Hey check it out! Blog activity!!

Let’s just skip past the apologies this time for having been absent for so long, and get right down to business. This is a knitting blog, right?

It’s (well, it *was*) Olympic knitting time again, and I’ve joined in. Last time ’round, in 2006, I knitted a cabled bolero sweater. Blackberry, from Knitty. While I got it all done, I haven’t worn it since. I find it too bulky, it doesn’t sit properly, and (completely my fault) I don’t like the yarn I used. Oh well, it was an interesting learning exercise! This time though, I have changed my focus.

Socks.

Solstice Slip socks, from the 2007 Rockin’ Sock Club to be exact! I have only made 2 pairs of socks from the two years’ worth of clubs I was part of, so this is where I get serious about them. The patterns and yarns are so lovely that I ought to knit them up! I’m not the quickest sock knitter in the world, so this should be (was) a great challenge for me. And guess what. Success!!

Now let’s bring this up to date. I’ve got a good few things on the needles, and indeed some on the spindles. I feel the fire coming back. Oh yes…

February Lady

With any luck there will be more from me soon!

Let’s start with some knitting, since this is supposed to be a knitting blog, right?

Last week I went to Point Pelee to do some birding with a group from work. It was a lot of fun, and the drive meant lots of knitting time! My travel knitting at the moment is a pair of Knee High to a Grasshopper socks from the 2007 Rockin’ Sock Club. I found there was a little mistake in the chart for the calf increases, but once I got that sorted out (after getting frustrated with it, of course- tough to read long hand directions in a moving vehicle) it was smooth sailing.

The weekend just before the Pelee trip was a holiday, so Andrew and I took off to climb at the Montagne D’Argent, not far from Mont Tremblant in the Laurentians of Quebec. Anyone else find it cold?

The temperature dipped to 3ºC that night, after raining all the previous day. Which meant…

Wet rock!! Not a whole lot of fun when your feet slip and your hands get wet and cold and crampy. As usual, when you’re having a bunch of fun actually climbing, there’s no one to take photos of the good stuff! When you’re on the ground getting ready to climb though, and the black flies are feasting on your ankles, it’s picture time!

Yes. We love this.

More photo round up! An old one of Evan from the camera. Hat comes off, and look! “I have hair like Andrew’s!”

A spring surprise from the garden. I hadn’t looked at this side of the house for a week or so I guess, and SURPRISE!!

We have asparagus! How tall is that asparagus, exactly?

Very! I had to read up on asparagus, and it turns out we’re supposed to harvest it when it reaches 7-9″ tall. Oops..!

Last one for today is a funny one.

Really…?

Now that spring is well and truly underway here in Ottawa, I have the great pleasure of watching the garden come to life! The light was fading fast when I shot these photos last night, but I thought you might enjoy seeing what’s unfurling.

Yes, there has been knitting too… I am whipping along with my Grasshopper socks, and enjoying watching them grow. At this rate I’ll have them done in- no wait. That’ll jinx it!

The colour isn’t quite right as the sun was setting fast. I wasn’t sure I’d like the colour mix when I saw it in the skein, but I really like the way they’re coming out. Just wish I could have more knitting time of course!

Last weekend I attended the Level 6 Cup here in Ottawa. I was there working a booth for MEC, which was neat because I got the chance to take my camera along and shoot some pictures of the paddlers- something I’ve never done before. It was such a great time!

The idea here is that the paddlers ride that big wave there, doing as many tricks as they can in the 45 second time limit. There are 3 rounds, so if you mess up the first one you get 2 more attempts.

This paddler is sitting backwards on the wave, half way through a flat spin (she will turn 360º without sliding off the back of the wave), and she is doing it “clean”, which means not using her paddle. Cool.

This guy is in the middle of another trick where he flips the boat up and around onto its nose, then regains the surface again without sliding off the wave. Crazy!

I’m not sure that there’s any way to get a good shot of this one… He’s flipping his boat like a forward sommersault! Of course, it looks like a total miss…

There were even a couple of Tandem Whitewater boats! I can’t even imagine…

What a fun day. There were kids there hanging out, and dogs lounging in the sun, and a festival atmosphere. So great.

There’s definitely something to be said for starting ‘em young!

I was just coming out of an appointment with the endodontist, so I was feeling like I needed a little pick-me-up, so in I went, and wouldn’t you know they had my yarn!

Next on the needles will be Tempest, and I’m dying to start. Only 3 more big cable repeats on Cable Down before I finish the second sleeve and can sew in the ends and block. Any bets on how long that will take?

So this is a new start. A new start in so many ways! Let’s see…

1) I’ve moved, again. (Can I just note that I don’t recommend divorce? That would be the most major upheaval in the last 3 years, though one I couldn’t blog about. I never wanted to be “that girl” on the web, you know?)

2) My boyfriend (of almost two years) and I bought a house together, and it’s so fantastic!! We have a proper garden, and not much grass. It’s almost all flower beds! We moved in in January, so it was completely under snow. Now that the snow is gone and the flowers are starting to come up, we’re dying to see what we’ve got! There’s a giant (what I think is a ) Maple tree in the front, and Evan has asked for a tire swing. We’ll see when the garden comes up what might be damaged…

3) That boyfriend from #2? He asked me to marry him! (I said yes… ) Man, it’s been so difficult to blog when the biggest things going on are not blog-able!

4) New blog domain! The old domain, sarah.ostrowalker.com, was my married name. So yeah. Not so much interested in that anymore. Welcome to my new online home! I’ve moved all the content from the old domain over here, so the old post are still around. Proof that it’s still me! lol

The last 9 months have held some serious ups and downs, and the knitting has been at times both a source of comfort, like yesterday while I was waiting for Evan to have some dental surgery under general anesthetic, and a source of utter frustration, like the Bluebell sweater I was working on at the cottage last year, that somehow doesn’t fit even though I was trying it on as I went. (It’s still in time out.) I’ve had things that have needed ripping out once, twice, and permanently, and there are things which have been just hanging around in perpetuity. But now?

Oh do I have the urge to knit!

I also have the urge to climb more, and learn to really mountain bike, and to paddle white water for real. I feel myself coming out of the funk, and am I ever happy for it.

So here’s to new beginnings. We’ll be seeing more of one another from now on…

Value Village to the rescue, yet again. I haven’t ever had a button stash of my own- I love buttons, but have never had the money to buy buttons when I find them. They’re expensive! I’ve looked at bags of buttons before, but I find they pretty much always look battered once the’ve been thrown together in a bag or jar or what-have-you. Not these ones!

I love these old jars. I think it looks really rustic/cool with the buttons inside!

They’re lovely, and in great shape, and there are even sets of buttons!

Oh yes. I’ll have lots of fun with these…

Mum had her surgery on Wednesday morning, and now the dreaded Garlic Free portion of the programme is over! Norma would be very interested to hear that mum’s surgeon asked her not to have any garlic for 10 days before surgery because it’s a blood thinner! Neat eh? He decided to do some research into the effects of the supplements that people take, to see if there might be any contraindications with surgery. He found that garlic is indeed a blood thinner, so better safe than sorry. When it looked like the pre-surgery dye injection wasn’t going to happen as planned, meaning that surgery would have to be put off for 3 weeks (the OR in Perth gets closed down for summer vacation for 2 weeks every summer, and that’d be starting on Monday) she was angry about the garlic! We’re a food family. We love garlic. So that was what she chose to be mad about! Better than being mad about having cancer, right? She was so funny about it. I love my mum!

Oh! Funny cancer surgery story. Kinda a teeny bit gross, so you’ve been warned. Before surgery they inject a dye into the area to (I assume) be able to better see the bits they’re working on. The doc tells mum to warn my dad that she’s going to come out of surgery looking a weird grey colour, and mum should know that her pee will be green. Sure enough, she comes home looking (I imagine, since I wasn’t there) rather like an alien. The funny part? When I spoke to mum that evening she mentioned the green pee and said “It’s not so much green as teal. It’s beautiful! Would make a gorgeous yarn or fabric dye!” Again, I love my mum.

Anyway, all that to say that the surgery is done, there are a few weeks off to heal and then the radiation starts. That’s when all the fun begins…

With all the waiting around, there has indeed been knitting going on!

Eunny Jang’s Endpaper Mitts. Raveled here

These are great fun to work on, as the stranded part flies by. Probably because it’s compelling to see the pattern emerge. The photos need updating as the first mitt is done, and the cuff and a few rounds of the stranded pattern on the second mitt are done. Mind you, really, I have knit 4 cuffs. Once, forgetting to use the small needles for the ribbing. The second time I cast on 2 stitches too many. 3rd time’s a charm I guess!

Baby hat pattern I pulled together, Raveled here. It’s fashioned after the Norwegian Sweet Baby Cap, Raveled here.

This was knit up in an afternoon/evening one day, out of random stash yarn, and with ears added because it looks like a little bear hat to me. I had to futz with the pattern to suit the different gauge, and then mess around with the proportions to make it fit an actual human baby. Again, the yarn I was using was wildly different that the yarn the original pattern called for, so the drape is strange, so the depth was funny, so… Anyway. This was another knit done compulsively to take my mind off of things. I love knitting for that reason!

Another little hat, knit obsessively in an evening. Raveled here.

Yet another compulsive knit. I have yarn. What can I do with this yarn? Hmm. Cowl? Knit, knit, knit… no. Rip. Scarf thing? Knit, knit, knit…. who wants a lumpy scarf like this? Rip. A hat? Knit, knit, knit… knit…. hey, kinda cool! Knit, decrease, knit, decrease… Voila! A hat. I have two balls of this. 3 hats out of 2 balls in one evening. I like that. The photos of it/them? Notsomuch. What can I say? I was rushed by the time I got to shooting those, and the light was fading fast. You can see the golden evening colour of it in all those photos!

So that’s the update so far. I’m finally coming up from under all the craziness that is my inbox and getting my act back together with all the work I owe people. It’s amazing how things can come off the rails when someone you love is laid low. Onward and upward!

My mum was diagnosed with Breast Cancer.

The thing about this is that it’s not an uncommon thing to creep into a family these days. Loads of women will be diagnosed with Breast Cancer this year, and not all of them will have a family history it. My mum has no history of cancer in the family, whatsoever. She lives a healthy lifestyle, she nursed her twins for 10 months, she has a healthy body weight and never smoked, had regular mammograms. You know, she did it all right. So what’s the deal?

My mum is not a whiner. She’s not going on about “why me?” but we’re all wondering “How?”. Of course, we’re rallying as a family, and doing what we can to help out and be present, and while she’s going through the weeks of daily radiation I’ll be there making dinners and doing laundry and all that.

This is not a post to publicly feel sorry for myself, as I’m not feeling it and I know I’m certainly not alone in being a daughter worried about her mum. I guess what this post is really for is to say keep healthy. If you’re a woman get to know your breasts through self-exams, and if/once you’re of appropriate age get your mammograms done regularly. Find a doctor you’re comfortable with. If you’re in Ottawa my mum HIGHLY recommends the Ontario Breast Screening Centre in the Hampton Park Plaza, at Carling and Kirkwood. They were marvelous there, and the reaction all the way down the line has been quick and professional and compassionate.

Mum has surgery next Wednesday, then it’s a few weeks till the radiation starts. It’ll be a while before I can really let my breath out. For the time being? Keep on trucking.

As my mum said to me last week, “I’m going to be a survivor.”

If I owe you an email or a call or a portfolio, I sincerely apologise. I hope you can understand that I’ve been in a bit of a fog lately. I will be back up and running soon! I’m under a rather heaving blanket of emails I’m afraid…

Here you go, have a look at some photos.

Yarn!

Beautiful collection of yarn ends in a wrought iron sculpture outside of Lettuce Knit in Toronto.

People!

That’s Susan, (Sudaph), winning an original WWKIP sketch by Franklin; along with a knitter whose name I have conveniently forgotten (SO sorry!! Tell me again who you are if you see this!); Molly, (LittleMousling), spinning up a storm in the shade behind Lettuce Knit; and Patrick, who was a delight to meet though rather poorly situated for a good photograph- in the sun wearing a white shirt. He has a great write up of the day on his blog.

Too bad I didn’t think to take a picture of Mairi, one of our fave Ottawa knitters, who has since moved to Toronto. We miss you Mairi! And thanks for the help with the sock gusset…!

Baby!

Was there something else going on that day…?

1000 Knitters!

Sitting for Franklin was a joy. As I am someone who tends to stay behind the camera, I was a little worried about being foolish or awkward. But you know? He is amazing. The man has the gift of making people feel at ease. His smile is genuine and his conversation sincere. Franklin, it was a pleasure meeting you, and I hope to have to great fortune of crossing your path again some day.

Now, if you’re familiar with Franklin’s blog, you’ll know that he is a man with a sharp wit. Happily, he is also someone who can be self-deprecating in a good way, and can ham it up. There was so much conversation and admiration of knits going on that I didn’t catch who made this, but here is Franklin as his Great Grandmother coming to America!

Oh… eet was terreeble. I was put on a ship, never to see my people again in all of my days…

There was also a little bit of me photographing Franklin photographing me photographing him. Cross-Blogging at its best.

Gotcha! Oh wait. You got me too. Ok then…

It was a fantastic day. There were lovely things being knitted and lovely people to meet and see again, and charming kids and all that good stuff.

Emma, I’m sorry the yarn didn’t last!! You were knitting so fast, I thought for SURE you’d beat it to the end! And what a pleasure to meet Rams!

I also got to have that super cool knitter moment of recognising a fellow knitter in the wild! I ran into Nancy on the street as I was walking to the event, and we walked the rest of the way together. Nice to meet you Nancy! Another pleasure was meeting Allison, also in from Ottawa. Too funny to meet a fellow Ottawan while away in Toronto. We’ll have to make sure to get out to knit nights.

All in all I would say this image sums it all up.

Emma noticed this graffiti as we were walking home, though it wasn’t quite so obvious to me! I missed it entirely, and didn’t even see it when it was pointed out to me!

Hanging with knitters makes for a great day. It’s simple friendship and sharing and no one is judgmental and isn’t that nice to find? Simple and obvious, maybe, but so worthwhile. I’m really glad I made the trip.

Thanks Toronto!