5 things that are true...and just for fun, let's pretend it's monday
Monday, October 1, 2012 at 12:55PM Mrs. G. 1) Mrs. G. is all done with her Christmas Shopping...you people are so gullible.
2) Mrs. G. was sleeping in her writing room when she woke up from a horrible dream -- someone in her family had insulted an entire roomful of Muslims. She stumbled to her and Mr. G's bed and told him she had had a bad dream. "That's OK, babe," he murmured in his sleep, "I'm a dream killer."
3) Mrs. G. and her sister-in-law Chris have been supporting each other as they diet. Friday, they agreed to switch from South Beach to Weight Watchers because Chris needed fruit stat and Mrs. G. couldn't stand to eat another piece of turkey. They agreed they would switch immediately without straying from their healthy path. Last night, Mrs. G. licked the creme filling out of at least 17 20 Oreos. Sorry Chris. But Mrs. G. threw the naked chocolate wafers away. It's Monday -- a brand new day!
4) Mrs. G. decided yesterday afternoon to knit her daughter a chenille blanket. After watching countless YouTube videos on how to cast on, knitting the "tail" which is supposed to be there at the end of the project twice, Mr. G. spending ten minutes unraveling a trapped Gus from the yarn he stole off the couch during the night and the endless swearing, Mrs. G. is just going to buy a blanket from a damn store.
When is he going away?
But the whole miserable experience was worth this FB exchange.
Family, This and That
Reader Comments (34)
Blanket knitting should only be undertaken by those with more patience than Job. This is not me. Get thee to a blanket-buying shop.
can i have your yarn? it looks luscious.
What a great thought...I have so many of Mrs G's scarves that she gave me over the years. I am the most uncrafty of all crafters altho Heather and Caitie are both quite talented. I have a skank of cheap yarn to learn the basics when Mrs G comes down on a picture hanging expedition in Oct. We are settled in the new house w. two neurotic Jack Russells. Spent the motning planting violas and framing my "children's pictures that I actually paid someone to take....Caitie, love your new do...it looks great. We plan on being there when you graduate. I too am through w. my Christmas shopping as we will be cruising on the Mexican Riviera. They have cancelled one port because of the drug activity. Other than Cabo, we could care less about disembarking...wish the G's were going w/ us. Am going to cook my first Thanksgiving bird this year and my Christmas tree should arrive this week. Should be interesting to see how when the proper time comes how my sprited Seamus reacts to it....Christmas stuff in the stores and I am not even ready for Halloween....
Mrs. G. I will give you private knitting lessons anytime you would like. You bring the wine and the yarn, I'll do the rest. I graduated from a child who could only knit knots and tears to an adult that can cast on, knit, purl, and cast-off and most importantly fix/hide my mistakes. These are important life lessons, baby. You never know when Mad Max will appear and need a jock strap knit from the supplies in the survival/emergency kit.
My almost 39 year old husband finally got his baby blanket last spring. I think my MIL finally paid somebody to finish it for her.
You'll be fine for Halloween, Mom. All you need is a BIG bowl of candy.
I too have known many a bad skank of yarn in my day.
Happy Monday to you all!
My confession. I bought materials to make my sister a quilt for her wedding. Didn't get around to it. After 10 years she divorced. I actually took time to start it--- but it has sat waiting to have the edging done. She re-married 3 years ago---- So the promised wedding quilt became to a divorce quilt, and then a wedding quilt.... hoping that it doesn't become a second divorce quilt!
It is NOT pretty when a dog digests a bunch of blue yarn and it comes out the other end...
I started a counted-cross stitch wedding sampler when my husband and I got engaged. In 1993. I guess I can shoot for getting it finished by our 20th anniversary in 2015. I showed it to Kai a while back and he asked who the groom in the sampler was supposed to be, because that guy has hair, and Daddy doesn't.
I did not believe for one minute that you were finished with your Christmas shopping.
I was not born yesterday you know.
About the knitting thing- I don't do it or understand anything about it.
What is this tail thing and does it really matter which hand you hold it in------I am lost.
And because I am so wonderful I will not bring up that I WON one of your scarfs in a give away 4 years away- done with your shopping my.....
Hehehe.
About the Oreo's the best part is the cookie.
M
My dogs get into my yarn on a fairly regular basis. I often discover they have found my yarn when I find it wrapped around the legs of the dining room table like a spider web gone bad...Now, I just bought some beautiful hand dyed sock yarn ....if they get into it I will shave them and use THEIR hair for yarn.
Suburban Correspondent, do you have a good site for that two socks at once trick you do???
hehehehehe...a skank of yarn. Love it!
Oh, but Gus looks sooo adorable with the blue yarn wrapped around him. How can you resist that adorable face?
I'm finished with my Christmas shopping....for 2011. Does that count?
I think I have all you ladies (& Gary) beat. When I was 13 I inherited a cross stitch tablecloth kit from my grandmother (it was in progress) so old the embroidery floss was rayon..... I worked on it for a while...I'm now 55, it's still not done.
I think if my son gets married some day, I'll give it to his bride to continue the bad crafting tradition that I maintain is a family legacy. :)
HAPPY MONDAY all!
Thanks Kelly!
I think my mom meant skeins but skanks run in our family so the mistake is understandable. "Hey, could you pick me up two skanks at Michaels?"
Sorry, klcrab, but I think I have you beat.
My mother pieced a full size Grandmother's Flower Garden quilt top when she was pregnant with my brother who was born in 1936. She was living in Tulsa with my grandmother and my two aunts at the time while my Dad was working in Trinidad.
For those of you who aren't familiar with that particular design, it is made up of 1 1/2" hexagons. She finished piecing the top and then never quilted it. In 1977, she gave it to me (unfinished) and said "maybe you'll finish it one day." I laughed and said "don't count on it."
A few years ago, my aunt told me that my mother, my grandmother and another sister had all made one of those quilts. She didn't remember my grandmother or my other aunt finishing theirs either. I was hoping to find one in my aunt's attic after she died along with some of my grandmother's sewing things, but no such luck.
While I was growing up, that quilt top lived in Texas, Louisiana, Edmonton, Bogota, and Oklahoma. Since she gave it to me, it's lived in California twice, Missouri, Kansas and now full circle back to Oklahoma, just 48 miles from where it was started.
I'm 68 and I haven't decided which DIL should receive it LOL.
Knitting makes me feel MOST inadequate. Though my recent post says that my grandmother taught me to knit, the one granddaughter who didn't get taught by her is the best at it. Go figure.
I have a beautiful sweater that is 95% finished. The last time I cast a stitch in it was in 1990.
MarthaMc, you are simply carrying on a beautiful family tradition of not finishing that quilt. Be proud!
@navhelowife - Toe-Up 2-At-A-Time Socks is the best book for learning. You need a 32-inch circular needle for it, though. I get mine from KnitPicks. Good luck!
I just saw this conversation on facebook (and joined it many hours too late -- because I can't help but add in my own two cents).
We won't discuss the 10th anniversary cross-stitch "sampler" I
amwas making for my husband fifteen years ago... I can't even find it anymore. But someone ought to examine my head because I cut 8 yards of fabric into 8.5 inch squares yesterday, just so I can make my son and DIL a quilt for Christmas... for their queen-size bed... when I've never made anything bigger than a baby blanket (and those were for babies so they couldn't comment on my many mistakes).Buy the blanket, Heather, and be happy!
The first thing I ever knit was in 1983 (preppy eighties, southeast university), and it was a Fair Isle sweater for my boyfriend, who I was obsessed with. It was cream and brown and blue and the fair isle part came out great. It took me many months and cost a fortune and when he tried to pull it on, it wouldn't pull down over his head.
My SIL's and I exchange gifts for Christmas, the rule is they have to be handmade. So, at a craft fair, I saw a neat scaft thingee my friend with me was able to figure out how to make. So...I am crocheting for the first time. I was able to make chains...the other stuff you do, she showed me. I usually have a death grip on the hook and have to stop every couple rows due to some sort of carpal tunnel paralysis.
Then, when I start up again, I see the cat's eyes dilating and all of a sudden all 16 pounds of fat kitty are on my lap, trying to eat the yarn and my finger...good times.
I did finish one, and I really like it.....so, I have to make two for the SIL...then the daughter saw it, wants one....and I might as well make one for the future daughter in law. Hopefully, they'll be done by Christmas.
I have two bags full of granny squares - my niece's baby blanket that I started when my sister got pregnant. Niece just started Kindergarten.
They had really nice squishy blankets in Target last week, Mrs. G. xo
I really can knit, but the year my son was born (ummm1985) I started a baby sweater. In 1998 I gave it to my Mom. She finished it and put it on a teddy bear. Creepy.
I have a box with about 50 skanks of yarn in my closet..
Martha, I love it!
Ok, I will add my story.
My Nana bought an unfinished quilt at an estate sale in Helena Montana in 1970. It was beautiful squares of sateen, an old fashioned floral applique pattern, the flower in the middle of a 12" square with buds at each corner. 80% of the squares were finished, 20% basted and just needed the delicate applique stitches finished, then peicing together. She couldn't bear that it wouldn't get finished.
In the 70's my Nana had several of my Aunts try to finish the squares, but no one was good enough to match the original fine stitches. Even tried a machine, god help them.
By the ealry 2000's I was nominated to take over. I have finished all the applique, fixed all the bad sewing, the squares just need to be pieced together and quilted. However......it is ugly, ugly, ugly. Pepto Bismal pink and mint green on white background. I hesitate to finally finish it because where the hell will I put it? If the colors were better I would love it. I am considering tea dyeing the whole thing.
So it sits in a box, unifinished, moved over and over, and nearly 90 years old. In the same box as the crazy quilt made from denim I started for my daughter five years ago....
I am of the opinion that a good end for chenille yarn is with the dogs, but what do I know? I am of the mad mind set that spinning my own, and knitting others socks is my PASS (post-apocalyptic skill set). The need for warm feet will keep this old woman from getting booted out of the tent, and someone will be sure to feed me in exchange.
Everyone has their gifts and skills, though, and what they like to do.
I went to Michael's AND Hobby Lobby this morning and managed to get out of there with no skanks. Well, 'cept my own big, fine ass.
@ Gary, my sister-in-law's dog once ate and shat a dish towel. This is what I thought of when you mentioned the dog swallowing the yarn. Said S-I-L had to try to step on the towel to help the dog get it out but the dog was freaked out (and probably uncomfortable) and kept walking away from the "help" her owner was trying to provide.
Since I am right-handed but hold my yarn like most left-handed knitters (due to learning to crochet first, I think), I have pretty good luck teaching people to knit. If you do the West Coast Tour this fall, Mrs. G., you can have a lesson on your way through the PDX area. One way to keep from knitting the tail is to form it into a little packet (or wrap it around a bobbin) so it doesn't quietly, evilly whisper, "knit me, knit me".
My second knitting project ever was a magenta and cream heavily patterned sweater. My gauge was so far off that the body (did I mention that I decided I would knit this in the round instead of in flat pieces as the pattern suggested) was going to fit a football player. I went to the yarn store where the owner kindly told me there was no way to fix it short of ripping the entire thing out to start anew. I sighed and went to shove it back in my bag when she asked if she could see it for a moment. I handed her my sweater. To my horror, she pulled the needle out and started to rip out all my work as she said "you might want to start winding up the yarn -- it will be really hard to untangle otherwise." She knew I would probably never knit again if that thing sat in the closet unfinished. I redid the sweater in a more suitable size and did go on to knit other things. Now if I can find the slippers I started and figure out where I was on the second one....
Thanks, Aunt Snow. I'll pass that beautiful family tradition statement on to whoever ends up with the unfinished quilt.
Unfortunately the family tradition is carried on by more than the unfinished 76 year old quilt top. I have plenty of my own unfinished projects. I put the "pro" in procrastination and am finally ready to admit that time is running out and I need to clear out some of this stuff before someone else has to.
I do envy people who like to knit. I can knit and read the instructions but it's not something I enjoy. I've never enjoyed any type of hand work with any type of needle. But knitting looks soothing to some portion of my brain. I'd much rather use a sewing machine.
Poor Gus! Good thing he's adorable.
oh my goodness, this post and comments made me laugh so hard here at work that I'm certain the co-workers are worried about me. I knit hats for the cancer center. European style. easy fast and love working on circular needles. most independent yarn shops have free stitch and bitch sessions and very reasonable classes for help on projects.