The sky, the ocean and the landscape are blurring into a unified, steel gray background lately. It’s cold enough to stay inside without feeling like a lazy, quickly growing soft-around-the middle, 40 something. Just to prove to myself that I wasn’t making excuses, an hour ago I bundled up and walked down to the beach to snap these photographs for you…to get the real effect, let your eyes and nose water while the wind blows through your three layers of clothing!

I’ve been knitting and spinning every chance I get these days. My spinning wheel is a Majacraft Rose and I’ve bought all of my wool from New England farms. I scour and prepare it myself so that I know no harsh chemicals have ever touched it. Natural in every possible way!

This is part of the pile of fleece I’m currently spinning for Steven’s sweater…it’s fun to spin the knubbly yarn because I know that the gold wool (dyed with annetto seeds this summer) comes from Wayne and Jo Meyer’s at the Beau Chemin Farm, the chocolately brown and black wool was grown by Mary Drumm, the soft greys came from a sheep name Elm who lives at the Stillwater Farm in Turner Maine, the cinnamon wool comes from Deb and Brandon’s Woolley Farm in East Baldwin Maine and the snow white mohair is from a local goat farmer whose name has momentarily slipped my mind…Steven’s sweater is a REAL Maine Sweater.

I don’t like to have the music or television on while I play with my wooly fluff. I prefer to allow my mind to wander in a million and one directions. This thinking time is frequently very productive…but sometimes I just daydream…I’ve decided that if I ever become a yarn or knitwear designer, my personal label is going to be “The Sexy Logger“. Don’t you think Steven’s new sweater looks like the lichen that grows all over our huge white pine trees at the campground?

I’m just completing the back…next month when the rest is knit, if I’m happy with the results, I promise to share the entire sweater…maybe Steve will model beside a tree with his chainsaw resting on his chaps…oh my! 😉

Because my hands resent too much knitting and spinning, I’ve spent a couple of hours each day sorting through electronic picture files so I can upload a better assortment of photos to the flicker account. I hope to have this accomplished by the end of the week but the process is very distracting…it’s like walking through history as I plow through 15 years of pictures…guests come and go and when I catch the face of someone who doesn’t come any more, I drift off into the woman who believes she’s organized enough to get back in touch with folks to see what’s going on… well, know that you’re in my thoughts even if I never get to write to you!

Speaking of distractions, if you like memory games, check out this French website:www.fifimandirac.com/. Once the site loads, choose surprises on the bottom right (not the pop-up window you may get too) then choose memory. You can turn over any two cards at a time and once you’ve made a match, the cards stay visible. I’ve loved Fifi’s simple designs for years and now I could waste hours playing this silly game…my best score ever was 39…but my average is closer to 50…how well can you do?