Random Thoughts and Pictures

I'm really glad the elections are over. This site was one too many with signs. Did they really think we'd vote for the one with the most signs? Or the one with the biggest sign?I knitted a quick hat the other day. It's perfect for rainy days. I didn't even have to use my umbrella when it was sprinkling in SF yesterday. I had Will capture Alex on the perch behind me, and the leaves changing out front when he took this picture.
A close up of the hat, but you can't see detail. It's 6 rows knit, 6 rows purl, repeat. It's also good for bad hair days.

I was on a creative roll this week. I found this 1950s kitchen fabric at the local yarn/quilt store, and I bought plain dish towels at the dollar store and then I cut and sewed the fabric onto the towel. I remember now why I don't love sewing, but I remembered quite a few things from my junior high school sewing class, so that was good.What a beautiful sky.

It was chilly this weekend, but it's going to get worse tonight and tomorrow with 35 degree low temps. We bought this stove from a neighbor at their garage sale. It really heated up the room and the house, which was just what we wanted. And the neighbor helped Will deliver it. It's only two doors down, but this thing was HEAVY. They used a dolly and it was still a lot of work. This weekend was the first time we used it.


About the only way to keep this boy off my desk is to hold him down. That only works for a few minutes.
Happy Thanksgiving to all. There are so many things to be thankful for.

California, Oregon, Washington, oh my!

We took a road trip up the coast to Oregon and Washington. When we left, the clouds were beautiful. We crossed many bridges, but only one was a toll bridge, and that was the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge in the SF Bay Area.

We took 101 up the coast, and encountered some beautiful scenes. The top speed was 55 mph, and when we drove thru a down, we had to slow down to 25, and when we went around steep curves, we had to slow down to 30 or 40, with a small leeway of probably 5 mph, but it was all good because everyone followed the speed limits (else they'd miss the curve), and there were no cars around us, particularly behind us, most of the time. I can handle driving the sharp curves with little or no stress, but having someone tailgate me or whip around to pass me is very stressful. We actually saw two old looking Rexall signs - one in Willits, and one in Ferndale. I didn't even know there were still Rexalls.


We took a 20 minute detour at Ferndale, a town that has maintained its victorian buildings and charm.
The sunset on the Oregon coast was beautiful even thru the van window.

My former boss's widow has invited us to visit him many times. He lives in Bandon, OR, a coastal town that is gorgeous. We took a side trip to Bandon to see Mike and his beautiful house and view and town. This was the view from the guest bedroom. We hadn't seen Mike in over 6 years, at Marilyn's memorial service.
I took this picture from the street in front of Mike's house. His is the only house on the street, but a new house is being built next door to him. The new house is not between him and the beach, so that is good.

From Bandon we drove up 101 to WA. The forest next to the ocean is such natural beauty.More bridges.
The bridge from OR to WA that goes over the Columbia River is huge. I was glad to have Will drive that stretch.
A view from the bridge.
We visited the in-laws in Ocean Shores, WA, but first we stopped in Aberdeen, WA because M-I-L had a bad reaction to new medicine and had to spend the night there. We got to visit with her new husband, and she was fine the next day, so it a worked out. Molly is waiting for her humans, who are in the kitchen, to throw a treat.

A rare, sunny day in Ocean Shores, WA, and we got two of them. Two in a row! To me it is just WRONG to drive on the beach. There were shells, all broken, with tire tracks next to them. Does anyone else see the connection?Ocean Shores beach.
The road out of Ocean Shores is very pretty. It's not fun to drive in the dark, but in the daylight the color of the leaves was worthy of a picture.

From WA we drove to I-5 and stayed in Ashland, OR. What a cute town. At first I thought it was like Palo Alto, but I'll change that and say it's more like Santa Cruz. Here is our room at the motel. For the first time in years we had one of those old fashioned hotel keys. I took a picture, but it didn't come out, but if you're as old as we are, you remember those keys!
This was the view from out hotel room. The leaves changing were quite magnificent.

Ashland has a lovely yarn store. This was just one wall of several that housed beautiful, colorful yarn. Even Will was impressed by the beautiful colors.

I took many more pictures, but this gives the gist of our trip. Unfortunately, I-5 was not quite as interesting as 101 (going up) but it was faster! Mt. Shasta thru the van window!

There are so many beautiful places to visit so close to home! Speaking of home, we are happy to be back home. So are the kitties.

If you are my "friend" on Facebook, you can see these and other pictures posted there. If you're not my friend, then why are you looking at my blog?

Knitting and cats and phones, oh my

I found this very old yarn at a garage sale. I'm trying to figure out what I can make with several skeins of it. It's 100% wool. I'm thinking about a vest.
Either these really ARE big cats, or maybe the trash bin is miniature. That's Ziggy and Mowry.

Alex, aka "King of the House", has decided he likes the chair where Ziggy usually sits. So that's Ziggy with his hind end sticking out at the bottom of the chair. Will had a cold, so for a few days I slept on the couch, and the cats kept me company in the living room.
It's pineapple guava season AGAIN! A woman who responded to my Fremont Freecycle ad last year is the first person I contact to see if she wants more. She already picked up a small bag last week, and I'll have more for her on Sunday. I'm always glad to give these away to people who like them. I think they are okay, but how many can I eat?
By adding another line to our family plan, I got this phone with a data plan to access email, etc. for only $20 a month more. I cancelled my business voicemail, which I've had for 10 years, which was $10 a month, so that's only $10 a month more. I tried to give my old phone to my parents, but they didn't want it. They like having their $10 a month phone that gives them about 10 minutes a month. OK, a little more than that, but not much. I was going to send it to them anyway, but then I decided to use the old phone for pleasure, and the new one for business. Then the buttons on the new phone got a little annoying. I could definitely live with it, but then I called AT&T and for $99, and $35 a month ('only' $25 a month more) I could have a refurbished iPhone (not the most recent version, but there have only been a few) that has a touch pad instead of tiny buttons. I've held out in principle because I think having a iPhone is like joining a cult, but this seems like a good deal. I will use the iPhone for business. Since I don't go to out of state conferences any more, writing off my phone as a business expense will work out well. I asked people what they pay for their service, and one told me "under $100". Eek. I guess our plan isn't that bad - it's under $100 and it's for 3 phones!

Random pictures

It's still 81 degrees outside and that is hot for 8 pm! We had a very cool summer, so now that we're having a heat wave, it seems wrong, even if it is often hot in September and October.

This morning started with a 3 3/4 hour conference call, during which time Mowry found the computer portion rather interesting. Luckily he didn't stay too long, because I couldn't exactly read the screen with him planted in front of me. I bet I had more fun than the other participants!


Will came with me to a client's office and planted himself in their cafe so he, too, could enjoy the A/C. This is the approach to the Dumbarton Bridge. It's hard to tell, but it was pretty crowded. We're trying to get from Palo Alto to the east bay. The cloud formations are lovely.
This evening at around 6:30 pm it was very overcast with pink clouds against the pink crepe myrtle tree out front. It didn't last long, so I'm glad I captured it in a photo. On our walk the other night the palm trees were illuminated by the sun, as was the hill in the background. Isn't this a beautiful place to live?

Garage sales, flea markets, concerts, oh my.

Today we went to a garage sale on a small court nearby. It's hard to go to garage sales after our neighborhood-wide sale two weeks ago, but this one house had MANY things. I found another wooden "window" planter (for $1) and she threw in a few fake flowers, Will found two work shirts in perfect condition (for $1 each), and a cool dominoes game unopened and marked $35 (for $3) . Then we went to the Ohlone flea market and I found some double-pointed knitting needles for $1. I probably could have offered the guy 50 cents, and I think he would have taken it, but I didn't. Unfortunately, two were size 2 and two were size 1, but they will be spares since I'm constantly losing them.

Then we went to the Niles Plaza for an unusual Saturday concert. First there was a flag ceremony honoring the memory of 9/11/2001, and I was a little concerned because when we got a new flag a year or two ago, they had a very religious (and in my opinion inappropriate) religious ceremony. It was completely inappropriate for a diverse town with people who have many different beliefs, but I digress. If they did this again, we missed it, because all we saw was a speech by Blue Star Moms (very appropriate) and a beautiful rendition of the Star Spangled Banner by a Niles local. It was a nice tribute to this horrendous event none of us will ever forget.

I got in some knitting time on this sock....

Wow - I got a lot done! The top photo is true to the color, and the bottom photo is too light, but you can tell that because the Crown Royal bag should be much darker. The music was good, the shade was good and it was a nice event. It was a hot day.
The cows on the hill made for a nice photograph.
I'm almost done with this cardigan from the lovely yarn Diann gave me. I had to add a strip for buttons because it was a little too narrow. My plan is to put all different kinds of buttons on here. I may use snaps to close it, instead of buttonholes, but for now I've done nothing about that.

Photos and more photos

My blog is really a place for me to post my pictures.

The "master" bathroom in our house is rather small, but it has a full size shower. The bathroom is the one room in the house that was painted a color, and that color is very pink. The blue around the tile is painters' tape, as we prepped for painting. We've been talking about painting the bathroom for 4 years now - it is 4 years since we opened escrow to buy this house.
We met Ken and Diann at the local hardware store a few years ago, and they told me peach was a good color because surrounding this burgundy tile inside the shower is peach tile. I was never convinced, but I'm sure it would have worked, had we been able to find where we put the peach paint once we were finally ready to take on this task. It may be a small room, but it was a pain in the butt to prep and paint.

So we went out on Labor Day 2010 and bought new paint. I wanted a medium beige, but Will thought lighter was better since the room is small. How small is it? The greedy people on HGTV's House Hunters would undoubtedly say "This is too small, and it's dated, and I couldn't possible live with this", but aside from the pinkness, we have NO problem with our small bathroom.

The color I picked was not what I thought it was. I like contrast, however small, between the woodwork and the walls, and I used two different paints, but couldn't match as close had I actually tried.

We hadn't yet painted the ceiling, but we debated and decided the pink must go.

Luckily, Will is tall, but he still had to use a step stool to reach the high parts. My job was the lower parts (behind the toilet, around the mirror, etc.).
What a mess. We had so much stuff (pictures, jars, towels over the shower door and on the racks, etc.) that had to be emptied out before we could start painting. Did I mention it was a hot day, so we needed a fan blowing in our direction, also. The great thing is that our small bathroom has a window, so it was well ventilated

Here is the finished bathroom. Not beige, but NOT pink! Hooray. It's growing on me. I love the retro light.
We bought this Buck Stove for a fraction of its new cost from a neighbor. We don't have a mantle, but now we have a place for some things when the fire isn't going.
Ziggy is sleeping on a shirt Will found at garage sale weekend.

Mowry loves sitting on my desk between my keyboard and my monitor, right in my way.Ziggy LOVES his toys. Here he is on his back with his toy fish. Above his head is "crazy mouse" - a toy my parents brought the kitties the last time they visited.

It's almost impossible to get a picture of all three cats. Ziggy in the foreground on his back, Alex and Mow watching Ziggy. It IS impossible to get a GOOD picture of all 3 cats, so I'll settle for this for now. I obviously don't have Photoshop or any other program that can edit and make magic.Ahhhhhhhhh, our avocados are growing, and if the squirrels and other critters don't get them first, we should have several in about 5 months! They are still small and yet I occasionally find eaten ones on the ground.
Happy New Year - L'Shana Tova.