Twenty years, now and then, KnitOwl Toys

 

  

 

Someone whose mom bought a KnitOwl handsewn toy twenty years ago contacted me today with a picture of the much-loved kangaroo and it's tiny joey, intact after many washings and adventures.  It was heartwarming - and I remember many times when our own daughter E lost her own kangaroo's baby joey and we had to go looking for it among all the toys before she could sleep at night.   The fabric had originally come from a men's cotton shirt - and I had chosen it at a thrift store to make some quilts with.  The entire toy except for one seam was made with tiny stitches with a hand sewing needle and hand quilting thread, from my original hand drafted pattern.  The joey stood only 2.5 inches tall.

 

I think sometimes about making some more toys - and putting them up, but as I told her, life gets in the way and I am always off to do something else.  Even last week, I was wondering about making another one of the dinosaur world type toys I had sent to another friend's daughter - or the forest rabbit log toy that E had (and we spent some time with that bunny getting lost, as well, as it was supposed to live in the log *ha* and it had some leaves for food etc.)

 

 

Most of all, it was nice to hear that it had been loved, and brought joy to a child - which was the entire point of making them in the first place.  I tried to - through some sort of Velveteen Rabbit magic - put some sort of personality and happy feeling into every one hoping it would carry through in some way.

 

Thank you for sharing your memories with me, and letting me see that the craftsmanship really did hold up very well over the years.

 

Marie at KnitOwl Toys (formerly MarieMeyer.etsy.com) 

  

Thursday bits

Daphne (dog, 12 years old), and Melody (blind dwarf Nigerian goat) out in the yard as I was cooking this morning, talking (I think) about the cat that had been sunning himself in that area just recently and where he was now that he was out of smell range.  They both went back and forth in that same little area for a little while after the cat got up, and the goat seemed to 'ask questions' to the dog, and then finally they both laid back down for a bit before Daphne decided it was time for her to bark at the door and go into the other bigger yard.

It is August, and the yard has been really really dry - but they have a big water trough (not seen from this angle) and we dump it and refill it every few days (lots of salamanders, frogs, and even sometimes little ringneck snakes there!).  There is some pigweed growing in one area but the goat finds anything she can reach that she likes (including tree branches and vines on the fence) and eats it with relish, as well as her alfalfa and oats she gets inside the house when we bring her in every few hours for a snack and a scratch and someone to tell her she isn't alone.  

 

Dogs and cats always going in and out at all hours, they each have their own way of asking.. we laugh sometimes that the goat 'meows' at the door when she is really lonely, having learned it from the cats.  That's even funnier, because the cats are Manxes and they hardly can make a squeak - but the goat really does sound like a cat when she cries loudly.

 

Made fried rice from leftovers and green onions in the freezer.  Crushed up a few dry roasted peanuts to put on top with some red chili paste.  I need to make another pot of rice to put up for the weekend later, but I have the container I like to keep it in the dishwasher right now. (reason for using up the last bit of rice)

 

Esme and Mark worked on the electrical boxes and wiring that she is trying to learn.  He had her taking bits apart in the garage to learn how to do it hands-on.  She has said she wanted to study that more, but hadn't been willing to get her hands on things that might break - so he gave her some old things from building the house and asked her to dismantle them to their base parts and then they'll hook them back up and she can see how to do it all properly in the garage circuits.

Other than that, did two hours of Japanese learning this morning, much more than I usually ever do for only one language.  And that is on top of what I will do later on this evening.  Usually I do about 15 minutes to an hour of multiple languages in the morning, and repeat that (not always with the same languages) later in the evening.  

This week, I've been doing almost exclusively Japanese.  I was told that Japanese is my best bet for any future translation work - and I admit it needs some more focus than I was giving it, especially in vocabulary.  

I'm doing the level 19-->20 on one Duolingo account, and reviewing level 10 Japanese on the other one instead of using the second one for multiple languages as I had been doing.  I've done babadum several times a day to 50 or 100 cards, baltoslav tools a few times each (you get three-strikes-out on there, but you can start over as many times as you want)  and tried translating anything I see on FB and Pinterest, and doing Clozemaster (that is Japanese and then Chinese, which does help with understanding the kanji characters), although that is only a few minutes every night.  My brain is doing the 'Hey, do you know this?' for words and symbols even when I'm doing other things, so that is working.  I know it is working best when the language keeps infringing later and things I didn't get quite right or wasn't 100% certain about (what is the symbol for ima (now, in Japanese), you know it when you see it but what IS it.. could you draw it?)

*baltoslav vs. babadum:  baltoslav there is no sound - you have to know what it says (hiragana or katakana shown, my katakana is still a bit shaky in the f and r sections, actually.. but this is helping), BUT, the kanji are there to help / intrigue you... and make connection.  You can keep google translate up in the next window and check the pronunciation to make sure you are reading it right, and that is cheating - but what is better than immediate reinforcement of the right sound / meaning when you don't know it?  babadum is the pronunciation and the hiragana/katakana mix, but no kanji, and you don't get to check what the right answer was because it is swoop onto the next thing, you got it right or wrong - and that is pretty good for learning like a child, as well - you start remembering what the right thing is because you want to get it right, but I am finding using both I'm learning differently on both, and that both help tamp down the pegs into the right places for vocabulary.  I think I kind of need a little of both.

I get along pretty good in it when I'm focusing on it, although I would still say it is well below my reading ability in French.  Japanese uses its own scale (N5 being the lowest level, up to N1 the fluent level) than the European languages (A1 being the lowest, and then A2, B1, B2 and C1 and C2 reaching fluent level).  I would have to say I know a lot of N5, but probably would still have to take a test in it several times because I am sure there are gaps between what they test and teach, just like everything has.  

 

I have a short work shift tomorrow, hoping the vehicle does all it should.  And then I have regular shifts on Saturday and Sunday.  I don't know when there might be traction on the little car we were told about - but he says he will let us know as soon as he knows something.  I stopped by there with the truck yesterday and got some of the issues it is having right now worked out, but not all - that brake spring is still not easy to fix, the fix we made broke again on the way back to the house *sigh*

Still : 

Yesterday the washing machine was acting up and the dryer looked like it had not dried the clothes or I had forgotten to turn it on.  Reset everything, and the washer finished out okay - whatever it was, it worked out.  The washing machine spun down to empty.  The dryer dried the clothes, and then I put the washed clothes in for the next load and they dried, as well.  I made dinner, Mark changed up what he was doing halfway through, and suggested instead we make two separate meals where I was working on one .. but I segued and still made what we were looking for, and what he wanted, and then we sat down and ate it while watching a cute film 'Earwig', a 2020 Studio Ghibli collaboration I had not even heard of.  I had a small nosebleed for about an hour through all of that - whatever luck that was it decided that was the right time for it and I just kept moving and tried to get done what we were doing, and it stopped finally.  I haven't had that for a long time, but then I haven't had a sinus infection for months, either - so I guess it follows trying to clear out all of that.   Today, I'm doing okay, working on the language work.  Next stress will be getting the vehicle to work on Friday and back home - and the battery is charging itself now, it was at 13.03 volts after I returned home which is well enough to crank it for Friday.   I just have to remember to not let the brake lights stay on when I'm not in the vehicle.

Funny bit : 

Night before last we made some egg / rice dog bread stuff with the rest of the pork grease and broth in the pork roast pan.  That is sort of a rich treat, so they didn't get all of it after it cooled, and we put some up in a bag in the fridge to give out here and there.  This morning, when I let the dogs out after the school bus ran, they lounged around the porch for a while.  Then, Minerva started barking she wanted to come in.  I went to let her in and the other two, Daphne and Charlotte, were laying in the leaves.  They both simultaneously put heads up, ears rotated, and everything about their body language said 'Will there be Snacks?'  It was a very clear communication to me.. so I said 'There could be, yes.'  To which, they popped up immediately and came running in to the house and all the way downstairs in front of me.  

Minerva had gotten up on the couch while I was talking to them, and looked at me like 'What did I miss?'  I said 'Snacks, come on' and she popped up and went downstairs, too.  I started giving them out and called for Sweetie, who was sleeping in the office on a dog bed, and she didn't come.  I went into the office with a piece in my hand and she curled up tightly and said 'I don't want another bath! (she got one last night, and it was cold apparently all night for her)'  But then I bounced the egg bread in my hand and she popped her head up and said 'OH' and followed me back into the kitchen.  Everybody got two more bits of egg bread and I put the last back up for later tonight.

I just love dog language - it is funny, and their emotions are very deep, from the I don't want a bath to surprise to pleading with their eyes for something they know is there (in the fridge, downstairs) and I still understand exactly what they are 'talking' about.

Of Frogs and Squash

What was supposed to be a long day of delivering packages, turned out to be hardly anything.  We joked are people stopping buying things or is it all coming tomorrow?  I have tomorrow off, but I work on Tuesday.

Went out and took some pictures of the basil and coleus, and happened to catch a few pictures of a little frog that was hiding in the soil until I began to water.

 

coleus, in brilliant purple and reds - we took some clones off these and others and they are all rooting nicely

 

small frog, smol forg, according to Mark

he sure posed well, for me, among the leftovers of my green onions here

 I cut up this butternut squash, which today had finally lost the bits of green it had.  The picture is from when I had it about a week, and now as at least three weeks.  It was from a farmer's market and fresh from the field (store bought ones are usually aged quite a bit longer to start with).

 

I peeled the outside with a potato peeler, and cut it up into julienne 'matchsticks' - and cooked some of it in the toaster oven, then mixed it with rice and cheese.  Finally, I made a tomato sauce and poured over the top of it.  It is not a dinner Mark or Esme would eat - but I was very happy with it!  I really like the taste of orange squash like this.

Butternut Squash 'au gratin' (and tomato sauce) <--follow link for Patreon 

I used the toaster oven on the squash and then added the precooked rice and cheese and toasted for another ten minutes, then made a simple tomato sauce

 We had some mashed potato that had been in the fridge over a week - and I mixed that up with a little milk and three eggs and fried it for the dogs to eat after dinner - because Mark and Esme had pizza, and there wasn't much of that as scraps, and there was hardly a spoonful of mine left at the end.  They were quite happy with that.  I need to learn to make that so that it stays together and cooks through at the same time - but for them, it doesn't matter.  It smelled good enough that I took a bite with them just to see what they were getting.

Tomorrow, we need to go get some of the groceries that Mark has been keeping on a list.  I had gotten a few of them here and there over the week when we deemed them 'urgent'.  We also need to get goat feed, because now she will only eat that one kind of food from the Amish store, and she is doing very well on it (it is alfalfa and oat pressed pellets) and the dogs are eating it out of her bowl as some sort of snack or camaraderie, along with eating their own dog food, which she does not do well with and we have been working hard to keep her out of.  

Languages : I've done mostly French, Japanese and Chinese today.

more rain and cats and bits

 

 

bit of here and there hobby farm rant - some day I will want to come back and read it all, I know

 

Our elderly tortoiseshell, Minion, does not like the rainy weather at all - and the chill that comes with it.  She also will not stay inside for long unless she is bundled up on top of someone, one of us, or the big Manx boy, Loki.  They curled in the carrier tray for my mail truck today, that I need to get out there - but I also feel it would be good to vacuum the truck or at least clean it a little before I go to the work of carrying this back out there (sans cat) and putting it back in.

I am still hoping to return to the book I was reading - after finishing some Romanian, Czech and a good swath of the remaining Welsh lessons on Duolingo.  We do need to go get some groceries though - and everything has gotten so expensive - this is an example of how a former programmer, who is not that good at calculation, does the shopping list.  Of course, Mark doesn't like it when I do this - because we always spend more than the allotted amounts, but I do it anyway, because I need to feel I have a handle on what the costs are and what we are using.. and then I see how much above that we tend to spend on snacks et al...

Heh, and there is 'American Cheese' and there is 'cheese' .. the type we cut up and add to the pizzas to make them actually stretch out to be a full meal.  

 

budget geekery post trip breakdown by cost 

the meat in that trip will probably last for a long time, as we freeze it and then parcel it out as needed until it is gone - and today, it was fairly gone, one third of the meat was regular price, and the rest of the 2/3 of it was clearance meat that we will freeze and make multiple meals out of

 

When I cook for myself it uses up things that are already in the cupboard not on this list - that only get replenished once in a while, like canned beans, dry split peas, rice, oatmeal etc.. and garden greens and peppers and zucchini (some from garden, some from farmer's market) that I freeze and should use more of but sometimes it sits there forever.  A really common meal for Esme and I is a rice dish, peppers and onions and 'other veg' and a few eggs.  Sometimes I buy a kielbasa and cut it up in the freezer and add it to those meals.  She has gotten to liking a salad of lettuce, tomatoes and black olives with a rice dish on the side maybe in a tortilla.  We were making ramen bowls with soft boiled eggs and extra veg in it for a bit but for summer now we haven't done that in a little while.

We also all eat eggs from our chickens several times a week and I use them for baking, and give extras to dogs, which they enjoy immensely.  We will get a slab of bacon once in a while and cook that up with eggs, or make toasted egg sandwiches for everyone.  Sometimes, I will make pancakes from scratch to go with scrambled eggs.  Pancakes are one thing I have always done well but it takes time to go about it properly.

 

Charlotte

Sweetie

(and Minerva, and Daphne dog, as well...)

The chicken feed is about 15.00 per week or so -we get it from an Amish store now because the goat feed we got from the co-op was bad once, solidified and the goat would not eat it, and then we gave it to the chickens with their chicken feed (which was co-op and seemed okay) but one of them died.. and we couldn't tell if it was the bad feed or what... so we started getting it from this other place, and it smells fresher and everybody eats it with gusto compared to 'oh, yay.... food' from the other supplier.  We supplement the chicken feed with lots of weeds, lespedeza, chickweed, lambs-quarters, clover, dandelion and whatever those huge nettle-looking things are that don't have any spikes... and a bit of the goat's hay (her other food is pellets of alfalfa'/oats which are 10.00 about every two weeks or more.. the dogs have a bag of food that is 35.00 every three weeks or so, but they eat eggs and whatever we happen to be eating they get whatever we don't put up for leftovers).   

blind goat, Melody - with Loki cat, outside beneath a tree in the fenced yard

(we adopted her from a farm because she had gone blind and needed bottle feeding.  The owner could not care for her with all the other animals to take care of, and now she lives here with our dogs and cats and comes inside for pellets and a brush down, sleep on the floor with the dogs a bit, and then go back out to the yard - she has a dog igloo she sleeps in and sometimes the cats join her there for company)

I feed the cats dry food (about 15.00 every three weeks) but they also go through one stack of tuna (1 can every 2 days) because the dry food alone was causing skin problems for our elderly cat.  The 'for cats' wet foods they don't like much, so it isn't worth it to buy it when we can buy a cheap brand of tuna and also have that for our own food if we don't use it for them.  I was feeding them a bit of egg every night as well (Cooked) but the elderly cat got where she left it every time so I make sure she gets the wettest bits of the tuna can and her dry food and that has done much better for her.  I should still make the egg for the two younger kittens though, as they ate it and had no issue.  

The Manxes are siblings, from barn-cat lines, and fixed at a young age, and are inside-outside cats catching mice on the property.  We had hoped that Minion, the elderly tortoiseshell cat (she's 15 now!) would teach them 'the ropes' and she has.  She has a touchy relationship with Lyffan, the female cat, but they do sometimes lick each other's head.. it just ends in hissing and 'go to your side of the room'.. but Minion and Loki (the boy cat) are often curled up together - she uses him as a hot water bottle.

They love to present mice, moles, voles, even grasshoppers to us, and spend a lot of time sitting watching holes or even under the doorway of the garage etc.. I saw Lyffan catching small frogs yesterday, which is funny because her name means 'toad' in Welsh (lyffant, actually).  They are doing well and Loki especially doesn't seem to be lacking for any calories at all.. most often you can find him lying on some patch of floor holding it down, in between mouse hunts outside.  Lyffan goes in her spats, between not wanting to come in except for meals and then running right back outside, to parking herself on Esme's dresser like the Queen of Sheba and spending half the night with her, or with me, as a blanket on my feet..  Esme can pick Lyffan up and walk around with her, something she doesn't like anyone else to do.  She will go from running a little skinny to looking like a round poofball, which follows suit with all the other Manxes we've had before.  The vet said she had an extremely short spine, no tail AT ALL, and sometimes we know that can give them digestive problems, so we keep an eye on that.

Snow 2024 : Episode Three

 

 

The crochet floor rug I'm working on, the other one is still a big hit downstairs but there isn't enough of it.

 

Today was Too Much Adventure, as I call it.  I was called in yesterday to do the full city walking postal route, and I did, get it done, and got home with only some fishtailing and 'hold your hat' over the hill, but I did not enjoy it.  And today, they called me and told me that kid was calling out again, and so I came in - delivered the packages, and it was only two and a half hours, but it had begun to rain and then it was due to freeze again.  

 

I tried three times to make it back up the hill to my house (after the highways were clear, but our side road is NOT.. and it was 29 degrees and people were sliding all over town even on clear highways, I saw the reports).. and the truck was smoking, and I decided to call it 'it could be worse - let's not have it worse' and park it in a neighbor's turnaround with a SORRY note sticking out the window with my phone number on it.  It didn't block their drive - but I'm sure it was 'what, why?'... but the other option was keep trying as it kept getting icier and maybe end up upside-down in the ditch.  The second and third time I tried to get up that hill I was sliding on the return towards the ditch also... and it wasn't fun at all.  

 

So, I threw on the emergency gear I had put in my seat each day this week for walking in this weather- big rubber boots (which, I actually wore on the route today as well as my good shoes got soaked yesterday) and an oversized parka over my normal parka jacket - and walked the mile and a half home.  I'm hoping to go out there (also dressed like this) in a few days when it is close to water temperatures again and take my plastic sled and a bin of salt with me and see if that will make the difference to get me the rest of the way home for the melt on Monday (when I'm scheduled again though, before the melt) **sigh**

 

A self-portrait of me walking in my big orange parka and rubber boots today

 

 

 

Melody, our mostly blind goat, enjoying some time inside (tied to the desk, because she singes herself) next to the propane heater

 

The heater is popular, here is Melody (nose showing only), Minion (cat), and Charlotte and Daphne (dogs) before they realized I had a camera and was taking a picture of them.

  

Chickens asking: Where is dinner? 

 

Charlotte going out with me to check on and feed the chickens.

Life With Catahoulas #4 original webcomic

 

They think he is cooking something huge, maybe a T-bone steak, when it's just a hamburger.

And Rex, the German Shepherd puppy, really was holding his bone in line the other day while everyone sat around smelling the food cooking.  

Life with Catahoulas is a weekly webcomic of the antics of four Catahoula Leopard dogs, a bluetick, a German Shepherd puppy, four cats and a goat, on a farm in Tennessee.  It is drawn by Marie Lamb, an author and artist, wife, mother and plumber.

Come see us every week for a new comic, 'around Monday', between Sunday night and Tuesday, depending on what's happening in this busy life!

Rex and his adopted mom and aunt

Can you tell that Minerva is his adopted Mom?  They have been chewing up the blankets this winter and Rex seems to think that all the toys belong right next to Mom's butt.  I have a cartoon almost ready for Monday for the comic strip - tune back then and see it :)

Rex loves! He ate several of the pretzels as a puppy and now carries his dumb-bell toy everywhere as his 'happy thing'. The Kongs are the very best - they bounce and can be carried and dropped down the stairs to great effect. If you have an aggressive nervous chewer the Kongs are really the best thing ever!

Lots of New Toys and more at KnitOwl Shop

There are lots of new toys in the shop this week! There are also some new paper goods and vintage items!


Happy birds and ducks

Mama Kitty and her kittens
are black cats for Halloween!

New handheld Playtime Bunnies!
These little stuffed rabbits are ready to hop!

A fun skeleton paper doll.

Doggie Tales

We've been discussing some ways to illustrate some of the funny doggie tales around here. Yesterday we tried out a few different methods in clay and ink.



The modelling clay would work well, especially with a tripod setup and good light. Mark made the bone for the little puppy :o)




My drawing needs to get a little better - trying to get the shape of Blaze's head down is difficult, there are so many angles!

Mouse and her Puppy

Mouse has a puppy... her name is Puck. Since she is so much smaller than the other dogs here, Mouse seems to have adopted her. They go in and out the front door together, play in the woods and attack each other in 'chase' all over the house. Of course, Mouse only plays chase with the puppy when she thinks she isn't being observed.. cat dignity and all...



Way back in September, Mouse already watched over this strange, large and unmannered kitten she has acquired. You can see it on her face here -- "Hrmph. What a task this is!"



We're done playing in the yard, time to come in now!


Puck got smacked back soon after this sequence...

What's going on around these parts: A lot of camera work! That is all part of more sewing for the shop, and listing things on Ebay, and fixing of computer equipment. I am working on my mom's birthday present (which includes knit dishcloths), and sent something out in the mail for my nephew's belated birthday.

The weather has been up and down - very warm one day and bright sunlight with cold wind the next. I'm also learning to drive the stick-shift truck - very different, but so far the transmission is still in one piece! So the days are full and varied, with lots of little pieces getting done on things here and there. My dream bag has five rows left to do before I start to plan what the back will look like.. or maybe I shouldn't plan it at all?


Daffodils in the garden here


Sunset at the lake