Wednesday, December 29, 2004

Vera, Renata and Mariana


Vera, Renata and Mariana
Originally uploaded by Joanna Root.
This is a picture of my wonderful sister in Brazil, Vera Alice (in the center) and two of her daughters, Renata and Mariana. As you may know, I lived with Vera, her brothers Edu and Armandinho, and my wonderful parents Alice and Armando Leone in 1966. It was a year I have never forgotten. Thanks to email we are now able to keep in touch better than before - her daughters are fluent in English, which is good because my Portuguese is getting pretty rusty!

Tuesday, December 28, 2004

A quick note

Hi everyone -  worked on the photo part of my Blog today. If you look on the side of the blog you will see a square showing photos that change. F you click on that image you will be taken to another website where my pictures are being stored. Look carefully above the large picture and you will see a word that says photo stream .... Click on that and you should be able to see all the pictures.

The thaw that didn't!

In spite of lots of sun today, and a good bit of wind we still have lots of snow on the ground. The docks have footprints, but no one made any attempt to shovel a path. We didn’t get much above freezing during the day and tonight's low is going to be 20. We spent the morning hearing hunks of ice fall from the mast, sails and rigging lines – and there is still plenty hanging up there to come down yet. The deck is at least mostly dry and our finger pier is dry as Eric swept it off. Although the city of Hampton has done a superb job of cleaning the main streets the neighborhood is still pretty slushy and icy.

We made these observations when we went out to the grocery store again for rolls. Bread and milk are still in short supply there. We heard on the news this evening that there were 586 car accidents between yesterday when the snow started and noon today! I can only imagine what it will be like tomorrow when everything that melted today freezes into a slick sheet. Potentially tomorrow will be more dangerous for driving, many places closed today and tomorrow there will be more traffic as business open back up. At least the kids are all home!

The big event of the day, after the grocery store, was a boot shopping expedition for Eric at the Red Wing store. This might not sound too exciting, but to a man who prefers no shoes, boots are a big deal! He wore them in pilot training (30 years ago) – actually a habit he picked up from Ron. He really liked them then, and I convinced him he needed some new ones. He experienced the shock of the same thing I noticed, as you age your feet get bigger (oh joy). Anyhow we got him a nice pair and he is very pleased with how they look. We waterproofed them tonight – since the snow won’t be going away anytime soon.  He choked when he heard the price, but hey – it has been 30 years, right? I told him they’ll last him forever, and he agreed. As land lubbers to be, he needed a nice looking pair of shoes in addition to his deck shoes. We are both happy with his choice.

In light of the boots, I am knitting faster. I have now turned the heels on both socks, and doing cuffs now. I start at the toes, my personal preference, as you can try them on for fit. Anyhow, I am working a couple inches a day on the socks, and will go until the yarn runs out. This is yarn I liberated from a thrift store wool sweater. I feel too thrifty!

The other good news, we are supposed to be in the 60’s by New Year’s Eve, with lows in the 40’s!  I guess that means we will at least get water turned on again in a few days. Maybe another picture tomorrow.

Until later ...

Sunday, December 26, 2004

The day after Christmas ....

Well it has been quite a weekend! We arrived in Richmond just before three and Zack met us in the driveway. He said, Nana, I’ve been waiting for you all day! How sweet was that! Maddie was all smiles (because she managed to pull one over the grown ups and skip a nap!) and Rebecca and Tom were all ready to begin the second round of gifts for the day. Eric and I both enjoyed watching the kids, and Becky and Tom open gifts .... And it seems like everyone was happy with their presents. Zach played Santa by the way, he recognizes his own name!

Tom made a super dinner, we had lasagna and sauce and salad. It was very very good!  Both the kids were getting pretty tired by supper, but really did good for such a long day. After baths they tucked into bed without too much fuss and the adults watched a movie.

This morning we got up pretty early, and as Eric had seen the weather and they said it might snow, we decided to head home early. We left at 10 am. The first 45 minutes of the trip were uneventful, but the next 45 miles took nearly 3 1/2 hours. The snow was big and wet and juicy, and the closer we got to home, the more it was coming down. We say one car off the road, and I think that was the one accident that slowed traffic so much. The only service truck we saw on our side of the highway said Tidewater parking lot maintenance - !!! Maybe he was helping a friend.

We stopped at the grocery for bread and milk (almost gone)  and we managed to get aboard without getting too wet, unpacked and then went out on the deck to clear paths and get buildup off the canvas roof that covers the cockpit. We had close to six inches here, by our estimates. I also made a snowman for Zachary and we took a picture for him. It could have been bigger believe me – the snow was perfect for rolling .... But I had almost forgotten how heavy wet snow was. We managed one about as tall as Zachary and called it quits. I couldn’t get his radish eyes and raisin mouth to stay on – but managed the carrot nose. Lucky I had some nice big knitting needles to hold the gloves! It was fun.

So now we are snug aboard, it is dark and the snow has stopped. It is supposed to warm up gradually, but then the weather man may be wrong – he had said 1-2 inches of snow for here!! We could be slick with ice, but hopefully everything will warm up nicely and our Christmas snow will just be a happy memory!

Snowman on the boat!


Snowman on the boat!
Originally uploaded by Joanna Root.
The Auana Ke Kai Christmas Snowman - we got 6 inches of nice wet snow the day after Christmas!

Friday, December 24, 2004

Christmas Eve and the stockings are hung!

It looks like Santa will need some radar to get here, we are very cloudy and generally a gray looking day. We watched Tim Allen and the Santa movie last night on TV, always cute to see stories about grown-up coming to “believe” again in Santa.

It got me thinking about Santa and days past. I think one of my first memories of Christmas is being at my grandma Walters house, asleep upstairs and hearing Christmas Carols being sung outside, and bells. I don’t know if it was friends of my aunts and uncles who were still teenagers, or just who it was, but I know I was pretty excited about hearing the sleigh bells. Christmas was always a huge affair at my grandma’s as there were so many cousins – 19 in all – we were a house full! Here’s their names (I cheated) - and just think, I think these 19 cousins have better than 41 kids, and now there are grandkids for them!!!

Darren, Denise, Doreen, Deanna (Armstrong – Mae and Gordon); Stephen, Phillip, Andy, Bill, Tim (Goold – Lucille and Dick ); Becky, Mark, Paul, Mary and David (Rowley – Peggy and Jay), Karen and Kevin (Walters – Ray and Jo); Cindy, (Jeffers, Delores and Roy) and Mike and I (Walters – Earl and Annabelle).

Seeing this list makes me think it is high time for the Walters to attempt a family reunion again. Nothing like a good idea for the new year! I may have to write to the aunts and uncles and us put some thought to that.

Well everyone, tomorrow we head for Richmond. Eric and I are excited to see the wonder of Christmas through the eyes of Maddie and Zack. I wish all of us could be together – maybe next year we will invite everyone to Virginia!

Merry Christmas and God Bless

Thursday, December 23, 2004

Happy Birthday

Today is a special day for all of us – DGD Madeline is One today, and Sally, SIL,  is 29! Hurray for the girls in the family! I always feel like people who have a birthday near Christmas are a bit cheated as far as gifts are concerned. I don’t know if that is true or not, what do you think Sally? Do you have any good ideas how to celebrate in a neat way?

Yoga was delightful last night, best of all was a gift of Chocolate – yummy chocolate. What more could you want?

Christmas music helped put Eric and I in the Christmas spirit today. Otherwise we had a warm day, but it was very windy. Not a pretty day at all. I am still trying to solve WUNWTAGC – even listening to most of our 270+ Christmas songs did not solve that puzzle. I am counting on Mike or Sally to solve this one – or maybe someone who listens to more radio than me ... Maybe Anne!

Anne, since you are on logger too – have you figured out a way to add links? Or is it dependent on the template you use? I notice some of the templates have them in the side panel, but mine doesn’t.  If you add in that code into you template would it add links? (Of course that means I would have to figure out which code controlled that aspect of the page) LOL.

Tomorrow! Christmas Eve!

Wednesday, December 22, 2004

Wednesday

We are going for the extremes here – today it is mid 50 and tomorrow will be 60. Only two days away from the frigid weather of last weekend. The poor cat is so confused. She would poke her head outside and twitch this past Monday; today she is spread out in her “I’m warm” pose.

This warm up is deceiving though, the main heater gave a loud shutter and shake and gave up the ghost this morning. When the water temp. gets about 42 or so, it is all over as far as the heat exchanger is concerned. So, out come all the space heaters and we now play move the heaters depending on what time of the day it is and where we want heat! I actually think the small heaters make the boat more comfortable, but then what do I know?

I got up this morning and made a batch of trash (Chex mix) to include in the Christmas ditty bags I put together for my Yoga buddies. Nothing, extravagant, a candle, a bath scrubby, a CD of soft Christmas carols and trash.... How’s that for spreading Peace, Joy, Love and Light? That is our Yoga mantra at the end of each class, also fitting for Christmas I thought. We’ll meet at 5:30 and have a small get together before class.

Our marina manager gave us an early Christmas gift, a gift certificate for dinner at one of our favorite restaurants. The one we wanted to take Mom and Dad to when they were here. You may remember we went there for our anniversary. It has good food, and a great view.

The socks are up to the gussets, so maybe they will have heels by the end of tomorrow. It all depends on how long I stay awake tonight!

The local weathermen now say no snow for Christmas, so it looks like our way to Richmond will be clear and Eric will leave a space heater on for us to be able to leave the boat. Oh good ..... I would have been disappointed.

We watched Tom Hanks on TV tell about making “Polar Express”. It is really an amazing movie from the clips I have seen, and the way it was shot is pretty ground-breaking for computer animation geeks. I guess this is the first movie of this kind made. Eric’s train friends (on his Yahoo train group) that have seen the movie say the train makes the movie worth seeing, even with out the super story. I’d love to take Zachary to see it after the holidays; I know he has the book and I think he would enjoy the movie too.

Tomorrow, knit knit and knit some more, and go to the Laundromat. Don’t think it would be kosher to show up for Christmas dinner with a load of laundry!

Monday news ....

We only got a trace of snow, barely dusted the docks. For us, the real event was the 40 knot winds that turned on about midnight, and roared all night. The over night temperatures here were 12-14 degrees according to the TV weather gurus. That gave us a wind chill of minus 2. Neither of us, or the cat either for that matter, ventured out to see what –2 felt like. It made me think of the horror stories my brother used to tell about getting off work in Omaha in the middle of the night, with every exposed part freezing as you walked in the cold to your car. I decided his experience was enough for me. Bad enough that I had to wear my Cuddle Duds (long underwear) under my jeans.

The highlight of my day was making Gumbo. I still don’t like the available sausage found in local groceries, nothing compares with sausage from Eunice Louisiana. However, since that’s not available I just have to make do. It still turned out pretty good if I do say so, and I enjoyed both bowls (small) I ate, and I have enough for tomorrow at lunch too. Eric, not having any Cajun genes, either acquired by marriage or otherwise, made chili. He did live in Texas quite a while, so I guess Chili is OK for his comfort food. Silly liked neither, but did get a small piece of chicken when I was cutting up the ingredients for the gumbo. She was so cold this morning she helped finish my oatmeal. She is one strange kitten.

Rebecca had an exciting day, 30 minutes to get both kids into snowsuits, and 5 minutes in the snow before they got too cold! She called twice, bored with being cooped up inside; they had already been to the grocery store (what a highlight expedition), and it was too cold for the usual park outing she and the kids take most days. Zach was highly disappointed that the snow was so powdery, he was sure he was going to create a snow man, and couldn't even make a snow ball. It reminded me of the many times as a child in Oregon that the snow was unsuitable for play. However, I do remember some snow forts and sled rides. Mike has the Walters family sled now,  in Florida and I think he has earmarked it for my grandkids. However, now that he will be a grandpa soon the sled may have to come back to him again after Zack and Maddie use it. We’ll have to negotiate that I guess!

No knitting or anything constructive today, unless you count the excellent nap. Listening to the wind howl and hearing the boat grind against the pilings (protected by fenders – but still grinding) didn’t make for very good sleeping last night. I remedied that this afternoon. Eric has requested another pair of wool socks, so I’ll get them started tomorrow.

Water temps are going down, so the main heater is lagging. We have the two space heaters out and if the past is any example, we will be toasty warm.

The forecasters are hinting about snow for Christmas, not sure if the are just kidding us or are serious. If it does happen, then we may not make the Christmas Eve trip to Richmond, which will be a disappointment.

Monday, December 20, 2004

Maddie and Skyler with great-grandma!

This is great - grandma Annabelle and her two great-granddaughters, Skyler and Madeline. Skyler was 8 months, and Maddie 10 months when this was taken this October. Both girls have blue eyes and redish blond hair! Is great grand-ma proud of these girls go you think?

Missing great-grandson Zachary is behind the chair eating a bowl of ice cream!

Christmas - six days away

It’s been a good weekend, I’ve had phone time with all my family, Mom and Dad, brother Mike, and both children .... Russell and Rebecca.
I’ve discovered my brother has a Blog, so maybe I best get serious about my own. See I am working on it!!! Not wanting to be outdone, and maybe, just maybe I can get pictures posted too.

I finished a baby sweater and hat this weekend, it was reported to be a 5 hour sweater, it took me the better part of 4 days! Of that time I ripped back and started over twice, and also had to research the edging on the hat and figure out how to do something new. So it was a good experience and I think my Yoga teacher who will be a grandma next month will like it. Picture to follow in a few days. It was a lot easier than the sweater posted here I did for Maddie though. Next will be one for Skyler. And Eric needs another pair of wool socks .... I have converted him!

The Tidewater area is expecting big weather the next two days, We are forecast to get 35 knot winds, and maybe .... 3 inches of the white fluffy stuff. Rebecca reported tonight that it is already snowing in Richmond. Much to Zachary’s delight. I wonder how she got him to to sleep? He is hot to make a snowman and play in the snow. I’ll be happy with none thank you, as it is we are going to be in the twenties with wind chills in the teens. Coldest weather here since Feb. 2003. Nothing like making the last winter on the boat memorable. We may soon be on auxiliary heaters if the water temperatures continue to fall.

I’ve been working on a Christmas riddle of sorts .... It was given to me at a party this past week. The majority of these I was able to crack by myself. About a half dozen I had to resort to an internet site of Christmas lyrics to figure them out. There are two I could not get at all. So here they are to give you something to do it you need a brain tease. Let me know is you get stumped. Mike you should do good on this!

How many of the following songs can you identify by the first letters of the first line of their lyrics?

HYAMLC
TFNTADS
GRYMGLNYD
ICUAMC
SNHNAICAIB
OTFDOCMTLGTM
DTHWBOHFLLLLLLLL
JTTWTLHC
YKDADAPAVCACADAB
ISMKSCUTMLN
CSBSDIHS
HTHASGTTNK
GGROBAR
OHNTSABS
AIWFCIMTFT
DTTSIAOHOS
WTKOOA
IDOAWCJLLOIUTK
CROANOJFNAYN
IBTLALC
OLTOBHSWSTL
SBRAYLITHSIG
IBHFC
WWYAMCWWYAMC
IHTBOCD
FTSWAJHS
JOSNLYETW
GKWLDOTFOS
UOTHRPOJGOSC
JBJBJBR
IHABCWY
JHTSBJRTTT
CTTMRPPP
WUNWTAGC
YBWOYBNC

The cat us snuggling up to my legs, she thinks it is time for bed. Eric is nodding off. Time for me to get this emailed off to the blog site, and then check and get the URL to send to all of you so you can read about my exciting life!!

I hope everyone is ready for Christmas and have their stocking hung by the chimney with care!

Tuesday, November 30, 2004

Another shot at blogging

Well I am getting excited about having and posting to my blog again now that I have found a way to post pictures. I am sure this feature is not new to most of you, but for me it is major, as I am posting via a cell phone and on a Mac computer to boot. My blog host wouldn’t let Mac users upload pictures -  Anyhow, I can now add a picture to the blog without a hassle and post too (even at the same time). Too neat, to my way of thinking.

I am working on DD Christmas socks, and am almost finished  with the second sock - good..  Of course, I can’t post a picture or she will see them – and then there is also the matter of my having left the digital camera at her house. I could blame it on something – but it was my own fault for not checking that I had it when we left after Thanksgiving.

I have to sew the pocket on the Poncho made of Kool wool, this is for the DGD who turns 1 on Dec. 23. This is the pink I mentioned before that I got for 25 cents a skein. It came out fine, though maybe I could have used a smaller needle. Since DGD is on 11 months, it will be fine. The only complaint is from Mom, as this has to be hand washed. Guess I’ll have to take care of it for her! I also want to make DGS a pair of socks for his winter boots – he saw my pair and thought they were sweet – his word.

Next I have to do a baby gift for a baby girl for my Yoga teacher’s first grand child. Probably a 5 hour Baby Sweater, but I am not sure yet. I have until January to finish it and I know I can’t make it in 5 hours!

Well enough for now, as I need to call it a day.


Monday, November 29, 2004

The Baby Surprise Sweater

This is the baby surprise sweater close up picture I promised this morning.

Sunday, November 28, 2004

Close up of BBS


Close up of BBS
Originally uploaded by Joanna Root.

Knitted Baby Surprise Sweater


Knitted Baby Surprise Sweater
Originally uploaded by Joanna Root.
This is my second Baby Surprise Sweater. It is made with Lion Brand Cotton-Ease, not Kool Cotton like I made up! Trying to think too hard. Anyhow, the orange accents on the front were done with lazy daisy stitches, and I think I will leave them. I have also done a hat with I-cord and I'll post a picture of both hat and sweater soon.

Friday, July 09, 2004

A find of sorts

Today at the Hancock Fabrics, where I went to pick up a pair of Magic Stripe Socks that I knit for display, I happened upon a find! Outside the main door, a box marked 25 cents! And in the box, yarn .... Marked $1.00 .... Well upon inquiring inside, I was told, “take it all, you can have it for 25 cents”  ..... So you know what I did – I did take it all, 13 skeins of Lion brand Kool Wool! Melon and Fushia, now to decide what to make with it!! Baby girl sweaters???? Something for me (PINK !!!) - who know what.

Saturday, May 29, 2004

Broadripple finished at last

My Sockotta, 72 stitch on size 0 needles were finally (YEA) finished yesterday. I lament that I probably won’t be entered into the contest because my digital camera is still “en route” with UPS. Brown hasn’t come through for me – oh well. Who knows, maybe I will find someone who can snap a quick shot and still provide the list with digital proof of a PAIR COMPLETE!

I am well pleased with how they turned out .... A nice tight fit. I ended up working the sole after the decrease on only 26 stitches – and finished the toe with the star-toe from Dawn. It worked out quite nicely and I am pleased. These were my first pair knit on this yarn, and though I did not dislike it – I do think I prefer wool and wool blends.

Musing on Age

In a few days I'll turn 50 something. A Gemini at heart - lots of things going all the time. Always new ideas. This is a new twist for me, writing about myself and my hobbies and blogging - maybe I am not to old to learn a new trick. We will see how this evolves - if it evolves!