Los Angeles Marathon

The Los Angeles Marathon is Sunday.

They are debuting a new course this year as well as broadcasting the race live.  The race starts at Dodger Stadium and ends in Santa Monica.

If you are in the Los Angeles area you can watch it on KTLA - Channel 5 or listen on AM 570 KLAC.

Universal Sports will also be broadcasting the race live.

Finally, you can watch online at http://www.ktla.com/ or listen at http://www.am570radio.com/

Since I will not be at the race this year, I am thrilled to know I will be able to watch it from home.  As usual, Hubba is competing in the push-rim division.

The start times are as follows (PDT):

• Push-rim Wheelchairs – 6:55am
• Hand cycles – 7:00am
• Professional Women - 7:05am
• All other participants – 7:23am

Usually the LA Marathon gives the professional women a statistical head start based on the professional field, then gives an award for the first professional runner to cross the finish line.  I'm not sure if they are doing that this year since I havn't been able to find any information about it on the LA Marathon website.

With that being said, 234 people have completed every LA Marathon since the first in 1986.  That's 25 years!

Win an Alpaca Fleece

One of my favorite alpaca breeders is having a giveaway. 

She is giving away an entire cria fleece after shearing this year.  The fleece will be raw, which means you can process it yourself or have it processed how ever you wish.

Please visit the Bluemoon Ranch Blog and Etsy site to get more details.

Good Luck.

More Halter Training

Yesterday we spent a little time with our two youngest alpacas and the halter. 

Our smallest halters are still too big for these little guys, but I feel the sooner they get comfortable with being caught and haltered, the better it is for all of us.  So my goal was to have them stand quietly with the halter and lead in place.  Both Captain Jack and Eduardo reached that place as well as took a few steps when I asked them too.

Captain Jack, like his sister Daisy, was a bit of a drama queen at first.

Gus and Yoda came over to check on Jack, while Frieda and Eduardo watched.

Jack did relax.  He stood here for quite a while.  Then took a few steps on the lead.

The alpaca dog was not allowed to help.

Eduardo was second up, and took the halter very well.  He relaxed and started walking very quickly.  Perhaps watching Captain Jack helped him feel more comfortable.

Fiber Arts Friday - Aaarrrrgggghh

I realized this week that I have made a big mistake on my Twitter Knit Along Shawl.  Actually I've made a lot of mistakes on this shawl, but I just realized I have made a big mistake.... over and over again.

Last week I mentioned that I was not happy with how the shawl was turning out.  Mostly this was because the edge didn't seem right, but the lace pattern didn't seem right either.  I assumed it would be resolved with blocking.  I don't actually know since this is my first time with lace and I've never blocked anything before.  So that will be a new adventure.

Anyway while I was contemplating the shawl this week, I picked up the pattern and saw these instructions:

The lace charts should be worked as follows:
RS: k2, yo [work chart to last m], yo, k2.
WS: k2, yo [work chart to last m], yo, k2.

Prior to starting the lace section, the instructions say to remove the center markers.  Unfortunately I read it as remove all of the markers and then missed the instructions above.  Which means I did nearly two repeats of lace chart A end-to-end.  No yarn over and no knit two.  Argh!

The silver lining?  A few knit-along-ers had metioned adding a life line before they started the lace charts.  Fortunately, I listened and added my own life line of dental floss.  As a result, it was very easy to rip out and put the shawl back on the needles.

So now I am ready to start lace chart A one more time.  Isn't learning fun.  ;-)

Enjoy more (hopefully successful) fibery posts over at the Wisdom Begins in Wonder Blog today.

Vancouver Paralympics - Update #2

Many thanks to Lynda who mentioned that there will be Paralympic coverage on CTV in Canada as well as online here.

Vancouver Paralympics - Update

It turns out NBC and Universal Sports will be offering some network coverage of the Vancouver Paralympic Games.  The following information was provided by the US Paralympics Newsletter.

NBC Sports

• Opening Ceremony highlights – Saturday, March 13, 1-2 pm ET
• Paralympics recap – Saturday, April 10, 3-5 pm ET 

Universal Sports

• Monday, March 15 – Tuesday March 23, 7 p.m. (re-air at 11 p.m.) ET

USParalympics.org, will also offer video and highlights of the competition from Vancouver.

Vancouver Paralympics

The Vancouver Winter Paralympics are starting on Friday.  Like the abled-bodied Olympics, the Paralympics is the premier competition between the best athletes in winter sport.

The same venues are used.  Many of the same sports are played.  Some of the rules are modified.  They are classified between men, women, sitting, standing and visually impared.

NBC doesn't typically provide much coverage of the US Paralympic Team and I don't think the opening ceremonies are scheduled on network tv.  However, you can see all of the events live and on demand on Paralympic Sports TV.

The opening ceremonies begin at 18:00 PST, Friday, March 12.