off to Hershey

We're off to Hershey today so it will be a short post. They have a winter event called Christmas Candy Lane which is perfect for the kids. Short lines and the weather is warm enough that we won't freeze after dark.

DS1 doesn't want to go... so now I'm going to have to convince him.... there's always one that doesn't want to do something.

Last night we went to a Hanukkkah party. DD didn't want to go. She said it would be boring. We had homemade latkes, homemade applesauce, and salad and some pickins... and then some cookies. The kids played outside and then made this little movie on the mac. DD had the most fun of all with girls that are much older (3 and 7 years) than she.

The car is fixed now. It needed a new battery. We've had problems since Christmas Eve... Everytime my in-laws (MIL or SIL) come we have problems with that car!

OK... off to convince DS1 that Hershey is a good idea

la tour de France fleece

silly me... what do I know about bike riding, except that I used to do it all the time in my youth. Well I've actually spent quite a bit of time watching the tour while spinning myself... not on 2 wheels though only on one and only using 1 foot. And here's what I have to show for it so far:

2 bobbins(started the third) of single ply BFL. I admit to cheating a bit on this, as it had been started before the race, but it's mostly what I'll be spinning this month.






and 408 yard of navajo plied Finn. This was taking up a bobbin and seeing that I only had one bobbin, I decided to practice navajo plying. (took me forever to do all 400 yards) It's my first attempt at this type of ply so it's not too bad. I'll probably dye this and make socks for myself :-)

I did a bit of spindle spinning early (as in 2 AM) Monday to try to finish off the Licoln fleece that I have. There's only about a pound left and I'd like to get it all spun. Have no clue what it will become... and also return P's Ashford spindle. I prefer the top whorl to the bottom whorl, but want to finish all this yarn the same.


Monday, we went to the DaVinci Science Center DD has been bugging me to go for months. Finally I found a place where I wasn't the only dalfujensia in the family :-) (I'm not sure I spelled that correctly.. I'll ask DH in the morning). It's like a please touch museum of all things science. DS2 wasn't impressed but found some things that he was attracted to. I'm sure we'll be back to visit again, especially since it's only about 15 minutes from home! Afterwards we went to the nearby Perkins for a late lunch (we were all starving). As we were almost ready to leave an older woman came up to me to remark how beautiful our children were. And how patient we were as parents (you talkin' 'bout me?????) Actually the kids were having a good day. And were in a particulary snuggly mimos mood. Anyway, that really warmed the cockles of my heart, so thanks ma'am!

Guess I need to think of something for Tuesday! The in-laws leave for home Wednesday evening. I don't know if we're all going to the airport or just DH... probably the latter. It's such a long trip to drag the kids on, plus the van is still in the shop.

Speaking of..... the shop called today. Apparently it's all related to the alternator. When the alternator goes wacky, so does the computer and all the misbehavior is related. I had DH mention to the mechanic about DS2 thinking that the cassette player was piggybank last summer. (Oddly enough a woman called in to car talk about this very thing last week) Carlos, the mechanic, said "oh.... that's not good" meaning that it could also be related. So we may be shopping in the junk yards for a new radio/tape/CD component to install (click and clack's suggestion as well) Maybe it's unrelated, but for a while the radio would turn itself on and off depending on how the coins were in the tape deck. I retrieved quite a number of them, but some are impossible to reach and I'm sure have worked their way in even farther. He was an equal opportunity depositor... any denomination worked as long as it was a coin! Even pesos, bridge and chucky cheese tokens. That's my boy... an investor!

OK... now for some knitting news. I've started Lizard Ridge square 12 with my new LM needles. I think that they are cursed. I've had to rip back 3 times now and each time I was on the last wave repeat..... it's ok, I'm method with this one. no rush to finish!

But these are finished:

Pattern: Charade by Sandra Park
Yarn: ColorMe
Color: Regal
Needle: KnitPicks Harmony dpns US2 (3 mm)
For: ME!!

Love the stitch pattern. Wish that this yarn didn't flash but oh well.... this is a great stitch pattern for a guys sock as well and super easy to memorize. I'll probably make DH a pair in a solid (black, blue, brown, or tan... you know a boring color) But they will definitely be on my feet as soon as the weather cools a bit. (I wore them to spin last night hehehe) I'm really loving the sock thing right now. It's become my new obsession (pushed dishcloths right out of the running... but they'll be back) I have a few skeins of sock yarn to use... then I have an excuse to buy more :-D


In nature news, we have 4 painted lady chrysalis now. One fell off the little paper that it was suppose to attach to and is laying at the bottom of the butterfly garden. Hope that doesn't damage the metamorphosis process. I tried to take pictures but they don't do them justice. They're kind of a brown with these shiny gold dots on them. and only about an inch long, much smaller than the black swallowtail that we did last summer. I think about 10 days we'll have butterflies. I learned when we were at the butterfly house that black swallowtails will not voluntarily feed when in captivity. You need to uncurl the proboscis onto the nectar.... which explains why our guy was not interested at all in the watermelon pieces we gave him. Had I known... at any rate he was released in plently of time to eat and mate (which after all is what they're supposed to do) I'm excited for the kids to see the process again. DD will be studying about growth this year as one of the units of inquiry and they concentrate on butterflies.


Well I'm off to spin some more before retiring...

happy crafting

what did you do on the 4th?

what a day.....we had plans to go to our friends' house for a picnic and then fireworks. The rain and our schedule of events cancelled out the fireworks.


We're driving along and all of a sudden the battery light goes on..... (mind you the check engine light has been on for about 5 1/2 weeks and nothing has been done about it) a few miles later the ABS light comes on and then the engine starts to rev. I suggested that we pull over... and turn off the car. So DH kindly followed my instructions. Then tried to start the car and it gave that rr, rr, rr sound of a dead battery. So call AAA (thankfully we have AAA+ which tows for 100 miles for free) and I start thinking who can pick the 7 of us up? My brother won my vote and as serendipity would have it (in a bad situation) his van was finished getting fixed, so he just had to pick it up and my nephew followed in his car. They let us have to van to use until ours gets fixed. Mind you, my brother lives 50 miles from me (albeit in the direction we were traveling) but still, he's an Eagle Scout through and through.
We unloaded the car with stuff that we'd need and all the people and parked in someone's front yard along the side of the country highway (a state route... that is fairly busy) and waited for the tow truck, which came pretty quickly once we figured out where we were. Oddly enough after the tow truck took away the car, the people in the house came out and looked a bit puzzled but were very kind in offering their facilities should we need them. My brother and nephew came and rescued us with their van and rabbit (be a better story if they rode in on a mustang, no?) and we continued on our merry way.
I'm curious to know what the problem is and if it's related to the check engine light.

Two of the caterpillars have pupated and one is in the J. The fourth looks about ready. I'd take pictures but the batteries in my camera died and my kids used the rest of the AA batteries in the house, so I'll have to go get more tmrw.

I started this cloth on the way down, finished it at our friend's house and left it for her. I found the idea on ravelry and think it's a brilliant way to use up those scraps of kitchen cotton.

Pattern: Lizard Ridge Dishcloth by Laura Aylor
Yarn: Lily's Sugar 'n Cream
Colors: Delft Blue, Red and White
Needle: US6
Made for: Gaby

There's one goof in it, but I left it go. All in all it's a great patriotic cloth and another wonderful use of the Lizard Ridge pattern. Thanks Laura! :-)

I still haven't finished sock #2. There is about 3 inches left to knit. I should get cracking. Tomorrow, OK technically today, starts the Tour de France and with it the Tour de Fleece... I'll spin up what I have in rolags and hope to card more as well.

And last but not least, some pictures from the Philly zoo yesterday. We bought the family deluxe membership so the kids got to go on all the stuff that was available and we'll have to go back again in the next year (I personally could go there every day!) We arrived around 11:30 and stayed until closing. Suffice it to say that there were 7 very tired people when we got home!










The tree house. This is a very cool large room where everything is oversized even for adults. You can climb up inside the tree and look out at the room. There are giant frogs kids can climb inside. A HUMUNGOUS beehive, gargantuan monarch caterpillars and butterflys, Some dinosaur replicas, a flower seat and more. The kids had a blast here.

There will be more pictures after I steal them from my FIL's camera ;-)