The Harlot and More

I went and saw the Yarn Harlot talk about her latest book last Monday night. She is hilarious in the written word as well as the spoken! Oh, to be so witty! It was awesome being in a crowd of others who "get the knitting thing." Sarah was there and I gave her the first 3 preemie hats (these 2 will be added to that soon). I even got my pic up on the famous author's blog! What a treat it was! For a Canadien knitting author who was in New Orleans for all of one day, I think she hit the nail right on the head. And for more on her time in New Orleans and perspective from a New Orleans native, check out Dez's blog. When I read the Yarn Harlot's blog about her trip to New Orleans it was very moving for me. The 2 year anniversary of Katrina passed quietly here. I wasn't sure how I felt about it and I was even more unsure of what I wanted to say about it.

When I search NOLA.com for "shooting", I get 559 articles returned. There has been gunfire down the street from my home more times than I care to remember this past month. Not too long ago the burned out, flooded, shell of a car sitting across the street from my house was finally removed. My elderly neighbors haven't quite gotten back into their home yet but at least progress is finally being made as they still mostly live in their FEMA trailer. Lots of volunteers helped to rebuild the playground at the elementary school in my neighborhood last week. Slowly, ever so slowly the abandoned houses are being torn down around us. The Family Dollar down the road just reopened recently, the rest of the shopping center still vacant. These are the day to day facts that come with living in New Orleans. Sometimes it's hard to see the reasons we decided to come back and I question our choice almost daily. But you suck it up and keep living.

And part of living for me is knitting! This weekend I finished the two preemie hats above and my 3rd Fat Bottom bag from the Happy Hooker pattern. I also can put the FO stamp on the Summer of Love Lace socks from the Rockin' Sock Club of Blue Moon Fiber Arts. This was the August shipment for the club. The yarn is Socks that Rock Lightweight in the Flower Power color. Finishing all these things brought my lace knitting mojo back and I completed 6 more repeats on the Maltese Shawl! I now have 15 of the planned 68 repeats. Even the Chevron scarf got a little love this weekend. Stay tuned for pics of both Maltese and Chevron projects as hopefully more progress (worth showing) is made.

Charity

Charity - From Miriam-Webster online, noun - benevolent goodwill toward or love of humanity.


Saturday morning I headed out to the Harley Davidson dealership in Slidell to participate in a motorcycle poker run to benefit Toy for Tots. The poker run was 110 miles, plus the ride to Slidell and back, put me in the seat for almost 200 miles. This was my first time riding with a group. I had a blast, everyone was super friendly and no one cared that I was the only sportbike there. Everyone gave me some good natured ribbing about not being able to reach the ground with my short little legs but it was all in good fun. There was food, an auction and some door prizes after the ride and a good bit of money raised.

I was tired the rest of Saturday and sore but first thing Sunday morning we got up and headed to Audobon park for the Annual 5K AIDS walk. We parked on the wrong side of the park and ended up getting there right as the race started but we were still able to register and jump in towards the end of the group. We didn't get pledges of support but rather made a donation out of our own pockets. If you'd like to add a donation yourself, click here.

Treated myself to a big juicy cheeseburger after all that hard work, too! I did even get a little bit of knitting done this weekend too! These 3 little preemie hats were all made out of little bits of leftover cotton and soy DK weight yarn from my stash. I've started on a 4th hat in dark blue with cables! They were all knit without a pattern and only took a couple hours each. But if you would like to see any of these written up as a pattern to use just leave me a comment and I'll write them up. Now you may be wondering why I'm knitting preemie hats. Just read Sarah's blog and see if you don't want to knit some preemie hats too! She's even giving away yarn if you do!

And don't forget that the Yarn Harlot is in NOLA tonight! I'll see you at Border's on Vet's at 7pm!

A Package, No, Two Packages! For ME?

I got home yesterday to find two packages waiting for me. I was so excited, especially after the day I had at work. So, I ripped into the box first. There was a card that said "open me last." So I started unwrapping things. A skein of supersocke yarn, a Jumbo eraser, a notebook, giant paperclips, Burt's bees gift set, a thing of Soak, tea and a tea infuser, a giant pen, (catching breath), wait there's more, another skein of sock yarn, this one Socks that Rock lightweight in the Tidepool color, beautiful stitch markers, knitting notecards, dpn protectors, a giant pen, and last but certainly not least, the book "Romantic Style"!!! Wow! Who did this amazing package come from??? I opened the card in anticipation to find out. A big huge thanks to Killerdaisy on Ravelry for this awesome summer camp secret exchange package!

But wait, it's not over, there was a second package remember! Gasping, thinking how can this get any better, i ripped into the second one! Digging through all the packing peanuts I finally pull out Knitting Lace Triangles by Evelyn Clark! But there's more, next a pulled out New Pathways for Sock Knitters by Cat Bordhi! The book that everyone has been talking about and guess what! It's signed! It felt like there was something else still lurking in the package, I reached in one more time and pulled out a beautiful skein of Socks that Rock lightweight in the Covelite color! Hmmmm, smell that wonderful hand dyed smell, and smile! And a super huge thanks to my friend CJ who sent me this package out of the blue just because she's such a super nice and thoughtful person!

What a wonderful way to start the long holiday weekend. Thank you both so much for your kindness and generosity.

The Yarn Harlot is coming to NOLA!

Just saw on the Yarn Harlot's blog that she is coming to New Orleans! Details are, September 17th, 7 PM at Borders Books & Music, 3131 Veterans Memorial Blvd. If you're in or around NOLA be sure to show up and represent! See ya there.

Signs of Improvement

Thank you everyone for the kind words about my migraines and the hospital stay. I got out of the hospital on the 10th, 3 days after I went in. The doctor gave me DHE treatment for the whole 3 days. The treatment made me sleepy and nauseous but I was feeling so much better when I got out of the hospital. But the headaches are returning. They aren't quite as bad as they were before going into the hospital but they seem to be getting longer and worse everyday heading straight back to where I was before. I don't know what to do. My next appointment isn't until the end of September with my current neurologist. I'm also thinking of going to another neuro for a second opinion but I'm not sure if they can offer anything else. I'm also considering telling the neuro that I will go back on the Topamax because it was the only thing that has helped to any degree. I went off of it last November due to the side effects. I'm just so tired of dealing with this everyday.


While I was in the hospital I decided to take some easy knitting with me and cast on for a pair of jaywalkers. I used some Panda Cotton in the Violet Breeberry color that I purchased on my vacation in Tennessee. The Panda Cotton feels dreamy knitted up but it is quite splitty while using it. I defanitely wouldn't use it with a really lacey pattern. Also, the put up is on the low side (~183 yards per skein), not sure if 2 skeins would be enough for a pair for say hubby's size 13's.

I'm having a lot of fun on the new motorcycle and have now sold the old one. Just have to get a bike for hubby now so we can ride together! Hope everyone has a wonderful day!

News and More News

The first news is I got a new motorcycle! It's a 2002 which I found on craigslist.com and the price was too good to pass up. It's the exact bike I've been wanting, a 500 ninja. It'll be a nice step up from my 250 rebel. I haven't even gotten to ride it yet but I'm taking off work on Friday so I'm hoping for nice weather!

The second news is that I will probably be going into the hospital next Tuesday for my migraines. It will be a 3-5 day stay while the neurologist tries to find something to finally get rid of this headache. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with all that time in the hospital but I'm definately going to be taking some knitting with me. I'm trying to decide if I should take the Maltese shawl and really finally get some work done on it or if I want to cast on for something new and if so what. Any ideas, suggestions?

Edited to add - One more thing, I just realized I haven't updated you on my weight watchers progress in a while. It has been slow going the past couple of months, with vacation and my dad and all that but I am now down a total of 30.2 pounds since I started weight watchers in January.

Irony Is Not Dead

Well, things have been very busy lately. I greatly appreciate everyones kind words and get well wishes for my Dad. I'm sorry I haven't had time to respond to each one of you individually. Please continue to keep him in your thoughts.


I haven't done much knitting lately either and have no new knitting to show you. But I have been on this cross stitch kick lately and can't seem to get enough of these little designs! In case you are wondering the designs are from Subversive Cross Stitch by Julie Jackson. These things are addictive!