Punishments

I really don't know who I punish more when I take away tv viewing for a day or several days. My middle girl who can read at a 3rd grade level (while still in Kindergarten) or myself. When I turn off the tv the girls tear the house apart. They do things that would bring them harm (sliding down the stairs on blankets) and lots of noise. I tried throwing them out of the house to play, but we had the "it's a bug" crying, the "it's raining" cry and the one I loved most...."it's a thunderstorm." It doesn't help that they really can't play in our backyard without constant supervision (not of them, but of the evil neighbors and their evil dogs). I do have Jim Dale reading Harry Potter books (number 5) playing in hopes that they listen quietly (yeah, right), but that is not happening. I can't handle this much noise and there are things that I want to get finished before the weekend. That is what I am trying to do...I am working on dishcloths (to give as gifts), my daughter's hat (she tore the needles apart trying to put an 1 1/2 inch amount of knitted hat on her very large head) that I have restarted more times than I care to count, 3 afghans and 1 clown and 1 penguin. When I get these finished I'll post the links to where I got the patterns or at least the book that you can look at to make something like it. I am also trying to get photos onto my snapfish account so that I can print photos for my neice (she is coming to town and I like to give her pictures of her with her cousins). But that keeps stopping itself. So very frustrating. I decided to take a break from that and put up some photos of things I have made recently. I hadn't put up photos because gifts for my friends were in there and I wanted this to be a surprise for them.

Okay, now to the pictures:
Hats that I have made.... The pattern idea came from Wendy Knits. It is a 3 x 3 rib, but I added 18 to the cast on to make it large enough to fit my daughter's head. The smaller size fits my youngest daughter and my neice. This hat was made for my oldest daughter and fits my youngest. It uses some leftover sock yarn that is a rainbow. My oldest loves rainbows. I started with a 3 x 3 knit and I don't remember how many I cast on and I used 1 1/2 US dpns. When I got to the crown, I just started playing around with trying to put a long thin area that would just be fun.

Did I mention that I was working on dishcloths? I think I did. I have a friend who likes the color yellow, so I made her some yellow dishcloths: I made one with a stripe, because I had someone ask me how to add a stripe to knit items. I made one that has Christmas coloring. I made just a plain yellow dishcloth. I also used a pattern from RaAnn Clegg (her site is: http://wicketstitch.blogspot.com/2007/11/leprechaun-and-pot-of-gold-dishcloth.html) I love her designs and I really enjoy making the dishcloths using her patterns. I also finished a prayer shawl. I gave this to my friend Margaret. She has very serious asthma and hasn't been feeling well. Also, there have been a number of accidents in her yard or in front of her house. She loved her new shawl and was very happy to get this. I also began teaching my daughters how to knit. This is the scarf that my oldest girl worked on:

Now for some of our backyard wildlife: We saw this poor bird and couldn't figure out what it was, but with some research, it appears to be an albino robin (it is half normal coloring and half albino). We have several rabbits They come very close to the house.

My newest cat has become a very interesting part of our household. After Easter, we had some empty Easter baskets lying around and she would lay down in them She likes to play with pencils: The other two cats just have to have a good deal of adult contact. My middle cat, has taken up residence in a broken drawer of my daughter's dresser (we are in the process of trying to fix it, again).

It is Friday....

Friday has finally made another appearance. This week has been a long week for me. My daughters have not been able to get the concept that mom needs to rest. So this week I went to Burger King (one near us has a playland), to McDonald's twice (again a playland) and the Museum (a scavenger hunt with the girls), a pool (across the street) and Kings Island (play area with water). Rest....what is that? I have been working on little projects in hopes of finishing them.

I started an afghan for a friend's daughter. I have a clown for my niece and a penguin for her as well. I finishing a hat for my daughter. Dishcloths for many people (I fill a box for someone and then put a name on the box and put it away for Christmas). I have an afghan for my brother-in-law that I am working on. It is slow work, because I don't have a pattern and I am making this up as I go. I have to make many hats and scarves. Every year I let the girls pick out their yarn and make them hats and scarves for the new school year. So I have 4 hats and 4 scarves to make. My husband is funny, he wants one too.

My new cat is a yarn cat. She loves to play with the yarn while I am knitting. But I made an interesting discovery....kitty teeth are sharp enough to make the wool separate. She chewed through my alpaca yarn while I was working on something. She is a good cat, she doesn't play with the yarn when I am not making something. Now I just have to teach her not to play with it when I am working on something.

I have been looking at some pretty funny knitting sayings on different items. I think one of my favorites is that I knit therefore I am always armed with two really sharp sticks, sturdy yarn and scissors so don't mess with me. I also like the ones that mention K2tog - do you know the code. I have a friend who liked the phrase SABLE....Stash Acquisition beyond life expectancy. But my absolute favorite shirt was the one where the front says, "My wife says we have the perfect marriage..." the back says "I work so she can knit." My husband agreed with it. But I think I knit to keep me calm when the kids get wild. So maybe my motto would be more like I knit so I don't kill. But I think I just knit so that I am able to control my blood pressure. What is best is that my girls love to wear what I make and love to pose with the items. I have a good group of girls and a wonderful husband.

Time to go....storms are moving in. Have a great weekend.

It's June.....

I find it hard to believe that it is already June. We celebrated my oldest girl's birthday. We had the girl's annual birthday picnic. We celebrated my oldest girl's 8th birthday, my middle girl's 7th birthday and for those who just can't get around to it, my youngest girl's 5 1/2 birthday. Everyone seemed to have a good time. My friend and I had dueling cameras (that is where we took pictures of each other while taking each other's picture). I was so glad to see all my friends who made it up to celebrate with us. Had a nice visit with my cousin, who came to the party. Visited with my brother-in-law and sister-in-law. My mother-in-law had just had surgery and was recuperating at home, but my father-in-law made it to the party. My parents made it....but my sisters (one of whom likes to state that we live too far away) and my brother didn't attend. But then they don't want to make the effort. This is where my friends, who are more like sisters, come in....they take the place of my sisters who like people to think they are good aunts, but really don't make the effort. I love being an aunt, but was never given the opportunity to be an aunt to my neices. When I married my husband, I inherited a nephew. A great guy. I was allowed to take him places, spoil him and take a real interest in him. I will be grateful to my sister-in-law for letting me be the aunt that I wanted to be. My brother-in-law is also allowing me to be an aunt to his child. I love that little girl, but I refuse to dictated to by her. Reason: I have three girls and it would be anarchy if I let her do it and they saw me let her do it. I do love her and I love the time I have been allowed to be around her. We wish we could see her more often, but she lives pretty far away and when she comes to town we go to see her at my in-laws. I am looking forward to July, because I will get to see my neice again and we want to take her swimming or playing at a park. My girls are also looking forward to her visit. They have so much fun together.

Now, I finished a prayer shawl today, took a picture (haven't downloaded the photo yet) and put in a box to be wrapped to give to my friend for a gift when she needs one most. She has been down a lot lately. People are crashing in her front yard and in front of her house and her lilac bush has been seriously hit more than a few times. You add in that her health hasn't been the greatest, (I have no room to talk) it really weighs her down. I miss seeing her and hanging out with her, but we do try to talk whenever we can.

I started working on a blanket for another friend's child. She gave me all this yarn that had been intended for her to make a baby blanket with, but she couldn't motivate to make the blanket. So I told her I would see what I could do for her. It is acrylic yarn and I am using two strands at once. I will be curious to see how this turns out.

Backyard wildlife has been blossoming. We have big black rat snakes....Saw one with my own eyes and where there is one there are two. We have lots of bunnies - adults and babies. Got to love that. We have chipmunks (I wonder if that is what drew the snakes to us). Birds, lots and lots of colorful birds. But there is a noticeable absence of cats...in the past we have had lots of strays in our backyard. We always took care of them, but they seemed to have backed off recently. It must be the neighbors evil dogs. Yes, I still have my lazy neighbor and her evil dogs. Over the winter it came to brass tacks. I take photos of the dogs in my yard, call the police and the dog catcher. Then they (the idiot neighbors) go to court and have to pay fines for their dogs. I noticed something one day. I was walking to church and when I was walking on the sidewalk, she would scold the dogs for going on the attack, but let us go out our back door to our backyard, she lets them continue the attack. I had a friend and her children over one day, I was telling her children where the yard ended so they stayed in our yard. Then I let the children out into the backyard and her dogs were out. My friend got to see first hand what I have been dealing with. She let them continue to charge barking and growling at the children (3 of whom were not mine). We watched the dogs and made sure that the children were safe, but she is getting even for our calling the police on her. But then her dogs should not be allowed to chase my children (has happened twice) or run in my yard (happened at least 4 times that I know of). The thing that is most gross is that she doesn't clean up after her dogs and it smells like a sewer next door. I know eventually there will be repercussions from that. That will have to come from the HOA.

I should be finishing a dishcloth and a hat real soon, plus I really want to finish some afghans. We will see where I end up on these projects. Have a good week.

Just a Few Updates

I have been busy. Yes, I have been playing on Facebook, but I have been working on dishcloths to give as gifts. I have made several. But since they are all about the same, I didn't take a lot of photos. I finished a hat for one daughter, a scarf (used to teach my oldest to knit). All three of my girls decided that they needed to learn how to knit and I had them all sitting around with needles and yarn knitting. Fixing their mistakes when they would pull the yarn off the needles. But only one was still working on her project over the next few days.

School is out. I have pneumonia. Go figure. My asthma takes a turn for the worse and I get very ill. I have another hat almost finished. I finished one prayer shawl in alpaca blue color and gave it to the family of Maria Schafstein (sp?). She died on her way home from spring break. The vehicle she was riding in flipped and she was killed. Others in the vehicle were injured and one is still in critical condition. She went to my alma mater and I just felt I had to share this with her family. I am almost finished with a pink alpaca shawl. I think that will go to a friend. Not sure yet. Usually about that time, I decide. I am still using patterns from a source I have shared before, for the patterns in dishcloths. I finished her leprechaun and pot of gold. It turned out very nice. I used yellow cotton yarn.

I am still working with Girl Scouts. I have a great time with my girls. My co-leader and I work very hard to get the stuff together for the girls to do and then we find all kinds of fun patches they can earn. It is a lot of fun.

My family and I have been spending a lot of time out. We go to the nearby amusement park. Love the place, especially the water side. I can watch them play and have fun, while I knit. I have so much to finish. I also take them to the zoo and to the museums. They get more out of all our activities. So do I. I enjoy being with the girls when they don't fight.

Don't forget Saturday is WWKIP Day. Take your knitting or crocheting out and have fun. Let me know where you plan to knit. For me it will now be in my house. Reason: I have pneumonia and hauling children to another place to play is just too exhausting and I need my rest.