Yesterday morning I loaded one spinning wheel, one fleece, numerous bags of knitting, spinning, soon to be dyed yarn, bags of apples and (what else) tomatoes, books and clothes, my computer, camera bag and THREE CATS, and headed south into highway mayhem, aka the land where driving is a contact sport.  Bu, the oldest, is no problem at all.  After the first mile of bumpy dirt road she heads into her ‘own’ cat carrier and settles down for the trip.  (I carry two carriers, just in case.. I mean what if I was stranded on the side of the road with three cats)  Zak heads onto the driver’s (in this case me) lap and Sam… well, this was his first trip with the crew.  Where would he choose to sit?  Ahemmmmm…. battle for the lap!  Just so you know, it was in the mid eighties (thank God for AC).  Zak weighs in around eighteen lbs.  Sam, the little birdbones, is negligible weightwise but long in the taking up space department.  Just for the record, I’m in the hundred and twenties category.  That’s so you can sort of picture the lap real estate available to all.  Let’s just say it was a long trip, there was a lot of juggling for space and I was sort of wedged right into the driver’s seat. 

  (I was very careful taking this , moved away from traffic and all that, and just hoped that maybe I was getting the cats into the picture)

I am an extremely lucky person.  I know this.  I was able to loan my house to a friend while I was north for a month or so.  I never expected to come back to a mess.  I was scrubbing floors and counter tops before I even took a bag from the car.  After a stint in the office today, I’ll get back to it.. unreal.  Upshot to this… NO KNITTING. 

Before I left, I know it’s only for a few days, but this time of year frost happens, suddenly, and everything can change, so I took a short walk through the woods.  It was so beautiful.  The ground is covered with ferns, everywhere.  It always makes me feel like an elf or some such woods creature with ferns nearly waist high.

and these..

With the skies clearing, a cold front will be on the way, this won’t last long now. 

  Last night: the first lace repeat on the Wool Paddler’s Shawl

Back and forth, come and go, what and where, it’s a fickle
life I lead. Last night after walking
around the tomato garden, seeing this…

I thought I was caught up, enough for a few days at least.  I had picked all the basil and made pesto, pesto, pesto.  I had turned another 1/2 bushel of apples into sauce and canned it. By morning, I had changed my plans, only moderately, but changed none the
less. The plan was to leave this
morning and drive to RI in time to make it for Tuesday night knitting at Su’s
RI Handspun.  I was looking forward to
visiting with friends and catching up on their summer projects. But then,   after what I saw it last night,  I couldn’t just drive
off and leave it; the garden… the tomatoes…  I did get in the car (or rather the truck)
this morning, and I drove to town to pick up more jars, some citric acid (I’m
not taking anymore chances) and TA DA!!!!! a new pressure canner! I’ve thought of getting one of these for a
long time. The only reason I haven’t is
because I could get away without it; that and needing a place to store it. I still could get away without it, but my
peace of mind has really been rattled with the new FDA canning
recommendations. I’ve never thought
about botulism as much as I have the past week or so. Here it is, the old and the new.

(Thanks Liz, I thought of all that acid I could buy.  But the pressure canner means lots less water and I don’t have to sterilize the jars first.  I don’t have a dish washer to help on that front, so I cook all those jars after washing all those jars and then can all those jars.. and this just made sense.)  C and I picked everything can able and I
washed and pared while he ran the tomatoes through the Squeezo and voila… two
pots are presently simmering on the stove. Hopefully, tomorrow when I try once again to leave for a few days, I
will be guiltfree and on my way.

In 104 more sts. I will begin the first pattern row of the
Wool Paddlers Shawl.

Ps. Have you seen Margene’s new shawl?