New Addition

This past week most of my time was involved either in preparing for the new arrival or getting him ready to appear in his first story. I made a pair of pajama bottoms for Billy and another one for Emil. I'm using a purchased T-shirt to go with each. (The cute bear fabric came from BJ's Quilt Basket.)

Emil arrived right on schedule, on Wednesday. I was getting a haircut, when I received a text from DH: "Your Emil has landed!" As soon as I got home, I unpacked the box. All of the special extra items I had ordered from My Doll Best Friend in the UK had been carefully packed around the doll, so the package was only big enough to hold the doll box. Here's what Emil(ia) looked like when I opened the box and took all the other items out.

One of the extras was a pair of glasses for Emil. I tried them on as soon as I took down his hair, got him out of the girl's costume and into his PJs. The glasses were perfect! I could already see him as a boy.

Thursday morning was haircut time. First I brushed and washed his hair using a shampoo with conditioner, being very careful not to get water near his eyes. I let him lie for a while with the shampoo doing its work while I got out a towel and prepared the other things I would need.

After rinsing out the shampoo, again being careful not to get the water near Emil's eyes, I began to section out layers of hair in small amounts, using a knitting needle to separate the hair. I did the front first, making sure the bangs wouldn't hang down over his eyes. Then I started on the back at the bottom of the head and working up, then one side the same way, and repeating with the other side. I was careful but not afraid. I knew I could get a very nice wig if something went wrong.

The big problem with cutting rooted doll hair short is that the hair sticks out from the roots. Without the weight that comes with long hair, the short hairs stick almost straight out of the roots. I layered it a bit around the sides and back.

Here's how he looked from the front when I had finished. (The hair had dried by then.)

Here's how it looked in the back.

I wet his hair again, used the glasses to help hold the hair close to his head on the sides and a hair band to hold the rest of the hair down while it dried.

When it was dry, I took off the hair band. I was actually surprised it worked so well, but I thought I could still get the hair a little flatter, so I put Billy's winter cap on Emil's head and left it a few hours. That worked well, but the upper layers of hair were then a little too flat, so I used the doll hairbrush to fluff it up around the top, sides and back, leaving the hair around the edges of the sides and back flat. I snipped a few wayward hairs that weren't the right length.

I was gratified to find that the glasses held the hair down on the sides. It still stuck out a bit in the back, but I had a plan. I changed Emil into his nicer clothes and took some photos. I was happy with the result.

Here's the full body view. (As with Billy, I put a fleece "corset" around his body between his chest and waist to give him a more "manly" look under his clothes.

Here's Emil with Billy.

Friday, I wanted to follow through with my plan to hold the hair down in the back. I had thought about an eyeglass band to hold the glasses on, like the band or harness athletes who wear glasses use to keep their glasses from flying off. My first thought was to sew loops on two ends of 1/4" elastic and slip the temple pieces through them, but that didn't work. The glasses just slipped out, because the elastic is covered with a fabric exterior and couldn't grip the plastic. 

A friend who collects and dresses all kinds of dolls suggested using a rubber band using a cow-hitch knot at each end. (To make a cow-hitch knot, you wrap one loop end of the rubber band around the temple piece and put the rest of the rubber band through the loop. To do the second one, you have to make the loop first and then put the  temple piece into it, tightening it down.) That worked a treat:

The added benefit is, now I don't have to take off the nice glasses when I'm moving the dolls around.

Emil will appear in this week's story. In last Friday's story, we learn that Emil is very nearsighted and needs hearing aids that are built into his glasses. These are designed for a conductive hearing loss, which is what he has. He can "hear" other dolls' thoughts just fine. (That's how dolls communicate with each other.) He can't hear cars, doorbells, music, dogs barking, etc., without his hearing aids. I wanted a character with a disability, and this seemed the easiest to do. I thought it would be interesting to introduce a disability into the stories.

In other news, we got our first snow of the season on Saturday. Fortunately, we were expecting rain and realized we had a window of "dry" weather long enough to get in our two miles, so we walked the dogs.

Goodbye, summer! We've been continuing our walks. Sunday we had some sprinkles while we walked, but we didn't get wet. I made cocoa when we got home. I hope we can keep it up.

What's on my needles: Still the Sunshine in the Rain. I thought I would be done by now, but it has been a busy week. I may have to rename it "Sunshine in the Snow" by the time it's done. I'm down to the last six rows. I thought I only had to knit the final pattern for two rows, but it's supposed to be five rows, so there you go. With luck, next week you'll see it.

What's on my sewing machine: Still clothes for Emil.

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt. No progress this month.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: Emil. Veronika gets a letter from an applicant for the new cast member. Mariah explains why you still have to know how to spell, even if you have Autocorrect, and the dolls choose Emil. (You knew they would!)

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Still A Scandal in Battersea by Mercedes Lackey.

What's in my wine glass: Terrain Vineyards California Red Blend 2016, a staple wine for us.

What's my tip of the week: If you're using iron-on transfer sheets that call for using an ink-jet printer, be sure you either a) have an ink-jet printer at home or b) can get the transfer sheets professionally printed within driving distance. There are places that will print iron-on transfer sheets for you using a laser printer, but they have to use a transfer sheet that is designed for laser printers. They may have them at your print shop. Call first. Not all print shops have them, I learned.

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

Cleaning and Keeping Clean

I knew you'd rather see this than watch me washing floors:

Those are my Banana-oat Waffles. I've shared the recipe before. It's a good use for bananas that have passed their prime.

Now that I have your attention, here's a rundown of my week, other than making waffles.

The Doll's Storybook was scheduled through the time we were gone on our trip, but I had another one in the works. I needed to be written, though, and then photos taken. It's called The Cruise That Didn't Happen. In it, Veronika was going to go on a cruise to the Bahamas before a hurricane destroyed her dream.

Of course, she was disappointed, but Veronika being Veronika, she was philosophical about it. The dolls talk about how to deal with negative emotions and Mandy gives a short lesson on how hurricanes form. I had to clean up my fiber studio before I could take photos.

I'll be cleaning up the knitting docket soon. I'm coming to the end of my "Sunshine in the Rain Shawlette" after all the extra knitting time during our trip. Just one more pattern repeat to go, the bind-off and blocking. I could be wearing it this week.

Friday was the Climate Strike, and our little town of Bend put in a good showing with "hundreds" of people showing up, according to an article in the Bend Bulletin. The local event was run mostly by high school students, and the participants were predominantly young people, but we noticed a lot of other grandparents turned up. It was a good reminder to be good stewards of Mother Earth.

After the demonstration, we stopped in at the Bend Brewing Company for a beer.

On Saturday, I had a visit with my friend Eevi, who came down from Tualatin with her parents to visit her aunt for the weekend. I picked her up and we went to BJ's Quilt Basket. We met online at the Knit Picks Knitting Community about 2009 (?) and stayed in touch after the Knitting Community folded (due to the assault by spammers), primarily through Facebook and Ravelry's The Frog Prince and His Knitting Community Orphans group.
We went to the Old Mill District for a stroll and stopped in at Flat Bread Pizza for lunch, where our wait person took this photo.

After lunch, we went back to Eevi's aunt's home and picked up her dad, before coming to my house for coffee and pulla, an old Finnish tradition. Eevi's dad is Finnish, so we had lots to chat about dealing mostly with Finnish food and our favorite dishes.

Sunday I got to sing with the new choir for the first time, having missed the choir's first time to sing for the new year last week. We have a few new members with the start of the new year after being off for the summer. It was fun singing with a larger group. On Wednesday we had cleaned up the pieces we were singing, so they went pretty well. I think everyone was pleased.

In other news, Zachary has lost his third tooth in nine days. At this rate, he'll need some choppers soon. He says that his doll Zachary Jr. has also lost some teeth, although it doesn't show. The Tooth Fairy had to reward the doll, too. I guess you could say the two Zachary boys cleaned up, money-wise.

The Oregon grandkids participated in a 5K run/walk/skip/jump event on Saturday to raise money for local schools. It was put on by Reed College with a number of sponsors. They were joined by their cousin and everyone's parents. The boys are, from left, Soren, Leo and Johan. Leo's parents are in the middle.

The cast of The Doll's Storybook will be welcoming a new member this week if all goes well. We needed a second boy, so this doll (called Emilia) will get a haircut and become Emil. I'm going to try to do the haircut on my own this time. I hope it will look neat and tidy when I'm done, Otherwise I will have to order him a wig. If he's ready, he will be introduced this week, as he's due to arrive on Wednesday. I think this face will work well as a boy.

He had already left Los Angeles when I got up yesterday morning, so I'm sure he will arrive this week, even if there is a delay.

What's on my needles: "Sunshine in the Rain," a shawlette from this pattern. Also still making some dishcloths to have something mindless to work on.

What's on my sewing machine: Clothes for Emil.

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt, but no progress this week.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: The Cruise That Didn't Happen.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Still A Scandal in Battersea by Mercedes Lackey. Not much progress this week.

What's in my wine glass: Phigment Red Wine Bland 2017 vintage from the Notso Wine Company. Lovely!

What's my tip of the week: You don't have to buy those expensive single-use Swiffer pads for your Swiffer (if you have one). You can make a reusable one. It's a simple knitting project. There are a lot of different designs available, but this is the one I like. Just spray on your choice of cleaners that doesn't need rinsing, or dip the Swiffer into the solution, and you're ready to go. When you're done, you can throw it into the laundry or wash it by hand, if you need to use it again. I plan on having several, so I can try to keep my floor clean, a never-ending job.

It takes 60-70 yards of cotton worsted yarn, such as Sugar 'n Cream, which also is good for dish cloths.

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

San Diego!

Fiber first, as usual. I needed a lightweight project to take with me camping and on the plane, so I started the Ginger Leaves Shawlette by Christina Wall.

I was planning to do just the kerchief, but then I decided it was going to go too fast, and I would have enough yarn to make the larger version.

Most of the week was spent in getting the trailer put away and getting ready for the trip to San Diego for DH's 60th high school reunion, but our DDIL had brought me a bunch of tomatoes from her veggie share, and I needed to freeze them.

I know you can just throw them into a bag and freeze them, but I decided to peel them, so I blanched them and pulled off the peels.

We didn't know when the first freeze would come, so DH harvested our pitiful crop of tomatoes.

We had gotten a late start, but we expect to better next year.

Wednesday night, we dropped the pups off with DBIL, who is just three blocks away from us. They know him, and we have stayed with him in his house, so they didn't seem to mind being left. He sent us this photo Thursday night.

 We flew out of Redmond early Thursday after breakfast at the airport. We had to go through Seattle, so it was a long day. After we arrived and checked into the hotel a few blocks from where DH used to live on Point Loma, we went out for a walk to the fisherman's wharf and then along the harbor to see what was new since we were here last. San Diego has a lot of new microbreweries, and one of them is located right along the walkway. We decided it wasn't too early for a glass of beer.

We walked a little further and finally stopped for dinner at a real Italian place. We left with a box of leftovers for the next night. Our waitress looked just like Lúcia Moniz, the actress who played Aurelia (Colin Firth's character's cleaning lady, and ultimately love interest). She even had the charming accent, but Italian, we think, not Portuguese (as we think Aurelia was). If was almost like going to Italy for dinner, as all the servers and other members of the staff seemed to be Italian. 

The next two mornings found us walking Shelter Island. One of the sights was this monument to the fishermen who have been lost at sea over the years.

On Friday, we visited with an old friend from college at lunch, which lasted several hours. After that, we picked up some flowers and took them out to the Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, where my in-laws are interred.

During our Shelter Island walk on Saturday, we stopped at the Half Moon Inn, now called Humphrey's Half Moon Inn, where we spent our wedding night 54 years ago. The concierge, a charming gentleman originally from Mexico, who has worked at the hotel since 1973, obligingly took our photo in front of the hotel.

We had two parties to go to on Saturday. The first was a check-in and get-together at a place called The Thursday Club. It's primarily a venue for weddings. There was a buffet of appetizers and a bar with wine, beer, soft drinks and cocktails. A band belonging to one of the alumni from Point Loma High School's Class of '59. 

Some people got up and danced, but most were trying to find old friends and carry on a conversation. It was a great band, though, and they played a lot of tunes popular in the '50s, when we were in school.

After that, there was dinner at a local Mexican restaurant.

Even though I went to a different high school and graduated a year later, I had lots of memories from the time before and after I met DH at San Diego State, so I could follow the conversation. It was also interesting to hear about where his friends had gone and what they had done since high school. I didn't meet any old girlfriends, but that isn't surprising, because my DMIL told me should couldn't remember that he ever dated a girl more than once before me.

Sunday morning, coincidentally our anniversary, one of the classmates treated us to a champagne brunch at the Bali Hai on Shelter Island. I ended up the only woman at our table with seven men. (One was walking around when I took this photo.) Sorry the photo is backlit, but we had a window table with a gorgeous view of the harbor, with sailboats tacking here and there.

After brunch, we had a few hours before our rental car would turn into a pumpkin, so we went out to Sunset Cliffs, where DH reminisced about some of the fun he had as a kid coming to the beach and playing along the shore and in the rocks. You can sort of see how he became interested in geology.

There were a lot of surfers, but the surf didn't seem very good, at least not like the photos you see. It was beautiful, though, and the day was sunny and warm.

We flew through Salt Lake City on our way home. It was the perfect end to a perfect day.

It will take a couple of days to recover. We got in about 11:00 PM and had to drive home in the rain, so it was after midnight when we finally feel into bed, exhausted but glad to be home.

What's on my needles: Ginger Leaves Shawlette

What's on my sewing machine: Waiting for doll clothes, mostly.

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: Getting Answers, which came out Friday.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: A Scandal in Battersea by Mercedes Lackey. There hasn't been time to listen much this week, so I've really only just started it. We used the Walk for a Dog app a lot. (You can designate "no selected dogs" if you have to walk without a dog, or they can let you "walk" their office dog.

What's in my wine glass: Still the Rex Goliath, although there have been a lot of others this past week.

What's my tip of the week: You can eat and drink a lot and still lose weight if you do enough walking. We walked 11 1/2 miles while we were in San Diego, including those steep steps at Sunset Beach. 

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

Better Late....

We were planning a camping trip over the weekend. Preparations for it dominated my week. Of course, I needed a project to work on while camping, so I cast on the Ginger Leaves Shawlette by Christina Wall. Here's how far I got over the weekend.

I've have the pattern for a long time. I decided I needed something yellow to wear when the days get gloomy, so I picked out Knit Picks Palette in "Semolina."

I cleaned our 5th wheel during the week and stocked the fridge, pantry and closets. We left about 1:00 PM on Friday. We had hoped to leave earlier, because to get to Suttle Lake we had to go through Sisters, and there was going to be a Folk Music Festival starting at 5:00 PM. The traffic wasn't as bad as we expected, so we were all set up well ahead of the arrival of the Beaverton grands, expected at 6:00. (I think it was more like 7:30 PM.)

We took the pups on a short hike from the campground while we were waiting.

Saturday, we were all set up and ready to enjoy the camping experience. The campsite was huge, so we had plenty of room for the boys to run around.

The boys had new paleontology vests and hats, along with some equipment they could use while looking for fossils during the hike around the lake.

The dogs really enjoyed being off leash for a while.

Dusty surprised us, and himself, too. We came across a lady with two dogs at a small beach. She was using a Chuckit to throw a ball out into the water for her two black labs. Dusty––previously a nonswimmer––suddenly went after the ball. He jumped into the lake and swam as fast as he could to try to get to the ball. I had a tennis ball in my pack, so I pulled it out, and we threw it for a while. The dogs had a lot of fun. I think he will swim again now, if he has something to go after.

The entire hike was 5 1/4 miles. It was easy for the dogs and adults. The boys, with their shorter legs needed some encouragement to keep going toward the end, but they made it. We had marshmallows (vegan, additive-free) for dessert, so we roasted them. (What kind of wine goes with marshmallows?)

On Sunday, we went to Bend for the Great Drake Park Duck Race. The kids' race started at noon. During the time leading up to the race, the kids had lots of activities they could enjoy. Here's Soren coming down the slide to the finish line of an activity that was a race that included climbing and walking on the squishy, bouncy blow-up course.

Here's a shot of the ducks approaching the finish line.

After the kids' race, we went to a deli for lunch. We had the pups with us, but we found out that dogs are allowed inside restaurants in Bend, just not in the kitchen area.

The afternoon race was for the adults, with a grand prize of a $20,000 voucher to the local Ford dealer. There were lots of other prizes, too, for both races. We will probably attend the race next year, too, but I'm thinking we will leave the pups at the house (Rocky didn't like the loud music), and we'll take camp chairs and a picnic lunch.

The only unpleasantness we had during the weekend was the combination of a weak battery, a battery charging unit that hadn't charged enough and a generator that didn't have enough oil to deal with all the charging that needed to be done to keep our water pump, fridge and lights working. I had to use my laptop for recharging my hearing aids and the car charger for the phones. That messed up my plans for getting the blog up and running on Sunday.

Besides the hike around the lake, we managed to work in a few other walks, including just around the loop in the campground. That took us up to 300 points on the Walk for a Dog app.

I've discovered that each walk of 1/4 mile or more gives you 10 points. Every walk ends with an advertisement or a short video commercal, so it makes sense that more walks add more to the revenue pool from which the donations to dog-related charities are drawn. I think we'll still do our two miles each day. It's worth it for the exercise.

Friday's story in The Doll's Storybook was The Last of Summer. The dolls are trying to get as much outdoor play in before the weather cools off.

(My apologies for the late posting. With the electrical problems, no internet and maxed-out data plan, it was impossible to write up the post before Monday.)

What's on my needles: Ginger Leaves Shawlette.

What's on my sewing machine: Clothes for Emil

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt. Very little done this week.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: The Last of Summer.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Finished Back in Society by Marion Chesney. Also finished The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs by Steve Brusatte. (We had been listening to that during our last trip to Beaverton. Now ready to start A Scandal in Battersea by Mercedes Lackey.

What's in my wine glass: Rex-Goliath Cabernet Sauvignon.

What's my tip of the week: Sun tea can be made in the refrigerator just fine. Just get it ready (bottle or jar of water with a tea bag or two) and put it into the fridge. It can be done the night before, but the process actually happens fairly quickly.

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.