Concerned Reader: Hey, Brewgal!
Brewgal: Hey! What’s up?
CR: Nothing much. What’s up with you?
BG: Oh wow. Lots.
CR: Really? Like what?
BG: Well, I went to Maryland Sheep and Wool with Little Brewer #1. It was really crowded this year, like always, but I got some nice handspun and even got to see Casey and Jess! From a distance, of course. The Rabbit Barn was jammed with Ravelers.
CR: That’s great!
BG: Then Brewguy went to Milton-Freewater to visit his Mom because she’s having some health issues and needs someone to come in to help around the house.
CR: Ok.
BG: So he was gone during Mother’s Day. The little brewers made me breakfast in bed all by themselves! I was so proud of them, even if they did end up eating most of my breakfast.
CR: Kids are great.
BG: Yeah! But then I got this virus from Brewguy that hung on and on, just like last year and I thought “uh oh, what if I get sick again like last year? I don’t want that to happen,” because I was running a low-grade fever for two weeks and just feeling worse and worse and then on top of that I got some sort of stomach flu virus thing that made me throw up for two days straight which made me miss the advisory committee I was supposed to present at and as a result my research partner had to come in from maternity leave which she had only just started the day before to give my presentation (did I mention she’s amazing?). Then I fainted in the shower and torqued my neck and knee which still hurt. But I went to the doctor who gave my antibiotics and topical steroids for the uveitis (which had come back) and now I’m feeling better!
CR: ….
BG: Too much information?
CR: Yes.
BG: Oh. You did ask.
CR: True.
BG: And little brewer #1 turned 8 years old. We hired a naturalist to take her and her friends on a walk through the woods. It poured down rain and they loved it! When was the last time you walked in the woods in the rain? Me, never!
CR: Um…
BG: And the pool opens this weekend!
CR: Ok! I’ve got to be running along. I think the stove’s on.
BG: See ya!

This is the duck,

Who tried to steal the lunch of the girl,

As she sat on Eyre Square,

And who brought the hook on her trip,

To see the sights near the Corrib,

And drink a few pints,


But whose plane was delayed


In Galway.
Apologies to Mother Goose.

Strikke!

It may not seem like it, but I really *have* been working on my Strikke-along project. I've changed my idea about three times mid-stream with this project. I finally settled on a semi-yoked, 2x2 rib pattern with a split neck.

Here we see my first challenge. Ok, second. The first was figuring out how to knit in the round. How do I join the sleeves to the body?


I spent almost a week puzzling this out. I couldn't figure out how to join the sleeves to the body at the underarm.
I kept reading and re-reading Elizabeth Zimmerman's intructions in Knitting Without Tears. Then it hit me: the sleeves are joined to the body on the OUTSIDE edge, not the underarm edge. The underarm stitches float while the body and yoke are worked. It was the diagram that confused me.


Once that hurdle was hurdled, the yoke went very fast. I added a crocheted contrasting border at the neck and a nice Tinn-Per Norweigan frog clasp at the neck.



Just in time for...

Gone in 5 seconds

Life oftens throws you a loop. Remember our redecoration? We moved the hanging cabinet from the kitchen to the dining room. Doesn't it look lovely? See my beautiful glassware and ceramics?



Look again.



The cabinet fell off the wall. Just...fell.





Brewguy was standing in the dining room talking to his mom on the phone. I was in the kitchen cleaning up a wine glass he had just knocked on to the floor and broken (can you say harbinger?) There was a boom, then a crash and a crash and more and more crashing as the cabinet fell off the wall, smashing all the glassware. More than smashing- pulverizing.

I stood there, open jawed. Brewguy was silent for a moment, then spoke into the phone, "Mom, I've got to go. The cabinet just fell off the wall."

The consensus is that the vibration from the door caused the bolts to loosen.

It has been a few days, but I am still mourning the loss. My grandmother's Fostoria, the Waterford I dragged back from Stoke-on-Trent in my suitcase, the art deco coffee pot, the crystal... all gone. Everthing I've collected over the last 20 years. Poof! The kicker? Our insurance does not cover glassware or ceramics.

I try to keep in mind that the little brewers weren't home at the time and so therefore weren't hit by flying glass. I'm still finding little pieces of glass around.

Like most disasters, there were a few survivors.

Sometimes yarn does not wish to be frogged. Take, for example, the pieces below.



I found these two pieces at the local thrift store. The price was right - 25 cents. I thought I could just frog them for the yarn. I think the first one was an unfinished baby bib. I have no idea what the little ball-shaped object was supposed to be. The opening was not big enough for a hat. A yarn hackey sack, perhaps?

So I began to take them apart. Pull, pull, snag. Puullll...grab. Grabsnag. Arrgh! This yarn was the stickiest yarn. It just did not want to be pulled apart, like yarn super glue. I can be very tenacious and stubborn (just ask my graduate school advisor), so once started, it became a contest of wills between myself and the yarn. I won, but at what cost? My hands hurt and I had spent WAAY over 25 cents of effort to gain...


A bunch of partial balls of yarn. The original crocheter cut the yarn at the end of every other row. Sheesh.

We're back from Milton-Freewater, Oregon, located at the base of the scenic Blue Mountains.

Blue Mountains seen here. You can sort of make out the mountains in the distance. They are, in fact, rather blue. My MIL tells me that the green in the foreground is winter wheat, so called for when it is planted (winter), rather than when it is harvested (spring). She's an M-F local, so I'll take her word for it.
Here is our trip in a nutshell:

Denver. Flat on one side...
Rocky Mountains on the other.
Pasco, Washington as seen from the window of our airplane.
Easter Sunday breakfast at the Longbranch Saloon in Weston, Oregon.
Pictured is half (half!) of the side order of ham and biscuit that came with my eggs over medium. The biscuit itself was the size of a small badger. Never have I tasted a better or larger biscuit.
Interior of the Longbranch. The taxidermy on the wall supposedly promotes digestion.

A trip out to Harris Park on the South Fork. The threat of rattlesnakes always brightens my day.

Back to Denver.

Not pictured: Walla Walla, Touchet, Lowden, Hermiston.

Remember Rainbow, the fish that was not yet dead? Still not dead, but not looking so good.

Rainbow has been hanging out at the bottom of the fish tank. Camera flash doesn't even move her.

I'm concerned. This does not seem like healthy fish behavior.

A fine vintage

We're preparing to go out to Milton-Freewater for a visit with the MIL. Mr. Brewguy has been out a few times this past year, but I haven't been out since the great moving-unmoving fiasco of March, 2007.

Brewguy's grandmother was from Sweden. As the story goes, her mother used to walk the halls of the family estate working on crochet or tatting as she strolled. The finished work was then applied to bedlinens, tableclothes, napkins, and handkerchiefs. Sheets and pillowcases were stored with the decorative borders facing out so they could be matched by the staff.

Here are some of the surviving Swedish treasures:

These are hand-loomed tableclothes and napkins with what I think are tatted borders.

Crocheted lace. I need a camera that can handle close-up shots.

The pieces on the right hand side are machine made. What a difference!

Linen needs to be ironed. I spent a lot of time ironing. I cannot imagine trying to keep all these ironed for daily use.

There will be swearing

My PDA was "removed" from my office today. And by removed, I mean pilfered. I'd like to think I just left it in a conference room but no, I left it connected to my PC. It was not connected when I returned from my meeting. The USB cord remained, untethered to its home like a woebegone umbilical.

Secure Federal Building. Ha!

I really liked that PDA. It was a Christmas present from Mr. Brewguy. A real step up from my old Palm 510. This one connected to the internet and everything. Now I have to change all my passwords and try to resurrect my calendar.

Dear Cursed, shit-eating, thieving rat bastard,
DIE! DIE DIE DIEDIEDIE!
Love and hate, Brewgal.

We've been doing a bit of renovating at Chez Casa de Brewgal. I've been wanting a little breakfast nook in the kitchen for a while, but the only space available was under my wall-mounted cabinet. For some strange reason, Brewguy objected to putting a table and chairs under a 50 pound cabinet filled with glassware.

So we moved it to the dining room.

I think it looks great. That left space for a table in the kitchen. It also revealed a hidden gem.

Original wallpaper, circa 1974. I had forgotten that we installed the cabinet where a shelf hung. The first owners had clearly put the shelf up over the wall paper, then removed all they could reach when the painted the wall.

Wow. Can you imagine the entire kitchen papered in this stuff?

It's all about me

Our division is moving to a new building on campus this weekend. I've spent the week packing. Ugh. How do I accumulate so much stuff? In addition to the regular work crap, I found three boxes of granola bars, four miscellaneous balls of yarn (white, blue, oranage, and neon green) and two crochet hooks in my office. I suppose I was thinking ahead in case we were forced to shelter in place.


Anyway, we were given leave yesterday so that the movers and IT folks could set up our offices without us milling about and generally getting into trouble.

A whole day to myself. A vista unspoiled. A blank canvas, awaiting the touch of the master’s hands. You get the idea.

I briefly considered then immediately discarded the idea of housework. Here is what I did for me:

1. Fiberworks, for their Leap Day 29% off everything sale. I am looking for a size 8 circular needle with a short (11”) cord. I've been using double points for the arm of my Strikke-Along project and I constantly feel as though I am wrestling with them. I was unsuccessful in that regard, but did come home with some Frog Tree Merino.

2. Quick run by Roots Market for organic poptarts, dried strawberries and walnut-raisin bread.
3. Second Story Books used books, where I found the following gems:

Copyright 1968. This has some great charted designs. I believe I can modify them to work in tapestry crochet.


A book to help me with my color combos. I'm trying to branch out in the color field beyond blue.


Amish Quilts are cool.


And patterns are great!

4. REI, to look for more Smartwool microweight shirts. I LOVE these. They’re light and warm, just what I need for my I-hate-the-cold layering self. No luck, but I did find an on-sale, small one-shoulder backpack I can use as a large purse.

5. Home, to make tea and watch the last two episodes of Project Runway unmolested.

All in all, a fine day.

Last Friday was a snow day at Chez Casa de Brewgal so I decided to stay home with the little brewers. Having been in New York, I hadn't seen them in a couple of days and wanted to spend some time with them. Let me tell you, these kids are busy.

We made overalls and a hat for the M&M doll I brought back from The M&M Store in New York. Total time = 30 minutes, not including the time spent finding the yarn in the Stash of Doom.


I did not take process photos, but this is the basic technique I used. The whole set is worked in single crochet. For the suit, I started with a chain that fit around the body of the doll. Join into a circle. Work the circle in rows until it is nearly the length you want (it will look like a wrist warmer at this point).

I put the piece on the doll and continued to work just the back portion, back and forth until it came up above the doll's arms. Then I chained 9 from one edge, over the doll's arm and attached it to the front of the piece. Work across the front for one row, chain 9 and attach to the back of the piece. I single crocheted one more row all around, going across the back, down the chain, across the front, up the second chain and bound off.

I also made a skirt for LB#1. Her own design.

I edged the split in contrasting bias tape.

There was just enough fabric left over for a super cool headband for LB#2.