Still Going

I am so sorry for the long hiatus. My lovely two week flu bug turned into a nasty sinus infection and a cough that would give me no rest. I went to my Dr. again yesterday thinking I had some fluid in the bottom of my lungs I just could not shake. He gave a listen and sure enough heard the crap crackling away down there.

I love my Dr. he is very conservative with the medications and knows I hate to take them. He suggested a quick two days of a corticosteroid to get rid of the fluid (starting yesterday) and wants me to call him this afternoon to see how I am doing. The good news is the cough is settling down by half already and I feel like I can I breathe down into the lower portion of lungs today. I think this should do the trick

I have not had my camera out in the past four weeks, I think I have only knit about 10 rows on a sock in that time, just no mojo right now so I have no new pictures. Just so I don't bore you all to tears I added some pictures of PJ playing hockey.

She is there in the foreground with the blue helmet on, this was taken at a girls hockey tournament in Vancouver early this hockey season. PJ plays defense and can be seen here with her eye on the girl in front her in the black uniform. The girl in black has the puck and is on a break away heading to her net for a goal, PJ is very focused on shutting that girl down to prevent her scoring a goal.



Here is the third picture in the series (I thought the second one would bore you) You can see PJ did not quite catch the girl, but she was able to put on enough pressure that she pushed the girl to the outside, closer to the boards and off to the side of net where she did not have a good a shot to score to the goal. (she did miss by the way)



This last one is PJ and two of her team mates with Hayley Wickenheiser Olympic Gold Medalist for the 2002, 2006, 2010 Canadians National Women's Hockey Team. Hayley was born and raised in Vancouver and gives back every year by holding this girl's hockey tournament.

The tournament was amazing there were dry land classes the girls could sign up for that were free, PJ did core strength and one called quick feet, learning off ice skills to help you skate faster.

Our girls took second place in the entire tournament. The team they played in finals cheated by my standards. They short shifted, this means they played only their best players though out the final game and did not play their less skilled players at all. We are lucky our coach plays all our players with equal ice time in every game. It shocks me to see coaches short shift a 9 and 10 year old children's hockey game, I think it unfair and wonder what they are teaching the kids.

Our girls were very proud of themselves, it was awesome to watch.

Still Around

Last Friday, January 20, I took SeaBass to a hockey tournament in Kewlona. When we arrived home om Sunday I unpacked and remember telling Paul I did not feel very well. The hotel was very loud and I never slept well that weekend. I thought I would lay down for a bit and shake th mild headache I had.

The next time I remember waking waking was over 24 hrs later and 8 had the worst headache of my life, with nausea and vomiting and fever thrown or good measure. This Friday I scraped myself out of bed and went to see my Dr. He did some blood labs and toughly checked me over. He tells me I have the Influenza virus and I can expect to feel third crappy for another full week. I don't ever remember spending a full week in bed before, but as of today, I have. Not even able to watch a bit of TV until yesterday for a couple hrs. I feel a better this morning, so hopefully not to much longer now.

Changing the World

One knitter at a time:


The picture is Deb's daughter LB, she just celebrated he1 11th birthday. PJ and discussed what we should give this lovely lady for turning 11 we hummed and we hawed, and then a light bulb went off over our heads. LB has mentioned in passing to both PJ and myself that she would like to learn to knit.

PJ and I went down to Micheal's armed with very important information, LB's favorite colours for example. PJ went hog wild and picked out two very pretty yarns and the needles she thought LB might like, she even picked out a little notions case, darning needles and a small pair of scisiors. We came home and PJ carefully wrapped everything up and tucked in a knitting bag, wrapping it with a bow and making a card. She walked herself down to the sleepover birthday party, where the gift was a hit.

So much so that the next afternoon there were four young ladies in the Kissing Cave asking if PJ and I would teach them all how to knit. Supper cool.



A bit spinning all done up and ready to knit. Shannon and Mom will recoginze it as that sample pack of camlid fibers from the Brown Sheep Festival. It is soft and sweet, and I had to get if off my niddy-noddy so I could load it with another finished fiber.



I ment to post this last week but got sucked into spending my time off writing reports for work, my least favorite part of my job. On the up side, only one more report to go...

For Mom

A bit about PJ, who would be mortified if she knew I was posting on this topic and even more mortified if she knew I was posting pictures.

PJ for many years was the tidiest of my children, in fact when it came down to the kids bedrooms she used to have the cleanest of the three kids. I thought "This is so great, I don't know how it happened but it seems as if the messy child gene that was so strong within me jumped right passed my children! Yippee!" Indeed I thought of Shannon and her wonderful childhood tidiness, I even thanked Shannon quietly in the back of mind, how blessed I was that my lovely daughter decided to take after her Aunt rather than myself. Then it happened:



I am wondering if PJ was exposed to an environmental toxin of some kind within the past 8 months or so and the recessive Messy gene was exposed to rear it's ugly head. The boys rooms they get a bit untidy but never downright messy. Mind you they don't spend as much time playing in their rooms as PJ does in hers, they are often playing Lego's downstairs. (Crap, now I am thinking they also have the familial Messy gene, they are just better at spreading their messes throughout the house so I don't realize how mess they have!)



I know your laughing Mom as you scroll through the pictures, you are thinking about karma, remembering all the times you went in a mucked out my room while I wept and you mercilessly threw out all my treasures. I understand now your motives and your passion for a tidy space, I hereby publicly apologize for driving you halfway to insanity with my mess. (I would like it on record that I am only responsible for getting you half way there, the rest I think Shannon should take credit for, it's only fair)

Then it happened: I got fed up with looking at the mess, I could not take it anymore. I waited until she was off to school in one morning and I went into her room with a garbage can and a broom. It should be noted for the record that I gave my darling daughter warning and let her know I would clean her room if she choose not to herself, I was kind enough to give her a time line to work within.



I had no mercy, I recycled an entire garbage can full of tiny bits of paper, half finished paintings, cardboard boxes that she just had to have for one project or another, old birthday cards, hidden candy wrappers, flower petals wrapped in Kleenex that were a treasure as far a PJ was concerned. After filling an entire (read huge) recycle bin, I proceeded to fill two large garbage bags full of garbage and took those out to the curb thereby rendering them 'unrecoverable'. I stripped the sheets off the bed, washed them and put them back, tidy, neat and wrinkle free.



When PJ came home from school she was very angry with me, very angry indeed. She asked about her bits of paper, "Mom did you throw away that little yellow note that I was saving?" "Mom where are my American Girl magazines?" She tearfully sat on her bed and said, "Now I have nothing left to play with, my room is practically empty!"

To which I answered, "I know, isn't it lovely?"

Bagged Out

I usually feel pretty bagged on Thursdays, but this Thursday I am bagged out like a cheap pair of jeans on their second day of wear. Why I am always so tired on Thursday takes a little bit of explaining. This year SeaBass asked if he could try out for Development Hockey. In the past he has always played House Hockey, which means league play within our local Association with a two out of town tournaments during the season.

Development Hockey involves trying out to play at a competitive level with the idea of developing the stronger players in each city for a higher level of play, if you don't make the team you get automatically put back into the House Hockey and play regular league games. If you do make the Developement team you play other Development teams from surrounding cities. BC and other provinces are divided up into geographical regions for hockey, Development teams play only teams from cities within their region.

This all boils down to traveling to play hockey, sometimes day trips involving a 2 hour drive to an arena in another city, sometimes staying the night for back to back games the next morning. The farthest teams in our division are 3 hours away, most closer to an hour to an hour and half (one way drive time). Paul and I told SeaBass he could try out for the team, but were not sure whether or not we really wanted him to make the team, it is a huge time commitment and more costly due to the travel. On the other hand it is competitive outlet for a kid that has a competitive streak and mile wide, the drive to play hard, and a passion for the game. Also better to be out on the ice than have time to get in trouble.

I am sure you guessed that he made one of the three Development teams that represent our fair town. It means he plays three days a week, including a practice every Wednesday morning at 5:30 a.m, we are lucky there happen to be two other kids in our neighborhood that are on the same team, we take turns carpooling the kids to the early game, but no matter what I am up every Wednesday at 4:30 in order to get him out the door and onto the ice. I told you it would take some explaining.

I do pretty good through Wednesday, but come Thursday I feel hung over and tired even though I have not had anything to drink. To add the mix I picked Q up at school yesterday with a fever and ended up staying home myself today to take care of him and not feeling so hot myself. We are both feeling better now, but a good nights sleep tonight will help us both be back to normal for tomorrow.

Just so you are not to bored with this post a couple of photos for you. I took these sunrise pictures Tuesday morning around 7:30, it looked like the sky was on fire.



Are you impressed with the amount of snow we have? So far only 4cm this winter, apparently our weather systems are coming from the tropics, were 11C yesterday for an all time historical high, 18 degrees warmer than we usually are at this time.



One more for the road, a pair of plain vanilla socks I knitted up while watching the kids play hockey. More to follow.

The Feet We Meet

I believe that Dr. Seuss gets the credit for the tittle of today's post. If my memory serves me correctly it is a line (I think the last line) from The Foot Book, one of my favorites. (By the way I had to ask SeaBass how to the good Doctor's name was spelled, he knew and I did not!)

Can you tell which legs belong to which kid? Mom knit up these socks for the kids Christmas gifts. They love them, they have an appreciation for hand made goods and they ask me to knit them socks with some frequency, so a perfect gift. They seem to really like that the socks don't match perfectly, they also enjoy that are really slippery on the tile and laminate, they are doing more sliding than walking down the hallways.

Mom sent me a text not to long prior to Christmas asking for the kids shoe sizes, I can tell you these socks flew off her needles. Three pairs I think in as many weeks, and all my kids wear adult sized shoes, PJ and Q are about a women's size 5 or 6 and SeaBass is a women's size 7/8ish.



I am hoping to have this all spun up by the end of the day today, it would make it my fastest spinning thus far. The fiber you see in the photo is all there is left to spin, should be easy to do this evening, except for the fact that my hands are little bit sore from spinning the past two days. I think that is more the function of the weather here than anything, we are unusually warm and have been all winter that means it is not near as dry as it usually is which equals sore hands I am guessing the moisture in the air aggravates the joints a little bit. Here's to hoping it cools off a bit more, and snow would be great too.



P.S. Mom, I remember the case but the kindle fire itself funny that knitting project stuck in my head but not the kindle.

Something Blue

I bought this fiber from a yarn store that was going out business here in town (don't worry another one opened up to replace it) It was a great price and I love the color. I am not sure the fiber content off the top of my head, but I am pretty sure it's merino wool.



I am going to try to ply it in such a way that I end up with a yarn that preserves the look of the hand dyed fiber, I am hoping I get enough to knit up a pair of socks.



I started spinning this fiber yesterday afternoon and worked on it on and off throughout the evening. I am going to try spin a bit every day and I think it will be ready to ply fairly quickly. I am about half way through the fiber already.

Gettiing My Feet Wet

I keep thinking about starting to blog again, but I end up sitting at my computer feeling like I need to explain why I have not blogged in so long. I think of all things I would like to say on that topic and figure:

A. no one is reading anymore because I don't blog anymore so why explain.

B. I don't have a great reason anyway, I just haven't felt like sitting down and putting my thoughts and activities down on paper.

I have been working on a couple of knitting projects that I would like to share, I am thinking the best way is just to try to jump back into blogging. If anyone would like to have a read, that is wonderful and if you have given up on me, no worries, that would be my fault for falling off the blogging train for six months.

I have gotten into lace over the past year. I started with some easy stuff and have tried to gradually move up in difficulty. I have seen some of the pretty shawls Shannon has made and thought I would get my feet wet.

This a scarf I made for a birthday gift, I had one skein of a pretty silk yarn that needed to be knit up into a scarf, downloaded a free pattern from Knit Picks and a gave it a try.





I thought I had a picture I took after blocking it, but I can't seem to find that one right now. It is entirely possible those are on still on my camera, I have not downloaded in a while. These were taken with my phone.

Drumheller, Alberta

Thursday we packed up the trailer and kicked off our summer vacation. We left around noon and headed to Banff, Alberta in the Canadian Rockies. We camped only one quick night here on our way to Drumheller Alberta, the Dinosaur capital of the World.

We are staying here for three days and then we will head back towards Banff and camp a bit through Jasper on our way to a wedding in Sexsmith Alberta.

Today we went to the Royal Tyrrell Museum, it was amazing. We all had such a good time.



I don't think I have ever seen so many dinosaur fossils, it was fascinating. I had no idea that the area here is known world wide for it's groundbreaking (hehe) fossil finds and its research facilities.

This is a Mammoth, I think this one came from the famous dig site in Utah, not actually from the local area. If you look carefully you can see the Saber Toothed Tiger set up to attack the Mammoth. This was one of my favorite displays, but only the tip of the iceberg.



I loved so many of them I had a difficult time choosing which ones to show you. So you get a Stegosaurus as well:



I have been lucky enough to grab a free Wi-Fi signal right here at the campground. The kids are sleeping and Paul is off to the showers and laundry mat. There is one here, so we figured we would try to keep on the laundry while we are at a campground that has a washer and dryer.

I think he really took the laundry with him so he could read his book, I finally talked him into the reading the Harry Potter books. He is on the third one now, that is saying something, he has never had the love of reading Shannon and I were lucky to be raised with. I have only known him to read about ten books since we have been married. If he is doing laundry so he can hang out in a place that has enough light read by, he must be enjoying the book. He may have done less than ten loads of laundry since we have married!

I am going to shutdown my laptop and enjoy my camp fire. I should be able to share more pictures soon. I am going to do a little campfire knitting.

We Interupt Your Regulary Irregular Programing...

For a yarn post, not just any yarn post but new stash.

I have been trying hard not to buy yarn for over a year. I have quite a bit of stash and have been picking my projects from my stash. I did slip a bit with some enabling from Shannon and Will upon my last visit to California. If I am honest they did not enable me one bit, unless taking me to a neat little yarn shop in Alameda qualifies?

Where is this all leading? My favorite local yarn store is going out of business. I find the owner a bit odd, but she carries lovely yarn and lots of spinning stuff so the store is very nice. I think she has done well business wise, but had a surprise baby when she did not think she could even get pregnant. I think the lovely little girl is around two years old and the owner is closing up shop to have more time with her.

This all means big going out of business sale. I caved, I bought yarn, for a great price. I will even confess to plans of dropping in next week to see if she has lowered the prices even further.

I bought this amazing alpaca and downloaded the free pattern. I have planning on knitting up a sweater for quite sometime now, but had not really found the right sweater/yarn combo yet. I am going to double check for gauge and then cast on this week sometime.



I also bought this pretty sock yarn, the picture does not do the yarn justice, it is really red. It is 10% Cashmere so very soft. It was a great deal.



I bought some really nice lace wt. alpaca that ended up being about $8.00 for 440 yards, that I have not photographed.

The good news is someone is opening a spinning/knitting store right downtown on September 1st. Only three blocks from the office, that will be tough to stay out of!

Thank You!

We had a postage strike here in Canada for several weeks. After being without mail for more than two weeks the government stepped in and mandated the postal employees back to work.

We were so excited, we had ordered checks not long before the postal strike and our Visa cards expired during the strike, while our new ones were trapped somewhere in the mail system that had ground to a screaming halt. We were in a bit of pickle for a bit with all that happening. We do a lot of things with online banking so that saved us.

Meanwhile all the wonderful Birthday cards that my family had sent from home were jammed up in the mail as well. The workers have been back at it for over two weeks now and we just recently (yesterday) received our personal checks and one more birthday card (Thank you so much Shannon, your gift of an amazon gift certificate is so perfect for me right now, I can download some books to read while my shoulder continues to heal) Thank you to everyone who sent birthday wishes.

Paul took me to Sparkling Hills Spa for a huge bit of being spoiled. We have never done anything like this before and it was wonderful.

I know this picture is a bit dark, but in the foreground is the king sized bed and in the background are the huge windows that make up one entire wall of the room we had.



A close up of the bathtub you can sort of see on the left in the photo above. I had a bath in it the morning we checked out. I don't think I needed one but I could not leave without using that tub.



The incredible view from our room looking over Okanagon Lake:



View of Paul swimming in one of the salt water pools, there are two one indoor and one out.



Really neat all glass shower that allows you to check out the view while you get soaped up:



The bed is not that interesting, I took this picture because I love the lights that are hard wired into the headboard, each one having its own small switch as well. Genius, every headboard should have this feature.



Me after a Salt scrub that sanded the marker off my shoulder. (Note: Salt Scrub massage was not as lovely as it may sound, was like being rubbed with sand paper over your entire body, but you get up and shower half way through and then get lotion slathered on, and I am pretty damn soft right now) Also, I do have a shirt on it this picture, it's strapless.



When we left the hotel on Friday we stopped in Salmon Arm for Sturgis North and then to pick the kids up from camp. I will post a few pictures of that next time.

The Day After

I was told after the surgery I could take the bandage off and shower in 24 hours. I took these photos about 30 hours after the surgery. I tried to wait until Paul got home from work to have him peel off the bandage and so someone would be around while in was in the shower because the pain medication made me a bit wonky. He ran late with a with a meeting and I could not wait anymore.

The first picture looks the most dramatic, but is really quite tame. The big blue thing is a Cryo/Cuff. If you follow the blue tubing from the top of my shoulder you will notice a white connector that Velcros at my chest, that connect to another piece of blue tubing which in turn connects to a thermos full of ice and water.

I rented a small pump, only $20 for the entire month, that pumps the cold water into the Cryo/Cuff. The pump cycles on and off constantly cycling fresh cold water in and the water my body has warmed out. Very cool. This thing rocks. I have been sleeping with it on and use it after my stretches. I am a week after surgery today and have very little bruising and have taken no pain medication in the past 24 hours.



The bandage looked huge! I understand after they do the arthroscopic surgery and they remove the surgical instruments from the holes they cut they then irrigate all the holes with a saline solution. The bandage is large to soak up the liquids they pump in to clean you all out afterwards, not because I was bleeding profusely or anything like that.



From the back: I have to say I would have saved myself a layer of skin back there if I had waited for Paul to get home. Down where I could not reach the tape and gave it a good yank, not pretty.



One hole in the back, which is the largest at maybe an inch long:



And two in the front, which might be 3/4 of an inch long. Each incision only has one stitch and they get taken out tomorrow morning.



The pink you see on me is due to a couple things, me taking the bandage off, red paint they used to clean everything once they put me out, and maybe cold skin due to the Cryo/Cuff.

Before the surgery, the surgeon came and talked to me for a while. He confirmed what side he would be repairing and actually signed his initials on my left upper arm in great big letters with a permanent marker telling me this was his contract to me that he would be operating on that side. I find it funny that they cleaned off the initials but I woke up to find other markings on me instead. I think those may have finally completely washed away after my shower this morning.

Basket of Good Intentions

In the process of getting The Cave just organized I have come across a few unfinished projects, as I came across anything that was on needles I just tossed the project into this basket, figuring I could deal with these projects over the summer and after The Cave was in a more organized state of affairs. As I tossed in project after project, I started calling it my Basket of Good Intentions.



I have decided it is time to tackle The Basket of Good Intentions. I am showing you two more pictures to be entirely honest about what else I have on the needles. I don't want to shamelessly post about some old project I finished up and have you all mention to me that it was one I never disclosed to you all to begin with. Here is one lonely thrummed mitten and all the materials to make it's mate.



I don't know if we can call the squares unfinished or not, I am still churning out squares pretty regularly with no real good idea what they are going to end up being, but you should keep in mind they are definitely in the ongoing project pile.



Here lies the first project I am going to work on out of The Basket. It is a lace wrap I started years and years ago, maybe even my first attempt at lace. Since the start of this project I have finished a few lace projects and I have been jonesing to start another so this should fit the bill nicely. I was really enjoying this project and think the only reason it never got picked up again was the fact that I was not sure I would be able able to figure out where I left off in the pattern. I spent some time figuring that out and after a knitting a row or two I think I need to change the kind of needles I have it on and then it should be good to go.



By the way the surgery went well, I am recovering nicely and really in love with the CryoCuff. I have pictures to show you soon. I am headed out town for a quiet couple of days with Paul.

I Bought It!

No don't worry, not the farm, but I did turn another year older. Thank you to everyone who called and everyone who thought of me and sent a birthday wish my way.

I bought the Red Table I eluded to a post or two ago. I am not sure the pictures do it justice. I love the piece so very much that I spent the better part of my weekend in The Cave with PJ teaching me how to make friendship bracelets. (I caught on quickly, it seems it's like riding bike you don't forget all the things you knew in grade school)

The boys would pop in The Cave now and again and join us for a while then they would run around outside and come back and play with PJ and I.



It is 120+ years old, made of Elm and even has the wax seal on the back that authenticates that it is indeed significantly older than I am.



I think I only need one more piece of furniture to make The Cave complete, I just need to decide on a colour. I have been thinking a bean bag chair in there would be perfect for the kids, it would give them a place to flop when they come down to chat with me, a good way to make them feel like they can join me anytime with a book or a craft project. Any ideas on the colour? Can you have to much red?

Got Bumped?

I have been having some problems with my left shoulder for a couple of years now. I could not tell you what triggered the whole thing but it has been a hell of journey.

It started as tendonitis and bursitis. That in and of itself bugs me as these are both symptoms that Drs. like toss out there like they are a diagnosis. Tendonitis simply means inflammation of a tendon, likewise bursitis means inflammation of the bursa. I always ask my patients what caused the inflammation? Over use? Poor bio-mechanics? Trauma? I wish I had an answer.

Eventually my shoulder simply started to seize up, the up side of this was the tendonitis and bursitis eventually settled down (it turns out if you can't get enough range of motion to use the involved tendon and bursa they become far less angry) the down side of this is really poor range of motion and therefore a decrease in overall function.

I started treatment with the easy stuff, chiropractic and massage therapy. When those things did not work I tried acupuncture and did a spiritual workshop in an attempt to hear what my body was trying to tell me with all this pain and dysfunction. I have worked with people and their bodies for 15 years and in that time have learned so very much, I understand that pain is not just physical but that it can be emotional as well. I see many patients that I believe get something they need out of their pain experience and I wanted to explore the idea of this being the root of my shoulder dysfunction. I wanted to know if there were emotions in my life I had chosen to ignore until they decided to make themselves known with physical pain. With all this work I had still come up with no answers and no relief.

As I traveled this road of treatment protocols my thoughts have always been of working from the least invasive treatments and gradually into more invasive treatments if the less invasive stuff did not work. At this point the next up was seeing a pain specialist who injected lidocaine into the joint space to numb the entire shoulder and have Paul attempt to move my shoulder through the range of motion and break up some of the scar tissue thereby increasing my range of motion, breaking the pain cycle and putting me on the road to recovery. No go. In fact we were never able to numb the shoulder enough to increase the range of motion more that maybe 10 degrees, and that improvement only lasted days.

Next up was cortisone injections, some would put this under less invasive than the last procedure, but in fact the long term damage from cortisone shots can be quite severe. Most medical practitioners do not use cortisone as it is meant to be used. The idea of cortisone is to turn off the pain response so you can rehab an injury. Today most Drs. use the shot as the treatment protocol by itself and leave the rehab portion out, I believe this is one of the reasons why some Drs. find themselves giving cortisone shots every six months or so for the same injury. They have in essence used the cortisone to shut down the pain, but have not taken any advantage of that period of pain relief to change the function of the injury they are treating. The cortisone did give me temporary pain relief but by this time I had so much scar tissue in the shoulder my range of motion was very poor and limited my rehab, so this was an unsuccessful treatment protocol for me. I have wondered if it may have worked if I had been less stubborn and tried it before I lost so much function.

This has left me with no options except surgery. Over a year ago I saw a surgeon who said I was one of the worst cases of frozen shoulder he has ever seen and that I was indeed a surgical candidate. He put me on his wait list.

A year and a bit later and I had my surgical date. Until yesterday I was scheduled for surgery Wednesday June 29th. Yesterday I got the dreaded phone call from the surgeons office. I got bumped! After all the planning, organizing and time booked off work I got bumped!

I should not be so dramatic, I am very lucky that only got bumped a week. My new date is for July 6th. I am so thankful that I am not the emergency that someone had to bumped for, I am thankful that I got bumped only week and not three months. I am thankful for the fact that they tell me they are not allowed to bump me again.

Random photo: I was downloading the pictures off of PJ's camera for her and came across this one, they clearly took this one of themselves. I love it, it made me smile so big I thought I would share it with all of you. That is PJ, Paul's mom Judy and Paul 's sister Jodie. Aren't they beautiful!

The Cave

Months ago I told you I planned to show you the craft room. I am so happy with the room that I have been spending time down in my Cave instead of on my computer. There are even several finished projects I should show you soon.

You may remember the naked pine cabinets I showed you many moons ago. Here is one of them all loaded up with yarn. I have to say I don't know weather to proud or embarrassed about my stash. There is quite a bit of yarn on display in this post. When people walk into the Cave and gasp, "You could open a yarn shop!" it makes me wonder if should be seeking out a some sort of ten step program for fiber addicts.



I love my red tool box. That is a hand me down from Paul. Years ago he bought a bigger one for his tools in the garage and I asked him if I could have the small one for knitting tools. The thought just occurred to me that I may feel slightly less sheepish about showing you my Cave if I did a post on Paul's garage. He has a wonderful collection of stuff it would put my hobby to shame.



Here is my project desk, where all the ideas happen. I love sitting here with my iPod on the dock listening to an audio book while I swatch or work on a project. Shannon you may recognize the little desk, I think it is a drafting table, Shannon and Will were kind enough to pass it on to me when they no longer had a use for it.



A place to spin and read:



The white cubes you see are the cubes my yarn lived in under the stairs, in a space we called the Kissing Cave. I would ask the kids to come down and help me pick out yarn for projects and then I would shower the kids with kisses and tickle them once they were under the stairs with me. That is how the craft room got the name "The Cave" I am thinking maybe "The Room of Good Intentions" might be better. Maybe we test drive calling it "The Room of Requirement" What do you think?

One last photo of the second yarn cabinet and bit of mess. The wire rack with the cloth bins on it is soon to be moved. That is where the kids put there winter boots when thy are not on their feet and each kid has a bin to put there mitts and toques in so they don't get lost. I will move that soon as I have been eyeing up an antique red table to put there. I have been eyeing up the table for months, I think I need to bite the bullet and buy it before someone else does. Maybe for my birthday.



A huge hug to Aunt P for sending me the nudge I needed to finish the post that has been half written for months.