I have no good excuses. Plenty of excuses, but none that really hold any water. So, here’s a recaplet of the last six months or so.

My favorite place/LYS/workplace, Unique One, has kept me busy. I worked there all summer, then two days a week up to now. I’ve knit a lot of lovely things because of the amount of time I spend at the store. I’ll post some soon.

I took a job as an English as a Second Language tutor at the local school district. I have three students in elementary and high schools. They all speak (natively) languages from Asia and range from close-to-fluent to “new arrival”. They are great students and I learn new things from them daily!

My kids are always busy. T2 has come to work with me a few times over the last few months and he’s been bitten by the knitting bug! Here’s his first Finished Object:

He found the pattern in Charmed Knits: Projects for Fans of Harry Potter. It’s the Elf Hat and he knit the whole thing himself. He also did most of the finishing work (one of those tasks I hate). Good job, T2!

I’m happy to be back. I’ll post some Christmas presents tomorrow (yes, I know it’s January, but better late than never!)

And, here are the crocuses that were bravely blooming yesterday.

Today is a different story. We’re expecting a foot or so of snow, followed by sleet this afternoon. The kids are all home from school and I’m paying far too much attention to my computer. So far this morning, I’ve shoveled 300 ft of driveway with T1 and T2, started dinner, and made this:

You can link it back to me from your own page. Email me if you need help doing that. I think it’s a cute little button. When I was joining webrings the other day one of them asked for a button, so I whipped this one up (please note the two, new web rings in the sidebar . If you know of other web rings you think I should be part of, please drop me a line.

Here’s the driveway:

One more pic from yesterday. We tap our maples and make about a quart of syrup every year. Here’s T2 in his hand-dyed, hand-spun, hand-knit hat, tapping in a spile.

Now, I will sit, play games with the kids and knit. Stay warm, all!

It’s finally winter in Maine. This morning we’ve had over four inches of snow and there’s up to a foot more coming. The kids are home from school, knitting circle and Planning Board are both canceled for this evening. The forecast calls for blizzard conditions this afternoon, with winds up to 45 mph. It’s the perfect day to sit and knit, which I will when this post is complete.

Since I haven’t done much writing for my blog this week, here’s your dose of me (and, yes, I’ve combed my hair since this picture was taken):

You’ll have to buy the magazine, as content doesn’t appear on the web. You can get your very own subscription here. You’ll find the photographs to be spectacular and the articles fascinating. I’m the Spindelicious columnist. This month I have an article on how not to dye. The humor will kill you.

Stay warm!

For this reason I’ve done zero knitting in the last day and a half.

I worked at the shop today, but there’s still a chance I won’t get called in to substitute teach tomorrow. That would be lovely. I can sit and knit. And, prepare for the winter storm anticipated Wed. and Thurs. I haven’t had a day off in 10 days (and I’m already booked for Wed, Fri, Sat, Sun, and Mon).

I need sleep!

I’m trying to add a Works In Progress list to my sidebar. But not just a simple list; I want a little bar that graphically shows where I am in the project. Oh, and I want the input to be through the existing interface, not playing with the code each time. Yes, I ask for too much.

Given that it’s 1 am and that I can’t make it work, I may go to the fallback: code it by hand. But, that wouldn’t be so much fun.

So, on knitting: Saturday I taught a knitting class. It was supposed to be for teenagers. The first class was five third graders, one teenager and a parent. The second class was two adults. Go figure. Well, one of the adults picked up the sticks and really went to it! In the 1.5 hours we were working, she knit at least eight inches on her scarf. Eight perfect inches–no dropped stitches, no extra stitches, no mistakes at all. Mel also owns Tamarind Restaurant in Rockland and I plan to have a great meal with her soon!

I promise not to do any more knitting or programming until I’ve had some sleep.

Please leave a comment if you’ve found me here. I need to know I haven’t lost everyone.

Thanks!

http://spinordye.com

The switchover will be in the next few days and there may be downtime. The new site is all my own, and will take a while to get set up completely. Please excuse the mess and the ongoing changes. All my old posts will be there and I should have more control over the content and how it’s displayed. It’s also cheaper.

The old URL is http://spinordye.typepad.com <–this is old; please don’t use.

Thanks for stopping by. I’m working on three posts–about books, needles, and dyeing–which will get posted after I get moved over.