Knitting and Spinning : Fair Ribbons!

Yay!  Ribbons!  While they aren't first place (far from it in some cases), I still had fun and love the idea of it.

 As always, after seeing all the beautiful knitted items in the case at the fair, I'm overwhelmed with, "I-want-to-knit-that-and-that-and-that-and-that.  Now."  This year, I didn't knit something with the specific idea of entering it in the fair.  I have all kinds of ideas for next year, though.  Already planning...

The Spinning Bee was lots of fun as always.  For those who don't know, the spinning bee is a 30 minute contest to see who can spin the longest continuous thread of yarn.

It takes place just inside the Sheep Barn:

Here we are getting ready:

Yes, we take our shoes off.  Easier to work
the treadles...

I tied for fourth place, having spun 72 yards.  In this contest, tying for fourth was also tying for LAST.  Not many people were entered...  Still, tons of fun.  And again, makes me want to spin all the wool.  Now.

Ready for the riveting video that Deirdre, the owner of The Spinning Room yarn shop took for me?:

(Did this take a long time to load on your computer? If so, I'm sorry....still new to the put-a-video-in-the-blog thing.)

The woman who won the contest spun 208 yards - almost triple my yardage!  She is an excellent spinner and here is what she has on her wheel:

So cool.  I'm sure if I had that, I would spin faster.  Or better.  Or something. (Or more).

Edited to add: 

Oh my gosh!  How could I forget?????  Paul made me this great cart so I could bring my chair and my wheel easily to the fair.  It started with this:

The he added some wood and nuts and bolts:

And now I have a most excellent cart!:

After using it, we have determined it needs bigger wheels, so a revision/start-over may be in the future.  I'm so glad I have a resourceful husband who had all this stuff hanging around.  And thanks to my friend, Lisa, for the $1 thrift store cart find!

Triple Double...

....Neapolitan Oreos!

No. Joke.  Vanilla cookies with strawberry and chocolate fillings. Paul and I discovered these in Target the other day.  Want to know how?  We were out doing errands after work, trying to hurry so we could get home and have dinner.  I need to run VERY QUICKLY into Target to get cat litter.  The pet aisle is very near the check-out line, so really, it would have been a lickety split trip.  The minute we walked in the door, Paul said, "Are you sure you don't need anything else?  It seems like  a waste to be here and not just browse around a little to see if we need anything."  As an aside, it is a general agreement between us that he really can't come grocery shopping with me because we end up with double the amount of items that are on the list.  And the extra items are usually treats, i.e. "third desserts".  So browse we did.  And we came home with these Oreos.  Which we definitely "needed". Quite yummy, surprisingly.

In Knitting News:
My Lucy Hat!:

I still haven't sewn down the brim.  Part of my excuse is that I didn't do the best job blocking it because I really need a head/hat form to dry it on.  I've been looking for one at all the flea market/antique shows we go to, because I like the look of the old-fashioned ones, but either they are very expensive or not for sale (just displays for the hats that are for sale).  On the other hand, I could have purchased a styrofoam one online or likely have borrowed one from The Spinning Room yarn shop, but I didn't think of it at the time.  Plus I was impatient and wanted to see how it turned out.  So.  I love it.  But I will love it more when it is blocked correctly.  Did I mention that the main color is yarn I spun myself????!!!!?!?!?!

Also, my SKYP socks are coming along slowly.  Not too much knitting got done this week since I was quite busy with babysitting my little doodlebugs. Pause the blog to say:  They are so darned cute.  We are in the read-this-book-10,0000-times-in-a-row stage.  Also, starting to try to say words: I say, "Benjamin, can you say 'book?'" and he says, "BA!".  I say, Benjamin, can you say, 'dog'?" and he says, "BA!".  I'm reading a book that says, "Bubbles, bubbles, POP, POP, POP!" and Michaela says, walking around the room with her stuffed Clifford dog, "POP POP POP POP POP POP POP".  They just make me laugh so much!
And so, here are the socks:

And a closeup of the skyp pattern:

Sorry.  Not great at closeups with my camera (not a great camera...), but I think you get the idea.  A pretty, subtle pattern.  And, despite not getting far, I got this far pretty quickly.  It's a very easy and quick, two-row pattern.

Oh, and I had another shopping "accident".  Except it was planned.  The Spinning Room had a Cascade Yarn Tasting and all the Cascade yarns were 20% off.  I know! Right????? I had to....

The light must be good in here today because
that is exactly what the colors look like.

Six skeins of Alpaca Lana D'oro - enough for a sweater, i hope; and 2 skeins of Cascade 220 Superwash Sport -maybe for mittens or a hat.  Oh my gosh.  This is really bad, though.  My stash has seriously gotten out of hand.  Especially recently - I've made several purchases of yarn for sweaters.  When will I knit them all????  Maybe I'll get a picture of my stash for next post.

In Book News:
I finished reading .
I learned about these Carl Hiaasen books from listening to the 2 Knit Lit Chicks podcast.  One of the women on the podcast loves these books and thinks they are hilarious so I thought I'd give one a try.  This one was definitely a fun read with lots of excitement and humor.  A perfect next-book after reading
Chaz Perrone is a self-involved, inept, marine biologist who throws his wife off a cruise liner.  Unfortunately for him, she is a great swimmer and survives the plunge into the ocean.  It is then her mission not to turn him in, but to get revenge.  Excitement and hilarity and some romance ensue.  There are a few sub-plots mixed in, which add to the humor, one of which involves the detective investigating the wife's disappearance.  He is apparently a recurring character in Hiassen's books.  I will definitely read another.

But now, I'm off to start:

The You-Know-What

Bright and early (5:30am) Saturday morning, Paul and I were on our way to see Denny and Renee in ... Ohio.  To get this (the You-Know-What):

That's Renee's cool Jeep in the background.  I settled for
that since neither she nor Denny wanted to be
in a picture.

I'm sorry --- did you need a closer look at this 1970 Buick Skylark with no windshield, no hood and....

...no engine?!?!?!?!  Yes, that's right: we drove 7 1/2 hours to pick up this gem.  Apparently, it really is a car in pretty good shape.  It doesn't have much rust for it's age, the frame is in good shape and the body is in good shape; it's a "Missouri car" if that means anything to you - it doesn't to me.  The very best part of it, according to Paul, is that it is the same exact model as his first car in high school.  Supposedly it will give Paul a chance to get rid of A LOT of parts he has.  For example, he didn't mind that there was no hood because "I have one of those in the garage." Huh.  Also, there is a spare engine in the garage too.  If you remember, we made another trip recently for that.  While the front and back windows are not currently in the car, they came in a box with a lot of other spare parts. Oh and did I mention, it's "for me"?  He's fixing it up so I can cruise around in it.

So, we got there by 1:00pm, loaded up and visited with Denny and Renee for a while, then we were on our way again...

Of course, I had my knitting in the car with me....

Finished my Lucy Hat!  Just needs to be blocked (it's drying right now!) and the brim sewn up.  Also worked on my Harumi Cardi.  The only exciting thing to tell you is that I've knitted my 14" from the cast on and now I can start the lace pattern.  Couldn't do this in the car since it involved lots of marking of stitches and looking at the pattern and I would have gotten nauseous.

We made our way 2 1/2 hours back toward home and stopped to stay overnight in Jamestown, NY.... the hometown of Lucille Ball!  And let me tell you, she is EVERYWHERE.  In a good, tasteful way.

This was my favorite one:

I love, Love, LOVED that Vitameatavegamin episode!!!   We ate at the Taco Hut in this picture for dinner, which also had lots of her pictures inside.  YUMMY Mexican food.  We have yet to find a good Mexican restaurant where we live.  Anyone local want to recommend????

Jamestown was pretty at night too:

And here is a morning-after glimpse of the almost-disaster:

Looks pretty normal right?  I bet you're thinking, "What in the world could have almost-happened?"  We decided to unhook the trailer in order to be able to drive around town and find a place for dinner.  So, there was Paul doing the usual unhooking of all the wires and winding the trailer post down onto the wooden block to take it off the truck hitch.  It released from the truck hitch, like usual.  Then.... the car and trailer started to ever so slightly MOVE BACKWARD.  Then it was oh-my-gosh-what-should-I-do-how-can-I-help-are-you-holding-that-by-yourself-should-I-hold-it-with-you-is-it-going-to-fall???.....  Me getting in the truck to try to move the hitch back under the trailer.  Nope.  It had moved to far.  Me climbing up the side of truck to find the rubber tire stopper thing in the back.  Wrong side.  Run around to the other side of the truck to climb up the other side to grab the stopper.  Meanwhile, Paul desperately using all of his weight to hold the car and trailer to keep it from rolling backward.  Maybe three dessert traditions are not so bad in cases like this...  Luckily, I was able to get the stopper under the back wheel of the trailer and all was fine.  Holy smokes that was close!

Now, Paul has unhitched trailers many, many, many a-time.  The surface looked flat.  He knows how cars on trailers work and when/how they roll.  Usually.  It may have been the fact that the car HAS NO ENGINE and therefore was not heavy up front to keep the trailer in place.

The next morning, we were on our way to make the 5 hour trip home, stopping here along the way for lunch:

I haven't been to a Cracker Barrel      in some time.  I forgot what a old-time-candy-and-other-stuff-you-never-knew-you-always-wanted trap that place is!   Luckily we were in a hurry to get back on the road, so I only got a little package of some coconut/chocolate candy.  For my first (and only) lunch dessert.  I could have done some serious damage if I lingered.

While checking the tie-down straps before getting on our way after lunch, I asked what this was:

And apparently I had discovered a "bonus" feature for this car!  I forget what it is now - but Paul was pretty excited about it.  Some sort of heating element thingy for which there is a gauge inside the car.  I think.

It was a pretty ride back home through the southern tier of New York, passing through towns such as Friendship, Angelica, Cuba, Painted Post and Almond.

Gorgeous view passing through Almond, NY.  I would
love to live here simply for the name.

Also, passed through Corning and this is my attempt at a picture of the Corning Glass Factory:

The trip home was different knitting, since the Lucy Hat was done and I couldn't proceed with the cardi...

These are the Simple SKYP Socks, (click there for the FREE pattern!) made with Shibui Knits sock yarn.  They will look like this:

SKYP refers to the main stitch pattern:  Slip one stitch as if to purl, Knit the next stitch, Yarn over, Pass the slipped stitch over the knit stitch and the yarn over.  Making them for a Christmas present for I'm-not-telling-you-who.   When I was getting my project ready in the hotel room before heading out, I discovered I have this many size 2 Knitter's Pride Dreamz double points:

There are 13 there.  Which is weird since they come 5 to a pack, so I should have 15 if I'm going to have 13.  Not to mention the two other sets of 5 I have in other brands.  Anyway....

What I love about this SKYP pattern is that the top ribbing is only 10 rows, and it's in 2x2 rib (knit 2, purl 2).  Usually, I sort of dread starting a sock, because my basic pattern is supposed to entail two inches of 1x1 rib which is about 20 rows.  1x1 rib on small needles with skinny yarn is somewhat tedious and makes me want to poke my eye out with one of my 6 extra Knitter's Pride needles.  So, the beginnings of both socks went lickety split and now I will be on to the main stitch pattern on the leg.

Two more things and then I'm ending this marathon post...

I had heard about Siggi's yogurt some time ago, but hadn't been able to find it in my grocery store until today.  It. Is. Yummy.  Definitely pricier than other yogurt but I think it is worth it for a treat.  Thick like Greek yogurt but really it's thick like Icelandic yogurt - where the maker is from.  I tried the Orange & Ginger one today and loved it.  Definitely recommend it if you can find it - I hear they have it at Whole Foods, which we don't have.  I found it in the health food refrigerated section of Hannaford, which is nowhere near the regular yogurt refrigerated section.

And finally...  I washed the cat/dog bed cover today, and threw Mandy and Phoebe for a loop.  Mandy figured out how to lay on the bed anyway, despite it being folded up:

... and Phoebe went to her old standby:

No, her bed didn't shrink - she if fluffier now that the cold
weather is here.

My Current Obsessions

My three current obsessions:

Obsession the First:
The Lucy Hat.

Found it in Knit Scene by Interweave Knits, Special Issue Winter 2012  and for some reason couldn't not immediately find yarn and cast on.

Here is mine so far:

The colors are more accurate in the previous picture...

And guess what????  I using my own handspun yarn! That I made myself!  On my spinning wheel!  How exciting is that?  I haven't actually ever knit anything with yarn I have made.  ( and I'm using a little Cascade 220 Paint for the contrast band.) I'm almost to the decreases and will be done with the knitting very soon.  But then I have to sew down the brim.  Finishing stuff - blech. And by finishing, for those of you who don't already know me, I mean any kind of sewing up, sewing on , etc.  Not finishing as in having a project completely finished and ready to wear.   That I love.  Stay tuned for the finished picture... and I better look like that lady in the picture when I wear mine.

Obsession the Second:
My Rice Cooker.

Wait.  Have I already talked about this?  If so, sorry.  I just Love. It. Soooooo. Much.  And if I did already talk about it, it's just more proof how great it is - that I want to tell you about it AGAIN!  Oh my gosh, it has totally changed my opinion of cooking rice.  I used to completely dread it because it was hit or miss whether it would turn out right.  Mostly miss.  But with this?  This wonderfully magic pot?  Put in one cup of rice and 2 1/4 cups of water.  Cook on high in the microwave for 8 minutes.  Stir.  Then cook on medium in the microwave for 10 minutes.  Let stand 5 minutes.  Enjoy perfectly cooked, fluffy-not-sticky rice.  No hanging around the stove, wondering if the heat it too high which means it will be undercooked or if the heat is too low which means it will take 10 years to cook or if whatever factor is there that makes it sticky and mushy.   I got mine from a Pampered Chef party, but also found a Pampered Chef one here on Amazon: Pampered Chef Large Micro Cooker for Microwave .  I highly, highly recommend it!

Obsession the Third:
My Cranberry Autumn Tea.

Love. IT!  I love my tea and I'm always looking for something different to try.  Ok, different-but-not-too-"out there"-and-fake-flavor-tasting.  This one is really yummy.  A subtle cranberry flavor and just overall warm yumminess.  I think I've had Harney & Sons tea before, but will definitely try more.  Try it here: Harney & Sons Fine Teas Cranberry Autumn Loose Tea Tin - 4 oz   
By the way, my go-to favorite tea is: The Republic of Tea, Ginger Peach, 50-Count
Ooh, and this one: Double Bergamot Earl Grey Black Tea by Stash Tea Company - 18 Tea Bags

I also had a Target "accident" this week:

What? It was 50-70% off.  I'm putting it away for next year.  And by "putting it away" I mean, "eating a lot of it before next year (Jan 1) when I start my usual healthy eating kick".  Ok, ok, that's not totally true.  I brought it home and told Paul I would be bringing some of it to The Spinning Room yarn shop to put in the candy bowl.  He looked disappointed.  But seriously, there was a lot of candy around here lately.  And I'm trying to eat healthy now.  Mostly.

Wait till you hear about this weekend's Paul-and-Liz-go-get-another-you-know-what adventure...