That's what friends are for...

You know your friends are the right ones for you when they get inspired gardening one day to stop and sew little catnip treats to give to your cats. Thank you Seth for embroidering this gem!

One thing that I adore about Seth is his love of playing games. We were walking in a big group somewhere... going to get ice cream perhaps (yes it was after the Belmont Stakes race) when Seth announced he had a present for me. With the hugest smile and on his face he decided I should play twenty questions to guess what it was. He's infectious enthusiasm inspired the whole group to play along and for the entire walk we shouted out our guesses. We had narrowed it down to a dried plant of some sort and when he just had to tell me about the catnip treats he and Garth had crafted for their two friends with cats. This was many weeks ago and I had kind of forgotten about it until last night when Seth handed the gift to me.

Sometimes I am struck by the kindness and generosity of these two friends (who coincidentally have been pals since their single digit days.) To have friends who are thoughtful enough to give you great random gifts is one thing. (Garth has brought me back special Texan beef jerky on two occasions now.) But to have that thoughtfulness extend to your two, quirky cats is quite something.

Some of you might be wondering why the toy says "ANG" when my cat's name is Dinah. Well, that's because when Seth met Dinah he picked up on an uncanny resemblance....

My new pal

There was quite a surprise waiting for me when I went home to Maine last week...My mom got a new kitten and didn't tell me anything about it! I walked in the house and he scooted on by like it was yesterdays news. Needless to say, I loved him immediately!

This was my temporary office on the one day I worked and sir kitten gazed at me through the screen...

Mom and I spent the week brainstorming names. My uncle was a big fan of the name trouble or Arizona. We considered a dogs name like Fido or Spot since, well check it out... he loves to play fetch!


My mom makes him these little tinfoil balls that he chases around constantly. He puts them in shoes, his water dish and every now and then right in your lap. Now, it's completely cat-style fetch, meaning he's in no way obligated to bring the ball back to you and you certainly can't expect it to be done quickly every time. He does love to play with the ball first, but then usually trots back and drops it beside you. This dropping, along with his little expectant wait for the your throw, just melts my heart. It make me feel proud. I can't wait to see him again!

Oh, the other names discussed:

Taz (I said no!)
Scribble
Arcade (this was a late contender that didn't get a fair chance)

but I think we settled on Rascal, right Mom? Or have you thought of more?

Umm, guys... there is a whole bed here

When ever I block anything, no matter where I put it, the cats seem to find it. Here they are snug as bugs in the rug, ignoring the rest of the big comfy bed. They'd rather sleep on pins, apparently. I wonder what the draw is? This yarn is alpaca/wool and when it gets wet, it does have quite a strong animally smell that maybe they're attracted to. Or maybe they just need to initiate the new object into their lives. Whatever the reason, I'm kind of pleased to see them cuddled together rather than chasing each other around fighting, even if it is all over my knitting! Make knitting not War!

Louis like to 'claim' other new surfaces as well, see. I moved these out for one minute!

I get by with a little help from my friends

Dinah was really very excited to help me write today. She hung out on my desk the entire time.

She's usually a little fur ball, but we had her shaved the other day to get rid of all her dreads. She's such a skinny little baby underneath I was afraid she'd freeze so I gave her one of the dog sweaters I had hanging around.

I think she looks pretty cute, right?? She doesn't seem to mind this shape either. I first tried a simple pull over the head version, but I think cats can't really deal with the front leg restriction. She kept trying to back out of it.

Anyway, here are some funny shots of her being her D-Dog self:




Mobile Units 1 & 2

I try to keep a nice clean and tidy home and for the most part, I think I do a good job. I'd like to think of my self as a good little home keeper, filling my kitchen with vintage trinkets and homemade pies....but if you look down you'll get a whole other image!

Meet the mobile units #1 & #2:
They belong to my cats Louis & Dinah who basically rule the floor. At any given moment the mobile units can be seen inching along under Louis's fuzzy paw with Dinah close behind. For some reason, Louis cannot eat until he's moved his food somewhere and since Dinah prefers to eat out of the same dish as Louis I decided to limit the number of floor obstacles by making them share. So Louis drags and Dinah reaches her paw in to scoop out one piece of food at at time. Together the two of them leave a lovely little trail of soggy cat food bits and tiny puddles. all over my floor, completely ruining the urban homemaker image I work so hard to achieve!

This diagram is slightly exaggerated... but not by much! I didn't even have room to show an entire day!!
I thought if I got them this heavy water cooler like thing, that they'd be satisfied by the bubbles and not need to move it around too, but how wrong was I? I think they see it as an even bigger challenge! Do you know how many times I've practically broken my neck because I didn't see the mobile units underfoot? Or sent water and food flying across the room by kicking them? Or stepped barefoot in a soggy pile of kibble? When you add the massive amount of fluff that comes off these two each day... my floor is worse than a teenage boys!

And yet my life is so much better, despite the dribbles and constant peril... just look how cute!

Shut in

I made a vow to shut myself in this weekend and get stuff made. Or at the very least, finish up the patterns for projects that need to be sent out. It's been a l o n g while since I've gotten up on a sunny Saturday only to nurse a pot of coffee and knit. It was so lovely to do that. Not knitting for work, not knitting to sell, just knitting because I had an idea and wanted to flesh it out. I sat through some pretty hainus Saturday morning cartoons and then That's so Raven before I switched to the NY channel for some equally hainus travel shows (where are you Kj?)

Today was so beautiful though, so I had to go stretch my legs. I headed to the farmers market to get some corn and cucumbers (my faves of summer) and also picked up the mussels which I mentioned earlier. Full bellied- I've now set in to computer land. Louis is helping me by guarding the door and making sure no one bugs me:

'Hey Louis, we're all alone this weekend cause rooms is out of town. I don't think anyone will be bugging me."

"Well in that case..." he says, "...I had better go sit on that dress before I loose the chance."

Louis always has to lay on ALL the projects I send out to clients. It doesn't matter where I put it, he will find it. Even if it's soaking wet, being blocked on a towel, with pins sticking out all over it- he just has to lay on it. Now he's moved to the pile of headbands that will be going out with the dress. I better remember to do furr ball patrol before I box everything up!

One last photo of the outcasts from this set of projects. I'll make sure to post the patterns as soon as they're published!

Weekend Review

Friday night I went out to a bar, that shall remain nameless. I did a lot of dancing, which was awesome and much needed. The fun thing about hipster bars (oh yeah, if you hadn't already figured, I didn't want to out my inner hipster, hence the nameless bar) is that the music is dancy but not your typical dance music. Country jams in abundance, who knows music from the ... ?? Not one song had I heard before, but I rocked out hardcore dudes!

There were some good dancers on the floor. Seriously, but I felt bad for this one guy who tried to get me to dance about seven times. The first time I actually went for it. He grabbed my hand and pulled me close and I thought "maybe he knows what he's doing and this could be fun." He put his hand on my shoulder and pushed me away about as hard as he could. I jerked to a halt when his arm ran out and then he yanked my arm to pull me back to him. When I got there, we just kind of collided and he pushed me away again. Figuring I'd give the boy a little help, I tried a little turn on the second way back, but we still collided and he continued pushing and pulling me as hard as he could. After a little bit more of this I stopped to say that I just didn't feel like dancing that way right now. All through the night though, he kept grabbing my hand to dance again but it was more like he forgot he had already tried me, than him being a pest. Once he come up from behind and when I turned he said, "oh, it's you" and walked away. Yeah, like I'm the problem. Boys should really learn how to lead if they want to twirl you round the dance floor!


Saturday was fun Brunch at Maggie Brown then cleaning and craft time. I made these mailboxes for my roommate and I. I've been wanting a way to cleanup our mail jumble and thought it'd be cute to have an 'official' mail location. I hung them in our hallway so we can drop the mail off on our way in.

I just used chip board, which I punched holes in and sewed together with a bulky yarn. I brought out my inner teenage collage spirit by cutting out letters from magazines to spell our names. I think I found a solution to make it a little more grown up though... I decided to stay in one color scheme. It was hard as heck to find a blue/green/yellow U, but I think it feels a little more 'designed' that way.

I found these pins at a street fair


Louis actually had nothing to do with the spilled sangria...