Where's the Bee?

What a day!
It started with my email address being banned from my server! Me! BANNED! It appears that my computer had a virus that the danged virus scan (with all it's bells and whistles and high tech knowledge )did not pick up and did some funky things all on it's own. The problem is now cleared up, but I am still banned. I'm taking a walk on the wild side, I guess. Living on the wrong side of the tracks. Yeah. I"m bad. So, my new email address is sanhurl[at]gmail.com.
Damned virii.
The day got better. Then worse.
Better because I finished the french market bag!

The darker yarn is cascade 220, shade unknown. The lighter pumpkiny color is a yarn that Leigh dyed with natural materials. I'm not sure exactly WHAT she used but this process fascinates me. Pick something growing in nature, boil it with wool and make a great color. Now, all you yarn dyers, and you know who you are, do not take this as a cosmic sign that I, deep inside long to dye wool. I dabbled. But I'm not interested in anything that detracts from my knitting time. But it's beautiful, isn't it? The Leigh yarn?

It is now felted and drying as we speak.
The worse?
I was wandering the yard in search of pretty when it happened. I stepped on a bee. Barefoot. Owie. Left foot, arch region. The bee did not fare well either. There is a small amount of swelling at this moment but there is a considerable amount of pain radiating up to my ankle when the foot even thinks about moving. A bee is so small but they do pack a considerable punch.
So, enjoy this picture. I sacrificed for it: Rose of Sharon

Where's the Bee? Oh, that's right! Under my foot!

And I perspire

"It's not the heat, it's the humidity". You hear this statement all the time. And yesterday I would have agreed with you. But today? I am going to go out on a limb here and state that it's the heat OR the humidity. I hate it all. Today it is techinically less humid but the air feels like an oven. Good thing summer around here doesn't last long or you'd have to slap me around a bit to stop my bitchin'! :)
I'm all excited for 2 things.
One:
Alton Brown's new show, Feasting on Asphalt is on tonight. Not only is he easy on the eyes, has a great sense of humor and cooks well, this show appeals to the wanderer in me. I cannot wait.
Two:
Andy and Derek are out shopping for our new car as we speak. We MAY be leasing a Nissan Altima. Leasing seems like the best option for our finances at this moment (please read: poor as hell) (remember we have 2 college students this year) (and we just are not rich) (we are just middle america, struggling to keep up with the increases all around us). Where was I?
Yes. Altima. I don't expect it to come driving in the driveway today, but soon. I have never owned a brand new car, by the way. The thought excites me. More than I ever thought it would. (Or course, we would not technically own it, but lease it, details..)
Three:
This one is a review. Watch Feasting on Asphalt.
You'd think I was getting paid to be a billboard, wouldn't you?
Oh, yeah, my sky is there on the top. Hot. Blue. Beautiful clouds. My world.

Checklist

My to do list has not gotten much smaller during this vacation.
~vacuum floors: not done
~sweep kitchen: not done
~corral dust hippos under beds: nope. not done (some of you may have dust bunnies, I have dust hippos. Much, much bigger)
~mail packages that are overdue to go out: nope
~balance checkbook: hahaha, good one: nope
~dorm shopping: DONE
~cook healthy meals: done, although in the extreme heat of today, it will be pizza tonight. I cannot stand to stand over anything hot today
~laundry: I started to make headway on the mountain 'o laundry. I have things at the bottom of the hamper that have not been seen in months. I just keep washing all of the frequently worn items.
~buy Mom's birthday gift. This one is DONE. Amazingly, it is even early. I know. I should take a little lie down, perhaps it's heat exhaustion
~pull weeds: haha, another good one. It's on my plan though. You never know, I may get to them. Maybe. Perhaps.
~Don't kill mother in laws plant: this is an important one. I am plantsitting for the week and it is imperative that this plant makes it out alive. It is used to full on blazing sun all day long. There is no sun like that in my yard (thank the good lord for that one) so keeping Mr. Sun worshiper alive may be challenging. I have stood over it, wringing my hands a couple of times already today.
~Sleep late: this one is done. I'm turning into a lazy bones. I slept until almost 9 am today! Unheard of!
The day is young, though, perhaps more of the list can be crossed off. Or, perhaps I'll sit on the porch and knit a bit. There's always later!

swaying in the breeze or KEEP THOSE THINGS COVERED, LADY!

Why, yes, I AM on vacation, thanks for noticing. :) *Norma says I'm being insufferable about it all. The nerve, really. Oh, it's TRUE. But you know, the nerve.
I headed out to the porch to do the knitting pictures in pajamas which is required of every knit blogger. It all went well, until I realized that as I was bent over the knitting, arranging it lovingly lounging in the sun, I realized that my PJ top was sort of....well...gaped open shall we say? You know, people, I am going to be 45 years old and the chest region doesn't quite stand as PERKY as they used to. Realizing that my private area was not quite as private as it should be, I did the blogger glance around. You know, "did anyone see that" kind of look, slyly looking left and right for the neighbors.
You guessed it. There was a neighbor. Oops. Sorry, Mr. Elderly neighbor.
I tell you this story so that you will enjoy these knitting pictures. I have given up a lot to have them posted here. And I wonder, would you visit me in jail if I have to spend time for exposing myself?
Trekking? Or not trekking? You decide:

Not trekking. It is quite trekking-ish though, isn't it?
It is meilenweit colortweed, trekking's long lost twin. I love it! It was a wonderful BP gift from Terri!
And this

Is a surprise project. It's not a surprise for you. It is for me. I did not plan it. I did not KNOW that I wanted to knit it. But all of a sudden, like an alcoholic black out, I found that I had printed out the pattern for the French Market bag and cast on. I have found that some of my absolute favorite projects have happened that way. For me, too much planning means failure. Who couldn't use a new bag, anyway?
Today, my second full vacation day, for those who are counting, I will be keeping my eyes on The Christmas in July special when I'm home and then dropping obscene amounts of money when Bethany and I go dorm shopping.

A Saturday in Rockport

It has been so long since I've tried to sleep late that I forgot how annoying the neighbors' bird is. I have nothing against birds, but try to sleep when the bird emits a loud wolf call whistle every nanosecond and (apparently unknown to me, they now have a second bird who is not trained in a particular whistle but is fond of the extremely loud ear piercing SHRIEK) answered by Bird 2 as a SQUACK!
Let's review, shall we?
Whistle....SQUACK
Whistle....SQUACK.
Repeat ad infinitum until your head feels like it may blow off.
But you know, an annoying morning on vacation is infinitely better than a work morning, don't you agree?
Saturday, Andy and I took advantage of our teen free life (Bethany was on a girl's weekend in New Hampshire and Derek had been in Miami all week on business, they are both home now) and drove to Rockport to enjoy the wonderful evening. By bringing my camera along, YOU got to come too.
Bearskin Neck: a shoppers paradise. Also a browser's delight.

The view from the tip of Bearskin Neck:

Not much of a saturday sky to speak of. Beautiful nonetheless.
Secret walkway:

This reminds me of the pictures of doorways, walkways and roadways that I took on my trip to Bermuda. I should dig those out. I guess I have a thing for 'WAYS.
Raise your right hand and promise me that if you are ever in Rockport, you will stop at the strudel shop AND the fudge shop and indulge. It does not matter if you are dieting or watching what you eat. You MUST sample these things while here. You may as well take the oath, I'm not going to give it up.
Helmut's Strudel

Yum. Apple Strudel.
The Rockport Fudgery:

Yum. Fudge. (Along with a picture of a mystery couple. They look nice, don't they? Does anyone know them? They are pondering whether they should buy some fudge. The answer is YES)

Bunch 'o buoys.

Heh.

All seagulls on board!

This view is officially known as Motif number 1. I can't make this stuff up!

Lots of Dinghys. Or is it dinghies? Dinghi?

Fig says, "Did I get a morsel of fudge or a crumb of apple strudel from their Rockport trip? A seagull on a platter? No. Nothing."
~~~

Check out Donna's blog for Who's Lace is it Anyway? Although lace knitting is not for me, this swap sounds like fun! Go ahead, join in!

Today's Saturday Sky is brought to you by FOG

Foggy, murky, humid day here in coastal Massachusetts. But it matters not one bit. I am now officially on vacation for 2 weeks. And while we would all rather have the perfect vacation weather, frankly it matters not one little bit! Not even a smidge. No work. Happy Me.
Do you know that we have over 120 people in the Saturday Sky ring? We also have a boat load of spammers applying. Unfortunately the ring doesn't replace the assigned number when I delete someone. I've had over 30 spammers. DAMN YOU, SPAMMERS! To what end would they apply there? No one sees it but me. Not too bright these spam people.
To join in, you can check the Saturday Sky blog (not an active blog, just there to keep the ring info handy)
~~
Good news on the car. The insurance company totalled it. We do not know the amount yet but Andy the pessimist believes it will only be a couple hundred dollars. (the car was a 1994), I, ever the optimist am holding out hope for a thousand.
~~~
You know, showing the pictures of the lobster party of last weekend, I realized that I have LOTS of long lost relatives all over the world. All ones that knit, oddly enough. My family seems to be growing by the minute!
:)
~~
Knitting. Oh yeah. I knit, right? I have actually knit in the last 24 hours. I hope you were sitting down for that. I had not knit in so long I wondered if I remembered how. I did. Truth is that my arm/elbow has been bothering me a lot the last couple of weeks and I had to give it some R & R. Damned elbow. Betraying me like that. It's not all better yet but it's on it's way. I have lost knitting stamina.
The thing that I learned during last night's knit session is that the trekking socks have to go. I don't like them. It's not you, Pattern, It's me!

The pattern is Aran braid socks . It's a wonderful pattern, just not for this yarn. I am ripping it out today. I have fought that feeling that it is all wrong since I started it. If you are going to put work into a braid, I feel that I must see it and enjoy it. It definitely gets lost in this yarn. This yarn and this pattern are NOT like peanut butter and jelly.
Rip.
Today I rip.
But it's okay. Did I tell you that I'm on vacation? I have plenty of time to rip.
:)

Rock! Rock Lobster!*

Sunday I got to do something I've wanted to do for a long time. Host a lobster bake. Lobster BOIL would be more accurate.
11 family members
12 lobsters


Cooked outdoors in Andy's beer brewing pot and huge gas burner:

Andy on the left, nephew on right
10 pounds of steamers:

Grilled fresh from the garden corn on the cob (my favorite way to eat corn!!)

With the addition of marinated steak tips for the non seafood lovers in the crowd ( I know!), boiled red potatoes served with butter and kosher salt, smoked salmon spread and crackers and blueberry cake and sliced watermelon for dessert.
I hope to make this a yearly tradition, it was that fun. Although I had big plans for the leftovers, not one morsel of food was leftover. I have never seen a crowd eat so much and leave so happy. What more could a hostess ask for really? I mean, besides a leftover lobster roll for lunch the next day?
~~~~
Questionable no more
For some reason, I had added Yahoo.com to my list of spammers. Probably one was a spammer. But not ALL yahoo-ers are. So, you all got lumped into the spam category. I think I fixed it now. Let's hear a big YAHOO!
~~~
*The song that was sung repeatedly at the lobstah party!

Happy Birthday, Norma!

2 things today. (*ANd by TODAY, I mean, Tuesday, July 18th. I posted a wee bit early as to get to bed at a reasonable hour. So, some of the birthday wishes were a tad early. Details, details. NOW, is Norma's birthday!! ) :) Both important.
First. And most important, go over and wish Miss Norma a happy, happy birthday. She deserves a rousing day of good wishes. Go ahead, sing to her if you wish. Or check this page and learn to say Happy Birthday in 161 languages. Think we can use them all up on Norma?
Here's mine for her:
Torson odriin mend hurgee!
That's Mongolian. She is the Dulaan queen and I'm sure all the children wearing her lovingly knit hats and mittens would want to say it themselves.
SECOND: Important in it's own way, but not as nice as a birthday, have any of you had any trouble commenting here lately? Specifically being denied commenting because of QUESTIONABLE CONTENT, when none was involved? If of course, your comment was denied because there was indeed questionable content, then go now and wash your mouth out with soap! :)
Please let me know. Of course, email me, because you'll have trouble commenting. Silly.
sanhurl[at]comcast.net
Now, go. To Norma's.

Good news and bad news, complete with Craptastic picture

The bad news is that Derek was in an accident with the car.

This is the picture from Derek's camera phone. For some reason, he cannot mail it to me, so I took a picture of the picture. Hey, it works!
The Good news:
No one was hurt. This was an accident on the highway and could have had much worse consequences. The car that he hit was a Suburban and has not a scratch on it. So, since we are thinking GOOD NEWS, especially thinking about insurance, this is more good. But let me say again, no one was hurt. And could there be any more good news than that? Although, Derek did hurt his hand in a post accident incident in which his fist hit the steering wheel. This was, however, a GOOD sign that he was okay. Anger, in this case, was GOOD.
Bruised hand? Probably not so good.
With that out of the way, now it's time for the REALLY GOOD. Taking into consideration the age of the car (1994) and the damage done to the front end, which includes inside damage (battery and radiator) WE WILL MOST LIKELY HAVE TO GET A NEW CAR!!! And that, my blog friends, is Great news! (There still is the insurance aduster appointment tomorrow, let's cross our fingers)
You see, in the past, we run our cars until they do not have one more ounce of oomph in them. Then we get a new car. This one, while getting on in age and starting to need multiple, expensive repairs, still ran. Old faithful. This has taken the decision making process out of our hands.
Great news, indeed.
goodbye, old friend. You were good to us!

Cloudy with a chance of meatballs

My sky was filled with clouds today. Which is fine with me as it kept the unbearable heat to a screaming minimum.

Perhaps not meatballs, but rather grilled chicken, grilled summer squash and baked brown rice. I encourage you to try the rice recipe. It is the greatest. I also encourage you to read the book, Cloudy with a chance of Meatballs. I still miss reading to the kids. If I start reading books to a random child on the street, would THAT be bad?
:)

Nightly walks

It's Friday, but somehow it feels like Thursday to me. This is good. The weekend is here and I feel like there is one more workday!
So what's the deal?
With my non blogging lately. I wish I knew. I guess I'm in a mondo slump. I feel a fraud calling this a knitting blog. Perhaps it's more accurately a photo blog.
I have been going for nightly walks lately. All in the getting healthy effort. (11 pounds lost, by the way). I took the camera along one evening, trying to catch the beautiful light of dusk. I am fascinated by the silhouette.



The one above is the silhouette of my home.
I am lucky enough to live near the water, so here's a peek at the beach that is 3 blocks from my house. (I cannot see the water from my home, but I can hear the boats and the foghorns)

~~~
I would know if I was going through a blog crisis, wouldn't I? I hope it's not fatal.
:)

Some sky reminders:

Ring
To get onto the Saturday Sky Ring, go HERE! The Saturday sky blog! You can join the ring on the bottom of that page, where it says JOIN. Then I will email you the ring codes. You will then put it on your page. Honestly, if you need help with it, I can appeal to people here, but I am html illiterate. But I know some good people. So ask away. It can't hurt.
Frappr map
Be sure to put a pin in the Frappr map. That is just plain fun.
Most of all, have fun perusing the sky ring and map. TO see skies from around the world makes me one happy camper.
And honestly, I could use a little happy camping right now! Can't you?

What day is it? Oh, yeah, SATURDAY!

Here's my sky in my head:

But here's the sky in reality:

If it looks blue to you at all, it is a fluke. It is white. Colorless. Kind of blah.
I guess my sky does't want to show off for it's Saturday photo session.
Or something.

No hedging

My favorite weekend activity was one that I did not photograph. I made the journey to Patternworks and spent a lovely hour or so amongst yarn. I carried around a hedgehog kit for quite a while, only prying him out of my hands at the register. I mean, do I REALLY need a hedgehog? Cute as he is, the answer was a sad NO.
I did however spend a bit of time at the koigu wall. It was there that I got inspired.

I have one word for you! MITTENS! It's been a while since you've heard this here, hasn't it? Don't you love the colors together? I did.
Until this:

Not enough contrast!
Believe me. The colors worked out much better in my head. I'm disappointed. Now, I have no hedgehog OR purple colors to play with.
Don't you hate it when that happens?

There was some Trekking sock progress over the weekend. The sock did not Trek. But it did indeed drive up to New Hampshire and sit by a lake. That's a trek in my book!
And today? Even though it feels a lot like grumpy Tuesday, it's actually Thursday.
Thank goodness for that.
But now, here I am at the end of my blog entry and I'm left with one thought.....I coulda had a hedgehog.

My weekend in pictures

Words tomorrow.

If it's Saturday, it must be sky!

It's Saturday! And you know what that means?

Here's mine!

If you want to check out the skies, look into the comments of my June 24th entry.
PRIZE PATROL!
There are 118 people signed up for Saturday Skies! (!!!!!WOW!!!!). Using this random generator, the winning comment number is 62. With careful counting, Susan of Labradorable is the 62nd person to leave a comment. Whoohoo, Susan! She wins a mystery prize of some kind of yarn (not yet settled upon).
Room for more!
If you are interested in joining in, there is no cut off date or deadline. Read the last few entries giving you all the details you need to know.
Subsitute Sky Leader
I will be away for the long weekend until Tuesday night. I will be swimming, boating and relaxing underneath the New Hampshire skies. The wonderful Miss Donna has so kindly volunteered to take my place here looking after the sky ring, approving new members and such. Any technical questions that are burning and can't wait until Tuesay can be directed to her.
There will be no flinging of paper airplanes, spitballs, whoopie cushions or any such nonsense on the substitute now, you hear? Make me proud!
:)