when it’s heating. Egads! I’ll be on a yarn diet forever if stuff like this keeps breaking. Anyhoo, every day I speak soothing words to the air conditioner, encouraging it to keep cooling yet one more day. Just call me the A/C Whisperer.

Well finally here is a picture of my finished shapely tank. I don’t think it’s too bad for a first garment. I sure did learn a lot with it though. Short rows, seaming, shaping, neck and armholes . . .

And my wonderful, loving, sweetest hubby in the whole wide world (he reads my blog you know) gave me a small repreive on my yarn diet. Just look at my patriotic Lorna’s Laces Shephards Sock yarn!!! And the size 1 dpn’s too! I love socks and my hubby! Thank you, thank you, thank you! You’ll be rewarded later (wink, wink).

So my wonderful hubby put in a new patio with a new grill and a small space for a vegetable garden for me over the weekend. Monday night we finished up the garden space and then off to the greenhouse to buy some plants. I wanted some green peppers and they had some really nice one’s on sale. So my hubby grabs two for me, I pick out some tomato plants and a red pepper plant and head to the checkout. We get home and I put in the tomato plants and start planting the peppers and what do I find . . . he picked up to habanero pepper plants instead of green peppers! Now I personally have nothing against habanero peppers but I tend to use more green peppers than habaneros. Well by this time the greenhouse is closed so we had to wait until last night to go exchange them. I double checked to make sure we were getting the right peppers this time! And now my garden is complete.

Around 2:30 this morning we had some pretty strong thunder storms roll through. Strong enough to keep me awake for the next hour and a half. Needless to say I’m pooped this morning! Must stay awake . . . must stay . . . zzzzzzzzzzzzzz . . .

In knitting news, I cast on again for Soleil this morning and it seems to be behaving itself this time. I decided to try the little trick of swapping the first stitch on the left needle with the last stitch on the right needle and this seems to be helping. I didn’t have enough time to knit the first row completely but it’s not pulling apart like the last time. I plan to work on it tonight while doing laundry and watching CSI:NY (if I can stay awake that is).

Well that’s all my news for now. Happy knitting everyone!

Or at least Soleil does. So I sat down this weekend so very excited to be started Soleil. I cast on all 160 stitches without losing my mind, checked to be sure my stitches weren’t twisted and joined the circle. I happily knit my first row and started in on the lace pattern. Two rows later the lace is going great but I noticed that where I joined it was loose and coming apart. I was so disappointed. Just the thought of having to cast on 160 stitches all over again was too much for me. I just put the sad little Soleil into my French Market Bag so that it could think about it’s attitude and behavior. I would have tried again tonight but I was too busy buying plants and putting them in my garden (see picture below). So maybe by tomorrow Soliel will have decided to behave itself and I will have the fortitude to cast on again. Until then I have a sock that needs my attention . . .

OK, I had to do it. I had to post a couple of pictures of my maniacal monster . . . er . . . I mean sweet kitties! (looks around) Whew! They didn’t hear me.

This is Roscoe P. Kitty (a.k.a. the Fat Manatee). Yes he really weighs 20 lbs.

And his cohort in crime . . .Cosmo. Don’t let him fool you, he is all fur.

He surprised me this weekend and built this little patio for the brand new gas grill he bought. He also made a little space for me to have a vegetable garden. Isn’t he just the sweetest?

You can never have enough socks right? So, here is sock #3 and the beginnings of sock #4. The yarn is Kroy Sock yarn and I don’t remember the colorway.