Cove Point Lighthouse

Next weekend is the Maryland Lighthouse Challenge.  This means you visit the 9 lighthouses in Maryland in one weekend...AND an additional +1 lighthouse in Virginia.  Sounds cool, huh?  I think maybe next year we'll attempt the challenge but reading about it did peak my interest in checking out the lighthouses in our area.  So today we drove to the Cove Point Lighthouse.  It was about 1 1/2 hours drive through the most beautiful farm land...really lovely.  The weather being perfect for a nice drive and lighthouse adventure.  Here's what we saw:

 The original plans for the light keeper's cottage.  It is now a duplex and you can rent it out for your summer vacation!  

 Starting from the left...the light keeper's house, the lighthouse, the fog house; the keeper was responsible for making sure the fog horn worked, if not the bell was rang as a back up.  These two photos were in a display of the history of the lighthouse.

 Same buildings as above as they stand today.

 The stairwell in the lighthouse.  Unfortunately, it wasn't open.  Too bad.  I wonder if it's haunted like the St. Augustine lighthouse? Hmmmm...

 Do I hear footsteps?

 No, not a ghost, just Mike who was too tall to fit in without ducking.

Sock Update

Well, I'm half way done with my sock challenge for September.  I'm knitting 5 pairs of socks in the month of September in Ravelry's Six Socks in September Challenge.  Here they are:

For Becky

 For Elsie

First sock in third pair...for me!

Sunday Fun in DC

Sunday was so fun! Mike and I took the Metro into DC, Dupont Circle to be specific. Since this was the first time for both of us to visit that part of the city, we were super excited! The main purpose of our visit was to visit Looped Yarn Works, a yarn shop on Connecticut Avenue, just off Dupont Circle. One of my favorite designers, Alana Dakos of Never Not Knitting is on her East Coast Tour for her lastest book, Botanical Knits...and she was visiting the yarn shop for a book signing!  Woohoo!  

We arrived early so we went for a walk to take in the sights.  The actual "circle" has this lovely fountain at the center.  On this beautiful Sunday morning we got our fill of people watching...families out in the park, residents decked out in shorts and tennis shoes with reusable bags in hand ready for shopping at local stores and farmer's markets, couples out for the morning heading to brunch and much more.  The area is filled with restaurants and shops...

A friend of mine told me about this book store, KramerBooks.  There is a bar and restaurant inside...not a restaurant with a bar, but a stand alone bar-bar.  Very cute! When I saw my friend at knitting, she said she was there Saturday night and the window was intact...so sometime between then and Sunday morning....well, you can see the damage.

So after we walked around a while, it was time to visit the yarn shop.  It's upstairs in an adorable old building (they're all old and adorable). As we were walking to the door, I saw a car pull up and guess who got out...Alana!  OMG, it was a total celebrity sighting for me.  I'm bumping Mike's arm and saying, "That's her! That's her!" 

So when Alana was settled in and ready to roll...I approached the desk.  I was a little early so there weren't too many people around.  She was SO nice! Well, of course she would be, she's a knitter, a mom, a regular gal! We had a nice chat about her business, family, etc.  It really was a treat for me to meet someone who I really admire from the knitting world...she's a mom and runs her own business (with her hubby). Her patterns aren't just beautiful, they are very well written and fit wonderfully. Her books/patterns are beautifully presented. I've knit three of her sweaters, also shawls and mitts and love them all! Her leaf/nature motifs are so charming...I can't resist them! 

The yarn shop is so cute! Small and compact but full of beautiful yarn lines.  I picked up a skein of Malabrigo Rios in the Volcan colorway to knit a hat from Alana's book...but in my celebrity sighting frenzy, it's the wrong weight.  Should have been DK for the pattern not worsted.  Oh well, I'll knit something else and look for some DK in the future.  

It was a great day!  Hope your weekend was fun too.

A Buggy Tale

I posted this story on our Ravelry group and because not everyone is on Ravelry (poor souls), I'm posting it here too. We were discussing bugs and all their virtues (HA!) at knitting on Tuesday, then this happened:

After last nights conversation (and much laughter) about bugs and how they REALLY bug me, I had to tell you what happened last night when I got home.

Rox was the driver last night, and fine job she did too. I got out of the car to a dark porch which isn’t a bad thing because it does keep the bug population down (you know how they love that light). So I scrambled to get the door unlocked and open because you KNOW there are bugs just waiting for me!

No worries…got inside unharmed (and un-crawled-upon).

Fast foward to “getting ready for bed” time: I’m in the bathroom, sitting on the toilet (tmi?) and I see a bug in the shower which is directly in front of me. After closer inspection I think it’s some kind of large ant (yeah, I say to myself, another weird Maryland bug) so I leave it alone, knowing Mike will be upstairs any minute to rescue me. If he weren’t home I would have got a shoe (biggest and baddest I could find) and squashed it pronto. So I turn my bad to the shower (first mistake) and start brushing my teeth. Here comes the bug, flying at me! Ok, so maybe not AT me but pretty darn close! Not only can it fly but I’m pretty sure it had a yellow and black striped butt in the fraction of a second I saw it before flying out the bathroom door, slamming the door behind me. (second mistake) Whew…escaped death!

I finish brushing my teeth in the hall bath and proceed to wait for Mike to return from walking Gracie. It took a while, Gracie’s tummy has been disagreeable the last couple days, but he finally shows up and I point to the bathroom door and say, “BUG! Maybe a BEE!” He is very calm. He opens the door, walks in and closes the door behind him. Brave man I married. A few minutes later he comes out and says, “I can’t find it.” I say, “I can’t sleep with a bee!”

More looking…“I just don’t see it.”

“I can’t sleep with a BEE!”

More looking…”I’ve looked everywhere.”

“I can’t SLEEP with a BEE!”

“OK”, he says, “Let’s read for a while and I’ll look again.”

You can imagine…I had visions of this bee flying into the bedroom at night stalking me…or with the bathroom door closed, crawling under the door…you who don’t like bugs either can imagine the many, many ways in which bugs plot to GET us. Well, I can.

Scratching at the bedroom door…it’s Gracie who wants out again (tummy troubles). So after another walk, Mike tries to find the bug again.

There is a happy ending (and sleep for me); the bee flies out and Mike catches him and gives him a nice swim in the bathroom pool…otherwise known as the toilet. Whew!

So the answer to the questions posed to me last night… 
Yes, I confess, I am a bug-a-phobe. But out in the world I shall go, heart beating faster, in fear of other bug-attacks…until the weather turns too cold for those darn creepy crawlers (and flyers)!

(And thanks by the way…for the listen!)

School Start & Birthday

Here's the first day of school photo of Justine and her girlfriend.  The freshman went alone on Monday, then everyone joined them on Tuesday.  Very sensible I think.  

(You can't really see it, but on Justine's shirt are a bunch of Scottie dogs...which is very cool for me because that was our mascot at my high school...Go Scotties!)

So here we are on Tuesday morning and Joey, who is a senior is joining her.  Can you tell he is totally annoyed with me for making him take a picture?  Well, it's my last chance...his LAST first day. 

Justine go-carting with her friends at her birthday party!  

Best idea ever:  Have your teenager have her slumber-birthday party on the first Friday night after school starts.  It was amazing how quiet they were!  haha

Eek!

This is the time of year that the lovely State of Maryland starts to get spiders.  Now, don't get me wrong, I'm sure there are spiders year round in our lovely state but this time of year they are extremely visible...and so are their webs...and they are HUGE. To clarify: huge webs and huge spiders.

Yesterday I was walking Gracie so she could visit the toilet, known to you and I as the world.  It was early so apparently some other walker hadn't swept the sidewalks of spider webs and I walked directly into one.  And as I'm pulling web from my face and arms, I look down and there is a spider on my shirt...A HUGE SPIDER....ON.   MY.   SHIRT! No doubt my screeching could be heard across the river at the Naval Academy possibly as far as Florida. The spider, of course, jumped right off and scurried away as fast as he could, probably more scared than I was.

 Here's what it looked like:

Here's what it felt like: