A small group of Castoffs met at Carol’s house on a sunny, beautiful fall day. When I walked in everyone was already peacefully knitting…except for Linda who forgot to bring her knitting. I had brought a book for Linda anyway, so she read for a while, then got online to hunt for information about Medicare benefits (Leslie’s question). When you get to be our age, retirement questions always arise, don’t they? Well, that took a while, so Linda really didn’t miss knitting her sock.
I brought my alligator that I’m knitting for my brother who lives in Florida, home of gators. He’s a lot bigger than I thought he would be. The gator, that is. Eventually, he’ll be stuffed, and much cuter. I think.
Lazy gator
…and a lot hungrier than he should be…
Hummus-eatin' gator
…then he wanted a bigger snack…
Headbone-eatin' gator
After that, I put him back into my knitting bag. Speaking of hummus, Carol just got a new Vitamix machine that does a lot of cool stuff, including making hummus (which was yummy) and fruit smoothies (which were YUMMIER). I caught the demo and thought I’d share it with those Castoffs who weren’t there. Boy, did you miss something…
Carol in action
It reminded me of the old I LOVE LUCY episode with the Vitameatavegemin segment. Hilarious, but the result was wonderful, healthy smoothies made from pineapple, strawberries and goat yogurt. Yes, goat yogurt.
Fruit smoothies from the Vitameatavegemin machine
After our smoothies, we got back to knitting. Carol is working on her socks – Linda helped with a little problem.
Sock!
Carol is going to miss knitting for a few weeks while she drives down to Missoula to do Gramma duty by babysitting little Waylon while his mama goes back to work part-time. We’ll miss her, but we look forward to hearing stories about Waylon.
Julie was knitting her soft mittens using Mocha Plus yarn. I love this yarn!
Mitten!
Leslie was growing a rug. It gets bigger every week and will soon devour the bathroom in her house (it’s future place to live). I love the idea of taking a dishcloth pattern and expanding it into another functional item for the home.
Rug!
Carol’s daughter, Shannon, woke up from her nap long enough to join us for a while. She helped us remember the name of a roller-derby movie directed by Drew Barrymore (Whip it!) and starring Ellen Page, who we all love. Thanks Shannon. Good to see you again!
Shannon!
All in all, it was a fun day. I love all the Castoffs together, but sometimes it’s refreshing to have fewer of us at a meeting. We can hear all of the conversations…well, I guess that’s a good thing. Our conversations ranged wildly from nutbags to frozen pineapples to goat yogurt to Medicare benefits. Huh? We did get some knitting, and a whole lot of laughing, done. I love these women.
Next week we meet at Marsha’s house with another small group. It’s only a three day school week next week, so I know that a lot of our teacher types will be out of town. Please join us if you’re here though, and we can knit and talk and laugh again. Keep those needles blazing and don’t let the alligators bite.
Julie and Linda, Carol and Leslie
