What happens when you open a yarn store....

And then your husband decides that he's taking a hike and the whole world collapses in a heap; then to top things off the little one is 17. Enough said. Your blog goes all to heck, that's what. Then one fine day you wake up and realize that you're taking anti-depressants even through you'd rather not be, and the sun is shining and sales are going through the roof and it occurs to you that perhaps you could buy one of those cute apartments they're building in East Village... a two bedroom. One for you and one for the yarn. That's what happens when you open a yarn store.

Toms shoes, aka, tiaras for my feet

I've been wanting a pair of Toms for a little while... Banana wears them, and I learned from her that when you buy a pair of Toms, another pair of shoes is donated to a child in need. Not every 100 pairs, or even every 10 pairs. Every pair. I wanted flats, I wanted plain, I wanted Toms.. but all I could find were fakes. Nothing in my size except one lone pair in Market Mall.

They asked me if I would like to try them on for size, so that I could put another, less sparkly, pair on hold.

Well. You can guess how that ended. (ps: I had to turn the flash off so that the photo would not actually hurt your eyes when viewed.)

I totally love them.

If you

Do this:

And go here.

You could have this while sitting outdoors:

And you would see part of this mountain, right in front of you. You wouldn't even have to crane your neck or sit up tall or.. move:

And I think you would agree that life is better when you get off the couch.

To celebrate 7 days of no carbs

(well.. there was that one giant cookie), today for lunch I went to Thi-Thi and got myself a beautiful peppered beef vietnamese sub. Ya baby... and I washed it down with a coke.

It's been one of those super exciting days that demand carbs.

Through sad circumstances I acquired a trip to Sock Summit in the place of C-MAC. She just wasn't able to go, and asked me if I'd like to. Hell yes. Yes, I would (though I wish it wasn't in adverse circumstances). That was yesterday afternoon... sometime in the evening I discovered that my passport was missing. I spent the next bunch of hours tearing the house apart, and never did locate the passport. Today started with trip upon trip upon trip to get pictures, signatures,forms notarized, false starts, false endings... and then finally some success. A coupon at least, with a claim that possibly, even probably I will have a passport by noon tomorrow. Not a moment too soon, since the plane leaves at around 2pm.

This is my second emergency passport. In 2008, 22 hours before I was to depart to New York, Marilynnie discovered that my passport had expired. 3 hours later, I had a new one in my hand. This time will take longer because the passport is actually lost. Serious indeed.

I'm willing to bet that it's in a knitting project bag, and that I will find it this evening when I pack. I will not relocate the $250.00 it took to replace it.

Maybe it's worth it though... that passport picture really was horrible. If it weren't for a sudden downpour this morning, I would have had a chance at redemption.

So, that's my story... I'm going to Portland to knit, buy yarn for the store, meet people, eat off of food trucks, and go to a sock hop (in an 80's costume).

I think.

You're never going to believe this.

You'll never see this again, I guarantee.


Shocked?

Amazed?

Thrilled?

Confused even?

YES. An entire wall of Addis.

I'm not even going to say the word again until next year.

It's OVER over.

Here you have BFML messing with his iPhone and taking a funny stampede picture of himself. I had to take a deep breath when I saw it, because I felt transported into a HeeHaw script. He's good that way, the BFML... he doesn't care what he does to his face in photos; it's all for the love of art. Or something. Perhaps it's just for fun. He makes me smile every time, but that particular photo made me laugh out loud.

But it's OVER. Stampede I mean. When I arrived at work this morning, I was was met with this big pile outside of a nearby office. I can still smell fireworks (well, not really, but you get my drift), but it's time to get.that.crap.outa.here.

I can remember working at Nova, and being so thrilled to wear jeans to work. By the middle of the week I would be wishing that I could stop dressing up as a cowgirl, and just get back to 'normal'. I think the dudes down the building from me had that same exact feeling when they arrived at 8:00 and had the place ditched out by 8:15. Cowboy hat and all.

Following you will find Mug's new normal! She worked for 11 days at the Stampede, selling corndogs and lemonade. I have to say that the corndogs were horrible (I'm glad to say that she didn't prepare them), but the lemonade was fantastic (Proud to say that she did!). Mug received a cheque for her first 3 days, and she was quite delighted. Me too. I've very proud of her. As you can see by her photo, she was very, very thrilled to discover her mother in line taking pictures of her.

I think that I'm going to try to get back on track with blogging. I miss doing it, and often imaginary-blog in my head. Since my computer crashed, I just haven't had the energy to make a new situation work. So.. let's see how it goes.

Soon I'll talk about knitting, and then everything will get back to normal!

Thanks Nestor

I had a plan to put birdhouses on the top of our uncut fence posts. BFML and I found one on a geocaching trip a few years ago. We found another at a garage sale (I think... to be honest I can't remember how it got on my desk, where it has resided for a number of years).

Recently I bought a handmade birdhouse from Nestor. He makes them himself, and what I love about them is that they are so natural.. So here are mine. Finally installed, thanks to a little inspiration from Nestor's handiwork.

Hair mask

Did you hear about the time I had banana head? I heard that mashed banana was a good hair mask, so I tried it. Short on details, I left it in my hair too long and was picking hunks of banana, and banana seeds out of my hair for some time. Kim cut my hair during the banana days, and the quote is: Well. (pause) That's a first.


So tonight I invented a concoction of my own, involving mayo, an egg yolk, honey and some apple cider vinegar.



Pray for me.

The Aeolian is cruising towards the finish line. I'm on the last chart. I really love it.

YO, universe!

BFML reminded me there's a compressor in the basement... So Mildred the Voyageur's back tire is fully inflated. However, at this particular moment in time I cannot locate my newly tiara'ed helmet.

Just as well I would imagine.

(we had a wonderful ride together to the locksmith's, where i acquired new truck & house keys. everything went well and mildred and i are one with each other. you will note in the picture that there is a mr. potato head on the steps as well as a pooper scooper. chez R, ever so elegant)

This is how it went

I thought I'd ride the Voyageur to the train station; stopping on my way to fully inflate the tires. I had even gone to Calgary Transit's web page to find out the rules and regulations, and voila!... I'm good to go.

Until realizing that air is coming out and not going in to the tube and that I now have a completely flat back tire. Sooooo... I walked the bike home (cursing the gas station for not putting up a sign), and looked for my small hand pump. (Note to readers: never buy one of those things, they are about 95% useless).

Found it, and noticed that the tube stem is not diagonal. After a sweat inducing round of pumping it has been determined that the tube does not accept air as is, so I put the bike away and decided that I'd walk to the train station with BFML. He had a few things to do before he left that took me from the cusp of enough time, to not enough time.

The dog pooped by my desk, and the cat puked by the front step.

Driving.

In which my model is retired

I often have Mug model my knitted garments because.. well, she's photogenic and I think every picture of her is beautiful.

I was just checking my flckr account and was absolutely, positive gobsmacked to find that not one but two freaks favorited her picture because they seem to have fetishes regarding bundled or scarved girls. She was wearing a helmet liner that I knitted for bike riding in the cold weather.

Serves the f'ers right.. I'm going to delete her picture and insert one of ME wearing it. I think that will put their fires out.

Grrr.

The Year of Estonian/Orenburg lace is turning into...

The year of the sock. The year of fundraising. The year of cycling. The year of knitting socks to fundraise for cycling.

In happy news, there is SOME progress on the lace front. I was able to find a copy of Galina's book from Shuttleworks, and so around the time of the Olympics I spent many, many hours working on the Eastern Star shawl. I think i have 5" or so completed (scoff if you may, that's one crapload of knitting we're talking about there); and tragically I dropped a stitch that ran allllll the way back to where the lace joins the shawl. On that note, the whole project went into the time out basket, and it resides there still.

OK, so I bought an Orenburg shawl from Galina. I admit it. It's fabulous and I love it, and I just saved myself a year of knitting. (It's everything I dreamed it would be and more)

My Estonian shawl (the Miralda) is almost complete, but I ran out of handspun just inches before the cast off. Not a huge problem (thank God), Correna had 4oz. of Bison that she bought from the same vendor as I had, so I have been spinning that to finish the shawl with. I thought I'd DO THE RIGHT THING (cuz I love her) and spin the whole 4oz and return her down in the form of yarn. So.. I need some extra time with that.


(an old picture.. it's almost done now)

As far as lace goes, I did knit Amy's new bolero pattern 'Watershed', and it's quite lovely. I chose the wrong yarn for the project, and the garment doesn't drape the way it ought to. My fault entirely.



Ohhhhh, and socks. I've been contract knitting them left, right and centre. Also, Martha donated a whole basket full that she'd knitted, so a bunch of the money I raised for the Ride to Conquer Cancer happened on account of socks. Currently I'm knitting a pair of yellow ones that I can wear during the ride. At least I hope so, they're DK weight, and maybe a little thick for the job. We'll see. I also have a pair of Casbah socks in blue on the needles, and finished a pair of Silk Garden 211 socks for Donna's birthday.

They're everywhere, they're everywhere.

What else? Hmmmmm... I knitted a Wool Leaves for a shop display. It's kinda cool, and will make a nice lap blanket when I bring it home.



Oh! Over a weekend retreat I knitted a version of Kourtney's "Mistaken" shawl. I absolutely adore it! You can knit it for yourself by downloading her free Ravelry pattern. (I actually knit the green one shown, but the picture is Kourtney's)



Lots of other stuff happening at the moment. My mom is having surgery on June 1 for breast cancer, so I'm going to fly to Victoria for 2 days. Nini turns 3 on June 4th. I have the MS Ride on June 12/13, the Ride for Dad on June 19th and the Ride to Conquer Cancer on June 26/27. It isn't even June yet, and somehow it seems like the summer is half over. To my utter shock, I barely have any more time to train for the rides. Damned blizzards.

The puppy turned one! He's so amazing, and cute, and funny, and sweet, and talented, and did I say funny?



Speaking of SHOCK, it would appear that I'm not going to have anything suitable completed to put into Stampede. I love a rosette, I have to say.

This has not been the year of taking good photographs, so I'll post this as is, and hope that I can fill it in with images at a later time instead of just.not.blogging.cuz.i.have.no.pictures.

If she wasn't blonde

and she wasn't... you know... Marilyn Monroe; she'd be lucky enough to have a hair style kinda like mine. Except I put mine behind my ears.

Men

Today I received a HUGE black and white calendar of naked men with their silly parts covered by Wollemeise. I'll let you guess which Wollemeisian was responsible.

and THEN, Jocelyn posted this on Facebook:



I love the horse part... I laugh every time I replay it.

Just in case you're interested in filming; the ad was completed in one take, and here's a video on how that was accomplished.

This too shall pass

I guess I'm going to continued to post links until the end of time.... but THIS one is the best one ever. EVER. I dare you not to love it.

PS: Kim cut my hair off today, and I really think it looks fantastic. I'm so happy and grateful. I haven't had short hair since Dida was about 3. So ya.. it was time.

Stuff

I'm wondering why there is a woman asleep on Jann Arden's kitchen island. I know it's true, because I saw the picture on twitter. Apparently she' a diva, so maybe diva's get to do that sort of thing. Also, did you know that Jann dresses her dog in outfits? Very cute dog, I must say.

I have a giant magnet on my hip. Opera is hoping that it helps my sciatica. I am hoping the same damned thing, exactly. I made an empty threat regarding bodily functions and said magnet, and she told me that i WOULD be purchasing it.

I watched 'Whip It' tonight, by accident. Real roller derby is way better, but more dangerous. Just ask Mug. Also, check out the bruise on Jaime's elbow. Biggest.bruise.ever.

I had a spicy chicken sandwich at Wendy's earlier, and somehow they forgot the spicy.

Today I completed the minimum fundraising for the 2010 Ride to Conquer Cancer. I'm really, really, really excited.

I've been a bit worried about my friend Linda, because I haven't heard from her in a long while.

I have two hand carved knitting needles in my possession that are so cool you'll want to pee your pants. A complete stranger came in and asked me to create a silent auction for them, and to donate the money to charity. I was gob smacked. Pictures and info to follow.

I wanted to tell somebody something, but I can't remember the something, so I'm going to forget the entire scenario.

I've been knitting a new Jared Flood pattern, Wool Leaves, for the last day or so, and I must say... doubled Cascade Eco is the way to go with every project on the planet. It's giant lace. Do purchase this pattern if you'd like to create a real quick lace blanket; baby sized.

BFML's movie is on... The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. I haven't seen it (or BFML) on TV before, so I'll leave the rest of the stuff for another day.

The do nothing weekend

Fail.

Instead we discovered that Banana's 13th birthday party wasn't next Saturday, it was THIS Saturday, at the very same time that BFML was scheduled to be at a hockey game with BGA, and a fund raising bingo directly afterwards. Did I mention that the Banana had invited approximately 10 girls? After a great deal of house cleaning and schedule shuffling we indeed held a birthday sleepover, serving gourmet hot dogs with home made chili, and numerous other toppings; strawberry cheesecake to follow. There were movies, there was much loudness, there was very little sleep.

Simultaneously all three dogs came down with something horrendous. Rox very nearly ended up at the emergency vet clinic, but by 5am she stabilized. Chicken broth and rice for the bunch of them today. We're reconsidering raw feeding in general. I don't believe her constitution can handle any surprises. Could it have been an extreme case of stress? That many teenage girls can be the last straw for a human, let alone a skittish dog.

Somehow, in the middle of that, I spun a good portion of the shetland that I washed, and Correna and I picked and carded. It's a nice light grey to charcoal... kind of an uneven lace weight, as the fiber was peppered with second cuts. I tell ya.. a little bit goes a long way (by the way, this isn't one of Tracy's shetlands).

I've been knitting on a little red hat that I found in Piecework. I like it, tho I suspect it's about 10 sizes too big. I'm also working on a Cowichan sweater and hat set. It's the first and the last that I'll ever knit... just not my bag. The sleeves are left to do, and.. well, 6 million ends need to be dealt with.

We did a little Christmas shopping; I'm pretty well done with Mug, Dida and Katerina. Otherwise I'm making progress.

The dogs are fighting... that's a good sign.

Think the back roads and pathways are clear enough for a bike ride tomorrow? We'll see.

I'm at work right now because I can't get home

Well, I can't get home before my head explodes from frustration. At the moment I can't actually get out of the parkinglot because the road in front of it appears to be glare ice. I had a plan B, but the guy on the radio just told me I was smoking something funny if I thought I was driving home that way.

Does the universe not know that it's pizza night? Geez.

So, now I'm going to explode your head by saying that last night the two tea cosy silent auctions ended, and I am thrilled beyond reason to announce that our two cosies sold for $300.00. My donation page isn't updated completely, but I believe I'm approximately 60-something percent done on my goal. My plan is to keep fund raising and to send my results to IK.. cuz we're a team.

Right now I have a hand woven Noro scarf to sell; several pairs of socks and mitts that Martha knit, a pair of socks for Trisha, sock blockers, stitch markers raffle tickets... Kayla designed the most beautiful shawl and she's going to let me sell the pattern.

I just don't know what to say. I'm so proud and thrilled and blessed and touched. I know so many good, giving people. I'm grateful.

Cancer? The knitters/weavers are after you. Look out.

This is a list

I'm going to be sad when I have to start riding in the light again. BFML bought me a new headlight, and it rocks the free world. I can see so clearly... I could actually read a discarded chocolate bar wrapper on the pathway. I could see what was a hole, and what was a bump, what was a rock and what was a leaf. I could see a ninja well before I was near her (her.. I knew it was a woman). She was walking away from me.

I have a new route, and it's calm; peaceful. I have more lights, everywhere. My Dollybird gave me wind pants, and fleece pants to go under them. She also gave me a wicking shirt, all of which I wore today. I was warm.

My new route gently runs downhill, so I get to cruise for approximately 15 blocks.

I stopped listening to my iPod, because it messes up the quiet.

I smell... leaves burning. Chicken dinners. A joint. The river. Coffee.

I see... the river in darkness, smoother and satiny. The interior of houses at dinner time. A dog with a florescent collar. The park, in pitch dark.

There are... no more skateboarders. Hardly any pedestrians. No black dogs on long leashes. No more rollerbladers. Not many cyclists. I'm almost never passed. I almost never have to pass.

There was no wind on the way home. Not even a breeze.

I thought the night was going to be my worst case scenario. With a little planning and a few changes, it turned into something really special... like that one rainy day that I rode through. Such a pleasant surprise.

Today a number of miracles happened to me.

Rose and Correna helped me at the shop. I was buried alive in yarn that had arrived, I needed to prepare/execute three orders, and the store was jam packed. With their help almost everything was handled.

I saw JSmoothie and Fiona. That was such an unexpected pleasure. Fiona isn't a toddler any more, that's for sure.

There's a middle miracle that isn't my story - so I'm dispensing with details. A friend, Leanne, became an answer to prayer.. she came with information, contacts and support. I don't have words to address how much it meant to me, and how much I needed her today.

When I got home today, BFML met me at the door to let me know that Genetics had called. I've been approved for genetic research regarding Long QT Syndrome. My DNA leaves for Italy this week. We'll hear something in 6 months to a year; to me that sounds fast, I've been waiting 7 years so far.

Sweet Jennifer donated to my Ride to Conquer Cancer fund.

And I safely road home in the dark.

There was lasagna.

There was knitting.