A Senior Outing

Travel knitting-on the way to St Augustine for a MRI for Bill's foot-yes, problems again.

I am working on remembering how to do some double knitting.  I am practicing on a dish cloth-this is attempt number two!  I've got it now! 

After the doctor's and a stop at Hobby Lobby for some essential oils  for my soap making, we went a bit south to our favorite beach side restaurant, SouthBeachGrill.

We ate on the outside deck, the breeze made it a perfect temperature for eating, talking and being. 

We drove on the beach ramp right next to the restaurant to take a 2 mile trek south.  

What a great way to blow the cobwebs from your brain.

The beach was almost empty and it was so peaceful. 

Welcome to the beach, my Ford Escape!  It was his first visit to the beach.  We made sure and left some sand inside so that we will get to visit the beach again-a famous talisman of Bill's Mom-and today just happened to be her birthday.  (She passed away almost 20 years ago now...)

We parked near the Matanza's Entrance and took a walk toward the ocean....it was at low tide and it was a long way to walk.  Just beautiful. 

There was a good northeasterly wind and it really whipped up the water!  The water was still very warm and so we enjoy standing and watching the water for a good while. 

We tried to do a selfie with my camera-not one on a smart phone mind you, but a real camera!  It was very funny!  This one is mine.... 

And this is Bill's.  He is trying to find the button and I am 'helping'!  This so captures us as a couple!

Luxury

I heard about this product from a podcast I enjoy.

It is the Woolful Podcast and in this episode, I learned about this yarn company. 

They send the yarn in this cool drawstring bag.

The yarn is so soft and springy.  Forget what you think about cotton yarn, this is going to be a delight to work with. 

The main fiber is cotton, milled in North Carolina with a special ingredient of silver with a tad of spandex for memory.  Now the interest for me is the silver which is not only a conductor(which means you could make gloves and still wear them while texting or using your ph) but silver is also used medicinally so the combination is helpful for those with neuropathy whether from diabetes or MS.  (So you can see why I am interested. )  I am going to make a pair of fingerless mitts with this skein to see if it will help my wrist/hand pain.  I will let you know!

I am going to knit a pair of   l o n g  mitts with this!

I'm thinking of knitting World's End Fingerless Mitts

as seen on  a friend's blog, Benita Story.

Mastering a Monday

I worked this morning, trying to utilize my best time of day but it was still tough to get my fingers to thread the unpolished amber stones with glass beads onto the thread!  I remembered to save out a few stones to make earrings to match!  My mother-in-law brought me these stones from a trip to Poland many decades ago.  (She still had family there which she visited every few years!) 

After much recliner time because of another UTI, (guess who has to see a urologist now-oh, joy!)

I managed to finish the Wild Leaves Mitts! 

These are made with superwash wool I spun and dyed with indigo.  I used about 155 yards on number two needles. 

This evening, Bill took me for a golf cart ride to pick our bunch of bananas that are ready! 

The flower stem gets so long when it is ready to be picked!   

There is another bunch that will be ready in another month! 

This is growing at the base of the banana trees- 

The texture is amazing! 

Bling takes this daily ride with us.  He sits and waits for us to come back and continue the tour!

He is a sweetie! 

We will take the bananas back to the house to finish ripening.  You have to cut the banana from the bunch to hasten ripening.  It's pretty cool.  I can taste it now....

Saturday Slump

I started out a bit rough-the needle pulled out of its connector and I had to start again!  

I have this one complaint about the KnitPick needles-they do not stay attached in the metal cup.  I glue it with E-6000 and they stay where they belong after that! 

Since I spent most of the day in the recliner, I got a lot of knitting done! 

I didn't have too much trouble designing the mitt;  I used the basic pattern I designed from the Pointedly Ribbed Mitts in my Ravelry store so I just had to center the chart and knit away!

I took good notes so I hope to have it easy making the second one!

Seeing the Course Ahead

 The intermission dish cloth is off the needles-side one...

and side two.  I used the Italian bind off-I have yet to do it from memory, thank you YouTube, but this time it took the least number of replays to get it bound off!

                                            
I finished the patriotic quilt that Millie pieced.  Apros pros for the 11th.  As soon as we stepped outside to have a photo shoot, cats appeared!

They are SO helpful! 

And this is going to be another pair of mitts.  It will match this hat as soon as I work out the logistics because I don't have a pattern.  But I think I see how to get to where I want to go. 

I have the chart for the back of the hand from this hat.

The rest of the mitt is pretty basic.

I am up to the challenge.

Limbo

What do you knit after finishing some complicated project?

I usually cleanse my knitting palate with a dish cloth.

It is a Brioche one.

It's working to clear things out for another challenge.

Seahorses!

Hippocampus Mittens

           Yarn in KnitPick's Stroll Tonal Blue Yonder and Queen Anne (now called Sea Star)
                                                               Size 2 circular needles
         Tip to Cuff using the guidelines from the book Magnificent Mittens by Anna Zilboorg

This was month 1 of the Winter Prep Along with Benita Story of the Fiber Pusher Podcast.

These fit me perfectly so I would say they are a woman's average size mitten. 

My beloved Sphinx in the studio!

Uldine finished!  It was a good knit!  

Size 2 needles

Felici yarn in Highland color

Sock size women's 8-9

Orange Fabric Month

There was a big gap on my RSC2015 quilt....orange was missing! 

I pulled out a bunch of scraps and had fun arranging them for the star blocks and the connecting ones. 

See how nicely they fit in and fill out the arrangement!  I am having fun with this challenge.

Milllie brought over a tumbling block quilt for the frame.  I am working it in a loose star and ribbon panto.  

Non-fiber Pursuits

I used a dab of school glue to adhere the shark collection to this 5 x 7 frame.  I used some fabric that looked like sand for the background!  It is hanging in my studio to remind me of the great visit to Fernandina Beach! 

I've been watching YouTube to teach me how to water color.  It is very satisfying to see the different results just a little bit of water can make!  It is waking a part of my brain that has been waiting a long time to awaken!

Back Home AGAIN!

I said goodbye to the grands....so wonderful to be with them for the week. 

So much love and fun to be with them (and their parents)!   

I will miss Kai, too!  He is a master jewel thief!

Thursday afternoon I drove home;  coming into my and yard and home...it is a good consolation and reunion!

Friday and Saturday mornings my friend , Loree, came to finish piecing her art quilt and then to load it up on the frame and quilt it!  It was so interesting to see her 'build' her quilt and make the vision she had for it come to fruition!  Yay to see it ready for the next stage of hand embellishment! 

I am working on my Undine socks........nearing the place to start the ribbing! 

I am making good progress on the Hippocampus mitts!  I love these two colors together!

Complementary colors are always a success! 

I had a bit of a learning curve with the thumb-when you knit down to the place for the thumb which you know because you get to try it on, you stop on the mitten and use the other end of the skein to knit the thumb tip down and then attach it to the mitten.  I tried to use the three needle bind off which was suggested but it left a ridge and it bugged me.  I ripped it out-ouch!  But loaded all the stitches back where they belonged and then used Kitchener stitch to connect the one side of the thumb to the mitten and then you 'knit' the other half of the thumb stitches as part of the body of the mitten.  It worked beautifully!   

Today, after sharing Loree's ta-da moment, Bill and I drove south to Lake Mary for our friend's youngest son's wedding.  It was good to see them and share the joyous occasion.

(For a homebody, I sure have been away from home a lot this year. Not complaining, just noticing... )

Little Feet!

Kai helped me knit this morning!  In  a matter of minutes he chewed my circular needle, pulled the yarn, turned off the news on my laptop and stole a key from the keyboard!  He went back to his cage for a reboot!  I fixed the keyboard and needle and put the pulled stitch back in place.

Just a nice quiet morning! (I'm turning the heel on the Undine tonight!)

After dinner tonight, we went for a ocean visit to let it blow the cobwebs from our brains

It was wonderful.  Caleb drew me another shark tooth circle but then I began to find my own shark's teeth without help!

It was exhilarating!

This is what we found tonight!  I found half of them!  Caleb says I have been promoted from Apprentice Fourth Class to Novice!  Yippee! 

Here is my haul compared to the biggest one Caleb has found!  Wow, huh?! 

Today is Day One of another KAL I am participating in with the FiberPusherPodcast group on Ravelry.  It is any kind of hand covering.  I am working a pair of tip to cuff mittens in two color knitting.  The pattern is Hippocampus.  I am using a cuff to tip pattern so I have to read it upside down and do a bit of improvising with the symbols but it is working out!  I didn't get a ton of knitting time today but snuggle count, too! 

It is going to be interesting to see how it shapes up.  I'm using two leftover skeins of Stroll Tonal from KnitPicks from the stash.