You've Got Mail

 

Look what I've learned to do! I discovered that I can finally do online orders at Ikea. Believe me, I've tried in the past and they would never deliver to my zipcode but now they seem more than happy to take my money. This is the first of three giant boxes I am expecting this week. I've got a lot of replacing to do-sheets, pillows, towels etc. What I couldn't get them to do is send me the new couch that I really need. Not yet anyway.  Of course, I'm not opening anything until we get the okay from the vet on Friday. We're not taking ANY chances of ever having to go through this nightmare again. 

Sweet Surrender

 

Yesterday was awful. Not only was my back still out, my whole body felt like I had been hit by a truck. I even thought about taking a Covid test just to make sure but I was in too much pain to get up and do it. In spite of the misery I got the Lofotens finished after taking a Tylenol and a morning and an afternoon nap.

While I was feeling halfway human I also started an assembly line for the Audun squares. I do better when I do a whole lot of one row. If I don't, I make a lot of mistakes. This crochet thing doesn't come naturally to my brain-not that much does anymore. 

On Friday I managed to get this far on the Advent sleeves. Doing them two at a time is the way to go. Like the Audun squares, it helps to repeat things a few times. That second sleeve just flies by as I have the pattern already in my head. I have no idea what today will bring but I hope it will be better than yesterday. Yesterday was pretty darn terrible. From head to toe, this old body has just about given up. It was the first day in nine weeks that I could't fight the mites and I am hoping they got the message a while ago and have vacated the premises. We'll see. 

Ouch

 

It seems I lifted one big bucket of wet laundry too much yesterday and now my back is out of whack. That's my great grandfather's cane I have by my side. When you see that out of the closet, it's never good. I can't get up out of the chair without it right now. My aching back makes the pain in my fingers seem like nothing so at least I can get some knitting done in my downtime. I'm finally at the toe on both the Lofoten socks.

Saving Face Time

 

I've had quite the technological adventure this past week. Son gifted me an iPad for Mother's Day and in the process of setting it up I locked myself out of it. I spent days trying to figure out what I did and how to fix it. It was either take it to the Apple store (which isn't happening) or buy a laptop that would run iTunes. I only have a little Chromebook and Chrome and Apple don't mix so I bought a cheap refurbished Dell laptop from Amazon and finally managed to restore the darn thing after 6 tries. The iPad kicks you out of restore after 15 minutes so you have to do it over and over again to get the full download. Jeesh. All's well that ends well though because I got to Face Time with the Big Grands which was a whole lot of fun and I can now use the Dell to print since our printers stopped listening to the Chromebook months ago. 

Speaking of Mother's Day gifts, Daughter sent me a Knit Picks gift certificate and last night when I couldn't sleep at 2 am I used it to buy the kit for these slippers and........

....the Hue Shifting Afghan. I've always admired all your miter square blankets but I just can't do the fiddly sock yarn thing. I am going to give this sport weight one a try and see if it takes. If not I'll have a whole lot of sport weight yarn to do something else with. 

Kitesurfing

 

No, not this kitesurfing.....

...the kind that comes wrapped up in pretty paper from Miss Babs.

Every year she comes up with a MDSW colorway that represents something about Maryland and I suppose kitesurfing is a thing in Ocean City. I had to look it up since I've never heard of it or seen it here on the bay.  She also sent me a little pigtail of another yarn she carries to swatch but it's just too cute for that. 

I need to get my knitting fingers moving again. This one is going to be calling my name no matter how far away I stash it. And just think...I didn't have to risk Covid to get it. Daughter has an adult student that attended the MDSW and after two years of being careful, four days later she came down with........well, you know. 

Week Nine

 

Much to Pup's dismay she's got almost another two weeks in quarantine. I called the vet on Monday and she doesn't want to see her until the 27th which is a week after she gets her third dose on Friday. I'm hopeful we'll get a good report. I'm so tired of living in this plastic wrapped house.  

I've bought new pillows and mattress covers for when we get the okay to be normal again. I bought new sheets a while back. 

A sign that progress is being made is the sight of an empty bathtub. It's still be used to boil all our laundry in the mornings but I actually took a bath in it on Sunday night. I had only been taking showers-several a day to fight the itch. Right now I am only in need of two. One in the morning and one at night. The serious itch is a distant and terrible memory at this point. We've got some small itchies and weird little prickles but they are manageable with just some spot treatment. Taking my first bath in two months was wonderful. I didn't feel like I was sitting in mite soup at all, although I did rinse myself very well afterwards and used a big dose of Epsom salt and vinegar in the water. Baby steps I know but headed in the right direction. I really feel the worst is behind us. Finally.

Tiny Needle Tuesday

 

Well look at that. I finally finished that awful lawn section. It only took me a three years but to be honest I'm surprised I got it finished this quickly. It was such a painful slog. I still have a bit of border to do at the bottom and then the sentiment at the top before I can declare a complete victory but I'm still doing a happy dance today. Whew.....