sherriknits

Power has been restored to most of the area and those who don’t have it should have it by this afternoon.  The area of town that holds Starbucks, Walmart, McDonald’s, etc is lit again.  I’m not sure what the problem was there because I heard it was a priority area…then one of the very last to get back up and running.

I forgot something important when I posted last night … I had meant to mention our gratitude to all of the teams of power company workers who have come in from all over the place.  This morning I drove past the one decent motel here in town and the parking lot was full of those white trucks.  It was still dark so I couldn’t get a picture.

Something that really affected me yesterday was the signs on businesses thanking the workers, one business was advertising dry ice for another business, others told of the availability of generators and then just the simple hand lettered “we’re open” signs…it all just affected me and I can’t find the words to explain my feelings.

And when we drove out to our friends’ house yesterday, I saw a gentleman from our church standing at the exit off the highway in the rain.  I turned to look as we drove by and hubby said he was working the food bank and wanted to let people know if they could get through the road or not (people were working on a downed tree right there).  Seeing him there made me cry.  It was cold and wet and I’m sure he could have sat at the food bank and let people figure it out for themselves, but he wanted to let people know they were open indeed, in spite of the fact there was no power.  The goodness of those who are giving! I think we’ll be hearing stories for a long time to come.

Here’s our tree.

When I turned around to come back inside, I saw this breathtaking sight.

Isn’t the sun just beautiful the way it’s shining on the house? And now we see the house until next Spring.  I think I’d rather have raked a few leaves rather than what we went through.  The leaves are probably 20 miles away.   lol

And now I think I will return to my knitting.  I probably knit about 10 rows on this square over the last 5 days.

I think I spent the first part of it recovering from being the sole care of one little imp.  lol  Now, it’s not like it’s a burden, but he IS a lot of care for one person.  Lots of fun, lots of constant verbal guidance, lots of having to pay attention to where he is…but yeah, fun.  :)  It just took me a day or two to recover.  I think partly because that last night I had a terrible night’s sleep due to a snoring imp sleeping in a sleeping bag on the floor and a dog who barked when I’d finally gotten to sleep.  Tues. when I went to work was interesting to say the least.

Here was last Saturday’s sky.  (wow, don’t those wires add a lot?)

And remember the tree?  Last Sat. it was still pretty.  We’ve since had several wind and rain storms and not quite so beautiful any more.

The family had a great time at the worship conference.  Hubby had to come home before the concert that evening, but he was pretty wiped out and had to be at church early in the morning.  His new shirt made me smile. 

I did get some knitting done.

Glad to be done with that one…easy but I really made a lot of silly mistakes along the way.  I haven’t had a lot of time to work on the next square, but this is another easy one so far.

At knit night the other night, one of my friends brought another pair of her crazy socks.  Gosh, these are just so beautiful.  This time she is doing real fair isle and I forget how many ends she got to weave in.

Aren’t they beautiful?

I got my November Lucky Lurker Sock Club yarn.  I have finished the foot of my sock (toe up) but I am going to wait a day or two before I post it so I don’t spoil it for anyone who may not have their yarn yet. (Love the pattern!)

I got my Ravelry t-shirts today!  I missed that we should order a size or two larger than we wear, so they are a bit snug…it seems to be quite a topic on the Ravelry boards right now.  I’m not horribly disappointed, I think they will work but I sure won’t go without a jacket. 

And today…it rained most of the day.  I had to take pictures at work because it gets dark early.

Remember the theater that was such a source of entertainment for me all summer?  Now it’s hard to see what’s going on…but every day there is activity there.

This next week promises to be pretty busy!  We head for therapy on Monday, remember  last time we went?  I hope we don’t see any deer this time. 

Have a great week and remember to be thankful for those in your life.

I’m still around.  I’m still knitting.  However, it doesn’t seem too exciting to show you the next 2 inches on my afghan square.  It’s still 2 steps forward, 1 step back.  It’s an easy knit, I just keep gaining stitches.  I’m so ready to be done with it and move on to something else but am not hating knitting it.  Life has been more occupied with things like paperwork… the not so fun side of running a business.

For some odd reason, I lost Paint Shop Pro on my computer so it is installing right now.  I probably shouldn’t be doing this at the same time, but if it isn’t right, I’ll just start over.  Where do these things disappear to?   

Pretty exciting things at the shop…we got wireless installed this week.  I’m not dragging my laptop with me every day, but my family’s business (inside which my own little shop is located) was still on dial-up and they started having problems with their UPS program so we decided it was time to do something about it.  They are now able to share my dsl connection and the benefit is that my customers can bring in their laptops and play on Ravelry, our new past time. 

Today was rather interesting.  I had a very inebriated gentleman pop in and ask if I was hiring.  I was trying to help a lady with a knitting problem.  I told him no, I wasn’t..so he kindly asked me to sign his paper stating he had asked about work and that I had paid him nothing and he blessed us all and left.  My customer dropped her head to the counter laughing, my sister and another worker from the family business were eating their lunch there and said the looks on our faces were priceless.  He had just come from the skincare business next door, and before that had gone to a very exclusive gift shop.  Obviously, he does not really want to work as he visits  businesses that are not likely to need his help.  Kinda sad, I thought.

I have no knitting pictures but I did want to share my most favorite tree in the whole world.

I have lived across the street from this tree for over 20 years.  I think of the time I was sick for about 6 weeks or when I was pregnant on bed rest and I’d lay on the couch for hours watching the leaves.  It is the last tree in the neighborhood to get leaves and the last to lose them every fall.  it won’t be long before it will be bare again…we usually have a big windstorm that ends up blowing most of the leaves down the hill many blocks away.  Only one time did the wind blow at us and we had basketloads of leaves to clean up. 

Right after I took the picture above, the sun started shining through it … isn’t this just beautiful?  (my yard doesn’t look anything like this…but this is what I get to see every day!)

The oldest son just came home with a slight problem.  He had a package of superglue in his pocket that started leaking, he reached in to pull it out and it bonded to his finger.

Let me tell you how proud I am of my kids.  Our church takes part every year in Operation Christmas Child where we fill shoeboxes with gifts for children.  The year, all 3 of my older kids are choosing to do their own and they are taking great care in filling their boxes with nice things.  On the other hand, the little imp and I went the other day to fill ours and all he had to say when I asked him what we were doing was “the little boy.  I’m tired.”   lol  Oh well, one of these years.

Do you notice the silly shirt my big boy has on?  I don’t want to start a political discussion here, but the daughter just returned from a trip to DC and this is what she brought him.  Perfect for the clown he is. 

Her fiance and his family had opportunity to visit the President in the Oval Office.  The girl didn’t get to do that part, but she did get to see the Oval Office in a tour the night before.  They did lots and lots of sightseeing and visiting areas around DC also.  What an opportunity.  Last night, one of our friends commented that he’s been to DC many times but never has he been able to come close to seeing anything like the Oval Office. 

They originally planned to take a day trip to New York City but that got nixed by one of the sisters.  I wish she could have done that…Lord knows she’s heard me talk about it enough…but they had a great time and that may have been too much. 

How fun is this that they sent me pictures over the days they were there to show me what they were seeing.  Who’d have ever thought.  Every few hours my phone would beep and I’d get to see where they were.

Well…what a mishmash of info.  Knitting content to return soon.

Knitting progresses, but no pictures exciting enough to show, I haven’t had long enough in one sitting to get much of anywhere but the first square is blocking as we speak.

Last night, the dog was growling and barking and growling again and I kept telling him to be quiet.  When the oldest boy got home, he brought in a sign that said we’d been visited by the sneaky norsemen.  This is what I saw this morning:

Next time I’ll pay attention to the dog and see if I can catch someone in the act.   lol

I got no time to knit at work today but had fun.  Wow.  The afghan book is selling like hotcakes.  The little imp came to spend the last 10 min. with me and we came home only to discover I’d left my camera at work so we drove back.  Turns out it was in my purse all along, but look at the beautiful sky!  I’ve been seeing this every night on the way home.

And why did I need my camera?  We had to get rid of those forks and wow did he kick into gear and get those pulled out in no time. This was all done to the great accompaniment of the 5 yipping dogs next door that are moving me to the edge of my sanity.  He is out there saying, “oh man!  those dogs!”

Tonight we are watching one episode after another of The Office.  The kids have all gotten into this and I resisted for so long.  Now I am going to have to go back and watch the early ones.  They are hilarious.

I’m going to pick up my needles now!

ps  Thank you SO much for your kind words regarding our encounter with the deer.  We’re all doing fine and have had no nightmares or flashbacks so to speak, we’re all just very grateful for God’s protection over us all.  I still marvel at how tragic it really could have been!

I used to not like the colder weather until I started knitting again.  Funny now how it’s something I start to look forward to.

I bought a publishing program called Ecto and if I end up with duplicate posts here, it’s because I have been having a heck of a time figuring it out.  This one finally made it over here but the other night I sent out a test post and it showed up sometime in the night and Carol asked me what the test was for.   lol….let’s hope all my duplicate posts don’t start showing up somewhere! 

Last night I finished my first Lucky Lurker sock sans heel.  I didn’t have my pattern with me so I couldn’t finish it completely and if I can ever get this post online, I will finish it tonight.  This was a fun knit and I do like the yarn.

I didn’t have my pattern, but I did have my new sock club yarn for the Yarn 4 Socks October sock so I cast on that one.  Lovin’ this yarn, too.  I had to go down a needle size on this one, too.  Since it is an 11-stitch repeat, I had to try to figure out how to decrease it still by more and did find a way to do it.  I am really confused why I need to do so much reducing on most sock patterns.  I am getting 8 stitches to the inch and it is still too loose.  Do I just like mine tighter than the pattern calls for?  My feet get claustrophobic of they are too tight in the toes, but I find if they are looser through the rest of the sock, they wear out too fast.

We haven’t seen the boy on here for awhile but he did want to show off his new watch.  He is loving telling time on it (digital) and we think it was $1.78 well spent by sis.

Edited to add:

The first Lucky Lurker Sock is done.  I like it.  It is a little bigger than I am used to, but I can wear it with my clogs and they will be just fine. 

Trying to get a picture was nothing short of funny.  I am going to have to find a sock blocker that I like.  The dear daughter was taking pictures and laughing hysterically because I pulled up my skirt so high…she got a picture that looked like the leg lamp on Christmas Story.  She was just sure I should post it on the blog.  haha

Remember my 7 random facts about myself last week?  Look what hubby bought from a little boy at church tonight.

$2 a pound…fresh picked.  Everyone was chewing on them raw.  My first bite brought me right back to that conveyor belt I worked on in the cannery 33+ years ago.  hmmmmm (sorry, I nearly gagged)

It was over 80 degrees here today and supposed to be the same tomorrow. 

No knitting today, for some reason, I was just wiped out.  I went to first service at church today.  Hubby and kids were on the worship team this week…it’s the first time back after 3 Sundays being gone on vacation!  I go to first service but stayed halfway through 2nd just standing outside visiting with a friend.  Fun.

The little imp and I drove through McDonald’s to get him something to eat and we came home to watch the rest of the Mariner’s game.  hmmmm…we finally won one!  I’m not a fair-weather fan, but it was nice to get a win after 9 losses!  Not sure what happened there, we were on a roll for quite awhile.  While I watched the game, I attempted to remove my nail tips I had put on for the wedding.  I had them filled twice and they were just too thick to be able to use my computer or much else without being a bit of a hassle.  I got them off but my nails look like I bite them…not too bad but not too great.  I definitely will get them again some day and maybe next time I’ll let them take them off for me.  lol

I asked if we could go for a drive since it was so beautiful out, hubby was helping #1 son put speakers in his van.  By the time he was ready to go, I had fallen asleep.  We did drive to the beach, though.  Just the 2 of us.  #1 son took the little imp to get a hair cut.  His girlfriend is a hair dresser and she bought him some gel and taught him how to do his own hair.  Cute.

Most of the time if we get a warm day here, the beach is freezing but not so today. 

It was calm and warm.  We drove on the beach for awhile and then when we came off the approach,  we saw deer in the dunes but I couldn’t get a picture….just a few feet up the road, look what we saw.

There were 2, the other one was already off the road and they were in no hurry to get out of anyone’s way.  I forgot to mention that a few weeks ago when I was downtown at my shop, in the middle of the afternoon I saw a deer run by on the sidewalk!  It was so scared and sliding on the sidewalk, I have no idea how it had come from the direction it had come on a busy street coming from the busier street.  It turned the corner and since I was heading out to my car, I drove around the block but it was gone.  We’re a few blocks from the river going the other direction but this poor thing was just lost and scared.  We see them in our neighborhood quite often, too.

We drove up the coast a few miles.  It was just too pretty.

We had to get home, though, because the little boy was being delivered home and we’ve been pushing our luck lately with getting to get away for a few hours here and there.

I guess I should let you see the new haircut!

Isn’t he just the happy camper?  Believe it or not, this is an attempt to smile.  lol

We got home this evening and vacation is pretty much over.  Tomorrow I have a lot of work to do but it’s ok, glad to have a job. 

We ended up going to visit my in-laws.  It was nice.  We drove down the freeway to the Oregon coast.  The first night we stopped to see my sister-in-law and I really regret not taking my camera in to get pictures of her 8 black kitties.  I tried to get one on my cell phone but it was too dark.  Had a great visit with her, but short.

We drove about half an hour from Portland and stayed in a rest area that night.  Of course, when we got up in the morning, the RV did not want to start.  It was getting worse and took about half an hour before anything happened.  While hubby was first starting to work on it, I made a not very pleasant discovery.  I had left my makeup home. 

I called #2 daughter and she looked up to see who might have Bare Escentuals in the area.  We did find one shop but they were out what I needed so I decided to be brave and rough it.  haha  I was really amazed, though.  When we got to Grandma’s house, I called one salon that advertised that they sold makeup and asked if the had BE….she said no but when I told her my predicament, she was horrified, probably more than I was.  She made one suggestion of somewhere to call but I decided to just let it go.  A few minutes after I hung up, my cell phone rang and she had called me back to suggest somewhere else I might try.  Wow!  There are still people willing to go the extra mile out there in this world. 

We got to Grandma’s about noon.  First thing the little boy did was to haul the garbage can up the hill….hubby asked him if it was already dumped…yes, he said…got it to the top of the driveway to discover no, the garbage man hadn’t been there yet.  They had one small bag in their big can, not like ours which is always ready to overflow.

We could not believe the growth in the area….houses on every inch possible it seems.  I tried to get pictures of how quaint some of the changes are but it was getting dark and the pictures really didn’t show anything.  We go there fairly often, but don’t take the time to drive around.

I almost missed the sun, amazing how fast it goes down!

Just seconds earlier it was so incredible.  After our little cruise around, we stopped once more to take a look.

We drove down to the beach again the next evening, but the fog was coming in pretty quick.  Here’s a cold boy waiting for Dad to bring his sweatshirt from the Jeep.

This is my Saturday Sky picture…it was beautiful earlier in the day.

I don’t think I remember being at the coast like that and seeing so many nice days in a row.  The fog came in that one night but was gone in the morning.

We had a nice visit with the grandparents.  Hubby found the problem with the RV not starting and now it works every time.  I have always respected hubby’s ability to fix things, but this time he really had his fair share of challenges to figure out.  There’s only one minor thing left that he wants to trace down…the lighter thingy doesn’t have any power and he can’t find where the fuse is blown.  We even bought a new thing for him to hook up….and he kind of jerry-rigged it so I could turn on my laptop on the long drive home but no go….I blew a fuse and it took the turn signals and radio with it.  He gave me the most detailed explanation of why, but it was lost on me.

He always tries to fix everything he can when we borrow the rv.  Our friends appreciate getting it back with all the minor headaches taken care of and we are more than appreciative that they let us use it. 

There aren’t many places along the coast to dump waste from your RV, but in Nehalam you can drive to the wastewater treatment plant.  I thought this box that had the envelopes to pay was interesting.

That’s algae growing all over the box, the spider webs don’t show.

We got to stop at the Tillamook Cheese Factory.  Actually, we never get to actually drive by it because one sweet boy has radar whenever ice cream is around.  We did walk through and see if they were working, we’ve seen it many times but today they weren’t.

The place was jam packed with people but we did find a table.

Eating ice cream is serious business for this boy.  He and I are both pretty slow so we finished in the RV.

We stopped in Astoria to eat and the silly boy made himself at home.

I didn’t have time to open the screen window as we approached the Astoria bridge.

I actually did get some knitting accomplished.  I made another Tibetan sock.  This time I used size 2 needles instead of size 5 as we did in class…and I like it much better.  The fit was perfect.  I need to frog part of the cuff, though.  The RV was so bouncy on the coast road and I read the pattern wrong and knit about 12 extra rows…I couldn’t remember doing so many rows on the first one I made and I wish I’d have checked when I was wondering about it.  I love it, though.

I think these will be the perfect house socks this winter!  I hope I stay excited about them and get some made for the rest of the family.

I also worked on the Riverbed Architecture…am hoping to get a pair of toddler socks finished before some friends send a box off to Afghans for Afghans.

I tell you, Cat is a genius.  Each sock I make, it makes more sense and I am just amazed that she figured this all out.  It is so fun and I can’t wait to start experimenting on some of my own ideas.

Well, I have rambled on enough…it’s good to be home and good to be back in touch with the rest of the world.  It was a nice break, though, to not have internet access, I think I’d have spent a lot of time playing on Ravelry and every other little thing I end up doing…but I’m glad to be back! 

Have a nice Labor Day…I’ll be working on catching up on bookkeeping.

We have been on the road again since Wed. night.  I had no access to internet til tonight and no way to post pictures.

I’m still knitting up a storm and tinking some….but no concern about that, I’m enjoying the journey.

Have a great and safe Labor Day weekend!

Well, today we finally made the trip to try on the tux for real.  It is on it’s way for alteration and to get the ivory shirt we had ordered.  Big brother went along and the little imp really loves to imitate.

He loves his new ’suit’

He worked hard at cooperating. 

Let’s see, what else is going on today.  I did lots of forward-backward-forward knitting on the sock.  I am ready to be doing something else, but I did start the heel flap tonight.

And the weather today?  I hope it changes by next weekend or we’re having an indoor wedding!

I came home from work and found this in the refrigerator.

It was just so colorful, I had to take a picture.

And now for the sad news.  Right now, I am on the new computer we got yesterday for my work.  That in itself is exciting but I had to find all my disks to get any photo editing software on here.  I also found the kids had not put any anti-virus on here so I did that, too.

But why am I on this one?  I left tonight for a short time to take the little imp to buy a Father’s Day card and when I came home, my laptop was DEAD!  Nothing I do will make it start.  It did this same thing when it was a few months old and they sent someone to fix it.  Now it is in the extended warrantee and I bet I get to send it to them now.  I did all kinds of bookkeeping today and I did not back up my work and to be honest, I can’t remember the last time I did.  Shame on me, I know.  I am so bummed out.  Do you realize how much stuff is locked inside your computer?  Not to mention I had to figure out how to get into my domain stuff since they give me a bizarre user name consisting of very random letters.  I can’t figure out how to get into my shop’s email so I’ll have to call them on that one.

And to add to it, I am really mad about my iPod.  They are in no rush to get my mailing label e-mailed to me so I can return the defective iPod they sent me.  I have been without it for over a week and whenever they decide to send me the label, I am looking at a week’s wait.  So much for the quick turnaround they told me about when I bought the extended warrantee on that one.  I use my iPod to fall asleep to, I have pretty big sleep problems and have found listening to books is the ticket for me.  I finally had to resort to the Ambien the doctor gave me months ago.  I do not like taking sleeping pills at all and was so happy with the solution I had found.

I am just a bit melancholy tonight, but I need to step back and count my blessings.  I know I have a lot to be thankful for and I need to choose to look at those things instead. 

At least I started knitting on the sock instead of playing with my laptop!  (although if the truth were to be known, I am pretty good at doing both at the same time!)   lol

Hope you’re having a great weekend!

The wedding date is coming fast (next weekend) and in one way it feels like things are under control and in another…yikes! 

In sock progress, I am halfway through the cuff and this time around, the pattern just ‘clicked’ and I don’t have to give it much thought any more.  I can’t really knit it without the chart in front of me, but it makes sense now.  I am not going to post a picture here because the progress isn’t enough to really waste the space.  I am enjoying it, though…but I’d really like to see this pattern in a solid color because I think it’s too pretty to be lost in the multi-colored yarn.  I am convinced, though, that I won’t knit Tofutsies in anything bigger than a 0.

Yesterday afternoon, I had the surprise opportunity to knit for awhile with a friend.  We didn’t have too much time, but I really enjoyed it.  That’s one nice thing about my ‘job’, I get to sit and knit with people.  Then today, 2 more friends came and spent the afternoon with me.  I am not sure I even knit one row even though I started to.  I think we were trying to solve the yarn problems of the world, not sure if we did or not.  All of us were so tired that I’m sure we made sense to each other.  lol  I like being able to just ‘be’ with people.

I don’t have much to share today but last night, I tried to snap a picture of the sunset through the car window.  It doesn’t really do the sunset justice.  I was knitting on the way home in the car (an hour ride) and I started noticing how beautiful the sunset was.  I told hubby that I see life so differently since I got my new camera.  Maybe some day I will learn to take better pictures.  This one doesn’t qualify but you can still tell how pretty it was.

And now, hours after I started this post, I am trying to wind down for the night but I just got off from a 3 hour phone conversation and then about an hour of talking to hubby.  Right now, I feel like my life is such a journey.  We are healing for a very difficult time in our lives and because of the wedding, I got a phone call from a dear friend needing to find a ride so she can attend.  In talking to her, I was able to see the tremendous healing that has happened in my life over the past 6 months.  God is good and He knows what we need.  The journey that I am seeing is so positive because I can actually measure growth in myself and see that a sense of value is returning and a peace is settling over my life once again.  I know I have a long way to go and so many people I know also are walking that road, but healing is coming and I love the idea of walking forward together.   Isn’t that what life is about, though?  Always walking along the road of life, ever seeking to be better than we were before?

So, in life, I also have to tink and sometimes frog…but I can still move forward, enjoying the journey and coming out with a finished product, persevering until I get it right.  Will the parallels between my knitting life and my life in general never cease?  I love that.