Death March and Ravelry News

The boys have been staying up alllllll night and sleeping all day so the hubs decided it was time for a Bowman Family Death March. I dragged them up at 8:30 and took them to Sunny Point Cafe for brekky. YUM! Pictured: banana bread french toast with chocolate sauce, OMG! Also pretty fruit plate. Shrimp and bacon grits... Oy Vey! Then we ran around Asheville all afternoon. I gave them sugar and forced them to drink coffee. They all got their shaggy summer hair buzzed off, and son #2 got his first mohawk. Awww... They crashed at 8pm- score!
Also, my designer shop is open on the rav, with the little eyeglasses bolero pattern available for free download. Im very excited about it- Mary made one already and its so pretty!

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Originally uploaded by marysk

Here's a picture of my eyeglasses Bolero, test knit by my good friend MarySK! Beautiful job! available as a free download on ravelry!

Inspired

Every so often I get inspired to try some new form of crafty. Have you SEEN the stuff on these craft blogs?! I decided to go with simple and bought a cardboard bird box from the craft store. I think it is supposed to be a pencil holder but works great for dpns etc. Then I snuck over to Sweeten Creek Antiques and rummaged till I found an issue of Fireside Monthly dated 1872 or something crazy like that. I used decoupage stuff from the craft store and just played with the pictures, and now I think the bird looks kinda cool.

There was an incident

Last night there was a scary thing that will forever be called "the Mini Purl incident" in Bowman family history. Without getting into details, let's just say that it woke the entire famdamily @ 4am, and I have a healthy respect for Truelove, who gave me the pumpkin cure for pug poo. God Bless her. So this morning son #2 and I went off on an aromatic adventure with Dharma the visiting sock monkey, to get the blankets washed.
We had a blast (after the blankets were safely out of the van) in South Asheville. We found pg tips at Ingles! Woot! We went to a cool new thrift store on Sweeten Creek Road and I scored some acrylic paints, an ink pad set and a great belt, and son #2 wasted, oh excuse me, spent, ten bucks on fricking candy. Hey, it was his homework in the summertime bribe money. We took Dharma into 12 Bones, the frickfracking BEST bbq I have ever tasted OMG!!!! I think Obama ate there when he was in Asheville. It's really interesting too, I think it used to be a jail? I want to go back and eat in the cell. (see pic of Dharma next to the flying pig).
At one point we drove past this random field on Sweeten Creek Rd and someone had mowed a giant smiley face into it. That was such an Asheville moment for me. Lots of knitting to catch up on!

Why I am Fat or Pugs and Beer

I think this is the usual multi-themed post. First a picture of the apple pie a la mode just to torment you all. hey, it had fruit in it right? Healthy! Next is our discovery that Easter likes her brewsky. Ward was having his semi-monthly beer and Eastie Beastie jumped up and made the "Daddy gimme that because its MINE" face. Also pictured, a random package that I got by mail from someone on rav who addressed it to "buggerhugger" which was slightly alarming but the cards sure are pretty! Still can't figure out what the package was for, but thanks 3Spirit! Also my cupcake sock, taking shape...

Who Needs A Mini Purl Fix?

Hard to believe that anyone would abandon this sweet little old girl. So thankful we rescued her. She is making fast friends with nunderwoman here, and is so pleased with herself that she rolled onto her back for belly rubs. Also pictured, the beginning of my cupcake socks.

Mr Foster Goes Down

Despite heavy peer pressure (KATHY) I just frogged the hell out of Mr fricking Foster. It felt soooooooo good.
Then I crocheted handles for the Haekelbeutel
Two down, what am I, kidding? I'll just keep casting on more stuff. Well, don't your projects tend to change focus as your skills increase? Or maybe it's just ADD.

Monkey goes berserkers

It has been a weird couple of days. First I was knitting the Beehive hat and it turned into a ginormous hat explosion. Then this morning ward and I were talking and all of a sudden there was this HUGE crashing sound followed by a big ZZZZAAAAAPPPP. We thought at first a squirrel had kamikazied on the power line because all the power went out, but then we saw a huge tree was down at the top of the culdesac. As I got closer I saw that our new monkey guest, the peaceful Dharma, had climbed to the top of this really tall tree and stomped till it fell onto the power line. She said she wanted the boys to stop playing computer games and pay attention to her instead. I woke their butts up and they are all playing twister while I get caught up over here.

An Eighties 4th of July

It is early in the morning at pug palace and I have a yarn hangover. Well worth it though, since I stayed up till 2am reading crafty tweets and finishing these fingerless gloves. I was so in love with them that I wore them all night. I woke up with Madonna hands! All I need now is some lace hanging out of my hair and some new gravity bra to hold up my boobs so I can wear that shirt with no shoulder. Anyway, the yarn is Valley Southwick from Webs and its a cotton bamboo blend. Its perfect for summer things, meaning I can wear them driving around looking all crazy in my antique sunglasses with a sock monkey in the car. She's all dressed for fireworks tonight, too. Maybe I'll knit her some matching gloves.

gorgeous collage

My creation
Originally uploaded by tamsyng

So crafty, creative and inspiring!

Ahevegas Tractor Retreat 2009

As Borat would say, "great success." Since my peeps requested it, here is a rundown of what all we did... Friday I drove to the Atl to pick up Knittymac at the Needle Nook. Great yarn store! Small, but has tons of great yarn including a huge wall of Dark Horse Fantasy, lots of patterns and accessories. We browsed. Then we got stranded at a Cracker Barrel right outside of Atlanta when the van overheated. It could have been so much worse! We were in a/c, with food, iced tea, and they sell both sock monkeys AND John Deere merchandise. The people were extremely nice to us and right before I had a nervous breakdown we were randomly approached by an angel disguised as a fat redneck woman who both diagnosed my car trouble and gave me fifty bucks out of a clear blue sky. So we waited there for five hours, the hubs rescued us and we made it, hot n steamy in his car, to Asheville by 11 pm. Meanwhile the hub's Uncle knew a guy who fixed the van for free! Knittymac and I met up with ILSM at the Holiday Inn and they gabbed till 4am. Lizabee was thrown into hostess mode and they had a tea party at Purl's and dinner at Early Girl Eatery.
Next morning we met at Mast with sock monkeys in tow and began a memorable shopping/touring spree. These gals were going on three hours of sleep! After Mast (more sock monkeys, tractors, cute totes, candy, and silliness) we headed to Haywood. We went to Malaprops and looked at craft books, then we went to Earth Guild. Earth Guild was a big hit, and books, yarn, needles, wheels and roving galore were fondled and purchased. Then it was lunchtime, so we ambled over to Woolworths which is an art gallery with local artists and has an old fashioned soda fountain. We strolled and ate lunch. Sock Monkeys had an impromptu party on the counter, and Knittymac had a free ice cream sundae for her birthday! Afterwards we went to Purls and shopped more yarn goodies! Then we decided that it was naptime but we HAD to visit yarn nook first. Naptime was forgotten in a flurry of more yarn. Linda (yarn nook) was overjoyed. The sock yarn in there is to die for. We had a short rest afterwards then it was off to the Fiddling Pig for a wonderful dinner, with lots of sock monkeys who loved the live bluegrass, clogging and fried pickles. Dharma was reunited with Noah, and all the kids were there. After dinner we sang happy birthday to Knittymac and she opened presents and we had mocha choc cake from Lizabee. Then the hardcore girls went back to Holiday Inn to knit into the night, and drool over ILSM's awesome color choices and stash. Sock Monkeys partied at the hotel, even the annoying thing was invited. At 1am I left and went home to grab some sleeps. Oh! ILSM got to meet the puggles that evening too!
Sunday I tried to get up in time to get the Mac to church but we ended up playing hooky at pug palace drinking coffee and looking at yarn, which the hubs thought was somehow funny. We got ILSM and met at World Cup, eventually taking over our back room hangout and knitting with glee. ILSM handed out her first batch of hand dyed sock yarn which, guys, is astonishing and you need to keep an eye peeled for her etsy store. She also made us all stitch markers! Lizabee and I handed out the goody bags and everyone seemed to like/love those! We had treats and coffee and ended up with a very sweet, touching ending ritual that included all of the tractor girls, even the ones we love so much that couldn't make it. Pixiethief was there! She's adorable, and added to the fun. We ended with tears and hugs, and I got gifted with nunderwoman which is another post for later. Some of us parted ways then, and the rest went for MORE shopping at the hippie store and later ate hotdogs before ending with a bang at the home store, which has yarn! Big surprise. Pixiethief got me the Hansi Singh book (!!!!!) so I got sort of stuck there on the sidewalkk drooling for awhile over knitted loch ness monster and angler fish patterns.
So that was the gist of it, I think- I know I left out things like Lizabee's homemade peach pie, sock monkeys riding pugs, and lots and lots of wonderful sharing of life stories and knitting talk. We thought of you all very often, talking about Pgurl, Manitoba2ct, Amandaleigh, Unforgrettable, 8ntfrogn, TiredM, Sugarmomma, Gramma, MarySK, Sillyfru, and many many others. Were your ears burning? We love you all and met in your honor, and it was as wonderful and loving and silly as you'd expect. I'll let ILSM tell you about her trip to the sock monkey shelter, but we took tons of pictures and the monkeys made friends and (mostly) behaved. That's all folks!