Unfinished Business

When I looked at my photos, which is how I usually figure out what I've done during the week, it looked as if I didn't do anything to take photos of. Then I decided to make a list of the things I did this week, and then I took a couple of appropriate photos. Here's my list:

1.) Wrote the holiday letter. (It's too long and needs editing.)

2.) Finally got around to cleaning the Fisher-Price Jenny doll with baking soda and then putting her through the laundry, followed up by a conditioning rinse for her hair. (See photo below.)

3.) I polished up Friday's story, then wrote three more, which will take us through most of December and took all the photos for the Christmas Eve story.

4.) Tidied the workroom and organized the yarn so it would all fit back in the Billy cabinets. Also consolidated the books to get rid of one box and went through most of our daughter's stuff she didn't want, to see if it would be worth donating.

5.) Supervised Rocky's coming and going, and gave him his medications and eye drops. Also too him to the doggie ophthalmologist, who was encouraged by his progress. Continue the drops and take him back in six months if he's still with us.

6.) Took Dusty to get his haircut.

7.) Two trips to the post office to mail books.

8.) Laundry (with Jenny in one load).

9.) Cooked meals, baked bread, etc..

10.) Cleaned one bathroom shower stall. 

11.) A few rows of knitting (Jackson's sweater).

12.) Ordered a few Christmas presents.

13.) Choir practice. (We had a lot this week. It's "Lessons and Carols" for the second Sunday in Lent.)

14.) A couple of walks with the dogs.

15.) Sang all that stuff at Church.

So here's Jenny after cleaning:

Here's Jackson's sweater. Almost ready to divide for the sleeves.

This is the "after" photo for the cleaning of the workroom.

Here's a screen shot of our performance. First, our wonderful instrumentalists:

Then the choir. How did we get to be so many? (I think it has to do with our director.)

If you have a few minutes and are willing, please go to Amazon and B&N and search for "Emil: Stories from The Doll's Storybook by Peggy Stuart" in Children's. Every click on the page for the book makes it more likely they will keep a good supply in their warehouse and stores. If you are outside the US, you may have a separate website for these retailers. If you have a copy of our first book, Mariah: Stories from The Doll's Storybook, it would help if you left an honest review on the websites, especially if you bought from them.

Where's my blog: If you want to follow my blog, go here and sign up to follow.

What's on my needles: Still the Bright Lights sweater for Jackson.

What's on my loom: No progress.

What's on my sewing machine: Its cover. I had hoped to piece the quilt this week, but just couldn't manage it.

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

What's in The Doll's Storybook: Charlotte and Emil, and The Festival of Lights. Emil got to light the candles all week. He explains the origin story of Hanukkah on the first night and deals with Pippa's unintentional upstaging.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Listening to State of Terror, a novel, by Louise Perry and Hillary Rodham Clinton on the Audible app. Fascinating so far.

What's in my wine glass: Madroña Vineyars's Lake Tahoe Zinfandel, 2016. It was a bad year for us, in some ways, but a good year for this wine.

What's my tip of the week: Unsalted butter works well to replace shortening..

Where are my books: The stories in each book first appeared in the blog and they are reproduced with few changes. Emil: Stories from The Doll's Storybook is now available for preorder from booksellers world wide. The link for Book Baby is here. The three stories are Best Buds, Getting What You Want, and The Boys Cook Dinner.

Mariah: Stories from The Doll's Storybook is also available. The three stories in the first book are Being Little, Besties, and Distraction.

If you don't get free shipping from Amazon or B&N, buy from the BookBabyBookshop, because 50% of the price goes to St. Jude. Other booksellers pay much less. 

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.

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A Week of Events

There wasn't a lot of fiber fun this week, but I managed to finish one washcloth to go to a military troop stationed in Africa....

....and have a good start on another one.

I plan to wash them before sending them, as I've found that the dye in cotton yarn often runs.

The "Sunshine in the Rain" shawl is blocked and ready to wear. It was pretty easy to block, because it has holes in all the right places to line up to block evenly.

It took about 24 hours to dry.

We had our time taken up during the week with filling out paperwork to apply for a loan to refinance our house so we could get a better interest rate and finish the improvements and repairs. One glitch was the "Peggy-Margaret thing," as it has come to be known.

Back in the day, when I applied for my Social Security card, I was allowed to use "Peggy" although my birth certificate, passport, voter registration and driver's license were all issued to "Margaret." That was 1961. There was no problem at all until a few years ago when Utah passed a law that mandated that the name on your Social Security had to match your driver's license. By then, I was already receiving Social Security and didn't want to mess that up. I also didn't see why I had to change my name legally to Peggy, so I fought it. My state representative was able to get DMV to waive the issue. When I renewed, the same thing came up. I had a new state representative, who also was able to smooth the way for me to renew.

When we moved to Oregon, I was given the choice of which name I wanted on the license, but they recommended using Margaret, because that was what was on my passport, just in case I needed the additional identification for traveling overseas. So all my adult life (from 18 on), Peggy worked, received paychecks and paid income tax, while Margaret drove, voted, traveled overseas and gave birth to three children. With this refinance, the lender decided they wanted to have proof that I was both Peggy and Margaret, so I had to try to find the scanned copy of the letter I received from the state of Utah explaining the problem and the emails between my state representative, the person at the DMV and myself. Finding all that was a headache and took time, but I was finally able to produce them. It resulted in one more document for me to sign, too, but all's well.

On a lighter note, Friday's story in The Doll's Storybook was about a cat Mandy brought home from school and Emil's surprising ability. Here she is, taking off her coat after bringing the cat home in a box.

And here's the cat.

I've been trying to get permission from the manufacturer of the dolls (Götz Puppenmanufaktur Intl., a German company) to use my photos of the dolls in a printed book. I had received some legal advice that if I could document that I tried to get their permission and they didn't respond to my inquiry, they would have a hard time suing me if I went ahead and did it, so when they didn't respond to several emails, I sent them a registered letter, thinking that would be my documentation.

That was August 28th. On September 15th my letter arrived in Frankfurt, but then tracking only said it was en route to its destination. There was no change as of Wednesday, when I went to the post office to see if they could help me with tracking. The local post office only had access to the same information I had, but gave me a number I could call to find out what to do. I was busy with other stuff (see above) so it was Friday before I called. The representative I talked to on the phone explained how to put in an inquiry online. That would start the process of getting in touch with Deutsche Post to find out where my letter went. I spent half the day trying to file the online form.

After finishing with USPS online, I checked my email messages and discovered I had an email from Götz. In it, they said that they were delighted to give me permission, and that the wording I am using in my blog post explaining that I'm not affiliated with them and giving them credit for designing and producing the dolls was perfect for a published book or books, which meant they had looked at my stories. The next step will be to see if an organization that deals with pediatric cancer wants to get involved up front, if not, I'll have to self-publish on my own, but at least I can move ahead with the project. I'm so excited!

The week involved a lot of the H-word toward the end, because we have company coming this morning for coffee and pulla, and we had to clean the house. It needed cleaning anyway, because the appraiser will come sometime this week.

We went out Tuesday evening for a scotch-tasting party. We had 10 people. There is way too much to know about whiskey, but I could taste the difference, and they were all good. I found out that after you sniff the whiskey "neat," which means without mixing anything with it, you should add a few drops of water before tasting.

We watched this video together, just for fun.

The host had a small house, but she had a Steinway grand piano in her living room. she played a little bit for us.

It was fun having a small group in a casual setting. We got acquainted with everyone and had a nice time. It snowed when we left to go home. They are already planning another one, and we will be going.

We managed to continue our two-mile walks every day, in spite of the busy week, which included getting the dogs groomed.

It makes me tired, just re-reading all this! I hope to get in some fiber fun this week, and certainly the washcloths will continue.

What's on my needles: Washcloths for Africa

What's on my sewing machine: Put away for now.

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt. Another week with no progress.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: "Marmalade." Mandy comes home with a surprise.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: I stopped listening to A Scandal in Battersea by Mercedes Lackey to listen to How To Start a Revolution, a nonfiction book by Lauren Duca. The author is a young journalist and award-winning columnist at "Teen Vogue." The book made me laugh and cry at times. She talks about the new political awakening of millennials and other young people, and how they can change the world for the better peacefully. I can recommend it.

What's in my wine glass: Terrain Vineyards California Red Blend, 2016 vintage. One of our staple wines.

What's my tip of the week: If you have bare floors meeting wall-to-wall carpeting, you can sweep the dust and dirt from the floors onto the carpeting and then vacuum the carpet, rather than sweeping into a dustpan. Obviously, you would only want to do this if you planned to vacuum the carpeting right after sweeping. Otherwise, you will be tracking the dirt and dust back onto the floor. (It's good to pick up any larger objects, such as books, newspapers, dog toys, balls of yarn, etc., first, though.)

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.

Old and New, Shake and Twirl

Joanie and I went to the Acorn Antique Show in Ogden, Saturday, with her companion, Ana.


We had lunch at the Union train station, as usual, at the Union Grill. Joanie presented me with a boy sheep and a girl sheep for Mothers' Day. I took this selfie with my two new friends.

There's always a quilt or two, but this time there were loads of them. I can't remember when I've seen so many quilts at the fair. Here's a little antique quilt show for you:












While we were at the antique show, DH and an old college friend were going over photos and slides from field work they did in Mexico in the '60s, putting names to faces, dating the photos and scanning them. They finished on Saturday, and he left Sunday.
I knew on Monday that we would be having company staying in my fiber studio, so I cleaned the place up (again). Here's what it looked like before I cleaned this time.



And after—



We saw "The Music Man" at Pioneer Theater Wednesday night. Great show, one of my favorites, and this cast was outstanding.


Common Threads met at Ginny's on Thursday. Kay brought this afghan to work on.



Kay had just returned from a four-month cruise. She had lots of photos, a whole iPad full. We only got through February, so we will have to see the rest of her photos next time.

While we looked at the photos, I worked on DH's Diagonal Cross-Rib Socks. I got more done in the back seat of Joanie's car on the way to and from Ogden, while Ana drove.




Details of pattern and yarn are here.


This week also saw progress on the Kai-Mei socks. The first sock is done.



Kai-Mei details here. I had a hard time getting a good photo. The navy yarn is almost black, and so you need lots of light, but the flash turns it into a regular dark blue.

The other big event this week was the earthquake. This is the first earthquake you could feel from our home since we moved into it in 2003. It happened on Saturday, so I missed it because I was on my way to Ogden. It wasn't a big earthquake, but it was exciting, because they are pretty rare where we live. DH and our visitor both grew up in California, so they knew what it was.

For this week's cuteness, Miss Daphne got decked out for her dance recital dress rehearsal.

What's on my needles: The Diagonal Cross-Rib Socks for DH, second sock moving along. Ready to CO his "March of the Fibres" cardi when I get a chance. Also the Kai-Mei socks, first sock done.

What's on my Featherweight: Still the third block for the First Ladies Quilt. The next class is this week, so I'll be back at it.

What's on my wheel: Still Full Circle spinning fiber in "Pigeon."

What's on my loom: Still some warp for another scarf. Watch for some progress this week.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Listened to While Drowning in the Desert by Don Winslow on the Overdrive app. It was hilarious, but with suspense. Just finished reading Marie Astor's To Catch a Bad Guy from iBooks. It was well worth the read.

What's in my wine glass: Twisted Old Vine Zinfandel, 2012. A favorite, but not because it has the same name as my favorite yarn shop in Portland.

What's my tip of the week: While knitting, I find I often need to work a row/round with some change to the pattern along the way, such as decreases or increases, followed by a row/round of working straight in pattern. When working back and forth, there may be a noticeable right (or public) side and a wrong (or nonpublic) side, with all of the pattern maneuvers done on the right side. If so, it's pretty easy to know when to work the decreases.
Sometimes, however, you can't tell which side is the side where you work the pattern, or you're always on the right side, as is the case when working in the round. Take sock toes. You might work a round with some decreases, then work a round straight knit. (You really should learn to read your work, of course, so you can tell which round you're on.)
However, if you're sitting in one spot, working away, you might try this little trick I use, which saves me from having to squint at my dark navy sock toe. I get my tape measure, stitch-marker box or some other item that has a right side and a wrong side. (Even the TV remote will do.) Lay it on the table or couch near you, right-side up, as you start the first decrease round. When you get to the end of that round, flip it over so it's upside-down. If your mind wanders (as mine often does) or you get interrupted, you can tell at a glance which row or round you're on. Right now I'm using my little sheep measuring tape. If I can see his face, I know I'm working the decrease round of my sock toe. If his butt is in the air, I'm working the round straight without decreases.



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 were harmed during the production of this blog post.