I Am So Far Behind...

...that I might just catch myself coming AND going...

It's Been Rough...

May as well start out with the bad news. Took Tippi to the vet a while back for swollen lymph nodes. Our regular vet is good - we trust her. We thought it might be an allergic reaction to something so we went with that, but it wasn't getting better. 

Went to a specialist, and it turns out that it's lymphoma. So I'm beating myself up about catching it sooner...We could've pushed harder to get to a specialist earlier. There IS a light at the end of the tunnel: she's basically in good health. It hasn't metastasized. 

BUT - she's 12. Doc (specialist) says she's a good candidate for chemo. But, she's 12. 

We go on the 31st. I've done major switching around of appointments to get there. Not that I don't trust Hubby to listen to the doctor - and we all know that Tippi is my heart-dog (I've been lucky to have a few of those) and I'd do just about anything for her. And I want to be there. Through thick and thin. That's what it's about. 

On the other hand, Raisa...our crazy problem child Husky - has had her thyroid medication adjusted, and the doctor gave her an appetite enhancer. The dog wouldn't eat. Huskies can be picky, but she refused every kibble, and at one point, also refused: chicken; rice; scrambled eggs; cheese; buttered toast.... We knew it was serious when she stopped eating toast. She would scale Mt. Everest for toast. 

Anyhow, hoping that the drops work because the dog's gotta put some weight on. And -- at some point sooner than I want to think about, I want to get her ready to take over for Tippi's therapy work. 

Springtime, Randomly...

Some pics that prove, sort of, that spring may finally have come to Illinois. Though it's still debatable, this Memorial Day weekend. 

A tree in Bolingbrook; I was taking a walk during lunch, and saw this beauty. Yes, it's one tree. Crabapple, I think, or maybe some sort of "mock apple" that was grafted, because it clearly has 2 different flowers on it. Same shape, just pink and white together on one tree. 

This is the fire alarm on the building. Needless to say, the birds have been enjoying themselves building their home there. What a pain! 

But it's not the only place; they've built nests in all the neon signs in the plaza. And you'll see another picture later on...

My front garden is going like crazy. The milkweed is actually sort of taking over; my parsley is bursting out of its pot (the pot I set out specifically for the butterflies - I have another set of parsley that we'll actually be eating!). The Monster Bleeding Heart is back in good form. The other wildflowers are coming along nicely, and the seeds I planted have, for the most part, come up. 


The Icelandic Poppy is nearly ready to pop. 

Remember, this is the big white one. And each year, it seems to get "poufier" in the front garden. 

We put out 3 new hummingbird feeders, but with the rain and the cold, we've only seen the hummers zip by. Hoping to see them landing and eating soon. 

This weekend, we'd like to get 2 more pots of basil planted, and get the gazing balls out on their stands in the garden. And clean off the front porch. 

The veggie garden is bursting. We've already done 3 harvests of romaine, and we've got about 6 radishes. The herbs are doing nicely and the leeks (see the front of the nearest bed) are going to be lovely. 

I've been really happy with the early planting; it seems to have made the lettuce happy, at least. I think it appreciated the heavy rains, and definitely likes the cooler days. 

The first radish of the season was very peppery, and with a bit of pink Himalayan salt, it was very delicious! 


Speaking of gardens, I went past the Cathedral the other day and noticed that they actually have done something interesting with their front yard at the Rectory. They've given it over to public gardens for fruits/veggies for the local families in need. That's actually pretty freakin' cool!! 


Our vicar over-planted...I've got about a dozen Roma tomato plants to find homes for, and I may just drop them off there - maybe they have space, or maybe someone knows of a yard they could grow in. Either way, Hubby has said that we are NOT growing tomatoes this year; and Kid #2 doesn't want them. 

So here's the other nest. This is a robin's nest at our church hall. And there's another one on the other door. Yeah, lovely signs of spring, till they nest on your building; then they get kind of shirty. I hope all the little ones have fledged; we had a rummage sale and they used this as the EXIT door. The robin wasn't happy... 

And...the chickens are laying again. Not mine - heaven knows we have no room for fowl. But a patient in the clinic has provided us with a couple dozen eggs the past few weeks. Yummy. 

Seriously, yummy. I'm spoiled now... 

And that's the wrap up for spring, so far. Lots of green stuff growing, but no blossoms yet. Well, the Bleeding Heart and the Lilac have bloomed. And the lily of the valley. But nothing in the "big flower beds." 

I trimmed up the bushes (butterfly bush in the front and a flowering tree in the back) and they've perked up nicely. Funny what a little trim will do.

The Knitting...

Well. Progress of sorts. The Kid #2 afghan continues to move bit by bit. However - it's getting warm outside! I traded the Green Sock for this today just because I needed to NOT have it on my lap. 

I'm feeling this afghan starting to "zip along" so I'm not going to abandon it; I want to get it to him for THIS Christmas! After that next red section comes the first black section. 


And as you can see by the Copland Shawl, black is a stinker to knit with. 

I'm really not enjoying the black parts. Copland is also zinging along. For a simple shawl, it's actually got a few hundred miles (or so it seems) of garter, and luckily, this yarn's stitch definition is amazing. It's also squishy and warm, so the recipient will really like it, I hope. And while my camera doesn't do it justice, the warm tones of the brown really pop against the black, which is blacker than this...Go figure. 

For the heck of it, I whipped up another small bag. I needed something to put my gemstones in because I carry them in my purse and didn't want them rattling around in a plastic bag, or at the very bottom getting scratched up. This is using leftover of the MadTosh "Robin's Nest" that I used for socks a long while ago; they were short-cuffed socks, so I had lots left over. Frankly, I dislike this for socks because it pills like crazy. And it was one of my maiden forays into "real sock yarn" so I really was sketchy about whether that 400 yards would "really" make socks with cuffs; my cuffs on these are barely 5" whereas now I know how far to stretch a sock leg!

This bag actually took me about 2 hours from start to finish. It's not great, but it holds my gems. Instead of an i-cord, I did a crocheted chain; and it's smaller than my other mala bag. It serves the purpose though, so that's all that matters. 

And I didn't have to buy yarn to do it. Just went into my "Oddments" bag and found this. 

And then there was my "personalized yarn crawl." This is "Yarn Crawl Week" for a lot of stores; but I didn't want to hike my butt up to Chicago to troll around there. Hate driving up there anyway. 

My friend Roberta and I did our own. We hit two stores, Knitche in Downers Grove and String Theory in Glen Ellyn. In Downers, we had, by the way, a fantastic lunch...But I digress. 

Knitche has QUINCE!! I have some Quince in stash for an open-front cardigan. I love it. And they were having a sale!!!


So I have "Tern" - a wool/silk blend, and I got the maroon one on 40% off!!! This will be a long-ish, very open cowl. I also got the pattern. I'll have to fill you in on that one later; it's in my Ravelry library. 

Then I got "Kestrel" - a linen yarn, flat-braided structure. This was in their "last chance" bin. Do I have a clue what I'm doing with it? 

Nope. Probably either kerchiefs or a table runner. Not sure yet. But it's lovely stuff, and for something around $7 a hank, it was a bargain. 

I've got one project that I started in linen, and it's a table runner but the linen is a bit more coarse than this. This stuff would be easier to wear next to your skin. They had a sample of a sweater (another open cardigan) that I'd have bought yarn + pattern for in a heartbeat, but it would definitely have busted my budget. 

So I'm glad I didn't see it till we were done and ready to leave! Yarn gods had mercy on me in that case.

Random Picture...

After yoga tonight, the sky was just so pretty. I pulled into the local cemetery to take a picture. And I thought I could find my great-granny's grave, but somehow, I couldn't locate it. That bugs me. Mostly because I've always known where it was, and this is hardly a huge plot of ground... Maybe if it's nice tomorrow, I'll see if Tippi is up for a walk and we can trot over there to see if we can find her. 

We may have our share of crap going on in Illinois, but in my little corner, we still have open space and lovely blue skies. 

Mother's Day & Gun Violence...

Yes, those two are related today. Thankfully, not my own experience, but overall, with the school shootings continuing at an alarming rate, mothers are afraid to send their kids to school. And if they're anything like me, that also includes the mothers of the TEACHERS. 

When Kid #2 said to me, "Hey, I did this cool project over the summer...I painted bricks for each of my colleagues," I just thought he was experimenting. He's a stencil artist and loves to do murals. So, I thought, "Cool, I bet that's a nice idea."

Then the brick dropped, so to speak. "Yeah," he says..."we've been doing active shooter drills and I thought that my colleagues and I could either use the brick to break out a window to evacuate the kids, or chuck it at the shooter -- odds are that if we come close to hitting him, he'll duck and that'll buy us time."

Do you understand what happened to my heart? 

This kid has wanted to be a teacher since about 5th or 6th grade. His focus was honed early and he kept at it, a kid who often got straight As, and in high school, took as many AP classes as he could. He double-majored in college, every semester after the first one, taking an overload. His advisor tried to tell him to relax, but eventually she realized that he was in his element. 

He's been teaching nearly a decade now; and he'll tell you that teaching has changed drastically. But he loves his kids. Loves his classroom. Bonds well with his colleagues. 

And he has to worry about painting bricks to evacuate students or stun a shooter. 

What in God's name is going on? And when will it end? There have been TWO shootings of congress-critters and THAT hasn't produced anything near a civil discussion of gun issues. 

Will they wait till one of their kids is shot? Because THEN it will be important? Really? 

I've got news for you: MY KIDS ARE IMPORTANT. And so are YOURS. When you've got kids showing you how to do an active shooter drill, I have a problem with that. 

Yes, I'm old; the worst we had were tornado drills. Please - if you're going to comment and tell me that "times have changed," please stuff that in your rear end...Times HAVE changed, and not for the better. I hold my breath when I hear of a shooting. I worry about both of my kids. I had a discussion yesterday with Kid #1 and he said a good friend of his got the stuffing beat out of him because of a negative comment he made about the Mango Menace. A broken eye socket, broken nose, and cracked rib. 

What have we become when said Mango Menace can effectively tell his rabid horde that "shooting someone in the Panhandle doesn't count." What is this? A near-dictatorship? God, help us. And I don't mean that colloquially. 

I mean: GOD. HELP US. 

Gotta breathe. It's Mother's Day. I had a great day. Texts from both kids; church with a great organist; good movies, and knitting. Did a face mask and nobody screamed in terror (!) (that's a family joke...). Cleaned out a few things to give to the church rummage sale. Life is good. I have to keep telling myself that, and I have to keep being involved to make life good for as many people as I can. The older I get, the more I feel like that's my mission in life. 

The Knitting Situation...

Well. Progress has been made on the Chevron Afghan!! Yeah, bet y'all forgot about Kid #2's afghan. He hasn't. He reminded me about said "decade in teaching" and then proceeded to remind me that I told him I'd make it for when he was in college; then when he graduated; then when he moved out... 

Anyway, I finally got Caron's Simply Soft black yarn; I don't know what took me so long, other than just forgetting each time I was in the JoAnn Fabric store, I forgot.

I pulled this out last weekend and got two sections done (one each, red & grey) and then I proceeded to redesign the colorway for the entire thing. I'm adding a couple of black sections in the middle. I just have to balance the Red/Grey/Red at the end. I could, I suppose, do a whole swath in black, but I'm trying not to do that because of another project which I'll tell you about. 

Black is a stinker to knit with and I've even got an outstanding light, not to mention that my knitting chair is in the front window, which is a western exposure. It's just difficult. 

So I'm in the groove again and I figure I've got about 4 - 6 more sections to finish this thing. Each section is a 14-row repeat and it goes really fast once you get cranking. He may have it for Christmas or his birthday. We shall see...

Anklet socks are on the menu for lunchtime knitting. I was looking at these and I thought, "What are you waiting for??" I'm doing a really simple anklet - not a Rose City Roller or anything like that - just a 15-row ribbing (yaaaaaaackkkkkkkkkkk!!! I hate ribbing!!!) and then 3 - 4 rows of "sock leg" then the heel, then the foot. Simple, simple. This Opal Celebration colorway is going to be fun to knit with. Kind of like one of those "sprinkles" cakes. 

Speaking of lunchtime knitting, I changed purses and the knitting no longer fits. That's not cool, but honestly the bag weighed a ton and I needed to drastically lighten my load. So I'll just have to drag a separate knitting bag along, which is a pain, but otherwise these socks won't see the light of day for a long, long time. I'd like to wear them this summer on the bike trails. 

My prejudice about black yarn is going to come to the fore; I really try to avoid it. The darkest socks I did were navy blue, and honestly, it's a singleton -- I have yet to finish the mate. Mostly because it's small and it won't fit my leg comfortably. I know - I should frog it, but by the time I realized it was too small, it was done. Oh well. I can live with that, and chalk it up to an experiment with a pattern, which I will not do again. 

Remember the Multnomah Shawl that was Christmas knitting? Well, because of a misinterpretation of the pattern, which was totally on me, I need to tink back the lace part. The suggestion from my shawl group - which is a great idea, by the way, is to place markers at each pattern repeat of the feather & fan. Otherwise, the designer has some funky increases along the spine that didn't make sense till I saw a close-up picture of it from someone else who'd done the pattern. You'd think the designer would have THAT picture in her Ravelry notes??? 

So I get emails from Expression Fiber Arts, and Chandi had a great "beginner" shawl called Copland, and I found yarn on sale on the site so here's the project that will either blind me or be absolutely fabulous. Click on the link there, and watch. 

I probably should have done it in the colors she did hers, but I saw the brown yarn, which has lots of color in it (my pics don't do it justice) and it's called "Unconditional Love." In the pictures on the website, it's tones of brown with greys and black. Unfortunately, these two balls have NO black in them, which I didn't realize till I got them (not too jazzed with that). And all THREE hanks were, uncharacteristically, a mess to wind. I chose "Abyss" (their "about as black as we're getting") colorway to bring out the blacks in the Unconditional Love, but... As you can see here, in that first 3" section of brown, there's lots of color, and I'm liking it. The black is kind of killing me already. You do stripes, then a swath of the color, then more stripes. You can make this as large as you want. I'm only using the 2 colors, and I want this so that the recipient can swaddle herself in it. 

I'm actually liking the black + brown combination, and I think it's pretty classy. What do you think? 

The pattern is a simple 2-row repeat, and I did have to order some ADDI's - I didn't have a 40" cable. Yeah, went to Amazon. I won't get to my LYS for a while, and locally, there's bupkus. This needle is a 16" cable and it's filling up fast. The "spine" of the pattern is really quite clear and clean, just that it's too small and kind of curls right now. In another few sections, it'll be very nice. 

Build Me an Ark...

It's raining again. We're molding. I stopped by my local park last week and took these pics; as of two days ago, the picnic table was back on solid ground. But the water is moving fast, and it's dangerous on the roads as well as on the trails. 

And it's raining again - and will do so for the next 3 or 4 days. 

Today, I had planned a bike ride, which didn't happen because before the rain, it was in the low 50s. Yep, welcome "spring" again... It's too cold to ride - at least for me. Maybe next week. I need to get my "bike legs" back because I'm starting my 500-hour Yoga Teacher Training (yayyyyyyy!!!) and I need to get into some sort of shape. Biking, for me, is great exercise, even though it's mainly lower body. 

Biking is a moving meditation and I love it. But it's gotta be dry to bike! This picture is the canoe access. Ideally, you would walk to that platform and launch your vessel. 

That part, as of two days ago, was still under water. With this rain now, I'm not sure when parts of the area will dry out. The ground is saturated. 

We're lucky - we're flooded in some areas, but nothing like other parts of the country - or even other parts of our state. We'll count our blessings, hope our sump pumps keep working, and hold off on actual spring and summer footwear till it all passes. 

News on Tippi...

Princess Tippi Un Sigrid

Our two princesses posed for pictures. And I have news, sort of, on Tippi. She's been dealing with swollen lymph nodes for a few months; we've tried several things, including a cystology report that said at first it was benign. 

We have no news (yet) that it's NOT benign, but we did go to a vet who's a specialist. Our vet sent us. 

Two issues: she's losing weight like crazy, though she's eating like a horse. And those lymph nodes. 

The weight is a separate issue; her labs are wonky and the vet thinks she's got the doggy version of Irritable Bowel Disease - not that she's got the runs or anything, but she's not absorbing her food. So in my mind, it's like an autoimmune disease - Crohn's for dogs. 

She's a happy, energetic 12-year old dog. What the doctor calls a "Class A dog." I'll explain that. 

So the lymph nodes could be 2 things: Benign or malignant. 

If they're Benign, we have some options. 

Princess Quinn Un Gerda

If they're malignant, it could be 2 things: Lymphoma or metastasized from another area. 

If it's Lymphoma, it could be 2 things: The "bad" lymphoma or what she calls "Indolent Lymphoma" which basically is like prostate cancer: at her age, it's not what's going to kill her. 

If it's metastasized from another area, that's bad, too. 

So, the physical showed NO OTHER LYMPH NODES were swelled. There were no obvious masses anywhere that the vet could feel. This is good. 

She took a more aggressive sample to send off to Colorado State University for extensive tests. We'll know sometime next week. FYI, that cost us $1300+... To do a larger biopsy with a whole-body CAT scan would've been closer to $6,000. It sounds crass, but we can't afford that. If this biopsy tells us what we need to know, that's what we need. The biopsy has a 4% "unconfirmed" result, and to me, those odds are pretty good. 

Fingers, paws, toes, tails and eyeballs crossed. 

Rings, Eggs, and Rocks...

I've been looking for a "middle finger" ring that I could wear. I usually wear my great-grandmother's wedding ring, but I wanted to do something different every once in a while. These, I found on Amazon, for about $15. If they turn green, I'm not upset. They're stainless steel washed with Rose Gold. 

They're billed as wedding rings, and one has a teeny-weenie crystal in it. 

It's a cute set, with lots of texture, and it's comfortable. And rose gold looks good on my skin. 

One of our patients brought us eggs. She has chickens. Each of us got 6 eggs, and a feather from the "donor hens." Each of us got a separate feather... 

These eggs are soooooo good!! They're actually extra-large eggs, too. I was happy to have them to share with Hubby. We've been enjoying them, and recognize that they're a nice treat. 

At our studio, we had a Crystal Trunk Show. I usually get a good discount, for hosting, so I bought several things, a bunch of which are gifts, so I'm not going into a lot. 

But I will share this with you: a fossilized sea sponge that, when they cracked it open, produced this beautiful white quartz. 

This is Guardians of Nature, and they always have such cool stuff! I did pick up another piece of black tourmaline to put by my computer (helps avoid EMFs) and a green opal that I adore. I skipped a beautiful smoky quartz heart, because the green opal was calling my name. 

They had an amethyst Cathedral stone; 22 POUNDS of amethyst. Wowza. 

Check them out on Facebook. If you're local, they'll send you a schedule of where they'll be. Go see them. 

Great people.


Random Picture...

Just another shot of the sponge. Apparently, rock hounds have an instinct for these, because if I'd seen this in the wild, I'd have walked right by it. 

It looks kinda like a lumpy potato from the back side, but the quartz inside just glows white. 

I figure these crystals are my Mother's Day gift to myself. That and the face mask! I don't need a lot of stuff; I appreciate the beauty of the crystals, and I like having them around me. 

I had a great Mother's Day, and now I'm off to watch "I Remember Mamma" and knit some more! Have a great evening!