Friday, September 29, 2006

Let Them Eat Cake

In yesterday's post I mentioned that the puppies were off destroying my yarn while I was baking. Here are the results:

Rose Cake

Autumn Carrot Cupcakes

Fall Cake

All that baking, and it wasn't for us. My family has been so conditioned, they didn't even complain. I did it all as a small bribe for the teachers at my kids' school. Our fall fundraiser isn't going so well. I set up the cakes in the Staff Dining room along with a note to please remind their students this is the last weekend of the magazine drive.

Cakes in Teacher's Lounge

Hopefully the request is softened a bit by the three different kinds of cake.

Thursday, September 28, 2006

Dogs Steal Yarn

I'm busy. School has started. Soccer season is underway, and I don't mean soccer in a drop the kids off at practice and go grocery shopping, or sit in the bleachers and knit and talk with the other soccer moms way. We are coaching Audrey's team, and here's my notebook with the positions assigned, and the soccer balls in the back of the mini-van to prove it:

Soccer Stuff

I haven't been doing big, involved crafting, to tell you the truth, it's hard to get any short, quick crafting done. (Actually, I've been tempted to blog the occasional pile of clean socks as "finished objects.") But I want to do SOMETHING, so I'm working on a Halloween scarf. A cheesy Halloween scarf, to wear at the kids' school while selling Boo-Grams the week before Halloween. It's made out of giant yarn (Lion Suede--I know, cheesy) on a giant hook (a J,) and I'm still blazing along at one motif made and joined a night, if I'm lucky. But hey, it's a holiday accessory and I wasn't looking for an heirloom quality work of art, I was just aiming for an orange and black scarf to wear for a week.

Halloween Scarf

Today, I was doing some baking and the puppies had the run of the living room and back yard, and I came around the corner and found THIS:

Puppied Yarn 2

Groan. If I had staged the photo I would have strewn some super-bulky baby-yellow chenile around, like I saw in the clearance bin at Fred Meyer today. But no, this is actually my black Lion Suede for my scarf, stolen by the puppies and joyfully (I'm assuming) dragged through the bark and blackberry bushes.

Dogs Steal Yarn is the name of Cari's great blog, which is one of the first ones I started reading. She's got a couple of gorgeous Italian greyhounds from a rescue organization, and a BEAUTIFUL baby boy, oh yeah, and she knits. You can check her out at http://www.dogsstealyarn.com .

Wednesday, September 27, 2006

September 27, 2006

I had a productive day today, laundry and dishes were washed, some picking up was done, errands were run. While I was dropping off some puppy food at the Humane Society (the vet had given me samples I wasn't going to use,) I ran into Karla-the-Puppies'-Foster-Mom and her husband. They have requested more puppy pictures, and I am happy to oblige:

James Holding Up Callie

Cozy 9/26/06

They are twelve weeks old, and weighing in at 18.6 and 19.4 pounds, they each gained about six pounds in the last three weeks. If they keep it up, by Christmas they'll be HUGE! For scale, here's Cozy in Audrey's lap:

Cozy and Audrey 9-26-06

Audrey CLAIMS to not like the puppies, can you tell?

One of the productive things I did today was to drop off packages for two swaps that I was very, very late with getting out (as in they were supposed to be sent off at the beginning of August.) It feels good to get them off to their recipients. Here are my wrapped packages for "Art and a Cup of Java:"

All Wrapped Up With Someplace to Go

This was a fun swap. We were supposed to send off a piece of original artwork, some coffee, a couple of new art supplies and a treat. It was fun to try to figure out what I thought the recipient would enjoy, I like doing that. But I hadn't done any drawing/painting in a very long time, before I had children, and I signed up for this one specifically because I thought the challenge of creating art again would be good for me. I was happy to find out I was rusty, but not incompetent. It was really good to do that sort of thing again, and I'm looking forward to finding some time to do more. This may be challenging---the puppies ate my artwork in progress---TWICE.

Wednesday, September 20, 2006

Last Day of Fall

Double GRRRR. I just spent half an hour writing a post and when I hit "Publish" I got a timed-out message and it's GONE, GONE! Another example of "Technology is nice, WHEN IT WORKS!"

It's beginning to look a bit like fall around here, especially the plants that were stressed by the dry summer we had:

Fall Oak Leaves

I dug out a couple of rosebushes this week. They were floribundas I had bought on clearance and planted not for their color or fragrance or growing habit, but because they were $2 apiece. They have performed admirably, but not being pruned they grew over our heads, interfered with being able to walk on the path, and were in the way of us being able to paint the house, so they had to go. I would like to replant the bed with a whole row of blueberries next spring, and this is why:

Fall Blueberry Color

At a time of year when all the flowering plants are winding down and looking tired, or wet, or wet and tired, the blueberries are a gorgeous spot of color, and will be for a couple of weeks.

I've been doing an awful lot of this lately:

Me with Puppies

The Puppy-Girls are signed up for obedience class in November. Right now it's a lot like living with a couple of very fast, active toddlers with sharp teeth, who aren't potty-trained. They spend a lot of time play-fighting (which the vet says is normal.) Their favorite place to fight is in my lap. This is NOT my favorite place for them to fight, because they get excited and can nip any of my body parts that happen to be in the way, which smarts.

Having the puppies around isn't very conducive to getting any crafting done. They've already bitten off a filet crochet edging and a knit bag (to be felted,) which is very frustrating. I did do these:

Halloween Pens Closeup

These are Halloween pens for an upcoming PTO (Parent Teacher Organization) fundraiser at the middle school (to use, not to sell.) I had seen some cute pens at our local Hallmark store, but they were $2.95 apiece. So I bought a dozen pens for $.89, wrapped them in strips of black tissue paper and Elmer's Glue, decorated them with wire, beads, 3" pieces of maribou boa and cheap plastic rings, and called them done, for about $.40 each.

I rather like them.

Wednesday, September 13, 2006

A funny thing happened on my way to the slaughterhouse. . .

Actually nothing amusing happened on the way to the slaughterhouse, the novelty was in that I ended up there at all. Monday my friend Janae and I began a 4-mile a day morning walk routine that we had started last school year and let slide over the summer. When we finished up I mentioned we should go to lunch sometime, and Janae (who is not one to let grass grow beneath her feet) said "What's wrong with today?" So I picked her up at work (where she serves lunch at the middle school our children attend) and we had a good chat over prawns. After lunch I asked her if there was anywhere she wanted to go on the way back to her car, and she said actually, she needed to go pick up her pig, at the meat packer.

You see, two of Janae's kids raised pigs for 4-H this year, and when they were put up for auction at the county fair, Janae thought her son's pig was going for less than it should, so she bought it herself, and sent it to the meat packer.

The fact that I ended up on a long drive along a country road looking for a slaughterhouse when I should have been home waiting for my kids to come home from school, well, that's pretty normal in my relationship with Janae. Everyone should have a friend with more energy than they have themself, who involves them in adventures they wouldn't otherwise take part in, Janae is my friend like that. A hundred and ninety pounds of pork looked like a lot less than we thought it would---until we tried to put it in her freezer.

To thank me for my help, Janae gave me a piece of salmon from her freezer (dated 2001) which I then forgot and left in my car. I remembered it rather suddenly this morning. Sigh.

Friday, September 08, 2006

Yarn Harlot

Yarn Harlot Portland

I went to see THE YARN HARLOT on Wednesday. It was fun seeing Stephanie, she comes across in person precisely as she comes across on her blog or in her books, an enthusiastic knitter with a good sense of humor and a way with words, who happens to be a very nice, down-to-earth sort of person. It was already standing room only when I got to Powell's Home & Garden, though as it got later and people started condensing and scooching together I was able to snag a slightly less obstructed view from my place behind the table of Asian-themed merchandise. Stephanie talked until 20 minutes before closing, so I opted to leave, rather than getting in line to get my book signed. But I had a couple of things I would have liked to have told her. One was just a message from John, who wanted her to know that my guitar-playing husband who doesn't intend to knit anything, ever, enjoys reading her blog, and would have been there if he hadn't had to run soccer practice. The other was that when her daughter had hit her up for a puppy, I was one of many people who left the "Awwww, get the kid a puppy!" comment, and now, having puppies, and feeling ever so much wiser on the subject, I would now defer to any reservations she might have about adding a puppy to her household.

Speaking of puppies, today was the first day my girls figured out how to get up and over the side of their puppy-pen. They are VERY PROUD of this accomplishment (I'm sure you can picture their bright shiny faces as they greet me from the outside of the pen, with great big "look what we can do" grins, and a half inch of guinea pig bedding spread on the living room rug.)

Wednesday, September 06, 2006

Stop Biting Your Sister!

Let go of my pantleg.
Don't piddle in the house!
Don't chase the cat.
There is nothing for you on the coffee table.
Don't eat the cat food.
Off the couch.
No biting my ankle!
That's not your yard.
Quit untying my shoelaces!
Get out from behind the couch.
Please, please don't poop in the neighbor's yard.
NO BITING!
That's not yours.
No.
Stop.
Don't
Naughty puppies!