Knitting Needles ~ what's on them these days?

My postings have been sparse of knitting "stuff" lately. So here is some knitting content. I have four active projects I am working on these days. First is the Bucilla Arans sweater jacket # 5904. This pattern has been knitted countless times by my mom and Grandmother. Last month while visiting Mom I noticed a bag of yarn sitting in a corner. Mom said she bought the yarn to make herself the sweater but found herself in too much pain to knit. I am knitting it for her. This picture is of the bottom up edge of the back:


This is an updated picture of my Forest Canopy Shawl. It doesn't look like much because it is in mid row and I can't spread it out.


So I discovered I have what is called second sock syndrome. I really like knitting sock number one but when it comes to sock number two forget it.... Well there is a way to knit two socks at a time on one 40+ inch circular needle. I tried to teach myself with the help of the book 2-at-a-Time Socks. Well what is wrong with the picture below you say?


You guessed it.... I am having some technical difficulties with the logistics of this technique. I sent out an S.O.S. to one of my knitting friends that can do this in her sleep. She is going to help me get the sock on the four DPN's back on my circular needle and help guide me in the error of my ways. :-)

I now have 4 fingers and half a thumb on glove number one. HUMMMMM I wonder if you can knit two gloves at a time?



Here is a small update on the seedlings. They are almost ready to be planted outside. Check out those two small pink pots. About 4 weeks ago Jimmy and I had a tomato and fresh mozzarella salad for dinner. I took a few of the seeds from the tomatoes, planted them and here is the results so far!

Simple Knitted Bodice - Finished

I finished the Simple Knitted Bodice yesterday. This was fun to knit and working with the yarn, Bamboo by SWTC, was a dream. I am very excited to have half the yarn purchased left so I can make something else. Perhaps a gift?

The finished knit:

Poo ~ Our Baby Boy

Since the first of this year our kitty Poo has developed a skin ailment that has progressively worsened. There was some short term relief in the days following a steroid shot from the vet. The week before last we took him back to the vet and we discovered the remaining 3 teeth were infected. They suggested since he would be under for the teeth pulling they could biopsy his skin and find out what is the cause of the skin ailment.

On Friday we got his biopsy results. Not the greatest news but not the worse either. The disease is called Pemphigus Foliaceus and the vet described it as an autoimmune disease where basically his system is eating itself from the inside out. Sounds very scary to me. This week he will begin treatment with high doses of steroids to be decreased gradually over time in hopes of knocking the disease into remission.

Information on Pemphigus Foliaceus:

http://www.veterinarypartner.com/Content.plx?P=A&S=0&C=0&A=2202

http://www.manhattancats.com/Articles/Pemphigus_Foliaceus.html


The pictures below were taken within an hour of Poo arriving home last Monday after surgery. He was pretty drunk still and had stitches in his mouth and on the back. The back stitches is the location where they took the skin sample for biopsy. He is actually healing nicely and I will be taking back to the vet Wednesday evening to have the stitches removed.

Mommy visit

This past weekend my husband and I took a road trip to upstate New York to visit my Mommy. By car it is about 7 hours from our house. Her little log cabin is located in a small community on the shore of Lake Ontario. I spent many hours of my life near that lake from picnicking in the summer to sledding in the winter in Webster Park. Oh yeah and watching the submarine races too.

My Mom is one of 8 kids. My Grandma, or Grammy as I called her, spent six years of her life pregnant (OMG can you imagine?) and countless hours knitting clothes and mittens for those kids. I am one of like 15 grandchildren and there are a fair amount of great grand kids too. Grandma left us 4 years ago this month. She is still greatly missed by my family and always will be. OK I am not sure how I got off on this tangent I guess it is because it was nice to see six of the siblings together including Mom on Saturday. Three of them celebrate April birthdays so Jimmy and I were able to have a birthday lunch with them.

OK so don't these two look like they could be a handful of trouble? Believe me Grammy had the white hair to prove it. They are my Mom's two youngest siblings. The youngest of them is only 6 years older than me. I had the pleasure of living many years under the same roof with them so I consider them more brothers than uncles. One of my fondest memories of these two is them getting into a fist fight and one of them spraying Raid in the face of the other. That incident was all over a telephone conversation with a girl.


My Mommy and her oldest brother and his wife. His birthday is in April too.


This fella is Spooky. He is one of my Mom's villains. He decided he couldn't keep from picking at a sore on his back so he got to wear this and adopted the nickname "Cone Head". He really is a pretty boy but a villain. :-)


This is one of my many Cousins. Isn't she sweet? In the last year and a half she has had not one but two TMJ surgeries. She had two because there was a clown that performed the first one.