Broken

About 2 weeks ago I wasn't paying enough attention when I took a glass out of the cupboard and it hit the counter and shattered. Yes shattered- it looked more like safety glass, thousands of little cubes not big shards like most of the glasses/bottles/jars I've seen break. I had never seen this before.

And not only did it shatter but it seems to have 'exploded' because I found glass about 10' away from the scene. I'd walk into the kitchen and the summer sunlight would catch on a piece for about 2 weeks after. Jp threw the rest of the set away, he felt they were too dangerous to have. I guess hundreds of dishwasher cleanings and daily usage just put too much stress on the glass. Have you ever had a drinking glass shatter into little cubes?

Time is on My Side

Today is a day I feel sorry (just a little bit) for my husband - an avid watch collector - as he has a big task ahead of him.  As well, he also inherited several clocks from his father that are special to him and  I won't touch them.

So, the daylight savings job has gotten easier for me as I used to be the one that would go around the whole house and reset all the clocks. But now, thanks to digital devices I no longer have to set several as they are automatically updated and my watch is updated by satellite which leaves me with about 5 clocks to change. Jp on the other hand (watch humour, LOL) will take several days to work through his watch and wall clock collection. Fine by me, I have lots of other things to do with my time (more watch humour)

Do you have lots of clocks to adjust today? 

Cold - Heat - Gas

Sheesh. My plans for a productive new year is not going so well on account of the weather. See one thing about me - I HATE BEING COLD - cold takes up all my energy and makes me grumpy. Now I admit that we haven't had weather as cold as in many parts of Canada or the United States but it's been cold enough here and unfortunately our house isn't built for the cold. It has single pane windows and no furnace. There are electric baseboard heaters but they are all mounted on walls with windows so basically your expensive heat just goes up the wall and out the window. And, over time, only a couple of them work or furniture had to be placed in front it as is the case in the kitchen.

We rely on a gas fireplace to provide us with the majority of warmth in the winter and supplement it with an electric oil space heater in the bedroom (that's about as efficient as we can get). But the other day I kept smelling gas and was concerned we had a leak. We turned the fireplace off and waiting 2 days for a repairman to inspect it. He finally arrived yesterday and said we didn't have a leak per se but the fireplace was very old and should be replaced as it wasn't burning all the gas,  only the middle portion of the burner was consumed by flame and the remaining portion was being released - which is what I could smell. He said it wasn't a risk to us but we should get a new fireplace. The only way to avoid this would be to turn it off or to have it on high.

Depending on the outside temperature that means that our living room is anywhere between 14 and 16 degrees C in the morning (recommended room temperature is 19 degrees C, while most people live with their furnaces set at 21).

Which brings me back to the beginning of today's story as I struggle to find a way to take a chill off my body so I can get things done otherwise I risk climbing into bed under the covers and watching TV (although there's already someone else doing that).

See? Cold. Grumpy. Aren't you glad you're my friend?

Catch - Up

I really hate being away from my blog for so long, and at first it was just going to be a couple of days while I was visiting my mom, but then I was home for 1 day and had to go away for two more and then, well, next thing you know more time has passed that I intended. Do you like that answer better than saying "I've been busy?"

My visit with my mom didn't end so well for her. Sadly she started experiencing extreme leg pain and so I took her to the emergency last Saturday night. I stayed with her until around 5:30am when they said they would soon admit her to the hospital. I have to say her experience in emergency wasn't a pleasant one. Besides overly defensive nurses and doctors, excessive delays (they didn't check in on her or talk to her between 1am and 5am) and the horrid sounds of other patients puking and groaning etc. But there wasn't much we could do, she was in extreme pain and couldn't walk and I was afraid things had the potential to get much worse for her so we had to stay.

Once she was admitted things and moved to another ward, things were much better. The nursing staff was much nicer and she was getting checked on regularly by one doctor/specialist or another. Unfortunately for her it was her birthday - not fun to spend your birthday in the hospital - but she seemed in pretty good spirits anyway. Multiple tests have been done for multiple issues and she's still in the hospital one week later. I hope she'll be able to go home soon and resume her independent living. It's unfortunate that she lives so far away (it's an hour flight plus a three hour drive -so at least 4-5 hours of travel after all is done).

Summer's finally over for us, we're back to the rain, and today I think we made up for all the rain we didn't have this summer in one afternoon - can you say "monsoon"? I knew you could (Mr. Rogers reference).

Once again I will have to catch up on many of your blogs as well. I'm feeling a bit of a panic as Halloween is only 33 days away and Christmas is now less than 90. I need to hustle to make things and buy gifts and I'm feeling a wee bit nervous. Hope you're well, more to follow shortly.

Where have I been?

I've been to the mountain and back.

Last week I was away on business in meetings at Bear Mountain Golf Resort. Wowza, is it ever a beautiful place, and the weather could not have co-operated any better. What a tourism commercial. We had people from Western Canada and Ontario at the meeting and I think everyone wanted to return (or move) to Vancouver Island!

Travel-wise it was fantastic. For those of us on the Vancouver side, we have to take a ferry to the island which is about an hour and 45 minutes. That too was wonderful. And the ferries have much improved. They used to be so 'functional' but now they are quite well designed breaking up the sitting areas making them smaller to reduce the noise levels. And landcapes and ocean were superb - and that's coming from a personal who's seen it many times and lives here! British Columbia is a gorgeous place to be.

The craziest part is no one golfed! The events co-ordinator booked a whale watching expedition instead. The thinking was that everyone could be together and mingle since we are all so spread out across the country and you'd only get groups of 4 doing that for golf - but still, two beautifully designed golf courses at your door and no one from our group stepped on the greens. I did see licence plates in the parking lot from Colorado and California though - I bet they had a good trip up here too. If you eve come to Vancouver, you must plan a trip over to Victoria. I'm sure you will be glad you did. (No I do not work for the tourism board)

The weather this spring and summer has been stupendous and I am over the moon. Being a summer baby I just love the sun and hot weather, however, being an adult I no longer get to lay about for hours on end just being outside. Maybe that's why I appreciate it so much.

Friday night Jp and I walked out of the house to go to the grocery store and then realized we forgot our bags (they don't give bags anymore in many stores to reduce the waste and damage to the environment - do they do that where you are too?) so we turned around and headed back into the house. Just then we heard a crash and I see a pile of boxes I had in my office covering the floor. Poor Eco was under my desk, probably not sure what to make of it. First thing we did is call her to make sure she wasn't scared and that she could get out.

Although I'm not happy about the mess, I'm so glad that I was there when it happened. First because I wouldn't want Eco to be hurt by it, and two because if it had happened while I was away I might have felt that Jp was somehow responsible.

The bad news is that my weekend plans were changed as I dealt with this issue. Oh sure I could've just thrown the boxes back together and restacked them, but I decided I'd better deal with them since they were a mess and so I cleaned out my bookshelves and other areas as well. Day 3, almost done! I'm sad that I'm missing the sun, but so glad that the visual clutter won't be clogging up my brain.

How are things going for you? I must catch up in the next couple of days!

Rewinding the Past

Have you ever pieced through an event and realized that you had all the clues all along but just didn't realize it or that things aren't always as they seem?

Case # 1 - There is orange hair on the street. There is an orange cat who lives on the street. The first time I saw it, I assumed that cat had gotten into a fight with another cat or possibly even a coyote, but he was still around so I assumed he survived. Even my neighbours though that "Mr. Trouble" was the source of the hair and worried about him too.

Then yesterday as Eco and I walked up the street,  I saw the orange hair all over a neighbour's yard and on the street. I figured that cat must have gotten into trouble again, BUT, on our return, that neighbour's dog was on the front balcony - and it was then that it all made sense.

They have a big chow like dog who sheds in sheets of fur. That orange hair on their lawn was not a street cat's, but their shedding dog's hair. And it was then that I realized it had been windy earlier in the day and the hair had tumbled around the neighbourhood. No cats were harmed at all.

Case # 2 - Yesterday, I pulled the pillow out of Eco's bed to wash it and saw some bark in her crate. It then occurred to me that she hadn't slept in her bed the last several days. And then I remember Jp telling me that while I was out on Tuesday night Eco had been coughing. That followed a play date earlier that day where she had chewed on a wooden stick with another dog. I then realized that she must have had some wood in her throat or perhaps stomach, which caused her to choke and cough which caused her to vomit in her bed which is why she had been avoiding her bed all week. Unfortunately I didn't realize this until Saturday or I would've washed her bedding Tuesday night.

Not quite ready to call myself Sherlock Holmes just yet? But I'm working on it.

Do you like solving these kinds of things? Want to see more ? Try reading The Science of Deduction

BC's First Family Day

Today is a statutory holiday in BC - for many years workers in this province asked for a day off between New Years and Easter, especially when other provinces in Canada had a holiday. This year is our first one. Somewhere along the way there was a vote on when it should be (no one I know knew anything about this vote) and it was decided that since we are unique people we should have it the week before the rest of the country. For many this probably doesn't make much difference, but if you're a national business you have potentially lost two business days in the shortest month of the year   - one for our holiday and one the rest of the country. As well, my family is in another province. Perhaps if we had the holiday on the same weekend one of us would have travelled to see family? Nope, not gonna happen. 

Today is also a special day here at Way Out Wear headquarters because it's the 7th Blogaversary. Yes, I have been writing to you for seven years. Reflecting on that time  one of the biggest things that has changed is my readers - not one person who was with me in the beginning is here with me now - except family. That's just part of being a grown-up isn't it? As the saying goes "people come into your life for reason, a season or a lifetime". I hope you are with me for a long time as I really do enjoy your comments and your company. 

Other things that have changed over the past seven years, just to name a few: 

1) Both my dogs, Maxx and Jazz are no longer with me but now I share my life with my wonderful chocolate lab, Eco. There were lots of stories about Maxx's epilepsy and lots of stories about Jazz's noise phobia, and lots of puppy raising stories

2) I got married

3) I started a business

4) I've changed my page layout and background at least 20 times

5) We replaced our old cars with new ones

6) countless knitting, crochet and embroidery projects

7) multiple thrift store adventures

8) too many stories about the weather

9) lots of cooking/baking stories 

10) and funny things about the family. 

So thank you readers for sharing my journey with me, I'm glad you're part of my family. 

Finished Projects for the week

Well I'm kinda proud of myself - I made and finished three projects this week.

First these Vancouver City Wristers in a lovely soft grey donegal (a yarn with flecks of other material)

These are interesting to me because they have the appearance of being cabled but they are not, the pattern is made by increases and decreases - not by holding stitches on a needle and passing them behind (or in front) as you do when you make cables.

Then these Jade/Teal Green Wristlets  in a Peruvian Highland Wool - too bad the colour is so off in this photo, because it's actually a very rich jewel tone.

I used my little mini digital camera because I have a gorilla pod for it and it has an easy timer, but it's been a while since I used it, maybe I should've turned off the flash because it's a sunny day today and it seems to have really affected the colours - the actual colour of the wristlets is actually the third colour from the left:

See how completely different it is? And I've tried several other times to capture that colour but I neve get close to that lovely jade as it should be.

I had just taken off my nail polish - what was I thinking - so I sorta hid my hands today. I will have to re-shoot these two photos.

And third, I made this little Doggie Baseball Jersey - it'll fit a 20 pounder or so.

Front

Back

I didn't have any one particular dog in mind, I just wanted to make this sweater. I am very pleased with how it turned out. The raglan sleeves have lovely decreases and it all sewed together very nicely. As well, it's a nice loose knit making it easy to get on and off Fido. Now I just need to find a doggie model.

And in other news, we had our soffits redone this weekend  - ripping out the old painted press board and replacing them with proper white aluminum soffits. They are awesome. Now the roof can breath better and it's all finished nicely without any rotting, done professional so everything's finished very well. The guys will come back soon to install a new front and back door and then our next big outdoor project is painting the house, but that's going to have to wait until at least May so everything can dry out. I also need to decide whether I'm going to keep the same colour scheme (blue and white) or change colours - I'm thinking maybe a dark taupe with white and/or black accents.

Oh and you know what else? It was a very beautiful sunny day yesterday - a wee bit cold (-3 celsius) but a glorious sunny day. It was so nice for all of us to be able to work outside and not have to do it in our typical January rain. I am so very grateful for the sun! How glorious. And today too, so soon I'll be off to walk Eco.

Hope you're having a swell Sunday too. Whatcha doin?

D is for...dogs and decorating

No I won't turn this into a dog blog but I just wanted to share this as I think it's priceless.

Someone definitely knows labradors very well! 

* * * * * 

Yesterday I put up the outside decorations - I still want 1 bigger piece out there - maybe a lighted tree? Dang they are all so expensive! Plus I have to think about storing it for 11 months. So, I bought a little light up "present" from Wal-mart but the thing fell apart as I took it out of the box. That's not a good sign, I put it right back in the box and will return it - I want my money back! I know I didn't pay a lot for it, and you get what you pay for and all that - but this went beyond all of that! It's just crappy!

Then I went inside and put up as many decorations as I could in the living room. Sadly no big tree again this year, there just isn't room in our tiny living room. I put up a little 2 1/2' tree but it doesn't have any lights. I miss lights in the living room for Christmas, so I may have to go back to the store to find something suitable.

Today I am knitting a Christmas present so it can be mailed. I must have it done by next Saturday. Clickety clickety goes my needles ...

How about you? How are you spending your Sunday? 

Progress is Slow

Some family/friends of mine have complained from time to time about the poor service by trades people in their area. Sometimes this lack of service is blamed on the small town they live in - well remember this post? Guess what? I still don't have new gutters on my house. The guy that was supposed to come that day didn't show up. He had some excuse about his helpers not showing up and how he had to work by himself. We rescheduled for the Friday. But he didn't show up that day either. Here we are a week later, and nothing. 

So we had to start all over calling companies again. Now we are supposed to have someone coming out on Friday to take a look and provide us with a quotation. I hope they show up. I hope they get the job done. I had wanted to paint after the gutters were in but I'm afraid I'm running out of dry fall days 

Do you have that in your town? Are most tradespeople these days really bad at responding to potential customers? It's no longer a small town problem anymore is it? 

September love

I must admit that we've had an absolutely fabulous August and September (so far). I can't recall a September that has been so dry and sunny and I am really enjoying it. Most years our tomatoes would just be nice and big on the vine by the end of August and then the rains would start in September and they would never turn red or they'd just split and then the slugs would get into them and into the compost they'd go. And the grapes would be just about ready and then the rains would cause them to stay sour and get mouldy and then I'm busy keeping the dog away from all the fallen ones on the ground.

September does have a special appeal to it for me - even though it's now been YEARS since I've been in school, September still feels like a time to start again, a time for fresh paper and supplies and for new goals in the 'year' ahead, hope for what lies ahead. And even last night when our dance group met for our fall classes, it felt like the beginning of a school year (even though it had only been 4 weeks since most of us saw each other) There were several new hair cuts and even some new hair colour and of course, many were tanned from summer vacations. And we were all so happy to be together and get going for the fall and planning for the future.

September has always been special to me as my parents shared the same birthday and so it was special in my mind because of it. It reminds me of bouquets of asters and dahlias and those lovely orange chrysanthemums. My mom now lives far away from me, but I trust by brother and SIL to tak good care of her, they always have very lovely presents for her and a lovely meal with a special dessert. I'm envious that I can not be there.

I really love the summer because I love the heat and the sun but for some reason when I fondly recall dog walks, I always conjure up images of the fall walks (often all the way back to walking my Old English Sheepdog when I was in high school). I think about being bundled up in my coat, boots  and maybe even a scarf and mittens with my dog happily enjoying all the different smells and the cool air. And turning a corner on the walk and being surprised by a tree that seems to have suddenly turned red (or yellow) overnight!  And soon it will be time for me to switch our morning walks to midday as it's staying dark later and later and soon daylight savings will mean we'll be completely in the dark (it's just easier to walk in the daylight rather than outfitting both of us with flashy blinky lights and reflective gear). The midday walks are also quite enjoyable, it's a nice break during the workday and sometimes we end up walking past the local elementary school around lunch time and many of the little kids run to the fence to pet Eco and of course, Eco just LOVES children and can't wait to say 'hi' to all of them.

Other than the hour or so before and after school as the kids noisily walk to and from school, most of the days are quieter and there seems to be a calmness in the air. Slowly one by one the hummingbirds and other birds start to disappear  - the geese honking as they fly south, sometimes in groups as big as 50 and sometimes they can be seen and heard for miles. And there are less and less lawnmowers or other sounds during the days. September just seems to have it all: warm, sun, rain, cold, frost, flowers, colour, empty trees, ending of summer, beginnings of autumn to winter. Sigh, isn't it a wonderful time of year?

What's your favourite part about this time of year? 

This old house

Busy weekend, trying to take advantage of the fact that we still have sun and dry weather so late in the year - I painted a fence on the weekend. It felt really good to get it all done, even managed to apply two coats to some areas. Except when I went to pack everything up, I closed the gate and realized I forgot to paint the back of it! Doh!

We'll do a little roof repair on a shed today, and some new gutters are being installed on Wednesday. This will be really nice because the idiot who installed the current gutters didn't know what he was doing and they leaked at every seam - plus there was a dripping seam right in front of the front door so when the mailman or the kids came for Halloween they'd get dripped on. Last year, one little girl gave the drip a very dirty look.

I've greatly neglected things inside the house figuring that it will rain soon enough and I'll have plenty of time to work on all that  paperwork - but so far we haven't had rain for several weeks -so I'm starting to get really behind. For example yesterday I was on a long drive and was thinking about all sorts of things when it hit me that I needed to activate my new Driver's Licence. I remembered receiving it in the mail and putting it in my wallet - completely forgetting I had to activate it. I was in a bit of a panic because I thought I only had two weeks, but when I came home I was happy to discover they gave 1 month to do it, and I hadn't surpassed the deadline. Whew! That was close. That could have cost me if I had let that deadline slip - I would've had to apply all over again. (In case you're wondering what kind of Driver's Licence this is, it's called in Integrated Driver's Licence and allows you to cross into the US via land or water without the need for a passport and since we're only 1/2 hour away from the border, it can be a very handy thing to have)

I have grass!!!

Ever since I got our  Labrador (3 1/2 years ago-my how time flies!)  I have less and less grass in my back yard, and since it rains so much here the yard gets more and more torn up every winter as the dog slides around chasing her ball (oh I know - I do throw the ball in other areas, but still she manages to bump it or fumble it and slide on the same areas of wet ground). A lawn is cleaner throughout the winter - you only have to wipe wet dog paws instead of wet AND muddy/dirty paws - and so I have been working hard trying to regrow some lawn before winter.

Now look, I have baby, baby grass blades!

I'm very excited! I sure hope
these little guys get strong enough before
winter and can survive until next spring. 

*************************

For a crafty/knitty update, here is 1 finished wrist warmer that I've made for me:

I know it looks kinda limp and not-so-attractive laying flat on concrete but I think it looks pretty good when it's on. I'll have to show you a photo when I've finished the second one. All this yarn comes from the same skein and 1 skein will do the pair. It's been quite fun knitting along wondering what colour and texture of yarn will come up next.  If you like these, here's the pattern!

Curious coincidences?

About 5 times in the past week, I've rescued something before the situation became worse -first there was our portable dishwasher that started to zap at the wall outlet, I was across the hall at the time, so I raced over and pulled to melting plug from the wall - it appears the outlet had shorted out. Jp had to cut off the old plug on the dishwasher (which by the way is 40 years old - can you believe that?), replace the wall outlet and replaced the circuit breaker in the box just to be safe. But what if we were in the yard, or even at the other end of the house, could it have started a fire?

A day or so later I awoke when the fan in the bedroom made a noise like to motor seized and the fan stopped oscillating. I hopped out of bed to turn it off. Would it have whirred until it burst into flames?

A day or so after that, the dishwasher (again, poor thing is getting a bad rap) was running and something smelled like it was melting, I opened the door and found a spatula that had fallen through the racks and had melted in 2 spots on the bottom drying element. No further harm was done.

Yesterday we were sitting having a nice family brunch when the light in the fish tank started to short out, so I hopped off my chair and dove under the table to unplug the aquarium light, and then removed the stinking hood from the aquarium so our whole house wouldn't smell. No more lights for the poor fish (gee, anyone want a free fishtank, I've been told I must get rid of them.. ) The boys think this could have been a house fire, but I think all the water in the tank would have helped to stop it from going further - although I might've had some cooked fish....

And then today, I was inside and heard a stellar jay squawking - as they always do - but then something didn't sound right so I went outside to find a very guilty looking cat hovering over an adolescent jay. He lost most of his wing feathers and had some bleeding but I think he could recover. I had put box out for him with some food and water, but a couple of hours later, it's  since disappeared - I'm pretty sure my neighbour took over it's care as she too, didn't want the cats to attack this poor little birdie again.

Gee,  5 things that I that prevented from becoming worse. Are they only coincidences? Or is there a bigger message? What do you believe?

Cleaning with dogs

I'm still working hard on rebuilding our backyard lawn from when Eco was a pup. With grass missing in the middle of the yard, it can be rather muddy at times. I'm positive a lot more dirt and debris comes in than if we had a lush green lawn. And when I saw this, I have to agree 100%!

Making Bread While the Sun Shines

We just got the cutest kitchen appliance - a Zojirushi Home Bakery! It makes little 1 pound loaves of bread - perfect for the two of us, and little cakes, and pretzels and cookies, and pizza dough and even makes jam!

(Isn't it tiny?  And it has a handle so you can take it places!! I)

It's the perfect size for our small kitchen and it makes a 'half' loaf which is perfect for the two of us. I am having a wee bit of a problem getting the loaf to rise to the correct heigh - it might be because it's cold outside(and/or the water's too cold), or maybe our humidity. I did buy fresh bread flour, powdered milk and fresh yeast. I've tweaked the recipe a bit and I'm about to make another loaf. MMmmm, I miss the smell of homemade bread. Bread machines were so popular for a while, but I don't hear anyone talking about still using them. The only person I know who regularly bakes bread is my brother who is a  fantastic home-chef. 

Last night is snowed about 4 inches and that's fine by me since I didn't need to go out today anyway. The dog had a great time fetching her ball - she would run and then pounce where it landed except she'd slide and send the ball flying and then she'd lose the ball. It was quite funny, too bad I didn't have a camera with me this morning. 

I hope you're having a wonderful Saturday afternoon. 

Construction Zone

At the end of our hallway was several small shelves that held a collection of JP's; he decided he'd take a break from seeing the collection daily, plus we wanted to put of full-length mirror in it's place. So I wrapped and boxed everything up and put it all in storage, while in the attic I took several old boxes out and sorted them out for donation or recycling or garbage. Then I took the full length mirror that we had and put it against the wall so he could help me hang it. That's when he informed me that we were to get a different mirror for the end of the hall and the 5' tall mirror we had was staying where it was.

So I put that mirror back but  now it looks  like a construction area at the end of the hall as I will have to remove  all the anchors from the shelves and repaint the wall (which I was hoping would be all behind the mirror and I could skip it for now) If I had known we didn't have something to replace the blank area, I wouldn't have taken everything down... (sigh) oh well I guess it had to be done eventually.

That was my Saturday (along with doing laundry). Today I'll be at my desk tidying up all the bills and papers from when I was away plus some computer work. And, hopefully some crafting time. No wait - I will definitely take some time for some crafting today! I must not always postpone it since I enjoy it so much - don't you think?


What are you doing today? 

I had no idea...

... that my innocent desire to paint our bedroom would end up being a month long task (okay it's only been two weeks - but we're not done yet!) I would have liked to show you some photos, but it's still not ready, my side of the room anyway. After painting we decided to reconfigure the room and bought some new dressers  and bookshelves - and with that came the task of dealing with years of items (ok, clutter) that must be either placed in a good spot, or discarded. For me, it's exhausting as some items were made by my late father, a skilled carpenter and woodworker and have memories attached to them.

As well, as I'm going through this task myself I'm thinking about my mother who's downsizing to 1/2 of what she has as she prepares to move to a house a few doors away from my brother. The house is better suited for her financially and locationally since she'll be so close to family. It's very hard for her to think of her mortality and all the memories linked to items as she has to decide to discard of them as well and to do this task on her own. I have the support of my husband who either talks me into getting rid of something, or talks me into keeping something or talks me into taking a break when it gets to me. I try to be there for my mom, but she's a strong willed lady and seems to be very focused on her new task - I am proud of her bravely accepting this task. In some ways I think it bothers me more than it bothers her!

It makes it a little easier to be indoors working on these chores when the weather has been so bad - and EVERYONE is talking about the weather these days - sometimes it's even the top story on the 6 o'clock news!

Well, computer break is over, I'd better get back to the task!

Kitchen Facelift

We spent the day taking the doors off all the kitchen cabinets, stripping the old paint, sanding and applying new paint. It doesn't sound like much but that was the whole day for 2 of us. Tomorrow we'll paint the backs and on Monday we'll give a second coat to the doors. And then we can put them all back!

My hands are a bit achy from the painting, so I'm not so sure if I'll pick up my knitting needles tonight - I'm just working on a stockinette stitch sock with a variegated winter wool. (photos to come).

In the mean time - hey sock knitters - check out this new book - One Skein Wonders for Sock Yarn! I think that is very awesome!

First I need to paint a few more things in my house before the rain and winter begins to set in, and then I can resume knitting up a storm!

My weekend inside

Oh yes, I'm still here (sorry for the absence of blog posts)- I had to get some boring stuff over with. Today, I was really hoping it would rain as forecasted because I had to clean my work room up - wouldn't you know it, it's a perfectly gorgeous spring day and I have to be inside at 23 degrees C! I hate being inside on sunny days! Also, I had to put together my income tax so I can drop it off at the accountant tomorrow- yes, I'm one of those jerks that wait until the last minute to file. There's no excuse for it. Poor accountant. The only thing that might make it a little better is that my forms go fairly fast (I'm uncomplicated on paper!) and we still have 2 weeks before the deadline, but yes, I admit, I'm a last minute filer!

On Friday, Eco and I were at the playground, playing on the apparatus and Eco jumped off a platform which is made of metal with pencil eraser sized holes (for drainage I assume). A minute or so later so stepped on my shoe and I saw blood, so we went straight home. It appears that maybe she got two of her toe nails caught in a hole when she jumped down. On Saturday morning, I went to wipe her feet before she came in the house and she let out a very loud yelp! Then I was concerned it was more that just her nails - what if she broke a toe? So I took her to the vet.

The vet checked her out and figured it was just some bruising but it was still a problem in a few days, we'd x-ray it. In the meantime Eco was given some pain relief. Boy is that dog zonked out! It's so strange to see a 1 year old lab sleeping so much. When she's up, she does want to play, but I'm afraid she'll hurt her foot again since the pain killer is in effect.

And now it's 4pm and I think I can finally go outside and read a book or pick up some knitting. My work room's not totally clean - but it's workable until the next raining day - this is Vancouver after all - I don't have to wait too many days for a rainy day! I'll be catching up with y'all soon!