Happy Halloween

How appropriate that I have an update for my
The first book is a collection of short stories. The book is titled: Strange Happenings: 5 tales of transformation The author is Avi. These short stories are tales of transformations the main characters of each stories undergo. I don't recall that the transformations are positive in nature and usually are the result of some lesson learned by the character; as such I would say these tales are fairy tale in nature. There is one about a cat and a boy, I won't give anything away, but this was my favorite of the 5, especially because the story line didn't give anything away.

My second book to write about today is The Witch of Portobello by Paulo Coelho. This story was written interview style about a woman developing her goddess spirituality, intuition and techniques over time. Also, what can happen to a person if they are perceived as a healer and gain a following. And, what conditions for acceptance can be placed on a person. A line immediately into the book: "no one places her dreams in the hands of those might destroy them. no one that is, but athena." really caught my attention. but also.. it made me think.. don't we all sometimes hand our dreams over to those who don't treat them well?


So, for the RIP II, I chose Peril 1, read four books.. I believe I've done this with one to spare, yeah me! and I've pushed myself to read books I wouldn't have read otherwise--cool ones too!

Voting for the presidency with your dollars?

Hey why not? Corporations have been doing it for years... go to this website: and while logging a vote for your fav candidate--fund some educational projects in the classroom. and let your local teachers know about the projects at donorschoose.org also, there isn't any reason, if you live in IA, you couldn't be funding projects in IA.

Look what the postman delivered to me!!!

I was so excited to receive this package... and it came in an envelope labelled Royal Mail. Since my husband in entered in Crown Tournament for the Kingdom of Calontir in a couple of weeks.... is this foreshadowing? Perhaps, but I think it is rather an indication of international mail.

Inside was so many goodies, I'm not sure I'm going to know where to start.. I received yarns from POSH! the Yarn Yard and some silk from Hip Knits. And if that wasn't enough, my SP spoiled me in lavendar--how did she know? I will be totally in the bath. Sorry honey, not my fault, blame SP... Thank You Secret Pal! I hope you are getting spoiled equally as much!

just another sunday

Earlier this week I finished Coraline by Neil Gaiman. This is another YA book. It is about a young girl exploring an alternate world in a flat next door to hers, inhabited by her "other mother" and "other father" and by the other folks that share the apartment building she lives in. I liked the nice touch about the cat that can be in both places. It was a good read, and I liked the part about being brave and overcoming fears. One might be wondering if all I read is YA books...nope but they are usually good stories, and lately, ones I haven't encountered before... I do find the sci fi ones particularly enchanting.

I'm also keeping busy with my socks.. altho I have no new pix to upload to show. I'm busiest with my hogwarts socks as I'm on deadline.. plus I want to get them done so I can cast on some new socks I'll be telling you about.

I'm also busy uploading my stash and project info to Ravelry. My ID is knittinggardener (go figure). I upload a few things and then I get distracted by looking all around. I think I've put 10k items into faves. A girl just has to have goals.

as I was just saying...

I was just saying in my journal yesterday that I was going to start following the poster I have up in my office by eleanor roosevelt in order to move through some items on my work and personal task list... and then reading Carla's blog today, I stumbled across the link to this awesome project. You know, there is such a thing as synchronicity and flow. I have a list of items I need to get done. I am going to commit to this project for one month from today. Today's item? Finish up three old items on some overdue work lists--why do they scare me? I don't think I know all the answers... and for me, that is a difficult place to be in.

endings and beginnings

I finished Neil Gaiman's and Terry Pratchett's Good Omens: the nice and accurate prophecies of agnes nutter, witch just this morning. and apparently I've been missing something all these years. it was great. I loved the storyline, and I love the type of humor that was in this book. I appreciated the tensions between good and evil and I think it would be funny to see an american version of this.. wonder what it would be like in a movie?

And I cast on for another project. We're headed to Phoenix for Thanksgiving to celebrate my dad's 25th wedding anniversary. We'll be joined by my darling niece and nephew so I cast on for a hat for my nephew Chase. Taylor already has one for Winter from me. I'm concerned about my tension.... I usually use the larger needles as I tend to knit tightly, but I may have to go up one more as I was ok on the natural color but got tight on the yellow color... I think I might take it out (gasp) and redo with size 7's just to see how what I get.. I do want it to fit after all... I do love Morehouse Merino kits. This is the second one I have worked on.. the first one was a scarf for my husband, and I loved it.

Books books books

I love books. Recently I finished The Water Mirror by Kai Meyer. Book one of the dark reflections. This is another young adult book I just found fascinating. Set in Venice, in a timeframe oddly parellel. it is about orphans, light and shadow, water and stone. Venice is the island under siege. the world is a different place and egypt is under control, but Hell could help out! Flying stone lions, and mermaids are in this book, along with the Flowing Queen, is she a goddess, or an essence? read the book to find out!

and one more: A Harvest of Changelings by Warren Rochelle. This book was about a man (Ben) who married a Fairie and they had a son. This son, along with three others formed a tetrad, and they were called back to the Other world once they reached puberty. Ben must help his son get to the Fairy gate, amid all sorts of "happenings" around that crazy Samhein in North Carolina. This book mixed celtic beliefs and Christianity, which I liked. I was kind of confused about it all happening in NC, which was never really explained, and there were other parts that were skimmed over, but all in all an ok read.

Couldn't have said it better myself

I think clean water is very very important and I think we are all PERSONALLY responsible for doing what we can to make sure the water around us is clean. and that means doing our part before we start pointing fingers.. and I can be a ranter when folks start pointing fingers before they've taken responsibility.. just ask me.

that being said... I'm tired of plastic water bottles.. I'm tired of folks not being willing to bottle up water before they leave their houses... (and please don't reuse plastic bottles not intended for reuse, they leach plasticizers, harbor bacteria, ech! and are generally unsafe) and the assumption that the sealed bottled water you are drinking is safe..huh...naive at best

but I'm going to let this link give you the other real scoop, the drain on our local resources that these water bottles are.. the water bottle scoop

Catch up

Its raining outside, again, today.. so with a stomach full of some great cinnamon rolls my husband made for me this morning.. I'll try to do a little catch up. first things first.. My Secret pal overseas finally recd her first package I sent way back in Sept!! yeah. I'm so glad our guys don't do postal strikes. you know, I like mail... and I appreciate receiving more than the usual bills, so I'm glad we have more than email. and at the great prices we get for the service. I did try another way of getting her happy halloween package to her this month--we'll see how it works out.

Gardening.. end of year chores... as usual we've put them off lollygagging outside when the days were nice--its our usual way. today in btween cloud bursts, we'll try to get some bulbs planted, and I'd like to get some suet feeders filled.. we'll see how it goes, as I'm also aiming for the Elizabeth II movie this afternoon.

and for some knitting...

I've been working on some socks around here... I've got two in the works specifically because of Soctoberfest... let me show you how they look:
this one is my Monkey sock by Cookie A. I have wanted to do this pattern for a long time. I loved this Trekking yarn, hunted for it all over the place once I saw it on the internet.. and saw how someone used it on Ravelry and am loving how it looks. And it is so EASY for me. This next one I am calling my Halloween sock. I am using the Candy corn special edition yarn by Lorna's Laces. I am using the Wollmeise Sock pattern designed by Monica Jines. I downloaded the pattern off Loopy Ewe.


and here's a little preview of this... with this:


With all this knitting.. I'm getting a little TV time. perhaps too much for my psyche.

RIP update

I finished The book without words: a fable of medieval magic by Avi this weekend. The tale was about a servant girl, a raven and two green eyed boys entwined after a sorcerer appears to be dead after completing some magic from his book. The book tells the tale of gaining trust between strangers, and what happens if you don't. It is also a tale of alchemy and medieval lifestyles and beliefs. I love the young adult stories that are out there today. Wish that as many would have been available when I was growing up. Keep writing Avi!

The red scarf project

When knitting daily put out their blurb on the red scarf project, I looked at the pattern and decided I really liked it this one. I thot about doing the project last year, thot about it alot--right on past the date for doing it. But not this year, this year, I went out and got the yarn, Galway to be exact, and cast on--and this is my project to date. Like those nifty stitch markers? I made them myself... with some help from my SIL Tamara, and some inspiration from here.

An addition to our family

 
 

Meet Spencer!

I casually mentioned to my husband on Saturday that perhaps it was time we started perusing the selections at the local animal shelters. Gretchen recently turned 2 and she is pretty well trained for us now and she is so high energy (as a border collie/spaniel mix would be!) and coming on winter it was time to start looking for her new buddy. I don't think either one of us envisioned that we'd find one right off the bat, or that we'd get so lucky and he'd be so cute. Spencer is an 11 mos old german short hair pointer mix. he is our first wirehair. He is very well-behaved--so far! we'll see what I say two weeks from now. Gretchen and Spencer's energy levels mix well. We called our vet on saturday before we introduced gretchen and that was the one thing she said we would be happy about.... so far, so great! And, so far, Gretchen is IN CHARGE. Spencer likes us, and likes her too. He really prefers if one of us is around so that is good, we don't want him to bond too tightly to her, as that will make it hard to train him. And Gretchen still prefers her alone time, and her Mom time, so I'm making sure I'm paying attention to that also. Spencer came from a family home so he likes children and he's had some basic command training. He's had some trouble adjusting to ringing the bell to go outside, so btw that and the "new house" we've had a couple of accidents, but we're adjusting.

and, I can't even begin to express how excited Madaline and Gabriel are about a new puppy in the house....