Denial...

not just a river, but a state of mind...

no, today's post will not include reference to the passage of time, nor to the importance of the day (milestones all round)...

no, today we will simply reflect on what has been a most enjoyable, relaxing summer...

okay?

We will think about short trips to Sandbanks Provincial Park: about the best signage ever

(this gives one-stop shopping a whole new meaning, although I thought you'd want to hit the chocolates before the dentist, so he could repair the damage, whereas Ben thought the dentist first, for a clean bill of tooth, made more sense);
the best sand dunes and sunsets.

Let's think about the things that have amused us most this summer:
(best $80 bucks I've spent in ages - it's better than watching TV) (look at what they deem important enough for this bag... I was SO impressed!);

the things we've seen grow
(Ben's jalapenos) (honest to God, the yarn was just growing there!!!)
(this is the Sidelines Top in the Fall Interweave Knits in Dream in Color Classy, "Gothic Rose", and because of my utter obsession and devotion to it, it has grown to a front, back, and 1.5 sleeves)

what else has grown this summer, you may ask?


but like I said, denial is a wonderful thing...

We interrupt our regularly scheduled programming...

to bring you this

and this


I was going to write about my new project, and my languishing projects, you know, the usual, but then not half an hour ago the sky went black, thunder ripped across the lake and, well, it hailed...



Ben offered to "model" the hail for me, but quickly realized, it's cold

hence the face...

so I am off to make my confession or something because I have NEVER seen weather like this in all my born days... we've had more thunder and weirdness in the past month than in my whole life... I think something bigger may be afoot...

and now, back to our regularly scheduled program...

Well...

well, where to begin?

We are recently returned from two (uh-huh, TWO) weeks of this

and this
and this
,
where I was also able to to this
,
and to read all this .

I have never, in my life, read 5 books on vacation - and that doesn't count the two audiobooks I listened to ("Tweak" by Nik, Sheff, and "Change of Heart" by Jodi Picoult).

Why, yes, I am a little more relaxed, actually... thank you for noticing.

And then we came home to this

,
and these


Lord, how I love vacation... and as glad as I am to be home, I want to know where the guy is who just knows that, by 3 or so in the afternoon, I am in need of a dose of mango daquiri... we don't seem to have those here...

sigh

on the plus side, we have a long weekend coming, so a little more recovery time is planned...

Wow! Long time no blog...

and no good reason, apart from returning to routine (blech), trying to put the house in some semblance of tidy after a summer spent largely outside (pee-yew), and just general I-can't-believe-it's-the-last-day-of-summer malaise (sigh).

I have been knitting - of course - working on a brown ruffled shrug for Cindy at Apple Laine
That was an early-stage pic - I am much further along but my camera doesn't want to play right now...

I am also in the end stages of another Lake Placid pullover for Artisan Knitworks
(again, picture was taken earlier)

And I have three projects from the LYS, Spun, to finish for them.

But what about ME???

My poor little head is abuzz with everything I want to make for myself - NOW - and I keep finding more - I almost feel sick thinking about all the potential projects, and then I keep finding more, and feel even sicker...

I can't even try to list the things I am thinking of, because I really do get panicky and out of breath - for God's sake, it's knitting, it's supposed to be fun...

I did learn something interesting today which is non-knit related - I was pulling out a sweet potato vine from one of my front pots - it's done well, but is now deserving of a quiet burial...

know what I found at the end of the vine?

I really had no idea that you could grow potatoes on potato vines - I just thought that was the name of the plant - I was thrilled, so much so that I interrupted a neighborhood game of HAGS (hide and go seek - their acronym, not mine) to show my sons and their friends -

apparently their friends think I'm weird now - I gather they didn't before, which was yet another revelation.

But I think I blew it this time.

New Books!!

Oh, don't you just love new books? The smell, the gentle crack of the binding as they are opened for the first time, the possibilities inside?

The sale prices???

Knitpicks is offering all of their books at 40% right now, and I figured I should take advantage to get some books which I have been eyeing for some time - hey, it's educational!

And it's supposed to rain and thunder all afternoon, the boys are cramming old Harry Potter books in preparation for Saturday's launch - I CANNOT WAIT!!! - so, really, it's destiny that I have a stack of books to peruse...

weeding this morning, between rain showers, and just wanted to share this flower, this coneflower, that has thrived so far this year - I've never seen this colour before, and am going to try to make cuttings so I can have them all over the place - I may need a sweater this colour...

Also, I think I figured out the macro setting on my camera, and had to give it a go...
Thank you for your indulgence...

My other project this morning was to dehair Charlie, at least a little - Maggie's breed does not shed, which is lovely, but I am honestly amazed that Charlie has any hair left...

so I read about "The Furminator" at Knit and Tonic - at this point I will try anything, I am so tired of picking dog hair off socks and clothes and furniture - well, I am amazed!
Almost half a pound - HALF A FRIGGING POUND - of undercoat from only half of his body! What's left is his black, silky hair, and the kaka is gone.

And he liked it, more than normal brushing. My sense is it's like someone with long fingernails scraping through his fur - when I get someone like that washing my hair at the salon, I get goosebumps, so I totally get it (no, I don't think that's weird... well, not really... maybe a little?) So I will finish him off now, and see if it does, in fact, reduce shedding as claimed. So far, so good...

now, to make lunch and read of things yarny...

I got it, I got it!!!

Finally, after much twisting and ripping and cussing and cramping, I got it!


There are a couple of glitches here and there - this is not a pattern that lends itself to dropped stitches, and since we got back from Mexico the dogs have been a little less understanding of my knitting than usual, hence the dropped stitches...

however, I am inordinately pleased with the fact that I figured it out, and it fits! I was up till 12:30 a couple of nights ago figuring it out, but still...

The yarn, STR 'Silkie', is a silk/merino blend which feels completely decadent on the toes, and I absolutely LOVE the colour... the problem was with my YO technique, as was suggested by Riggwelter and Lv2Knit in the comments, which brings me to another thing I love about knitting - no matter how much you think you know, you don't, and there will always be a humbling kick in the arse when you get cocky... so I turned to Eunny Jang's fabulous arsenal of knitting techniques, and discovered I have been doing my YO's wrong forever... always something new to learn...

Yesterday's mail brought a couple more sock kits, which also look totally yummy:


On the left, the latest from Pick Up Sticks, with merino/bamboo/nylon yarn from Seacoast Handpainted Yarn, and on the right, this month's offering from The Loopy Ewe, with another merino/bamboo yarn from All Things Heather...

We've had a scorching couple of days here in Southern Ontario, but the temps are much cooler today, with mondo-thunderstorms expected tomorrow... which means I will be getting myself out to a couple of garden centres today to buy flowers - I am SO EXCITED!! I'll be buying annuals to jazz up the front of my house a little (it's way too GREEN and so far the only thing with colour I've been able to grow is a hockey net), and hopefully some new, exotic but yet low maintenance and dog-proof perennials for the back (yes, I ask a lot of my plants).

and this? Well, this is what I was looking at 2 short weeks ago...

sigh...

the dock from our resort, with Isla Mujeres in the distance, and ocean, ocean everywhere... there's no place like home, though... right?????

Beware - knitting content ahead...

Why, yes, I do still knit, and I have the sticks to prove it...

Beautiful bronze sticks, handcrafted by Molly at Celtic Swan, which were my birthday gift to myself, and which I am chomping at the bit to use on my next socks, the April Kit from Blue Moon Fibers Socks that Rock club:

Sorry for the flash effect - this is a much better representation of the truly edible colours in this wool/silk blend:

But first, I must finish the twins' socks, which are due this Saturday... hmm, sounds like a test or paper or something, doesn't it? Not like the relaxing, satisfying activity we all know knitting to be...
They should be done tomorrow, and I did do the second pair while we were away last week:

Project: My own generic sock pattern, size 7, for the twins
Yarn: KnitPicks "Bare", dyed with orange KoolAid and received in a yarn swap some months ago
Started: May 5, 2007
Finished: May 14, 2007

These are the red and blue Bemidjis, knit for Artisan Knitworks and mailed the week before I left, all cuddled up on the couch:


Hmm, funny how you don't necessarily see the chaos surrounding you until someone comes to visit unexpectedly, or you take a picture of some of it and get an objective look - remind me not to take pictures anywhere else in my house...

Today's project has been to wash and scrape our old plant pots, so that the boys can paint them in their own personally selected colours, and then fill them with their own personally selected flowers - so tired and old looking, huh?


They were here when we moved in, must be older than dirt, but for now, they do the job just fine - and WAIT till you see the colours the kids picked - this will be one glow-in-the-dark kind of garden...

speaking of the kids, Ben had a project a couple of weeks ago wherein he had to build a real structure out of common household items. He chose the Skydome in Toronto:


and opted to make it out of... are you ready?... marshmallows.

BEHOLD! Edible Skydome:


You have to picture, us, sitting around our table, stringing endless amounts of mini-marshmallows ( couldn't use the BIG ones, oh, no) on toothpicks, stranding them together, and then glue-gunning them (and they actually didn't melt like I thought they would). We had a tough time coming up with the dome part, but I had a flash of inspiration at the grocery store and asked if I could buy one of the plastic tops they use on vegetable trays. No, apparently they don't have a code for those and can't sell them. Could they give me one? What, am I NUTS? GIVE something away? For FREE???? So, I paid $15 for a veggie tray, the contents of which I then jammed down the throats of my kids and their friends who were lucky enough to be visiting that day, and we had a dome.

Which was too small.

Saran wrap does, in fact, have a million uses, and I would gladly offer a testimonial to that fact.

All in all, a fun project, and so damn creative - however, it will be a long, LONG time before I can eat another marshmallow.

and now I will leave you with the latest addition to my fridge:


Am I the only one who finds this pee-in-my-pants funny? My girlfriend and I made asses of ourselves in the cardshop with our uncontrollable laughing, but apart from her, no one else really gets it...

sigh

Meme tomorrow, Scarlett, I promise...