4 Magic Sock pairs

MagicSocks
Originally uploaded by radarkaty.

Well, two completed pairs and two singletons with number 2 on the needles.

These were made following Norma's Magic 28 pattern, basically. There are a few little differences because I can't count. One could be a Magic 29 plus 4, for example, the long-footed purple sock - 29 rows on the leg, about 33 on the foot! I didn't have the pattern handy and couldn't remember where to start the foot row count - gusset pick up or end of decreases. I guessed wrong... but I decided not to rip back. Last night I finished the second one to match!

The Green and Yellow sock will have a Yellow and Green mate and be fraternal rather than identical. I was leary, but the second sock is on the foot rounds and looks pretty good. I was shy about 25 yards of green to make identical socks.

The legs have a couple of variations: the all green sock leg is stockinette after a k1, p1 cuff; the small purple and the fraternal pair both have a k2, p2 cuff with a k2, p2 for two rows, the p2, k2 for two rows leg; long-foot purple has a k1, p1 cuff with a k3, p1 leg; and they all have stockinette feet, except the small purple where I carried the leg pattern down.

It's been fun. With the 7 hats and 1 pair of mittens, this makes 12 items for Dulaan. Now, I'll move onto Garments of Grace for our Church project and do a few Christening blankets.

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Annie asked about the yarn stats:

Purple is Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Chunky, size US6 DPNs
Green is Cascade 220, yellow is Plymouth Encore, size US5 DPNs.

Pinks and greens

Pictures from the garden:

Peony, Rosebud, Zinnia and the beginning of Sun Flowers.

Those three sun flower plants need to be separated. I took a chance that only one would grow by planting three seeds in each place. Chance paid off at one site. All three grew at the second! So, I'll transplant two to the other side of the house and see if I get four Sun Flowers. Thanks Dorothy - children of Joy and Hope or maybe Nexus are growing in Maryland!!

Taged*

* taged is purposely misspelled. A vandal in our town spray painted 'taged' on all the signs on about 2 miles of road. We assume the vandal meant 'tagged' and my son gets the biggest kick our of saying 'you've been taged' because of it.

Julia McC at WoolGathering sent a meme my way...

7 Random Things about me:

I hope they don't have to be interesting because I'm having a hard time coming up with anything!

1. I became an Avon Lady when I was pregnant with my younger son (despite the fact that I rarely, if ever, wear make-up and my facial cleansing routine is warm water each day. The lady at the Clinique counter couldn't believe how 'great' my skin was without product! :)) I was trying to earn a little cash to go back to college and get my degree. That was almost 17 years ago and I haven't gotten my degree and I'm still an Avon lady! :) I do try to give it up now and again, but my regular customers always seem to stock up at about the same time I try to back out!

2. I love movie musicals. When I was a teenager, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers was my favorite. (In fact, I still kind of like it!) On one trip to visit New York City, I was determined to own the album. (This was before VCRs, let alone CDs and DVDs. Well, let's just say I'm old!) We went into every record store we passed until I.Finally.Found.It!

3. I'm thinking this movie led me to like Here Come the Brides a lot! Of course, Bobby Sherman and David Soul may have had something to do with that too! The series was recently released on DVD. I bought it!

4. Despite the fact that I love the Mountains in the Fall, I almost always vacation at the beach.

5. Mom and I had our house built in 2001. We had a porch put on the front because mom knew I always wanted a Front Porch on my home. However, we can barely use it because it is in Direct.Sunlight. most of the day and it is too hot to sit out there most of the time.

6. I was hired by my current employer despite being overqualified. (Thank you, Phyllis!) I had been looking for full time employment for almost six months. I was either over-qualified (too much school), under-qualified (no full time experience), or both, for every job I applied. Phyllis thought I would be bored (she was right) because I was over-qualified, but hired me anyway. I was looking to get some full time experience - work a year or two - and then move on. Twenty-five years later, I'm still there. Well, at the same agency, but a much different job! I can retire in 2014 and I will.

7. I don't usually ask people to participate in Memes (or chain mail, or e-mail forwards or whatever) and I won't here either. But feel free to consider yourself taged if you want to post 7 random things about yourself on your blog. Let me know if you do!

Of Swaps and Exchanges and Fundraising...

Mother's Day was also my 48th Birthday this year. Happens that way periodically.

My SP10 pal sent me presents - timed to arrive for the celebration. Amazon did not forsake her and I received my gifts in plenty of time! Two GREAT books to add to my collection...

Stephanie's is already read! Ann Budd's will come in VERY HANDY!






I already received my ISE4 presents... My creation(s) are just about ready to mail.

I'm also gathering the goodies for my final SP10 box to send out...

I have international pals for both and the goodies take a while to get where they are going. My plan is to have everything done by Memorial Day (May 27) so that I can begin my summer season without worry of missing deadlines and such.

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Fundraisers:

Claudia's MS Ride -- her ride is June 23 150 miles!!! Donate to this great cause and you'll be in the running for some great prizes!

Dorothy is participating in the Relay for Life in Canada and has her fundraising site up and operational. She has set a personal goal of $2000. Her husband thinks that goal is too lofty. Let's show him the power of the blog world and help Dorothy meet her goal. Oh, there are prizes too! :)


I thought there was another -- I'll be back with details when I find it! :)

Oh, if you like Pampered Chef, there is an American Cancer Society fundraiser going on at my house this month. You can drop me a line (chefkc at comcast dot net) and I'll send you a link - $1 for every pink product sold and up to 25% of the sales are donated to ACS Breast Cancer Education and Research.

Check out my sidebar for some great places to donate knitted and crocheted goods. More to come.

Viva Las Vegas - Part 2

Ah, Bellagio... pictures barely convey the beauty of the waters...







Circus, Circus!

After checking out of the timeshare/condo on Sunday morning, for a late afternoon check in at the Flamingo, we stopped by IHOP for breakfast. Then we started at the other end of the Strip and dropped by the Circus...

It truly is a Circus! There is the Midway (and the Casino!)...



There are Carnival games in the Midway where you can win giant basketballs and giant stuffed animals - or nothing at all, but can have fun with a little Skee Ball!


And there are Acrobats! (This small troupe did a couple of minutes of various swinging routines in anticipation of a much larger/longer show - I think. We didn't stick around...)



Met our friends for lunch, then checked into our final hotel destination - the historic Flamingo - soon to be imploded, I believe. My room was on the 26th (of 28) floor.



The (zoomed in) view from my window:

My Vegas Trip - the first part

Arrived way too early in the morning, but a room was ready. Yay! Checked in and hung around enjoying the beauty until the friends started to arrive.


Got the call and hopped the shuttle from the condo/time-share to New York, New York (one of the three places on the Strip the Sunterra Shuttle stops).



Walked down the Strip taking in the sights

on the way to Paris, to meet my friends!

ISE4 goodies!

I had a generous exchange partner from the Land Down Under! Donnie sent me two great scarves, a pattern book, a local decal - appropriately featuring the knitter's favorite (or not so favorite) jumper - the Frog!, and handmade stitch markers. She labeled everything with starry explanations!

Here's the loot. Unfortunately, I could not get a great picture of the stitch markers - there in the middle of the total picture...




Thank you, Donnie! I hope to put the scarves to good use when the weather returns to cold later this year. The Decal will prevent visitors (and residents!) from walking through our glass sliding doors. I plan to make a shawl for myself and those stitch markers will sure come in handy!

Pictureless catching up post

I had a marvelous time in Vegas. I'll post pictures soon. I have to crop and resize and such and haven't the energy right now.

I received my ISE4 scarves and some goodies from a lovely knitter in Australia! I need to get some batteries... they died in the camera in Vegas and I haven't been to the store yet this week. Pictures when I do!

I've been knitting gifts for my SP10 pal and for me and for me! :) Plus planning some Magic 28s for Dulaan and some hats too. I might just make a Magic 28 pair tonight. I'm at the fixing and figuring stage of my other three projects... mindless, mini socks might be a good idea tonight!

Today's plan - Gardening. I was getting my garden ready. It's the first weekend I've been home in a long time without freezing temps, weird snow or rain. Mom and I bought some plants (perennials and annuals) from the High School Band Plant Sale today. We are planning a riot of color and texture in the garden area my son was tilling.

It started out lovely - 70F or so. Older son was tilling one side and I was Clawing the other.

On my side, I planted sunflower seeds between growing Hostas; put our little cages around the peonies so the blossoms won't kiss the mud when they bloom; and scattered some Touch-Me-Not seeds.

My son had finished tilling and was mixing in good soil with our lovely (not!) clay soil. It was just about ready for me to plant the plants we bought.

... then it started to rain. :(

I had noticed it starting to cool down and was hoping it wouldn't rain until I got the plants in. No such luck.

We got the garden tools stowed, came inside and ordered pizza. Later, I checked the Weather Bug on my computer. It had dropped more than 20 degrees in about three hours -- from over 70F when we started to 50F at 5 PM.

According to Weather.com, it was not supposed to rain today. The weather forecast called for partly cloudy in the afternoon with rain tomorrow. Here's hoping they'll be wrong about tomorrow too, so we can finish planting.