Striped Sky

I loved the way the sky looked this morning with the long ribbons of clouds across the blue presaging another glorious sunny and warm day.




 
The lilac mums are in full bloom too.  They're so pretty and I really like their distinctive aroma.  It's too earthy to be called a fragrance but it smells nice and plant-y, I think. 




Yesterday afternoon I raked the leaves in the side yard into a long berm and then prayed for no wind overnight so they'd stay kind of where I put them until I went out this afternoon with a tarp and dragged them to the curb.  Any leaves that fall or blow into the yard after today I'm calling "mulch."
 





 

We had company at suppertime yesterday.  This Sharp-shinned Hawk landed on the top of the fence and stayed and stayed.  We didn't see it catch anything but enjoyed watching it survey the prospects.





I took these Frustration Anklets (that I knitted when I was stuck on the couch nursing my broken ankle and I couldn't figure out how to pick up stitches on the Cumulus sock to play along with Mason-Dixon Knitting's Sock-along in May) along when we went to Fort Wayne as room socks and realized how much I love them.  I've worn them every morning and evening since (and they're getting a little gamy... no, no, I wash them, really I do) and realized I'd like more.  I checked on my Project page on Ravelry to discover that it only took me eight days to knit the pair of them.  I feared that I'd need to be back on Vicodin to ever knit that fast again or be trapped on the couch but I cast this one on at Friday Night Knitting last night, knitted on it from about 6 o'clock to nearly 9 o'clock there, then got through the heel and sides joining before hitting the sack around 11 o'clock, so I can get halfway in about 5 hours of focused knitting, no drugs needed.  I took it along to brunch this morning and knitted a few rounds while we visited after eating, then I knitted on it while icing my ankle before going out to haul the leaves to the curb.  I'm hoping to get the foot part knitted tonight so I can do the toe tomorrow and have one more made.  My plan is to knit anklets with this black-to-white-to-black yarn until I run out.  I don't care how many anklets that makes as long as I have some to wear when I want them.  We all know I don't give a hoot in a hollow log if they match.  (No, I haven't finished OJ's stocking hexagons or the Sudoku strip(s) but I'll get back to them, never fear.  I suspect that I have more than a touch of craft-ual ADD.)

November 5--James Visser, Grandfather with Baby.  Amanda heard the rumble of her dad's voice downstairs.  She lay in bed listening for Cecilia's morning cry but Dad was all she heard.  She got up, put on her robe, and went down the stairs.  As she neared the bottom she could see into the kitchen.  Cecilia was in her high chair picking Cheerios off the tray, one by one, while Dad, Grandpa now, told her about his plans for the day.  Amanda sat on the stairs to listen.  "Since it isn't too cold I was thinking we could go to the zoo.  What do you think?"  The baby raised her eyes to his and bobbed her head.  She handed Grandpa a Cheerio.  "Thanks," he said, "I take that as a yes.  Maybe we'll take your mama along.  She used to like to feed the giraffes."  Amanda stood and walked into the kitchen.  "I still like to feed the giraffes.  Great idea, Grandpa."    She didn't think she'd ever seen a bigger smile on her dad's face.

The strains of an old episode of The Lawrence Welk Show are wafting down the hall and every once in a while Durwood sings along.  It's not a bad way to end a pretty darned good day.
--Barbara