Is anyone interested in adopting Siena?  She’s a wonderful sweetheart of a dog, who will curl up next to you on the couch if you let her, howl when she’s really excited, come up to you and smile with her big brown doggy eyes, asking for pets…

The time has come when I am forced to admit that I cannot care for her right now the way she should be cared for. We have too many dogs, and I don’t know when my health will improve. R gave me an ultimatum last night, and with a heavy heart, I must let Siena go.

The deal was that she could stay if someone could brush her with the Furminator brush every week, and I haven’t managed to brush her even once. My parents brushed her, R brushed her, but then no on brushed her, and the hair built up, and 2 and 3 weeks ago I felt well enough to vacuum, but I think those were the only 2 weeks I felt well enough in the last 3 1/2 months, and I haven’t managed to hire a housekeeper yet, because the first one I called had her phone number disconnected and the second one I called didn’t show up for the estimate appointment scheduled, and didn’t call me back when I called her afterward.  I need to call her again, or find someone else.

Anyhow, I’m off topic. Does anyone know of a good home for Siena? I’m about to go find the contact info. for the rescue group we got her from, Siberian Husky Rescue & Referral of California… She LOVES children. She is so dainty and light on her feet. She is the smartest dog I have ever been around — she amazes me sometimes with her sneakiness, providing endless stories and memories. I’m going to miss her. My mom made a painting of her. I’m glad I’ll always have that. It’s really been a pleasure having her.

This is really hard for me. I was only ready to give her up when I knew where she was going and I knew she would be taken good care of and I knew I would still get to see her.

ETA: She was growling at Mojo in this picture (just off screen) — it was a setup (R of course, nothing I would do). The grinch! Makes me laugh… Longer explanation here.

ETA: From L to R, our three dogs at the time in a row, my brother’s dog, and my parents’ dog at right front

ETA: [Note: for the pictures of Siena on pillows in this post, I left pillows on the couch, but in no way did I position her on the pillows or encourage her to sit on them in any way.]

I’m have pretty good faith that whatever home she ends up in through the rescue group will be a good one. However, I’m not certain, and that worries me a little.  If you live in the Bay Area and would like to adopt her, or know someone who would, please leave a comment.  I’d like to meet the family if possible, although this needs to happen fast.

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Damn, I was in so much pain yesterday, I couldn’t stand up, and R had to wheel me out of work in an office chair.  I was sitting in a meeting and the pain was really bad.  I was taking slow deep breaths to try to relax and ease the pain, and all of a sudden I was hyper-ventillating and I almost blacked out.  After that the pain was so intense I can’t even describe it.  I felt like I couldn’t move or breathe or do anything.  I slowly wheeled my chair around inch by inch (R was sitting right behind me) and told R to get my purse and drive me home.  Fortunately the meeting was wrapping up.  I thought about standing up and walking to the back of the room, and I was in so much pain I didn’t think I could get up out of the chair.  I decided to wait until R came back with my purse and ask him for help.  When he came back, he pointed out that even if he helped me up, he didn’t think I could walk all the way to the car, even if he pulled it up to the curb.

As he wheeled me out of the building, my manager offered to hold the doors open, and it became apparent that I wasn’t going to get through the doorway when I got stuck at the first door jamb, because the floor is raised at the jamb.  R and my manager lifted the chair over the bumps in the door jambs as well as onto the carpet in the lobby from the tile floor and the door mat outside from the cement walkway, and my manager walked out to the car with us and wheeled the chair back to the conference room.  Meanwhile, I just sat there, in the chair, with my feet out, and hand over my eyes, tears pouring down my face, cringing every time I was wheeled over a bump in the sidewalk.  There’s got to be some humor in this story, no?

I’m staying home today & tomorrow, taking vacation, because R’s going to Newark to take a motorcycle class from like 11-6, so I would have no way of getting home other than taking the bus, and I’m in no condition to take the bus, because it involves a lot of walking, hell, I’m in no condition to work.  Anyway, he’s taking this class because he thinks it will be a lot cheaper to get a motorcycle than a 2nd car, because there are many days when he doesn’t feel like bicycling or taking the bus.  We often carpool to work, but since I only work half-time, he has to find his way home without a car.

Let’s just say it hasn’t been such a fabulous first week back at work.  The only reason I returned to work is that my doctors, both spine & pain specialists said they don’t have anything else they can do for me, and last year after my doctors stopped doing things for me (oral steroids, injections) the insurance through work didn’t approve my disability leave anymore and I didn’t get paid, and I didn’t want that to happen again.  I can’t afford for that to happen again.  I don’t know what I’m going to do now though, since my manager told me not to come to work if I’m in pain (ha! that’s pretty much impossible), and I’m pretty much out of vacation (I’m actually borrowing vacation now, but I can borrow a week — great vacation, eh?  Sitting at home wracked with pain!)…

I’m not even coherent enough right now to work on finishing up the pattern for Sicily.  I’m barely coherent enough to write this post (with many spelling revisions).  I did finish knitting Sicily (Ravelry link) and I absolutely LOVE it!  But I look like HELL, so I’m not going to model it for you (and I’m in too much pain to drag out my mannequin).  I did however, take pictures of Aria (Ravelry link) a little while ago (or rather, I had R take photos of me in Aria, even though I looked mostly like hell in those pictures with big bags under my eyes) and Susan from Crystal Palace Yarns posted the FREE pattern.  I will blog about it soon!  And I will blog about another pattern I wrote last month and published last week soon too!  That’s it for now though, because I feel like I’m about to fall down, and I’m already sitting in my chair.

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I should be working on other things, but I keep being captivated by this new sweater design, Sicily, I’m working on.  It has a similar construction to Corsica, with a central cable band, but Sicily is worked in DK weight yarn (the sample is knit in Jaeger Roma) and it has a stockinette stitch lower body (finished off with a hem) as you can see in this photo.

Here’s a closeup of the cable band.

Beyond that, you’ll just have to wait and see!

P.S.  I really like the way I did the lower body shaping.  I tried it on and it fit like a glove.  Of course, the sweater ended just beneath my breasts and I was just wearing a bra underneath (or would you even call that underneath?), so  I wasn’t about to take a photograph!

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At the end of May/beginning of June, I knit these two scarves for people in the LGBT community to wear during the Lutheran General Assembly in San Jose this June.  A really good friend of mine requested that I knit a scarf for this cause as her birthday present, so I knit two.

For one of them I made up a lace pattern

The other, I knit diagonally

I strongly urge anyone who reads this blog who lives in California to vote to keep gay & lesbian marriage legalized in the state of California this November.  Vote NO on 8!  (I just saw a commercial for voting yes during the VP debate aftermath, so now I know the measure number…)

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I knit this shrug, the Two-Tone Ribbed Shrug from Fitted Knits (Ravelry Link). for my sister-in-law for her birthday in May.

I was knitting her this scarf, the Lace Ribbon scarf (Ravelry Link) from Knitty in Socks that Rock Bambu, but it was taking FOREVER because it’s on size US 3 / 3.25 mm needles (so that it would look nice, that’s not the recommended gauge or yarn for the scarf), so I gave up on finishing it any time in the near future because it was already several weeks after her birthday, and I whipped out the shrug in a few hours over a day or two.

I must say, Stephanie Japel must have the shortest torso of any widely published knitwear designer, because I tried on that shrug, and it looked absolutely ridiculous on me. Now, I’m only 5’7″, and I have long legs, not a particularly long torso, so I don’t know what’s up, but that’s one of two of her designs I’ve knit, Cathode being the other, to which I had to add 5 1/2″ to the body (and 1″ to the short sleeves)!   Ok, I’m done with my little rant. I know I have long arms, they go with the long legs. I usually have to add about 4 inches to sweaters with long sleeves. So, if you knit my sweaters, and you have short arms, you might need to shorten the sleeves. But I don’t have a long torso.

The good thing is that my sister-in-law is a good bit shorter than I am and thus does have a shorter torso, and reportedly, the shrug fits perfectly and is a nice addition to her wardrobe.

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