A very Spidey Christmas

Christmas Stocking

This is what has been taking up my time.  I started this on November 21st and just finished it today.
I am quite pleased with how it turned out, hopefully the Fisherman will like it. 

I am quite prodcutive

When I am left to my own devices and there is no t.v.

 

Dessert from Saturday nights dinner

apple crisp

Beef stew with turnips, carrots, parsnips & sweet potato

beef stew

Wooly socks made for the Fisherman just cause. 

Made with Lionbrand Fishermen's wool on size 6 needles.

2x2 rib. 

wooly socks

Knitting season is fast approaching

Christmas is my favorite time of year, the snow, the twinkle lights, the magic, the red cups at Starbucks, hey, just being honest.  What I don't love is that Christmas now starts in October and the commercialism of it all and why it's now called 'giftmas'. It is what it is, it's the times we live in etcetera, etcetera, sad, but true.  I will get off my soapbox now. 

The Fisherman tells a story where his younger brothers teacher knit her entire class a Christmas stocking, his brother being in this class received one, he was slightly jealous and still is I think of that.  So, being a knitter, I've decided to rectify this and knit him a Christmas stocking. There was an internal debate, what kind to knit, a serious more traditional one, maybe some kind of gansey motif or something fun like the fornicating deer or penguin? The Fisherman loves Spiderman, so I go onto Ravelry and search for the famous web slinger and low and behold there is a Spiderman sweater!  It's cute really, knit up in blue with red trim, Spidey's face done up in intarsia on one sleeve and a spider web & spider on the other, I've decided to take the Spidey face sleeve and somehow turn that into a stocking to be hung by the chimney with care (there may even be a Deadpool one in my future if all goes well with Spidey).  Pictures to come when I start it. 

I need some ideas for stocking stuffers, gifts I got under control, the stocking stuffers are what throw me, any ideas?  

The Fishermans Socks

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day.

Teach a man to fish and you can get rid of him for the weekend.

Boyfriend Socks by Alice Bell
Knit on size 1.5 needles
Yarn: Sundara Sport Merino Two
Color way: Cape Cod Bay


The socks, they are done and best of all, he loves them! They fit well and are warmed than a pair of silk lined socks he once had, and they go well with his robe.

I started a second pair of socks for him yesterday for him, out of Lion Brand Fishermen's wool on size 6 needles, so, it's really no surprise that I turned the heel this morning.  Hopefully these will be done by Friday. 

I am most proud of the sock label I made to wrap around these. I took a cartoon drawing my fisherman's brother drew of him, made it black & white (I do not have a color printer) put it in the center with the sock name at the top & knit for you with love and under the picture was a cute little joke along with the care instructions.

I've gotten a little tripped up on my Irish Coffee, but I have a feelings once I get past this little hurdle, it'll be smooth sailing for the sweater (fingers crossed). 

Look what followed me home...

...can I keep it?

The Fisherman took me on a wonderful surprise weekend to North Conway, NH. There were waterfalls and snowfalls, wonderful meals and tons of laughs.  While in N. Conway we happened upon a yarn store. I went in looking for some lovely souvenir sock yarn for me, when the Fisherman happened to notice some berroco sox in a manly color way. He liked it, so, I got it to knit him a pair of socks.  I'm thinking a plain ol ribbed for his pleasure kind of socks for this yarn. 
I also got myself some lovely purple/grey/black yarn for a pair of tall socks for myself.  Hey, if he can wear hand knit socks fishing, so can I, plus, I've been watching #operationsockdrawer on instagram and have increasingly jealous of all the hand knit socks people seem to have.


multi color of tans, gold, navy, green & white

actually, it's a lovely black to grey to purple color.

Th-th-th-that's all folks. 

I am thiiiiiis close

to being done with the Fisherman's sock, the first one on the size 1.5 needles.  I already have plans for another pair after this one is done too, because I am crazy and like knitting kayak covers. 
The man wears a size 12 shoe.  SIZE 12 SHOE!  Luckily his feet aren't wide.  

I spent some time with the Fisherman this past weekend and he requested biscuits and gravy for breakfast.  I have never made this nor had I ever eaten before, but it was GOOD. I looked up some recipes, and went with the Joy the Baker's dad's buttermilk biscuit recipe, so easy & so yummy! As for the gravy portion, I decided to go with the Pioneer Woman's recipe for sausage gravy. Again, so easy and so, very, very yummy.  

biscuits & sausage gravy

Now, what you do with the leftover buttermilk? You make homemade buttermilk pancakes of course!
(sorry there's no picture of those) They were quite yummy though!

That's really all I got and for that I am sorry. 

Grateful

There is something in everyday to be grateful for, some days it is harder to find that one thing and others there seems to be an myriad of things.  It is the 10th month of 2013, my year of gratitude, here are some things that I am grateful for in no particular order:

• my Bubba, man I love that kid with all my heart.
• my family, alive and gone
• kitties
• the Fisherman
• my friends
• my past loves, heartaches, joys and everything in between
• silly songs
• kayaking & fishing, 2 thing I really enjoy
• yoga
• knitting
• shooting range, I miss that
• driving range, nothing like hitting a big ol bucket of balls

I'm starting to think about what I want my word to be for 2014, Love or Faith. Though truth be told I'm leaning towards Love. Luckily I have a couple of months to decide.  :)

Monkey with Crayon Rage

That's totally gonna be my band name.

So, silly girl that I am didn't read her instructions properly and continued ribbing away on her Irish Coffee instead of switching to stockinet stitch...for five rows!  Rather than tink back the 5 rows I'm just dropping the purl stitches and picking them up the correct way and so far so good.  :)

Th-th-th-that's all folks!

Gramps

It is done! Fin! Finished! Ends woven in, old man buttons attached and elbow patches ironed on.

Ta-Da!

I can't wait to give it to my little bubba on Saturday.  I like this tradition of knitting him a sweater for his birthday.  Little bit of Auntie love for her little bubba. 

Sadly, I have to frog back a bit on the fisherman's sock and start the heel about 5 rows sooner than I did.  Not a big deal really.  My goal is to have these done by our weekend getaway around the end of October.  (same goal for my Irish Coffee Sweater) I totally can do this, at least with the sock because I knit pretty much the foot & heel while watching a bunch of episodes of Supernatural on Netflix Saturday afternoon. 

On a side note, I love my mailman at work, he just brought me gelato from the shop across the street :D

It's Fall!

It's officially fall.  The sun is setting earlier and earlier, the air is a tad chillier and blankets are once again gracing the bed. I love this time of year, snuggling by the fireplace, drinking tea, knitting big things, like the squish (no picture yet). 

log cabin blanket
picture courtesy of the fisherman

I brought my log cabin blanket to the fisherman's house to soak & block. It's still there and he's been using it to keep him warm while he writes, he took this picture after bringing it out to the sunroom (aka my favorite room) to dry, but, it's 'officially' finished, blocked and photographed.  Surprisingly it grew quite a bit in blocking which for some reason surprised me.

My little bubba's gramps cardigan officially has buttons on it! Next up, elbow patches!

Also, I turned the heel on the fisherman's boyfriend sock.  The second sock I did on size 1.5 needles rather than the size 2, it should fit snugger and I did the heel from the Watson sock rather than a short row.  So far so good, fingers crossed!

The Most Important Meal of the Day

I'm talking about breakfast.

Saturday morning the Fisherman and I went fishing at the flats.  I caught seaweed and a shell, the Fisherman caught a flounder.  I don't know, such is the nature of the beast or the fish in this case.
I used a spin rod as it is far to late in the season to be teaching me how to cast a fly rod, which I am ok with, I like the spin rod.

When we got home I went a little hog wild and made a full Irish breakfast for my Fisherman.  This was a plan as I made the brown bread a couple of nights before and went to the magical German Kitchen where the blood sausages and good bacon live.

I poached my very first egg with the help of Alton Brown (he is a genius) and look how pretty it is.
It doesn't even look poached, but, trust me it is.

first poached egg

 

Breakfast included: Irish Brown Bread, poached eggs, beans in tomato sauce, blood sausage, bacon roasted potato (not shown) & breakfast sausage (for me I don't really dig on blood sausage). 

 

Irish Brekkie with Earl Grey tea

The Fisherman was so proud of this breakfast that showed it to a couple of his fishing buddies.  They were impressed (as they should be...look at that egg!!) 

 

It was gobbled up with much enthusiasm and gusto and I believe the phrase, 'you know it's a good breakfast when you need to take a break from easting sausage to eat some bacon.'

 

We then retired to the couch for a much needed nap.  :)

 

Sugar Skulls & Kayaking

I love em they are pretty and kinda girly.

I have had zero mojo for anything. Seriously, not.one.blessed.thing.

I did finish my little Bubba's (don't ask, I call him Bubba) Gramps cardigan, I need to put on the super cool old man buttons and elbow patches on it still, but the knitting and blocking is done (pictures once the buttons are on it)

Good news is I finally got my knitting mojo back.  I've been working on Irish Coffee and my dear Fisherman's Boyfriend sock. 

The sock that I finished I fear will have to be redone with smaller needles, the foot part fit ok but the leg portion could be a little tighter.  Being that I hadn't started the second sock I figured it would be a good opportunity to knit it using a 1.5 needle rather than the size 2.

Now if only my exercise mojo would return, I miss it, just not enough to get out of bed in the morning (it's too crowded after work)

I cannot wait for the weekend, Batman the animated series on Friday night with some knitting, fishing on Saturday and maybe some kayaking and Sunday, lounging and video games, perfect weekend in my opinion.

Can I just say that I love kayaking, who knew?  My fisherman and I went kayaking a couple of weekends ago (my second time out), and was on the lake for almost 5 hours!  Some paddling and exploring but mostly drifting and a little light fishing (I caught a tree!) it's so peaceful. I might take a plain vanilla sock with me next time, for the quiet time. 

My kayak (it's the fisherman's but it's the one I use and love) is orange and heavy and desperately needs a name, because calling her my sweet girl just isn't cutting it anymore. She needs a good name (maybe Kaywinnit). I also kinda want to adorn her with a sugar skull sticker. 

Hopefully I'll have the squish blanket finished & blocked for my next post.

Summer Recap

Man alive it's August. When did that happen? Seriously...

I ran a 5k the last Sunday in June, well, I ran the first mile and a half, I did a little of both walking and running the last mile and a half, it was hot out.

before

during

after

July:
~ Turned a year older
~ I went kayaking and chased some ducks.  It was fun, I can't wait to do it again!
~ played mini-golf, lost & got sunburned

August so far:
~  I've walked on the beach at sunset. it was lovely.
~ was able to hold the crow pose for like 5 seconds in yoga :)
~ finished a sock. 

so far so good :)
hope your summer is too

A love story of sorts

I couldn't let another anniversary go by without saying something.

That handsome devil at the top there, is my kitty Sirus, Si for short, 12 years ago today my now ex husband and I adopted him.  He was an early birthday present for our first year of marriage.  Apparently I am the kind of person who needs to have a cat, or so Dave told me.  Dave went to the shelter before he took me and scoped out the kitties, found Si, whose name at the time was Seal.  He brought me down to meet him and another couple was interested in him, luckily we got him first! He was an older cat, about 1 or 2 at the time and a complete love.  We took him home, and this is where the love story begins. 

I have always been Si's person and he has always been 'my' cat.  Meaning that Si was always in the same room as me, if he was asleep on the couch and I got up to go to on the computer, he would wake up and follow me.  At night, he would sleep on my pillow, well the top of it, with his paws on my head. Dave was actually a little jealous of this.  In fact that was one of the reasons he agreed to getting Lila, so that he could have his own cat. HA! Lila is very much her own cat, and my Si guys shadow.  She absolutely adores him and follows him EVERYWHERE, it's kinda cute. 

Si has been my faithful companion thru a lot, a divorce, 4 moves & more than a heartaches.  He is my heart. 

the first and last time we ever napped like this

Paint Night!

So, Saturday morning before I left for yoga I checked my email.  There was a groupon for paint night, so I clicked the little linky poo and checked out what it would entail.  I found one that, I will be honest, seemed easy.  I am not an artist nor do I play one on t.v. It was circles and really, how can you screw that up? So, I got the groupon & 5 seconds after the code arrived in my in-box signed up for the "class".  It was at a sushi bar in Cambridge, yummy idaho maki btw, ordered myself a beer, and got my paint on. 

I thought I had progress pictures, but, sadly I do not.  I do have the finished result.  And I am also pleased to announce that I did not spill anything, which, after the pizza inncident on Sunday, was my goal for the night.

All and all, it was a really fun night.  Next time I might see if I can con some people into going with me.

Here is the end result.

a pair of socks

I have misplaced my knitting mojo.  It happens to the best of us right? I was however able to complete a Patricks socks before the mojo went walk-a-bout.  What you don't believe me? You want proof? Fine, I see how it is... 

BAM! Socks



Betcha feelin bad for not believing me now, arentcha? It's ok, I forgive you. ;)

Boston Strong

Man, this post is hard to write.  The city that I love was attacked on Monday.  Thankfully no one I know was injured.  My heart goes out for the injured and for the families of the deceased.

Dear Boston,
My home, my heart, always will be yours. 
pam

Gamble about like a bunny





I signed up for my first 5K. Who is this person inhabiting my body? Seriously, WTF am I thinking? 
I started trainning today with my nifty RunZombie 5k app, 37.30min, 1.99 miles, not too shabby for a beginner who mostly did walking. I might treat myself to some yarn or a pedicure after I complete this.

Speaking of yarn! I had some birthday yarn from many years ago, that was just sitting there and sitting there looking all pretty & green, pleading with me to knit it up.  I felt bad so I bought a pattern, and started knitting on Irish Coffee, and I love it!  I can't wait to see what it looks when it's done.

The BFF socks are coming along well, the pattern makes the yarn sing! or the yarn makes the pattern sing, either way you get the idea.

That's about all I got.
:)
xoxo

April

So, yesterday, April 2nd, I looked outside my office window and what did my wandering eyes did appear, an otter.  Yup, random.  No one at work believed me, I was beginning to doubt my eyes, but, I know what I saw and it made me happy and that's all that matters. 

The Golly socks are no more, the pattern and the yarn were not a good match, and I am ok with that.  I'd rather knit up that lovely pattern on a plain yarn where you'll be able to see the pattern than have it be lost in the lucious yarn colors. I was able to find a new pattern, one with lots of cabley goodness.  I will start those most likely on Saturday.

my lil freshie

 I've had this little freshie since she was 8 weeks old.  Even though she is still small (she was the runt of the litter) she has grown alot.  She was once a scared little kitten and now, she is a scared little cat.  She still doesn't like loud noises, new things or people make her scurry under the bed to her own little kitty fort, but unlike the kitten she once was she will now jump up on your lap to cuddle. This coming Monday my dear, sweet, little Lila girl will be 8. 

Geek + Weekend = Geekend

Saturday, I went to a LAN party, the first that I actively participated in.  It was great fun, good people, junk food - pizza, donuts, mini muffins galore! I played Tomb Raider Anniversary, Left 4 Dead 2, Quake 3 and we even watched a little Firefly. Good times!!

Sunday - I went to PAX East. I totally fangirled on Chewie & Deadpool, it was awesome.

 

There was no knitting, except maybe 2 rows on my "little ass kicker" scarf that will be a cowl.  I am not digging the fringe/linen stitch situation, it's driving me a little bonkers. Thankfully I'm only like 5 rows in, so, it's not a big deal to rip it and start over. 

 

The 2nd boy sock is almost done, I should probably bring it home so I can work on it tonight.  Lately, I've been eating HUGE salads for lunch (mostly in preperation & recovery from the lost geekend) and since those huge salads take time to eat I've only been able to knit 2 or 3 rows on the sock a day.  Sad.

Stash is a personal thing

At knitting this past Saturday, I was informed that my stash was stashy enough and that I needed to add more to it.  I say no, not yet anyway.  I have somethings on the needles I want to get off first.  Also I think part of my problem is that I buy a lot of sock yarn, my theory is that I can splurge on a nice skein of yarn without it breaking the bank, like say, a sweaters worth of MadTosh would do.  So then what happens is that I have a ton of sock yarn, luckily I like knitting socks. My point, yes there was one, somewhere, is that while others may feel my humble stash isn't large enough, I think it's perfect for me.

I got a grown up phone this year, it's bad when you have the same phone as your 13 year old niece. So, I logged onto Verizon, saw that I had an upgrade and went with whatever was free, in this case it happened to be the Iphone 4, it's nice, not sure I like being this connected to everything though. Granted it comes in handy, at say knitting and I need to check a pattern or youtube a technique. 

I'm trying to get back into the habit of blogging, I miss it and I miss you guys.  They're not all going to be gems but I will try.  :)

Love Me or Leave Me

Let me lonely, you won't believe me but I love you only.

Oh Nina, how I love you.

I had an extremely blah week last week, and although the mood is subsiding, I'm still in a funk.  I sometimes feel like Jack in Brokeback Mountain, I wish I could quit you, but, like Rufus W says "everything it seems I like's a little bit stronger, a little bit thicker, a little bit harmful for me."

Seriously, just call me Sugar Kane.

I've been knitting on my fisherman's Golly socks in the lovely Cape Cod Bay colorwork by the talented Sundara. 

I am still plugging away on my boo's socks, I am just past the heel turn on the second sock. 

I have also started a linen stitch scarf, my tv knitting, using my Walking Dead inspired yarns from Bohemia Fibers and a pair of socks for my dear sweet love Liam in STR lightweight, colorway Puck's Mischief. 

So many things

That is my baby girl, until I can think of a better name for her, she is a S&W M&P 15-22.    She was a gift.  Cool huh?

And ya, I met the Yarn Harlot, and she graciously held my sock.  She's kinda awesome.

Happy Valentine's Day!

It's Valentine's Day, the day of love, flowers, chocolate and socks!

I finished one sock for the boy, they are really black, but my phone likes to make things purple, I do not know why.  

My secret squirrell knitting has been taking up most of my night knitting, it's out of yummy madeline tosh sock, so squishy.  I adore this yarn and I will eventually buy myself more, at the moment though, I am trying to knit from stash.

That's about all I got right now. 

Hope ya'll have a love filled day!

Blizzard!

And I ain't talking about the yummy frozen DQ treat. 

I am talking SNOWMAGEDDON!! There is a lot of snow, which means that Mother Nature has graciously granted me a knitting day. 

Today I will work on the Gridiron sock & my super secret swap project :) 

I really have nothing interesting to say and I appologize. 

One Month

It's been one month since the start of the new year (and probably my last post - sorry)

So far, I've been doing well writing down things I'm grateful for, some days it's just simple things like the kitties or hot cocoa with marshmallows, others, more important things.

I joined a swap on Ravelry, I'll post what I sent my lovely spoilee after she received her package (it has some knit gifts in it.)

I was sick the past couple of days.  I hate being sick, when you're little staying home sick was fun, it's not fun anymore, maybe cause the cartoons have been replaced with bad t.v. drama. 

I am almost done with my tall socks part deux, I have started a second pair of socks for my friend Liam, and another pair of gridirons.  That will be 3 out of my 6 pair for the year when all is said and done.  :)

The Squish will never be finished.  I have accepted that I will be knitting on till I die.  I may just knit my memoirs into it a la Madame DeFarge.  I exaggerate, I know this.

I am tired,  I just didn't want you to think I fell off the face of the earth.

xoxo 

Confessions of a Newbie Gym Rat



So, I've started going to the little gym in my building.  I've grown quite attached to my favorite elliptical machine.  I get a little sad and mad when I go there & someone else is on it, willing them to get off the machine with my mind.  It never works. Please tell me I'm not the only one who does this.

More tomorrow.

Happy New Year!

2013 was rung in with a thud.  One day, I will stay up to watch the ball drop, ya, I keep telling myself that.

I really just wanted to wish ya'll a Happy New Year!!

xoxo