We had quite the storm blow in today.  I was off at work, but when I got home DH informed me the tree in the back was quite the mess.

It actually looks like lightening hit it here.  Although the winds were nuts, so it could’ve just been wind.

I hate having storms hit when I’m not at home.  Especially with my menagerie left unattended.  We moved once to a temporary apartment when DH took a new job and wouldn’t you know the apartment across the street from ours was hit by lightening and burned.  It didn’t burn all the way to the ground, but the top floors were damaged and a man and his dog were hurt.  Terrible to think about.  I know it’s a freak thing, but still I worry.

On the next block over a gas line blew a couple of years ago and set a house on fire and that one did burn to the ground.  It had little kids in it and a dog, but everyone got out safely.  I imagine they didn’t have insurance because the lot to this day stands empty.  Would never know there was a house there now.

Since this is dog’s on Thursday, I have an update about the menagerie.  Well, well, my Sophie has always been jealous, and the green-eyed monster has once again appeared.  Here she is looking innocent.

Even though she had just been out, she purposely let loose where Coco had been playing.  Uh-oh.  I spent a good portion of my morning cleaning up that mess.  I have a rule see - I may live in a zoo, but it will never look like or smell like one.  DH and I spend a good deal of time cleaning and disinfecting around here and I believe all the folks who have come have remarked it never seemed like all these pets lived here.  Anyway, I’ve seen the monster before,  it happened when DH moved in with us, and then again when we got Max.  When she was younger and spry you didn’t want to tick her off.  I believe DH did it a few times and got the brunt of it.  Well, more attention and walkies for her should set her straight.

So, there are several whiskers that reside in this house.  I know you may have forgotten with all those cute puppy pictures.  Last night we noticed Chrissy was having issues.  Other then shooting evil looks at Coco.  First there was a howl and then DH noticed an on coming squat.  Yup… looks like another bladder infection.  Off to the vet for confirmation today.

This is when she was feeling better. Of course she still has that “don’t mess with me look.”  It may be permanent.

Update:  Well we’ve stumped the doctor.  She doesn’t appear to have anything wrong with her right now.  I  would’ve bet on the UTI.  So now we think it’s just stress, so she’s getting some kitty Valium and just resting today.

First off just let me say, if you sorry if you stopped by earlier and could not get on.  I’m not sure what happened.  It was some sort of server problem.  I did some tinkering.  Don’t know if it’s something I did or it just got done, but it seems all cleared up now.

It rained overnight and was hot, muggy, and cloudy most of the day.  It did finally clear up later, but it stayed hot.

So, I did get to play with my loot a little bit, but mostly I spent the day with DH.  He’s been working a ton on a big project he has going on and we haven’t gotten to just hang for a while.  We just ran some errands and had a big lunch, but it was nice.

Onto the loot.  First off I love, love, love this little book.

This book has not gotten near enough press and it is the cutest book.  I also met the author and she is very nice.  There are some great new concepts in the book and new designs.  There is also some great kitty things I will be making for the feline members of this family.  However, I have to tell you all a new little canine member may be joining our family soon.  So, there will be some special knitting for her.  All will be reveled in time, but when I say little, I mean little.

This will be the first thing I knit from this book.  Isn’t it adorable.

One of the things I love about these shows is the plethora of patterns.  They knit up awesome samples to touch and examine, so you can make your own.  They also have such variety and all of the new things.

Now I really liked this one regardless if she looks like Nancy Reagan or not.

I think Mom would look fantastic in this sweater.  I don’t know about this year, but maybe next.  She has other “I wants” on her list.  I also loved the raglan cabled sweater, you don’t see that much.

Finally there was the must have shawls and this delightful pretty shawl/sweater combo (on the far right), which I think would be gorgeous in an oatmeal or off white.

One of the things that seemed to be plentiful as this festival was indie dyers, which let me just say was a blast.  I found many, many things that could’ve gone home with me, but I was totally in love with Gales Art booth.  She does these crockpot random batts that were super reasonable.  She is a really nice person too.  These were just super fun and I can’t wait to spin them up. So all in all, I stayed on budget, which was good and I had a great time.

Today I met up with Beverly and Dawn for a fibery road trip.  We headed out to three different stores on the way to the 2008 Midwest Fiber and Folk Festival.

This year the festival was held partly inside and partly outside at the McHenry Community College.  They had some very nice vendors and overall I think it is a very nice festival this year.  Tomorrow I’ll post my loot, but tonight it’s just photos of the festival.

I did have one bad experience as I was snapping a few general blog pictures, some woman yelled at me for taking pictures.  The worse part about it was she was extremely rude and very aggressive.  She never did give a reason as to why we couldn’t take pictures.  I did post on Ravelry about this and hotliked to the organizer, so hopefully she could explain why.  If you’re on Ravelry hotlinking is an ok thing to do.  You get a little message that says something about your ears burning and you can go to the link.  I should also mention, I never saw a sign about no photo taking.  I also checked their brochure and there was no mention of ‘no pictures’ in the brochure.  DH thinks I should have persisted and asked why until I got a reason, but I think that would’ve created a scene.  I also should note, I’m not profiting at all on these photos and was just going to post them here to let folks know they should go out to this nice event.

Anyway, since I have the pictures already, I’ll share them with you.  This is the inside gym area.  This first picture was the last one I took and was the spot I got yelled at.

This was the outside.

Here’s my friend Beverly.

Here’s one of my friend Dawn.

Here are a couple of others.  So if you decide to head out there, you should have a good time.  Just beware if you take any pictures.

Gosh do I hate this type of heat.  I think  it’s supposed to peak today and get down into the mid-80s, but still that’s way too hot for me.  Thank goodness for AC.  I couldn’t live without it.  I couldn’t knit without it.

I managed to weave in and seam up the back.  It now looks like a sock.  Yeah!

Well after hours and hours of watching an Inspector Lynley mystery, two discs of season three of All Creature Great and Small, and few episodes of Weeds season 2 and a bunch of other misc things… I finished the the argyle bits of the sock.  Whew!  It moves much quicker after this point.

Oh - and do you Plurk?  Why don’t you join me… it’s only totally addicting.  (lol)

My hand is feeling much better now and I’m back on the argyle.

And really this is all under control.  Yup.  Right.

Somehow I strained my left hand.  I don’t know how, but if I flex the wrist area it hurts.  I haven’t even knitted too much, so I must of slept on it wrong or did too much typing at work.  I’m not sure exactly, but it’s slowing the ever slow sock down today.

Since we saw Sophie last week, this week is my mad Max.  He was quite a little pistol when he was a yougin’.  In fact there were many a days DH and I looked at each other and went “what did we get ourselves into?”  Right about 7 though he seemed to clam down.  Even my Mother remarked how calm he was last time we went to visit.  Don’t get me wrong - he’s still a pistol when he wants to be though.

So we’re celebrating the 4th around here and let’s see - other then a little bit of barbecuing, which was going well until my hot dog caught on fire, I’ve cleaned the house and finished up a bit of sock knitting.

Now you know the sock I’m talking about… the argyle sock.

We have a good fit.

Yeah!

Update July 2, 2008 - for some reason the mosaic maker photo buggered the blog in IE.

I normally use Firefox, which was fine… I also checked it in Opera and Safari and was fine.  Sorry about that.

This was a lot of fun…
The photo is here

Here how it works.

Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr search.
Using only the first page, choose an image.
Copy and paste each of the URL’s into the mosaic maker over at FD’s image maker.

What is your first name?
What is your favorite yarn?
What was the first thing you made with yarn?
What is your favorite color?
Which crochet or knitting designer do you have a crush on?
Favorite handmade gift you have received?
Dream project?
Favorite notion?
What will you crochet/ knit next?
What do you love most about yarn?
One word to describe your craft.
Main inspiration to craft.