It's hot. Brutally, stifling, hot and the 3 amigos are driving me nuts. I blame it on the AC. Here they are all cool and comfy, it's sunny and they're pacing and thinking "Why aren't we outside, why aren't we walkin' around, cashing chipmunks, sniffin' butts, all that good stuff? It's summer, why aren't we out there??" So I let them out them, in they're big furry coats and 4 minutes later, faces pressed on the patio door, making slimy nose prints, it's "CRAP it's HOT out here. Let us inside!" So I let them inside and 10 minutes later, cool as cucumbers, they've completely forgotten the previous expedition and they're giving me that look... Outside?

 

Awww... look how well trained you think. HA!
An illusion, it's the magic of weiners (held aloft in my right hand as I take this pic). Too bad this wasn't a video, I could make all their little heads go up and down like bobble dolls. Shelties are stomachs on legs so food is absolute control.

I've heard some people say, well it's too hot to knit. Too hot to knit! People are going out to play soccer and softball or sitting in the full sun at open air concerts. At home they are mowing lawns (some even without lawn tractors), pulling weeds, watering flowers, standing in front of scorching barbecues. They are dragging their children across vast areas of asphalt to get to zoos and amusement parks where they stand in lines to see, to eat, to ride and get sweaty. I think I can sit in a chair in the shade with my 5 thin DPNs and avoid breaking a sweat when I lift them to make some socks. I'm in great knitting shape by the way. My knitty muscles have wonderful definition. I'm not saying the rest of me couldn't use some work.

My fav knitting spot is the porch however it's even been too hot to sit there.

But really, I have no fear of soft wooly things in the summer because I have that great North American life saver call AIR CONDITIONING (trumpets blast). I've tried to live without it twice. The first time my computer died because of the heat. It just made this horrible whirring sound more appropriate to a Chevette with engine trouble, then with a puff of burnt dust it wound down and died. I work from home and my livelihood was in that machine so this was a bit of a catastrophe. I laugh now but then I remember hitting the floor in a sweat soaked mess and weeping. The second time I realized the constant heat was making me so grumpy I had started to rage at my clients, not just about them.

So over the weekend, with the AC blasting, when I should have been traveling the country looking for a place to live, I made some good progress on Silvester by Anna Dalvi and I just might finish it in time for Carol's Bday in August. I was a bit stuck because I couldn't remember where I left off and the pattern repeat of rows 84 to 136 gives you plenty of opportunity to guess incorrectly.

I finally put the nose and eyes on my White Willy, Peabey the Polar Bear by Snowden Becker. Simply a genius pattern, with almost no sewing-up AND it really looks like a polar bear. Check out the pattern on Ravelry, some intrepid soul has made a small herd of them. Too cute.

 
Also I've started sewing up Notre Dame De Grace by Veronik Avery. Sewing up is my least favourite part of knitting and I tend to put it off. I will often finish knitting a sweater in months but then take years to actually make it into a wearable (hopefully) garment. I don't like to rush into anything.

I was just finishing the collar (which is done but sewing each half towards the middle back) and realized the left side was not equal, or in any way similar, to the right side. The left had these lacy holes along the sewing stitches while the right was nice and tight to the edges. Well, being the perfectionist I am (I hear my clients chortling at this) and really wanting to wear this without embarrassment I decided to resew the collar, which I did, but now I was left with a little extra loopy bit, which I pulled. Silly, silly me.

A length of yarn appeared which could not be returned to any happy point plus I now had a hole and 2 extra loopy bits. I tried to adjust and made another tiny hole. No problem. I will just sew these bits up, this hole, this yarn, it is all fixable. Sooooo.... I carefully sew and wrap some ends and pull some more and sew some more and next thing I know I have a carbuncle on the shoulder seam. It looks great from the outside by the way, but on the inside it creates a great quasimodo lump which I know will show and will also be uncomfortable to wear. OOOOOkay,  I decided to start again but I had made such a dense closure that scissors were the only option. People you know what's coming don't you. And yes I did cut something important and I started yelling and yanking and the dogs hid. And I had to put it away where it will "rest" for a time before I can reknit the shoulder and the collar without frightening the animals. Time well spent.

NOTE: Sometime in September by the side of the road in rural Ottawa, you will see a homeless woman, with 3 dogs and a grocery cart full of beautiful yarn and unfinished knitting. That would be me. The quest for a home continues.

I've been wondering for some time now (read 1.5 years) how to begin my blog and now I think I'll just leap right in and not worry too much about the whys and wherefores.

I am thinking however I need to change my masthead because I don't know if I'll be a "country knitter" much longer. Due to a readjustment in my marital status I've had to sell my house in the country (perched on a rocky ridge surrounded by 75 foot white pines) and must now find a new home. I'm not quite sure where I'll end up in 3 months but I know it's going to be a surprise to everybody including me. Just this weekend I looked at a very new 2-story home in bland new suburbia, on a lot measured in 1/100's of a foot (gosh hope that fence isn't off!) and a teeny, tiny, age unknown, bungalow on a half acre, 15 minutes from town. All you real estate agents out there are just cringing; I can feel it from here. She's the nightmare client, she'll have us running all over rural Ontario and then buy a place in town.

My backyard garden this spring. No visible neighbours. I'm very good at being a hermit.

Last week - notice 2 septic lids cleverly disguised by a boxwood shrub and a water/pond barrel

City or country? Do I want to look at my neighbour's barbecue and let them know they are over cooking their steaks? Not really.

Do I want to worry about mouse entry locations and the 30-year old septic system that needs to be replaced? No, not that either. I look at the dogs and I know at least what they want. Chipmunks!! lots and lots of chipmunks.

Truthfully I've been so stressed over selling and the Great House Search that my knitting has really suffered. I've been unable to concentrate, haven't actually knit much of anything and when I do I keep making mistakes. For example, I've started the lovely little Alcea by Susanna IC. 5 times now, yes really FIVE. You'd think after casting on 331 stitches 3 times I would have worked the bugs out. Not really. Just this last time I ended up with 4 extra stitches when I got to my first pattern row and said to heck with it and did a few knit 3 togethers instead of knit 2 togethers. The next purl row showed me I was off on my stitch count again and I just fudged a yarn over (the brakes were off, I was playing fast and loose, caution to the wind, letting it all hang out, and it wasn't pretty). And then, I looked up at exactly the wrong moment when I saw that Betty of Mad Men was, gasp... FAT, and dropped a couple stitches. I put it down (well put it down very quickly several feet away in an over the arm motion) and decided I needed some red wine to calm the nerves. One of my dogs came after me, hooked the yarn around a toenail and followed me out of the bedroom, down 1.5 flights of stairs, into the kitchen and almost made it outside to the deck before I realized that purple blue blob attached to her tail was half my ball of yarn, tangled with 50 stitch markers and a few dust bunnies plus leaves. I will put this away for now and find some extra bulky yarn and knit a very quick hat as therapy. I don't even have the will to rip it out.

BTW this in no way reflects badly on the pattern, it just says I can't count right now. At all. Even to 22 which how many stitches should have been in each repeat.

Here is a photo of Attempt #4. The yarn is Estelle Super Alpaca Lace Paint, 100% alpaca, squishy soft.

I'm actually spending most of my time looking at patterns which as we all know is soooo productive. I'm one of those knitters that has to find just the right pattern for my "yarn vision" and won't stop looking until I am absolutely sure I've found IT, or as close to IT as is humanly possible without getting a research grant from the government. I've been looking for years for the perfect wrap around sweater with a shawl collar and just recently realized that what I've really been wanting is a wool version of a house coat.

What's been knit successfully you ask? 
Well I just finished the Ashton shawlette out of a really delicious cotton linen mix Pima Lino Lace. I went quite tight on the gauge for this one and reduced the needle size to 2.75mm. Smaller needles because lace knitting isn't challenge enough and I wanted to reduce the loopiness factor. The shawl is very summery feeling and the teal colour is terrific. I've added beads —my first time trying this out — and I liked the way they weighted down the edging, no curl here, and added a little extra vavoom.

Well there it is, my first blog. It's been a long time coming.