Fishing Frenzy

We were on a fishing extravaganza all this weekend. It is pretty much all that we accomplished. The word accomplished can only be loosely used here as we did not actually catch anything despite all my efforts to check stocking reports and fishing forums online. We did do a pretty good job of trying different colors of power bait. We even threw in some eggs today as we saw a kid catching with eggs on Saturday... nothing doing though. All those fish and not even a nibble. At this point I would be happy to have seen one move in the water.

We did have a very nice weekend though. It was not raining for one thing and it was quite warm for February for another. The two lake photos you see here are from Battle Ground Lake at Battle Ground Lake State Park. We had never fished there before and found it to be quite pretty. This first picture shows some of the wildlife. There were actually 4 loons when I went to take the picture, but one flew away before I could snap the shot.

This next shot is of Patrick you can really see that the lake is quite still and pretty. There were a few rounds of screaming kids running through the woods, but not as many as there likely will be this summer.

This is the first year we sprung for Washington fishing licenses and I was very glad to find the lakes close to home were so nice. We also visited Horseshoe Lake (Woodland, WA) and Klineline Pond (Vancouver, WA) today. Patrick thinks he make take the Tanner Spring residents to Klineline Pond sometime as it is very accessible.

After Horseshoe and before Klineline 2 very hungry fisher people stopped in at The Oak Tree Restaurant in Woodland. Yum! Great comfort food. I had a meatloaf sandwich and Patrick had a chipotle bacon burger. We also took home some desert for later. (Incidently, while I was looking for the Oak Tree link I navigated around and found this funny little slide show about smelt. Patrick likes smelt so I thought I might just share.)


Yesterday we went fishing at Mt. Hood pond in Troutdale, OR. Shortly after we arrived home our new couch arrived. So here is a picture of the living room with the couch installed. I am still not sure of the position, but I am quite pleased with how the colors in the room contrast and compliment each other.

I have a few other pictures to share. I think I will just plop them on the bottom of the page. The first is a cute picture of Duncan and Annabelle. Isn't Annabelle getting big? The second is of my completed circle bag. All done! Yay!

One final note from little miss link surfer... don't swim in the Willamette.

Tired and Cranky

My mom was out for an extra long weekend the last several days, but has now returned home. It was really great to see her and my step-father Craig. We went to the Oregon Coast and stayed in a lovely rental with a bay view in Netarts. My parents have a lot of common interests with Patrick and I so we always have a good time.

There is just something about the end of a nice vacation though that leaves you sort of bummed. I don't feel well today and I am quite cranky. I want to start a new knitting project, but I can't decide what to make. All the yarn in my stash seems like crap and I am not sure if I want to try the Inga hat or if I want to make the St. Vincent Cloche that my mom wants.

I am clearly just to tired so I guess I will have to finish some of my WIPS and maybe go to bed early.

Photos of the Remodel & Knitting

So as promised here are some pictures of what we have been up to. To our right is what my bedroom color is now. I love the color. It is really warm and inviting. It also allows me to have fancy shiny things like the gold in the curtains without being too over the top. I also love that I could have a little pink in the room without having it be too girly. The bed spread even has flowers on it, but with the green spread on top it changes it into something much more sophisticated.

We also have been buying some new furniture for the house. In the bedroom we bought a leaning bookshelf from Crate and Barrel. I really like the shelf, but I feel like I shouldn't have quite so many books on it. This sort of decreases the functionality in my mind, but I think Patrick would rather I not have "things" so as not to clutter up the house with me living in it.

Patrick is the most upset about my clutter with regards to the living room. I have insisted that my sewing table has to stay out there because I really don't have anywhere else to put it. It isn't ideal, but I am not going to go down the path of having to beg him to bring my sewing stuff upstairs and set it all up every time I need to hem a pair of pants. Can you imagine? It would take 3 hours to complete a 20 minute job! Besides, it is my house too.

So anyways, here is part of the furniture we purchased. The couch hasn't come yet. The chair is one Patrick has been ogling at Cost Plus World Market for years now. Honestly, I think he could have got a better one at Dania for about the same price, but he has it in his head that he wants this one. At least it will look good with the couch I picked. I had to haggle for that couch. Patrick wanted something modern, but that chair would have looked atrocious next to a mid-century couch. I will post pictures of the couch after it arrives.

I do adore our tables for the living room. We got them at Crate and Barrel. The couch is green with dark brown leather trim. These tables will be great with it. I think the flower arrangement I made will also really tie all the green nicely to our plum colored wall. I also finely have a place to display all this crystal we got for our wedding.

I also have been working on this round felted bag. The instructions I found for this one are online here. It is pretty mindless because you just go round and round. I am starting to get bored with it so I am glad to say that I only have the last 10 or so rounds left! The pink color is from a large cone of wool I purchased from the Pendleton Woolen Mill factory outlet in Milwaukee, OR. The gray is Patton's Merino Wool. I love working with Merino. It is so much softer than other wools.

Finally, I wanted to post a new picture of little miss Annabelle. She is almost 5 months old now and she is just starting to get that stocky pug shape. She used to kind of prance when she ran, but now she is starting to bound. She is quite the determined little girl so I had a hard time keeping her still for this picture!

Next time I will have to post a Duncan picture. Last night he got into some tomato sauce so today he looks a little pink around the whiskers... not exactly the ideal Kodak moment. Clearly he is going to need a full fledged bath to get him back to his spiffy self. At least he did have some fun getting all messy. I on the other hand wound up with some burns on my hand and half my dinner on the floor!

Home Remodeling

OK, so it isn't perhaps the most obvious topic to start off a blog about knitting and dogs, but Patrick and I have been remodeling our 2 back bedrooms in preparation for a visit from my mom in a week (yay!). Remodeling really sucks. It is hard work, takes up all your time, and makes you grumpy at spouse, dogs, and the people at home depot. Not that the aforementioned people aren't great, but the spouse came up with this idea, the dogs are either perpetually whining from whatever room they have been quarantined to or are getting into whatever place or item you most wish they wouldn't, and those darn friendly home depot people were just way to encouraging.

Now though, hurray, we are nearing completion and I have told Patrick that by Saturday morning we need to have all the tools put away, furniture where it belongs, and dust settled so that I can do some serious pre-Mom cleaning. Honestly, the woman will only be in our house for about a total of 20 hours and half that time she will be sleeping, but my mom grew up under the wing of my grandmother. Grandma is someone who can stand at a kitchen counter for hours with a sponge scrubbing at what to us mere mortals appears to be a perfectly clean counter. Mom isn't exactly that bad, but seriously, the women in my family, myself excluded, make Martha Stewart look like a bag lady. I live in constant fear that my family will one day discover that I quite often leave dirty dishes overnight... sometimes longer. Did I mention that I live over 2,000 miles from my nearest relation?

So now that I have established that I hate to clean and am somewhat nuts lets get down to something more interesting. I have been working on several knitting projects. I knit Patrick a pair of socks. They are very plain and brown, but the idea was to get them done fast so they could be worn around the house to keep his feet warm. The other project that is almost finished is a round bag that I am thinking of giving to my mom. I had been looking for something quick and circular to knit because I got these great options knitting needles from Knit Picks for Christmas. I will post some pictures later on. Right now I am just too pooped! I am sure you aren't, but if you are desperate you can always check me out on Ravelry where I am known as DogGoneKnitting.