A Place for Everything

 

In anticipation of getting Pup out of the pen this weekend I started emptying shelves and cabinets that will all have to be moved back into place. Everything is getting piled up on the dining room table for now. 

I can't wait to get all those bookcases and cabinets out of the hallway. They've been a catch all for all sorts of junk. It's really gotten out of control. I've gotten so used to living like this that I'm not even sure where to begin. 

It's hard to believe that I am still living in the chaos of the big kitchen remodel that started 3 years ago. I've been using all the boxes and dining room furniture to pen in Pup. She kept a close eye on all the activity and I kept a close eye on her. She's used to me moving boxes of junk from place to place. It seems like all I do anymore.  

Yesterday she seemed a bit wobblier than she has been. Her limping was worse which is worrisome. Now that she's feeling better she may be overdoing it but I've been literally sitting next to her 24/7 to make sure she doesn't. We may not actually get out of that pen as soon as I hope but I'm getting ready just in case. I'm going stir crazy sitting here looking at all the work I have to do to get my house back in order. I'm going to have to pull up old photos to see where everything goes. I've forgotten. 

After dropping a very heavy flashlight on my toe (big ouch), I gave up for the day and went back to sitting and knitting. Number 10 is coming together. When I have my mind on my projects I can just tune out the chaos around me. Today I need to figure out how to get my spinning wheel out in this mess because tomorrow is the first stage of the Tour and it all begins in Copenhagen this year. 

Purple Haze

 

Thanks to all the Pup drama I don't get outside much which is a shame because it really has been a lovely summer. I did notice when I had Pup out for her brief morning walk yesterday that all my summer blooms were blooming. 

I have rows and rows of pretty purple hosta flowers lining the sidewalks front and back.

My hydrangea isn't blooming like it usually does because it suffered a lot of damage when my poor pine tree out front went over. I had to trim it back and only the remaining top is in flower but the blooms that are there are a lovely lavender this year for some reason or another. 

Speaking of lavender....last year I made up a pot of mixed herbs and accidentally bought lavender when I thought I had bought sage. I have never had lavender bloom when I have tried to grow it on purpose but this one managed to put up some spikes of flowers. Go figure.

Oddly, everything in my herb pot survived a long winter of neglect which was a big surprise. Since I've been too preoccupied with my never ending disasters I've had no time to think about planting anything anywhere this year. It's a good thing Mother Nature had my back.

Tiny Needle Tuesday

 

I really needed to get to work on the latest baby sampler but stuck here on the living room floor, always keeping one eye on Pup, I wasn't sure how to proceed. Since I am not sleeping in my Ikea chair anymore I decided using its bare bones for a stitching stand just might work and it did. 

An old island stool makes a handy floss rack and a knitting stand holds the pattern and all the other whatnots.

In four days I've managed to get this much done. I figure if I stitch one block a day I could have it done in 26 days. I know I won't but at least I've got a plan.

As for today's Pupdate....she's standing really well on that bad leg as you can see. We don't have to use the sling anymore.  She's actually driving me crazy. On Friday she will be off any restrictions so maybe....just maybe I'll have a life again. I've got so much to do. 

Ribbit, Ribbit...

 

I bought some of Knit Picks new Heatherly yarn in hopes of starting a little sweater for a soon to be Grand. It's a big fluffy yarn and I was surprised to find it came in skeins. I shouldn't have been surprised because it clearly shows it in the photos but nonetheless it was a surprise. 

I do a lot of sock yarn winding but I couldn't recall a time I had to wind yarn this thick or fluffy. It wasn't fun. In fact it was frustrating as heck. 

After struggling through the winding I cast on without too much incident but decided I hated the pattern I had bought. What was I thinking? I hate assembling knit pieces and I had bought a pattern that had lots of finishing. After finding a better pattern-a seamless one, off to the frog pond it went. 

During said frogging I broke my one and only 16 inch circular interchangeable cable. I have this very old Knit Picks set and I decided right then and there I hate the fiddlyness of it and went and bought several sizes of 16" fixed circulars instead-which was a small fortune btw. Now I have to wait for them to arrive before I can cast on again but since I am not going anywhere anyway it doesn't really matter. I've got plenty of other things to keep me busy.

The Little Things

 

 A friend I haven't spoken to in ages called me yesterday and was gobsmacked by my never ending tale of woe. I assured her it wasn't all bad. There have been moments and memories from all this turmoil that I will cherish. Early mornings for one. I love getting up before the world is awake. It's my time. 

I make myself a pile of waffles for the freezer and a good pot of coffee and just be. When normal life returns and I'm not sleeping in a pen on the living room floor I'd love for this routine to continue.

As for today's Pupdate...she's joining me for breakfast now in my early morning hours. She was never a morning eater but she's enjoying a small bit of hamburger and rice. I learned the hard way kibble is not working on her tummy just yet when she gobbled it down and heaved it right back up. The best news is that she is finally putting some weight on that poor leg. It takes some dog months to use the leg again but she's hobbling around pretty well now. She'll probably never be able to maneuver stairs or jump up on things again but that's a small price to pay after all she's been through.

Heels

 

I turned the heels on all three socks yesterday. That's it. I'm not sure where the time goes all day especially since I am getting up usually between 4 and 5 but it goes and it goes fast.

As for today's Pupdate.....look at that side eye she's giving me. She's not trusting me anymore since I have become the mean lady who pulls on her bad leg and puts cold stuff on it all day. The better she's feeling the harder it's getting to do anything with her-which may be a good thing but it's making my life more difficult. 

New Stuff

 

I'm not able to get very much done with everything that is going on but I have been able to order stuff. Here is the weaving kit I ordered a while ago. It's a simple twill kit and that's probably just my speed after such a long break in between projects. 

The new baby sampler has shown up from the UK. It's a lot smaller than the first one I ordered which is a good thing since I am running out of time. This latest Grand is due in September. 

Here are the little project patterns I couldn't wait to share. I found them on 123 Stitch when I went to buy floss. 

I first saw this sheep stack pattern and put it in my cart but then I saw......

...the goat stack and had to have it too. 

The llama stack was equally adorable so it came along as well. They've got many, many other animal stacks and if I finish these, one day I'll go back for more. I can't stop thinking about the cows. 

And....for today's Pupdate, she's sitting up today and hobbling around a bit. She seems much more comfortable and didn't need all her doses of pain meds. It sure didn't hurt her appetite. They want me to reduce her diet by 30% during this time of inactivity but I'm not so sure that's gonna happen. We do like our tea and cookies every afternoon. 

Nine

 

I got up with Pup at 3 am yesterday so after I got her back to sleep I had some time to myself. I got Number 9 finished and.......

......Number 10 started. 

Pup's starting to come around from the anesthesia and we are working hard at getting that leg moving again. I thought she was going to hate this part of the process but right now she seems to like it.

Pupdate

 

Monday was a very long day. Up at 5 and on the road with Pup for her big day. The Mister and I sat in a nearby park until 2:30 waiting until the vet called to say that it all went well. I had booked a hotel room nearby for the night because they said she had to stay all night but she was doing so well the surgeon said we could pick her up at 9 pm if we wished. Lucky for us, it was a pet friendly hotel because the emergency hospital was packed and they had run out of kennels and could use the space if we were willing to do the night duty ourselves by giving meds and icing. I put The Mister to bed so he could drive us home the next morning and I stayed up beside Pup all night keeping her comfortable. It was really no effort because I was running on pure adrenaline and she was pretty drugged up.

If you are squeamish don't scroll down to the next photo where you can see her incision. 

Back at home the next morning we could see that it was a much bigger boo boo than we anticipated and to tell you the truth I am a little freaked out about it. We have to severely restrict her movement for the next few days so it's more floor sitting for me. Three times a day we have to do a massage of the leg along with some serious PT all followed by a 15 minute icing. We have to do this for two weeks and then we switch to heating the leg after her exercise and massage for another two weeks. Needless to say she's got a bag full of some pretty serious pain meds. 

So....don't be alarmed if I disappear once again. I'll be giving updates for time to time on Pup's progress but I doubt I will have anything crafty to show off for a while-but at least she's home and that means an awful lot after the terrible day we spent waiting for that call.

Tiny Needle Tuesday

 

If all went well, Pup should be coming home today so expect a Pupdate tomorrow. I wrote this on Sunday because I had something else finished to show off. My bookmark is done. Now I have to assemble it by sewing that felt onto the back. I think I am going to change the green felt for some ivory because that way the stitches won't show as badly. I have little faith in my ability to do any neat stitching.

I have been working on the Village Quaker this week but I ran out of the light gray floss for the next ring of border. It's all one color, thank goodness, but it takes a lot of floss. I ordered more but I bet you dollars to donuts I have more of it stashed away somewhere. I am just too busy (lazy) to go digging for it right now. I also ordered some more small projects since the bookmark is done and I can't wait to share them. They are really, really cute. 

While I am waiting for all that to arrive I might as well get some more boring green stitches done on the grass around the little shepherdess. There really is no end to the things I have to finish up around here.  

Project Interrupted

 

I know today is Pup's surgery day but I don't want to talk about. I don't even want to think about it so I spent the weekend keeping my mind occupied by sorting stash and planning projects. When I found this one I realized I had another story to tell. 

The Swish was replacement yarn for the Holm mitten project that I frogged because every time I picked it up to work on it I got hives...or so I thought. 

Last winter I had spent a small fortune on this new Arne and Carlos yarn but since I thought it made me itch, I tossed it all in the trash thinking there was something really wrong with it. Looking back, we now know it was not the yarn but the M word. Pup first showed symptoms in early January and I started having issues in February-just about when I had started this project. I can't believe I tossed all that beautiful yarn but at that time I HATED it and wanted a scapegoat for my puzzling malaise. I wouldn't have even gifted it to my worst enemy. Thank goodness I didn't post about it at the time because it really is lovely yarn and I would have owed Arne and Carlos a huge apology.

Well..see you on the other side of our latest Pup drama-hopefully with some good news for a change. 

A Treasure Hunt

 

The Tour de France is just around the corner and I doubt I will be able to so much spinning but just in case, I spent yesterday digging out my spinning toys. In the process I remembered I bought some unwashed fleece last year from this pretty lady here, Cari. 

For the life of me I couldn't remember what became of her. Thank goodness for the blog because I can see from last year's post that I did indeed wash her. 

I also dyed part of the fleece but I never posted about what happened to any of it or posted a photo of it dry which is odd. 

After searching high and low I found her in a bag in the bottom of a closet. She needs to be carded which is an outside job. The weather is perfect this weekend for it, cool and breezy but I'm stuck inside with Pup. So sadly after all that searching Cari once again is on the back burner. 

I also dug out and wiped off all of my dusty drop spindle project baskets.....

....along with my support spindles. None of them have seen the light of day since last summer and I had to use the blog again to refresh my memory on just what was going on. I think I've got it. 

Of course, my biggest spinning derailment was in using up all the yarn I had spun the year before. I usually get a project or two out of them but not last year because the big itch descended in January. I couldn't handle wool, wear wool or even think about wool all winter thanks to some little creatures so small you can't even see them. If I hadn't of just lived it I wouldn't have believed it. It was like something out of science fiction-or a horror movie. 

Ektorp Liberation Day

 

The beat up old Ektorp couch in the living room got a face lift. We took off the plastic yesterday, gave it a good vacuuming and cleaning and put on a brand new cover. I bought the cover years ago and now I wish I had bought more since Ikea doesn't make Ektorps or their covers anymore and they really are the most comfy and easy to clean couches ever. 

Since it is going to take two of us to wrangle Pup after surgery we needed a place for The Mister to plant himself for the duration. He's not as bendy as I am so the floor isn't an option for him. After Pup gets the all clear we are moving the old couch to the lower level and I'll be getting a new one for the living room.

At least I've been fairly productive with all this floor time. I've got six more Audun blocks to show for this week.