Knittin' and Lovin' It

Been Busy

To the jerk(s) who dumps their garbage in the recycle bins at the recycling center...

It is not funny when you throw your full bags of garbage into the recycling bins. When you do this, those of us who are actually recycling have no where to put our stuff. You can not use the excuse of "I didn't know it wasn't a dumpster!" All bins are well marked and the dumpsters are the humongous bins that you have to climb up the stairs for. So you are either extremely stupid or very lazy. I vote for very lazy with a touch of stupidity. Get off your lazy a** and climb up the stairs. If I can climb up the stairs then you can too!

Now that I've gotten that out of my system I can tell you all "sorry for the lack of blog posts." Things here have been busy and I've managed to come down with a head cold again. So I'm slogging through things here and haven't had much energy to do anything else.

I received these a few days ago.


Mrs. Superwash showed up on my door step with her two non superwash children in tow...Don't ask me how Mr. & Mrs. Superwash had two non superwash children....it boggles the mind. With the loss of Mr. Superwash, Mrs. Superwash was no longer able to support herself and the children so she came to me looking for shelter and support. The family has welcomed them with open arms.

Kaity and I will hopefully dye these three skeins this weekend or next weekend. It's going to depend on how cruddy I'm feeling. I bought her 1 skein of superwash worsted and 2 skeins of bulky Bare yarn.

I also got my 2nd TLE Sock Club shipment. If you want to see it click HERE. I love the yarn, pattern and goodies.

I started a headband for Kaity.


The pattern is The Woven Headband. I'm using Lorna's Laces Lion & Lamb, color Bittersweet. The yarn doesn't have much bounce in the skien but it does when it's knit up in the woven cable.

That's the extent of what I can show you. I ripped out my TLE Swap Pals project. I didn't like the pattern, I didn't like the yarn so it was frogged and I ordered new yarn. The USPS has not seen fit to give me my darn box so I'm still waiting. It should have been here yesterday so hopefully it shows up today.

I didn't finish the Everlasting Bagstopper. The handles are still about a foot shy of being done. I will save you from the boringness of that photo. I need to work on it this morning.

I'm just about done with the first section of the Bee Fields Shawl once again no photo because it doesn't look much different then it did the last time I posted a pic of it. I've knit another inch on Rogue. I'll post a photo of Rogue after the front and back parts have been knit and joined back together.

The IRS deposited our stimulus check. Since I still have a bunch of work that needs to be done on my teeth (and I'm trying to be responsible) there will be no shiny new iMac sitting on my desk, maybe next time *sniff, sniff*. So instead I bought the yarn for Shawn's sweater from WEBS sale. He originally picked out the Charcoal Grey Cascade 220 but there weren't enough skeins so he went with Sapphire (#9332) instead. It looks grey on WEBS site but after lots of searching I think Purlsoho has the best photo (just in case you want to see). I threw in a couple skeins of the Valley Yarns Huntington sock yarn to try. At $4.29 per 50g hank you can beat the price.

I'm not going to be able to show much from my either TLE order I've placed because most of it's for my swap pal. I did throw in a skein of Perchance to Knit Pamper Me sock yarn for myself. I got Gingerbread....yum!

I'm off to throw the dirty clothes down the stairs and finish the dishes. I know, I know, what a glamorous life I live. Everyone wants to be me!

Socks & Aggravation

The aggravation doesn't have anything to do with the socks.  The aggravation has to do with some packages that I'm waiting on.  I'll get into that in a second.

First up, the socks.



I worked on Kaity's Simple Socks last night.  I'm just starting the gusset but this sock is moving along quickly.  That could have something to do with the fact that I'm using worsted weight yarn.

Yesterday I had to go round and round with UPS on some packages that they have of mine.  You all remember the package I got in from Amazon containing my new knitting books the other day.  I got the box from UPS and it was delivered without a problem. 

I used the same address to order some winter boots for Shawn and I and to order a 50% off Kids Cardi kit from Lion Brand.  Well the address wasn't good enough for UPS this time around.  From what I gather the address we were given to use was the old address for the post office.  They moved 2 years ago and lodging never seen fit to change their info.  So after several phone calls and several Tylenol later everything was straightened out. 
The worst thing would have been that I would have had to take a drive into town to go pick them up from UPS instead of them being delivered.  No biggie, I can handle that.  We've already stumbled upon where the UPS sorting center is anyway.

The kicker is that I used the same address for an order with Knit Picks and they took it upon themselves to change the zip code.  *Sigh*.  No problem.  General Delivery is a military thing, the USPS in Great Falls should know what to do with it.  With General Delivery a street address is not important.  They see General Delivery and send it out to the base.  It may take a few days extra to get here but it will get here.  The box was suppose to be delivered today or somewhere near that day.  Anyone who's ordered from Knit Picks knows that the tracking leaves little to be desired.  To put it kindly it stinks! 

Nope, isn't going to happen so delivery today for me.  For some reason my box ended up staying on the FedEx truck so it went from Denver, CO to Salt Lake City, UT then from Salt Lake City back to Denver and then from Denver back to Salt Lake City.  I guess the yarn and needles wanted to do a little extra traveling.  All of this took about 6 days.  *double sigh*. 

So now my box is sitting in Salt Lake City waiting to head out again.  I was told by Knit Pick's customer service that if I don't get the box by 1 Sept they will ship out a new box.  At least they will ship out a new box but I wanted my needles to start another pair of socks.  Plus I have one circ Harmony needle in there and I think a lot of sizes are now back ordered until Oct.  *Super Sigh*  But I ordered several of the nickel plated needles so I'm good to go.  Thankfully my Simple Socks are almost done so that needle will be free again to start another pair of socks.  What a pain.

The good news is that we may be in our house by the beginning of next week.  I'm not going to celebrate until we're in the house though.   :~)

Score One For Me

Score one for the knitter.  Ah life is good.  We went clothes shopping yesterday since Shawn got off work early.  Old Navy was having a sale on a lot of their clothing so we managed to snag several outfits for all 4 of us for less then $300. 

Then to make things even better I found the Lion Brand Wool-ease Thick and Quick on clearance at Wally world for $4 a ball.  They had 10 balls all in the same dye lot so I snagged them.  I'm using the color Cranberry.  I'll post pics when the highspeed comes up again.  Hopefully that will be Monday but I'm not holding my breath.

I also got some more needles from Knit Picks and used a gift certificate to pick up from Amazon.com: More Sensational Knitted Socks and Last Minute Knitted Gifts.  All I need to do is order the yarn for my cousins blanket but first I need to decide on a yarn.  I did find one at Webs by Reynolds called Kids Collection Wash Day Wool.  I'm not sure about the wear-ability though.  It's $6.50 for 176 yds making the cost less then $40.  Not to bad.  Though I may go see what the LYS has.  I may find something there too.

Now the bad news which made me cringe and yell a few choice obscenities.  When it comes to my yarn the cussing may come out.  The building that holds the post office in Mtn Home had a section of the roof collapse.  It's a big building with several other military offices in it.  It use to be where the Commissary (military grocery store) was so it's a fair size building.  Now my mail was being held and we had just put in a forward but we aren't sure if they sent our mail out before the roof collapsed.  I have an order from TLE and my yarn I bought from eBay there.

From what we gather, the roof collapsed in the center of the building but not over the post office.  Everyone was evacuated out safely but they haven't been cleared to go back in and probably won't be.  Any mail coming in to my old address now will forward fine because the post office has set up shop elsewhere on base.

Shawn just left to run some errands so here's hoping our stuff made it out fine and is already here on base.  We did find something interesting out.  Even though we live on base our address is going to be Great Falls, MT instead of Malmstrom AFB, MT.  That is going to be so weird to write. 

Well I'm outta here for now.  I need to swap the laundry and get the dishes done.  I have a mega laundry mountain today between the dirty clothes and all the new clothes that need to be washed.

Montana, Here We Are!

**Warning: Long Post, No Knitting Content, No Pictures!

Yesterday is a day I'd probably rather forget.  We found out the kennel closed at 6pm so we had to basically drive as far as possible and stop as little as we could.  We still didn't make it.  Missed the kennel by about 40 minutes.  We did find someone who was willing to take them for the night.  They are being moved back over to the other kennel where they will have 24hr access to the outside, weather permitting and they are a lot closer to the base for easier visiting. 

So needless to say I have no pictures of my travels which really bummed me out.  I did get a starfish necklace with an opal in the middle when we stopped in Spencer, ID for lunch.  I'll take pics later for the next post.  It's cute.

Good News:
The house they have for us is a newer home and according to others who are in them, they are really nice and we are going to love it.  It's just a two story, no basement and it has a garage....yippy! 

Bad News:
The house isn't going to be available till like 10 Oct.  So we are staying in a 1 bedroom TLF until the house is available.

Kinda Good News:  They are going to try to move us to a 2 bedroom TLF after this weekend.

More Bad News:  Our dogs have to stay in the kennel until we get our house.  They can't come anywhere near TLF.  If they come inside they'll charge us $150 and kick us out, so they'll be staying in the kennel.  I miss the little pains already.

Even More Bad News:  All the stuff we brought with us has to go in storage.  Yup, my yarn too.  There is absolutely no room for storage in this place.  Talk about a super bummer.  My yarn is going to be in storage for the next month....sigh!  I may try to squeeze an order on payday from Knit Picks for some yarn for the baby blanket, sock yarn, and a few more 32" circ needles for sock knitting.

Kinda Good News: Since we rented our trailer from Uhaul we get 30 days free storage from them.  At least I don't have to worry about that.

Some More Bad News:  Most of our winter stuff is in storage with all our household goods so I'm going to have to go clothes shopping for all of us.  I quite sure that we are going to need warmer clothes before the end of the month.  This makes me want to smack my head against the wall.  I already planned on clothes for Kaity and Bree but not for Shawn and me.  We only need a few things to make it till our house is ready and our stuff is delivered but it's still an aggravation.

I keep wondering what else can go wrong.  Don't worry, I'm swaying with the punches and going with the flow.  I was really upset and on the verge of crying myself silly yesterday evening but today is much better.  Now Shawn and I are kinda laughing and trying to joke about it.  All that matters is that we have a place to stay, the dogs are in a good kennel where we can visit often and we have a house to look forward too.  Home is where your family is, not the house itself. 

On a bright note, I can sooooo see why Montana is called Big Sky Country.  I've never seen a sky go on forever.  The mountains and the blue sky are gorgeous.  The drive from Helena to Great Falls wasn't too bad.  I'm sure it will be much better when we make the trip without a trailer loaded with over 900 pounds worth of stuff.  We'll definitely head down to Helena to explore.

Dudes, I'm seriously in trouble, Great Falls has a Starbucks.....I squealed when we drove past it which made Shawn chuckle....he knows how much I love my coffee.  There was a double squeal when I seen the Barnes and Noble.  The base is fairly small, so I'm happy about that and it won't be long before I'm feeling totally at home here.

I'm Still Here

**Warning: This post mostly contains ranting!  Some knitting content located at the bottom.  I've marked the end of the rant!

I finally decided on a baby blanket pattern for my cousins baby.  Now she's having a girl but doesn't want anything girly girly or frilly.  OK, cool beans I can do that.  Will be a nice change from the soft yellow/green of Blake's blankie.  Not to mention all the friggin' pink and purple that Kaity always wants.  :~)

So here's the pattern.  It has some nice simple cables, all in all a simple pattern and will make a wonderful blankie. 
Next up, I needed to find a yarn to go with the pattern.  I decided on Knit Picks Swish superwash yarn.  Cool, they have heather colors now.  I'm tossing between the Marine Heather and Lemongrass Heather.  Now me being the smart knitter that I am, I say "Hey why leave anything to chance, I'll order the color card and go from there."   W.R.O.N.G!  Knit Picks is out of stock of the color cards for the Swish and aren't getting any in until 27 Sept.   So now I have to order one of each ball of yarn or wait until 27~friggin'~Sept.  Does anyone else see a problem with them having the bloody flippin' yarn but it's going to take them well over a month to get more color cards in or am I just getting my socks in a wad for no reason?  Ack!  Please hold on while I smack my head against the key board.   n n jdudrfdhsoijodfg

This isn't the first time I've had problems with Knit Picks.  You all remember my gripe with the shawl pattern, that they knew there was a problem with and hadn't fixed and of course they made up for that by giving me free super slow shipping.....woo~friggin~hoo they saved me a whole $2.79!  Wow wasn't that ever so nice of them.  I shrugged it off and said no biggie.  Which of course we all know turned out to be a problem too because once again 2 more skeins wasn't enough I needed more.  No biggie, Sue helped me out.  The still claim you only need 4 hanks to complete the shawl but everyone that I've talked to so far has needed one more making it a grand total of 5 hanks needed to complete the shawl. 
Then there was what I'm now starting to think of as "The Great Cotlin Debacle of 2007".   I finally gave up on that one.   I decided I didn't need the stuff that bad.  It's in stock now but I've already subbed it with other yarn.
Then I needed the US2 needle to finish my sisters tank.  When I went to order it, it was going to be out of stock for like a month.  Thankfully I was able to find a needle at TLE....Sheri to the rescue.
So now I either have to go with another yarn or I have to fork out $3.29 per ball for the yarn I just wanted a damn color card for.  So instead of it costing me $1.99 plus shipping it's going to cost $6.58 plus shipping.  I know it isn't much money but it's the point.

***End of Rant***

I've been working mostly on Blake's Blankie.  I have 3 squares and the border left and I'm done.  I'm aiming to have this completed by the end of the weekend.  I'm not going to bore anyone with another progress pic.  Trust me the pictures would be mega boring.  I'll take a pic when I have the blanket completed.
I put a few more rows on my sisters Trekking socks but once again that would be an extremely boring picture.  I'll post again when I have a little more done on them.

Bree is doing much better on her new meds.  The prevacid is doing what it's suppose to an no nasty side affects have reared their ugly heads. 
Kaity now has a spot reserved in one of the 1st grade classes in Great Falls.  Shawn contacted the school looking for a shopping list so we could get it done and out of the way.  The lady Shawn talked to also put Kaity into a class to ensure that she will have a spot when we get there.  The last thing I want is for her to get shipped off to a different school then the other kids on base that she's going to end up playing with.

I'll leave you with this:



And for all of you who have an interest, the top drawer in the background is part of my sock yarn stash. (click on picture to enlarge).  If it comes in a hank it's stored in that drawer.  The second drawer holds all the sock yarn that comes in balls like Trekking and Opal.    :~)

Yarn, Socks, and Aggravation!

On the sock knitting front, I'm completely aggravated with the Monkey socks for my swap partner that I'm currently working on.  I had the stupid thing almost done last night and ended up having to rip the whole toe out.  I then had problems picking up the stitches and lost the last pattern repeat.  The socks went flying while Shawn ignored me and continued to watch TV.....he's a smart man to keep quiet when I get mad.....lol.  Although I am proud of myself, no new cuss words.  :~)  About 10 minutes later I picked up the sock fixed the pattern repeat and put it away for the night.  I'm still mad at it right now but I'll work on it later tonight.  It won't take much for me to get it finished up tonight.  That will make it 4 days to make a sock.....that is a personal best.

My first box from the Loopy Ewe came in this morning.....Yippy!  That's the one with the Louet Gems in it.  Oh boy "I Heart Louet Gems"!  It is squishy and soooooo soft.  No wonder Cookie A. uses it to make her socks.  I will be buying more.  Sheri also sent me a skein of yarn to make a baby hat for the Loopy Ewe Q2 Challenge.  I have some great yarns in my stash for wristers but don't really have anything that would be appropriate for a baby hat so I asked Sheri if she could throw something in.  The yarn Sheri sent me is perfect.  Now all I need to do is figure out a pattern or make one up.

I do have to admit that I couldn't pass up the Cider Moon and Fleece Artist that Sheri added so I bought Cider Moon in the Go Go colorway (sold out) and Fleece Artist in the Marine colorway.  So I should see that box by the weekend....hopefully.  :~)  Plus I just got the confirmation stating my Vesper sock yarn from Knitterly Things has shipped today.....YIPPY!!!!!   I can't wait to get that in. 

Now onto the moving front.  We are pretty much guaranteed to get one of the first two bases on our list.  Our top two are Malmstrom AFB in Great Falls, MT or F.E. Warren AFB in Cheyenne, WY.  We were told we will have orders in hand by 15 May so we could find out any time between now and 15 May where we are going.  The person Shawn talked to said to check the database from time to time to see if we've been assigned a base. 

Either base is going to be a fairly easy move for us because both bases are about 8 hours away.  No 8-10 hour days in the car with the kids, dogs, and cat for days on end.  :~)  Talk about a major relief there.  Although Shawn was bummed that we would only be getting one day of travel pay....no super nice hotel rooms for $50 a night.  When we came up here we stayed in some really nice hotels for $50-$60 a night while everyone else was paying closer to $100 a night.  The only place we had to pay $80 was in Mitchell, SD which unless it's grown since we went through doesn't have a whole lot to of anything.  Hell we were charged $80 and we couldn't even drink the friggin' water.....don't you think that would be deserving of a discount....lol. 

The discount really comes in handy to be traveling on military orders.  Most hotels have a military discount or have a government rate for those who are traveling on orders.  You won't believe the places that have military discounts, you just have to ask for it.  :~)  I guess you can consider that a nice little perk for being in the military.  Although I'm not sure if that would be worth signing away 4-6 years of your life over to Uncle Sam.....lol.

We're going to start cleaning out the crap in our house starting this weekend.  I don't want to take junk with me when we leave here and we are only allowed around 8,000-9,000 pounds if I remember correctly.  If we go over our weight allowance we have to pay so much per pound which is no biggie if you only go over like a few hundred pounds.

Damn I was long winded today.....sorry all.  :~)