Tyra, put that pattern for a baby sweater down! I’m not talking about me (yet) but rather my neighbors across the road. There are, at last count, 4 sets of twins in the field next door that were not there yesterday. In fact, one set I got to see being born this morning on our daily walk. Another set had just been born and the mama was cleaning them still. It’s so amazing to see these teeny-tiny lambs plop out and proceed to stand right up and try to nurse! The ewes talk to the lambs in this low voice in the first few minutes of their lives that isn’t quite a bah, more like a cat’s purr. The lambs get straight up and start head-butting the ewe’s udder. (Can I get an OWWWW!!!!!! from all the other women out there?!!?) It seems that almost all of the sheep that have lambed so far have had twins. Way to go farmer! Some of the ewes are so very pregnant that it looks as though they have a large beach ball under their wool coats when they lie down in the sun.
This week has been interesting, not just for the baby-making going on. We had our first quiz night in the pub on Monday night. Our team didn’t place last, but it wasn’t for a lack of trying! We had a lot of fun and met a lot of the local villagers which was nice. We also found out that our cat, Milo, is becoming a bit of a celebrity in town. She is apparently the local neighborhood watch as she is always seen in the windows as people go by. We would tell folks where we live and they would reply, “Oh, you have a grey cat don’t you?”. We found out that there is also another Milo in the village who is also grey. Now, what are the chances of THAT?
We have guests coming this next weekend and today is a lovely day here in Ivinghoe Aston so I decided to go on out and straighten-up the courtyard. It is the one area of the house that has been, up to this point, left pretty much as the movers placed it. There were several large clusters of big clay pots and a cluster of smaller clay pots in plastic crates and my few herb pots in another cluster. Yeah, it was a cluster…….
So, today I went out and moved all of the clay pots over to a corner where they aren’t in the way. I potted-up a few herb plants that were still awaiting their “nice pot” home and moved all of the herbs to the sunniest and warmest part of the yard. I also did a couple of very minor repairs to the conservatory. All in all, a couple of hours work but definately worth it. The courtyard feels like it is ready now for the arrival of warmer weather.
Sunbathing herbs
The courtyard as seen from the bedroom upstairs
Now, to get the spare bedroom straightened up…….
P.S. One of the sheep across the road had a lamb. I am very excited by the implications of this 🙂
Ok, so I know I told you that I would review Inside Crochetthe next day. I am a very naughty monkey I admit. Instead of making a blob post I made cookies and went to a cocktail baby shower (more on that later). I’ve got to start saying things like “in the next post” to absolve myself of responsibility for cookie explosions/cocktail baby showers.
So, today in penitence’s I am reviewing two things! Both the first issue of Inside Crochet and the cocktail/baby shower. Hold on to the seat of your pants folks it’s going to get crazy round here!
I was really excited when I heard about Inside Crochet coming out. There are a few knitting magazines here that have crochet in the title, but if there is a single pattern in them you feel lucky. For the UK to have a magazine devoted solely to crochet is great! When I heard that Amy O’Neill Houck was one of the editors of it I got really excited. Amy has a great blog called The Hook and I that I have written about here before I think in my very first post. It is a great blog and I am always inspired by both her crochet projects and dinner ideas.
One of the complaints that I have seen on places like Ravelry is that most of the designers were from the US or abroad, not the UK. I’m not trying to diss UK crocheters or designers, but it seems to me that crochet design in the UK is not as sophisticated as that in the US. This is still a very knitting-centric country and crochet is still considered little more than an afterthought most of the time. I mean, the fact that this magazine is the first crochet magazine in the country sort of proves this point really well. I think that as the UK becomes more accustomed to crochet as more than blanket edging or doilies, there will be more designers coming from here.
Most of the patterns in the magazine were quite lovely, with subtle stitching or color work to make up the designs. All of the patterns had excellent photos taken from nearly every angle conceivable to make it easy to know what the hell the garment is supposed to look like. The instructions were quite clear, though all written in British crochet terms so may be confusing for any American readers if they don’t know that there is a difference before they start. There is a section on learning to crochet that clearly shows what’s what in British crochet terms.
There is only one pattern that I honestly could not believe that they allowed into this magazine. It is by the British designer Sasha Kagan called Petit Fleur. I cannot find a picture of anyone who has made this yet so let me describe it for you. It is a tank top made out of a mohair-like yarn. The main color is in a olive green with magenta, purple and pea green parts to it. It is a granny square compilation that ends well above the belly button. Oh, and it has fringe. This pattern looks as though it was taken directly from a Stitchy McYarnpants blog post about yarncrafts in the 1970’s and 80’s. The only way that this pattern could have gotten any better/worse is if there were a pair of cameltoe inducing hotpants made from the same yarn and stitch pattern! I felt sorry for the model.
Now, before you all jump down my throat for being mean, I do understand that it is a designers job to push the envelope a bit by trying new ideas out. What I don’t understand is how it actually made it into this magazine. Was it simply because she is a British designer and they seem to be sparse on the ground? Or did it somehow look better before they actually saw pictures of it?
Ok, enough about that design. Overall, the magazine is well put together with clear pictures and a nice flow. I would and will buy it again when the next issue comes out.
Now, onto the cocktail party/baby shower that I went to. A lot of the folks that my husband has meet in the past year that he was here without me were in attendance. It was nice to finally be able to put faces to names. As many of these folks were also ex-pat Americans it was nice to hear that a lot of the things that I am going through are pretty normal. Like not being able to get chocolate chips at the grocery store to make cookies! The highlight of the evening in my opinion was the rather round mother-to-be walking around offering jello shots in little paper cups with one hand on her prolific stomach, smiling like a Madonna painting. If I ever have a baby shower type thing, this is what I want. No pile of women playing children’s games in a room decked-out in pink and blue and yellow. It was a fun night and I’m glad that I made the train ride…
Yesterday I had a chance to go with the hubby to Bath. He was going there with a co-worker for work while I was going there to get out of the damn house. It gets pretty…..well…… intense if I’m not able to get out the house every once in a while. To put it simply, I go a little batty.
Anyway, we left the house at about 7am to catch the train from Tring into the city. Once we were in London, we had to go from Euston Station to Paddington Station where we met the happy co-worker and caught the train to Bath. The ride on the train takes about an hour and a half, but it was pleasant with great views and lovely conversation. When we got to the ancient city, I wandered off to have a look around and the guys caught a cab to go off to their appointment. I meandered up their main shopping street where I found their quite nice Oxfam book shop (you can take the girl out of the country and make her carry a lot of books up a flight of stairs but you can’t take the girl out of the used book shop!) and got a couple of books. I then found my favorite WH Smith in the country where I finally found a copy of the much anticipated Inside Crochet magazine. I’ll have a review of it in tomorrow’s post.
After hitting the essentials, I decided to mosey on up to the Bath Fashion Museum. This is one of the few things that I hadn’t done yet in Bath so I figured that this would be a good time to check it out. As with all admittance fees in Bath, I found the 7 pounds a bit hefty to go to a museum, but I pressed on thinking that it may well be worth it. Sadly, it wasn’t. The museum is pretty small and in a basement under the assembly rooms. The lighting and the paint colors chosen all made it feel rather like the War Rooms in London than a place showcasing fashions of the past. There was one exhibit there that was sort of interesting. It was a retrospective collection on the work of Bill Gibbs. The exhibit was interesting though sort of messy. The walls facing the clothes were covered in a nearly indecipherable mass of pictures and bits of writing from a fashion writer who seemed to write more about himself than about the actual subject which made it quite incomprehensible. The handouts which you needed if you were to make any kind of sense of the exhibit were badly photocopied and really dog-eared. Is the museum in such a precarious financial situation to not to be able to afford a laminating machine and a color printer? Only a handful of copies of this are really needed since the room was too claustrophobic to hold more than 10 adults at a time (and surely not all of them would care enough to pick-up a copy!). The clothes were pretty impressive, what could be seen of them through the very dim lighting. Once again Kaffe Fassett and I meet in Bath as he worked with Bill Gibbs in the 70’s and there were several of his pieces on display in the exhibit. Here’s a couple that I managed to take photographs of through the glass display cases….
A Kaffe Fassett Sweater
The Color work is unmistakable
The fashion museum may have been a disappointment but the sunny day and lovely Georgian architecture of Bath were seriously pleasing. Just wandering around this city shows just how much planning and forethought went into it as it is nearly impossible to get lost. And if you do get lost, you really don’t give a shit since the views around each corner are so lovely.
Normal street in Bath
Bath isn’t typical of British towns as it actually had a design. Unlike London or the myriad of smaller towns and villages that simply grew without a lot of organization, Bath had a central planner and was built, for the most part, all at the same time.
A church and the Abbey in the background
The center of Bath is more or less the ancient Abbey and the Roman Baths. I’ve been to the baths a few times and decided not to go in this time around. However, the Hubby did get a shot of me “crocheting the Abbey” for you.
After we were done sightseeing in Bath we caught a train back into London. Since it was already the end of the day, the Hubby wasn’t going back to work. I decided that since I was already in the city, I wanted to investigate reports that I had heard that yarn was sold in some department stores. So, we took a tube to Oxford Circus and there we visited John Lewis.
I want to move in to this store.
For starters, it had the nicest yarn selection that I have yet seen in this country. It was also the most reasonably priced selection that I have yet to find here. In fact, I actually found a yarn that is cheaper to buy here than it is in the US. I found Mirasol Sulka for 4.85 pounds. The usual going rate for it in the US is from $8 to $10, usually on the higher side. Even with the exchange rate, it is a lot cheaper in a department store in the UK. They had, what looked like, the entire Debbie Bliss line as well as the Rowan line. The folks working in their craft department were helpful and the whole place was well organized and lit. The entire store reminded both of us strongly of the Marshal Fields flagship store in Chicago. It not only had clothes and make-up, but furniture and upholstery fabrics and things of that nature. We also visited Liberty’s department store in the amazing faux Tudor building where they stock the Rowan line of yarns as well as a very nice fabrics department as well as a lot of knitting and crochet tools.
We then went to dinner at a Japanese restaurant that the Hubby knew of nearby. It was here that I met the bottle that killed my resolve not to buy anymore yarn until Maryland Sheep and Wool. We got a bottle of plum wind to go with dinner and for some reason, I ended-up drinking, well, more than half of it. After our excellent meal, a very giggly Sarah with Hubby in tow marched (or, to be slightly more precise, careened) back to John Lewis for a little after dinner yarn shopping therapy. I got 7 more skeins of the Mirasol Sulka, 3 in cream and 4 in navy blue to match some of the light green that was already residing in my stash at home. I also got 5 balls of Freedom Spirit by Twilleys of Stamford that was quite reasonably priced.
Yeah, I totally fell off the wagon on that one. I blame it on the drinks. 3/4 a bottle of wine and decent priced yarn within walking distance is a dangerous combination!
On the way there we managed to get a photo of me crocheting the iconic red telephone booth.
Can you see me giggling?
My lapse heralded the end of the night with the siren’s call of puppies needing to go to the bathroom as well as a serious need for some sleep.
Having had more than a few vet visits this past year I felt fairly confident that this one would be pretty straightforward. Take the 5 animals to the vet, have their chips read and hand in the paperwork to get their pet passports. I should have known better than that at this point but, I am still at times naively optimistic that things are going to be easy.
For starters, I got a little lost on the way there. Part of this was confusing google maps instructions and part was confusing hubby instructions. All of the animals were totally freaked-out by just getting into their crates again and going in the car. It’s been a little bit since we got here so they were, I think, expecting another plane ride. They weren’t pooping themselves and drooling freaking-out (thank God), rather vocally telling me about how freaked-out they were.
So we finally find the place and I cannot figure-out how to get into it. Like many, many businesses here it is in what used to be a house. So there are lots of smallish rooms that have obviously been reconfigured to be used in this capacity. It smelled like the vets offices that I knew at home in Iowa, lots of strong cleaner with a heavy overtone of animal drugs. I even felt like I was stepping back into the 1970’s a bit with the decor and ambiance of the place.
When we finally got into a room, the vet looked like every farm vet I have ever known. Stained shirt, hair in need of a trim, heavy hands with some serious calluses and angry looking cuts, kind eyes and I couldn’t understand half of what he said and for once it wasn’t me not being used to the accent, he mumbled. The dogs needed a shot for something that either we don’t have very commonly in the US or that we just don’t vaccinate for and the cats were totally fine. There was a lot of writing to make up all of the passports and some pretty fun looking stamps. I think that he was fairly impressed with how in order my paperwork was, but it is hard to tell.
I miss our vets at Sheeler Road Animal Hospital. It never felt like the madhouse that this place did even on it’s most busy of days. I also miss having female vets as Meara was pretty freaked-out by a man trying to look at her. I’m just glad that she didn’t bite him. I don’t think that this new vet is the type of place that they would ever remember us no matter how often we were in with the animals…
I am starting to think that a change is something that I have been needing for a little while. Since I’ve moved here, I’ve gone quite out of my normal comfort zone, sometimes several times in one day. For instance, I started a fiber group this past week. Sure, no one showed-up to the first meeting other than me but I had the balls to announce who I was and why I was there to an entire pub’s worth of folks and then sit there and crochet alone for an hour and a half. This is surely not me. Every time I get into a car I do things that are almost unthinkable in the states. Things like blindly pull-out into the wrong side of a very narrow two-lane road that my side has been fully taken-up by cars parked there. If you don’t do this here you will never get anywhere yet it is so completely not in my nature to do this sort of thing. I go faster on much narrower and curvier roads than I would even consider in the US.
The Chilterns are so lovely that I want to learn how to take better photographs. I know that even with a good camera, I cannot do the landscape here anything close to justice. On my (almost) daily walks with the dogs I keep seeing things that make me think, “man, I wish that I could show everybody how cool or beautiful that is!”. I want to take a class on photography. I’m sure that y’all would thank me for this too:-)
I also find myself inspired in my crochet. For some reason the peacefulness here is very conducive to reading patterns. That being said, I’m still not following them all from start to stop, but I do seem to understand them better. I’ve also been inspired to branch out a little in my crochet. The other day I was looking out the window when the group of daffodils across the road caught my eye. I decided then and there to make one. So, here it is…
Not bad for a first try I think. I was running up and down the stairs to the yarn attic trying to match the yellows and the whites by holding them up to the window and comparing to the daffs outside. I restrained myself from actually going outside as I thought that crazy American woman holding yarn up to daffodils at the side of the road might just edge me over the line from eccentric to full-on woo-woo.
Tomorrow, it looks as though I’ll be taking a day trip to Bath, one of my favorite towns anywhere. The last time that I was there they had a great exhibit at the art museum that featured quite a few Kaffe Fassett originals. Hopefully, I’ll have a few pictures and stories to tell!
As for now, I am off for our first vet’s visit! Wish me luck driving 3 cats and 2 dogs there!
As of today I no longer have a valid excuse for not posting as often as I should. I now have the internet. A very nice man from BT came by today and hooked-up the phone line to the house. I would have taken a picture of him but I think that I sort of freaked him out by just being me enough already and I really wanted my internet. So, he’s about for about an hour doing things with beepy devices in and out of the house. He then asks if I have a telephone (which we do [long story on that one, maybe another time dears]) and voila! We have a phone line. So, as he’s leaving I ask him how long it will be until the modem comes and he said that it should be quite soon.
I go upstairs and come back down and voila! again! There is a package in the front just waiting for me! And it’s a modem! Holy shit! That was FAST! At first I was going to wait until the hubby came home to set it up but as I read the package it said, “fast and easy set-up!” and I thought, “what the hell!” which is usually a bad thing for me to think, especially as it applies to technology. Anyway, against by better instincts I hauled the device up to the attic where all the wireless computer related stuff is and plugged it into all the appropriate sockets and voila! Yet again! It worked!
Sexiest thing I've seen all week
Nothing is going to get done around here housework wise for the rest of the week folks as I gorge myself on internet access!!!
So, I finally have my “studio”, as we are calling it as it sure as heck isn’t an office, put together. Of course my room is always a work in progress but here is what it looks like for the moment.
As you can see, Meara and Weezy are being lovely models for me by sitting like little ladies in the two chairs in the room. I didn’t even have to bribe them or anything to do that.
Meara is such a show-off!
One of my favorite aspects of the room is the view, which is quite fun. I purposely turned my spinning wheel away from the view of the sheep as they were too distracting.
All of my crafty books are in here as well as a good chunk of my horticulture books. Some of them got delegated to the attic as there were just too many of them and a lot of them don’t really apply to the UK. I mean really, I don’t really need a Trees of North America quite at hand as I used to now do I?
The lighting in this room is excellent. It is a diffused Northern light from the window and there are six quite good halogens in the ceiling. Most of my yarn is in the attic as well since there just wasn’t enough space in the room to deal with all of the containers as well. I have made sort of a little room up there with even a little chandlier and lots of pretty throw rugs.
My attic yarn room...
You can see that I have started decorating the ceiling/walls of the attic with yarny sorts of things...
I am missing home even as I begin to realize that our house in Florida was really not a good fit for the two of us. It was ok for me alone, but as soon as there was the two of us living there is started to become quite crowded. This house is a much better fit for us in many ways, First off, it is larger with a more usable attic space. I wish that there was a bit more to the yard as I am itching to plant things but having the conservatory is really nice. We are looking at getting a little shed to put out in the courtyard in order to store our bikes in that will make the conservatory a little easier to use. But I like that the “greenhouse” space is so very attached to the living area of the house. The kitchen, except for it’s odd little washer/dryer combo (no, it doesn’t really work at all) and it’s British sized fridge is a much better space for the hubby to create his gourmet masterpieces in than our old place. I am glad that it is going to be loved by a singleton once again. But I still miss home. I miss the bear tree behind the house and the bank of windows in the front room with their cool Northern light. I miss the owls hooting and screeching in the dusk and the cardinals flitting about the azalea bushes in the front. I know that I will get over missing these things, eventually. I don’t think that I will get over missing my friends, however. Or the ease at which things can get done in the US.
Today we went to the bank and finally got me put on the checking account as well as opened a savings account. The water bill came on Saturday and it was what we were waiting for in order to have me on an account at the bank. It is amazing to me that that was all that it took to get me on when all the other very official papers that we had on Friday weren’t enough.
I have started a new Yarn Therapy group here. I am hoping that someone will actually show up for it, otherwise I will be crocheting away in a pub by myself for an evening. I have posted flyers in Tring and should probably go to Ivinghoe and Leighton Buzzard and post some there as well. I need to get over to Leighton Buzzard anyway as there is a vet there that is supposed to be pretty good. So, if you are in the Ivinghoe Aston area on Tuesday nights stop in at the Village Swan and look for the woman crocheting and say hi!
I decided to break the post into two pieces as it was going to be pretty long even with the metric ton of pictures in it. Sooooo, here’s Part II…
The day of our departure was a serious flurry of activity that started early and didn’t end, at least for me, for a good 38 hours or so. It was a REALLY long day….
In the morning we went and took cuttings of my African violet plants. I more or less filled up a rollaboard suitcase with the the 400 or so cuttings that I had.
How often do you get a good ass shot? I mean, really?!?!?
Then there was a lot of running around doing last minute errands and packing. One of these was taking the remaining geese to their new home. It was kinda fun as it was in a rental minivan:-) Pity the poor folks who rent that bad boy next! Then, in the afternoon, we ended-up taking the pets to check-in at the cargo area at the airport. We were there for a couple of hours since the paperwork for 5 animals is pretty intense. But the folks at the cargo area were great and we were able to keep the dogs out until it was time for us to go check-in for our part of the flight.
Once again our plane was “Hot Lips”.
Our ride
We were able to see the pets get loaded onto the plane which was nice. I was pretty stressed out by this point even though there was nothing more that I could do at this point.
Do I look stressed?
We got through and all of the pets were absolutely fine. We had about a day to get sleep and get sort of oriented and then we were full-bore into our stuff being there. We had a lovely truck driver knock on our door at about 8:00 in the morning on Friday with our container in tow. He told us that the unloading crew would be there in an hour. We scurried to get dressed and incarcerate the pets. Alas, we hurried to get everyone in their places and then no-one showed. So, we called the company and there had been a whoopsie in the planning as they had planned on the truck coming on Monday not on Friday. So they contracted a local, what they call removals company, to come and unload the container.
The Old Chapel and the container
The crew arrived in about an hour and then the hard work started. I was amazed at how well things came through as even the clay pots that were sort of thrown in at the end were for the most part intact.
About halfway through
Arranging the house proved to be…..well…..challenging. There is a lot of space but oddly not a lot of wall space. At least not on the first floor.
Unpacking is a bitch
Milo had decided to hole-up in the art nook the night before the movers got there and we really couldn’t get her down. So she had a lovely birdseye view of the whole moving-in.
Milo, the sniper
We are getting used to the area. It is very much like the area that I grew up in. Very agricultural. I think that more tractors go by the house in a day than cars and trucks. Hell, there almost as many horses that go by! But it is REALLY pretty, so much so that there is an official designation as for it’s beauty.
Our front view
We have some baaaaaad neighbors!
We finally found a large craft store in the area that is comparable to a Michael’s or Jo Ann’s. It’s called Hobbycraft and I wasn’t let down by their selection of yarns.
Sarah and the Hobbycraft
I was let down by just how FREAKING expensive they are.
Sarah checking out the yarn selection
If I am going to pay £6.00 for a very small ball of yarn I want to be giving it to a small shop owner. I actually didn’t buy any yarn at all. Can you believe that? Me, walking by lots and lots and lots of yarn.
We’ve been taking lots of walks in the area. There are a lot of footpaths in the area and the girls love walking on them in good weather.
Walking on a pretty spring day
This is what the area looks like. The Ivinghoe Beacon is in the background of this photo.
The Beacon with freshly tilled soil
On our walks we end-up seeing lots of sheep with their lambs. They are super cute and pretty much everywhere.
Spring Lambs
All in all, we are adapting quite well. I have just started a new Meet-up group called the Ivinghoe Aston Yarn Therapy. I’m hoping that someone will show up to it. We’ll see. I will be posting more regularly once we have internet at the house.
So, still no internets at home except the sloooooooooow and rather dubious connection through the cell phone. I sort of misunderstood the hubby in the fact that the engineer is going to be installing the LINE for us to have internet at the end of the month, but they are only going to be sending the modem after the guy has installed the line, so it could still be a few more weeks before I have a “regular” internet connection. I think that I may go insane.
So, today the hubby brought me with him to work. There is more than one reason for this as we had wanted to put me onto the bank account that he has already set up. However, apparently I am not living here yet enough to prove that I am, in fact, living here. I had a receipt that shows that I am a part tenant in a house and am due half of the deposit through a government accredited company as well as the actual LEASE to the house, neither of which are valid proof for the UK government to open a bank account. However, a water bill is. Go figure. It feels like a never ending battle to do anything in this country. Things that are quite simple in the US seem to require a full rectal exam here and things that are usually quite complicated (like going to the Dr.) are super simple. It’s disorienting not knowing what exactly you should gird for battle with.
Otherwise, adjustment is going well. The dogs have decided that they really enjoy the walks in our area even though they both seem to think that they could take either a sheep or a horse. Anytime that we see one or the other of these animals they both go into paroxysms of barking that, if translated into (American) English would sound something like, “I’m gonna kick your fuzzy/tall ass! Oh yeah, if I could get off this leash your ass would be SO mine! I would be your worst nightmare sucker!” The multiple times a day that a horse and rider amble by our house causes an explosion of barking and growling that is comparable to the UPS man delivering something in the US. I am hoping that they will get used to it pretty soon.
Now, I have promised photos. These go all the way back to the going away party with the hookers. So, if you have a slow internet connection, go grab a beverage of your choice, maybe even take a bath or something, it may take a bit….
Most of us met-up at the Krispy Kreme in Winter Park in the morning for sugar bombs disguised as “breakfast”.
It's way too early for this!
These two don't look as happy with the doughnuts as they should!
Krispy Kreme and Hookers, a good combination!
Plans changed at the bon voyage party as originally we were going to take a boat tour of Winter Park but the weather suddenly turned nasty, so where do we end-up? At a yarn shop of course!
Here's the Pimp sitting pretty around the big table at Sip and Knit
Becca Looking like trouble at Sip and Knit
Tucker, the official dog of Sip and Knit and everybody there was very welcoming of our mobile party. We also stopped at Michael’s and scored some clearance yarn. (Love that glow in the dark yarn!!!!!)
From the yarn shop tours we moved on to the EATING segment of the party, and in some cases (I’m not naming names here!) drinking. The folks at PF Chang’s were quite gracious to our rowdy crew, even taking photos for us at the end!
Good Chow
As you can probably tell, I handed off my camera to the pimp during this part of the party as I am usually pretty bad at taking photos at things like this and, well, he’s a dad thus used to taking photos of a bunch of rowdy females (He has daughters! Get your mind out of the gutter!).
Sheila says "Hiiiii Ya!"
The Hookers surprised me with presents. There was a lovely large “Ball Sack”, a book of photos and a lovely afghan with “Happy Hookers” emblazoned across it.
I'm surprised by the size of the Ball Sack that Lily made for me!
The Book of Hook
I'm very happy with my hooking afghan
The whole group!
The manager of the restaurant was very obliging in taking our group photo (I think that he sorta wanted the crazy group that kept making hooking jokes out of his establishment!). He seemed more interested in making sure that he got the Ball Sack in the photo than he was in getting the bottom of the afghan.
Our last stop was to give the poor denuded horse statue in front of PF Chang’s a little, uh, help….
Letting the horsey feel like a "man" for once....
The night before we left was a Yarn Therapy night at Infusion Tea.
Sorry, no real reason for this picture, just had to put in a good photo of me for once!
It was a great group and I finally got to show off the blue and white pain-in-the-ass in it’s FINISHED state!!! Yes, it is DONE and has been sent off to it’s intended recipient a few months late.
Can you tell that I am happy that this is DONE?!?!?!?
The conversation was invigorating and heavy in the tech area. It is an interesting group and I am glad that Terri decided to keep the group going!
We will have the couch if we have to throw our quiche at you for it!
Terri, the "Head Therapist"
It was a really nice night that helped me to forget about the stress that is on the horizon….
Sarah Jane Humke 