7 Quick Takes (Vol 258)

You have your marching orders! When you are done decoding the blather contained in this super secret blog post you need to click on the picture above to be whisked, at a rate MUCH faster that Johnny Manziel’s NFL draft experience, over to Conversion Diary.

Blather made to order.

1.
Good customer service. I love good customer service. And Universal Yarn has fabulous customer service. I can’t tell you the whole story just yet because I can’t actually talk about the yarn that I ordered from them.

It might be currently on my needles being fashioned into something as a gift for someone.

But what I can tell you is that one of the skeins that I ordered had FIVE knots in the skein. One or two knots is acceptable. But five is a whole lotta trouble. Let’s just say that Universal Yarn made everything good again, and in a fashion that wasn’t just timely but super sonic.

I will tell you the whole story when I am done with what I am knitting and the gift has been given.

How’s that for being cryptic.

But really, if you want yarn, order from Universal. They have made me a customer for life.

2.
Every house has it’s own quirks. It’s own personality. Chez Knit is no different.

One of the things that we are finding is that when the weather outside is warm, the temperature inside will also be on the toasty side. We can get a cross breeze by having the front door open and the windows in the family room open as well, not a great cross breeze but a breeze.

However, at the moment we do not have any ceiling fans, which would help the situation. Those will come eventually. And at night we can’t leave the doorz and windows open except for the window in the bedroom.

It is May and I am NOT putting the air conditioning on. Not going to do it. However, that meant that the temperature in the master sleeping chamber (I have been reading too much Elizabethan history) was, shall we say, just this side of the temperature that I need to bake a good loaf of bread.

Thank goodness for oscillating fans. I had that baby on low and pointed stationary right at my poor menopausal body all night long.

3.
The grill is gone.

You didn’t know it was going anywhere? Well it was and has. The behemoth big grill has gone to live at the office of HHBL where it can more easily participate in Grill Fridays. It is happy. We are happy. Everyone at Public Insight will be happy.

And we will be happy here at Chez Knit when we get a grill that is more suited to the size patio we now possess.

I am also so very glad that you didn’t see us this morning putting the Behemoth in the van that HHBL rented. I did a fairly accurate impression of a Russian heavy weight lifter. I am thinking that I could sign up for the Clean and Jerk competition without any difficulty.

Thank goodness I no longer have a uterus that might have fallen out at an inopportune moment.

4.
I am completely enjoying the do it yourself macro journey that I am on. It is definitely a journey of adjustments and contemplation. It is about learning what a lens turned backwards on my camera body is actually capable of and what is the best set up for coming close to capturing the photos that I see in my head.

It is also about understanding what this do it yourself macro set up can and cannot do.

I cannot, for the most part, hold the camera in my hand all the while trying to get the focus right manually and still expect that I am going to have any kind of clarity. I must use a tripod.

I am also finding that the angle at which the camera is situated also make a great deal of difference. When you have the lens on the camera with the reversing ring there are things that you can do and things that you can’t. You can set your ISO and exposure. You cannot set your fstop. It becomes a dance of moving the object that you are working with and zooming in and out with your lens and then very carefully adjusting your focus before hitting the shutter button and waiting for the timer to tick down.

I have also come to find that the best camera/lens position for this is with the camera pointing down as best as is possible. With the lens reversed the depth of field is as shallow as Kim Kardashian. The photos are much sharper with the camera placed at that angle rather than at a 90 degree angle to the floor or table surface.

Like I said, it is a journey.

My morning coffee grounds, obviously post use.

The every day average things are so very fascinating close up.

5.
The Spring fever continues here at Chez Knit. I am rearranging things in the kitchen area. I would like to better utilize the pantry space that I have and I would like to move most of my stocked up items and my canned items up to the kitchen area so that I can better keep an eye on stock and not have to go to the basement every time I need something.

But to do that I have to move some other things and then find a place for them.

It will all get done eventually, right about the time I get it into my head to re-organize again. I am not one to rearrange furniture but pantries and closets are totally fair game.

6.
A BIG Happy Mother’s Day to my momma. She is the best momma a girl could have.

7.
And here are the Instagram pictures for the week.

I am totally obsessed with Instagram.