Home is where the heart is

Soppy, but true. Home is where Mom and her heart would like to be right now. After over 2 weeks in the hospital, she's getting right tired of the whole thing. So is Dad. He has been staying at the hospital every night, except for the one time this weekend when I spelled him.

She got a pacemaker today - a fashion accessory for the new valves and arteries she got for Valentine's Day. Think of it as an early birthday present. Her birthday is tomorrow.

I'm making her a pair of bright red socks as a coming home/birthday present, although I'm hoping that she'll be home long before the socks are finished. (Pictures coming when I actually feel like taking the camera and the knitting out of the bag.)

I really like the yarn, Lang Jawoll. It's softer than the Regia I usually use and comes with a nifty little spool of reinforcing yarn for the heels and toes. Let's see if I actually remember to use the reinforcing yarn when I get that far. And, as I mentioned above, it's in a nice bright red.

More knitting content when my life slows down...

I'm a sucker for a good quiz

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The West Your accent is the lowest common denominator of American speech. Unless you're a SoCal surfer, no one thinks you have an accent. And really, you may not even be from the West at all, you could easily be from Florida or one of those big Southern cities like Dallas or Atlanta.
The Midland
Boston
North Central
The South
The Inland North
Philadelphia
The Northeast
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Interesting thing - I took this quiz twice (because I accidently deleted the code the first time). The first time I came up with The Midland. I must have answered a question differently the second time around. I moved around a lot (Kansas, Oklahoma, Wyoming and Texas) when I was a kid, so that probably influences my accent.

Mom is in a regular room right now and slooowly recovering. No one is saying how long she'll need to be in the hospital (which translates to probably quite awhile). I told her she's getting lots of well-wishing from my on-line friends - she says thanks!

Little bits of knitting are still getting done:

Tiny progress on qiviuq scarf #2...

Down to the toe of stockinette sock #2...

A so-so picture of completed qiviuq scarf #1...

Qiviut, quiviut, qiviuq, quiviuq? I've seen it spelled all of these ways...

Qiviuq is the preferred name from Folknits (where I purchased the yarn and pattern). Qiviut is the name used by the Oomingmak co-op. I'm not sure if it is a regional difference or a branding/registration/copyright difference. It all comes from the same source - the downy undercoat of the musk ox that has to be hand-plucked or combed from the animal.

The claims I've heard - Qiviuq is as soft as cashmere and 8 times warmer than wool (can't remember where I read that). As I've had recent experience with cashmere, qiviuq and wool, I'd say it's close to that claim. The fingering weight cashmere I used on those Christmas scarves for Mom and Mom-in-Law was a tad softer. As I was knitting with the qiviuq and letting the scarf rest on my leg, I noticed a definite warm spot. Since it was a very airy lace-weight knit that was quite a lot of warmth for very little weight.

Mother is still in ICU. Well, let me rephrase that. She's back in ICU.

If you've dealt with major medical issues, you'll be familiar with that kind of thing. She went from ICU to a room; started having trouble breathing; went to the pulmonary ICU; went back to the cardiac ICU. Oh, well. Considering everything, she's not doing too badly.

Thanks for all the thoughts and prayers - they're much appreciated.

The best knitting for hospitals? Something that can be put down quickly without getting pulled off the needles or hopelessly lost on the pattern. I managed two repeats of quiviuq scarf #2 during her surgery, but have only been able to work on my stockinette socks since. Thank goodness for stockinette socks! Thank goodness for audio books on CDs, also! I've been listening to Agatha Christie's Towards Zero during my sojourns in the ICU waiting room.

I did manage to finish Quiviuq scarf #1 before surgery, but didn't block it until last night. It's always amazing to see the pattern open up when you block lace. I'll try to take an unpinned photo tonight. (Those are blocking wires running through the convenient columns of yarnovers.)

Happy Valentine's Day

Mom got her Valentine's gift yesterday - after 6 hours of surgery she's got two new heart valves and a double bypass. She's still in ICU but may be moved to the cardiac floor later today.

Happy Valentine's Day, Mom and Dad!

Happy Valentine's Day, Sweetheart! I love you.

This and that

I almost panicked this morning. I was going to take pictures of my knitting projects last night, but went to bed early and told myself I could do it in the morning before I left for work. Got to work and realized that I hadn't taken pictures. Bummer...

What a minute! Two of the three projects I'm working on are in my knitting bag! So is my camera! (It's been a long week and my brain is rather foggy.)

Still chugging away on my stockinette socks. Only working on these during lunch, waiting in line, etc. I'm to the point where I just want to be done so I can move on.

Quiviuq scarf #1 - I've finished 20 of the 25 repeats. Got through part of another repeat and realized I was totally messing up the zigzag patterns on the borders. I'm going to have to rip back about 6 rows. Yuck! I may have it finished up this weekend so I can start on Quiviuq Scarf #2.
I even spent some time on my marriage gansey this week! I've got another 12 rows done on the body. That was all I could manage, since my hands start hurting after a while.

Lots of people are knitting from stash this year. I'm not going out of my way to do that, but I am going to try to finish up some works-in-progress that have been hanging around. The Marriage Gansey is one of those. It is a physically strenuous knit for me - tight gauge, small needles, tightly spun yarn. And why did I have to include all those tight little cables?

Circumnavigated Cardigan buttons - for those who asked. I didn't want to take it off (it's cold this morning) so the picture is a bit blurry. I got to show it off at the guild meeting Tuesday night. Looks like I'm the first to finish. Told everyone the yarn was from the estate sale of the guild member who used to teach this sweater. They thought that that was incredibly appropriate.

The Dewey Knit initial meeting was a resounding success. I don't think they were expecting near as many people and talked about getting a bigger meeting room for next month. Thank goodness, since I was getting a bit claustrophobic. About seventy people crowded in there - I was glad to see a few men, even one teenage boy knitting away. All ages, all levels of expertise. Should be interesting.

De-stashed! I gathered up a bunch of yarn the other day and gave it away. Acrylic that I'll never use, left-over skeins from finished projects, bits and pieces, even a whole group of skeins from a crochet afghan project from the 80's. It was rather surprising to see to how much there was. My lys is gathering up yarn for the women's prison. The prisoners will be using the yarn to make shawls that will be auctioned off and the proceeds will benefit a battered women's charity.

It's still winter

Brigid, poetry, and a new knitting club

In honor of Brigid's Feast and the silent poetry reading I present a really bad limerick - proof that I need to keep my day job.

Second Annual Brigid in Cyberspace Poetry Reading
WHAT: A Bloggers (Silent) Poetry Reading
WHEN: Anytime February 2, 2007
WHERE: Your blog
WHY: To celebrate the Feast of Brigid, aka Groundhog Day


There once was a knitter from Dallas
Who wished that she lived in a palace
Upon finding no yarn
“I’d rather live in a barn!
And knit up the wool ‘til I callus”


Yes, I admit I wrote that one myself. (See? I told you I need to keep my day job.)

On the knitting front - I didn't find good wooden buttons of a size to fit my fairly small buttonholes, but found perfectly matching standard buttons (I'm assuming plastic) that are working great. They disappear into the tweedy yarn on the button band and become virtually invisible. I've worn this cardigan for the last 3 days and am enjoying the soft, warm, fuzziness of it.

My local library is sprouting a knitting club - Dewey knit! (Cute isn't it?) The inaugural meeting is tomorrow afternoon from 2 - 3:30pm. I'll probably go and check it out. Always need another excuse to sit and knit for a while with like-minded people. I've already met one of the organizers, since I do all my studying at the library. She always wanders over and checks out my knitting - I sometimes knit and read management books at the same time.

Hope you all have a great weekend - stay warm!