Happy Birthday to the Queen...

... in which we take a long weekend and eat cake!

Upstairs Downstairs 

So what am I up to? Well Old Guy is out of town for a high school reunion. It's a bonus weekend of sorts in that pizza brochures and burger menus are once again emerging from the nooks and crannies of drawers and Bordeaux cherry ice cream swimming in Nestle's Chocolate Quik Sauce can be freely eaten and in copious amounts. I'm on day 3 of a cottage cheese and Miss Vicki's potato chips binge extravaganza. This has all come at a most inopportune time as I am supposed to be training for a 10k race next weekend.

It was with great sadness that I finished watching my Upstairs-Downstairs DVD collection (Christmas present) - so much so that I actually watched all the Bonus features which included cast and crew interviews, plot development, musical score information etc etc... I just did not want it to end! Funny when I started Season 1- I thought "oh gawd this is dated..." but as the story unfolded and drew me in... it seemed the perfect period piece for my hexagon quilt hand sewing project.

I'm not sure this happens to other people but I always seem to find myself watching shows in which someone is knitting (ie Mrs Bridges in "Up & Down" - as us groupies call it). I watch her technique. I replay it backwards and forwards to see if it's the "real McCoy" or just fudging. By the end of Up & Down I saw that Ruby's quilt was a hexagon quilt - just like I was making! How special is that?

Well time for Saturday morning chores (really how can I call these chores?)

• pick up my starter heirloom tomatoes from my Tomato Guy
• meet 2 good friends for coffee and knitting talk
• pick up my BRAND NEW sewing machine!

Come home... and... hmmmm -  the world is my oyster. Cottage cheese and chips anyone?

Getting my quilting mojo back...

Sorry - no posts - I'm busy wheelin' and dealin' on the spinning and weaving destash front. So far two more looms out, and a beautiful set of walnut Alvin Ramer Wool Combs have found a new home...

Having said that I'm on the quilt-y trail and am starting a new project... the details are here

long time no write...

Since this February 2012 was a Leap Year - I guess I just leaped right over it... ha! ha! I'm finding that I'm am very busy these days. And not sure exactly what I've been doing.

I've been going to physio for my knee (which is coming along - but not as quickly as I'd like). Having said that I walked the 2012 Hypothermic Half Marathon - in which I just beat my personal worst.

I went snow shoeing for the first time and it was fantastic! My new favorite winter sport.

Making Snow Angels

I've bought a "new to me" bicycle with 20" tires. It's a vintage Italian folding bike. I really didn't need another bike - but since I ride all over campus during Fibre Week I wanted something I could easily fold up and carry into my room at night. It was cheap inexpensive.

1960's Cinzio fold up bike

I moved to the dark side - and bought an iPhone (ugh!).  I've joined the iPhone drone team - walking head down, fingers fidgeting and falling into ponds etc. I text my kids night and day.

"Lunch is ready"
"Are you home?"
"Do we need milk?"
"Where are you?" (In which the response is "I'm in the next room")

When asked if I know the temp outside - I respond "No, but there's an app for that."

I am playing with Siri the voice activated "intelligent assistant" with mixed success.

" Siri  - text Youngman 2"
" You want to send a text?"
" Yes"
" To Youngman 2?"
" Yes".
"What would you like to say?"
" Thank you for looking for a coffee maker"
"Okay - Would you like me to send your text?"
" Yes..."

Message sent via Siri:

"Thank you for looking for a call me Baker"

We are still working out the kinks...

A cautionary tale...

Last Monday I decided it was a day to get organised.  And therefore, I did three things:

• Took down the Christmas decorations
• Shaved my legs
• Washed all my bloomers

In retrospect it was akin to a woman shaking her fist to the gods and daring them to send in the Mack trucks...

... and they obliged.

Earlier this week a new schwack of snow hit the city. It was a magnificent big fluffy luminescent  snowflake morning which came with an underlying bit of caution. Black ice lurked beneath some of the snowy surfaces. (Sorta like the alluring siren song of aquamarine white wave tipped waters - which just happen to be shark infested).  I hopped on my bike and looked forward to my morning commute. I planned to stay on the sidewalk, go slow and praised myself for having studded winter tires.  I was moving along quite well when suddenly... I slipped.

Looks like I have plenty of time to brush up on my crochet skills now... and time to reflect on the futility of trying to get ahead of the game when it comes to the mundane day to day stuff.

Happy New Year (belated)...

Listening to History - Bill Woodrow (sculpture)

Good morning! And welcome to my first second official "Judi Day" of 2012.  I'm hoping they won't necessarily all be like this one, as we  "roll in"  the New Year with carpet installers arriving shortly. The house is in chaos. 

***I wrote this last Monday and didn't get it posted on time... if I scratch the whole thing and start over, I anticipate another entry that doesn't make it to the blogosphere  - so I'm just going with the flow.***

New Years Day was spent moving, dissembling, tossing and of course the annual renegotiation of space (which is a premium commodity in our abode).


" I'll trade you -  your room with the window for my room with more square footage."
"But you have a hole behind the door..."
"...Leave the door open perhaps?"


One thing I hate about moving all "this stuff"... is it becomes glaring apparent to all - that I have alot of stuff. Spinning wheels, looms, sewing machines, knitting yarns, weaving yarns, and all the infinite accessories and tools that go with each endeavor. And of course, the ever expanding library of books. I am a book sucker. I love books. Mine are mostly "how to" or art books of every description. When they're tucked away in bookcases they aren't so obtrusive, but as they creep out of knitting bags, and onto tabletops and counters and bedside floor space they become more obvious. When they need to be moved upstairs, downstairs, from room A to room B... well let's just say statements like "something must be done!" hang heavily in the air like the smell of bacon on a Sunday morning.

Having said that - I love my books. I like looking at them, holding them, adding little stickies to pages to remember anticipated projects perfect for handspun yarn or the orphan skein rescued from a bargain bin on my travels. As I write this I realize I have always been more of a person who is just as excited by the idea of the project (the imagining of it) - than a person who needs to sees it to physical completion to be satisfied. A project or idea can dance in my head for quite awhile and the vast majority need never evolve further than being a theoretical stitch on a needle; or a fibre of thoughts ever spinning.

(One week later: still climbing over books and magazines and buckets of yarns, and boxes of fabrics...)

If I'd only known....

From Christmas past...

Last year I wrote the following optimistic little ditty ...

"...I also decided to make the boys Christmas stockings this year. I've been threatening to replace the plush Teddybear stockings I bought the Youngmen when they were Babyboys (21 and 23 years ago)  - but I just haven't gotten around to it. I suppose tacky plush teddy's hanging by their necks on the pseudo yuletide hearth is a vision I'd like to erase from their memory now while I still have the chance - that way when we all end up in therapy it won't be something that comes up..."

So this year, I pulled out the stocking fabrics, the batting, threads and pattern pieces and began to stitch. I had wanted to quilt parts of the stockings, and I wanted them to be a little larger than the plush bears. Well they are bigger- way bigger - as in ginormous. And not in a good way. I think in my enthusiasm to finally make the Christmas stockings which I had always envisioned over the years, I may have over compensated. So much so, that both Youngmen are somewhat appalled. To make matters worse - there is a whole "anti - new Christmas stocking" backlash in the yuletide air. I've been advised that they "like" their tacky plush teddy bears "thank you very much!"- with ragged hats, threadbare droopy bow ties and saggy bellies that get stuffed each year with chocolates, candies and magazines. 

I do realize that Christmas isn't "all about me" but I was somewhat taken aback when I offered to cut off detach their fluffy little plush heads and stitch them to the new stockings as a compromise. This suggestion was met with unanimous horrified derision. 

And so my elaborate handmade Christmas stocking family heirloom has once again been stifled. 

Another sheepless Christmas begins...


(If you are wanting all the process details of making the dratted stocking please click here).

Old Guy...back?

Well where the heck did that week go? I barely had time to break out the 2nd tier pizza pamphlets and the Old Guy was home again...

Not that he wasn't missed. But something was different this year.This year I actually got a little c-o-o-p-e-r-a-t-i-o-n from the troops. . And I'm not used to that. Dishes were washed, garbage carried out, snow was shoveled, and shoveled and shoveled again. All without begging, pleading, threatening or bribing (..."How much is this task worth ... two bits? A buck? Two bucks?"). It was a bit like (dare I say it) co-habitating with other adults.

Which is not to say I only value the Old Guy for his ability to wield a grill brush over the BBQ in the middle of winter, or his ability to remember which day the recycle bin goes out. That is not true.

I missed our witty morning repartee, our weekend rounds to the grocer, the butcher. Our evenings over a brew-ski lamenting about our day and relaying the latest and greatest goofball story heard on the radio or read in the paper. The novelty of having the "whole bed to myself " wears pretty thin pretty quick. But most of all I missed him. All of him.

Welcome home Old Guy - we missed you.