Lest we forget

In Flanders Fields

By Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae

In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row,

That mark our place: and in the sky

The larks still bravely singing fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the dead: Short days ago,

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

Loved and were loved: and now we lie

In Flanders fields!

Take up our quarrel with the foe

To you, from failing hands, we throw

The torch: be yours to hold it high

If ye break faith with us who die,

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flanders fields

Composed at the battlefront on May 3, 1915 during the second battle of Ypres, Belgium

Red Alert!!!!

A sweater is urgently needed to be sent to Scotland for Christmas!

I think My Mom thinks a Hudson Bay inspired Wonderful Wallaby is in order for my Wee Niece. This means I'm dropping everything else and power knitting a sweater. Fortunately it's a small sweater. Pictures once I have some.

Finishing

Finishing anything is proving elusive lately. The cotton hoodie just isn't going to work, I give up. At last, I stuck with this far, far too long.

Mom's birthday socks just won't finish themselves. Probably because I haven't been knitting them lately. I'm sure there's no correlation.

My blue sweater got frogged and restarted. Again. Urgh, I really hope this time it works.

I have managed a couple Christmas things. So far that's the only bright spot.

Other Stuff

I purchased a sheep skin for the critters. So far Soccer likes it best. In fact he growled at Squish for walking too close to it. No pictures of that unfortunately.

Here's Squish enjoying it before Soccer took over:

Mouse wasn't quite sure she trusted it yet:

Current Weather
Mostly cloudy, 3C.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas.....

It snowed.

On Thanksgiving Weekend no less. Urgh. And it's staying cold for the next several days. This could be it until Spring.

And I looked at a calendar and realized I need to get moving if I'm going to finish knitting Christmas gifts for my nieces and nephew. No pictures for the obvious reason that the older two are getting to be old enough to surf the 'net.

Did I mention that it snowed?

Knitting

Things continue, I cast on socks for my Mom and I really need to finish them as quickly as I can and not just because her birthday's at the beginning of December.

I restarted the sleeves for my blue sweater and I may frog them and do them again as I don't like the way they're coming out the second time either.

I think I salvaged the cotton sweater and am working better with the gauge on it.

Current Weather
Mostly cloudy -1C. And there's snow on the ground.

A Scent Hurdle Day

Ahab rocked the Sent Hurdling on Saturday afternoon. He struggled a lot in the morning but that was not unexpected by me or anyone else on the team due to the fact that we were running outside on grass and he's never done that before.

We tried to schedule some outdoor practices this summer but every time we ended up cancelling due to a thunderstorm. Not unusual for summer in this part of the world but frustrating never the less. Unfortunately, this did mean that Ahab never got a chance to learn to play Scent Hurdle on grass. Wonderful, distracting grass; it has so many lovely smells......

It was clear from the beginning that Ahab was having a hard time understanding that he was there to play Scent Hurdle and not to sniff the grass. However, as a team we decided to let him keep trying. There are not many sports you can play with your dog that will tolerate, much less encourage, you to train your dog during an event, this is just another reason to love Scent Hurdle. This did mean that everyone else on my team had to sacrifice the chance at points for their dogs and I'm very grateful that they did because after a few runs with me going with him to the box it suddenly clicked for him. Ahab is like that, when he "gets" something it's like a switch goes off in his brain.

The first time he managed a clean run everyone; and I mean everyone on my team, on the other team we were racing against (they had finished their run), and all the spectators watching gave him a big cheer. It was extremely touching. There might have been a tear in my eye; it could have been the wind.

Knitting
Not much to report on the knitting front. Progress continues on the Cotton Hoodie, a blue sweater, a pair of socks, and a vest. But, not enough for interesting pictures.

Current Weather
15C and mostly cloudy. Fall is in the air and all the leaves are turning. Soon it will be winter again.

Firecracker

Yeah, yeah; I was that creative and named the sweater for the colourway of the yarn. Bite me.

The picture shows the unblocked sweater so I'll still be able to tweak the fit slightly before wearing it. However, I absolutely love how this turned out, it's wonderfully soft and looks nifty with the tweeding (is that a word? it should be) in the fabric. This was another seamless bottom-up sweater as per EZ. No stitch pattern or anything as I quite like plain, simple sweaters. Plus, they're great for TV watching.

Pattern: Improvised
Yarn: Knit Picks Stroll Tweed in Firecracker
Needle: 2.75mm
Gauge: 31 stitches and 37 rows = 10 cm

Unblocked Firecracker

Didn't feel like I was playing with fire quite so much with this sweater, I had nearly an entire ball of yarn left at the end. Although my yarn scale says I used almost 11 balls but I know I only bought 10 and there's plenty left. Weird.

I want to do at least one more before taking a break from these. Trouble is, if I stop I may not come back to them and I have three more planned at this time. May just have to power through all three to make sure they get done. I think I'll do blue next; my favorite colour is blue and guess what colour of sweater I knit the least for myself? Yep, blue.

Current Weather
22C and partly cloudy.

Looks like summer is drawing to a close; the weekend is supposed to be pretty miserable.

A Dragon

I finished knitting a dragon today. Heh, that's definitely a nifty sentence.

The picture doesn't show it well but he yarn is very sparkly so he shimmers a bit when the light moves. This yarn is a bit scratchy but I think it makes for a fine dragon. They're supposed to have scales after all. Some of the dragons made from this pattern have contrast coloured spines and wings but I decided to make him a solid. I have a feeling I'll make this pattern many more times as it is just so darn cute. Maybe future dragons will have contrasting colours.

Pattern: Tarragon the Gentle Dragon by Knit-a- Zoo
Yarn: Unknown Sparkly Red from the Stash
Needle: 3.25mm
Guage: not critical but you want it to be fairly tight.

A Dragon!

Other projects are continuing. Firecracker is about half done and I can't wait to have a chance to wear it. It's wonderfully soft. I have to keep reminding myself that summer doesn't last long and they'll be plenty of time to wear sweaters. Sometimes is surprisingly hard. This has been a wonderful project for watching the Olympics with as it's all stockinette stitch in the round. Lovely.

Pennants continues as well but it involves counting so progress is slow during the Olympics when knitting and TV watching must go together.

Not sure if I'm going to finish the cotton sweater; something about the gauge is not working for me.

And socks are at an awful low spot.

Current Weather
Cloudy and 24C.

It's been a few days without rain which has been unusual for the past few weeks. Hopefully the farmers can harvest.