It’s so hard to say good-bye. I didn’t think it would come this quickly, but we had to put Chloe to sleep yesterday. She hadn’t been the same since George died and the last week she just wasn’t doing well. It was obvious she missed George terribly and just didn’t know what it meant to exist without him.

We’ll definitely miss her silly ways. How she used to paw the edge of the couch before jumping up. Drooling as she kneaded anything. You could always tell where Chloe had been laying because there were little drool spots. Her obsession with chewing on plastic bags. And what I’ll miss the most is her mewing at night with her orange mouse and then putting it by our bedroom door so we’d find it first thing in the morning.

She came to live with George and me almost 11 years ago. They instantly loved each other and became the best of friends. I could always count on Chloe to make me smile, even when George was driving me crazy. She mothered George and he loved every minute of it, even when it turned in to a major kitty cat fight. When I watched Days of Our Lives, I could always count on Chloe to be sitting by my side within the first five minutes of the show. I gave her the nickname of “my soap-cat.” We created so many songs to go with her nickname “Kwo-cat” over the five years Bryan and I have lived together and it’s hard not having her to sing them to. Our house is so empty now and my heart has a great big hole in it. Both of my baby kitties are gone. We know they are together forever now.

My classes this summer have been keeping me very busy. I’m having a lot of fun in both classes, which is how summer classes should be. I’ve also managed to get a little sewing in during my breaks from reading.

My Adult Popular Literature is an online class and I’ve been reading science fiction, fantasy, romance and non-fiction books for that class. I’m in the middle of a romance novel now called Be Still My Vampire Heart. It’s really been a fun read and one that I didn’t expect to like. I still have to read three mysteries and a western.

This weekend I was working on a book talk that I have to do for Adult Pop Lit. I’m doing it on one of my favorite books, Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld. It’s been two years and after reading over 90 books since then I needed a bit of a refresher. I’m not one to reread books but I reread Prep to refresh my memory and I enjoyed it as much as I did the first time I read it. As one of my friends said yesterday, “The cover really doesn’t do it justice.” If you like coming-of-age stories and haven’t heard of Prep, I highly recommend it.

My other class is Information Books for Children. It’s basically Children’s Non-Fiction but since there are fairy tales, poetry, plays and literature cataloged in the Dewey numbers with the “non-fiction” in a library, information books fits the books better. We’ve read some great and not-so-great books for the class. The point isn’t to read all wonderful books because we need to learn about the not-so-great books out there too. My instructor is wonderful, she’s the same instructor I had for my Children’s Lit class last fall that I loved.

The last several weeks have been a whirlwind. June has also not been a friendly month for the Lee kitties. My parents lost their second cat, Lucy, last week. She hadn’t been doing well since her friend Milly died on the first of June. My parents were out of town and Lucy was boarding at the vet. She’d been having trouble breathing on Tuesday and just slipped away later in the day. At least she went peacefully and knew she was loved, she was definitely a spoiled cat. My mom made sure of that.

This past weekend, Bryan and I decided to make it a three day weekend to celebrate his birthday and both took Friday off. Friday, we just relaxed and got a lot of reading done. We’d planned to go to Springfield, Illinois but the threat of bad thunderstorms made us rethink our plans. Saturday, we did one of our favorite things - blueberry picking! There is nothing quite as scrumptious as fresh, handpicked blueberries. We thought we’d pick just enough to get us through a week since we’ll probably go back this Friday. We had not idea we’d picked almost five pounds. So we gave some to our friend L and her husband to enjoy since we know they won’t be able to get out there for a while. Then Sunday, L brought us some black raspberries from her garden to add to the berry delightfulness in our house. Even Chloe seems to like the fresh berries, though she can’t eat them. She gets so excited when we open the container of berries. You’d think we had kitty cat food stashed way in those bags by the way she acts.

Bryan also spent part of the weekend getting his Etsy shop and new blog set up.

Once I get some photos of my sewing I’ll post them. I hope everyone is having a good summer.

Bang, bang, bang. That’s pretty much what we heard in our apartment from Thursday last week until Monday this week. Thank goodness the rain made them finish up on Monday evening. They were redoing the roof of our apartment building and didn’t take a day off. I was so ready for them to finish so that I didn’t have to hear the banging any longer or their obnoxious choice of music. The other day when we asked them to turn the music down they told us that it was a bummer for them. It was definitely a bummer for us to have to listen to it in our own house. I was tempted to find some good crazy polka music and play it loudly for them. Now there is just stuff left around the apartment building, I hope they come clean up their messes soon.

By popular request here is a photo of the treasures that I brought home from my grandfather’s house - buttons, a darning egg (which I know will come in handy) and the library cards. There are so many more things in boxes that my mom has stored away. When she scans the photo of my grandparents, I may post it. It’s absolutely priceless. For now you’ll just have to settle for a photo of me that I had never seen before.

I think it’s my new favorite photo of myself.

Our family has lost another kitty family member. Milly, my first cat, who has lived with my parents the sixteen years I’ve been away from home was put to sleep on Sunday. She had been dealing with kidney failure for a while. Her seventeen and a half years were lived to their fullest. I know my parents will miss her dearly and will miss her sneakiness at the dinner table. Chloe sends her love to my mom and Lucy, the remaining kitty in my parents’ house.

First, just a quick housekeeping note, keep an eye out here for a moving announcement. Bryan and I are deciding to cut costs a bit and share a domain name. We haven’t come up with one yet but when we’re all moved in I’ll give you some warning. I’m giving up the erica-lee.org domain name after seven years and need to be moved by November 17, so there’s a bit of crunch time.

Thank you all to your very sweet notes and messages this week. I truly have dear friends from all over the country and world. Sometimes it takes something like this to remind me exactly what it’s all about. It’s so easy to get so wrapped up in school and other stuff that I forget about the really important things like family, friends and taking time for myself. School is important but I can’t let it completely rule my life. As my mom reminded me earlier this week, I need to remind myself how badly I wanted to go to school and why I’m in school. I’m still enjoying school but it’s feeling a bit overwhelming at the moment making up papers that I missed.

Tuesday evening at our knitting group, we had a blast making creep cakes and watching The Nightmare Before Christmas. I’m still working on the Waving Lace socks and am about half way through the foot on the first sock. Unfortunately, my plans of getting the whole sock done in October didn’t work out but I made significant progress. (Also my photo of the Waving Lace socks in the leaves made it up on Lolly’s blog. My sock’s 15-seconds of fame.) Lately, I’m experiencing start-itis and was swatching for the Tweedy Vest but got frustrated with the 8-row rib pattern that I’ve decided to do the same pattern with my own 3×2 rib pattern. I just really want a vest and to use yarn that I already have in my stash.

Aunt Nan, Grandpa (Gpa), my mom
(May 2004)
The cool rainy days of October have been passing by the last two weeks without notice. All of a sudden the leaves are turning and I’ve been thinking where have I been that I’ve missed this last two weeks. As the leaves fall and the earth prepares itself for a long winter, so too have our feelings for two family members we’ve lost in the last two weeks. My aunt died on October 12 after a four-year battle with cancer. She passed on peacefully with my mother by her side. We all traveled to Kansas City for the memorial services. The Birds of Paradise in one of the flower arrangements seemed so fitting for a woman who traveled all over the world, visiting more than 30 countries in 30 years, and loved visiting the most exotic and out of the way places.

My grandfather, who had also been battling cancer for a few months, also passed away just six days after his younger daughter. We truly believe that he waited to know that his daughter had passed on safely and that it was his time to go. Bryan, my mom and I were with him until the end. It’s truly been a time of reflection and wonderful memories. As Bryan and I went through photos at my grandfather’s house, memories of being a kid living in western Kansas came flooding back — dance recitals and performances that my sister gave in my grandparents’ living room, most of which are captured on video tape, memories of riding our bikes up and down the street with our neighbor friend and the joys of visiting the local library. My grandfather so loved the local library that when I visited this past summer, he made sure that we visited the library. It was a real treat and we know the library staff will miss him too.

We lost two wonderful people in our family but the heavens have gained two beautiful souls who are traveling extensively in first class. My aunt is traveling to every country she couldn’t physically visit while she was alive and my grandfather is zooming around in his heavenly Airstream to far off places.

Time seems to be in a bit of a time warp around here. Thank you all for your kind words about my blog. Since I wrote my “not sure” post I feel a bit less stressed about the blog. Before I felt like I had to post something so people would read and thought there was almost no one reading. Then all of your comments and emails started to pour in and it made me realize I’m not just writing things and posting them in the great beyond that no one reads and no one cares about. It’s sort of the blog version of Sally Field’s “you like me, you really like me.” There have been times in the last few weeks where I’ve thought, I should post this on the blog but honestly do you really want to see each block of the Moderne Baby blanket finished? I think not.

In the last few weeks, Bryan has graduated and earned his MLS. Last Monday, it hit him he’d finally earned this degree that for so long had been so far away.

I’m enjoying my last summer of freedom for a few years. I’ve been knitting exclusively on the Moderne Baby blanket since I finished the Cat’s Paw shawl a few weeks ago. The shawl is beautiful and I wore it to Bryan’s graduation. Unfortunately, I think I’ll be ripping out the bound-off edge and knitting at least another inch or two onto it since it feels a bit short when I wear it. An easily fixed problem, thank goodness. I will post a better photo of the shawl soon. Back to the blanket, it’s amazing how much knitting you get done on one project when it’s your only project. I don’t remember the last time I had only one project in progress, I’m not counting the single sock that needs to be finished. I’m hoping to finish the blanket before the June heat rolls in. My goal for the blanket is to finish knitting it by June 1, that doesn’t include sewing in the ends.

Thirty-three years ago my mom celebrated her first Mother’s Day. She had a baby who hated to sleep, wasn’t a morning person, traveled all over town by backpack and loved her more than the world itself. Things have changed a bit in those thirty-three years. I still have nights where I don’t want to go to bed, am definitely not a morning person and now I travel by car, bike or foot. One thing that hasn’t changed, I still love her more than the world itself. My mom taught me to be a strong woman, not just settle but persevere, have a sense of humor, for goodness sakes, have a sense of style in your clothes and your home, and so many other things that I can’t think of at the moment. Almost thirty years ago, she became a mom a second time to my little sister, M. She’s been a wonderful mother to my sister and I.

She wears all of the scarves I’ve knitted for her proudly and loves the handknitted socks she inherited, she wears them all the time.

On this day that my husband is graduating, my mom will definitely not be forgotten in all of the celebrating!

**Sorry, Mom these are the only photos I could find in a pinch.