Grammi's Birthday Gauntlets

I finished my Grammi's birthday gauntlet gloves the other day! Her birthday is this Saturday, November 28, but I have no fear of spoiling the surprise since I know she doesn't read this blog. They are knit out of Lamb's Pride worsted weight wool in a dusky rose color. My grammi thinks fingerless gloves are silly, but my mom tells me her hands have been getting rather chilly at dialysis when she wants to read - so maybe she'll reconsider their potential practicality this year!

I found the pattern online, and usually when I do that I'm good about noting the website or designer - but I must have completely spaced that this time because I can't for the life of me figure out where I pulled the pattern from. I scanned it in though, and you can click here to see the pattern I used. It's 'easy' - but not at the same time. There is nothing hard about what the pattern is asking you to do, but at the end when it says "knit left gauntlet basically the same as the right" what you actually are supposed to do is reverse the pattern on your own - I would recommend just writing out the pattern for the left gauntlet before you start knitting - it's too easy to get mixed up trying to just reverse everything in your head!

Annie & Laea

Mom came to visit this past weekend - and Laea & Annie got to spend a little bit of quality time together. We caught them both on Annie's dog bed on Saturday morning - a rare sight! Maybe they like each other more than they want us to think!

Cx #8 - Barton Park

This past weekend was the final race in the 2009 Cross Crusade series. Sniff. The Barton course was hard - lots (too much!) of flat, non-technical riding that allowed people to really open up. The pace was much faster than any of the other races this year. I rode well in the muddy sections that there were, but I definitely could have used a different gear on my SS for the flats - I just couldn't spin fast enough to keep up with the ladies who were able to gear down. The race was really fun though - and in the end I placed 10th!

The following three race pics are from Brujo. I am not really sure who this is, but he was nice enough to share his pictures with the PDX bike community up on Flickr!

Me, waiting at the start line for the gun to go off. Teammate, Fletch is to my right.

Carrying my bike uphill.
On another run-up.

Extra Cx #7 Pics!

Thanks to Michelle for these extra shots from last weekend's race out at PIR! I forgot to mention the best news from this race in my last post - which is that I got 5th place in the B Category!!! That's a great finish for me - normally I'm back in the 18-20th range. They did upgrade a bunch of people from my category, which helped, but I still had a really good race.

Me - expressing pre-race jitters at the start line.

Post-race muddy backside.

Mud-shot from the front! (Smiling after rinsing all the dirt out of my contacts. Ouch.)

Part of my cheering squad! We also had a big group of friends come out to watch and cheer and it was so fun to see them all out there on the course!

Cross Crusade #7 - P.I.R.

Last week on Sunday was the second to last race in the Cross Crusade series for 2009. The event was held up at PIR - and the weather was perfect. By perfect I mean it rained for about 5 days before the event - and the POURED during the women's race, so the course, was slippery, technical, and covered in mud. Perfect.

A shot to give you an idea of how deep the mud was covering most of the course - it was like riding through peanut butter.

Photo from PDX Cross

Towards the beginning of my race - when I'm not totally covered in mud yet.

Photo by OregonVelo

Running uphill carrying my bike.

Photo by Jenn Levo

A shot back down the hill so you can see the mud, water, and barriers!

Photo by Jenn Levo

Getting ready to re-mount my bike.

Photo by Jenn Levo

Running over the top of a concrete bunker that was on the course.

Photo by OregonVelo

Lowe's Sweater!

Last week I finally finished the sweater for my friend, Michelle's, daughter Lowe. I say finally - because I had the darn thing completely knitted in July - and then I stalled out on sewing all the pieces together. Lowe has been getting bigger & bigger recently - and I started to get worried she'd get bigger than the sweater - so that made me motivated to finish up. Here's a shot of little Lowe-bug in her sweater, and also an adorable pair of ruffle pants that Michelle just whipped up last week. Michelle is a sewing genius!

I knit the sweater using a Blue Moon Fiber Arts pattern called "Baby Yours" - the yarn is also Blue Moon Fiber Arts - Socks That Rock, lightweight, in Sunstone.

Extra Halloween Shot!

Not sure why I forgot to post this one yesterday - but here's a great one of me pretending to eat my friend's baby, Lowe! (as a side note - Lowe was about the most ADORABLE lil' pumpkin you've ever seen - and she slept so soundly! Even as the undead were coming to get her!)