7 Quick Takes (Vol 206)

Guys it is almost the middle of March!!!! In the words of the ever wise Calvin (of Calvin and Hobbes not John Calvin. Although, who knows)….the days just fly by. You know the Quick Take Regulations. Once you have consumed your weekly fix dose of blather you need to click on the picture above to be whisked, at the speed of the College of Cardinals voting on a new pope, over to Conversion Diary.

Blather the Ides of Debbie Sue!

1.

I have told you before, this is my sis-in-law, The Chef.

OK, really she is the sister that I never had. I love her. And do you want to know how sweet (and sneaky) she is? Well I will tell you.

When we were visiting together in Florida I mentioned that I have no idea how I am going to do my hair for the upcoming Shoe Queen/Slim Jim nuptials. I figured I would just go and let Dana, the woman who has cut my hair for 25+ years, fiddle with it. And that was the end of the conversation more or less. We swapped “hair” stories for a bit and moved on to the next thing.

So imagine my surprise when The Chef called me on Saturday to tell me that she had sent me a little “surprise” for my birthday. A gift certificate to the salon where Dana cuts my hair!! Enough so that I can have my hair fiddled with twice. Once to find a style and once for the big day.

I TOLD you she is the best sister ever!!!

2.
We had a house showing yesterday. I just don’t get all that excited about them anymore. The house is picked up and clean. Heck it is generally always picked up anyways as there are no progeny to mess things up. But I just don’t get excited about showings because…

Well….

Nothing has come of them yet. But whoever looked at the house yesterday actually sent positive feedback and said that they liked the house and that….they might be interested.

But I am still not going to get my hopes up until a realtor calls and says they want to buy the house. It is just better that way. When the house went up on the market almost a year ago every showing got my hopes way too high. And then when the “lookees” said they didn’t like the house or weren’t interested in the house or didn’t like the floor plan my mood would just plummet.

And 2012 was a tough year anyways for other reason so I decided that I just wasn’t going to do that anymore.

But we will see.

3.
The following is another reason to love Netflix streaming. HHBL will tell you that my “queue” is long….188+ I think and mostly filled with documentaries. I love documentaries. When I see one that looks interesting I stick it in the queue for later viewing. Below is the trailer for A Walk to Beautiful. I have included a link for the entire film, which can be watched on PBS or Netflix. You must watch it.

You must.

As I was watching the movie (and of course knitting) I noticed that all the women who come to the Hamlin Fistula Hospital are given…a knitted blanket. It is theirs to keep forever. These blankets are treasured for the comfort that they bring and as a symbol of what the hospital can do and has done for these women who are shunned by family and society for something they have no control over. But something that can be fixed through surgery, at Hamlin, for FREE.

And I got to thinking about those blankets.

And I let my “fingers do the walking” as it were and found that I can knit blankets for the Hamlin Fistula Hospital.

So you know that I am. It will be my “bedtime” knitting when I am sitting in bed watching something on Netflix on the ipad.

I am so excited. It is completely autopilot knitting, garter stitch all the way. The hospital website gives some basic instructions but I may fiddle with it a bit (are you surprised at this??). I think that as long as it is the correct size they aren’t going to care if I do the squares as straight garter stitch or if I throw in mitered squares in the blanket. The only problem was that the blankets are knit with acrylic yarn, for it’s sturdiness, and I don’t have a lot of acrylic anymore. But I knew that the local thrift store probably had some for cheap and so I am now set with enough yarn for at least one blanket. Any of my Knit Sibs who want to get rid of their acrylic yarn, you know where you can take it. Or better yet…..knit a blanket yourself.

A Walk to Beautiful

Hamlin Fistula Hospital

4.
I have had cold veggie pizza for breakfast two days in a row this week.

The perfect breakfast.

Just thought you should know.

5.
Last week, when we actually had some warm weather, I had the sliding glass door open for the afternoon. Oh the smell of the outside air was so excellent. And it just shows how stale the inside air becomes after having the house shut up since October. HHBL and I live most of the warm months with the windows open. We are not particular fans of air conditioning. Don’t get me wrong, we will use it, but our rule is if the daytime temps are going to be over 90F and the night time temp isn’t going to cool down below 70F then we turn it on. OR if the humidity is crazy high. Otherwise it is windows open baby and the whole house fan on at night.

But now Mother Nature is being mean again and it is cold and cloudy and there was a skiff of snow this week. She is such a tease.

But warmer weather is just around the corner! And then the screens are in and the windows are open. I always sleep better at night if I can hear the night sounds.

The coyotes killing something in the woods is SUCH a wonderful lullaby.

6.
It is almost time for Max the Magnificent’s annual “shave”.

Oh Alpha tell me it isn’t so.

I was going to have this done next week but……it is still too cold I think. Max is an elderly dog and groans when he has to get up. I think that his hip joints would be better served by waiting until May when it is a bit warmer.

Elderly dog? Whose an elderly dog? I think I will lie down now and take my early mid-morning nap. Is it time for lunch yet?

7.
It is almost gardening season! Can you tell that LaurenLeap and I are eagerly anticipating. She was actually out at our little 1/100th of an acre of heaven on Sunday doing some work. We are rearranging beds and she was measuring and re-staking. We are making our plans and thinking our thoughts. This year we have decided to eliminate cucumbers from the rotation. The yield wasn’t worth the effort and we can buy pickling cukes very cheaply and easily from a local source. We are adding some Kale (but only for me as evidently LaurenLeap doesn’t like it!!). And there might be peppers this year. The spinach will be in pretty soon I would think as it really likes to be cold. And this year we are hoping for our first harvest of rhubarb. We planted a square of it last spring and then just let it be. Oh and I think we are going to try Butternut Squash as well and not plant those small pumpkins that turned out to be more ornamental than edible.

Excitement is rising and the urge to dig in the dirt increases.