JessaLu Knits (and Spins!)

While at the car show I upgraded the paint on the Jeep (just enough to help me recognize it in the grocery store parking lot):

When Don is working, it usually draws a crowd. He’s amazing to watch, he does everything freehand and has been doing this since the 70’s. He added pinstriping to my red Jeep so this has become somewhat of a tradition. He will also do the striping on the Chevy if we can ever get it to that point ;o)

Oh, did you want to see what he did? ;o)

(Jeep got a lil dirty in Vermont…)

All. Freehand. Seriously. The man is a marvel.

Okay one more picture from the car show which is little more ‘candy-ish’

How cool is this car?

Have a great weekend, everybody :o)

P.S. Steve’s a Coopworth - in all my excitement in the last post I forgot to mention that. Doh! She’s also very…aromatic. Thought you might be curious… ;o) Oh, and Carole? You can stop laughing now… ;op

…was interesting, to say the least.

Before I start with telling you about my weekend fun, let me thank everyone who shared their 9/11 story on the previous post. I think that talking about what happened that day is an important step to the emotional healing that we all need to go through. Thank you for helping me with my healing process, I hope I helped you all just a little bit.

So, now on with the show :o) First, there was a car show on Friday (no pictures, sorry - they’re on the ‘new toy’ that I haven’t been allowed to play with yet).

Then, on Saturday, there was the Vermont Sheep & Wool Festival. I got up early (which is easy to do when you’re surrounded by guys with loud cars who like to start them and rev the engine at 7:30 a fricken m.), had breakfast with RR and hit the road around 9ish. It took me about 2 hours to get there and, to get there, I had to cross this bridge:

Scary Bridge AND Saturday Sky! ;o) Who says blondes can’t multitask? *g*

It’s bigger when you get closer. ALOT bigger. I had to cross it again to get back to the car show - in the pouring rain and feeling miserable - so feel sorry for me just a little bit, k? Thanks :o)

At the festival I met up with Jessie and we walked through the first building. I was in the market for a fleece but hadn’t decided what kind. I had a list of the breeds I was interested in which helped me keep my head just a little bit. ;o) After we walked through the first building, Cynthia had gotten there so we met up with her and her DH and walked around the 2nd building.

Now…I have a small confession to make…I had heard rumors that once you start spinning and get your first wheel it’s hard to stop collecting. Sometimes wheels virtually fall in your lap. I didn’t believe this and thought it was a vicious rumor…until it happened to me. Our neighbor was cleaning out her house (she’s selling - remember? And we’re nervous…remember now?) and came across a wheel in her basement. She remembered that I am a spinner and…long story short…

Meet Wheel #3.

…as you can see, she’s missing some pretty important parts - right now she’s visiting Dave’s shop and getting a tune up and new parts :o)

The other big event that took place is…I am no longer a fleece virgin. I am now the proud owner of ‘Steve’ (the sheep had no name - the woman I bought her from didn’t really have much of a personality, either - so RR dubbed her (the fleece, not the crabby lady) ‘Steve’. Don’t ask.) And, here I am holding her after my purchase and yes, that is a maniacal gleam in my eye:

(notice the crabby lady wasn’t so crabby after she had my cash in hand….that’s her over my right shoulder) Jessie had been looking at some sheep to take up residence in her new digs so we walked over and saw those (very cute!) and at that point she had to go to a family thing so she ducked out. We were all hungry so we went and got something to eat - I had french fries. This is very important and will come up again…unfortunately…

What else did I buy at the show? Why these happened to make their way into my shopping bag…

Two 2oz hanks of merino/tencel in ‘Autumn’ and a ball ‘o roving in…well…in pretty colors. I’m trying to break away from the ‘berry colors’ that permeate my stash

after that Cynthia and I decided that we just *had* to go to Kaleidoscope Yarns which is just down the road from the fairgrounds. Her DH had some fun trying out yarns…

(made ya nervous there for a sec, didn’t I Josh? hehehehe I haven’t gotten the photo off my camera…yet…muahahahahahaha)

…and I managed to make a purchase before the fries decided to come back and haunt me. (I have stomach ‘issues’. Again, don’t ask.)

One skein CTH in ‘Earth’; one skein Mountain Colors 4/8’s Wool in ‘Painted Rocks’ and one skein Mountain Colors Bearfoot in ‘Rosehips’

Unfortunately, because of this little issue, I had to cancel the rest of my plans in Vermont (Sorry again, Jess) and make a frantic drive back to Lake George so I could be miserable in my own hotel room.

The next day was the final day of the car show. It was fairly quiet and uneventful - I felt *alot* better, I got some knitting done and a had little upgrade done to the Jeep (which will be covered in a post to be posted soon…) ;o)

Oh and one more thing - this is what Steve will look like when she’s all clean:

purdy, ain’t she?

…when the world changed?

Five years ago today my world changed. Not as completely or as terribly as someone who lost a loved one in the World Trade Center, but it changed nonetheless. My perception of the world shifted. Before 8:46am on 9/11/2001 I had believed the United States to be infallable and incapable of being attacked on our home turf. This became a glaringly naive belief a little after 9am when I got a call from my boss who was in Richmond, VA to tell me that a plane had hit the WTC. He told me to go to the upstairs apartment in our office building and watch the news so I could see what was going on. He knew that RR worked in the City from time to time so he wanted to be sure that #1 I knew what was going on and #2 that RR wasn’t in Manhattan that day.

I spent the rest of the day glued to the television, watching. That was all I could do. I felt helpless. Then I got angry.

Almost every generation has gone through an event such as this. Our Great-Great-Great Grandparents had the Civil War, our Great-Grandparents had WWI, our Grandparents had Pearl Harbor, our parents JFK. Each generation lost their innocence, their belief that their fellow man was reasonable and capable of dealing with their differences without violence. Each had an event that, when discussed, started with “Where were you when…?”

This has touched us all, and in so many ways. For some, it has irrevocably changed their lives. So many people were taken from us that day. They say that 1 in 5 knew someone who was in the towers. RR lost a few classmates who had gone on to be Policemen and Firefighters in the City. I am thankful that I did not know anyone personally who was lost, but it still hurts my heart to know how many people that lost a family member or a friend in the attack.

So, this is what I am asking you today, on this, the fifth anniversary of 9/11. Where were you when this generation lost its innocence? What were you doing that day? On your way to work? Working? Walking the dog? Doing the first load of laundry of the day? Feeding your children? Sitting down with your first cup of coffee? Sleeping? Walking through the streets of Manhattan? Watching the smoke? Trying to help?