Expect more politics here.

I've thought a lot about my "lack of interest" in blogging over the past few months and I think I've come up with at least part of the reason. I segregated my blog last year, moving political discussion to liberalmom.com. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but looking back it really wasn't. It's just not me. Politics, or rather, progressive politics, are such a big part of my life. Only a hand full of friends read that blog.. and I appreciate those readers, when I do get around to posting there. But, by segregating my thoughts, its as if I was hiding my political leanings, and I don't normally hide. Shrinking Violet, I'm not.

This is a huge political year, probably the most important election season of my entire life - so much I could have written about, and didn't, because I thought no one would read. What a wasted opportunity.

I'm not sure what will happen to liberalmom, as I did invite others to post there with me. And thankfully they have had that soapbox when they felt a need to vent. So ladies, you know who you are, feel free to tell me what you'd like to do with that blog. I'll keep it if you'd like to post there. If not, I'll probably redirect the domain to come here.

So anyway... the past few days in politics have been interesting. That isn't to say that since the morning Sarah Palin was tapped as V.P. candidate, that it hasn't been. I'm still rather dumbfounded by that decision - as is every conservative in my personal life. Great job McCain, they all ran the other way screaming in horror. So thanks for that! Really!

So far I've tried to ignore McCain as irrelevant, because he sort of is. Out of touch, bad ideas, even worse decision making. But the fear cards being played this week by the McCain campaign... The racial undertones... the hate inciting...

From Dana Milbank of the Washington Post

Worse, Palin's routine attacks on the media have begun to spill into ugliness. In Clearwater, arriving reporters were greeted with shouts and taunts by the crowd of about 3,000. Palin then went on to blame Katie Couric's questions for her "less-than-successful interview with kinda mainstream media." At that, Palin supporters turned on reporters in the press area, waving thunder sticks and shouting abuse. Others hurled obscenities at a camera crew. One Palin supporter shouted a racial epithet at an African American sound man for a network and told him, "Sit down, boy."

and more..

Also from Milbank..

"I was reading my copy of the New York Times the other day," she said.

"Booooo!" replied the crowd.

"I knew you guys would react that way, okay," she continued. "So I was reading the New York Times and I was really interested to read about Barack's friends from Chicago."

It was time to revive the allegation, made over the weekend, that Obama "pals around" with terrorists, in this case Bill Ayers, late of the Weather Underground. Many independent observers say Palin's allegations are a stretch; Obama served on a Chicago charitable board with Ayers, now an education professor, and has condemned his past activities.

"Now it turns out, one of his earliest supporters is a man named Bill Ayers," Palin said.

"Boooo!" said the crowd.

"And, according to the New York Times, he was a domestic terrorist and part of a group that, quote, 'launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and our U.S. Capitol,'" she continued.

"Boooo!" the crowd repeated.

"Kill him!" proposed one man in the audience.

Emphasis added by me.

McCain/Palin campaign? You done pissed me off even more. I've never wanted a President Obama as much as I do right now. You sling the hate... and I'll spend all my time slinging hope. Reality has a well known liberal bias MY FRIENDS, and I think you know that, otherwise you wouldn't stoop to this sort of shit.

So, to close this with a smile...

I hope you found it as funny as I did.

There, I feel better already.

I survived not only getting one hat out to my first target, but I got to take out yet another unsuspecting HA2 player, Michelle (seriously, click the link for the funny death notice!)

Funny, the work in progress sent back to me from my original target, is nearly identical to the yarn I picked out for her. I hope that means she really loves it.

So, I'm still alive. It turns out that as of right now, there is not another work in progress heading my way, as someone downstream flaked out, hasn't sent a death hat to her target, much less responded to any emails. I now sit and wait for my death to arrive in the mail, or for a mercenary mad hatter (extra players, not really playing the game until The Oracle calls on them to "make a kill". I know this all sounds confusing and downright silly, but its a lot of fun!

Also last week, I finished up spinning, and plying, my guild holiday wool...

It didn't come out at all like I expected, and I honestly hated spinning this. Because of that, I'm having a hard time figuring out what to make with it for the holiday swap. I've already cast on 2 different projects with it, only to be disappointed. Ugh. A felted stockinette table runner is sounding really good about right now.

Life 'round here is still quite busy. Jill and Danny's wedding is on the 11th and my dress doesn't get fitted for alterations until Thursday. Not that I'm in any rush mind you... the alterations are costing nearly as much as the dress. Highway robbery in my opinion.  If my Bernina was working I could just do this stuff myself. Alas its not, and I'm stuck.

But, mark my words.. I will not ever, be in another wedding. I hate weddings. Huge waste of money, and only marginally fun to attend.  Everyone should just fly to Vegas and elope. Seriously, save the money, elope and buy a house, pay off a school loan.... or something else.  I won't even go into my disdain for the jewelry industry, who suggest men spend THREE MONTHS SALARY on a diamond, probably mined by children in a war torn country. /rant over.

I'm also gearing up to spend weekends traveling to northeast Pennsylvania with other local Obama supporters. New York is most definitely safe as far as delivering for Obama. Pennsylvania is still a swing state, so we're doing voter registration and such, helping out the Scranton/Wilkes Barre offices.

And speaking of my hometown...

Ok, its Fox, so this should be expected, but split decision? Looks to me like the only McCain supporter on camera is the reporter.

Where on earth did summer go? I actually had to turn my heat on the other day, because it was 58 degrees in my dining room! I'm not ready. I'm so not ready. Its times like these when I think a warmer climate would be ideal. North Carolina? Tennessee? And if the political climate in the south wasn't such a diametric contradiction of my own views, I'd be packing up a moving truck.

The impending cold also makes me literally itch to knit a sweater. This is weird, because I don't like knitting sweaters. Too much investment in yarn ($) and time (I get bored and never finish them). And while I've always turned away from the, in my opinion, fashion disaster also known as the "shrug", I'm anxiously awaiting the pattern release of Elizabeth's Gordian Shrug (ravelry link here). Luckily, I'm a back up test knitter for this pattern, but damn... I'm cold now.

Other knitting... I signed up for Hat Attack 2, which started last week. The pattern was released on Tuesday, and I had a finished hat to send out to my target on Thursday. My first kill. Since I haven't received a hat in the mail from my assassin, I'm still "alive" and waiting for an unfinished hat from my target to keep playing the game. Confusing? It confused me too at first, but now I have the rules of the game down pat.

Its an interesting pattern, based on a Fibonacci sequence, which I usually shy away from for whatever reason.. I don't know. I despise the yarn called for in the pattern (SWTC Therapi) and opted to sub with Sublime Merino Cashmere Silk DK. It caused some gauge issues, but in the end it all worked out.

As for Music Monday... I know I sort of gave it up in my lack of blogging over the summer. However, I'm bringing it back with a bang. On Friday we celebrated International Talk Like A Pirate Day, and I've been listening to a lot of Flogging Molly lately. Combine the two and you get...

If I don't blog again this week. Have a great one y'all!

I've never seen a dragonfly in our yard, much less on my porch. Luckily it stuck around long enough for me to run and get the camera.

Something finished. Shown blocking on a dinner plate!

Pattern: Rose Red (ravelry link)

Needles: US6 dpns and 16" circular

Yarn: Sublime Angora Merino DK (ravelry link)

This is my second Rose Red. My first one used some llama yarn I ordered from Hid N' Hills but unfortunately it just didn't work out. The gauge was off and the yarn "bloomed" a bit too much. Overall it was huge. (Mental note, that project still needs to be frogged, re-skeined and yarn re-claimed). This time my sub yarn was perfect.. PERFECT.

This was such a fabulous project to knit, and as usual, Ysolda's patterns are awesome. I'm actually a little sad that I've finished it. If I had more identical yarn in another color, I'd cast on another right away.

Now, want to see the other side?

I would have never thought of using a dinner plate to block a beret before I got this pattern!

I originally intended to get these up by last Friday.. and didn't. Sorry. And today, on the third official day of school, I'm dealing with two sick kids. Dylan and Connor are both home for the day - cough, sore throat, sniffles.

First, some pictures from the last week of summer vacation..

Yes, those are pink streaks in her hair.

Alex while camping at East Lake, Labor Day weekend.

Dylan and Ethan also on the slide, Labor Day weekend at East Lake.

Horrid picture. I was rushing to snap one, since the bus was literally pulling up to the driveway. Cassidy Alex and Dylan - First day of the 2008/2009 school year.

Connor, a few hours later, watching for the bus to come around the corner.

Nothing much else going on here. I'm not even knitting very much, which is pretty typical for me this time of year. I don't expect my knitting to pick up any time soon though - its political season.

I have some pictures from the kid's first day of school. Even ones of Connor waiting for his school bus. He did excellent by the way. Not even a single tear... from him anyway!  But I have to get them off the camera yet, and I'm not really in the mood tonight. I promise.. tomorrow.

But I do have this ...

This is just screaming to be made into a bumper sticker.

I have to admit, that after taking so much time off, it is a little hard to get back at blogging. I mean, where do I start? Which activity from the past month do I highlight? What knitting project do I blog about?

Perhaps this is part of the reason why my little "vacation" extended itself.
But I'm back.. for now.. and I can't promise that I'll be blogging as frequently as I always have. Well, at least until the kids return to school anyway.

So what have we done this summer? Actually, not too much. Nothing exciting anyway. But, we did make a trip to Sandy Island Beach ...

(You will notice a complete lack of even a single picture of Cassidy. This would be because as soon as we get there.. every single time.. she manges to find a friend to play with and we don't see her, but from a distance for most of the day!)

Also in July, my spinning guild held its annual Summer "Dye Day" at Christina's house...

I didn't bring anything to dye, but after inhaling the vinegar fumes all afternoon, I couldn't resist going ahead and dyeing my holiday wool at home later that night...

I started out dyeing it "avocado green", but it turned out too much like baby poo. So I started a fresh dye pot with "sky blue" to try to over-dye that awful green... the result was, to say the least, very very surprising. I love the end result though.

And now for the most exciting news. The knitters among us will already know about Ravelympics, mostly because you just can't log into Ravelry without hearing about it. For the non-knitting readers, Ravelympics is sort of a take on the Yarn Harlot's Knitting Olympics from the winter games, 2 years ago - but much much more organized. In a nutshell, Stephanie (the yarn harlot) had this idea... cast on a project, a challenging one, and finish that project before or during, the closing ceremonies.

Ravelympics is basically the same idea, but Ravelry forums are used to organize, cheer each other on, and see pictures of other's progress and finished items. There are even "events" for different types of projects, like "lace long jump" and "designers discus" (and the list goes on). Its cute, and its funny.. and its actually fun to be part of.

BUT... I held off committing to participate until the very last minute... the day before! So I totally missed the part where I had to actually "sign up for" a specific event. So no medal for me. And thats ok... I'm using this time to press on with the design of that lace shawl I've been talking about forever! I don't need a medal.. I'll have a beautiful, original lace shawl at the end, that I designed all by myself!

Since I didn't want to buy charting software, I searched and searched for an alternative, until I found what I needed. A font, specifically for knitting charts! And as soon as I installed it, I sat down to transfer my handwritten-on-graph-paper-chart into Open Office. I played, I tweaked, and did some more math.. then got started! I actually did cast on during the 8PM airing of opening ceremonies.

But by Saturday morning, several repeats into the project, despite the lace looking just gorgeous, I decided that my lace was too much for the body of the shawl. And that in fact, the lace I had spent so much time charting, would make a much better border for the shawl. I ripped it all out, re-wound the yarn, and sat down with my charting tools again and re-worked a new lace pattern. After 6 hours of more math and swatching, I had a new chart and casted on again...

Despite the poor lighting in an image taken at 10PM, I really do love this shot. Because I hope to make this pattern for sale as a .pdf download, I don't want to show too much. I am loving it, but I have at least 10 more repeats to go before I start the border section. Will I do it? I don't know... stay tuned!

After months of having to reschedule, Beth and I were finally able to make the trek down to Loren's farm for what we called, SteekFest. If you don't know what steeking is, and wonder why it might scare the crap out of a knitter, it is in plain English, knitting something with multiple strands of colorful yarn, top stitching the "channel" in which to cut using a sewing machine, then cutting it. Why a knitter would want to cut into knit fabric is very simple. Knitting multiple strands of colors is much easier knitting in the round, but you need to have openings for armholes, right? Chop Chop!

We decided that since we are all steek virgins, instead of risking an adult sized sweater, we would all knit itty bitty teddy bear/doll sweaters, and this way there wasn't a huge time investment if something went horribly wrong. Well, apparently my teddy bear sweater is hiding or mistakenly went into the trash bin during my last stash dive and divide because I was the non-steeking photographer instead.

Loren sewing her sweater...

Beth sewing hers...

Loren cutting hers...

Beth cutting hers...

And this is what the cut steek now looks like, all ready to have a sleeve sewn into it...

And when we were done steeking, we got out Beth's shiny new drum carder...

which turned out four soft FLUFFY batts of Loren's Albert Finney's lovely Finn lamb wool...

And and... then there was the visiting of the sheep...

We had a great time! Thank you Loren and family (animals included!) Oh, and we got to make the drive down in my new van. Huzzah! Now to read other accounts of Steekfest, see Loren and Beth's blogs. There are also several other pictures from the day in my flickr album.

Lastly, its Monday and that means music. I haven't come across anything new lately, but I have been revisiting music I've sort of forgotten about for twenty years, like this song...

There was a discussion on Ravelry's Lazy Stupid and Godless forum (of which I'm a proud member, obviously) about angsty music. I tried to remember my teen years and what I listened to when I was depressed and angry and.. well, I couldn't really think of anything. To this day, when I'm pissed off or worried, or nervous, or sad, I put on something fast and hard. One would think that to be counter productive, right? But for me, yeah, it sort of builds my anger, but before too long I'm dancing, and I'm happy again.

But... someone else mentioned "Dear God" and I remembered the very first time I heard it... And begging my parents to stay up late on Sunday night to watch 120 Minutes on MTV.

I obviously recalled my teenage angst.