Yay! It's finally spring

Would ya look at that! A cherry tree in full glory. Love it. Means the cold, icky, horrible weather we've had is likely at an end. I was starting to think that we'd never see the giant yellow orb in the sky again. I actually left the house without a jacket today and did not get hypothermia. Not even a goose bump. Yay!
This afternoon was spent spinning with friends. It was great. Lots of laughs and Judy made some really yummy treats and tea to help us keep spinning all afternoon.
This is Judy spinny with her corgi in her lap. They both look pretty relaxed, don't they.


The change in the weather has really helped me be more productive. The plain socks are done, fancier socks are on the needles, the Nihon sweater is designed and cast on, and I pulled out some fiber to spin. I didn't feel like climbing into the wool room (don't ask, Holly peeked in when I opened the door and wound up snickering every time she looked at me for about a half hour), but lucky for me, the Lisa Souza fiber I ordered a while back was right up near the door.


This is BFL in LimenViolet. I split it into three roughly equal sections and predrafted it out. Then made a nice three ply sock weight. Hopefully it will be socks by the next post, but no guarantees.


I want to thank everyone for being so positive about the book, especially you, Denise. Hopefully you'll let me cry on your shoulder every now and then. I think I've come to terms with the fact that it won't be for everyone. It's nice to know that others are as tired of the recent trend in knitting designs as I am. I'm ready to do something about it and you're all welcome to come along for the ride. At the very least, it should be pretty interesting.

Drive by Gnoming

Holly and her daughter Orion came up for a visit this weekend. There was much shopping, driving and eating. Not necessarily in that order.
We went to the Sewing fest out in Abbotsford which, unfortunately, was very sad. There used to be a mix of booths, sort of half sewing and half crafts. Now it's pretty exclusively sewing. Which is great if you sew, but not so much for the likes of us who do other stuff. It was a little disappointing, but I did manage to get a great deal on a couple of Aussie stumpwork bug books. Even the monkey likes looking at the pics in them.
We decided to pick up assorted coffee influenced beverages at the great coffee corporation on our way home and were treated to this:
Disembodied voice: Welcome to Giant Coffee Corp! Can I take your order?
Holly: Uh yeah, two tall, unsweetened, green tea lemonades...
DV: Two grande sweetened-
H: No, tall, unsweetened
DV: Oh! Extra sweetener-
H: NO, unsweetened!
DV: Okay, two tall, unsweetened green tea lattes-
H: No. Two. Tall. Unsweetened. Green. Tea. Lemonades.
DV: Got it! Two tall, unsweetened, green tea lemonades. Is that all?
H: Nope. One tall mocha frappe light with coconut syrup...
DV: The frappes are iced.
H: I know, I said light.
DV: Okay, with ice.
H: Light!
DV: Iced.
Holly: Light. L. I. G. H. T. Light
DV: Oh! Light! So a grande mocha frappe light...
Holly: Tall. With coconut syrup and a tall java chip frappe.
It went on a little longer and screwier from here but you get the idea. Funny, but kinda not.
They went to dim sum this morning with Angela and her guy, but we begged off. We missed the dim sum so we could put 20 garden gnomes on Angela's front lawn. It was the only way we could do it while she wasn't home and still have Holly get to see it. Of course, I'm a twit and forgot the damn camera. So you'll have to hope Ang or Holly post pics. It was truly weird and her neighbor must think we're nuts. This poor guy was out gardening when we pull up, unwrap almost two dozen garden gnomes and place them around the front yard.
Definitely a drive by gnoming.

I have been unable to get motivated to do anything I really should be doing for a while now. Maybe it's sleep deprivation. I don't know, but it's making me crabby. Feels like I've got all this stuff to do and all these deadlines, and I just don't do it. WTF?!
I've decided to start a pattern book. I'm sick to death of all the "knit it this weekend!" crap out there and want to do something challenging and wearable. There's a certain designer out there who needs someone to slap her and let her know that a 36" bust is NOT a large. No more waify little models, who obviously haven't knit a stitch, wearing knitted skirts on cliffsides with their hair blowing in the breeze. I wanna see knitters. Knitters of all shapes, sizes and ages, doing things that knitters do, perhaps even, god forbid, KNITTING! No more sandwich deprived 15 year olds pinned into garments that some brain trust decided we'd make even though they're only showing the effing collar. (That one's for you Kerry)
The problem is, how challenging can I make it without alienating everyone? It keeps me up at night. I don't want to hold anyone's hand, be a grown-up people. Read the instructions. But will people actually read the instructions? This is going to take me a while to figure out. And I haven't even got to all the legal end stuff and printing and test-knitting and and and and
Crap. Hyperventilated a bit there.
So bear with me. Today I give you a picture of plain socks. It's all I've been capable of lately. Sorry.

Answers, Winners and an FO

First, the answers to my little quiz:

1. Monty Python. "Spell bolour with a "k"? Kolour! Oh what a silly bunt!" I used spinny to avoid being sued and because it worked for me a bit better. BTW, people have to do something truly appalling for me to spell "bunt" with a "k".

2. Cat hair, but I would have accepted any answer. And Lorinda, it's always been Kirk. I mean, come on! The guy has managed to avoid dying from galactic vd who knows how many times. You've got to admire his resilience if nothing else.

3. A garden shed that may someday soon become his new home so that I could use the old garden supply room as my wool room.

4. Older than me! He will always be older than me. That is the only acceptable answer.

5. Guitar building or Luthiery. And yup, I actually did make a decent living in my chosen field for a little while. Got some REAL interesting stories about musicians too. Ask me sometime.

6. Johnny Depp.

7. Aie ya IS a sentence. I use it in polite company instead of swearing. It manages to convey all sorts of emotions, but mainly horror and disgust.

8. I got tendonitis from knitting for the Vogue Nihon class. My Dr kindly suggested I just stop knitting and spinning for a few months and it would clear up. He then went on to suggest that I knit and spin less to stop it from flaring up. He stopped talking when he saw the look on my face and then suggested tylenol and ice.

9. I am continually treating my addiction with wool. So far, it hasn't let up. Hmm, I wonder why methadone doesn't work...

10. Tubal ligation with a rusty steak knife. Usually after a trip to the mall or mistakenly finding myself in a Chuck E Cheese.

And now, the winners!
Uli - sock yarn
Frauke - bags of mohair
Dad - food stuff
Irene (Rusty) - sock yarn turned into socks
Myriam (via write in vote) - topknot
Lorinda - handspun skein (please email me with your address)
Denise - roving (now you must tell me where you live, mwahahaha)
Anthea - sock book
Kerry - socks ( I KNOW where you live)
Heatherly - laceweight mohair (address please)
Jacqui - sock yarn ( I need your address too please)
I added an extra prize 'cause it seemed silly that only one person wouldn't get something. Ian Sim doesn't count as he is the monkey. Silly bunt thought he was being clever. I think his prize shall be a cuff upside the head. He didn't even get #6 right!


These are the finished monkey socks from the Second Sock Syndrome Swap. Debbie knit the first one for me and now I've got a pair. I like this someone else knitting one sock for me business. Any volunteers? I have a 7.5 foot, it's not that big, doesn't take long to knit a sock for that size foot.

Blogaversary Contest

Well, it's been almost a year. As usual, it's just whizzed by and I didn't get nearly enough done. It all started with this pic:


In honour of my managing to post on a semi-regular basis without offending a large amount of people, I'm going to give away some of my vast and terrifying stash. There's some of my handspun, a pair of socks, laceweight mohair from Ami Ami, Fancy Image sock yarn, Regia, a topknot, some BFL, the Vintage Sock book and TWO FULL bags of Rhapsody! Before you get all excited, you have to answer a few questions to earn the goods. Everyone can enter, especially my friends! I love sending stuff to my friends. Come on guys, everyone wants free stuff!


These are the prizes. Good incentive? Dad, the red peppers and peppercorns are your prize.
So, here's the deal. Answer one question, answer a few it doesn't matter. I will give points for creativity.

1. Where did I get the idea for the name of my blog? Your answer must include the word "bolour" and the letter "k".

2. What is this?


a) dryer lint I plan to collect and make into a sweater for the monkey.
b) the amount of fur I got off the duvet cover in one day.
c) a desicated tribble that ran out of grain on the Enterprise.

3. Last summer, the monkey built a:
a) garden shed.
b) his new home.
c) a wool room.

4. How old is the monkey?

5. What is the career I actually went to college to learn?

6. Who would I leave the monkey for in a cool second?

7. Use the phrase "aie ya" in a sentence.

8. How did I get tendonitis and what did my doctor suggest would clear it up?

9. Do you think I have a treatable or untreatable fibre addiction?

10. What operation do I threaten to perform on myself?

Have fun! I'll post the winners after March 17th.

What a Great Pal

It is a small world. My spoiler for the Second Sock Syndrome Swap was my spoilee for SP9. Debbie sent me all kinds of wonderful stuff. There are great smelling candles, a beading mag, a very pretty bracelet, bath stuff, tea, woolwash (a brand I haven't tried yet), and, of course, weird candy. I love weird candy! She found me cackling chocolate eggs. There were a lot more of them, but those sort of things don't last long around here.
The absolute best thing in the parcel was the sock. It's the monkey sock from Knitty done in a bright blue Jitterbug. She claims it is only her 5th sock, but I think she's lying. It's really nice and I plan to make it's mate as soon as I can.
Thanks Debbie! You spoilt me rotten and I had an awful lot of fun opening all the goodies.

Effing Groundhog!!!

Meet Punxsutawney Phil. He said we'd have an early spring. I say, he'd probably make a tasty stew as this is NOT my idea of an early spring on the Westcoast:


Just yesterday morning, crocuses, snowdrops and even daffodils were blooming. Today, this. Obviously large hole-living rodents aren't accurate predictors of the weather.
On the up side, my Spin to Knit swap pal sent me this beautiful skein, a pair of vanilla candles, some great goodies and a pen the monkey will never steal (it has marabou and a chocolate on the top).


The skein is three ply romney/mohair/merino/silk chunky weight. It's very soft and has a nice little halo that I think will really bloom when it's knit. This one's looking like a chunky ribbed hat for me. Many thanks Jaimie, it's gorgeous!


I think the cats have the right idea. Snug in and sleep till spring comes.

Uh yeah, I needed another hobby

Since I have oh so much time and never really enough to do, I have decided to try my hand at basketry.
You can all stop laughing now. I am doing this voluntarily, they have not finally come to take me away. Stop. Laughing.
After five weeks of great instruction with Irene (she taught me to spin as well, multitalented lady), this is what I have so far:


The start of an Appalachian egg basket (it's already been mentioned that those must be some big ass eggs), a little wall basket and two little rectangular ones. The tiny rectangle basket isn't quite done yet.
There's been knitting going on as usual. I've actually been working through some of the stuff I got at Madrona. It's been pretty much instant gratification knitting, hats, socks, bags, etc. I still have to get back to the spinning homework, but now that the cotton I have to spin up for dyeing in level 5, I don't have any excuses. And time's running out.


Must go spin and do research!

SP9 The Big Reveal

Sadly, I am frequently the one you all know. Gotta love the look on the non-tardy owl though, can't you almost hear the, "aw fer cripes sakes"?


My Secret Pal was Maggie. She disects seals. There are pics. No. She's not some sort of weird seal serial killer, she's a vet student. Her blog has lots o' pics. Go check it out. She sent me this great fibre from a local mill. It's mystery mill ends and the colour and feel of this stuff is wonderful. Once again I wish for touch'o'vision. I plan to spin it woolen to keep it fluffy and soft and make something fluffy and soft with it. No idea what yet, but I've been dying to spin with this stuff since it arrived and I haven't been able to because of other stuff that had a deadline. I've had to put it out of my line of sight (and feel) so I could stay focused and not be tempted.


This is the last of the vacation pics as I was unable to get a photo of the body bag coming off the ship when we landed in Miami. Now THAT would have been an interesting picture!
You'll just have to settle for the happy monkey and his new friend the stingray. I don't think I've ever seen the monkey so happy and relaxed. And I have to tell you guys, stingrays are the coolest things ever! They are incredibly gentle and the underside of them feels like velvet. The top side is a bit like elephant hide. This one was very happy to just be supported in our arms and look at us. This stingray place is on an atoll just off Nassau in the Bahamas. They have about ten female stingrays and breed them. The 'rays have all been debarbed and have a fairly large ocean pen to roam around in.
This was easily one of the neatest things we did on the trip.

To Whom it May Concern

Dear Sirs/ Madam,
Please add 4 to 6 hours to every day. As I am currently falling behind at approximately that rate, I think this would help me stay afloat.
I promise to not use any of this most precious "found" time for anything as trivial as sleep or say maintaining a thin pretense of sanity.
Thank you for your attention.

Madrona

Last weekend was Madrona Fiberfest in Tacoma. Lynne and I drove down on Thurday night and spent the next four days taking classes, eating (lots of good Thai food and martinis), catching up with friends, making new friends and of course, SHOPPING.
Yup. I bought a little bit of fibre. BFL, merino, silk, cashmere, the usual suspects. Check out those batts! I got them from this lady who was very nice, but kept bringing more stuff that was nearly impossible to resist. By day two, we were openly comparing the vendors to crack dealers. "Here little girl, the first bit is free, tell your friends." Insert evil laugh here.


Purchased a small amount of yarn as well. Blue Moon was the first booth to decimate my cash supply, but others quickly joined the fray. I'm nothing if not consistant.


I only bought the two Spindlewood spindles on the left at Madrona, and yes, one of them is square. I did notice. It spins really well despite it's obvious deformity. The two spindles on the right were waiting for me on Monday night. They're the now infamous Bosworths, a featherweight in really deeply coloured pink ivory and ebony and a moosie. They are exquisite. And they're actually here. Amazing.


The other nifty thing waiting for me on Monday was this package from my SpintoKnit pal. It's a large skein of very soft spindle spun merino/silk and some nice teas. I think the yarn needs to be a scarf. Many thanks to the nice person who sent it!


And if you've stuck with this post to the bitter end, here's a pic of the guy who drove our troop carrier (you read that right) in the Dominican Republic. We stopped in a sugar cane field and he whipped out a rather large knife to cut some for us to try. The Dominican Republic was an interesting place. Sugar is their main product for export followed very far behind by rum. Our tour took us to the back of a cafe where two people were making cigars, through huge cane fields and out to a refinery. Every time we stopped, we had to drink some rum. So basically, they got a bunch of tourists loaded and then put them on a boat that felt like it would sink at any moment. Exciting! I especially liked guessing which drunken tourist would puke first. Fortunately, no one did. Not even me. And we made it back to the cruise ship without having to swim for it. A nice and somewhat surprising bonus.

Last week was very productive.
Things were dyed:
Like this merino/silk for Holly.
Things were knit:
A pair of plain old socks in superwash merino.
Things were reknit:
It's the right size now and we're not to speak of this again.
This is the beach I enhanced my dose of skin cancer on in St Maarten. No one needs to ask why I want to live there anymore do they? Okay, except for the half-naked (as in only swimsuit bottoms) aging tourists, it's pretty much paradise. Be happy I spared you the view of the very large old man wearing nothing but a bright orange string thong that greeted our arrival.

Oh! I almost forgot. Chrissy had posted this on her blog a while back and I think everyone needs to see it. It's real. I know, I couldn't believe it either, but apparently it was made in New Zealand last year and is looking for distribution. I could not stop laughing. Enjoy.

Got Gauge?

I don't. I am an idiot. I got cocky and didn't swatch and now I have the joy of reknitting the sweater that I had pretty much finished last week.
Crap.

Some retail therapy occurred in the recent past in the form of the CTH New Years Sale, a trip to a sort of local YS and spindle enabling via Kerry. The spindles are a Beeswing and Satinwood Lizzie and a Mahogany and Purpleheart Emily. Both are from Adam 's Woodshop.


After five days at sea with nothing at all around us except half naked europeans and flying fish, we docked in Guadeluope. This island is technically part of France, so I got to subject people to what I remembered of school french. We bought lots of spices and some beautiful fresh fruit and wandered around the town a little. It was off-season there, so it was very quiet. We did go on a tour here to a nature preserve.
The brochure said, "Suspended walkways allow you to wander through the canopy, from one tree to the next at a height of at least 15 metres aboove the ground." This was the reality:


Being tethered by two carabieners to cables so you can inch your way along a pair of 1 x4s didn't seem very condusive to "wandering". Not to mention the fact that a have a fear of heights and spent the entire time staring at my feet so I wouldn't plunge off the tiny pieces of wood to my certain and surely embarrassingly slow death.

Snow, WIP and some FOs

New new year is already almost two weeks in and I'm behind. How does this happen?! I'm always doing stuff, so how am I so behind? WTF!?! But it's not all bad so far. The monkey finally said, "uncle" and gave up his old beater. This is his new baby. He loves it more than me I suspect. He gets this sappy grin on his face every time he looks at it.
And while dealing with car salesmen was not a treat, it was fun to tell one of them that the monkey's only stipulation was that it be blue. The salesman only paused for a moment, but it was a fun moment.


I have managed to get a few things done. I've got my Second Sock Syndrome package ready to mail. I used STR in the light weight and Sivia's Reptilian Lace pattern from Knitty. My pal wanted to try knitting socks on two circs, hope she likes the colours. Sorry,but I can't remember what that colourway is called. I've also got the first skein for the Spin to knit swap done. I used some Targhee roving that had been dyed in red, purple and brown and spun it to a light DK. That parcel will be ready for mailing by Saturday.


Here's the Kochoran hoodie finally sewn up. This sucker's been sitting on the arm of the couch for over a week. I just didn't want to do it. I have no idea why. I love this sweater. It's huge, soft and really warm, things that I desperately need since it decided to snow again yesterday. I hate snow! St Maarten here I come!


And on the needles right now is the Trinity pullover from CTH in potluck bulky. Weird pattern, it's knit from cuff to cuff and then picked up and knit down for the front and back. It's working up very fast and despite big shade variations in the skeins, it doesn't seem to show in the knitting. Should have it done by Monday. Wonder how long it'll sit on th earm of my chair before I sew it up...


The second stop on our cruise was Tenerife in the Canary Islands. We were a little thrown when we arrived as we'd both expected a quaint tropical island, but it's a modern bustling city. We didn't have a scheduled tour here and spent the first part of the day wandering around. We found a public market and bought spices and fruit and then used my pathetic spanish to take a cab to the other side of the island to a place called "La Casa del los Balconies".
La Casa is a tourist spot where they've restored one of the old houses to the way it was when the missionaries were there. It's sort of like a museum complete with mildly creepy mannequins playing house in the rooms. It was a bit of a disappointment, but the view of the ocean and the volcano from there was great! The cabbie was really nice and took us on a site-seeing tour of that side of the island. Banana plantations, black sand beaches and wild poinsettias everywhere. It's a really pretty place. This pic of the Tenerife parliament building and an old fort called the Black Castle. It's kind of a neat contrast with the ultra modern and the very old side by side.

SSSSwap

I think this will be the last swap I join for a little while. It is pretty brilliant though, just knit the first sock and send the rest of the stuff on to it's new home. I have no trouble at all making one sock!
Sorry guys, this is yet another questionnaire. A more interesting post tomorrow, involving FOs and the monkeys new wheels.
1. What are you favorite sock yarns?
Trekking ombres, STR, pretty much anything hand-dyed and I'd like to try the new Colinette jitterbug (Kerry, you're such an enabler!)
2. What are your least favorite sock yarns? Anything you just cannot use? I have a rather extreme dislike of acylic for socks and I'm not fond of alpaca for socks either. Don't get me wrong, I love alpaca, I just don't think it wears well for socks and I do WEAR my socks.
3. What method do you prefer to use (DPN's, 2 circs, 1 circ, etc.) I use four dpns. I've tried the other methods and I always go back to four dpns. Creature of habit.
4. Is there any method that you cannot use? Haven't found one yet.
5. What are you favorite colors? Blues, burgundies, purples and anything in-between. Not big on yellow or orange.
6. Are you a beginner, intermediate, or more advanced sock knitter? I guess fairly advanced.
7. Any other info you want to share (such as other likes, dislikes, hobbies, etc) I don't like cooked tomatos or boy bands.
8. Last, but not least, what are your sock measurements? 7.5

Happy New Year!

We spent Christmas Eve on Vancouver Island with my brothers and their families. It was really nice that we could all be together to catch up and exchange gifts. Not to mention to totally spoil the niece! Little bugger's growing at an insane rate and giggles if you so much as look at her. That's a pic of Aurora and Aunt Tiffany.
The monkey and I spent Christmas day together and were going to cook a ham, but were so full of all the crap we'd munched on by noon that we decided to have it Boxing Day. That worked out well and I like the different set of leftovers we can make with ham. Quiche, pea soup, ham and eggs are a nice change from turkey sandwiches and turkey soup.


I've basically spent the last week watching dvds, reading and knitting on the couch. I may have to have my butt sugically removed from it by tomorrow afternoon. My jammies and I are very good friends. I've relegated real clothes (you know anything that involves underwear and socks) to just for dog walks and company. I'm starting to understand the appeal of hermitry.
I have removed a couple of knitting projects from my stash. That's a Jean Wong design hat and a pair of cabled wristlets. They're sitting on my weeklong knitting indulgence, Noro Kochoran hoodie. Mindless, pretty, soft and warm, exactly what I want my comfy couch holiday knitting to be. I won't have it done tonight, but it's pretty close.


The travelogue continues in Barcelona! This was the second day of our cruise and the first stop. We'd had enough of bus tours and decided to just wander around shopping and site-seeing. That's a pic of the Olympic rings in the main harbour. We wandered along the shore and then up the main drag which consisted of two lanes each way with a large boulevard up the middle which was full of little kiosks selling everything from handcrafts to chipmunks. Yeah, I said chipmunks. We stood in front of that kiosk pondering for quite a while!
We found a large open air produce market as well. The monkey and I always wind up in grocery stores and public markets whenever we travel. We find the coolest stuff in them and local produce in foreign countries is so cool. We bought some clementines (I really wish they imported them out here) and dried fruit and really amazing handmade chocolates. People were wonderfully patient with my rudimentary spanish.
We only had a few hours on shore and decided to ride the elevator up the statue in the main square before we went back to the boat. This is the view of the street I just described from the top of the statue:


And yes, I am completely aware of the monkey's obsession with climbing things. At least this one had an elevator!

Crap! I'm old.

I remember when I was in my last year of high school doing the mental math to see how old I'd be in 2000 and thinking, "damn, I'll be really old." I also remember how ancient I thought my dad was on his 40th birthday. Sorry dad, I was 15, what can I say? If it's any consolation, it seems that the older I get, the less ancient you seem to be to me.
So I turned 40 yesterday. I'm having a little trouble with this. I mean, I still get IDed on a fairly regular basis and the ladies at Safeway still call me "miss", so WTF? Oh well, I guess I'll get used to it in time to turn 50. I refuse to even discuss that inevitability. Lalalalalalalalala I can't hear you!
But, dispite the number, it was a really good birthday. I was taken out for delicious meals, given yarn, sent flowers and just generally spoilt rotten. I loved it. Today is a bit sucky. What with the having to make my own food and all.
These are flowers my dad sent:


Aren't they pretty? And those are pussywillows! How cool is that? Thanks dad!
And my SP sent me a birthday parcel too. It's all made locally in her area. There's a very pretty tealight holder (that will be very handy when our power goes out again), some yummy apricot jam, chocolate dipped orange rind, some jasmine soap, and chocolate crackling elves. The elves are chocolate filled with pop rocks. They amuse me no end. Must find more, everyone I know needs to have some of these. If you can eat them without grinning, there's something wrong with you.
Thanks for the super pressie SP! You have excellent timing.


The travelogue continues with our short stop in Pisa before we boarded the cruise ship. We only had 45minutes in Pisa and sadly, it wasn't long enough for us to go up the leaning tower. But we walked around it and the Duomo and Baptistry as well. When you round the stone wall that surrounds Pisa this is what you see:


It's incredibly beautiful. I was really surprised at the size of the tower. I had always thought it was huge, but as you can see, it's not that tall. Still impressive and will last now that they've reinforced and shored it up. Hopefully we'll make it back there to climb the tower someday.
That was our last day in Italy and I have a fun fact: apparently, you cannot buy Dante in italian in Italy. I went in almost every bookstore we found and no go. We found Dante in spanish, german and english, but no italian. Figure that one out.

Sienna

The third stop on our trip was Sienna. This was easily one of my favorite places. It's a small medieval town completely surrounded by a large stone wall. Cars are not allowed in Sienna unless you live there and have permission, so the bus dropped us of outside the wall and we walked down through the curved streets to the main square.
The central square slopes down to a castle and is shaped liked a scallop shell. Twice a year horses are raced around the outside of the square bareback. Since the rules are fairly vague, the jockeys are allowed to push each other and often fall off their mounts. Ergo, the first horse across the finish line wins the race, whether he still has a rider or not!
The streets form circles around the square and it's pretty easy to get lost. To preserve the feel of Sienna, all wiring has been run underground, so it still looks mostly as it did hundreds of years ago. We cimbed the bell tower (400 odd steps, the monkey is a bit of a sadist) and had an amazing view of the surrounding countryside.
I found a wool shop in Sienna! Italian yarns at at amazing prices. Pretty sure I peed a little. The poor man running the shop must have thought I was mad. Trying to ask for certain colours in my very stilted Italian and probably looking very much like I'd gone rabid. The monkey couldn't wipe the grin off my face for the rest of the day. The other ladies on the tour were showing off the lovely designer scarves and bags they'd purchased and I would proudly hold open my bag of yarn for them to see. Yup, lots of people think I'm crazy. I've learned to live with it.


And just so no one thinks it's all about the holiday and there's no fibre content any more:


FOs! Bday present socks for a friend and a scarf for SIL. It's okay, both pressies are not surprises.

Since it's the season for gifts and sometimes they're kinda interesting, I give you a short meme:
1) the oddest gift you have ever received (not asked for): bright yellow lacey lingerie from my parents
2) the oddest gift you ever asked for: a large chunk of exotic hardwood and fret wire
3) the oddest gift you ever gave: adult diapers
4) the worst gift you ever got: gift card for a video store we don't have in our area

In case the meme failed to bring a smile, I give you this list on friendship that SIL sent me. I was going to forward it on to my email list, but I thought I'd share it with everyone here instead. Enjoy!
1. When you are sad -- I will help you get drunk and plot revenge against the sorry bastard who made you sad!
2. When you are blue -- I will try to dislodge whatever is choking you!
3. When you smile -- I will know you finally got some!
4. When you are scared -- I will rag on you about it every chance I get.
5. When you are worried -- I will tell you horrible stories about how much worse it could be until you quit whining.
6. When you are confused -- I will use little words.
7. When you are sick -- Stay the hell away from me until you are well again. I don't want whatever you have.
8. When you fall -- I will point and laugh at your clumsy ass!  (I thought you were dancing!)
9. This is my oath..... I pledge it to the end. "Why?" you may ask; "because you are my friend".
Remember... A good friend will help you move... A REALLY good friend will help you move a body... Let me know if you ever need me to bring a shovel.

Friendship is like peeing in your pants, everyone can see it, but only you can feel the true warmth!

WWLWA Pt 2

Day 2 The Vatican
The Vatican is an entity unto itself. It's really a separate country within the city of Rome. It has it's own police, work force and postal system. Regular Romans must get permission to spend any length of time there. It is completely surrounded by a huge wall with video surveillance. We had a tour guide for the morning and I really wish that we had just gone through the museum on our own. It's vast and I don't think we saw more than a tenth of it. We literally raced through beautiful statues, maps and tapestries. I have quite a few blurred photos of the fabulous ceilings throughout the maze of corridors that leads to the Sistine Chapel.
We were able to spend a little bit of time in the Sistine Chapel and what struck me first was how very small it is. I always pictured it as this huge space with an incredibly ornate ceiling, but it's tiny. The ceiling is amazing and with the recent restoration, the bright colors are almost overwhelming. We were hustled out of there and on to St Peter's. I was struck by the overwhelming display of art and wealth. I'm still not sure what to make of it. The only thing that really felt like it belonged there was the Pieta.
We decided to climb to the top of the cupola in St Peter's. After another stimulating round of "try to find the helpful Italian" (45 minutes that took!), we get in the line to climb the 300 and some odd stairs. Now. You can take an elevator to the base of the dome and then climb, or you can take the stairs. We're stupid. We took the stairs. Please keep in mind that the 340 stairs are just the ones in the cupola. They don't actually tell you how many stairs there are to get up to the cupola. I lost count. We'll just leave it at lots. So by the time we get to the base of the dome, we feel like death on a plate. We take a small breather and then forge on to the dome. The dome is two layers., the inner one with the frescoes that you can see from the inside of the cathedral and the outer one that you can see from almost everywhere in Rome. The stairs wind their way up between the two layers. The distance between the layers gets smaller as you go up. A lot smaller. You cannot change your mind. You have to go up one side and down the other. This is not a good place for anyone with even mild claustrophobia. But, we made it and here's the view of the square from the top of the dome:

See those dark metal things on the side of the dome? Those are candle holders. At some point in history some poor schmuck had to climb out there put candles on those things! Talk about your bad jobs.
We left the Vatican in the early afternoon after visiting the grotto that holds the tombs of past popes. A very strange and beautiful place.
We crossed the Tiber to find food and wound up having pizza in a little outdoor cafe. Took another crazy roman cab back to the hotel so we could crash before setting off for Sienna the next day.

Meanwhile, back in the here and now, the monkey and I have caved and put up a tree. Neither of us was feeling very Christmasy and there was nowhere to put the presents. So voila, tree!

Things we learned while abroad Pt1

We're back! Believe it or not, it was really great to finally be home. We had a very interesting and mostly fun trip, but in the end, there's no place like home. Even if you have to come home from the Bahamas to a foot of snow and below freezing temperatures.
These next few posts are gonna be huge and I don't want to send everyone into mini comas, so I'm going to break up the pics into sections and do it over three or four posts. Nobody wants to see 400 pics of places they aren't familiar with, so I'm just going to pick a few of my faves and hope you like them too.
I'll start in Rome, where finally landed after 36 hours of travelling to discover that our room wasn't ready and we had to sit through an hour of tour orientation. Keep in mind, we haven't slept, we've have had very little to eat and what we did have was plane food. All we wanted to do was grab some food, shower and collapse on nearest flat surface. So instead, we sit through orientation that once again makes me understand the importance of the two week waiting period to get a handgun. When it's over I ask the ladies running the tour if we have a room yet. Nope. No room. And strangely now we can't find our luggage. When we ask where it is, they tell us that it's in our room. We tell them that's great and ask for the keys to our room. They tell us we don't have a room yet. I won't go on here as this conversation went on like this for about 5 minutes and I couldn't find a handy brick to bonk myself over the head with anywhere. It felt like the Italian version of Who's on First. The monkey finally gave up on the tour ladies and talked to the front desk and got us a room key. Guess what awaited us in room. No really, guess. NOTHING! No bags. At this point even the charming even-tempered monkey is cursing. He goes back down to the lobby (pretty sure he was afraid I still had enough strength to commit grievous bodily harm upon the tour guides) and finds our luggage in a hallway at the back of the hotel. I think the tour guide told him it wasn't ready yet. How he managed not to slap her by this point is beyond me.
Day 1, Ancient Rome
Now when we booked this tour they listed off all the things we would see in each place. What they neglected to tell us is that they really mean "see". We drove past them at 60k in a bus. A bus that I managed to throw up in for about 30 minutes, missing part of the tour. The monkey and I are not totally old yet and in reasonable physical condition, so we spent our free time really exploring and going into the places that we'd passed by on the bus. We walked all around the People's Square, the Forum, Pantheon and the Coliseum. It was great. Rome is very interesting as all of the ancient buildings are in the midst of a large and fairly modern city. The size of the old temples was awesome. Incredible to think that they were built with no machines. Everything was stone and brick overlayed with marble and beautifully carved.


We took a cab back to the hotel that night because we so tired and it was a very Roman experience. Roman streets are very narrow and the cars are very small, but there's tons of them. Almost all the cars have scrapes along the sides and numerous dents. We found out why. Italians are insane. Our cabbie had a smoke in one hand and his cell in the other, he passed stopped traffic by driving down the centre line into oncoming traffic and would turn around to say apparently hilarious things to us in rapid fire Italian at about 100k. We managed to catch the words "Mario Andretti" and "Ferrarri". It sounds scary but it was actually fun and really gave a bit of a feel for the city.

And Jen, you're the winner of the blog contest. Congratulations! You are now the proud owner of yarn from Florence, rum from St Maaten, olive oil from Sienna, sugar from Guadeloupe, a leather bracelet from Tenerife, a key chain from the Bahamas and a lovely Costa cruise lines floaty ship pen. Contact me through my hotmail address so I can send you your loot.


Any guesses as to what this sock represents? If you said the amount of knitting I did in the past three weeks, you're right. Sad isn't it. But I read 5 books. Do I get any points for that?