Meandering Monday

My Dad is serving as the hand model - look what Joan aka The Fairy Godknitter sent me for my birthday! Oh, you can't really see the purple skeins in the 7 Gorgeous Scarf Patterns kit but when I decide on a stitch pattern, there'll be months of those WIP pictures (as is my wont). Slow and unsteady, that's my motto.

There may or may not have been maple candies in the package but they were, ah consumed prior to documenting. That instant gratification thing and the thrill of discovering a maple candy shaped like a shell tastes the same as a maple candy shaped like a monkey. There was a comparison of notes.

Thank you so much Joan!

This is what I've been doing:

and undoing on the Undulating Waves Scarf:

It's heartening that I can now figure out how to fix it and actually dropped and reknit one of three repeats all the way to the first row of the repeat. I see why I have problems with left and right as directions though - every time I have to check if / means k2tog or if it's \ sKpsso. They're facing opposite directions. I confuse them even now. (When I first started the scarf? I had to put post it notes underlining the rows. People, this pattern is dead easy. Scary.)

KSD is running her annual Knitter's Hunk Award at handeyecrafts - too late to nominate but with 64 entries, your guy has a pretty good chance of showing up. Head over to her blog and vote now - 4 pairs are voted on every 24 hours.

I've been reading The Thirty Years War for the last thirty years - at least it seems like it. It's barely 300 pages and I'll bet half of that is endnotes, index, bibliography and maps but I have this thing about knowing what's going on and there are way too many Hapsburgs, Henrys and Ferdinands, not to mention German city-states, duchies, etc.  It's all pretty fascinating but it's slow going.

We seem to have three new kittens in the neighborhood - they are so cute. They romped through the hole in the fence the other morning - the siamese looking one first,then the black and white who proceeded to play keepaway much to the White Cat's annoyance. Finally the Gray & White kitten showed up and freed the White Kitten from the clutches of the Black & White kitten who then wandered disconsolantly about the hill, pawing at the pine needles occaionally. I may or may not have been calling them Melchior, Ezekiel and Kissinger, respectively.

Hez seems unamused by their presence but she was impressed by their routing and cornering of a mouse yesterday.

Comments

[jodi]

That is one gorgeous beaded scarf project!

Lucky you with the lovely parcel, too.

[Cheryl S.]

But what about the castle?
Where's the castle?

[Stacey]

That Joan is something else. I got a tiny box of the maple for my birthday and I have one piece left. Yes, one piece. I've doled them out carefully and I'm holding out on the last one.

[Cookie]

Hello! You can't show us the sexy man and not tell us why he's in your blog? Did someone send him to you?! :D

What a wonderful package! Isn't that Joan just fabulous?

xo

[Chris]

Happy belated birthday! I suck. If it helps, I spaced out my dad's birthday, too. *makes mental note that Carrie's birthday is right before Dad's birthday*

At least you have great friends like Joan. :D

[pixie girl]

Lovely package, and I love the stitch markers on your scarf!!

[Elspeth]

Ooh, pretty lace knitting!

[Jocelyn]

Wow, kittens routing a mouse -- that's impressive. I'm loving that lace knitting! And I'm wishing for maple candies right now...

[joan]

I'm reasonably certain that it was a maple moose, not a maple monkey, but when you mail in August, anything can happen.
xo

[Kim D.]

That is the only way to eat Maple Candy - immediately! The same way I drink Maple Root Bear - as fast as possible.

You know there is that easy trick that Sally Melville teaches for being able to easily identify the symbols for k2tog and skpo or ssk.

k2tog = look at the direction of the slant on the two - it leans to the right.

ssk = look at the slant of the s and how it leans to the left.

Hard to explain, but take a pencil and draw it out and it will make a lot more sense.

[bybee]

Maple candy...definitely one of my weaknesses. Dang, I wish I'd gone to Russell Stover's before leaving the country last month.

[Nora]

Lovely gift! And such pretty knitting - I hate those slanting symbols, too. My mind doesn't work that way.

[BigAlice]

Gah, I missed your birthday!? Happy belated birthday! mmmmm, maple candy, yum!

Decreases going a different way than expected would throw me too.

I love your picture of Hez. He seems supremely indifferent and comfortable.

[Bridget]

Oh man, I totally missed your birthday, and I was determined not to! Oh well, I hope it was happy - that package would be a nice way to celebrate.

Hez probably wanted the kittens to think she was inscrutable ...

[Gale]

I still want to hang with Hez.

[Amy]

I take it you're voting for Nathan Fillion.

[Kim]

Wait: "tough love" or "love tough"? Very different, you know. . .

Happy Birthday to one of the best blog friends I've made.

[Julia]

Happy birthday, sweetie! Kittens!! How perfect.

[opal]

how great is joan?

your scarf looks lovely!

go nathan go!

[CarolyninAlaska]

Looks like you received a great birthday haul! Mmmm... maple candy and chocolate?... sounds yummy.
(I don't know what a Truffalo is, but it sounds suspiciously chocolaty.)

[CarolyninAlaska]

Found the link of error!!!
Thanks again!

[Sonya]

I'd have scarfed the maple candy too. We used to get maple candy shaped like maple leaves and they were the joy of my childhood.

The scarf yarn is purple? Excellent! Can't wait to see the WIPs.

I hope those kittens don't bother Hez. What did one of them do to get named Kissinger?

[Aarti]

I always think war history books sound good in theory, but I never know if I want to read them. I generally skim over the military parts of books I read, but the political stuff is so fascinating! The War of the Roses, for example, is one that I'd like to know more about. And while not a war, exactly, I think the French Revolution is quality reading, too.

[Lorraine]

Carrie- I see maple candy all the time- it's like the syrup, no?

Love the beads and the stitch markers.

[knitnana]

Lovely gifties...I enjoy maple candies now and again, myself - the boss just returned from VT so we have a few. Oh, maybe not, anymore...
;)
Hez is impressed by anything? Okay, perhaps kittens...
(((hugs)))

[Miss T]

I love those stitch markers!

[bethany (dreadlock girl)]

We at BBAW are trying to contact you!!

Please email mypalamyATgmailDOTcom for information about YOUR Book Blogger Appreciation Week nomination.

Congratulations!!

[Bookfool, aka Nancy]

Ooooh, I want to see the kitties! Take pictures, please!

LOL about the candy not making it into the picture.

You got a BBAW nomination!!! Yay, you! I'll vote for you, even though I have no idea what you've been nominated for.

[Brigitte]

So, it's too late for me to nominate Jon Hamm??

Kissinger, LOL! That's a great name. That is mighty impressive that the little ones caught a mouse. Hez should be impressed. So I'm guessing she's not the touchy feely clean your ears kind of grown-up, huh?!

[Merri]

The kitties sound too cute; I would be tempted to kit nap one(or all...LOl)

Maple candy!?

I love maple syrup but KNOW I would have an instant headache with the candy..good though!

(she said, knowing full well that there is no difference between Maple sugar candy and licorice allsorts which are equally sugary but which hold great thrall these days..lol)

Sounds like a good haul and birthday!

[Angie]

I love your scarf and that you have mad repairing skillz. I really thought I commented earlier but that's what I get for iPhone reading.

Lovely Joan package!! Happy Birthday!

The new kits in the neighborhood sound adorable and have Hez to show them the right way.

[Eileen]

On your recommendation, I went to vote. There is no way that monkey maple is the same as shell maple. And that scarf is looking pretty good close up. Isn't it a good thing when something looks good in close-up?

[JessaLu]

I know you wrote about other stuff in there but now all I can think about is maple sugar candy...sorry about that...mmm...candy...

[Stefanie]

A very happy belated birthday!