Tag Archive: socks



By next week this balloon will be finished. I think I’m tired of balloons.
Yay!
Sondheim is rolling around in his grave as I work on this and quite a few other of his songs. (That intro kills my eyes and hands!) By the way, I finally got brave enough to get back into Phantom songs. That has inspired much longer playing sessions. I started out last October 1, 2024 doing minutes or just an easy tune. This week I managed two sessions of over an hour each. And I was excited by how much fun I had!
On the other hand, I’m maybe 2k behind. At least TrackBear helps me adjust my daily goal making the 50k within reach — I hope.
No, my machines are not so fancy-dancy. Still, my time on both the stationary bike and treadmill increases. I hope it increases.

For the knitting, I’ll just use last week’s pic as I’ve done very little knitting.

Friday


The lower half of the balloon is nearly done.
The yarn my daughter gave me is becoming toes.
Here’s what the skein cakes look like.
The yarn my son gave me is becoming the finished toes.
This is how the skein and cake look. The cake was made because the dog made yarn vomit out of one of the skeins while I was gone for a day.
Yoga socks are nearly finished but I lost interest as it’s getting cold.
Arch ribbing starts soon. I still love these colors.
This is what the yarn looks like. Not much left. I hope I have enough for at least shorties.
Nearly to the heel. I like this color, too.
Close up off the yarn.
Mid arch ribbing.

Musically I’m enjoying sight reading a lot of songs from one of Sondheim’s books.

Three more hours until No Plot becomes my problem.

Finishing Friday


I’m finally to the basket. Still need to finish a couple spots. I love the colors.
Shiloh helps display my scrappy socks. I’m starting the heel today.
Too sleepy to open her beautiful green eyes.

Happy Cat’s Day.


Working the bottom fourth of my new Sea Turtle Diamond Painting. I’m listening to “Learn Faster, Perform Better” by Molly Gebrian during the painting. It’s very interesting.
Only because I knew I needed to report progress on my Two-At-A-Time socks on Chiaogoo needles, I put a couple rows in on each pair.  I finally got new glasses for these up-close WIP. So my only excuse is arthritis and not even that so much as, um, life?
Some of the fun songs I’m learning. Shiloh, loves and comes running when I play or sing that song to her. My son wants me to learn Skyrim. It is cool. And Succession needs to be relearned. Too much time between plays.

My rebinge of Grey’s Anatomy is a part of ‘Life’ made it to S13E12 out of, what? 22? What’s funny is how the guys join up with me. Sometimes all four of us are watching.

I have finished three books and now need to write reviews.

My newest addiction. Another part of ‘life.’

The furry three take up the rest of my time. They keep us on our toes, laughing, caring, cuddling. Nothing gets finished when hugging or walking these balls of fun energy.

Yeah, don’t let that innocent look fool you.

Your prompt for JusJoJan January 31st, 2025 is “fini.” Find a word that has “fini” in it and use that as your prompt word. Have fun!

Well, that’s easy! It is Finishing Friday! A great way to keep track of hobbies and passions. A way to see progress when, at times, it seems the end is as far as infinity. Row at a time, an inch at a time, a chord played right, or a rhythm that stays where it belongs is fun to keep track of. Many keep track of grievances or pain. I have. I probably will again and again. But I feel more fulfilled if I can see good and beautiful things done from the same place as the bird’s song. It feels right. It gives me pleasure. Not because I am looking for praise. I thank you for that, but it is more for me to feel like I am moving forward.

This felt good as it hit. Some days I do a lot of lessons. For others, I just do the one to get the points. I love languages, so it is fun for me.

The last two hats were for smaller heads. So I decided to make one a little bigger. I just finished the ribbing and started on the basket weave part. It is easier on my hands than crocheting or knitting, so while I am feeling the arthritis, I’m being gentle on the fingers.

My brother’s socks are coming along. Less than an inch to the end of the arch ribbing. Then, an inch to the beginning of the heel. I feel I am at the beginning of the end of this pair.

The middle section of the ‘smiling turtle’ diamond painting is almost done. It is a fun project. I love all the colors.

I have, in all essence, finished this book. Most of it was a review of things I’ve learned all my life, especially as a music major. But toward the end, it started meeting my needs. It has a lot of ways to improvise. I still find myself trying to play every single note rather than play, but I’m seeing ways to do it. I’ll be doing the review for this book soon. Mostly, at this point, I am in love with the last song presented. It’s called Coming Home.

So my favorite songs to play right now are Baby Elephant Walk, Just the Way You Are, God Bless the Child, and Coming Home. They drive me to the piano. I actually spent an hour there today. Remember in the summer or fall when I stated I could barely get five minutes in before pain or boredom pulled me away. Now, I have the joy of actually hearing and feeling the earworms that crawl through my head the rest of the day. My own music!

My ukulele, violin, and recorders sit sadly, waiting for my hands to feel better. I miss the learning process with them.

Well, that’s my Friday report. Fini!


Wow. With summer heat and humidity, not to mention ADHD with non compliant stresses, progress is slow. But my super power is running.

Even the smallest amount of progress will get the job done eventually. It is in the giving up that nothing happens. Except drama. Reliving trauma never brings positive results. Acknowledging the downside, not jumping in and feeling sorry for myself, helps me survive and thrive.

In this case:

Talking too much, distracting thoughts, feelings, actions, and resulting health issues. They all are there. It was worse when I was working in jobs that weren’t healthy for me.

I wish when I’m interrupting I could say I’m sorry. But I believe that sorry implies a will to change. Sadly, in my 74 years that change is detrimental to my health. Every time.

I was Hermione raising my hand with the answer. But being fair, I let others answer first. By the time the teacher called on me my mind had already gone a thousand places and I couldn’t even remember the question. Then someone else would get it right and it was exactly the answer I knew I knew. And I knew what I had to say was unimportant. That my gold star was unimportant.

Yet learning was the reward. Still is. And friends. And family. But ADHD threatens all of it. Unless I do little bits. Many, many little bits.

I’ll never be a concert pianist or win great awards from my efforts of anything. But I have to be happy with my little wins. And keep trying to be a human who does her best to be kind.

Anyway. My little win is my new slipper socks.

I move the stitches as I work the last ribbing row onto separate 9 inch circular needles. That makes the cast-off work so much easier.
Shorty slipper socks with arch hugging ribbing.
Yep. For me.

And because I love how that arch feels I’m trying it on the watermelon shorty socks.

Two rows into the ribbing.
The heat makes yarn too hot. My brain needs something to stimulate it. But often, I find I get sloppy and make a ton of mistakes.

My Duolingo is still going but Chinese is as hard as Hebrew and Navajo. I tend to lose a lot of hearts. But I find a successful language like Italian to play with until I build the hearts up.

My music is even harder to get to because of heat and disruptions. But. I will keep trying to get all my passions back into my daily schedule. I miss having a good routine that pushes me to try.

Across from my piano that didn’t get touched is my sunset beach. But that’s the south side of the house and it gets hot in there. Bring back nice temps!

So there we are. Making Monday in August.

My favorite bitmoji

I’ve finally started the heel on these.
This pair is nearly ready for a heel. Maybe an inch more of the arch ribbing.
My new recliner diamond painting is ready to set up. This guy is cool! I can hardly wait to get started.
My new project. Ponytail holders. The red band will probably not show once I crochet the lime green around it.
Info about the yarn.
I had made progress of about 4 rows but found an oops. Can you see the blue marker in the top of the sock on the right? Ugh. I felt watermelon would make me feel better these days. Oh, well.
No light shows progress on my sunset beach diamond painting.
With the back light on bright you can see my progress into the water. Me stepping in…

I’m finally getting my piano groove going again. I’m keeping sessions short and as successful as possible.

I finished all but the Dexter movie. Can’t seem to find it. But both series(es) done. I miss the music. Trying to find a good piano copy of the sheet music of the beginning theme and end theme.

My allergies kept me from the recorders. I don’t like playing them with a sore throat or sneezing.

I am finding progress on my Enya Ukulele. Even my B flat seems right every now and then.

Time to play!

Made It Monday


I finished my scrappy no-show socks. I thought they’d fit me but they are slightly too small, so off to a friend.

I still have more of that purple-bluey yarn so I started toes for a new pair.

I finished my Uke strap.

It straightens out when I put it on. It’s comfortable .
I’m on the heel of the remakes. They are going to be a little too big for the first recipient. But  we have a friend who might like these when her feet and ankles swell.
Nearly finished Shooting the Curl!

The snow finally melted. We are told on the news, that though we started our week in the winter we will have Spring and then Summer by the weekend. Crazy Oregon! I love it!


We started out with pretty snow, but now it is all atrocious mud and rain. Yuck!

Your prompt for JusJoJan, January 26th, 2024, is “atrocious.” Use it any way you’d like. Enjoy!

Jemima of Jemima’s blog provided us with the prompt of the day. Thank you, Linda and Jemima!

My achievements for this Friday are meager, but I feel good about them. My greatest accomplishment is over a year in getting it done. Now, I need to find a way to send it to its new home.

Sealed and an acrylic paint border. I had tried different types of tape including a pretty duct tape. But none stuck very well. But I think the black looks better anyway. I’m just so sloppy with paints I got it on everything. It cleaned up okay. But I’m ready to do some new diamond paintings.

The socks I was knitting ended up being tinked back to the arch area. I had them all the way to being close to done, but I held them in my hand and wondered about the size. They are supposed to fit a size 1 child, but when I looked that up, that would have been at least 7 inches long. These were only 5. So most of the week I have been undoing the work. The good part is I am getting better acquainted with the shadow wrapping needed for the heel and above. So when I finally get there again I’ll know what I’m doing. By the way, in the picture, you will see that each sock has its own needles. When I reach the heel of these no-show socks I find I do better with them separated.

The sock on the right is the one I’m working on until I reach the heel. The ball is all that I had to tink off the sock. For the sock on the left, I just wound the yarn around the sock so I wouldn’t get them mixed up.

When I want to just relax I am working on this pair of slipper socks.

I’m going to have to decide who gets these soon so I know how large to make them. I already have a pair I made for me but I love them enough to want another pair. They are comfortable.
Photo by Tatiana Syrikova on Pexels.com

I’m still only on day 8 of the lessons as I haven’t mastered the few chords taught so far. My fingers are getting tougher, but they still aren’t coordinated enough to not mute other strings. But, hey, I can now get through Row, Row, Row, and Mary Had A Little Lamb. Yay! I’m thinking I need to make a strap for my uke to carry it around and take the pressure off my hands. There are several patterns on YouTube.

Photo by Vika Glitter on Pexels.com

I wish I had learned recorder as a kid like these guys. But I’m glad I do understand music so that I can read and play the notes I know how to play. I finally got out my alto and found I remembered how to play it. My lapse of learning happened when I realized I had been using the wrong fingering for the type of recorder I had. Baroque versus German. All of my recorders and I inherited a lot of them from the school I worked in, plus my alto and my tenor that I bought are the Baroque.

Now that I know that I have retaught my fingers the F. I stopped playing before because it sounded wrong, and I couldn’t figure out why. Now I know, and I have to re-train my brain for it.

Speaking of the musical instruments, this is the time I usually play around with them. So, have a great Friday night and week-end!


This post is part of Linda’s Just Jot it January, and today’s prompt, tenaciousness, is courtesy of Cheryl. Check out her blog here!

Oxford Dictionary says of ‘Tenacious’:

“ending to keep a firm hold of something; clinging or adhering closely.

“tenacious grip”

or

not readily relinquishing a position, principle, or course of action; determined.

“you’re tenacious and you get at the truth”

or

persisting in existence; not easily dispelled.

“a tenacious local legend”

When I am working on something I can seem stubborn. But I would rather think of it as tenacious. Sticking to it until I become better, sticking to it until I have a product to wear, or give to someone else to enjoy. The following are my newest slippers and socks.

These are a pair of this-and-that slippers using up leftover yarn. If they don’t turn out well, I will keep them and love them myself!
These will be the smallest no-show socks for a sweet little girl who is a size 1 child. I hope they turn out to be her size. I have to admit my own size is easiest to do as I have my own feet available to check as I go.
I tenaciously cling to the idea of learning to play new instruments while maintaining the ones I know. My recorder is always near me. I’ve finally gotten the idea of how the Baroque fingering for F and F sharp is different than the fingering I learned at first. I like that it sounds right now.
The last time I tried a stringed instrument was a guitar I had as a young teen. I named it Herman. I gave up because it hurt my fingers. So, I thought a ukulele would be easier. Definitely easy to tote around. Nope. I’m only on one-finger chords, and it already hurts. But now I have a group on Facebook helping me learn to keep practice times down to 10 minutes until my fingers develop callouses. I plan to stick it out. And still get back to my piano. No sense in letting that go when it has been with me since I was 5. 69 years of piano? I ought to be at the concert level! No. I just want to enjoy it and learn more.
Remember this guy? I was working on him a year ago. I gave up because I didn’t like to do the last steps. But I finally finished sealing the painting. Tomorrow, I will frame the work with the tape in the upper left corner. Then he and the leg-warmers will go to their new owner.
Through the limbs of the mesquite, you can see the tenacious snow that won’t leave the driveway despite the rain we have had for a couple days. More rain is expected. Somehow, I don’t think I will see snow tomorrow.
My brother has a new but beautiful enemy. We have about 6 of these guys hanging around our yard and our neighbors’ yards. Though I would appreciate them dealing with all the mice around here, they seem to be going after the chickens and small stray cats and rabbits that hang out in our area. My brother got beak to beak with one as he tried to save one of his chickens, but the owl had already won. So he strengthened the coop so that owls couldn’t get in. Sadly, our chickens are free-range during the day, and that makes it dangerous for them. When not being pests, these large birds are gorgeous. And probably more tenacious than any other predator around here.

But I can’t leave this prompt without this tribute:

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