Happy Thanksgiving!

    Hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving yesterday!  My cousin, Ed, and Jeff's sister, Sherry, joined us for dinner... which turned out better than I ever expected!  The pork roast had a nice tasty crust on it but was tender and juicy...actually fork tender. So good!  (A Ronco rotisserie is a wonderful tool to have on your kitchen counter.)  Oven roasted butternut squash...from our garden, green beans and baked potatoes with gravy filled our plates.  I did a loaf of Italian bread in the bread machine and it was still warm at dinner time.  (I use regular flour...but shift it twice...instead of bread flour.) Dessert was pumpkin pie.  A simple menu but tasty.  I just piled the dirty dishes in the sink and hoped the Thanksgiving elves would visit but no such luck and they're still sitting there...uck.  Oh, well, I've changed the water twice...once more and I'll actually break down and wash dishes!  Jeff sent Ed home with a goodie bag of leftovers last night and still had enough for his late night snack.  I think there's enough for lunch but not for another supper.  Oh, well there is a small roast in the freezer....  Maybe we'll try a beef roast for Christmas.
   I sent in my order for sock yarn Tuesday.  I was comparing prices from my favorite catalogue with an online site and found that the online site was having an early Black Friday sale!  The yarn was half price...so I couldn't resist!!  Got enough for 4 pairs of socks (3 are Christmas gifts, 1 for me).  I have used the online site before (Webs) so I'm aware of it's quality and I can always order the other yarn from the catalogue later.  Judy had gotten me some sock yarn on sale at JoAnn's a couple of weeks ago using her coupons.  The 2 skeins of yarn she picked up cost less than the regular price for one!  I didn't have any choice about color...and since Jeff doesn't really care...I started a pair of socks with that yarn for him.  (It's not a Christmas present, just new socks.)  Then Wednesday afternoon Judy called from the shop to let me know that she had just sold my Black sheep hoodies(see blog entry for Nov 11 for photo.)!  I had cleaned the TV room that morning putting away yarn, etc so I had to dig out yarn and start another  hoodie.  Now I have a sock growing on short circular US 2's in a Deborah Norville Serenity washable wool sock yarn called Chili and a size 1 raglan-from-the-neck-down hoodie in a Red Heart acrylic called honeydew on US 5 & 7's with a Henley neck and a back zipper.  The sweater should be finished before Monday when I work in the shop again.  Hope I can get a couple of Santa and Ms Santa hats(see Nov 23 for photos) done by then, too.  I am surprised they sold!  I guess Jeff's new socks will have to wait until Monday.  
   The online knitting group (KnitTalk@yahoo.com) I belong to asked all its members to post what they were thankful for this year.  Here's what I posted:

• I am thankful for the man in my life...he makes     it interesting and difficult but never boring.
• I am thankful for the dog in our life... it would be dull without her.
• I am thankful for our friends and family... without them it would be lonely, no one to play 'remember when' with.
• I am thankful for this little house in this little woods...it may be old and ramble shack but it keeps out the weather and keeps in the warmth.
• I am thankful for knowing how to knit...it keeps me busy.
• I am thankful for the shop and it's customers...even when I get tired of making another baby sweater.  I meet so many nice people there!
• I am thankful that I took early retirement...going out 3 years early was worth it!
• I am thankful that I am a cancer survivor although radiation weakened my malformed heart valve resulting in valve replacement surgery and the rest of my life on warfarin.
• I am thankful. 

Deck The Halls!

   The shop is decorated for Christmas and the

The front door of the shop

outside looks beautiful!  Around 4pm the spotlight goes on and sign really lights up!  Judy, Sharon and Abby outdid themselves!  Judy also

The side of the whop

did a wreath with all natural embellishments for the Adorn-a-door silent auction to raise funds for the art association but for some reason I can't download that photo today!
   OK, I did finished the Gingerbread Giant...man...and decided it's definitely a stuffed toy, not a tree ornament.  Disappointing.  So I tried

The Gingerbread Giant w/Santa & Ms. Santa Hats

it again...this time with a size 1 needle and sock yarn.  Came out much, much smaller and looks cute.  But a real bitch when I drop a stitch!!  I'd like to make a couple that size for the shop but I don't know if my hands will allow it...especially when there's wood to stack.  Hey, I even raised a blister on the back of the ring finger of my right hand...and it just hangs there not doing anything...as the base of the needle rubs it as it passes by!  Not to mention how many times I drew blood from the tip of my left index finger! Knitting can be very physical. 
   The only thing of mine that sold this weekend has been a Santa hat.  Oh, well.  They're easy to make.  Hope more than that sells this week!  I need to send in my yarn order so I can start knitting Christmas presents!  Saturday is 'Shop Local Saturday', and Friday and Saturday are traditional good sales days for the shop. 
   Got to clean house a little this week before Thanksgiving.  Good thing no one looks too closely!!

And Another Load of Wood

   Jeff picked up another load of pallets yesterday and told the guys at the hardware store that that would be it for awhile.  There are always a few pallets left over from each load that don't get cut apart coz the trailer gets full of cut wood before all the pallets get cut up.  Eventually we have a pile of pallets waiting to be cut apart...like now.   Jeff wants to get all the pallets we have cut up and stacked... before they're covered with snow....before he picks up any more.  We've decided we're going to have to put up another woodshed, and probably get a face cord of hard wood, too, after the first of December.  If we get really inspired, we could even clean off the porch and take all the junk to the dump...oh, the politically correct term, to the recycling center...in north Utica and stack some wood inside.  Now, that would be nice.
   I finally finished the four size 6mo raglan-from-the-neck-down cardigans with plain roll brim hats with

top knots coordinated with them (but priced separately) to take to the shop Sunday.  Each sweater has 1 motif in a lower front corner.  There's a duck, baseball, black and white sheep.   I even got the Pretty in

Pink size 1 hoodie finished

Pretty in Pink Hoodie

and the sewed
the back zipper in last
night.  Then about 9 pm last night I started
looking for something to knit when I remembered I had bookmarked a
pattern at Craftsy.com
that I saw on Facebook.

It's a gingerbread man.  My mom had directions for one that we made for years but I can't find it.  This one looks pretty close so I thought I'd try it.  But it's working up 3x as big!  More of a toy than an ornament.  I still have got to get the arms and the head done and stuff it and then I'll decide if I like it.  It's done with worsted on US4's so it's not too difficult. (Calls for 4 dp's but I'm using 2 short circulars.) 
   There are hunters in the woods around us.  Fanny won't go out even with a human escort.  The gun shots even make me a little nervous!  Hope they know what they are doing.   Haven't seen any turkey or deer since hunting season opened.  
  

Still Stacking Wood

    The weather today was sunny and pleasant so we spent about 2 hours this afternoon stacking wood.  Either Jeff is putting less on the trailer each time (I doubt it) or we're stacking faster!  There's just enough space in the woodshed for 1 1/2 rows then we'll have to decided if we're going to put up another woodshed next to this one.  And I actually cooked dinner today (Angie's Italian Fried Chicken, garlic mashed potatoes with gravy and green beans) which tasted pretty good if I say so myself...after working outside!  I just put together a Cherry Dump Cake and the smells from the oven are pretty good, too!
   I've been doing some size 6 months raglan-from-the-neck-down cardigans with a single intarsia design in the lower front corner for the shop.  They knit up fairly quickly and so far this weekend I've finished a white sheep on a honeydew green sweater and a yellow duck on a delft blue sweater. When I came in from stacking wood...and before I started dinner...I cast on for a pink sweater that will have a black sheep on the front. I'd like to do a baseball on a blue sweater, too, but I'll have to buy a skein of yarn first.  It's a change from working on the hoodies... even if they've only been size 1's... and since they work up so quick, these little sweaters are easier on my hands!  I'm not scheduled to work in Cooperstown until next Sunday so I might have time to do some hats, too. As part of a 'Shop Local' campaign, the shop will be donating part of our sales for the week before and after Thanksgiving to the food pantry.
   The on-line knitting group I belong to (KnitTalk on Yahoo) held it's annual 'Aftober' recently.  All members are encouraged to finish projects and talk about them.  Those who do receive a well-decorated envelope and a mystery 'prize of no great value'.  At the end of the month the prize is identified.  This year it was a Kumihimo loom (google it!). I'm looking forward to coming up with a project to use mine with.  Thank you, again, Afton and your helpers.    
   Our autumn visitors seem to have decided to move on.  Haven't heard them since we put D-con in the attic way and on the cellar stairs.  I have heard them a couple of times in the water closet in my room but it sounds like they were moving the D-con dispenser around to get into it easier.  Hate to do that to Mickey M's relatives, but.... 
   One of my Christmas cacti decided it was time to bloom.  This one blooms between Halloween and Thanksgiving and the other one between Thanksgiving and Christmas.   I was surprised  when I moved some furniture in the parlor yesterday to dust to find this one in bloom!  I guess it does pay to clean...once in awhile. (photos will be posted tomorrow.)
  

Time For Something New

That's my Black Sheep Hoodie

   It's been decided that it's time...and we've got the money...to put together a new brochure for the shop.  It's been about 10 years since the last one was assembled and things have changed a lot.  Here are a few of the photos that are in the running for inclusion on the brochure.  Now these were taken with a point-and-shoot digital camera!  WOW!!  The actual photos for the brochure were then taken with a digital SLR.          
The ladies who put together these scenes spent about 6 hours in the shop yesterday picking things out and taking the photos. Thanks Sharon, Deb B and Judy for doing a great job!  And these wonderful photos represent roughly half of what we've got in the shop! 
   The shop is Cooper Country at 2 Doubleday Court in Cooperstown, NY.  We're open 10am-5pm every day...except Thanksgiving...thru Christmas Eve.

Busy, Busy!

    Boy, did my sweater display look empty yesterday...and the hat rack, too!  I brought two hoodies and 5 hats with me but they didn't take up much space.  Good thing Judy suggested keeping the 2 pumpkin hats on display until Thanksgiving or the display would really have looked poor!  I've got a 'Pretty in Pink' (pink with white trim) hoodie...with a cable around the hood and 2 down the front...on the needles ready for sleeves.  Before I headed for Cooperstown I stopped at Walmart and got a skein of honeydew...a nice pale green... yarn for another hoodie with cables.  I've got some baby yarn around here someplace so maybe I'll do a couple of newborn sweater sets just to fill up the space, too.  And, Judy picked up some sock yarn for me on sale at JoAnn's on Sunday.  Jeff's socks are wearing out and I haven't ordered my yarn for Christmas gifts yet so it will come in handy. 

What's left of the teapot collection

   I'm not scheduled to work in the shop again until the Sunday before Thanksgiving so I think I have enough time to knit...and stack wood...and maybe even clean house a little. I've been boxing up and putting away a lot of my teapots as I clean the shelves ever since the type-drawer shelf in the kitchen fell off the wall this summer.  The Christmas teapots...and most of the holiday knickknacks...have taken over since they don't get put away.  There was just getting to be too much stuff with everything else.
   This morning Jeff and I stacked wood and we got the trailer emptied!  He didn't think we'd get it all done but we did! 

The shed's almost full!

When we were finished he went to town to check the parking lot but the hardware store didn't have enough pallets stacked up to make it worthwhile to hitch up the trailer and go get a load. (YEA!!) He's got a lot of pallets taken apart ready to be cut and stacked so there's enough to keep him busy...hey, do I hear the saw??  Oh, no!!!
   We've been waiting for the man from Harbor Point to come over this afternoon and clean our furnace and he just got here.  (Jeff insists we do it every year  and it's kind of late in the season to be doing it in November!)  Fanny barked threaten-ly and then hid under the kitchen table.  (Oh, thank goodness for tablecloths that hang over and create hidey holes!)

A Late Night Visit

   Last night around 9pm we had a visitor.   I was sitting at my PC in the parlor and Jeff was at his in his room watching something on Netflix when I heard it in the kitchen.  I stomped my feet and yelled and it scampered away.  Jeff came running to see what the commotion was about and I told him there was a mouse in the kitchen near the dog's dish.  Fanny checked that out (from behind Jeff's legs) and Jeff said we'd have to get some D-con or something today.  Then he went back to his movie and I decided to go into my bedroom with my little netbook well away from any mouse activity.  Fanny came with me for about half a minute, then jumped off the bed and went into Jeff's room, came back into my room...to make sure I was alright?...and then went back to his room and dove under his bed. (Brave watch dog, huh?)  She stayed there until he turned off his PC a couple of hours later.  She wasn't too sure about sleeping in my room until I put the puppy screen across the door way.  She sniffed it, decided it must be mouse proof coz she won't jump over it so of course a mouse won't, climbed back on the bed and went to sleep.  Now mice in the house in the fall are a fact of life in this little house in the little woods and they don't bother me too much, especially after I put out a couple of packets of D-con (on the attic and cellar stairs, well away from the dog) but I never had a dog that hid from a mouse before.
   Oh, I got a Facebook message from the shop yesterday afternoon...2 sweaters had just sold!  Judy called later and said I also sold a couple of baby hats and a pair of adult socks.  Not bad for the first week of November!  I got the embroidery finished on the 2 hoodies I've been working on, just leaving the zippers to sew in today, so they'll be ready for the shop on Monday.  I'd like to start another hoodie but I think I better spend some time making hats!  Jeff is outside cutting wood today so I know what he's planning for me to do tomorrow!!

At Last...!

    At last we got a couple of our green tomatoes to ripen!  The first group got the blight...inside the house!...and rotten right there in the window, but these two ripened nicely without any sign of the rot!
    We've been busy cutting and stacking firewood.  There's 3 1/2 rows in the shed now and probably room for another 3 1/2 rows with what Jeff's got ready to cut.  But he picked up more pallets today so I think we're going to have to put up another woodshed if he gets what he picked up today ready to cut for this season.   (He cuts for 2 days and we stack for 2 days and then take 2 days off to let our backs recover!  It doesn't get easier.)
   Yesterday we went to Gloversville to a sports shop Jeff saw advertised online.  It wasn't hard to find (would have been even easier if we had taken the right route) and the weather was nice for a ride.  Someone put a traffic circle on Rte 30 since the last time I was on that road and that threw me a little...got beeped at both going and coming!  I do not like traffic circles.  
   I finished my Black Sheep hoodie this afternoon.  Just have the embroidery to do on it and the Train hoodie...and sew in the back zippers and the buttons...got until Monday to finish them.  A little each day and they should be done and ready to take to the shop when I go down to work.  Got a few hats to take, too.  I got a couple of patterns for adult Aran ski hats that I hope I can get to this weekend, too.