Thursday, July 05, 2012

Busy, Busy, busy

The last couple of months have been busy!  Hence, no blogging.
Even after my disappointment in the fair last year, I missed entering in San Mateo this year, so--I went ahead and entered in the Stanislaus County Fair.  When I finally made up my mind to this, I only had a couple of days to get my entry form in.  What have I done in the last year that I still have in my possession?  Made a mental checklist, decided to make a couple of new items, and got my entry form done.  The items have to be taken to the fairgrounds this Friday, 7/6.  I guess the judging will be next week as the fair starts on 7/13.  I have five entries:
1) big bright bold potholder
2) crocodile stitch slouch beret made in fingering weight cashmere/merino marled yarn
3) doily, purple/plum #10 cotton
4) stole/shawl, my own design crocheted in FW soft cotton yarn
5) vest-pattern converted from DK  to FW Kraemer yarns Sterling Silk & Silver yarn, which is gorgeous!
Our CGOA chapter had a table at the San Mateo County Fair again this year.  Kitty, Peter and I were there on the last Sunday to answer questions and share our love of crochet with anyone who wanted to stop and chat.  He and others from the group were there both weekends.  We are just not a large enough group to be able to cover every day of the fair.  Hoping Andy can join us next year on the final Sunday as he is the only current member who speaks Spanish, and that day is Spanish Heritage Day.  Unfortunate for us, he had other commitments this year.
I was also commissioned to crochet a scarf which had a deadline.  It was a bit of a challenging pattern and had quite a bit of finish work.  But, I made the deadline.
Oh!  I almost forgot to tell you!  Probably the biggest consumer of our time for the last few weeks--we got a dog.  She's a rescue with kinda sad story.  Penny's sister-in-law works at a convalescent hospital on a very busy street.  They noticed this poor little black chihuahua running in and out of the traffic.  It finally came up to the door, and when someone opened the door, she came right in.  One of the ladies grabbed her up and took her in and gave her a good bath, apparently she was very dirty and smelly.  They didn't know what to do with her at the end of shift, so Cristy said she would talk to her husband (they already have 6 dogs, 3 large and 3 small).  She came out carrying the dog. Pete called us to tell us about it so Penny and I ran over to their house to see.  We came home, called our landlord to see if it would be ok to add a dog to our family.  He was fine with that.  So we went and picked her up.  We took her to the vet the next day to have her checked out.  No chip, good health, but has allergies that make her eyes all red.  The vet estimated that she is 3 to 4 years old, and that she was a couple of weeks pregnant.  He was wrong!  She had her pups less than 3 weeks later, so she was about 6 weeks pregnant. One pup died almost immediately, another died in less that 24 hours, and the 3rd pup died at 2 weeks old.  She was fat, growing, had just opened her eyes: was fine when we went to bed but was dead when Penny got up.  We are trying not to feel too guilty, because we don't know anything about Poppy's past.  We don't know how she was treated, how long she was loose on the streets.  The very least, she was woefully neglected.  Her poor little toenails were so long she had trouble standing up and she has had a shoulder injury sometime in the past.  She is settling in and she and the cats are tolerating each other.  She's a smart little thing and I think she's going to make a great addition to our little family.
I will post pics of the fair and the dog when I have a little more time.

1 comment:

Krocheter said...

The crocodile stitch beret sounds incredible...and what a great yarn! Loved reading about your new dog, too.