California

We were here, Now we're leaving for a while....you know, sung to the tune of California, Here I come. We are finally leaving the sunny climes of CA heading to the cooler regions of the Pacific Northwest. We are carting a 14' wide load from San Diego, CA to Seattle, WA. It's not very tall, only 4' or so, but it sticks out 3 feet on either side of our trailer. In the state of CA, we have to have an escort. That means that we have someone following us everywhere we go telling us what is coming up behind us and clearing the lane from people behind us when we need to move to the right or the left. It's only the second time that we have had an escorted load, and it's an interesting experience, to say the least. (I guess we are going to be "stuck" in Redding, CA for the weekend. We need a county permit for a detour, and our company didn't get it for us, so we now have to wait until Monday morning to get the permit.)

We got to California last Friday. We had a load of military equipment (2 hummers) that we brought out from Chambersburg, PA. It was a fast and furious trip, but we made it to Camp Pendleton in time to sit for the weekend. We went up to Ontario, just outside of LA, where the only truck stops in the greater LA area are. We went there because we figured that we would pick up a load in or around LA and that was where we decided to go. Not only that, we were having some white smoke coming out of the stacks and there was a Kenworth dealer/shop in Fontana, about 5 mins from Ontario. We ended up having to put the truck into the shop to the tune of $8,500.00 to replace a cracked head, a blown head gasket, a cracked exhaust manifold, and a broken turbo charger. We stayed in an old Best Western hotel that was okay, but it wasn't great. It did have a pool, which was freezing, and a hot tub. I wasn't able to use either, but the boy used both and enjoyed it.

We were home the week before last to pick up our mail and to get things like snow chains (can you believe it's that time of year already?) and to do some minor repairs on the truck, mostly preventive maintenance. While we were home and getting our mail, I got some good stuff. I almost always have yarn waiting for me at home (three sock clubs will do that) but I also had some of the boys school books waiting for us. We are slowly but surely getting everything together and getting this school year off to a start. The only thing I haven't ordered now is the Spanish program that I want to use, but if I don't do that until after Christmas, we have plenty of work. I decided to change math programs this year and chose Teaching Textbooks. One of the things that I like about this is that they teach math "things" that I am not comfortable with and don't have the first clue about teaching and the program is written by two Harvard graduates for the homeschooling community. It starts with grade 5 and goes through the many subjects of high school math...yay!!!

On the way to California, we went through New Mexico and saw this sunset:








The sky was a burst of brilliant oranges and pinks against a backdrop of shearing clouds that reflected the sun in such a way that the sky just looked like it was glowing. I must have taken 40 pictures of it driving down I-40 and these show the different colors that we saw.

On the weekend while we were in Ontario, CA waiting to get the truck fixed, I went out on the trailer and set up my yarn winding station. I was able to wind all of this and actually got some funny looks. Our neighbor, in the truck stop, came back and saw me and wanted to know what I was doing. When I told him I was winding yarn, he wanted to know for what reason, and then I had to show him the socks that I had finished and show him that the yarn is wound so that I can use it to knit socks from. I happened to have my stash outside and he couldn't believe that my hubby would allow me to keep all of that on the truck. I felt like getting the picture of the "super stash" out and showing him how little I really have. I could list each one seperately, but if you want to see what they are, you can look at my stash. I wound the Knitivity yarn that day, two skeins of Oldfield Creek Sock and Yarn Handpainted, some knit picks gloss, the Shelridge farm, and some Lorna's Laces yarn. I still have some more to wind, but I don't want to wind everything, although I do sit the fence about what winding does to it. It does make it easier for me to store if it is in cakes as opposed to hanks, but is it bad for it?

I cast on the other day for a pair of Monkey socks by Cookie A, and I'm finding them a quick and easy knit. They look really complicated, but they are cool. I have a Duet Sock yarn from a Swell Yarn Shop in the Hot Flash color way. It is chocolate brown, hot pink, and orange with the coordinating yarn in the chocolate brown. It is making some awesome monkies. I'm going to give them to my mom for her birthday, since I can't seem to find a pattern that the Mountain colors yarn that I was going to use for her socks, wants to be. Everything that I have knit with it so far is just not right.

I'm still working on the tank top for my sister, although it is in danger of becoming a UFO. It's still in my knitting bag, it just doesn't seem to see the light of day very often. I need to finish it so that it's done and she has it, but it's all stockinette all the time and you know how that it.

I finished the I love gansey socks and I need to get them to my sister. They were knit for her birthday, which was the end of September, and I think I had them done in time for her birthday, but we weren't there, so she doesn't have them. Amanda made a comment about how much knitting I get done on the truck and I guess it's all a matter of perspective. I don't think that I get all that much done. It seems to me to take forever to get anything finished, but then again, I do usually have 3 or 4 things on the needles, so maybe that's my problem. I also tend to get a case of finishitis and then all kinds of things go up on the blog, so that may be why she said that. And yes Dawn, these were done cuff down. I know, I told you how wonderful toe up was, but sometimes that pattern just calls for cuff down.

I cast on a pair of socks toe up, but the yarn that I'm using is just not working out for that pattern. It's the Mountain Colors Barefoot yarn, and with the little bit of a halo that it has, it's just hard to see any kind of pattern. I'm going to have to frog them and put the yarn away until I find something else that it wants to be.

When we were in Oceanside the other day I got some good, or at least interesting, pictures of the Pacific ocean from the rest area just south of Camp Pendleton. The rest area has an overlook that is under a bunch of trees and you kind of have to look out through the trees to see the ocean, so that's why the pictures are surrounded by the trees. You can see the ocean and the pretty blue sky on both of these pictures.

In the rest area there were a bunch of squirrels that were begging for handouts. I got a couple of pictures of one that ran up and down a low wall begging. He was kind of cute, and had a really funny, short tail. It looked like half of his tail was missing. He looks like he's giving me what for, doesn't he. He was mostly just begging, and by the amount of sunflower shells and stuff that was littering the ground where their den was, I would say that the squirrels are fed quite a bit.

Also in the rest area were a couple of types of flowering trees. I took some pictures of them and maybe someone who reads this will know what they are. The first one is a good sized tree that has these bright red puffs on them. They are really interesting and I have no idea what they are. the second one is also a rather large tree that has pinkish purplish round puffy balls on them. There is no fragrance from either tree that I could smell, but I also didn't get really close to them.

I guess that it is time to go to bed now although I did want to say a big thank you to my secret pal from SP11. When we were home, I got a post card from Virginia City, NV. I guess she had gone there and sent me a card. I also got, and man I love this, a gift certificate for the Loopy Ewe. Thank you SP, I LOVE it with all capitals. I will use it the next time I'm able to catch a sneak up.