My personality test & a sock

See, I'm a joiner so I had to take this test that was on Dawn's blog. This is pretty right on so I have to share.

You Are An ESFP

The Performer You are a natural performer and happiest when you're entertaining others. A great friend, you are generous, fun-loving and optimistic. You love to laugh - and you like almost all people equally. You accept life as it is, and you do your best to make each day fantastic. You would make a good actor, designer, or counselor.

What's Your Personality Type?

I'm knitting too, I swear, I just am bouncing around 3 projects & have nothing finished. And you know how I feel about WIP pics. I did finish one sock though & I'll post that just to prove this is still a knitting blog. Hedera in Claudia handpaint John B.



* Notice how I already changed my yarn diet ticker? I have every intention of buying yarn at the Woolie Ewe birthday sale. 35% off everything in the store. I have $230 in birthday money. It is a no brainer. I imagine today will be the day that no yarn speaks to me - isn't that just the way?

I Captured the Bird of Peace

Yes, I did. So here's how it happens. After I get off of work at 5ish I let my cats roam around in the yard for an hour or so. Thursday a week ago when I went out there I found an injured dove in the yard. I immediately get the cats to leave him alone - not that they could even CATCH the injured dove that can't fly, I mean, it's not as if they are hunters or anything - I grabbed up the dove & put him in a shoe box. Then I called Patrick. Let me get a few things straight right off the bat. Patrick grew up in a VERY animal friendly home. My in laws are huge animal rights activists to the point that the MIL captures spiders & lets them go outside. I grew up on a farm with cows - and not the dairy kind. All of the men in my family are hunters & hunting season equals fresh deer in the freezer. Our views of the roles of animals in the world differ quite a bit. As I have grown older I have become much more open hearted to animals, but I'm still a realist - if you know what I mean. So if you are a PETA person, I don't want to hear crap about my comments - as you'll see I'm too animal soft hearted for my own good. Ok now...back to the story. I tell Patrick of the dove & he said he'd deal with it when he got home (duh). He calls me on his way home & we have the following conversation:
Him: I looked up injured dove on the internet & we have a few choices
Me: Yeah?
Him: Yeah. First of all, it says it depends on what kind of person you are.
Me: {holding my breath & kind of hoping we are the kind of people that knock an injured dove in the head but instead say} So what kind of people are we?
Him: Well, we can wrap it's wing with an ace bandage & keep it for a few weeks & then it SHOULD be able to fly, then we let it go.
Me: {immediatley wondering when the dove still can't fly in a couple of weeks who will knock it in the head} hmmmm, ok, then that's what we'll do.

This requires a cage, which we happen to have since we didn't have very good luck with the hamsters. (oh yeah, remembering that the cats CAN hunt - well, a caged animal anyway). We keep the dove. We wonder what birds eat & the feel immediately stupid when we realize the answer - bird seed - duh. We wrap the dove as per the instruction on the web site (which I can't find right this second).



So we are doing the right thing, right? Who the hell knows. We know nothing about birds. Or doves. or injured doves. Quite honestly the dove doesn't seem overly grateful that we rescued it....I think he feels that we birdnapped him. Of course we did immediately put him in a little birdy straight jacket & we do have cats so I'm sure he figures he's lunch. Saturday morning we wake up & he has escaped the straight jacket. I have no idea how. Whatever, we wrap him up again.

Saturday we were both gone all day. Patrick goes to the pet store to get it some toys to keep it busy. Because really, I mean, the dove had toys in the wild, right? (insert eye roll here) The pet store girl basically tells us that the dove is one of the stupidest animals alive & that if we stuffed a wire ball with grass it will spend it's days taking the grass out of the ball. Geeze. Good thing we got it a toy. Maybe it's not thinking ANYTHING after all. Patrick goes to get the cage to put said toy in there & low & behold we see this:


Do you see it (right there under the piece of green grass)? It's a FUCKING EGG. The bird laid an egg. At this point I am totally speechless & if you know me at all you understand the severity of this statement. Really, I just don't know what to say about the bird we save from certain death & wrapped up in ace bandages laying an egg. I shake my head in disbelief for the rest of the day. The phrase "No good deed shall go unpunished" keeps coming to mind.

We tell this story to the FIL at lunch on Sunday. He knows a lady that takes care of injured birds! Oh man, that is the best news I ever heard. We drop the dove off at her house. We ask her if she wants the egg. She looks at us like we are crazy. Seems that the bird lady is a realist too. I have had people that said they couldn't have left the bird there if she didn't take the egg too. To those people all I have to say is this - I know where you can go to get an injured bird.....Just saying.

WIPs & I don't seem to get this yarn diet.....

I really have been knitting, I have just been neglecting my blog. If you know me at all or have read my blog very much you know that I'm not big on WIP pictures. To be honest, I really don't want to see your socks in 20 stages of completion & I figure I'll save you from the boredom of looking at mine. Right now you'll just have to bear with me though, or not see any pictures. I am SUCKING at finishing right now - but I'm on a starting roll. There are so many things that I want to work on that I figured I'd just cast them all on & work on them. How's that for a plan? So in the last week or so I've cast on for 3 projects.

First of all I cast on for this Opal Shawl - I have been wanting to knit this FOREVER - well, honestly about 6 months - but it seems like forever. Alissa had a finished one at a class I was taking & I immediately decided that I MUST have the pattern. Unfortunately the author is deceased & there is copyright issues...blah blah blah...so it wasn't particularly easy to get. They worked it all out & I got my hands on a copy from Yarns & Stitches. I must say - the pattern photo is the most unflattering I've ever seen on any pattern. I would have never purchased it from that picture - but I saw 3 of them in person & they are really really lovely. If that picture is unflattering, well, I have no idea what you call this one. I'm only putting it up here to show you that I have been knitting & the yarn is knitting up so freaking pretty that I can't stand it. Socks That Rock medium weight in January One colorway. I am also having issues with the lace pattern on the bottom - it seriously isn't that hard but I've torn it out 6 times now. Thank goodness for life lines. I think I am to the point that someone else needs to look at it to make sure I'm not insane.


I have been looking at the Flickr group for the Chevron Scarf from Last Minute Knitted Gifts. I realize that everyone & their sister is knitting this scarf right now & I really really dislike being a sheep & following the crowd. I just couldn't stop looking at the combinations & the beautiful results. In my spare time & before I went to sleep at night I would plot which yarns would look which way. Finally in an act of desperation I convinced Betty to ride with me to the Woolie Ewe to pick out 2 yarns that might work & the only prerequisite was that neither could be pink or even contain pink. This is quite shocking I know, but I was left with a startling revelation when I was packing for New York last year....despite the fact that I have knit countless scarves in all colors of the rainbow, I have 5 pink scarves. Naturally I suppose when it came time to knit something for me I always chose some pink yarn...now I have knit a few other things for myself that aren't pink, but they are few & far between. This will be one of those. We chose two skeins of Cherry Tree Hill - Misty Moor & Life's A Beach. My goodness it's pretty! Usually I love the yarn when I'm picking something out & I'm excited about the project until I get into it, then it bores me senseless & I lose love for it. Not so with this scarf. If you knit with me while I'm knitting on it, I'm going to show it to you & say "Isn't this pretty?" about 14 times so just bear with me. Love for a work in progress - it's a new disease for me....



Then I didn't have any socks on the needles so I cast on for Hedera in this yarn I bought last weekend at the Shabby Sheep. It's Claudia Hand paint sock yarn in the John B colorway. It's a departure from my normal color preferences but I'm trying to broaden my horizons. And it's knitting up so pretty - I'll show you when I'm done - damn those progress pictures!




I also bought this - a new wooden swift! or I should just say "a swift" since I don't have one at all. I have the world's suckiest ball winder but it will do until I decide on a new one. My chair back isn't doing the job & Patrick says I'm bitchy when I force him to be a swift so he won't do it anymore. My options were limited. I found this one at White Rock Weaving for what I considered a great price & I christened it this morning on the sock yarn for Hedera.


As you can see I've reset my yarn diet ticker. I just don't seem to be doing so great laying off the yarn buying. Yesterday I took a toe up sock class by the wonderful Joan Schoeder hosted by Woolie Ewe. I had no intention of buying yarn, but really, how could I resist. They had this Lorna's Laces Flamingo Stripe:




Over the past couple of weeks I also bought the yarn for my Chevron scarf & that sock yarn that I'm using for Hedera. Other than that I'm doing pretty good though. Ok, I've blathered on long enough. Tomorrow is my birthday & I plan to post something fun....stay tuned.