Our Cody

August 3, 1993 - May 30, 2007
Cody passed away today with us at his side. He was our loving dog for 12 of his almost 14 years. We were very lucky he chose us and will miss him very much.

Bittersweet homecoming

That's the word Dianne used when I told her about our Cody.

It is so good to be home, but we arrived Thursday night to a very ill little dog. At not-quite-fourteen, Cody's little body has decided to give out and the doctor can't fix him. Renal failure.

We took him to the vet yesterday and learned how to give him subcutaneous fluids and that perked him up. He is happy at home with us and we will spend as much time as we can loving and caring for him.

It arrived!

After spending the morning walking around, having a little lunch and a little rest, we headed out to dinner yesterday evening and there on the stairs was our bag! Yay! From the flights on the tag, it appears to have taken a trip to Tampa, Florida. It's not clear if it embarked on the detour via London or Chicago, but it's with us now. It will see five more planes before we get home, but we're optimistic that circumstances will keep it on the right track. I don't think there's too much risk on the small flight to/from Islay and we'll know right away if BA/AA messed up since we have to retrieve our bags for Customs in Chicago...



But on to brighter thoughts. Here's the picture I wanted to include in my last post, but couldn't because I didn't have the right technology...but now I do.

48 Hours

Friday was our first full day in Scotland, after leaving PDX on Tuesday. Effectively, it took 48 hours to get to where we were going.

10:45 PDT / 12:45 CDT / 18:45 GMT
Town Car arrived West Linn to pick us up. He was early, but that was okay because we were ready. Good-bye cookies to the pups and we were on our way.

12:30 PDT / 14:30 CDT / 20:45 GMT
At PDX, first announcement that the flight would be departing 1 hour late because of weather issues in Chicago

13:00 PDT / 15:00 CDT / 21:00 GMT
Boarding begins, followed by pushback from the gate and announcement from the pilot that a Air Traffic Control Ground Stop at ORD meant a possible take off in an hour, but we'd taxi out and wait, just in case

14:30 PDT / 16:30 CDT / 22:30 GMT
Returned to terminal with an ETD of 4:30pm (original departure time was 12:50pm)

15:45 PDT / 17:45 CDT /23:45 GMT
Wheels up. Making the 8:15pm departure to Heathrow was at serious risk.

19:15 PDT / 21:15 CDT / 03:15 GMT (Wednesday)
At ORD, finally, trying to get on the last flight out. No joy. Then in a very long line for rebooking. We were booked on the 6pm Wednesday flight. There were no hotel rooms and cots would be set up at K1.

Wednesday
01:45 PDT / 03:45 CDT / 09:45 GMT
Can't stand the refrigerated section of ORD, so we got up an wandered till the Admirals Club opened.

05:30 PDT / 07:30 CDT / 13:30 GMT
Read an email from Joanna offering to rescue us from the airport, followed by a call from Patti with the same offer.

10:45 PDT / 12:45 CDT / 18:45 GMT
Norm, Patti's husband, pick us up at the airport and we head to meet Patti and Joanna. What a great respite from ORD.

Lunch at Noyes St Cafe in Evanston, followed by tea and chatting with Joanna at her house. After a look at her extensive scarf collection (all handmade, of course), sewing room, and lovely garden, Joanna dropped us back at the airport. I would insert the picture we took at the airport (having forgot to take one with Patti at the restaurant), but my card reader is in the bag we don't have (see below)

15:15 PDT / 17:15 CDT / 23:45 GMT
Boarding begins for the 6pm flight. Followed by the message from the captain that takeoff would be delayed. There were 105 planes ahead of us. (Did I hear that right?)

18:30 PDT / 20:30 CDT / 02:30 GMT Thursday
We are finally leaving Chicago.

Thursday
01:40 PDT / 03:40 CDT / 09:40 GMT
Arrive Heathrow, change terminals, go through security, immigration and customs.

04:15 PDT / 06:15 CDT / 12:15 GMT
Depart Heathrow

05:30 PDT / 07:40 CDT / 13:30 GMT
Arrive Glasgow, head to baggage claim and find one of two bags. File claim for the bag. The good news is the bag we have has most of our clothes.

06:15 PDT / 08:15 CDT / 14:15 GMT
Begin car hire process. Late arrival combined with agent/computer issues result in a very long time to get the paperwork done.

07:40 PDT / 09:40 CDT / 15:40 GMT
Car keys in hand, it's time to find a place to stay; it's too late to go to Aberdeenshire for just one night.

10:30 PDT / 11:30 CDT / 18:30 GMT
We are finally settled in our room, with M&S sandwiches for dinner. It has been a long two days

LONG Layover

Greetings from Chicago O'Hare, where we have been for 11 hours and have 10 more to go.

Yesterday, just about the time we arrived at PDX, weather caused a ground stop at O'Hare—all flights in and out were stopped. We arrived O'Hare at 9:15pm (probably just minutes after our flight took off late...) and spent an hour and a half trying to sort out when we could get to the UK.

6pm Central Wednesday

If you see a news story about people on cots at O'Hare...that's us sleeping in the refrigerated section of the airport AKA the connector between HK and another concourse...it was too long a night to even care what it was. We shared the refrigerator with probably 300 other stranded souls.

As for knitting, at the last minute, I changed my mind about taking Sasha because it was too heavy in my non-wheely carry on. I found a print out I made of the Lace Cardigan from the Spring/Summer 07 VK, and decided that was what I needed to take. It's been a little slow going—not because it's hard—I'm just tired. But it's something else that will help keep me occupied for the next 10 hours.

The kindness of local Fiberly Friends will also help. Patti, Joanna, and Patti's husband, Norm are going to rescue us for lunch and a break. The Admiral's Club is nice, but 12 hours is probably too long to spend.

So begins our journey...

In the Activity Bag

The most important part of trip planning is the Activity Bag. What am I going to do for one, two or twelve hours of flying time—not to mention airport waiting time? So that's the first thing that is done.

Here's what's in my bag for the trip to Scotland:
Sasha skirt

Fiber Trends Möbius scarf in Handmaiden Seasilk, Ebony





Cool new Bose headphones (the first that actually fit!)

iPod with lots of music and books




Bark and Rachael Ray magazines.


Hopefully that will keep me occupied and 8 hours across the pond will pass easily.

We leave Portland tomorrow morning with layovers in Chicago and London (not the original plan, but American cancelled their U.S. flights to Glasgow (bummer!) We will have a cute little MacBook with us and wireless access at all the places we are staying. (Sign of the times, I guess.) So it's possible I'll be posting if I score any great fiberly finds, see any cool pups or just see something interesting. But if I don't you'll know why.

And, yes, I did pack some clothes, but nothing new.

Doggie Dash 2007 is Done

Saturday marked the 20th OHS Doggie dash and it was a great morning with no rain and LOTS of dogs. Thanks to everyone who helped us raise over $1000 for the Oregon Humane Society.

The turnout was a testament to Portland and Oregon's love for dogs. By our estimation there must have been over 2000 human participants and 1000 of the doggy variety at the Tom McCall Waterfront Park. There were big dogs and little dogs, oldster dogs and bouncy young dogs, pedigrees and lots of mutts and they were all wonderful.

We met a few dogs like Pearl the Bulldog and Joey the English Cocker Spaniel (or just Cocker Spaniel if you are outside the U.S.) And of course we took some pictures.
     

And we learned a few thing like the OHS is the third oldest in the country, having been founded 138 years ago. The dog adoption rate is 96% and the cat adoption rate is 80% much higher than the national average. Pretty impressive.

Check out the more doggy faces on TheHudsons site.

Thanks again to everyone who sponsored us!

Shawl for the trip

When I cast on for the Elann Shawl Knit-a-long, I thought I'd just take it on the trip across the pond, but after staging the Sasha Skirt and Fiber Trends Möbius scarf, and finishing the Mom Projects, the shawl was calling to me and now it's ready to take instead of make.

I used my handy-dandy dressing wires and transformed this:


into this:


I have to say I don't block/dress everything I knit, but it really does make such a difference with lace.

Sewing for Mom (and Tom)

Since the Dressing Gown is now relegated to a Christmas gift, I went to plan B. When I saw Vogue 7883, I immediately thought of my mom. I shopped online for fabrics and ordered several fabrics from Fashion Fabrics Club that I thought would coordinate. In the end I decided on a lime linen/rayon for the cropped pants. White seemed so boring for the top, so off to Mill End I went and found two very "Mom" prints. The top is the Vogue pattern. The jacket and tank are from OOP Butterick 3141.
  

In the midst of it all on Sunday, my Pfaff serger just croaked—big noise, then bent needle, then nothing. I'd been sure to remove all pins, so I was clueless as to the problem and totally bummed. Now I could just use my sewing machine to complete the projects, but I've grown used to the clean seam finishing of my serger. So off to Montavilla Sewing Center, which has the good graces of being open on a Sunday. It would cost $99 minimum for the repair and, by the way, there are no parts to be gotten for the 15-year-old model. Hmmmm. I've been looking at the Babylock Imagine for a while and the desire to forge ahead without interruption prompted the decision to replace over repair. At least I got a reasonable trade-in for the defunct Pfaff.




When we got home I continued on what I'd been working on: Tom's May shirt. The doggy fabric is Howard Robinson's Canine Couture.

Trees

It should come as no surprise that there are trees in Oregon. And it isn't as if we've never seen trees, but our experience in the previous 25 years to moving north was limited to what folks had in their yards.

Our walks continue and we added Tryon Creek State Park to the mix. Our first visit was on a less than dry day. Fortunately the forest canopy kept the most of the rain off.




Even the dead trees were interesting.




Tom had the camera...
  

It was a sunnier day on our next visit to Mary S. Young Park. Along one of the paths we saw a face.

Thursday Miscellany

The Boys
It was a lovely day Saturday, so we just took a quick walk around the neighborhood. When we arrived home and had "released the hounds" to go outside, we decided to just enjoy the day a little more. Cody likes being on Tom's lap...but only for a short while.
  

More flowers
You'd think I'd never seen flowers in my life...Here are some cool ruffly pepperminty tulips from the aforementioned walk.


And we arrived home to see yellow flowers hanging from a bush by our driveway. Tom says it flowered last year but all the flowers were inside.



Sasha Progress
Now that I've reached a milestone in the Sasha skirt, I think I'll pick up the Luna Shawl again. I need to leave something for the plane and airports.