Friday, May 26, 2006

Ann

A good friend died on Wednesday.
Ann had courageously fought ovarian cancer for a long time.

Ann was the kind of woman you wanted on your side, she may have seemed harsh sometimes, but she was a no nonsense woman that told you like it was.
Ann was a wife, mother, grandmother, sister, knitter, weaver, spinner, great cook. With her passing I am learning more about her.

I last saw Ann in January at a guild work night, busy knitting away, having a laugh with everyone.

As a guild member she was an inspiration to everyone, as a person she was also inspirational. Her zest for life, the encouragement she offered everyone, her Rowan jelly..... Yummmmmm

Her Son kept a carepage for Ann while she was in hospital, it was a way for everyone to get updates and to send well wishes to her without having to inundate the family with visitors and phonecalls. I truely appreciate the effort that he made doing this, as I never felt that I was one of the immediate friends that should be visiting her.
I would have loved to, but she had so many other people that were closer.

I met Ann less than three years ago, when I joined Burr house spinners and weavers.
As part of the guild membership, we work a few shifts in the store that is run by the guilds, Ann's work was always the stuff I picked up at the store, her work was simply amazing.

I will miss her very much.

Tuesday, May 23, 2006

Long time... Again!!

I may well have been busy, but does that really mean I couldn't have blogged quickly in a month, shame on me.

I have been busy though, and I don't have many pictures to prove it.

DH has been getting allergies up the wazoo, one of his reactions we were very concerned about and he ended up at the hospital, got prednizone, and epipens amongst other things. The search for the culprit continues, although he does think it might be the Kevlar gloves he wears at work.

I have of course been busy knitting. I finished Daffodil a long time ago, but here, finally is a piccie of it blocked!!!!
















I have been plugging away furiously on both of my Pi shawls, which are notoriously bad for photographing in the state they are at right now, which is exactly when I would want to photograph them. So here is one attempt.













I haven't actually worked much on the Pi's since the 14th, that is when all my wool arrived from knitpicks. The wool is for this

I also found a nice little basket in Loblaws the other day, I had actually seen them before, and quite liked the look of them, all the time thinking what a nice knitting basket.
I had decided to get one on saturday only to discover that they were all gone. Bummer. So off I went on my merry way, randomly filling up my shopping cart, when what do I see in the clearance bins, my basket!!! Sure, it's got a handle missing, I was planning on cutting the handles off anyway, but it was reduced, which was a big bonus, it was $3.99 from $6.99 only I am sure it was actually $14.99 last week.

Anyway, it fits all the pallette yarn colours in quite nicely.













Here is where I got to with the cardi anyway.

It is sewn up ready to be cut at both sleeves and the front. Don't ask about the photo, for some reason photobucket is playing silly buggers.












One sleeve is now cut and the sleeve is in progress.














I also had a craving to make some little socks the other day, so I went yarn shopping and came back with this.












Some yarn to make a top and some socks for the wee one! Of course the moment passed once the yarn was home, I am sure it will appear again soon.


I forgot one more picture. This is from the fireworks that we had last night on may 2-4. Victoria day for those unaware of the significance of the holiday here in Canada.

We had visitors up from the US. Frank and Jeff are visiting canada every few weeks for work related training, they are in Milton, so not far from us, DH met both in Maryland when we lived there, they worked for the same company, He has maintained a friendship with Frank ever since, and they go to the Mopar Nats yearly together. We don't get many visitors, so the kids get all wound up when we do, they were just here for the night, having to return to Milton for schooling!
They went and bought a box of fireworks as we had missed the big fireworks display the day before.
The box of about 15 fireworks of course cost a small fortune, but was worth it. Katherine got scared so we got earmuffs for her, actually it was my range ear protectors. I carried her down the stairs of the deck, missed the last step, and of course in the nature of trying to protect my young, fell, onto my knees, and the little one got away scratch free. My knees are sore. Skin is completely off one of them. I swear men don't take these kinds of bumps for their kids.

Anyway, the photo, I tried but the delay on the digital is way too slow, so I missed most of them, got a few trails of one, and this one, I think it looks like a light bulb exploding.