A Bomb Cyclone and Two Finishes

As you may have heard on the new, the weather here has been a bit crazy. They called it a bomb cyclone. Our power was out for 2 days, and there are still areas that are out. So it's been chilly and extra dark lately.  However, I finally have a couple of finishes to share.

Jeck is the name of this pattern.  I matched them up pretty well, but I have no idea why they look like two different sizes.

I really love this pattern for mitts and have made it several times! It's called Love Bug Mitts.

That's all for now! We have our fingers crossed that the wind storm predicted for today won't cause so many outages and at least allow people, whose power still is out, to get their power back!  Happy Friday!

Our Crazy Trip!

During the long wait for our plane to leave Seattle, we got to see a beautiful rainbow. You can't tell from this photo, but it was really a double one!

We took a nice hike in a park directly across from our sister's new condo.

On the walk we saw lots of turtles. Can you see them on this log?

We got to see our nephew's newly renovated 100 year old house and our great niece's team win a soccer game.

Enroute to Illinois to see our older daughter's family, we visited several interesting state parks and saw a dinosaur at the Wisconsin Dells! 

We saw lots of Canadian geese at the little lake by our favorite motel.

And we got to see the progress on the dam that feeds the lake in our daughter's neighborhood and spent more time with her dogs than our grandkids because we had COVID.  Thankfully they have a nice porch, so we were able to visit outside.

All in all, despite the challenges, we had a nice visit and are now completely healthy! And I got to do lots of knitting.....

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Have a great week!

 

 

How Did It Get To Be November So Soon?

Thanks for your kind comments the other day! We took our most recent October walk on Thursday when it wasn't raining here. One of our favorite places to walk is Coulon Beach, a waterfront park in nearby Renton, Washington.  

You can probably guess why these statues were dressed this way then, but they usually change their outfits every holiday, and some days aren't wearing anything!

A huge flock of black ducks was swimming in the lake.  There must have been over one hundred of them!  I'm not sure though what kind of ducks these are; does anyone recognize them?

We always see lots of Canadian geese there, but this time a few of them were sleeping on the path and didn't even flinch when we walked past them.

There were a lot more cormorants also; they are such interesting birds!

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Have a nice November! I'm working on a bunch of unfinished projects. How come I am so much better at starting than finishing them?!

Happy Almost Halloween! And an Update.

You may be wondering where I've been. Well September has been a weird and a bit challenging month. Well, early in the month my Afib, which had been under control for a couple of years, reappeared and then we had a crazy trip to the Midwest which ended up with us coming home with COVID-19 despite having had the most recent vaccine. It took a while for both of us to get our energy back, and I am scheduled for Cardioversion on Friday and hope it works.  Despite all the craziness, I have finished quite a few projects!

I made these booties for our choir director's new baby and this little unicorn for the baby's big sister.  I included the Fancy Nancy and the Quest for the Unicorn book also.

I also made these two hats which will be donated to a local charity that provides lots of help to families with children, including babies through middle schoolers.

And I made these two pairs of socks. I am making the top pair again in a plain color and changing the pattern to include another heart.  The second pattern includes a short row sock, but I used the same heel as the first sock.

I need to get ready to have lunch with a friend but will post some more photos soon. Have a fun Halloween!

  

Clicking Those Needles!

I've been busy lately finishing some projects for once! The dishcloth is part of a housewarming gift. As you can see, it's a simple stitch pattern with a 4 stitch/row border. 

I love this glove pattern and finished these before starting another pair. The pattern is easier to see with a plain color.

It takes a bit of time to make one of these Ronald McDonald Christmas stockings, but it's done now in just time for the October deadline.

This yarn was a fun surprise and big enough to make a baby hat with 1 skein and a tiny leftover. I love the stitch pattern, too.

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OK, now back to work! It's not raining anymore, and time to take a walk. Have a good day!

Finally a Post! I've Been busy!

I've been busy finishing some projects including this pair of socks. The pattern is called Hopscotch Socks and requires a certain skein of yarn.  It's called Zesty Sock by Universal Yarns and comes in several different color combinations.

My quilt group makes Christmas stockings as well as quilts for the Ronald McDonald House in Seattle. I was busy finishing this one and am about to start on another one as they need to be done by October.

I won't tell you when I started this sweater, but it's finally finished and been delivered to our oldest daughter for her birthday which was yesterday! It's a fairly challenging pattern, and the yarn I used was kind of splitty. But it's done, finally!

And I just finished this pair of socks last night. It's a fun pattern called Shell Yeah and a great way to use up leftover yarn. I will do it again.

Since I finished a project and it wasn't raining, we decided to take a walk in our nearby canyon.  Here's what we saw at a house on the way there. 

Don't you wonder how it stays up there?

This is one of the entrances to the trail that starts on either side of the main road into a nearby development.  Squibbs Creek flows along the trail, but the stream is pretty shallow now. There's another entrance at the end of the trail which is the way we headed. The trail is wide and well maintained and is a very nice walk in the woods.

On the way back home, we had to stop and take a photo of this pretty dahlia.

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Well, that's it for now; gotta get back to my next project, a dishcloth, that needs to be finished soon.  Have a great weekend!

 

We've Been Celebrating!

We went to Cannon Beach Oregon to celebrate our 59th anniversary and were blessed by nice weather despite the rain on our way there and back at home while we were gone!

This was a surprise finding in a small park near one of my favorite yarn shops. (And yes I did buy some yarn even though there was plenty back at home.)

We love the walk to Haystack Rock! As you can see this sand castle is about to be washed away by high tide. When the tide is low, it's possible to walk out to the rock!

Today I just sent off this dishcloth which turned out much better than the first one. Lesson learned: read patterns carefully!

Here's one more hat to be donated soon.

Can you guess what this is?

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That's it for today! Have a nice week and a fun Labor Day celebration.

 

Catching Up!

This summer has flown by. Our weather has been unusually hot with little rain so we've kept busy doing lots of watering to keep our plants alive. We've also had visits from our oldest grandson and my sister and her husband. Despite the business of our summer so far, I have completed some finishes, but I've sure fallen behind on my blogging. 

This is a fun sock pattern with a different kind of cuff.

I finally got some professional help making the button holes on this sweater which had been languishing in my stash forever.  And on top of that a friend and I discovered a really nice and helpful yarn shop in our downtown; if you're ever in the area, be sure to visit The Knitters Studio!

These are the last of the 5 dishcloths I made for my sister who recently visited us.

This is a fun pattern!

The Diamond Mosaic washcloth. The first one I made a long time ago turned out square, and I have no idea why this one didn't! In checking the pattern, it looks like I omitted part of the directions, but my sister liked it anyway.

The Blue Angels were in town for our annual Seafair celebration, and my sister and Ted got to see them in different places every day they performed! We had a fun visit and got to explore lots of walking trails too.

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Enjoy the rest of August! 

               

Finally Enough Time to Post!

It's been really busy here! Earlier we had some sod installed in our backyard which has kept us busy trying to keep the raccoons from rolling it back up! Who knew they could do that and be so persistent?

 We've done some traveling to local spots including Cannon Beach, OR, and Leavenworth, WA.

Haystack Rock at Cannon Beach

Leavenworth, WA, horses

We have also taken David, our 19 year old grandson from the Chicago area, to some of the local sights including the Tacoma Glass Museum and a walk at Coulon Beach that ends up at this rock cairn. (I had forgotten how much teenage boys eat! 😉)

At the Glass museum you can watch people blowing glass and also see projects such as this one by Chihuly. Isn't it a beauty?

Somehow David balanced the rocks on the left; he did the 3 big ones, and I added the little one.  At the moment he's off in the Olympic Mountains hiking with the husband of his mom's friend, so I've had a little time to do some knitting!

This tiny little T-Rex was a bit of a challenge! It's for the son of a choir friend and will come with the book, Danny and the Dinosaur.

The booties are for his sibling-to-be.

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Happy Fourth of July!