Tag Archives: Knitting

Notes to Self

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Cabin '89

I broached the topic of summer vacation plans in yesterday’s post and I would like to follow-up on this subject. First up, would be our trip to LA, to watch Dan graduate from college. While there we would like to see Anne’s Uncle Lou and Aunt Pearl. There is also our friend Cooper that we want to see and that is just LA. Anne has never seen Yosemite and it has 45+ years since I have visited this park. I called about lodging and the only beds left on the valley floor are in a tent camp. This would be fine, except when Anne’s sister Jane stayed there last, what she thought was a night of heavy rain, was actually 10” of snow, but hey, life is an adventure, right? We would then head north, almost to Sacramento, to the Gold Country, where Frank and Kathy live. Turning south, we would swing by Monterey and visit Chris and my Dad, and then sprint back to LAX. These are our plans for this trip. We still have to figure out is either of the boys will join us on this Tour de California. Dan will be there, but I don’t know his schedule. Dave could be returning from Hong Kong and could hook up with us. I also have to figure out how long this itinerary will take and this is just the first vacation.

Later in the summer, we will reprise last summer’s Michigan vacation. This year though, we’ll bike the UP, instead of the Lake Michigan shoreline. Any leftover time will be spent at the Cabin. There is still a lot of planning left to do, reservations to be made and people to be contacted. This vacationing biz is beginning to sound like work.

I thought that I was doing pretty well in the Luv-boat department, until yesterday, when Kubie pointed out that I owed Anne a dinner, or rather an all caps, DINNER. Anne bicycled 2K miles last year and that deserves recognition. Last time we did one of these recognition dinners it was at Tony’s, four stars Tony’s. Tony’s also happens to be the restaurant where I proposed to Anne, some thirty plus years ago. Finally, this last week was the fortieth anniversary of our first date. We attended a high-school concert of Bob Seger and the MC-5 together in our senior high-school year. So, instead of doing “pretty well”, I now seem to be floundering in the Luv-boat department. Amends must be made. Thank you, Kubie, for resetting me on this. Stay tuned folks! Valentines Day is lurking in the near future.

Anne is knitting Dave a Rams style hat. She hopes that it will look, just like one of their helmets. Yesterday, she was concerned that she had a twist in her knitting and was afraid that she could be making a Möbius strip cap. To wit, I had to ask, “How to you get your head around that problem, let alone get your head in it?” As it turns out, she thought that she had made a mistake, but she was mistaken.

Anne Almighty

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Anne Models Amanda's Gloves

Three at last! Three at last! Thank God, it is three at last!

Apologies to Dr. Martin Luther King, but this was Anne’s mantra on a couple of the days this week. There is no school tomorrow, so today is her Friday. No apologies are really necessary for blaspheming with this post’s title, because it is never blasphemy for a husband to praise his wife. Right Dear? What do you think, Mark? Um, um, um, yes, Dear!

Anne had a field trip last night. She rode the school bus across the river to see a play that fellow teacher, Ms. Dwyer was directing. The play was called “Curtains”, a murder-mystery comedy. Anne tried to get me to come along, but last night was too dark and stormy for me to venture out.

The picture with this post, shows Anne modeling her latest creation, fingerless gloves for Amanda. The background of this photo is pretty busy. It has two of Anne’s quilts in it. Anne is also modeling one of her new Christmas sweaters.

Anne left some blog fodder out for me, a cough drop wrapper. This cough drop wrapper has inspirational sayings on it. These include the likes of: “Don’t wait to get started”; “Hi-five yourself”; and my personal favorite “Turn can do into can did”. I guess if you have a cold, or at least a cough, one needs some extra encouragement, but I can’t help but wonder whose job it was to come up with these sayings. Once coined, were they then focus grouped too?

Skunk Cabbage

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I thought yesterday’s April Fools Day post was hilarious. Unfortunately, this sentiment was not universally held. Anne, my lovely spouse, muse and the subject of said post was not amused. So, a day later, this post is a bit of a makeup post. Hopefully, it will smooth some feathers and mend some bridges.

Skunk Cabbage (Eastern), also-known-as Clumpfoot Cabbage, Foetid Pothos, Meadow Cabbage, Polecat Weed, or more formally, in Latin, as Symplocarpus foetidus, is a low growing, foul-smelling plant that prefers wetlands. It is also the subject of Anne’s latest knitting creation, a pair of Skunk Cabbage inspired mittens. Anne models her creation, in the two photos with this post, inspired by a link or two. When Anne isn’t knitting, she is biking, making her monthly quota of miles for March, and doing the family’s taxes. She has finished Dan’s and is pretty much done with ours, but Dave’s taxes are driving her nuts.

Part of the problem is that while Dave has been working and getting paid, he isn’t being paid a salary. Last summer, at Rochester, he was a consultant, not an employee, so no taxes were taken out, bad enough. Last fall, at NIH, as an intern, he is being paid in “taxable energy credits”. TurboTax interprets these credits as equivalent to short-term capital gains and taxes them accordingly.

Speaking of David, he has selected Purdue University, as his school. He will attend this fall, as a doctoral candidate in Biomedical-Engineering. Can you say Doctor Dave? He visited Drexel last week, but was not as impressed with it as he had been with Purdue during his visit there earlier in the month. I wonder it that humongous Philly cheese-steak sandwich didn’t agree with him? He was also accepted at Rochester, his safety school, but the prospect of another Rochester winter, did not appeal to him. There are still several schools that he hasn’t heard from, but he was tired of waiting and decided to enroll.

Dan, our left-coast son, has been busy preparing for this year’s CalArts MFA Open Studios (April 10th). He doesn’t have a formal show this year, but he does have some recent work that he might be able to exhibit. The formal spaces for this show are reserved for graduating students. He had laryngitis earlier this week, but hopefully he is over that by now. Thursday, he took the train up to San Francisco, to visit Cousin Liz and take in an art show.

Under the topic of home restoration, all the contractors, to repair the storm damage are lined up. First comes, the mason, then the roofer and then the awning guy. This will likely take all month or more to occur. As my general contractor cautioned, each day it rains, is a slipped day of schedule. At least he didn’t start rhyming, April showers, brings May sub-contractors, or however it goes. I just remembered a question, who is going to do the trim, vents and lights? Something to ask him, next time we speak, then onto the gutter guy.

Home Alone 2-gether

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This week, before work, on both Monday and Tuesday morning, I have managed to crawl out of bed, go downstairs and then go biking.  I find it strange that I couldn’t mount this effort back when the weather was unseasonably warm, but waited until November’s true nature showed itself, but I guess that is just me.  I got 10 and 16 miles, respectively.  I took the picture of the Muny and Pagoda Circle in the dark.  I rested the camera on a bridge pillar and took a one-second exposure.  I think that this technique deserves more exploration.

Anne is seen modeling, in her very own independent fashion, two of her latest knitting creations.  The headband and matching fingerless mittens are for Ashlan.  We were eating dinner together while the NPR Marketplace business show blared out from the kitchen radio.  I don’t know how exactly we got on the subject of retirement and the proposed raising of the standard retirement age from 65 to 69, but we couldn’t decide when the proposed increase would occur.   Would it occur in 2018, 2048 or somewhere in-between?  But why let the facts (or the lack of them) get in the way of one of Anne’s great soliloquies:

The year is 2048, the place a classroom in Saint Louis.
 “Oh no, it’s that old bag Mrs. R.  I bet you that she is a hundred years old.”
 “Not yet honey, not for another six years.  Then I can finally retire.  I remember way back in the day when a person could retire at the age of 65.”

After dinner, I blogged for a bit and then we sat down on the couch and watched Glee together.  It was a fun episode that managed to smash together, substitute teaching, Gwyneth Paltrow and the musical, Singing in the Rain.  Paltrow may do a better musical song and dance routine than Anne, but Anne is the better substitute teacher.  Nine out of ten teachers agree.  The tenth teacher was some disgruntal gym teacher named Sue Sylvester.

Ms. Blockhead models Anne’s new creation

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Ms. Blockhead Models Anne's Newest Creation

Ms. Blockhead in the Conservatory with the Knitting Needles?  No, well then I don’t even have a Clue.  Pictured above is Anne’s latest knitting creation.  She calls it, Three Strikes and You’re Out!  She started knitting it a week ago Monday at the Cardinals baseball game, which they won, thank you very much.  It is destined to be donated to The Red Thread Project, this coming weekend.  Ms. Blockhead is my name for Dan’s sculpture that was used to model Anne’s cap.  She started off life all fit and trim, but after a few years in the weather, she has developed a rather severe case of curvature of the spine.  This is especially hard to treat, considering that she does not have any spine.  Now it is time for Anne’s guest post:

OK, for you knitters out there, here’s the scoop.  Pattern is a 5-stitch repeat, ribbing is K1, P1, and the crown decreases need a multiple of eight.  I used US 8 circular needles with Aran Worsted weight yarn, ( I think).  My gauge was 4.5 stitches per inch.  Cast on 90 stitches, join and do K1, P1 ribbing for ~1″, or six rows. Place marker to mark beginning of round if desired.

Three Strikes and Your’re Out Pattern.

Row 1:  *K3, YO, K2Tog*, repeat * to * around.    3 stitches =  3 strikes, get it?

Row 2 and all even rows: K all the way around. 

Row 3:  K2, *YO, K2Tog, K3*, ending with K1 on last repeat.

Row 5:  K1,  *YO, K2Tog, K3*, ending with K2 on last repeat.      3 pattern rows = 3 outs, time to switch sides.

Row 7:  K1, *SSK, YO, K3*,  ending with K2 on last repeat.

Row 9:  K2, *SSK, YO, K3*,  ending with K2 on last repeat.

Row 11:  *K3, *SSK, YO*, repeat * to * around.    3 pattern rows = 3 outs, time to switch sides back to first side.

Row 12:  K all the way around

Repeat Rows 1-12 until hat is desired height.  On this hat, I knit 1-12 twice, then 1-6 again.

Decreasing on the Crown

Decrease twice on first row of knitting to get stitch count from 90 to 88.  Place markers every 22 stitches. 

Row 1 (decrease row):  *After marker, SSK, K2Tog, K to next marker.*  Repeat around hat.  (8 stitches decreased)

Row 2:  K all the way around.

Repeat Rows 1 and 2 until 16 stitches remain.  Repeat Row 1, so 8 stitches remain. 

Cut yarn ~ 8 inches long.  Thread on yarn needle and run through all eight stitches twice.  Remove knitting needle(s), and draw stitches together.  Weave in ends.

I was trying to get a nice square decrease, like a baseball diamond, but the decrease lines have a little bit of curve.  Oh well, I’m certainly not in the mood to rip it out and try again.