So Many Socks!

 Why knit so many socks? What is the appeal? 

For a knitter, there are great long bits of mindless knitting down the leg (unless you do fancy cables, which I do not do), then a fiddly bit that you have to concentrate on to make the heel and gusset, then some more mindless knitting in the round until you reach the toe. For me, that's a perfect combination of easy and more difficult.

For the recipient, handknit wool socks are a way to have warm feet and fun colors that can show or not. 

As you can see, I have a lot of orange shades to use up.

Gift socks (two pairs)

Two more pairs, both for me

More gift socks

Another orange pair for me...

...and another pair for me

 

Horse Rescue

Do inanimate objects have souls?

For many years now, I've watched the decline of this poor horse in the yard of an abandoned house. From the road he looked like one of those mechanical horses outside supermarkets that kids would ride for a quarter. I used to dream of rescuing the poor thing. 

This year, as a birthday wish, I gave a sort of hero's quest to my son and husband. Please, please, rescue that horse from that terrible neglect and let me give him a home. 

They actually did it! They found the property owner and made sure they would be able to "rescue" the horse. Then they discovered something--this was no mechanical horse on a base that would stand on the ground--this was a horse made of cement! He was extremely heavy and his poor legs were broken off. He needed me more than ever. 

My son gathered a bunch of big burly friends. They brought trucks. They brought work gloves. This morning they went to get my boy. 

He was in tough shape, and so heavy the rebar bent when they tried to stand him up

It took a lot of strength to move him into place

And here he is, upright once again after all those years of lying in the dirt. 

His name is Chauncey, after the pony that "belonged" to me on a ranch in Arizona I once visited as a child. You can read about that visit, that pony, and the cowboy who gave him to me here in the post called Tenderfeet. 

The Story of Little Toad

Our town has a Trap, Neuter, and Return (TNR) program that encourages people to capture "community," or free roaming unowned cats. The cats are then taken to the local shelter and neutered or spayed, then released back to where they have been living. The hope is that this program will eventually and humanely reduce the population of feral cats. 

Cats are apparently marked after the process by having their ears tipped, so they can be easily identified from a distance as already neutered. 

I know that this program has been in place for many years--sometimes with government funding and sometimes through the goodness of private citizens. 

One little guy who was the recipient of this free service was a young gray and white cat. He was so friendly and sociable that folks wanted to have him taken in by one of the many no-kill shelters here and offered for adoption, but at the time there just wasn't any room for any more cats. So he was released back into "the wild"--his neighborhood near the downtown plaza. 

Then fate took a hand. One evening, the director of one of the most successful shelters was dining out with friends at the Little Toad Creek Brewery downtown when the gray and  white cat came up and "spoke" to them. They knew he was asking for a home so they took him along, named him Little Toad, and featured him as the Action Programs for Animals Pet of the Week. 

I saw his story on Facebook in mid-July and couldn't believe that he was not adopted immediately. Two weeks later, he joined our family. He made himself at home immediately. He wasn't bothered by the cats or the dogs. He isn't at all shy and greets visitors at the door and shows them to a comfy chair, just like a little maitre d'. 

Little Toad at the shelter, waiting...

Home at last; best friends with Minky (whose shelter name was Butch Cassidy)

Everyone gets along. L to R: Little Toad, Henry (shelter name Jupiter), and Minky

Hats for the Homeless Shelters

I've been knitting these hats in odd moments--while watching the [mostly terrible] news, listening to Congressional hearings, or during the scary bits in Killing Eve that I don't want to see. Almost all of my backlog of acrylic yarn has been used up now. The hats will go to our public library in November, to be distributed among the homeless shelters in town.

 

More Socks

 One last pair of gift socks. I think I have reached the saturation point with family members. Our sock drawers are bulging!

Those of you with keen eyes will spot the color mistake I made while knitting and watching TV at the same time.

Late Gift for Christmas

 Handknit from Knit Picks Static yarn, Rooster colorway

39 Hats for the Homeless Shelter

I knit these over the summer.

 

Socks Knit for Christmas

 

Saying Goodbye to an Old Friend

I donated my well-loved and well-used Ashford spinning wheel to the thrift shop today. I seemed to have lost the knack for spinning and my kids--although they had fond memories of this wheel--had no place for it. Besides, it really needed a home where it would be used for spinning, and not just for display. 

My favorite local thrift/charity shop, Rock of Ages, agreed to take the wheel, all my spinning tools, and three large bags of wool, silk, angora, llama, and alpaca fibers. I hope that someone will buy it all and will use the wheel for many years. It would be a wonderful Christmas gift for the right person.

I ordered the wheel in 1975 from the Ashford Company in New Zealand. It came as a kit which I put together myself. It was a great learning experience and I was always glad that I knew every part of my wheel, its name and function and how everything went together. I kept the directions all these many years. 

 

Here I am, back in the day, spinning with a group in a park in Sumner, Washington. At that time, I was an early member of The Moonspinners, a spinning guild that met in the evenings. I also co-owned (with my friend, Marj) a spinning and weaving shop in Sumner called The Country Weaver.

This shawl was my last big project--hand spun, hand dyed, and knit of soft wool. You can follow the whole process in this post, From Sheep to Shawl. 

Thank You For Your Kindness

As I was lacing up my sneakers for my morning walk today, I realized that the very people who had helped me so much had last seen me in severe pain, but had never heard the rest of the story--the story that they had set in motion through an act of kindness. This post is a thank you to them and a reminder to us all that what might seem like a small kindness can change someone else's life.

Back in 2007 when I was 62 and still working, I was in so much foot and knee pain that walking was becoming more and more difficult. I had even cancelled out on our proposed 25th anniversary trip to Italy the year before--we had a family trip to Yellowstone instead, where I was wheeled around in a rented wheelchair by my cheerful son, Ben, who made wheelchairing fun. 

I had come to believe that joint pain was a part of growing older. As I limped through each day, I was resigned but sad to be missing out on so much.

One day, while walking down the hall at the school where I was librarian, I was hit with such severe knee pain that I grabbed at the wall for support. I hadn't realized that one of my fellow teachers was walking behind me and saw my agony. Di, an occupational therapist, took me by the elbow, saying "You are going to the principal's office with me, NOW."

It turned out that the principal had a wonderful orthopedic surgeon. She handed me the phone number and these two good samaritans stood over me while I phoned and made an appointment. I will thank both of these women to the end of my days!

Within a week, I got a shot in my knee that gave instant relief that lasted several months. I met with my own doctor and we mapped out a plan to deal with my bad joints starting with the ground up. I had foot surgery as soon as it could be scheduled, which meant that I had to retire before the end of the year as originally planned. 

Once I had healed, we moved cross country to New Mexico. I had my right knee replaced in April 2008 and the left one replaced on November 8th of the same year. 

People talk about life-changing events, and now I know just what they mean. Because of the kindness of two women (and the expertise of medical specialists) I can walk without pain. I'm 76 now and, since those surgeries, have been to France and Iceland. I've hiked in many amazing places around New Mexico and the Southwest. I walk six days a week through pecan orchards and along irrigation canals with my friend Florence, who is five years older than me and who inspires me every day. 

Thank you to the friends who saw me in pain and found a way to help. You made such a difference in my life.

July Morning

This is that morning, the one where there is some indefinable something in the air that promises that autumn will come. Is it the coolness, the dew (so rare in the desert), the sound of the owls hunting in the orchard? Autumn is still months away and the day will soon be blazing. But, still. This is that morning.

Thinking About San Francisco

I'm working on this puzzle and it's bringing back so many memories of my childhood in San Francisco--waking up to the sound of foghorns and seagulls, riding my bike around the block in the fog, going by streetcar to the children's room in the big library on 19th Ave., getting lost in Golden Gate Park, going to Fisherman's Wharf with my parents for fresh crabs (and later sneaking the stinky shells into the trash cans down by Ocean Beach).

We lived in San Francisco from 1945 to 1956. I arrived as an infant in a little Ford with my parents who had driven cross country from Maine. At first we lived in housing for naval workers at Hunter's Point. At some point my parents were able to purchase a house on 48th Ave., just one block from the beach. When I was five, my little sister was born. (Note: My parents sold that house in 1956 for $11,000. Houses in that neighborhood are priced in the $750K's now!).

It was such a different time for a child. I rode my bike anywhere on the block as long as I didn't cross any streets. There were three taverns on that block and I would hold my breath as I passed to avoid the smell of stale beer and cigarette smoke. There was also a lady who lured children into her house to teach us Bible stories with a felt board. I went for the felt board, which fascinated me. I don't think I ever mentioned this adventure at home--not because I was being naughty, but just because kids' activities weren't generally a part of our dinner table conversations. 

A neighborhood friend and I took her doddering old grandpa on a walk to nearby Golden Gate Park where we all got turned around for a bit before finding our way home again. I wonder if my parents even knew we had gone. We were probably around seven at the time.

Francis Scott Key Elementary School, opened in 1908. In the late 1930s a more modern FSK school opened, but this old building, known as "The Annex" when I attended K-3, was still in use in the late 1940s 

When I was ready to go to kindergarten, my bachelor uncle (unfamiliar with children, I imagine) walked me there on the first day--down 48th Ave. to Judah Street, then up Judah to 43rd Ave. The second day he sent me to walk there on my own. To my credit, when they eventually found me, I was standing in front a big house painted in the same brown and yellow colors, but many blocks away.

I walked a couple of blocks down 48th Ave. when I was probably in 4th grade, to a skating rink to take ice skating lessons. Once again, by myself. No one hovered in those days, and the term "helicopter parent" had yet to be invented. 

Eventually I was allowed to go on the streetcar by myself to the library--what an adventure! I would take out as many books as the librarians would let me pile up and would start reading on the way home. 

Going back to work on my puzzle now.

Audrey Gets Dressed Up For the New Year

Here is Audrey on November 1

She is a Turken or Naked Neck chicken, but when she is molting she is naked all over in patches. 

What a mess!

 

By November 18, you can see that Audrey has begun the (painful-looking) process of growing out new feathers. 

Here is a graphic illustration of what is happening. The whole technical explanation that goes with it can be found on the Cornell University Bird Academy's page "Everything You Need to Know About Feathers." It's really worth your time to look at this beautifully illustrated article.

And here is Audrey today, January 14, in all her iridescent splendor. 

Happy New Year!

Books Read in 2021

This list will be added to during the year.

Backman: Anxious People Audio

Bharara: Doing Justice; A Prosecutor's Thoughts on Crime, Punishment, and the Rule of Law

Box: Dark Sky (Joe Pickett #21) Audio

Brown: Inferno (Robert Langdon #4)

Brown: The Lost Symbol (Robert Langdon #3)

Brown: Origin (Robert Langdon #5)

Cameron: Bone Rattle (Arliss Cutter #3)

Cameron: Open Carry (Arliss Cutter #1) Audio

Cameron: Stone Cross (Arliss Cutter #3)

Church: The House at Otowi Bridge

Cleeves: The Crow Trap (Vera Stanhope #1)

Cleeves: The Darkest Evening (Vera Stanhope #9)

Cleeves: The Glass Room (Vera Stanhope #5)

Cleeves: Harbour Street (Vera Stanhope #6)

Cleeves: The Moth Catcher (Vera Stanhope #7)

Cleeves: Raven Black 9 (Shetland Island #1) Audio

Cleeves: Red Bones (Shetland Island #3)

Cleeves: Silent Voices (Vera Stanhope #4)

Cleeves: White Nights (Shetland Island #2)

Clinton: The President is Missing. Audio

Conroy: The Water is Wide

Doerr: Cloud Cuckoo Land

Evanovich: Eleven on Top (Stephanie Plum #11) Audio

Evanovich: Fortune and Glory (Stephanie Plum #27) Audio

Evanovich: Hard Core Twenty-Four (Stephanie Plum #24) Audio

Evanovich: Top Secret Twenty-One (Stephanie Plum #26) Audio

Evanovich: Tricky Twenty-Two (Stephanie Plum #22) Audio

Evanovich: Turbo Twenty-Three (Stephanie Plum #23) Audio

Evanovich: Twisted Twenty-Six (Stephanie Plum #26) Audio

Grafton: W is for Wasted (Kinsey Millhone #23)

Grafton: Y is for Yesterday (Kinsey Millhone #25)

Grisham, J.: Camino Island (Camino Island #1)

Grisham, J.: Camino Winds (Camino Island #2)

Grisham, J.: The Chamber

Grisham, J.: The Confession

Grisham, J.: The Firm

Grisham, J.: The Guardians

Grisham, J.: A Painted House

Grisham, J.: The Pelican Brief

Grisham, J.: The Racketeer

Grisham, J.: The Reckoning

Grisham, J.: Rogue Lawyer

Grisham, J.: The Rooster Bar

Grisham, J.: Sycamore Row (Jake Brigance #2)

Grisham, J.: A Time for Mercy (Jake Brigance #3)

Grisham, J.: A Time to Kill (Jake Brigance #1)

Grisham, J.: The Whistler (The Whistler #1)

Grisham, J.: Witness to a Trial (The Whistler #0.5)

Grisham, S.: I'll Take Your Questions Now

Haig: The Midnight Library Audio

Hamilton: Blood is the Sky (Alex McKnight #5)

Hamilton: A Cold Day in Paradise (Alex McKnight #1)

Hamilton: Die a Stranger (Alex McKnight #9)

Hamilton: The Hunting Wind (Alex McKnight #3)

Hamilton: Ice Run (Alex McKnight #6)

Hamilton: Let it Burn (Alex McKnight #10)

Hamilton: Misery Bay (Alex McKnight #8)

Hamilton: North of Nowhere (Alex McKnight #4)

Hamilton: The Second Life of Nick Mason (Nick Mason #1) Audio

Hamilton: A Stolen Season (Alex McKnight #7)

Hamilton: Winter of the Wolf Moon (Alex McKnight #2)

Hannah: The Four Winds

Hiaasen: Strip Tease. Audio

Hoffman: Magic Lessons (Practical Magic #0.1)

Johnson: Daughter of the Morning Star (Walt Longmire #17)

Johnson: Next to Last Stand (Walt Longmire #16)

Johnson: Now in November

Mandel: Station Eleven. Audio

McCall Smith: Chance Developments Audio

McCall Smith: The Colors of All the Cattle (No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #19)

McCall Smith: The Department of Sensitive Crimes (Detective Varg #1) Audio

McCall Smith: The House of Unexpected Sisters (No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #18) Audio

McCall Smith: How to Raise an Elephant (No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #21)

McCall Smith: The Miracle at Speedy Motors (No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency #9). Audio

McCall Smith: To the Land of Long Lost Friends (No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency #20) Audio

Meltzer: The Escape Artist (Escape Artist #1) Audio

Millet: The Children's Bible

Montgomery: The Soul of an Octopus

Morgenstern: The Starless Sea. Audio

Moriarty: The Husband's Secret

Newman: Falling. Audio

O'Farrell:  Hamnet. Audio

Patchett: The Dutch House. Audio

Patterson: Cross My Heart (Alex Cross #21)

Patterson: 1st Case 

Patterson: The Summer House

Pears: Arcadia

Pears: The Raphael Affair ((Jonathan Argyll #1) Audio

Picoult: The Book of Two Ways. Audio

Raden: The Truth About Lies; The Illusion of Honesty and the Evolution of Deceit

Shipman: The Charm Bracelet

Smiley: At Paradise Gate Audio

Smiley: Some Luck (Last Hundred Years, A Family Saga #1) Audio

Waters: The Woman at Otowi Crossing

Winton: Dirt Music

Winton: The Riders

Wolff: Landslide; The Final Days of the Trump Presidency

Woodward: Peril

Mending a Memory

 My mother must have made this quilt for me some time in the 1940s, as I remember it being on my bed when I was quite small. Over the years it had gotten worn and was mended by some clumsy hand stitching (probably mine when I was a teenager). When the quilt was too far gone for further use, it was put away in a cedar chest, where it lay folded for decades. 

This is what much of it looked like:

After much thought (years and years of thought!) I finally decided I was brave enough to try to save what was salvageable. I cut off the two sides that were in the worst shape, added binding to the cut edges, and then took out the awkward old hand stitched mending. This made all the tears and worn spots visible and ready to be dealt with. 

Next, I used fusible interfacing, cut into tiny pieces and inserted into large rips and into small places where the fabric was worn. It was painstaking work, just perfect for this terrible pandemic year. When a piece of interfacing was set in place--sometimes with tweezers-- between the two layers of ancient fabric, I used a damp pressing cloth and a steam iron to fuse the three layers together. Tiny scissors trimmed away stray threads. 

And here it is: Faded, worn, and somewhat smaller than it used to be--but it is hanging where I can see it first thing in the morning and last thing at night, just the way I remember seeing it when I was a child. 

Morning Walk

This was my walk this morning--past horses, onion fields, an irrigation ditch, and a pecan orchard.

Horses at the neighbors' place

Field of onions being harvested.
Planted last fall, each onion is now the size of a large grapefruit

This field was quiet and empty two days ago. Now it is filled with kneeling workers,
carefully picking onions and placing them into the big crates. A forklift works day and night, 
loading the containers onto trucks.

Irrigation water flowing down from the Elephant Butte Dam, about 80 miles to the north

Pecan trees. The dust in the distance is from the onion harvesting.

The soil under the pecan trees looks like this between flooding by irrigation

Back home again to the big scary cactus, started with just two pads 11 years
ago and now about 9 feet tall.

Pandemic

These are worrisome and anxious times, what with the whole world experiencing the coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic. I wanted to put some links here so that we would know what to do if one of us falls ill.

As of today there are 43 cases in New Mexico, and one case in Dona Ana County. The first tests were made available today and ran out in 2 hours. More tests will be available on Monday.


General Information and a Counter (more up to date than the CDC site below)

Johns Hopkins Coronovirus Resource Center: https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/

Keeping Track of the Spread of the Coronavirus, Staying Up to Date on Advisories and Closures

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention--Number of cases in the U.S., number of deaths, source of exposure (updated at noon each day): https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/cases-in-us.html?CDC_AA_refVal=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cdc.gov%2Fcoronavirus%2F2019-ncov%2Fcases-in-us.html

New Mexico Dept. of Health--Number of cases in New Mexico, number of tests given, cases by county, and links to testing sites: https://cv.nmhealth.org/

City of Las Cruces, COVID-19 Alerts--updated daily, local closures, where to get tested, community resources: http://las-cruces.org/AlertCenter.aspx?AID=Access-Local-Coronavirus-Updates-here-74
Note: Be sure to click on "view all updates" (in red and on the right in the center column) to see all of the prior updates. There is a lot of information here.



More Information From the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention

Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)--How to protect yourself, symptoms, who is at risk, and general resources. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/index.html

What to Do If You Are Sick--if you think you have been exposed to COVID-19 or if you have symptoms, these are the steps to take. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/if-you-are-sick/steps-when-sick.html

Disinfecting Your Home if Someone is Sick--How to clean and disinfect surfaces in your home, how to launder items, etc. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prepare/disinfecting-your-home.html?fbclid=IwAR1nbuAmHd81W9xThTtbpOX_b_YZIijOsqivtQEwB4x7d1kvXKjtgao-yMA

I probably will add to this list as I think of more questions.

More Sweaters for Refugee Babies

A friend in my knitting group has offered to deliver baby sweaters and hats to the Salaam Cultural Museum in Seattle for shipping to a Syrian refugee camp in Jordan. The folks at the museum will add the baby garments to boxes made up for new mothers. The boxes also include blankets, diapers, and other baby necessities; then the boxes themselves serve as baby beds. 

Here are my latest contributions: