uproar on FB makes me share good story....

So Knitty had something in their cafe press site that was a very cute design it said "I share needles". When Amy singer posted that particular product on Facebook to do some advertising, A whole grip of people got upset.... So she had deleted the product all together. Since it was only offensive since these sniveling idiots waited until she placed in on FB and it has been in the cafe press site for years....means to me these complainers are cheap bastards that won't go spend money on her cute stuff anyways. This makes me sad.

Why? Well because it reminds me of this store....I find knitting so addictive and also expensive I had to find an alternative source for my Addi turbo knitting needles.  I was working on a secret project that was very much pushing my experience level. I need multiple size needles and I wanted lace tips. Well I just fell across a guy advertising on Ravelry that his store never got a chance to open and he had some inventory he needed to move.....

Sounding fishy yet....

Hold on it gets better.

So I private messaged him and we arranged to meet up in a public setting better yet in the parking lot to a yarn store, during the middle of the day, right before his kids were going to get out of school. Yup you heard me I arranged to buy (knitting) needles in a parking lot out of some guys car.... I was good and brought exact change and my friend ( I can't remember if it was Tana or Shawna). We pulled into the parking lot and my cell phone rang, He said "Are you driving a silver car with paw prints on it?" I answer "yes", he says "cool- I'm in the minivan with the 'my kid is student of the month stickers'..."

I got two sets of Addi Lace for $24 dollars, which was a score...

So I buy needles in parking lots.....and no I don't share needles... Addi's are too expensive to share.

So as just an update on my pay it forward

In January I posted this post. There were some people that I know right away what I want to make them. Jennifer- Is a friend from high school and she also knits. She belongs to the House of Ireland and dances for them too. I know I wanted to make her this very cute bag as soon as she signed up.

I have made sure to line the bag and I had the best fabric to that with. It was left over from another project.

Well I've been teasing her for weeks. I haven't had time to mail it off. But since I have tomorrow off it goes out in the mail. I have to say I'm going to miss it I love it. 

Wow it's been a whole month since my last post....

My little tomato plant is still doing well. I have about 8 tomatoes! I decide to plant the cucumber plant above it so it is a salad waiting to happen.

Plus my strawberries are pumping them out.....

I have about 3 projects on needles right now.

Bamboo covered flipflops

My Yosemite, is about 1/2 way done.


And I'm starting on a new double knit project for swap buddy i picked up, some DMC Pearl Cotton, so that I can make a pair of wonder women bracelets.....

.

And the biggest news is I left my job in Tacoma. I was tired of being verbally abused, called a prostitute because I took another job for a large corporation so that I could have health benefits, and told that I couldn't take heart rate to save my life. I love my clients down there, but get that attitude every day was the reason I left in the first place. I had never taken back a boyfriend once I left them. She couldn't see what I did for the place, or maybe she could but didn't want to admit that I could be everything she couldn't.
Sad thing is she continued on the assistant, guess not everyone can learn from their mistakes.

Best part not working 60 hour weeks, better I'll be able to open up my storefront again. I will be adding stuff to my Etsy store. 

Summer is here.

My husband and I are campers and kayakers and generally outdoorsy people. For the previous two weeks we have been doing what we love. First weekend we headed up to Victoria on the clipper and walked around for two days. I, of course, found a yarn store.

Beehive Wool store is wonderful well stocked and inviting haven.... I took home 2 skeins of yarn one for me for my traveling socks I started in Disneyland and one for David for a new pair of travelling socks....
OceanEdge and I spent a great deal of time enjoying the good weather and walked the waterfront at least 5 times that weekend, so I was surprised to see a little yarn bombing arrive without me seeing who set it.

I cast on for a shirt that I wanted for a long time it is the Yosemite pullover. I cast on the night before the trip and on the way out on the clipper sat next to two other knitters. I ended up re knitting the sweater for at least 4 times but I worked on it all weekend. It's slow going but I hope to have it done before fall.

 Last week we went with the next door neighbor and his son to the Garlic festival in Ocean shores....We headed out Saturday night after my work, hurried out to a campsite in Twin harbor it was great and the camp fire was perfect for simple knitting I am working on a baby hat with the left over yarn from the matching booties.

 Sadly the Garlic festival was not very good, there were about 20 tents and 6 places for food and the food was less then gourmet. So we packed up and went to fly some kites....

My tail from my red barron kite tangled with OceanEdge's jet tail and I brought it down. :) He caught me on camera untangling....what a knitter knows how to do so well...

Back to the outdoors.

I have finally started to carve out a little time for myself. I will begin my Violin practice again, and hope to find a teacher.

But I have started to want to work outside again. Work is balancing out a little, my full-time job has me coming in earlier and in theory leaving earlier. When we get all the kinks ironed out like having two surgeons scheduled and having the blood analyzer braking down for an hour. I might be able to leave on time! Today was golden. It was 70 degrees and clear beautiful blue PNW skies, and I got to leave an hour earlier, because I rock. I took a 45 minute nap on the couch and decided to go outside and plant some of the plants we bought Sunday.

We bought a tomato plant, dill, parsley, chives, and a lemon cucumber plant. Also a flat of strawberries, and a hanging planter so I can grow the tomato upside down.
So I took pictures all along the way of trying to figure out how to plant the tomato plant so lets see how it looks shall we?Buy  a simple hanging basket.Make sure it has a nice simple hole at the bottom big enough for a plant to go through cut a hole in the liner.

simple hole

Wrap the plant carefully in paper and place through the whole at the bottom

hang and fill with dirt

Hopefully I will have a happy little Tomato plant here, I planted some mint in the top of the planter, but only like 6 seeds so maybe I'll have to get something else to grow in the top....

I also started on my herb garden to the right of the above picture is the area I want to be my outside kitchen. I have always wanted to plant an herb garden and four years ago I did. Today I am proud to say there are still some of the plants the mint and the parsley have stayed. :)

Sorry the picture is blurry but I started weeding in that area again tonight too. Just below the brown or weeded section is my husband's mint he loves mojitos so I planted mint and was very surprised to see it still and that it had not taken over the whole thing....As you can see I got a great deal of the herb garden weeded before my back said I quit. I hope to plant some of the plants I bought tomorrow if the raccoons don't eat them tonight. I know they like dill.

I retire as Matron of honor last night.

I have been a matron of honor for two times in the last year and a half. My friend Tana finally snagged her man after 11 years or so of dating. I am happy to see the marriage is finally finalized. I also get to post the Bridal shawl. I originally bought a great deal of yarn the plan was to make a square shawl in the icelandic ways with sewn on edging I wanted to have it all four elements represented but it didn't happen.

The bride and her friends folded 1000 cranes to decorate the hall. So it seemed that the choice of the shawl was simple the Dancing Crane Stole was perfect. I ended using only 1 and 1/10 of the cream Kramer yarn it is Merino, silver and silk blend. I blocked it the first time with pins and decided that it was too pointed so I bought welding tig rods and re blocked it It came out beautiful and the bride loves it....

Next stop knitting for me again!

Silence = busy

        So as some of you who know me in real life... I've been really busy. Once I started back to work I have been lucky enough to have 2 jobs. This has allowed me and the husband, OceanEdge, to get out of big bad debt into normal debt. I started working for a large company Veterinary Hospital and I am working ~38 hour weeks for them Wednesday through Saturday. I forgot how busy Saturdays are! Plus I work for my old Veterinary Hospital Mondays as a Office Manager and Tuesday as a Technician for about ~17 hours.

Plus I am planning my friends Bridal shower and my small vet hosp. 5th anniversary party in the same weekend.

Fritillaria lanceolata It's a native Lilly.

Plus I was taking a 6 week botany class through University of Washington.  This weekend was the final class, where we romped through deception pass park and identified native and non-native plants. This class was so much fun and I am very glad I was recommended to take a botany classes by a Bard friend of mine. He was right I am a little too solitary if I am allowed.

David came with and afterwards we climbed down to the water front and looked at the rocks hoping to find sea glass to no avail. We decided to take the long way home and stopped in Port Townsend. We walked around a little and tried again to go to the twisted ewe but they were closed. David found me another yarn store Diva Yarns and in gratitude I bought him some yarn that will match the scarf I made him this fall. We then had dinner at Alchemy it was fabulous, where I cast on for his fingerless mittens.  I knit them all the way home in the car and while on the ferry I untangled the second skein I bought.

Seattle from the ferry.

Today OceanEdge and I and some of my knitting buddies went to the spring fair in Puyallup. I am still on my yarn diet and didn't buy any yarn but bought two pieces of Tupperware. WE walked around for a few hours and looked at beautiful fiber and yarn, ate fair food. Cute animals and I didn't take a dang picture....

Well hopefully from here on out there will be some more time blogging. Bridal shower is May 1st. Company event April 30th.  Class is over so more time is hopefully around the corner.

Fugallity

So I have been buying syrup for my coffee for a few years now and last month I got really smart... Make your own.
 I took a vanilla bean, 3 cups of water and 3 cups of sugar and heated it on the stove. So for ~$1.50 I have had the best vanilla coffee syrup ever!!!!

Sayings I like...

Yesterday I was inspired by my stamp collections and created this one... I am really torn with this quote, I sometimes like and sometimes think it is cheesy as hell. 'Cus come on if you aim for the moon you won't land amongst the stars you'll just burn up on re-entry....
I guess that is motivational in it's own way.

 

There is another podcaster that I fell in love with, if you have not listen to Cast-on. Then you need to leave right now and go download them and listen to her. Her voice is great and I love just listening to her so much so I went and listen to a book she recorded for librovox. It was for the book "The Age of Innocence."  

Back to the ATC, one of her tag lines is

   

"If you are cold put on a sweater that is what they are for." 

I got this cute little sweater a few years ago from a knitting store in Seattle during the LYS tour, Shawna and I would drive all over Western Washington to go to all 38 or so stores in 2-3 days. This cute little sweater used to hold my keyring credit card, but now that card has expired it just didn't have a purpose. Well now it does....I give you card 11 and 12 produced on the days they should have been....

Stretching 6,7,8,9.10....

Well I did it I caught up! Wednesday night is knit night for me. Since I was so behind in the ATC challenge I spent my first half watercoloring some of the cards I'm cataloging today. I love watercolor. I can't believe i never really played with it before...

 Yesterday I had to take a drug test for my future job and drove down to Auburn took the test. Then drove down to Puyallup...for a new yarn store- no I haven't forgotten about knitting.  Then drove towards home I saw a total of 10 birds of prey on the drive. I love big birds, they are majestic.

 Everything is beautiful. I guess I have a great self image, because I am always surprised by what I look like when I look critically at myself. I guess everyone should be as luck as I am that I see my inner me and not my outer me.

 ...in my worth, my ability, beauty, art, kindness, love and the list could go on and on....

 This one was more a trial of technique and texture.

This one of course is my favorite one as it will probably be many peoples favorites. I took a picture of that stained glass at the Vatican 2 years ago. I am head over heels in love with it....I found my embossing powders and thought this would be a great showcase for it.

I am stretching and pushing myself. I found a great book at Aaron brothers. I flipped through it and have some great ideas for some of the next cards... Look out I feel agile now. ;-)

82 cards... 3,4,5...

So I'm a little tardy with these. The fact that it's Monday morning and  I'm on the train heading to Tacoma, and today is the 7th... I had envisioned make a card everyday however I started on cleaning my office, on Thursday. It is a feat of strength and fortitude, and it's still not done. But it's so going to be awesome when it is!
I got very distracted by cleaning and just meditated on what I wanted to do...then a thought can to me do a triptych. So with a assorted pack in my pocket and hoping I had a pen in my purse I headed to the sounder station. Drew these up on the ride so they have a little Dr. Katz feeling to them but now I'm only 2 cards behind and I need some finishing touches on these- like color... but pen to paper, and I've got a start.
I hope this kind of looks good since I'm posting from my phone.

Once I got home from CPR Class and cleaned up the original post and finished these three cards. I took a picture. Change, Emerge and Fly. I hope to follow through with these inspirations as I continue to clean my office. I got the little butterfly from my mom's house and had just thrown it out until I came upon today's study... It seemed like a perfect way to remember her and to fly.

Since I will be 3 cards behind tomorrow I think I feel another triptych coming along...

Grow

So I thought I would try to just use what office and art supplies I have at home, I even put back a brand new package of watercolor pencils I had in my hand this evening after knitting... I have a travel watercolor kit at home I haven even cracked open.

I have been meditating on what I wanted to do for today's card all day. I had stamped the word GROW before I left for knitting at 6pm. I really wasn't wanting to go to knitting today. I really wanted to clean (gasp) my office it's a sty... But on the advice of a high school friend on FaceBook I went. And of course thoroughly enjoyed myself and once I got home I banged out today's card in 20 minutes tops.

I even added the blue sky to yesterdays card it seemed like it needed something.

I did break and buy Strathmore Assorted pack ATC's at Fred Meyer's How could I not they were on sale and then another 40% on top of the sale...

Trying something new and old.

So I used to listen to this podcast... She went by Miss Violet. I identified with her, her voice and laughter reminded me of my cousin. I listen to all the podcasts even before they disappeared and even sent her a goody or two. Well she is a knitter, a perfumer, a dyer, but first a artist. She now has THIS. I guess I stalk her. It's ok... I still squee like a fangirl when she comments on my posts on FaceBook... But she pushes me to do stuff I wouldn't try, or rather haven't tried in a long time. I started as a artist, my father's 2nd wife was an artist.... I used to play in her office and draw and paint. At one time I remember her telling my Dad I wouldn't be an artist... My only honors in High School was National Artist Honors Society. I have worked in a lot of mediums (paper, pen, pencil, acrylic, pastels, fabric, yarn, metal, red clay, porcelain clay, fimo clay, wire, thread, watercolor, bead, glue, Spackle, dry wall [hey my bathroom ceiling looks awesome], words). I love drawing and acrylics...

So She has moved and still shedding stuff from her previous lives she found 82 ATC's and challenged her readers to follow along.Go read the entry and once you read it and probably everything else come back and I'll bet you have responded something like I did... "damn it i think i want to play...
January 28 at 1:25pm"

Well... Here it is a few minutes after midnight on February 2nd.
1) I have created 10 cards from Bristol board I had left over from High School. If you missed how to go here to learn how.
2) Drew one of my favorite things- a tree. Drawn with one of my favorite ZIG pens.
3) Looked around my desk and see what I could add to make the tree special and found my scrap of Aloo and my Diamond Glaze. I am very proud of my card! I will take a picture in the morning when it's dry.
4) I have blogged about it.

Create.

So this is just for me to remember who I owe stuff to....

I posted this on Facebook

Keisha Marie Reis
Pay it forward 2011: I promise something handmade to the FIRST 5 people who leave a comment here. However, to be eligible, you must re-post this status, offering something handmade to 5 other people. The rules are that it must be handmade by you and it must be sent to your 5 people sometime in 2011. Ready, set, GO

*Tiffany Adams Oooo me me me!! Pick me!
*Maggie Kosmeja Peloquin me! Purple and vanilla
*Jennifer Trempe-Thomas Me please! purple, followed closely by green.
flavors are lemon, peanut butter with chocolate, or salty/spicy. I bought the yarn from a new yarn store... I already have the pattern in mind.
*Kathleen Edelheit Me Me Me!!! Hummmmm.
*Amy Smith Everett WOW, cool, I'm number 5!!!! BLUE!!!blue, orange,& white...Broncos colors!

Fwd: Genealogy.

So here is my bed in Chula Vista. I have been collecting all the family photos and whatever paperwork I can find. I found my great great grandfather naturalization papers, which triggered my first cousin once removed, to find her second cousin! Kind of cool to find relatives since my immediate family is dying off...

-- First posting from my phone, I'm excited I just might post more now. :-)