I had a day off

Once a week, I get a day off - Sunday. What I did this Sunday was ignore all the bookwork and housework that needed to be done. The weather was perfect for lying around and napping and knitting.


Our backyard has been turned into a meadow.


I watched the hummingbirds visit the feeder.



I made sun tea.


And I finished knitting the Rufflicious baby sock. (Baby Ull yarn, US 1 Addi Turbo needles and Kalamazoo Knits pattern)


What a perfect day.

I want to adopt them

This weekend I was treated to a delightful experience. I met Ellie and Lilly.


The girls and their grandmother came in. A new baby girl was to be born into the family and Ellie and Lilly wanted to knit a gift. We picked out the yarn, Monte Cristo, and I taught them to knit.

If my grandchildren were to be like this, then I am ready to become a grandmother. It was a pleasure to spend time with both of the girls.


This is Ellie modeling the Tomten.

Thank you, ladies, for stopping by. You made my weekend.

How to get to a yarn shoppe

The shoppe is located in Suttons Bay. For those of you who have never been here, Suttons Bay is a village. At least, I call it a village. I just looked up the definition of a village versus a town and I still cannot tell which is which. So I will call Suttons Bay a village, as I like the word.

Anyway, Suttons Bay is a village, located on the western side of the Grand Traverse Bay, in Leelanau County. You can access the shoppe by walking to it, driving to it, or as this lady did, by riding her bicycle to it.


She rode the TART trail from Traverse City with her husband. She is not the only one to do that. We had a mother and son come out the other day, the same way. Our summer weather has been so beautiful, that it only makes sense to visit us on your bicycle. Especially since we are only a couple of blocks from trail.

Remember the picture of one of our Susans knitting her first sock? Well, she finished the pair and they have since been mailed out to her daughter in Pennsylvania. I do like that colorway.


And our other Susan made these sheep up for the shoppe. She used a Fiber Trends pattern and Lamb's Pride. Aren't they cute?


Diane knitted a baby sweater and this hat out of Marble Chunky. I have to admit that I like this yarn, even though I thought we would never carry straight acrylic.

Fourth of July

The Declaration of Independence: A Transcription

---

IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

---

The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:

Column 1
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett
Lyman Hall
George Walton

Column 2
North Carolina:
William Hooper
Joseph Hewes
John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge
Thomas Heyward, Jr.
Thomas Lynch, Jr.
Arthur Middleton

Column 3
Massachusetts:
John Hancock
Maryland:
Samuel Chase
William Paca
Thomas Stone
Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe
Richard Henry Lee
Thomas Jefferson
Benjamin Harrison
Thomas Nelson, Jr.
Francis Lightfoot Lee
Carter Braxton

Column 4
Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris
Benjamin Rush
Benjamin Franklin
John Morton
George Clymer
James Smith
George Taylor
James Wilson
George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney
George Read
Thomas McKean

Column 5
New York:
William Floyd
Philip Livingston
Francis Lewis
Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton
John Witherspoon
Francis Hopkinson
John Hart
Abraham Clark

Column 6
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett
William Whipple
Massachusetts:
Samuel Adams
John Adams
Robert Treat Paine
Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins
William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman
Samuel Huntington
William Williams
Oliver Wolcott
New Hampshire:
Matthew Thornton

What we do for you.....

There are so many yarns out there. If I could, I would carry about 90% of them. But since I only have so much room, we are continually thinking of new ways to fit more goodies into the store.


One of the ways we have done is this is by adding more shelves.


Here is my son, Ian, building some bookcases for the shoppe. T-Bone, his dog, is backup.

Jill's blanket

These squares are courtesy of Jillian along with the Great American Afghan and the Great American Aran Afghan books.

This is a post where the pictures do say a thousand words.

This and That

On Wednesday, one of our customers found this little guy out on M-22. They brought him back and placed him with the Lily of the Valley plants. During the day, I watched him hop around and chirp away. When I came back in to work on Friday, he was gone. I am hoping he found the rest of his family.


Jill is knitting an afghan for her granddaughter, using various squares out of the Great American Aran Afghan and Great American Afghan books. She has mentioned that she will never again knit anything pink.


One of our Susans is knitting her first sock, using Yarn Hollow's Sock Religious. This yarn comes in a flat and is handdyed by Rita. I love this colorway.

Patty brought in 3 more socks to show off. All of these are made with Classic Elite's Summer Sox. Aren't they colorful? Patty said the yarn was a joy to knit.

And the Barb came in yesterday and brought in a sock she knitted with ShiBui.

Nancy is modeling a coat she purchased. This woman uses fur and other wonderful materials in her knitting. Isn't this gorgeous?

Keeping the Faith

Like everything else, owning a knit shoppe has its ups and downs. Real life intrudes and you have to pay the bills, do the bookwork, and sometimes deal with unpleasant events. But then, someone walks into the shoppe and you talk about your passion and you remember why you put in 8 days a week.

People like Patty who is churning out socks (this is Yarn Hollow's Sock Religious, Coffee Wave colorway)


or Carole who has started knitting again after many years.


For whatever reason, we love what we do. We play with colors, with textures, with the feel of good fiber. We challenge ourselves with a new technique. We go into a meditative state with garter stitch. And we meet others, who feel like we do.

Thanks, folks.

Lady Darcy of Thistledown in residence

Every shoppe needs a dog. Or at least, that is what us dog lovers think. And we are fortunate to have a dog, every now and then.

If you are lucky and you stop by when Lady Darcy of Thistledown is in residence, this is what you will see.




She takes her responsibilities seriously.

After all, there may be something hiding in the ground cover that could prove detrimental to the yarn.

All you need is the wanting

About one week after Christmas, Shirley came into our shoppe. We had not met before and she announced that she had not knitted for about 30-40 years and she wanted to make five sweaters for Christmas and she wanted to start now. We introduced Shirley to Knit Pure and Simple and she started her sweaters. At this time, she has completed one sweater and has two more almost finished.



Kate is modeling the sweater for us. Shirley used Lamb's Pride Worsted and it is cosy. Makes me almost want some snow and a fireplace.


Laura knit this hat after our Lace Workshop with Amy.


This is the Picture Hat from the Gathering of Lace. Laura received this book as a give away and she promptly made good use of it. Her mother belongs to the Red Hat group and Laura knitted this for her. Amazing!

I told you we wouldn't lose Jill. She is making samples for our shoppe and this is her latest.



The top is knitted from Euroflax and the pattern is called Linen Top. Kate Coyle is also the author of the book Boho Baby Knits. A book we just happen to carry. Two skeins, easy knitting, and you are ready for summer.

Yarn

When you have a yarn shoppe, you get to open boxes of goodies. Here is what came in last week.


One box from Cascade and another from Classic Elite.



We have added the Alpaca Sox and Summer Sox yarns to the shoppe.


And then restocked our colors for the Cascade Ecological Wool.

The better to knit with, my dears.

Lady Darcy of Thistledown

In our house we have 4 dogs and 4 cats. One of those cats and dogs are Scotty's and mine. We have 3 children. One is living with us right now. She is in between selling her house and buying a new one. She brought in 2 dogs and 1 cat. We have a son in college. He has his 1 dog with him and his 1 cat with us. We have another daughter in college and she has her 1 dog with us and her 1 cat with us. Got the picture?



This is Lady Darcy of Thistledown. She gets to come to the shoppe. Because we have the dogs, Darcy is their alpha female and she just loves to get them all together and go for walkabouts. At first she took them back into the woods, but lately she has started to discover M-22. We are not thrilled with any of the walkabouts and many has been the times that I have taken the van and gone out to find her and her partners in crime. So, as a preventative measure, I have started to bring her to the shoppe.

Darcy makes a great shoppe dog. She loves the attention and she will quickly lie on her back, giving you the opportunity to scratch her belly. She also loves to lie on the rug by the front door. They are both the same color, so she becomes one with the rug.

So, until our daughter buys a new house and moves out - Lady Darcy of Thistledown will be my partner at the shoppe.

April showers bring spring flowers

I always loved that saying. I grew up on a dead - end street that had a woods at the end. And I loved to wander around, looking at all of the flowers that grew in there. Violets and Jack in the Boxes are the ones I remember, although there were others.

We have a raised bed in front of our house and this is what grows in there during this time of year.



These pictures were taken over a week ago. I love these little flowers.



Not sure what they are called, I call them star flowers, they are delicate and I like their color.


There are other small flowers in there, but since I planted them about ten years ago, I have forgotten what they are.

More Knitting by the Bay

Here is the group. Actually, this is part of the group. We lost some and these are the ones who stayed until the bitter end.

Good bye until next year.

Knitting by the Bay

Knitting by the Bay 2009






Nancy showed off her Mananita.





Amy came back to see us again. She taught us how to knit the Pansy Shawl and the Beginner's Shawl.



Nancy also showed us the shawl she made for her daughter's wedding.

It was gorgeous.
Amy's sweater that she talked Susan into adding the sleeves.




We spent a lot of time of knitting and tearing out.


But we learned a lot, ate good food, and made new friends.





The Beginner's Shawl.