And the Winner Is...

I am so excited..... let's see who it is...
Using the Random Number Generator at random.org, the number 7 was selected...

Congratulations, Dee! This is what she wrote:

Anonymous said...

What a lovely give-away! I found you thru Brenda's blog. I would love a wood splitter too :o) Happy New Year! Dee
Dee, please email me your snail mail address and your package will be arriving next week! Thanks to everyone making the give away so special for me! I enjoyed reading your comments and getting to know some new friends (and new blogs!).
A little over a year ago I tipped my toes in the blog water, not sure if anyone would even read my little blog or care about my silliness. The kindness, generosity, and friendship so many of you have given me has brightened my life daily. Thank you all!

As we begin this New Year, please pause a moment and consider these words of the Psalmist:

1 Lord, you have been our dwelling place throughout all generations.
2 Before the mountains were born or you brought forth the whole world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God.
3 You turn people back to dust, saying, “Return to dust, you mortals.”
4 A thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night.
5 Yet you sweep people away in the sleep of death— they are like the new grass of the morning:
6 In the morning it springs up new, but by evening it is dry and withered.


7 We are consumed by your anger and terrified by your indignation.
8 You have set our iniquities before you, our secret sins in the light of your presence.
9 All our days pass away under your wrath; we finish our years with a moan.
10 Our days may come to seventy years, or eighty, if our strength endures; yet the best of them are but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass, and we fly away.
11 If only we knew the power of your anger! Your wrath is as great as the fear that is your due.
12 Teach us to number our days,that we may gain a heart of wisdom.

 ---Psalm 90:1-12
 
Happy New Year and may our Father richly bless and keep you!

Backstroke....

After a completely exhausting tustle, The Shawl has retired to a long soak. She is pouting; I am gloating. Victory is mine!

There is a lesson here for all difficult to knit lace shawls....never take on an English professor. Our perseverance is legendary. We train by sitting longer and through more boring things than any athlete. We are able to identify split infinitives in a single glance. Subject / verb agreement are mere intellectual reflex to us. Unable to glean the meaning from a text? Hand it to us; we can find more meaning that the author ever dreamt of in their philosophy. We laugh in the face of essays that have 500 words and more than half  of 'em are one syllable. Try to sneak someone else's work by us? Never! We have the ability to remember writing voices longer than most people can remember their own names.

I am an English Professor. All lace shawls -- quake and be afraid.

A Distraction

We will not mention The Shawl today; after knitting until midnight whilst watching The Sword of Lancelot (which was really good), I am still 62 stitches from done. The best I can figure, another hour should do it. But, I am developing an unhealthy obsession with The Shawl, so I am not going to talk about it. Really.

So, to distract myself, the Airman and I created these:

As we were baking, he commented, "You know, Mum, working with explosives and baking are a lot alike. You have to follow the receipt or it all goes to slaw in a hurry." I needed to hear that, by the way. As you know, I try really hard to not think about what he does every day.

Anyhow...

Today we are going to play with our new Christmas toy -- the wood splitter. While the Hardy is extremely effective, this old house takes a lot of wood to keep warm. Thoreau was certainly correct when he said that wood was the fuel that warmed one twice.

When Will It End???

Wild 'n Wooly in Lexington, MA, is one of my favorite yarn shops in the world. I only get to visit it in July while I am in Concord for my three weeks, so it is a full Saturday visit for me. Jackie and her wonderful staff let me wander, drool, fondle, and pet all the yarn in the shop, all the while offering me food, drinks, and a chair. I love visiting them and always come home with a nice selection of projects for the coming year, which is delish as we have no local yarn shop within a two hour drive.

Let me introduce you to my friend, the Dragon Melody Shawl.

I started it two summers ago and have worked on it since. Reportedly, it is a "quick knit" but apparently I have hit the knitter's hole. You know --- that place where you knit and knit and knit only to discover that you haven't made any progress... The first part went quite easily -- straight stockinette for 12 inches and then a knit lace edge. But, then the real fun begins. All the end stitches are kept "live" as a knit lace edging (35 stitches) is added along the bottom. According to my math (and remember, I teach English) there are about 600 stitches to pick up along the bottom, one every other row, in a 12 row lace pattern. This translates to 93 repeats of the lace pattern to pick up all the stitches.

I have knit through Lost Horizon, Jesus Christ Superstar, Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Toy Story, Aladin, Terror of Tiny Town, Zoolander, Sleepy Hollow (okay, I drooled a lot during that movie and did little knitting), and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Bugs Bunny's Cartoon Collection  and still seem to be making no progress. I even added markers every 36 stitches to give me some kind of "check point" to indicate that I really am making progress. I wake up thinking about getting it done before I go back to work next week. I knit during supper. I have even awakened myself, holding the sheets as if they were needles and mumbling to myself, "just a few more stitches...." I am exhausted.

That being said... any suggestions on where to block what the designer calls a large shawl? I am thinking the front yard...

Give Away -- Finally!

Without further ado, our little give away for one of our friends here at Lazy Bee Farm.

In this adorable Snowman tin are: one bar of balsam scented sleigh goat milk soap and one mini-bar snowman in vanilla; a handknit dish / wash cloth; a handwoven red alpaca lavendar sachet, handwoven linen tea towel, a pint of Lazy Bee Farm honey (not pictured) and Victoria's Charms of Tea -- purchased just for this give away!

To enter the drawing, please leave a comment for one entry. And, if you are so kind as to mention this on your blog, please leave me a note for a second entry. The winner will be drawn on New Year's Eve using the random number generator. I can't wait to see who starts off the New Year a winner! We have a saying here in the mountains... what you do on New Year's is what you do all year...

Now, as Inigo said in The Princess Bride, let me sum up...

As happens nearly every end of the semester, I get a computer virus -- I suspect from a disgruntled student -- just saying... This one wiped out IE, so I haven't been able to log in to the Internet from home. Add to that the fact that Blogger wouldn't let me log in from anywhere, it is a formula for great sadness for me!

Other events...

• The Airman is home for two weeks! Joy, joy, joy! Did I mention that I was happy??
• We have more than eight inches of snow on the ground (the second bout in two weeks)...
• A frozen water hose will explode if you touch it in subfreezing temperatures and the water is still on... and said exploding hose can knock one little farmer flat on their hinney whilst rather large dogs run the other way...
• I love Mr. Hardy who invented our new wood stove. If I weren't too old, I would have his baby.
• While other people might think it is odd, I personally think a wood splitter is a fine Christmas present. What would make it finer would be having someone else use it.
• My nephews can say "Aunt Matty" 400 times in less than 1 hour. I wish my name was something else...
• I am not too old to see Tangled. Neither is the Airman.
• Never move a 42"  loom when there is a project in process. I can't even write about this yet.

There is much more, but I will spare you the details for now. I have missed you all terribly and can't wait to catch up on my online reading! What has been going on in your world!?

Not Dead

Hi Gang,

Not dead. Blogger wouldn't let me sign in for almost two weeks. I couldn't even open blogger! Now resolved, but finishing grades for this semester.

Give away and posting to come in the next day!

Stay warm!

Hugs,

Matty 

It's a Pair!

One pair of socks done!

We had a pre-retirement meeting today which gave me the chance to knit all day so I could finish Corrie's second sock. I am a little disappointed that there are two rows difference in the toe. Most likely I was off in the colour round when I cast on, but you know, they are identical to that point, so who cares??

There is something that makes the second sock go so much faster, at least for me. I guess it is because it feels like I am on the home stretch. Actually, I feel the same way when I turn the heel in the first sock. Either way, I love knitting them and always have a pair on the needles. Even if they are just my plain Jane's, there is something so special about wearing a pair of hand knit socks. You know that you are loved!

What are you making these days?

Btw, this is my 300th post! I can't believe how quickly they have flown by and how many wonderful folks I have met along the way. I am posting a giveaway to celebrate later this week. Stay tuned!