Annie Knits

I Have a Slightly-Formed Idea

And I'd like your help. 

I blogged recently about not having just a ton to blog about.  I just don't have time for deep or even complete thoughts during the summer.  It seems my time is so chopped up with caring for my kids when they're home that even when I do sit down and read things, they don't sink in -- I don't make connections like I can when I have some time to myself.  I rely on other people's blogs and the newspaper for that kind of thought during the summer. 

When I read this post by Fred of The Slactivist I got a jolt (actually it's a back entry -- I'm catching up.)  It's tangentially about some of my angst over blogs lately.  I wrote about the comments I get about bloggers recently -- 'How do you know they aren't icky old guys in their basements...' -- to which I didn't respond.  What kind of answer do you give to a question that so deftly defines the questioner's ignorance of and inexperience with blogs?  This woman's blog is a new find for me and this entry helped to crystallize some of my thoughts concerning the war overseas...Probably not an icky guy in a basement somewhere in middle America.

What blogs do you read that help you define or explore your own thoughts and opinions?  Leave links for me, cause interruption number one has awakened (why can't this kid sleep past 7:00 a.m.?) and I'm about to become fragmented again. 

Oh, wait,  here's the truth of the matter -- he's hugging me right now singing 'Happy Birthday To You' in my ear as I type.  Clarity of thought for a few years is a small price to pay for this one moment in time.  [smile]  Peace.

Lest You Think I'm Moping...

I don't think I'll rant today.  Not when I look what Mother Nature always gets me for my birthday (tomorrow I'll be fortymumble -- hmm, could that be the reason for my doldrums?). 

We call them surprise lillies, but I bet you gardeners out there know their real name.  I love these plants.  Bulbs actually.  They are a big clump of green leaves in the spring, thicker than daffodils and wider, blunt at the ends.  They are among the first things to green up in my spring garden here in Missouri and they're a clump of background green all spring.  Then, without flowering or anything, they die back.  You mulch over them and wait.  At the end of July, over the course of about three days, green spikes shoot  out of the ground and flower like this.  Surprise! They're pink and orange.  They flower for several days and then they are gone as quickly as they came, the fleshy stem rots away completely.  Again, I say, among my favorite plants for sheer cheek! I also love their setting in my garden.  They're in a super shady spot that gets a hit of sun early in the morning.  They almost glow in the dark here.  Happenstance, let me assure you, but I marvel at them each year come the sultry late July mornings -- just one of my little joys.

Another little joy is my little green gazing ball that is now engulfed by mint and Rudbekia (Black Eyed Susans).  See the peek of glittering green?  Spent daylilies on the left, mint and Rudbekia front and center, and a pot full of Winter Savory on the right (I love Winter Savory Beurre Compose in the winter).  The little shot of happy I get when I walk in the door.  And this time of year, the finches come and eat the Rudbekia seeds here too -- it's a rather large patch just alongside our breezeway -- cute little bundles of yellow and black flitting around just outside the windows. 

What?  You don't make beurre compose with your summer herbs?  It's great on frozen winter veggies.  Just take a stick of softened butter and a handful of herbs -- parsley, thyme, savory, oregano, rosemary -- all good (not basil or sage -- they turn icky and black).  Even mix them up... parsley thyme butter rocks -- whatever flavors you like.  Whir them up in your food processor (I have a small two-cup version that's perfect) enough to chop up the herbs.  Scoop out the butter mixture and put it in plastic wrap.  Form the mixture into a log and twist the ends.  I keep this stuff in the freezer and put a tad on almost everything all winter.  Keep it tightly wrapped, with wrap touching all parts of the log so it doesn't get freezer burn.   I know it's 'butter', but I don't use a ton.  Just enough for flavor and I don't like to use margarine or any of that fake stuff.  I especially like a hit of thyme butter in cream of mushroom soup.  Yum.  The herbs stay fresh and retain that fresh taste, not at all like dried herbs.  The downfall is that when you are out of power for 4 days you might feel like you have to throw away everything in your freezer and then you have to start your beurre compose collection all over again.   Sigh.

Knitting?  Rowan fans out there:  are there any good patterns for this yarn in their books?  I'm fixated on the idea of knitting a denim sweater and I want to know all of my options.  However, I don't want to do the math to figure out the shrinkage issues, so I feel I have to use one of their patterns.  I'm happy to buy one of their magazines if it has what I want, I just don't want to buy them all -- and we don't stock them in the shop.  Suggestions anyone?

See you next week!

Friday Night Update

My blog entry titles suck sometimes.  Whatever.  I've got a Friday evening sky shot for Sandy -- this is a huge, billowing cloud.  Cross your fingers that it doesn't turn into another set of storms!

Off topic (knitting) a little -- if you're adopted, a birth or adoptive parent, or know one of these, this Diane Rehm show podcast (scroll down to the 11 o'clock hour) is something you should listen to.  The book contains portions of an interview with my birth mother as well as a hundred other birth mothers.  Such a bunch of courageous women.  I'll have to blog about this issue sometime -- I am an adoptee.  My birth mom found me 15 years ago and is part of my life now (hey, your kids can't have too many grandparents can they?).  My mom and birth mom are women to be emulated.  They both make me so proud -- I should be so great.

On the knitting front, I'm working on a new version of the stealth wedding afghan -- the last version was, alas, too small.  This one is just right and I've got to get cracking if I'm to finish in time.  Sorry, no pics.
The yarn?  Two colors of Korall and one of Korall Fancy -- chevrons of course.  Korall is this great wool cabled yarn -- nice heft but not wooly or scratchy, very soft really.  It's lovely.

On the blogging front -- I have to say...I'm not feeling very interesting lately.  I'm certainly not knitting anything absolutely earth shatteringly interesting or difficult or creative -- what do you blog about when, really, there's not much in your life to blog about?  Seems all I do is cart kids around to their summer activities and do their laundry.  I'm not even reading a particularly great book just now -- just a summer read called The Eight -- kind of Dan Brown lite. 

I have to say that I'm anxious about the situation on Lebanon and Iraq -- I don't think that our international fate/image is in particularly good hands at the moment and that makes me nervous.  I'm anxious about the weather -- weird all over, blackouts, storms, heat -- and I don't think the energy consumption plans for our future are in particularly good hands either.  Serious malaise here... maybe that's what's got me stymied... I think Lucia blogged about this feeling earlier last week.  Even buying yarn (the yarn for the afghan, ok?) didn't help -- so this malaise isn't something superficial [smile].  And you know, now that I notice it, my dog can't calm down either.  Something's afoot, I tell you, something's afoot.  Just can't put my finger on it -- [smile again].

Sometimes a rant makes me feel better.  Maybe I'll work up one of those for later ... 

It Was a Dark and Stormy Night ...

Wednesday evening to Sunday evening without power.  I'm not waxing poetic at all about all this.  Bridgett is and you should read what she has to say.  Her experience is a lot like mine was -- sans funeral and broken tooth that is.  And she got her power back on way earlier than I did.  But she writes better than I do.  Better and deeper -- I'm especially intrigued with her 'three days of civilization' postulation.  Go read, I'll wait.   

Meanwhile,  I'll distract you with pictures. You've seen this angle of my yard before, but not with a cute electric company guy from Indiana climbing down the pole in the middle scant hours before our power came back on Sunday evening.  We had guys on our block from Indiana, Ohio, Florida and Missouri.  They were all so polite and we were all very thankful.  This particular guy ate the two cheeseburgers I had leftover from dinner.  He told me I'd have electricity in a few hours and that I should keep them, but I didn't believe him and he ate the hamburgers happily.  He was like 19 and looked hungry.  Turned out he was right -- our power did come on within a few hours.

Here are pictures one of the three hundred-year-old oak trees downed on the street behind me. See how they just cut an opening for us to drive through (the bit behind the truck?)  The rest of the trunk is here below, on the right.   Behind this house is the culprit -- a very old Sycamore that fell on the power line that runs behind our houses.  It also loosed all of our poles so they had to be re-anchored.  At least it didn't fall on someone's house, just a garage.  Damage enough.   Another tree fell just to the right of this picture and another to the left, punching a hole in this guy's second story window and crushing his side-yard fence.  *Note to city:  stop cutting out tree roots to repair sidewalks -- it weakens the trees.  Figure out some other way.

Well, on with things.  We're fine now, but so many others are not (nearly 100,000 still without power).  Hopes and prayers for them please, because it's hot here.

And while the trip to Britain seems like a long time ago now, I still haven't shown you any of my acquisitions or my pics from Stonehenge, etc.  Yarn and stuff today, ancients another time, 'k?  This crazy little bag (pencil length) is all I got at Harrods.  Like I could buy anything there anyway -- even Coach bags are too cheap to be carried at Harrods.  But this little pencil case in the back to school section in the basement caught my eye.  Sheep being abducted by aliens.  Perfect for my knitting bag notions, dontcha think?  Cracks me up. 

And here is the yarn I found in Winchester (wine included for scale - smile).  Two kinds of sock yarn (one of which we have in the shop but since I've been meaning to get it anyway....) and enough Rowan Denim to make the Starmore sweater in her Aran Sweaters book.  Wendy did one of these and she's right -- it's like knitting with stiff blue jeans (I swatched some) but the idea of it shrinking and wearing like jeans... I like it.  Wouldn't it be fun to have some house socks made out of denim?  Just crazy enough to try, I think, and I got plenty.  Oh, and the aran weight from that flock in Peterborough -- just two skeins. 

I'm off to work -- see y'all tomorrow.  Stay cool!

Whew!

We're ok -- out of power since Wednesday night when a whomping storm blew through but fine now.  I've got to climb mount laundry -- again -- and I'll blog about the storm and aftermath later.  Thanks for the emails and concern.  We're cooling off again.  Whew, again.

Gotta Get my Swaps in Order

I'm not much of a sewer anymore.  I did some quilting in the '90s and I've sewn several Halloween costumes, but, really... hauling out the machine, clearing the Hero Scape off of the dining room table, measuring and cutting and threading and ironing... not really my gig.  But the Knit Sock Kit Swap entails the making of a sock bag, so I've done it.  My pal likes brown and any other colors with brown.   I shopped and shopped and found funky and country and quilty and tye-dyed browns but nothing that made my heart sing until I looked in the upholstry section and came up with this fabric.  It's got monkeys, fish and flowers on it.  It's kind of retro, but in a traditional way.  It's pink and brown.  It's a firm broadcloth. Daughter found the funky beaded trim... I've got enough left to make myself a monkey bag I love it so much.  So there.  I'm including some STR in the Cobalt Bloom colorway -- see how the cake fits perfectly into the little square-bottomed bag?  I got the pattern from a link through Trek's blog, but she needn't worry -- I won't be making a ton of these.  Just this one and one for me.  I'm very proud of the sewn in beaded trim.  Not particularly practical, really, just for grins.  Oh and for the seamstresses out there -- self-lined.

Now... Hmmm... a sock pattern.  Oh, why re-invent the wheel.  And my pal Paula was so generous, I've decided to send my pal my favorite sock book.  You got it.  Sensational Knitted Socks.  Especially since she's not really a sock knitter, but more of a novice -- everything she needs is in this book.  I hope that sending the whole book isn't cheating -- we're supposed to send a pattern with some yarn and a hand-made bag.  I'll tell her which pattern from the book would be good with this yarn -- I guess it is kinda cheating.  Oh well.  Now, just have to add a few little gifties -- some soap I found at the local farmer's market, a counter, some stitch markers, needles ... It'll be in the mail tomorrow.

My SP8?  I'm collecting stuff for her last box too -- I've got Lantern Moon needles, Noro Silk Garden and a pattern from the shop for a short row scarf that's smashing in this yarn.  Some more soap -- chocolate this time as she loves chocolate and I can't ship her any in the summer -- and more little fun things and that'll be off tomorrow too.  Whew.  Now I can put away the sewing machine and dear son can get back to his game.

In the Mood...

To write more about England.  I'll try to finish it up here.  But there's so much to tell and you all are being so patient with me. 

So, on to Stratford upon Avon.  Which I've told folks is a little like Branson, Missouri.  Very touristy.  We, however, stayed in a lovely hotel, right off of the main drag and right nextdoor to this canal.  Through which these wonderful long boats passed all day.  They're like big rig motor homes on water.  Only like 5 or 6 feet wide, but beautifully appointed and maybe 30 or 40 feet long.  There is a 400 year old canal system all over central and southern England and folks buy or rent these boats and sight-see that way.  Stratford had kind of a harbor where lots of them parked to hang out for an evening or to take in a play.  The city also has this system of old, old locks and dams.  The kids would help close and open the locks and had such a great time.  Here, son is watching this boat enter the lock.  Then the lady opened the sluice and the chamber filled up.  She opened the gate beind son, and off went the boat, on to the next one about 200 yards up river.

Next came a guy, youngish, on his first trip in his new boat.  He actually let the kids help.  See his new boat in the background?  So, they open this gate and get the boat in the chamber, close the gate, let the water out and open the down river gate so the boat can move on.  See how low his boat is now?  This small picture is actually of them opening the next gate.  So cool.  There is even another boat waiting it's turn behind them I think.  It's a one-way deal, and there is a wider place between each set of locks so boats can pull over and pass eachother.  If we went back, this would be the way to see the countryside.

I did actually visit the English teacher Mecca -- old Bill's birthplace.  See here's the proof.   But Stratford had something much cooler in store for us:  Warwick Castle.  This is actually a Mme. Tussaud's property and I was wary, but son gets to pick the itinerary some of the time and he'd found this flyer in the hotel.  We figured if it was horrible, we could go into the town and see the sights there.  Silly us.

First of all, it dates from the time of Henry V -- Warwick (the Earl of?  I don't know) was known as the king maker and this castle held out against many an attack -- begun in the 11th century, bits of it were a thousand years old!  So the current Earl couldn't afford it's upkeep and sold it to Mme. T.  They turned it into a living history museum where the kids can get tortured on the rack (constructed from an original that had still been in the castle dungeon -- bad, bad karma in the dungeon we visited -- even had a place they called 'the hole' where you went in and didn't come out.  Enemies of the king and all.  Yeesh.) 

Or you can lock them in the stocks. They had tableaux of waxen figures enacting the Henry the 5th stuff, as well as a visit from Queen Victoria in the 19th century so you could see how the castle had been used through history.  They had a very scary ghost tower that son and I *paid* to go into and get the you know what scared  out of you. 

Then you can watch exhibitions of archery and falconry (like with real birds of prey catching real prey as it scampers away...)  You can climb to the tops of the battlements and nearly throw up from the combination of the height and the heat -- oh wait, that's me.  You can even see the holes in the floor of the battlements  through with  soldiers poured boiling oil onto attackers below.  Lovely.  Also lovely are the passing nods to safety, such as the small bar behind son in this picture.  It's the only bit keeping him from pitching over the side and falling, oh, I don't know, a lot of feet.  Like hundreds.  Really far.  He did not inherit my fear of heights.

To cap off the day, you can sit on a hillside, behind the castle, across the river from a trebuchet (a kind of catapult seige machine) and watch them fire a 100 pound flaming rock 300 yards with it.  Then your kiddies can scamper across the bridge to find where the flaming rock landed.  Such fun.  Yeesh I say again.  (Make sure you click that picture to make it big so you can see how far they shot that rock!)

Both son and daughter (and hubby and I grudgingly) loved this place.  Here are daughter and I next to the trebuchet, behind the castle -- in this picture you can get a sense of it's scale.  Huge.  And for the price of admission, you could clamber in and about and around the whole thing and really get a feel for castles.  Ignore the theme parky flier and go if you get the chance.  Really.

Wow.  I've still got two cities to go.  You're being awfully patient.  But wait.  The yarn is yet to come.

The Travelog Continues

On Friday (remember, we'd arrived on Monday) we checked out of our London hotel and took a shuttle to Heathrow Airport where Steve, the car (a Skoda, whatever that is) was waiting for us.  Leaving Heathrow to get on the London outer-belt and onto a north bound highway for our next destination was harrowing to say the least.   Dude, 15 words, some of which are hyphenated: left-handed stick-shift driving on the right-hand side of the row and roundabouts. 

This is how Dad looked at the hotel pub on our arrival to Peterborough -- daughter's head is hiding the pint. The kids, obviously, were none the worse for wear. 

Our hotel, to the left, was a renovated manor house, begun in the 11th century, called Orton Hall.  So fun to stay is this cool, old place.  Here is the orangerie, dear husband, and Steve.  We did emphasize the idea to the kids that parts of this home were built before there were even organized Native American settlements in St. Louis (the mound builders date from the 15th century).  It's about 2 hours north of London (counting time lost to navigation errors on my part), so not far, and they host a lot of weddings -- two while we were there.  Here are the kids and I in the courtyard in front of the older part of the house.

We used Orton Hall as a jumping-off point to visit Flag Fen, an Iron Age archeological site and Cambridge.   First was  Flag Fen --  fen means swamp and ths was a kind of bridge area across the fen used for ceremonies of some kind.  Here is son next to a hut re-built on the foundations of an ancient one.  Flag Fen is important because it is the first place I found any wool.  Coarse, aran- weight stuff spun from the herd of sheep they keep here, descended from ancient sheep of some sort.  I got two balls just so's I'd have something wooly from England -- I was getting desperate.

Next it was off to Cambridge.  It was graduation day from  King's College and it was freaking hot.  I didn't just love Cambridge  --  crowded and all -- not shown to it's best advantage I don't think.  Here's daughter in front of King's College.   We saw the Cathedral there and a yard used in one of the Harry Potter movies, here on the right.  We tried to go punting, which is pushing a boat around in the river behind the college, but everyone else in the whole city had the same idea and they were closing early to watch the 'game' that afternoon anyway.   

So we went back to quiet, cool Peterborough to watch England lose to Portugal in the World Cup semi-finals was it?  So memorable to be in an English pub watching with Englishmen -- would've been more fun if they'd won.

Next day, we checked out of Orton Hall and drove Steve west, but not before we visited Stamford, a lovely medieval town and Burleigh Hall.  Burleigh is where they filmed parts of Pride and Prejudice -- you know, when the mean rich lady (what was her name?  I'd settle for the actress but I can't for the life of me come up with it right now) is sitting in the painted drawing room?  Burleigh.  And when they're all walking up to Darcy's manor home?  The outside of Burleigh.  A beautifully maintained home, still lived in, with lovely gardens.  We took the tour, of course, and walked the gardens (lots of deer poop) and ate in the cafe.  Then on to Stratford upon Avon for a few nights. 

Still no more yarn than the few balls I'd found at the Fens.

Here's what I'd like Typepad to add to their templates:   captioning.

Knitting? What Knitting?

I have actually been knitting.  The July baby we've been waiting for has been born.  Katie Jane was born July 3rd while we were gone -- mom and baby are fine.  (Mom's the one with the shop that sells blingy sandals, remember?)  Now that I know the gender, the hunt for yarn and a pattern isn't such a problem.  In fact, I whipped out this cute cotton sweater this weekend.  Well, started at the pool Thursday night, have to seam the sleeves today. The yarn is a cotton/acrylic mix from Reynolds called Ole Ole (how do you put those thingys over your e's for French and Spanish using a keyboard?)  It's soft and pink.  I've got green ribbon to string through the eyelets in the yolk.  Reynolds pattern number 82291, knit on 8's.  I also got the other colors at the right for a ... you guessed it, log cabin blankie.  Which, by the way, as you can see, I've also been working on, now that the baby pressure is off.  But, dear readers, you'll remember, I've got another baby, and now two weddings looming ...

A knitting-in-public aside.  I worked on this sweater during two separate outings at our club pool this weekend.  Both times, I had ladies say things like, "Oh, knitting, that looks so cute, but it's too hot to knit out here right now isn't it?"  Or "I love knitting but only scarves so I have to stop when it's summer."   And while it was like 96 degrees here this weekend with 100s forecast for this week, too hot to knit a little cotton sweater?  It's not like I had a wool afghan in my lap... whatever.  Not so irritating seeing it written on the page here... ahem.  Rant over. 

I've got to take daughter to camp, but I'll have time to do a quick English countryside entry later.

Takin' a Break

From blogging about England that is... Scout's got a meme going that I can get into.  Rare.  It's her Wanna Know a Secret meme and I've got one. 

You've seen my approach to child-rearing and the humor involved.   That my kids can quote Monty Python chapter and verse is a source of pride.  And as I'm immersed in the 9-yr-old boy thing right now, I have to find ways to enjoy potty humor.  You know where I'm going.  I actually do enjoy potty humor when done well... and there is a Cartoon Network show that does it very, very well.  Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends is must-see TV at our house -- when Dad's not home that is.  There I've said it.  What follows is a link that exemplifies the show's approach to... well everything.  Blue is the little blue guy, Mac imagined him, and the weird yellow guy is Cheese, another imaginary friend who acts like a 3-year-old. Put the puzzle together to see the clip.  Potty humor is present, so be warned.  (We can't remember why Cheese is sucking on a potato, but it was funny.)  Now go laugh.