September

I am a bad, bad blogger because I seem to have missed a post for August. And most of July. Whoops? There was no way I wasn't going to get on here and talk about my (truly) beloved Woodstock Fair that is held on Labor Day weekend and the fact that I...

WON BEST IN SHOW for knitting again. Woooooooo! 

I LOVE THAT WHEN THAT HAPPENS, I'll admit it. I only enter stuff in that I think is better than average, which means I don't enter in stuff every year, but I'm still surprised this year by my win because, man, there were SO MANY great handcrafts this year in all departments, not just the knitting one. It was a great year for the contests and I loved spending my time pouring through all the contest barns (three).

My Fruit Stripe socks also did well. :)

I have no idea what it means to have a Superintendents Award (they were new this year) but I'll take it! THE MORE RIBBONS, THE BETTER.

So very good year for my knitting. I registered the mittens when they were barely started *gulp* and quite literally didn't finish them until the night BEFORE I had to drop them off. Heh. Luckily, I'm quite familiar with mitten construction/Fair Isle colorwork so I didn't hit any road bumps along the way with anything. 

Unlike a champion animal, both of these guys will be put to work this winter and get a lot of use. (The last pair of Best in Show mittens have since gone on to put in time shoveling snow and actually getting DIRTY and quite roughed up.) No rest for the woolies come winter, no matter what they win. :)

I won't bore anyone with endless pictures of sheep, bunnies, chickens, etc. I have folders full of them but, honestly, they don't change at all from year to year. The above photo is my first attempt to try a panoramic shot with my iPhone, atop the hill where the tractors/old timey machines live. Because of the hills, you only get about 1/3 of the fair in there though. What a gloriously beautiful evening though! The weather was perfect!

I've never entered in any cross stitching but I'm thinking about it for next year because the theme for next year is 'America the Beautiful' and I do love a patriotic stitch. You have to get prior authorization to submit into the theme contest though so I'm still mulling over ideas and researching it. (If you have a favorite good sized, somewhat primitive/sampler-ish, good contrast patriotic design that comes to mind, please feel free to share.)

There has been a lot of knitting in general this summer for me. (Along with a lot of reading.)

 There's been a scarf finish, in this wonderfully nubby and WOOLY, sheepy Icelandic yarn.

 More socks, with varying success. I couldn't hate the purpley ones MORE if I tried. I've tried to use that yarn (which is expensive but will remain nameless) several times for several projects over a great number of years and it's never worked in any capacity for some reason. Doesn't work for these socks either but I didn't have the balls to just throw them out. Sigh.

 More work on squares for the Neverending Scrap Yarn Blanket. (Plus another batch in my bag that need to be blocked.)

I think I need a small break from it though before I start something else. As soon as we came home from the fair I drug out my stitching and put this to bed:

Honey Bee Hill by BBD. I only had a bit in the left corner to do so it was an easy finish. I do love my bee patterns. :)

Also, this happened this weekend:

A customer packaged returned to me. Look closely at the date though. *ahem*

Now THAT'S a first for me. WHERE HAS IT BEEN ALL THIS TIME?

Think about THAT next time you are complaining about a slow package. COULD BE WORSE.

Like, a WHOLE YEAR worse! Ha!

Hey look!

I actually made some progress on a couple projects. Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! That hasn't happened in a while. (Seriously - where did the summer go? I feel like I did nothing, went no where, etc. It was a pretty depressing summer though, for the most part. It's probably better that it's over actually, now that I think about it. Good riddance summer? lol)

These are my 'Jury Duty Jaywalker' socks finally finished. I had jury duty in July and I prepared for that by making sure I had a pair of wooden circular needles (because you can't have metal needles here) and got some nice striping yarn (because I lovessssssssssssssssss striping yarn) and even started the cast on in a much-loved-by-me pattern (Jaywalkers) to get them ready for some major courtroom knitting and......................my jury duty was canceled. Of course. (I'm 0 for 4 now in being called up for jury duty. I'll get there one day, oh yes I will! lol) Oh well. I finished them eventually.
 

I'm not going to try and figure out many times I've knit this pattern now but it's a lot. (Ten maybe?) There really is nothing better out there to showcase a self-striping sock yarn, IMHO. And it's free to boot! (I think? It used to be free. It's PROBABLY still free? I should check that. lol)

Okay so this isn't finished, not by a long shot, but I'm very proud I made it this far on this. It's a creepy, waaaaaaay out there Halloween design that has been in my stash a long, long, long time. (Long enough that this particular fabric is no longer sold so I'm glad I got it at the same time as the pattern. It really needs a linen with character, I think, to offset the crazy design.) It's not easy trying to cross stitch when you have a silver bullet who likes to LAUNCH herself at your Q-Snapped piece like it was a trampoline. Seriously. What is the appeal?? She just comes out of nowhere and BOUNCES off it like a gymnast! It's funny but it makes stitching, uh, a little slow. Heh.

Not that these guys are ever naughty like that. Oh no. Perfect angels, all the time. *snerk*

(They just turned 12 weeks this Sunday and I'm fairly certain that = Terrible Twos. I'm starting to turn into Bad Mommy with the No! Don't Chew That!s and No! Biting!s and the always popular Get Down from There! And then 10 minutes later they are snuggly cuddle muffins who melt your heart. *sigh*)

My beloved Fair was this weekend and, in fitting with the whole summer, it was kinda depressing so I'm not going to bother to post pics. *sniff* It was dark, dreary, rainy and humid (oh god, HUMID!) the entire time it was going on so we didn't spend much time there. Also, I didn't enter in anything this year so there was excitedly hunting for ribbon status, etc. Maybe we'll go to the Big Eastern Exposition in Massachusetts in a couple weeks to try for another 'fair fix'. :)

Woodstock Fair 2012 (picture post)

 Best of Show? Oh me, oh my. *fans self*

Well that wasn't on my radar at all. I got worried when I didn't see them in the Handcrafts barn (thought they got lost) - until I figured out they were in the next barn over in the Best of Show booth. Worrying over. Heheh.

Ribbons be damned, I still plan on wearing the heck out of those mittens this winter. :)

Some photos from the Fair:

 There are lots of barns FILLED with all sorts of animals there to be judged (cows, sheep, turkeys, chickens, ducks, baby animals, pigeons, guinea pigs, .......MORE)  but my favs are the bunnies. Foofy, fat-faced, quiet little buns.

 This lil guy was a Grand Champion.

This trio was cute enough to make me want to hug them.

I kinda like the foofy, fancy pants chickens too though.

Naked sheepies playing a three way game of 'Head Butt'. Those two would be head butting while the third was butting the back end, then they would switch places and keep it going.

Look at the crazy horns on this one. I don't know that I've ever seen a sheep (ram?) at the fair with his horns still intact. He was very anti-social though and refused to turn around and say hi.

This might be the biggest sheep I've ever seen. Look how TALL it is. And BIG. I think someone forgot to tell him he's not a cow.

This year's Giant Pumpkin Winner was over 1,450 pounds. 

That's a whole LOTTA PIE! (I always wonder what they *DO* with these afterwards.)

I would love to grow one of these just as a lark. Like, right in the front yard so the neighbors would oogle and stop in their cars. lol

 

The annual sand sculpture was still in progress Saturday night. 

They start it Wednesday but don't finish it until Sunday. They still had a lot of detailing and other things to do to the dragon/gargoyle in the front. 

 There are a lot more barns filled with produce, baked goods, all manner of art like photographs and paintings, a whole barn of entries from children, handwork, etc., all for judging, plus you have your agricultural barns where you can make butter, play with baby chicks. A field full of tractors from all eras, plus other old machinery. It's what makes this fair my favorite. It's all so organized and there is just SO MUCH to see. (Plus all the rides though I have to admit I don't go down that end. One of us - not me - doesn't 'do' rides.)

I had my one annual corn dog (YUMMY!) and we split a few other fair favorites between us, like 'German' fries and an apple crisp 'sundae' and ended the night, as always, sitting in the grandstand watching go-kart racing under the lights. I never made it down to the other fairgrounds (down the hill) where all the horse jumping and dressage is done but I just watched SO SO SO MUCH of that with the Olympics so I didn't really miss it.

Another Fair done. Whew.

Busy busy busy as a bee.

Catching up to orders again after getting behind a bit last week with the 'no power' thing= NO FUN AT ALL. Quite frankly, I'm a little mentally tired of making beads after going non stop on them now for a full week without a break. One more long work session and I'm caught-the-hell-up so weeeeeeeeeeeee!! 

Because of that and all the mess of last week we didn't get to go to the Fair all weekend long like usual but we whooped it up Fair-style Saturday night. 

 I never ever get tired of yakking with and petting the sheepykins in the sheep barn and oogling at all the crazy chicken breeds, especially this 'headless' poufy, rock star wonder:

Crazy, right? Poor thing couldn't see a THING.

I could post, ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, about a gazillion more cow, bunny, steer pulling, kart racing, crazy food pictures but I don't want to bore y'all. My love for the Fair knows NO BOUNDS but I fear I'm in a lonely group. lol

So tomorrow is a day off. Where I get to take my poor ailing Nitwit to the vet one last time and see if the doctor can talk me into not putting her down. :(

Guys, I can't put up with the peeing around the house any more. :(

I never thought I would be one of 'those' people who would do something like this but it's been going on since last December or so and she's had multiple blood tests, xrays, special foods, two rounds of expensive medicine, new litter box set-ups, etc. to the tune of almost $1,000 now and NOTHING has helped. NOTHING. There hasn't been a single bit of progress with her peeing on throw rugs, any bit of clothing you leave hanging around (including laundry) and chairs. (Hell, sometimes it's just straight up on the bathroom floor.)

She's 15 and is obviously suffering from some sort of medical issue (always tired, drinks too much water, somewhat dodgy liver/kidney numbers) but it continues to evade diagnosis and now I'm just...........done. She's jumping up on things now to pee on them so literally nothing is safe and I don't know what else to do. Every vet visit is another $200 because of the testing and I can't do it anymore. (Between her and Mooshie's gimpy tail, this year has been a huge money drain, vet bill wise. It makes me a little nauseous to think about it actually.) I feel horrible about it but she's had a long life and she's clearly been feeling dumpy for at least 10 months now. He might have one last 'miracle cure' tomorrow but I'm not holding my breathe. *sigh*

(Note: she still uses the litter boxes just fine in addition to this. It's like she drinks a gallon of water some days - but not always - and then can't tell when she needs to go so she just goes on the first fabric thing she sees. But when she's having a feel-good day, she makes it to the litter box just fine. There just aren't many 'feel good' days left anymore though as the months go on.)