A Little Bit About A Whole Lot

Last night I sat and watched more of the Planet Earth Series with Hubby and the Daughters... there's over 15 hours of stuff to watch. It's really cool to learn so much about our planet... at the same time I'm knitting. My goal is to finish the glove before the family heads back to school tomorrow. I was quite dismayed when I realized that I had made a mistake. The thumb for the glove was a whole inch higher on the one I was knitting than on the one that was finished..... and so (in a whisper) I had to ravel it back.... hmmm : { It is a rare occurrence when I screw up that badly this far along. Usually if I am going to make screw ups it is when I am laying the foundation for the pattern. I can't even blame it on the program I was watching. Last night I was back at the cuff again and so the journey of the lace glove is on..... I still have today to get it finished. It's not likely with all those ruddy fingers to knit but I'm going to try.

As for the jacket commission.... well that's why I wanted to get the gloves finished... so that when Hubby and the girls went out the door tomorrow I could get down to it and work that jacket commission like there was no tomorrow... this is what I'm aiming for....

The warp is 50% alpaca and 50% wool, the weft is 100% alpaca. I'm aiming for black and plum instead of cream and gold. My deadline is the end of January. I have most of the warp done. I have none of the weft done. Argh! It will be a head down, work till my fingers bleed situation. I think I can... I think I can.... I think I can! This jacket will pay for college this year!

Speaking of College.... it is that time of the year when I start watching the college website for their course lineup and information. Woo hoo! I'm really excited this year to see what they have available. Level 4 obviously.... but I would like to do some other courses too. Oh man.... I just checked their website and the course lineup is out..... Oh man.... there is just too much to choose from.... I want to do them all. I definitely want to do the dyeing cotton course and I'm thinking that sock making with Cat Bordhi..... mmmmm! Oh man this is going to be expensive. Argh.... and they are having a Cashmere spin-in.... oh man! It's better than sex.... well.... a little....

Well I have to print off the service leaflet for church and back at those gloves....

I'm Really Just An Old Bear You Know!

OK I'm thinking that the snow can end now.... I've had enough this winter,...the cold can end now and the ice can definitely end now! Christmas is over and we don't really need any more. Hubby and I went out for a walk last night.... this is not just some easy thing you know! Firstly I don't have any boots.... that's my own fault since I am so darn picky about footwear. I'm not just going to go and spend a $150.00 on any old thing. So I hunt for footwear. I try things on, and walk away, and savour the delights of fit and comfort and ease of putting them on, and reflect on the price, before I finally go back and purchase them. More often than not the boots/shoes in question do not make the grade and so.... I often am footwear-less. I have a really good set of runners right now but quite frankly I'm hopelessly low on footwear at present and I am going to have to bight the bullet and actually buy a pair. I think I have finally found a pair of wintery shoes that I am willing to fork out money for. They are a pair of walking shoes at Back Country (which is an outdoor camping, fishing, hunting supply store). So when I go to FSJ in the near future I guess I will go through the life altering experience of purchasing footwear.

The reason for this change of heart is aching in my bum right now. You see, when I walked out the door last night to go walking in the FRIGID AIR under a wintry sky, I took my first step down the front steps and landed on my tail bone. This is not good for someone with back issues and is too scared to visit the inside of the MRI machine to go forward with more back surgery which is what I am being told is what is needed for my back to be a functioning part of my body. Anti inflammatories are the only thing between me and complete sedentariness.

As a result of all the previous diatribe... I have concluded that hibernation through January and most of February is the only thing that keeps me sane.... before I started the Master's Spinners program January was my month for reading.... now it has become my month for homework. (which I'm going to have to give up for one #@$#% jacket commission)!!! Walking is unheard of since any fall could set me permanently in a wheel chair. So it was after quite a bit of cursing that I decided to venture into the great road beyond to walk the treacherous fields of snow and ice that have formed on the road, driveway, walkway, forest,.... and pretty much anywhere I look. I walked a short 1/2 km and thought about my aching bum and the bruise that was forming there and then felt my back giving me the nasty and turned for home. You see... now we get to the reason for this title.... I really am just an old bear! Hibernation would be good and considering the Christmas weight gain..... a little living off my fat wouldn't hurt me either!

Jacket Commission

There once was a lady (let's call her Silly Creature for that is what she was) who knew how to spin and weave. She had alpacas that had lovely soft locks. She was also working on her Master Spinner Level 3 homework. One day, she lost it totally, when a lady came and asked her to spin fibre and weave a jacket.... she said yes... which was her first mistake. Everyone else on the planet who was working on their level 3 homework was working diligently but Silly Creature was procrastinating about everything because if she did anything other than the jacket commission she felt guilty. If she did the jacket commission she hated it and wanted to work on her level 3. So one day right after the new year she put everything away and got out her fibre for the jacket commission. She wanted to puke since her new cotton cards were calling from under the Christmas tree, handles screwed on and ready to be used, saying,"Come and card your lovely soft cotton... come and card your lovely soft cotton...." this was terribly distressing but Silly Creature continued to work on the never ending pile of fibre on the floor. Soon she had a gob stopping pile of fibre spun and so she began to ply. The sound of the new cotton cards began to drift into the recesses of her mind and still she spun. Her lace gloves which she didn't get finished on New Year's Eve as she planned, were calling too, but she diligently ignored it and continued on working on her jacket commission. One day several weeks later she finished the jacket commission and looked up from her work with a smile on her face. This was not the ordinary smile of a woman with a completed project, this was the smile of a demented banshee. You see being torn in two by conflicting desires is not healthy..... the moral of the story is, do not leave jacket commissions till the last minute.... better still do not take commissions of any kind when working on your Master's.

I'm off to check out my rocker since I went off it the day I said yes!

As Time Goes By

There are all kinds of things that happen as time goes by, but as the song says, some things never change.... one thing is for sure if I have a really rotten night where I sleep little even though my eyes feel like they have pound cakes resting on them and when I do finally fall asleep I dream horrible nightmares, you can bet your bottom dollar that the moon is full or pretty close to it. And so, here I sit while the whole house sleeps peacefully, awake with scratchy eyes after a miserable night of tossing and turning. I know when I'm licked..... I just get up and give up on my bed for a bad job.

All night I listened to the clock in my room ticking away and then I came downstairs and the clock down here ticks too. The funny thing is, that I got to thinking about all that ticking.... it's December 31st... the verge of 2010.... it seems like the last ten years have whipped by me in a flash. Do you remember sitting on December 31st ten years ago and wondering if all the computers in the world were going to freeze up and make the world come to a stand still? We didn't even own a computer back then.... Hubby and I couldn't afford one. All I knew was, that if all the computers of the world would screw up world banking, then I hoped it would wipe out Hubby's student loan and drop a few ten thousand into our account. Alas, nothing of the sort happened and life continued in its never ending tick toward the future.

We here at Nicholsville West farm are not planning any great events for this New Year's Eve. It will be a quiet one with no company this year, perhaps a little time watching the new DVD that we got for Christmas called "Planet Earth: The Complete Series". We really can't think of a better way to ring in the new year than by watching something about the destruction of our planet..... unless we could have a DVD telling us about the restruction of our planet. I wonder what the next decade will bring. Will I be sitting here in ten more years thinking about the same things? Will I be here at all.... or any of us for that matter.

Sometime during this day I will call a friend, (maybe you), I will light a fire, (hopefully in the fireplace on my deck), I will finish knitting a glove, (I'm almost there), I will kiss my Hubby, I will hug my Daughters, I will drink a little Apple Cider, and I will wish all my blog followers a good new years, that you all have plenty in the way of needs like I have, that you all have people that surround you loving you as much as I am loved.... that you all have joy in your hearts for a least part of each day, and that you remember to regularly thank God, whoever your god may be, for the power that created this divine place on which we live must indeed be an awesome force.

Happy New Year!

Party Time (cont)

Woo Hoo... What fun!!!!

Party Time

Today is the 30th of December 2009..... in case you didn't know. Today I am hosting a party for the Knock-out Knitters and the HH Spinners and Weavers. The party starts at two. I am off to the grocery store for pie pastries.... you know, the little ones that take forever to make... I'm making mini Quiches and my Almond Wedges. I also have piles of crackers and cheese to offer and a little liqueur not to mention punch and tea. I'm looking forward to the little party. I have some little door prizes and I have a nice gift to exchange. It should be fun.

If you are one of the ones coming.... I look forward to seeing you.... and if you live too far away to come.... well, I wish you could be here....

In the meantime... have a good day!

Sunrise.... Sunset

I have an annual thing that I do. After Christmas settles down to a dull roar I start watching the sunrise and sunset times on the weather station until the spring equinox. Somehow it makes the winter more tolerable to know that the days are getting longer. On December 19th there was a beautiful picture here and I thought, -this is really the turn of the year,- when I saw it even though the turn was still a few days away. It was so beautiful that I've been wanting to post it here on my blog. This picture epitomizes the winter solstice for me. Now I can watch the skies slowly growing brighter as the days grow longer. It really is a Northern thing I think. When you live this far North the sky can almost become something you worship. It really does help you get past -42 degree temps and make you aware of time progressing into the next season.

While I like to do this at this time of the year there is a feeling of urgency.... a sense of pushing at time to move it on forward faster.... then I hit the spring equinox and I want to put on the brakes and slow everything down. I start to watch the morning sky and I have this wonderful sense of well being.... but for now I just want to hibernate! It is odd how I think I might actually be able to slow or speed time progression... I mean little ol' me... really.... not likely! So you will notice to the right under the header for this blog a new gadget..... the Sunrise and Sunset times will be posted every day that I blog.

Quiet mornings of dark,
Birds hide,
Mice sleep,
All the creeping things are tucked away.

Slowly this land awakes and throws off its blanket of white,
Daylight penetrates my skin,
Suffusing me with well being.

Birds come home and plants bloom,
Alive, all is alive.
I watch and wait,
Patiently, growing warm.

Hope you are thinking of warmth too!

Now.... a little cotton today, I think.... and tea! Perfect for -24.