A No-Brainer

It was a beautiful day. Housework or horses ... housework or horses ... Even the knitting had to wait.






Beats working, wouldn't you say?

It Had to Happen Sometime ...

This being Minnesota, it couldn't have lasted forever, the stolen treasure that is Indian summer. The trees let go of their leaves in the rain over the last few days. The horses are getting wooly. The girls don't have to be hounded to put on a jacket. Sweaters, anyone?


Um, yes. Careful observers will notice the skein of yarn in my rather messy closet, which doesn't look quite that bad in person. Honest. I put it there to keep it away from the puppy jaws of death, and clearly forgot to bring it downstairs to join its friends in the stash.

How Far Away is Norway, Really?

She's gone and done it this time! Astri, that is — she who loves Norway and all things Norwegian — found herself a job, sold all her stuff, shipped the rest and left on Friday evening for a new life in Oslo. What else could we do but make sure she had a good meal before she left? At Steph's place (that's Astri, on the right):


Thank you, Julie, for the photo. ... And after lunch on Thursday*:


So. Astri. I'm very excited for you! I'll miss you. Stay in touch.

*I had no idea that my sweater was going to match the walls, honest.

I'm just sayin' ...

I just read this in someone's profile on Ravelry:

"And because it needs to be said, I can’t be friends with McCain/Palin supporters. I know it’s intolerant. I’m OK with that."

At least arrogance and its fraternal twin, smugness, are holding their own.

Not to be denied are those happy cousins, ignorance and narrow-mindedness. Take this excellent example. Regardless of what you think of John McCain, he gets credit for not tolerating it.

I have to go work on the vest.* I can't stand this.

*this project has not been approved by any political candidate. Sometimes red is just red ...

Look! It's knitting!

I bet you thought it never would happen. I had my doubts, too, but here it is ... the green seed-stitch sweater:


It's been finished for a couple of weeks, but you know. Things get busy.

And, there's been other knitting going on, which occasionally trumps sitting at a keyboard. First, this little item, for baby Ellis:


And, this will be a vest for the shop, one of those with the tall ribbing:


It's this pattern from Tahki's new Tweed Collection booklet, and i'm going a bit off-road with it. The pattern calls for Donegal Tweed, which is worsted weight, of course, but I'm using Blue Sky Worsted Hand Dyes, which leans more toward a light bulky and which I wouldn't knit smaller than on a 9.

There's also some un-knitting on the horizon. Remember this?


I decided I don't like it. One edge is very nice, but the other is fanning and it bugs me. I don't know if it's my upside-down and backward technique, but whatever, it isn't working. So into the frog pond it goes. There are a couple of manly scarf patterns on Ravelry that I'm going to look at, so all is not lost.

Have time for a little silly dog trick? Puppy Gunnar ...


... has perfected the hockey stop on the guest bed -- you know, where the skater skids sideways and sprays ice dust everywhere. Gunnar and Riley were playing the other morning and clearly the hockey stop was part of the game. All the bedding wound up on the floor on the opposite corner, but it was so funny to watch him, how could I be annoyed?