Shawnita’s Weblog

So I was sent to Cali for a week or so on a fire assignment and when I got home there were some pretty blooms in my yard to greet me. It was a nice change from the smoke and ash that was in the air. There are little jaleppeno growing from the flowers.

One thirsty looking flower…it has been pretty hot around here lately.

Hopefully I will be home long enough to see what else is going to be growing in the next few weeks. But with how the weather is acting and the fires that are already burning I am not sure how long I will be home. Time will tell.

Last week I got the opportunity to attend fire school…is was lovely. I got to see a very small bit of what the husband does on a daily basis during the summer. The weather was perfect and we got to see some amazing views of the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest (sometimes called the W bar W). Here are some lovely pics…

Helicopter

Checking the line we built

Me being silly…

This is how you eat lunch in the woods…I would do it every day if I could.

Now all that I need is some soil and some plants but that will have to wait until next week when I get home. I am also thinking that I will need to have some sort of irrigation system that waters automatically as sometimes I forget or am not home. Also a very good friend came over to help with the outdoor faucets at the end of the season last year they were leaking so Chad replaced them with PVC faucets and now I can water both the front and the back yard at the same time! And do laundry at the same time. I guess that these are the simple pleasures in live in eastern Washington, hopefully this week I can get some knitting done this week while I am holed up in a hotel room in the big.

My yard is in full bloom…thought I would share some photos. This afternoon I planted some vegetable pots for the front yard. With the puppies in the back yard it was really the only safe place.

Front Porch

Dogwood Trees

Crazy Ivy that I have not quite decided about yet

I have been a bad blogger and I am not sure why, it is not like I have been SO busy that I haven’t had time.  But I guess that it can only go up from here.  Right?

Last night I cast on some new socks from the book that I bought on a field trip to Knitochet.  I am using the sock yarn that I received for Christmas from my SIL Mara.  The pattern is Sugar Maple, and I am liking how it works with this colorway.  The yarn is Socks that Rock by Blue Moon Fiber Arts in Hollyday.  I wasn’t so sure if the patter would compete with the colors but it seems to be working out well.

I apologize for the bad picture, but I forgot to take one at home so this was taken with the phone.  Which, on a side note, is now a Blackberry Pearl 8100 and I LOVE it!

I also finished a baby gift for one of the five babies that arriving in the next nine months.  This is the Big Bad Baby Blanket from Stitch and Bitch. 

I am excited for the possibility that we may have a knitting group here in the area now, we are going to try and give it a go this evening.  Hopefully it works out!

I can’t believe that it has almost been a year since the husband and I have bought our house. It is exciting! We have been looking back over the last year and seeing if we got everything completed that we wanted to. Overall we are happy with what we have accomplished, there are still some projects that we would like to get done before spring actually gets here.

Here is a quick recap:

1. Removed horrible popcorn ceiling before we moved in.

2. Painted each room (the whole house was white and boring)

3. Removed the five ceiling fans (thanks Father-in-Law)

4. Removed the wall of Junipers in the front yard that hadn’t been taken care of in 30 years.

5. Replaced the carpet in our master bathroom with tile (carpet is very yucky in a bathroom)

6. Covered the dark paneling in the laundry room.

7. Put new sod in the back yard and moved the dog kennel to the shade of the large tree.

Things that we would still like to complete:

1. Plant a garden in the back yard.

2. Somehow rearrange the kitchen so it is not so cave-ish.

3. Put hardwood floors in the dining room.

4. New windows through out the house, most importantly replacing the 10 foot slider in the dining room.

I think that is about all that we should focus on in the next year. I am excited to see what this next year brings to our little family.

On a completely unrelated note here is a picture of the husband airing out his bunker gear in the carport. He is saying that it smells funny. Upcoming knitting project to come.

I have not been feeling well the last few days and I think that my puppies have noticed.  They both climbed up onto the couch with me the other evening and just calmly laid there. 

They are just too cute! I have been knitting, but studying for Anatomy and Physiology has been more pressing.  Since all of our friends are having babies I have been only knitting small little items; sweaters, hats, and all those fun things. 

My littlest sis is having a birthday this weekend, Happy Birthday! I can’t believe it is that time of year already.  But here is what I am working on for her present, Endpaper Mittens.  These are going to be great in the HUGE snow storm that they are having right now, they are snowed in as I type.  These mittens are working up quite nicely and I will leave it at that ( I don’t want to jinx myself). 

I was slightly confused with the whole left hand carrying the yarn thing for a while.  And my left index finger may have lost circulation for a few minutes at the mercy of finishing the row.  But I am getting a little quicker as I go.  Updates to come and the first mitten is finished, hopefully this evening.   

This afternoon the ladies at the office and I took a short field trip to the LYS Knitochet. We had a great time feeling this yarn and that yarn. JoAnne and I found the most wonderful colorway from Mountain Colors Bearfoot. I have knit some socks with this yarn before as a gift and loved them so much that I almost didn’t want to give them away. But, of course I did give them to my mother-in-law and I assume that she is enjoying them. Jessica also showed this great book to me, 2-at-a-time socks, there are some great patterns in here and the book is spiral bound so that it will lay flay when you are knitting! How great is that!? Here is a picture of our great finds. The Mountain Colors is called Wilderness, I am excited to start on the Sugar Maple pattern with this Bearfoot yarn.

On a wonderful husband note, when I got home these were waiting for me and the husband announced that he would be making dinner and had bought a nice bottle of Three Legged Red. I think this has something to do with the fact that he is leaving on Sunday for two weeks, not sure though.

Working on a new project, loosely based on Elizabeth Zimmerman’s February Sweater, that has cables.  I have been wanting to try some cables and I thought a baby sweater would be a great first small project.  I chose the cables from a book that I got for Christmas (thanks Mara!) Holiday Knits, the cables were in a glove pattern.  The cable is a simple pattern that I think is a right size for a baby sweater, I didn’t want it to be overwhelming.  The rest of the body is a simple stockinette .

I am excited at how this is turning out and how quickly it is knitting up.