Happy New Year

Just a quick post to wish everyone a Happy New Year. I don't hold with resolutions, so no lists here: they're hard to live up to and why should you only resolve to do better once a year?

It would be much more beneficial to resolve to do more fun stuff; add several extra hours per day to just have fun, not watch what you eat quite as closely, find a permanent designated driver and drink how much and when ever you wish and, best of all, have an unlimited budget and storage for all the yarn you could possible desire!

When I was young (under 40) I never understood the curse, "may you live in interesting times." Now I'm happy to answer, "Nothing" when someone says, "What's new?"

May 2007 be kind to you and uneventful.

My First Calendar Dishcloth

I could hardly get folks out the door Christmas evening so I could start my first dishcloth from my new Dishcloth Calendar. Since I'm a big fan of Andi's lace pattern dishcloths on Monthly Dishcloth Yahoo Group I started with March's Little Shells Pattern by her. I used Peaches & Creme.





Also finished the Mid-December Kal from the same Yahoo Group; in Peaches & Creme

Bloomin' Tree

Christmas is two days past, I KNOW, and here I am with my Holiday Post. First the knitting content.

I tried my hand at two-handed fair isle with Knitty's Center Square hat. Everything worked but my floats so the hat is a tad small. Suppose to fit an adult but ended up fitting my 4 year old great nephew.

Our animals are very hard on full size Christmas trees so for the last few years we've had a rosemary tree. Never before has it bloomed while in the house.

Do you see the purple flowers? They sorta clashed with all my red themed ornaments. Different don't ya' think??

Christmas Eve morning we visited the Hillcrest Farmer's Market to buy flowers for the table. It was a beautiful day for a morning stroll through the vendors' tents.

Finally Annie with her Christmas Rawhide bone. She knew that she should have a present too and wouldn't leave us alone in the morning until she got hers. I have no idea how she knew since we kept her presents out in the car, never bringing them in the house!

See that tongue action?

Frost Advisories in Paradise

Those new to San Diego say we never have any weather here; that it's always 72 degrees F and sunny. Here are pictures to prove them wrong - yeah I had to wait several years to photograph the evidence but whose counting.

We had a cold winter storm passing through here since Saturday; rain, wind frost advisories and actual snow in our inland mountains! This is a big deal in San Diego; it was the lead story on the local evening news tonight - I'm not kidding, lead story!

Headed home after work today the Eastern sky was something to see. The light was right out of a Plein Air painting; gorgeous warm pinks and soft oranges. I was sure it would be gone before I could make it home and into the house to grap my camera. Here are two of my shots taken at 4:30pm PT. I was so lucky it lasted until I could take these pictures



The lower center of the clouds you can see it raining. Soon to move east and turn into snow in the Laguna Mountains.

Cooking Tuesday

Youngest Daughter had a day off from work and offered to come over and help decorate the house for Christmas. (Yeah, I don't care for the decorating part of the holidays. It's not a bah humbug thing it's just that it's time away from knitting and sewing.)

I had a table full of ingredients that I'd bought to make the Cranberry Orange Bread recipe that I found in the December 2006 issue of Sunset Magazine. When Youngest Daughter saw the flour, sugar and dried cranberries she decided she'd rather bake than decorate.

Fine with me!! She started measuring and mixing while I grated orange rind and squeezed them for juice. (She pointed out that this was the first time we'd done Christmas baking where I was the Baker's support team which has traditionally been her role. She did a couple decades of helping Mom and Grandma bake for the Holidays. Time she took over I'd say!) I enjoyed the supporting role; and the whole day.

Here you have 9 mini and 1 full size loaves of Cranberry Orange Pecan Nut Bread and 5 mini loaves of Lemon Poppy Seed Bread. (I should have cleaned up before taking the picture; they're still on the racks we used for cooling and glazing.)



That wasn't enough cooking. I then made two trays of beef and cheese enchiladas. Here's the tray we baked; the other went into the freezer.


The day ended with the following score: 15 loaves of Nut Bread - two trays of enchiladas - and three dishwasher loads.

Oh, and we did get the living room decorated too.

Willy Boy

We have a 16 an-a-half year old orange classic-tabby cat named Willy. (named for Willy Wonka) He has perfect bull's eye circles on both sides.

My older daughter got him from a friend whose cat had kittens - remember back when you could easily find a kitten from a home that you knew? He was cat-food-commercial cute.

Here he is at 4 or 5 months old sampling my catnip plant.

The house we lived in when he was young was a two story with an open staircase with rug covered steps. Willy use to race up the steps, around through the rooms on the upper floor then duck under the top step on to the huge cat tree's upper perch and then jump 8 feet across to the sofa and then he'd be off for another lap. Sometimes he reversed direction. My youngest niece use to come down and ask if she could come watch Willy fly.

(This huge cat tree was a real tree that had been removed from my sister's front yard. Carpet covered squares were attached to several of the larger limbs to provide padded perches for sleeping and observing.)




Later years Willy got fat and slept most of the time. He was so lazy he wouldn't even hold his head up he just lay there.
















Friends gave us an ornament that looked like Fat Willy

These days Willy Boy is moving much slower. He's lost a lot of weight due to a Hyperthyroid condition which also makes him meow VERY LOUDLY. We're always having to get his attention to stop the hollering; his volumne is permantely stuck on HIGH.
He's still a sweetheart. His favorite spot now a days is a laundry basket full of clothes.

Starting to Feel Like Christmas

That Christmas-y feeling got it's toes in the door last night.











We went to see Cygnet Theatre's Holiday Play, It's a Wonderful Life, A Radio Play. We are season subscribers and bought the extra tickets for their Christmas Play just because we support this Theatre to the best of our means. I didn't expect much from "a Radio Play" - what's that? A group of actors just reading a script?

Well, it was much, much more! They re-created the 1947 setting and atmosphere of a NYC radio studio; clothing, hats, nylons with seams, huge face-covering microphones and best of all a sound man with all his gadgets that was a delight to watch.

You know the Movie - you know the script of this play; only thing missing was Jimmy Stewart's stammer.

We thought the play started 15 minutes late but it wasn't until afterwards that I realized watching the actors on stage visiting and preparing as we entered the theatre and found our seats was part of the play. A few of the actors came down in character and visited with the audience. That was a little weird - what do you say to a make believe person?

I realized I really miss the old time singing commercials after hearing the three performed during the "Broadcast."

If you're in San Diego this month forget the movies and try and get tickets for this very nostalgic Christmas piece.

And here's a not to be missed synopsis of the story!