WIP Wednesday - 6/29/2011

I drove myself crazy looking for this skein of yarn:



I was thinking about knitting it up for my July 2011 Socks.  The June socks have not been started yet...

Anyway, when I went to look for it in its Rubbermaid tub, I.could.not.find.it.  So, I spent quite a bit of time yesterday looking through other tubs, knitting bags, boxes in the closet that might have held knitting at one time or another...

I was so bummed.  It's by Lone Star Arts.  She was a vendor at DFW Fiber Fest a few years ago.  I bought it because the name is Aggieland.  How could I resist that?  Plus, although it is a shade of maroon and white, it looks red and white to me.  I like both; so, it made no matter to me. 

I looked in the tub that it should have been in again this morning, and this time, I looked in a bag that has some white alpaca sport weight in it, and there it was.  It made me quite happy to find it.

I am hoping to finish these socks today:



I had to get more yarn - and it came - and I finished one already.  I did not knit the cuffs TAAT, because I am alternating skeins every row.  The new skein is more saturated with the pretty Robin Egg color; so, there would've probably been a sharp demarcation between the two had I not.  It would have been to fiddly to do them TAAT with four balls hanging off the needles.  I am not in the mood for fiddly these days...two balls is challenging enough.  These needles with the joins that are not very smooth are slowing me down too.  Oh well...I am trying to keep my eye on the prize - a finished pair of socks.  If you remember, they are the May 2011 Socks. 

Once I finish them, I am going to try and finish Elphaba.

MK out.

Ten on Tuesday - 6/28/2011

Carole's topic this week is Ten Favorite Things About the Fourth of July:

1. Sales at the mall - a good excuse for spending money and keeping our economy strong...it's patriotic...right?!?
2. Picnics and cook-outs - hamburgers, hot dogs, beanie weanies (my specialty and always requested by my MIL at her soirees)
3. Parades - I haven't been to one in years
4. Family and friends - cause they make everything more fun
5. Boat rides - speedboats, sailboats
6. Baseball - America's pass time
7. Homemade ice cream - good for the soul...but not the waistline
8. Flags - everywhere...Hooray for the red, white and blue!
9. Fireworks - the ones at The Ballpark at Arlington are the best I've seen locally, but one year we were in Boston for the Fourth of July, and we took a river cruise to watch the show.  It was spectacular!
10. Freedom - cause that's why we celebrate the day

Have a good one!

MK out.

Movie Monday - 6/27/2011

It's been a couple of weeks...

I have been watching movies, but not with my usual passion.  There's many things that are pulling me in different directions.  There's that grief thing too.  It's a time stealer.

Anyway...

Robin Wright (now without the) Penn stars in The Private Lives of Pippa Lee, about a woman with a troubled past who grows up to be the wife of a much older man, and mother to two now grown children.  Alan Arkin, Juliette Moore, Blake Lively, Keanu Reaves, Maria Bello and Winona Ryder also star.  It was definitely a chic flick, but worth a look.

I watched Handsome Harry on Showtime, and I can see why it slipped under my radar.  It's about a dying man (Steve Buscemi) who asks his Navy pal (Jamey Sheridan) to look up another Navy buddy (Campbell Scott) and pass along his apologies for his participation in a wrong the gang had committed against the guy years ago.  It was okay.

Morning Glory is a cute, but very predictable little film that was worth watching on an afternoon with nothing else better to do.  Rachel McAdams stars as a news producer who is trying to reconcile the animosity between the show's co-hosts (Diane Keaton and Harrison Ford) in order to save the show.  Again...cute, yet predictable.

Cher and Christina Aguilera star in Burlesque, in which a small town girl (Aguilera) tries to make it big at a nightclub with an iconoclastic owner (Cher).  She starts out as a waitress, but soon proves her worth as a singer and entertainer, as well as being an all around smart cookie.  It was predictable, but pretty entertaining.

We took two of the grands to see Kung Fu Panda 2.  My friend Jules told me it was a snorer, and I had forgotten that until I was telling her what I thought about it and she reminded me.  Sadly, I almost fell asleep myself.  There were some cute parts, but it wasn't as good as the first one.  Isn't that the rule, though?  Eh.

MK out.

The Petunias Got a Haircut

I am not a good gardener...in fact, I hardly think I qualify as a gardner of any kind.

So, I put the plants in the ground, they get watered and I weed every so often.  The temperatures have been in the upper nineties to one-hundreds in the last couple of weeks.  I was also out of town during this time....but....

Remember..I had noticed that some of the begonias were not getting as big as others in the same bed.  The petunias were kind of taking over in areas, and a friend suggested I prune them.  The gardener (whose people come and trim the bushes and groundcover) told me that a little plant food or fertilizer might help.  Did I do any of that?

No.

So, today, I decided I had to do something.  I'm sorry I didn't get any before pictures.

I weeded and gave the petunias a haircut.  They were choking out the marigolds in places.

Bad petunias.

So, the bottom bed got the most of my wrath.



I pulled out at least two, maybe three, dead marigold plants from this bed.  Dead as in, dry sticks.  I'm no plant doctor, but I know signs of life when I see them...or when I don't.



Oh well.

I still need to put down some enriched soil or plant food or something.  Then, there's the bags of mulch I've never bothered to open and spread.

Not.a.gardner.

MK out.

FO Friday - 6/10/2011

I finished it!!!  I quickly learned that I am a little rusty in the sewing department, but hopefully, I will get back up to speed with a little more practice.



In other news, we went to Game 5 if the NBA Finals last night. I had my knitting and I was ready for the game:



Who is this guy that goes to just about every important NBA game?



The Mavs won!!!  The championship is not yet a Finished Object, but they are well on their way...



MK out.

WIP Wednesday - 6/8/2010

I have always enjoyed making things for babies and toddlers.

I started a color-block sweater for a friend's little one.  It is good basketball game knitting, because I don't have to count or anything, and it keeps my hands busy so I don't get too ner-vee-ous.*



The little dress is coming along:



I just love piping.  It is such an understated detail that packs quite a punch, in my opinion:



I used to use a lot of piping when I made things for The Kid when he was little.  I would sometimes make my own, but I am not above using pre-made piping.

I am really enjoying using my sewing machine...

MK out.


*Shout out to Dirk Nowitzki, Jason Terry, Jason Kidd, Tyson Chandler, JJ Barea, DeShawn Stephenson, Shawn Marion, Brendan Haywood, Brian Cardinal and Peja Stojakovic of the Dallas Mavericks!!!  What a game last night!!!

Not Ten on Tuesday

I couldn't think of Ten Ways to Beat Insomnia so I thought I'd show you what I am up to today instead:



Since my mom had commandeered my sewing room as her sitting room, I hadn't done a whole lot of sewing in the past several years.  Unlike my knitting habit, I do not have much of a fabric stash.  I did go through my mom's quilting things that she had here and kept a few pieces of fabric for which I already have plans, but the rest is going. 

I did buy two lengths of fabric last year with the intention to make skirts.  I think I will in the next few weeks.

MK out.

Movie Monday - 6/6/2011

It's Movie Monday....Monday....Monday....

In Saint John of Las Vegas, Steve Buscemi plays John...a guy with a gambling problem who has moved away from Las Vegas to get away from the tempations.  He now lives in Arizona where it seems that his bad luck is perpetuated in all aspects of his life.  He works for car insurance company and has a thing for the quirky Jill (Sarah Silverman).  She likes yellow smiley faces.  His boss (Peter Dinklage) sends him out with another co-worker, Virgil (Romany Malco), to investigate a claim in Las Vegas.  If you don't know that the script is based on Dante's Inferno, you miss out on all the symbolism, but no matter...While the acting is good and the characters are quirky - overall, the film is just alright.

Youth in Revolt is an adaptation of a novel by C. D. Payne.  It happens to be first in a series.  I have not read any of them.  Michael Cera stars as Nick Twisp, a 14-yr-old boy with raging hormones.  His divorced parents are played by Jean Smart and Steve Buscemi.  Each parent is shacking up with loser partners - played by Zach Galifianakis and Ari Graynor.  Nick meets Sheeni (Portia Doubleday) at the trailer park and starts to pursue her.  He wants her so bad, that he tries to manipulate people and ways to get to be with her.  It was quirky and pretty good.

The Tourist is a movie of improbable events.  You have to suspend belief while watching some of the escapades that unfold.  Angelina Jolie plays the lover of a guy who owes a lot of money to a gangster and is in hiding.  The Scotland Yard and the gang are after her to get to him.  Johnny Depp plays an American math teacher on vacation.  The lady uses the math teacher as a decoy to shield her lover.  The action takes place in Paris and Venice.  Angelina has a smile on her face the whole time, as if she gets the fact that the movie is more of a madcap comedy.  Depp didn't get the memo.  It's not his best work.  He should have played it as Captain Jack Sparrow.  It was okay.

Unstoppable, with Denzel Washington and Chris Pine, is about a train that left the siding without an engineer and is going full speed ahead.  Frank (Washington) is a long-time engineer who is teaching the ropes to Will, when they are instructed by the office to clear the tracks - a rogue train is heading their way.  After it passes, Frank gets the idea that if they can catch up to it, they might be able to stop it.  The movie is action packed from the word go.  I liked it a lot.

MK out.

State of the Garden

I still need to plant flowers in a couple of areas and put down mulch.  I need to hurry with the planting, because it is getting blazing hot around here.

My garden areas have mixed results.

The bottom-most bed is going crazy...the petunias are overtaking, crowding out the marigolds, but the begonias aren't doing half bad:



It is hard to see, but in the middle of the marigolds is the yellow-headed stepchild.  When I planted it, it didn't have any blooms and I put it dead center.  It looks as if I did it on purpose, with the orange ones encircling it, but I was not intending to have yellow in my garden this year:



The flowers in this bed, higher up on the wall, are the same size as when I planted them (except for that one petunia):



Half of this bed is doing very well...the other half - not so much:



Same with this one:



I don't know what to do.  My level of expertise has been exhausted.  Besides watering and weeding...I got nothin.'

MK out.