Here's the picture that came out best. I still must figure out how to do real close ups with my camera. I've only had this thing for 7 years, you would think by now I could use it better.

The Glass and WhatNot

I'm going to have some work to do on these pieces getting them ready to wrap. I'll be grinding edges flat and then hand polishing the tops. The most fun part is designing actual wrapping and balancing it so that the piece hangs exactly the way you want it to.

Knitting. I'm going to read, knit socks, the sweater, and relax on this long weekend. I suppose there is a NASCar race on TV that may get some attention from DH, or not. Lol. We'll see. But we intend to eat well and remember our ancestors.

The little pink socks are still at the ribbing, which is a whopping two and a half inches wide, and tomorrow I'm making some stitch markers for the sweater panels. I don't want to be running all over the place with those different patterns should I space out thinking about Worldly Troubles. I found some little, flat, blue and white flower beads, a tulip shape, and some other small Czech frosted beads to use for this set of markers. I bought them on a bead buying expedition to Quartzsite one year. At last, a good use for them!

Bits and Pieces of the Crafting life.....

I wanted to share some ceramics here so there will be more pictures coming, and also a little of the wire wrapping that is very fun to do. My hands are getting tired though and I have to be careful just how much stress can be put on them now. When you look at the delicate joints in your fingers you wonder how something like that lasts as long as it does.

The glass pictures that I took today got deleted from the camera.. "Oh, what's that button do; I never saw that one before.. OH NO!!!"

Anyway, I will get them taken tomorrow afternoon and get them up here. They will look rough and odd, but you will see the possibilities in them. They always look that way when first fused.

My hubby wanted to keep this ring so I made a present of it to him. The Mexican Fire Agate was collected and polished by our friend who passed away suddenly one year. I didn't wrap it for a long time but then one day it just seemed right to do a ring of it.

This was a wrap that I did of a smooth stone that was brought to me at the Fair. The man who brought it had a friend who was too ill to fly to his father's funeral, so the man who contacted me asked me to wire wrap this stone, and also told me about part of the history of his friend's father.

David was the father's name and he was a Jewish man who had worked hard to save people from the Nazis and had saved approximately 500 people before he had to flee. The stone was very rounded and irregular and hard to wrap but I wanted to have the symbolism of the waves that carried David and his family across the Atlantic Ocean to their new homeland to be represented by the waves across the stone. The little curls at the top of the stone represent the little curls of wave around the pillars of the dock where the ship came to rest, with the ropes that tied up the boat above them symbolized by the twists there.

This is the back of my witchie. See the little owl. I did a lot of air brushing on the parts of this piece. Her coat is an interesting Macco glaze that has shiney bits in it.

I love this little witch stitching up her little ghost's PJ's. She is all in glazes and fired earthenware. And she's lighted, too.

Chenille bulky is not my friend. I love the feel of all chenille knits but not this bulky so much. I will finish this sweater however. This gets frogged again and taken down another size because when I lost weight again it just got too big.

A close up of the pattern which is lovely and pretty simple. Next time I make it I am using the colors of the sea!

Mother left me some wool yarns and I've used most of them but this is the newest project

Mother left me her wool yarns and I've used most of them up but I have not got this one done of two colors in Seafoam pattern from a book at the Library. Colors are wrong but I love the pattern. What could I do?

Those elusive Baby Tort pics

Sorry Karen and Vi, the baby tort piccies are on regular film, and I have to find the prints we had made of them. I was going to do that this AM but other things have popped up to get done. The power supply crashed yesterday and had to be replaced last night, and I have to down load a bunch of stuff today for firing the dichroic glass and getting my soak schedules just right for what I have. I will get those pictures up asap because all the kids want to see them, too. They didn't get to see them when they were really tiny. Gee. I forgot about that.

Megann, have fun with your new pets. Over time you will find out a favorite food and all the safe food, but never feed them potato peels. If I think of anything else I will send you a note. Oleander, of course. I think you probably know quite a bit already if you are adopting them. Let me know if you get piccies up somewhere cause I'd like to see them, too. You'll like them.

This is the baby shawl I made for my first grandchild. I made this during the 90's. Probably early 90's from my baby book that I'd made all the sweaters and hats from for my daughters. I've thought about fringe for it, but babies seem to eat fringe. I've still not made up my mind about the fringe. No, I'm not a Grandmother yet so it might become a shawl for me in which case I will put a very long knotted fringe on it.

What I meant to say in my answer to Karen's comment was that it is NOT beaded, not that it is now beaded. Sorry for that typo. I am not reading so well tonight!

Also, in close up I realized that the blue logo from the bag under it to prop it up was showing through as a faint almost stain. Lol I have to get better at this.

This is the top I am knitting and the three yarns together gave me a worsted weight yarn. I think it's going to look very nice. The pattern is like a shell but has cap like sleeves.

I wanted to show you something I started in the mid 80's when I first learned the art of mixing thin threads to get a gauge. These were bin cotton yarns from where I worked and I used two colored balls to minimize pooling of color. I do plan to finish this since I can still wear it! lol

Here's a close up of his eye. He had 7 brothers and sisters of those that I found that the ravens didn't get, and now there are only three left. There are Lucky and two who went to my faceting teacher who wanted very much to have them. They are all doing well now that they have got over a few hybernations.

I put the sprinkler in there so you could see how big he is. He has green eyes like his mama and he is about 10 years old.

Meet the baby of the tort family! His name is Lucky and I will tell you a story about him too. But this is just the caption.

These are the scarves that DD2 made for me for Christmas and the little hat I got a year ago at Christmas from my twin DD (DD3) who has been knitting for quite a few years. She and her twin have knit those four foot long pointed snowboarders hats as well, and even now some socks (DD4) for some of her friends. The first socks for DD4 ( the twins are three minutes apart in age) is on this blog also. DD1 is a crocheter of amazing patternless triad design doilies, beaded jewelry, and all things afghanish... She showed me one this summer that I hope she will finish. Hint Hint.. heehee It's lovely..

My daughter who just learned to knit made this farrow rib scarf for her Dad for Christmas. Later I bought more yarn to make him a watch cap to match and you can see the two skeins of it just under the scarf. Right in front of it there are two skeins of Alpaca/silk/Merino yarn that his Aran sweater is being knit from. They match perfectly but the glare from the table tricks my camera sometimes. Poor thing!

I found yet another sock pattern!

Of course that's no news at all to the sort of people who may read this, but I've found one I really LIKE a lot and want to make in the pink yarn from Elann. Yeay!

Today I packed away some more things that should have been down on New Year's Day, according to my MidWestern Mother's mindset. But I like the way the sparkly little tree cheers up the dark days of winter, and Oh yes, we get them here in SoCal, too. I had it all undecorated but didn't have everything put away. Now it's put away.

It was always the best time of the year for my mother because she liked to bake and decorate for Christmas. She made life fun for her children while living a hard life, mentally and physically, herself. My sister and I have begun to remember things that we sort of buried about Mother's life.

I hope that she lives in Heaven in a beautiful garden, like the ones she made on earth. Now that she would surely love. She'd love to be able to prune and form beauty, with lots of congenial company to share composting and rose tips with. Mother loved hand embroidery so I'm sure in their spare time the Gardening Angels get to do that, embroider our sunrises and sunsets and the edges of stormy skies. They must use the tendrils of winds to do this, stirring little whirlpools in their delicate way.

The Brown Yarn

It's a thick and thin, 100% wool from Great Britain. It's part of Charlotte's yarn stash, too. I think I would like to make a capelet out of it and line that with brown or black satin. I love the mink colors of this yarn.

This is the brown yarn I tried to put the picture of up earlier.

Today I stepped on the future, and Wars of the Past

Well I stepped on a tortoise egg that I was going to take a picture of. This accident happened while I was wrestling with it's father and trying to get a picture of HIM, the brute! The egg rolled off onto the ground and I stepped on it. It really had no future as anyone who knows about reptilian eggs realizes, and did it ever smell! Oh well, hopefully the dog won't try to stick his little nose under the flower pot I covered the evidence with to get a lick before I go out there and bury the remains! I so wanted to show you how big and how round they are.

I haven't been sleeping well at all so am not getting a lot of any sort of brain work done. I haven't worked on the dichroic glass pendants, and I haven't tried to knit. Just walking through my days in a haze trying to not run into the walls.

Vi I hope you had a great time at the Maryland show, and I am going to read that blog right away to see what you've been upto in your injured state.

Mother's Day was wonderful. We played all day in the MMPOG (MMPOLG for those who adhere to that protocol- I'm one of them) with our two oldest DDs. It's more fun than being a kid again! The Little Sisters, as they are called, sent me a sweet card, an e-mail, and the one who does radio dedicated her Sunday show to me, a very nice warm and fuzzy feeling sort of wrapped itself around me.

This is part of my writings on how I feel about War, since the subject was opened by my earlier remark about Churchy's and my relationship:

"War is an utter wasteland of human making that destroys lives and the earth for centuries after it has been fought. I think the reason is that we never admit that war solves nothing. We won't admit to ourselves that it only sets in motion other events to come, however far away into the future, that could, if we had the will to do so, be traced back to the original failure of diplomacy that caused the war in the first place. Lies become the truth, sadly, and we never really comprehend the way that they knit together a burial shroud for future generations. In truth, the British Empire should look just as bad and just as much a failure as the Roman Empire but we are still living with the falsehoods surrounding British "Empire". And, thus the march to war continues, based on lies that half a nation will be telling the next generation."

This is a link from CodePink, a Women Against War movement, to Julia Ward Howe's Declaration after what she saw and went through in the after math of the American Civil War.

http://www.codepink4peace.org/article.php?id=217

Well, sorry, I can't seem to use the hot link feature very well so it's still a copy and paste sort of thing for CODE PINK there.....

I think Women can stop this madness if we get up out of our chairs and start showing everyone we are sick of the slaughter of innocent people and the aggression that comes with unopposed power. History has many stories to tell about power vacuums and how all consuming they are. We stand in the middle of life everywhere and have tremendous power only in a few of these places. Our power can be used properly and with a will. Why Not?

This is for machine yarns and doesn't like anything with slubs. It is cranky but will wind any smooth yarn beautifully. My machine knitting teacher gave this to me to wind yarns bought in Tecate, Mexico. I've been there once, liked it very much but coming home there was an accident along the only highway out of the place, on the American side of the border, and we sat in traffic for four hours. This was with four kids in the van and I really felt like the trip was ruined for them even though they were patient and sweet natured and looked at every inch of scenery that they'd never seen before.

Lovely wool yarn from who knows where but it is a Boucle. Anyway I have a lot of it. I found the winder at a swap meet in the 60's Isn't it cute? It came from Vallejo in California.

These are some last century yarns. haha.. Anyway, They are at least from the 60's and some of the stash that my friend gave me of her wools and other weaving bits before she gave the rest away. I think they will make lovely little scarves. The yarn on the left is from Ireland.

You can barely see the brown of his eye. It is very dark warm brown.

This is Churchy who would not stand still for a really good picture. He was too warm and wanted to be fed and couldn't stay still. He and I don't get along as well as Poko Ono and I because he is too aggressive. I don't like aggression in any form what so ever.

Isn't this sweet? Thanks to Vi, I picked it up from this AWESOME European site....

http://home.tiscali.nl/jes.tromp/index.html

and wanted to share it. I will make it a hot link a little later.. Like tomorrow? hehe

Hello Vi and Greetings to Karen

Oh Vi, you must mean that your Papa had green eyes and a dignified countenance. She looks very Roman to me at times. heehee

One thing that made Poko have that very wide eyed look is that Jaz always tears out of the house in the morning and barks right in her face to get her to run. I yell at him and he dashes off to find something that will actually flee but by then Poko is Wide awake! She was also snatched up, directly after the first indignity, and put on top of the BRB for her photo session so there is more than the usual alertness in those green eyes.

Hi Karen, and thank you. We think she is lots prettier than her mate, who is a bit surly. Haha. He is old and tired by now, being in the neighborhood of 70 years of age. By the way, I am going back and reading your blog because the quick look taken this afternoon was so intriguing.

My day. Hmmm.. Hubby had to drive four hours out to a desert town this evening to do an upgrade on a POS (Point of Sale) system that couldn't be down any earlier than 8 pm, so he is now probably driving back. I told him that if anything happened to him, he had better warn his boss ahead of time not to come to his funeral unless he, too, wanted to die. heehee.. So much for Quaker non-violence!

It's too late and I am feeling very silly. It's too late to knit as it's far too late to keep my eyes from crossing.

Poko looks a lot different than Churchy, as you will see when I get pictures of him up. She is flatter and lighter colored. She is about as big as a dinner plate, only more oval of course.

Poko's close up, showing her green eyes

Pictures of Poko Ono, Mother Tort.

Poko was a rescued California Desert tortoise that came into Project Wildlife when I was working there. She makes a nest every year under a lime tree, which is not doing well because of the burrow and the drought, but somehow we manage to keep it alive. As soon as I can Churchy will be found and his picture taken, and Lucky, their baby also. He has green eyes like his mother. Churchy has dark brown eyes. Most of the babies had brown eyes, for those wondering about Tortoise genetics.

Still no piccies

I am trying to get the small kiln's pyrometer calibrated. Sorry. This all takes time. I'll be doing chores the rest of the day, too, and getting some by laws printed out for the Ceramic Club. Is this a Monday? Ah yes, that laundry day!

The ribbing of the back for the aran is almost finished. It's supposed to be three and a half inches wide, and has a twisted knit stitch every other row. It looks really cool. When I was doing this twist, I recalled a black sweater I made for myself ages ago that was all twisted stitch. I loved it but forgot completely about it! How can that be????

Anyway, now the fun part begins as I start the first pattern row. Better get some stitch markers made. I'll make them as I go from some of my beads. Red on green should be pretty, eh?

No comments! Gah! The whole Idea is to HAVE comments!

I have tried to get comments to show right on the same page in the blog when they were clicked on but it doesn't happen for me anymore. It sure used to! And somehow I shut OFF comments for the new posts.

Slaps forehead! Twice! Now I hope that comments can be made again.

Got about another quarter inch of ribbing knit on the aran Isle. Did not get any pictures. My Bad!