Happy New Year

Just wanted to wish everyone a happy new year and brightest blessings in the coming year. I have no idea what DBF and I are going to get into tonight, but it'll probably involve champagne at least. I bought a new dress, so we'll see if I'm ambitious enough to wear it.

Happy New Year everyone. Hope the new year is full of yarny goodness for all.

Knit on...

Finally Some Pictures

I'm still enjoying the rest of my mini vacation from work right now. Watched the Cats play basketball today and beat EKU which was good. I was rather concerned there for a little while.

I'm still stealing wireless internet from my neighbors (bless them for having an open network!), so I decided that today I would post a few pictures. First, some knitting...

A finished sock for DBF's mom being modelled by Phoebie, my parents' new cat. She was really sweet. Yeah, she liked me, but in typical cat-fashion, wouldn't give you the time of day when it came to picture taking:

Now I'm knitting a sock, but those pictures will be for another day. I have Final Fantasy to beat right now...

Knit on...

I'm back, and I'm knitting

Big surprise there. I'm back home now, enjoying the last bit of my vacation before going back to work, and of course knitting. There is however a new obsession...Final Fantasy 12...

DBF bought me the game for Christmas (Have I mentioned on here before how much I love him?) and I was dying to play it as soon as I opened it. I had to go visit my parents though, so the game play was delayed. I played it yesterday for the first time and I am in awe. The cinemas in this game are incredible, the gameplay is awesome, the licenses are pretty cool and I'm still figuring out the gambit system.

But today my alma mater is playing in a bowl game, the first in a very long time. So I'm going to go over to DBF's (I don't get ESPN) and watch the game, munch on some typical football munchies, and say Go Cats a lot! Have a happy New Years and I'll have some pictures here real soon. I've just got to get them off the camera first!

Knit on...

Merry Christmas

Well, merry day-after-Christmas. Hello from the sunshine state. It poured rain all day yesterday and we had tornadoes. Welcome back home!

Anyways, it was a nice Christmas down here with the folks. I'll be back home tomorrow and I'll try to post some pictures then if I get the chance. I got a bunch of new toys (PSP, games, DVDs, and some cookbooks) that I have been playing with non-stop since opening them. If I had a car today, I would probably go brave the crowds and hit the sales (I saw Star Wars Battlefront 2 for 18 bucks for PSP and I want it...), but seeing as I don't, I will finish DBF's mom's socks. I'm on sock number two now, past the heel, on the home stretch, but there is this problem. It's called Lemmings.

Lemmings is this game for PSP. It starts out easy, gets harder, and then becomes just that much more addicting. Oh well. I'm forcing myself to finish this sock. I may have to take a little break now that I'm done with Christmas knitting (Ha!), but I would like to finish DBF's scarf and my gecko scarf which has been sitting in poor isolation at the house for months now. Poor gecko scarf. It's cold up home, so I'll be needing a nice merino scarf soon and DBF could use a nice alpaca one I think :oP

Hope everyone had a merry Christmas, happy Hanukah, kwazy kwanza, a tip-top Tet, or a very solemn Ramadan (to quote Krusty the Clown from the Simpsons).

Knit on...

Last Minute

I always wait until the last minute to make sure I have everything done and ready to go on vacation. This trip is no exception to that rule. It all began yesterday when people started passing out gift cards at work and I realized I didn't have any to give since I was expecting anything. So, off to Starbies I went and got a bunch of 5 buck gift cards. Now watch, none of the people I need to give them to will show up today. They should since we get a 1/2 day and get paid for it...anyways.

Last night I exchanged presents with my grandparents right after work. I wasn't expecting anything from them since they sunk 300 bucks into my spinning wheel for my Christmas present, but they bought me a shirt set and a makeup kit anyways. That was very nice of them and I appreciate it a lot. DBF and I gave them each a 15 dollar gift card to their favorite stores plus a 15 dollar Fazoli's gift card so they can go out to lunch on us. I made Grandpa the pair of socks you have been watching me knit and I gave Grandma some dish cloths seeing as she really wanted some. I also gave them candy and nuts in the stocking as well.

After that, I went over to DBF's place and met him there after work (he got off early last night) so we could go see Eragon (did you know that Eragon is only one letter off from dragon? Just put a D instead of E...DBF found this out due to Spell Check). It was pretty good. I now want a pet dragon so I can ride it. Anyways...

Tonight DBF and I will exchange gifts and then he will go play at the UK game tonight. Lucky dog...I still have never been to a game even though I went to college there. Oh well. While he's there, I will pack. I very well may have to pack two suitcases, one for presents, one for clothing. The sweaters I knit for Mom and Dad take up a lot of room and then I got several more from my grandparents to take down there as well. At least none are wrapped, so I don't have to worry about them being destroyed going through security, especially the bottles of cologne.

Hope everyone has a very merry Christmas and doesn't get snowed in. I'll be sitting in Florida, playing by the pool. Ha ha... :oP

Knit on...

Seaming and Weaving, Seaming and Weaving...

Guess what I did last night? Normally Wednesday evenings are for spinning, but not yesterday. I needed to finish up the cardigans and sweater I made for my parents and grandmother. I had to weave in ends for Dad's cardigan, seam and weave Mom's cardigan, and weave Grandma's sweater. So, I took some pictures too. Both cardigans are so dark that it's hard to get a good picture of them, so use your imagination!Mom's cardigan on me. Like I said, it's dark, sorry. Here's the cardigan on the bed:

I'm really liking this pattern. I don't like the yarn (wool-ease thick and quick), but I like the simple shaping of the pattern. It's from Lionbrand.com. I did completely change the neckline on that one, and it actually turned out better. I wasn't too keen on the polo shirt-like neck they had on this sweater. I couldn't see Mom happy with it either. I just picked up stitches around the edge and crocheted a smooth neckline. I need to remember that next time I made DBF a sweater. Crocheted necklines will look much better than anything I can do with the needles aparently...Here's a close up of the buttons. They're little spirals.

I would show you Dad's cardigan on the bed, but it's entirely too dark to even make out a sweater. So instead, I'll show you a finished pair of socks:

Yarn is Trekking XXL in some blue colorway (threw the band away a long time ago) Size 10.5 mens feet in my basic sock pattern, will be given to my grandpa today. I had to start one more pair of Christmas socks for DBF's mom:

These are made out of Knit Picks Dancing sock yarn. It's a cotton/wool/elastic blend and it feels rather nice. I like Trekking better, but she wanted ones made out of mostly cotton. Ask and ye shall receive. They are much brighter than the manly ones, huh? I like it though.

Tonight I'm going to go see Eragon with DBF. He gets off work early, so we're going to take advantage of that. Tomorrow I'm packing up all the gifts and a few clothes for myself and heading home to visit the folks for a few days. I may be blogger-less down there, so if you don't get any new posts after tomorrow, that's why. I'll try to find internet somewhere and post if I can though.

Knit on...

I hate migraines

So I trounced into work late this morning due to a massive migraine that shut me down for a few hours. I hate those things. I hate having to miss work because of a stupid headache, but I can't stand the light when I have one, so I figured I might want to get rid of it before staring at the giant glowing computer screen. Blah.

I finished the second sock last night, but it was pretty late when I got home, so you'll get a picture of it tomorrow. I started DBF's mom's socks last night too. They're being made out of Knit Picks Dancing yarn since she wanted socks made of cotton. It's a cotton/wool blend, so it should make a nice fabric. It is so far anyways. I was amazed at how sproingy the yarn is too. You can definitely tell there's elastic in there. Now I just have to weave in the ends of Grandpa's socks and the presents for people up here are good to go. DBF's scarf is the last one I have to make, but I'll work on that once I get done with his mom's socks.

My head is still throbbing, so I'm off for today. Tonight I'll be seaming mom's cardigan so that I can have another FO. That and weaving in ends of three sweaters. I'll weave in the socks' ends during lunch today.

Knit on...

Wrapping, Seaming, Sushi-ing

So last night was about wrapping presents for the most part. Seeing as I'll be flying in a few days, I decided not to wrap anything that I will be taking with me since I've heard they will open it up if your luggage is inspected. Instead I have a giant bag which will hold everything in it so that certain people don't see their presents before I can get them wrapped and under the tree. I wrapped all of DBF's presents, his mom's, my friends', and my grandparents'. I also stuffed stockings for DBF and my grandparents. I don't know why, but last year I put together a stocking for DBF and enjoyed it so well that I decided it needed to happen again this year.

Anyways, after stuffing and wrapping, I finished sewing up this:

Grandma's five hour raglan sweater. I've come to the conclusion that the five hours includes an hour of knitting and four of seaming. Blah. It's done, it's soft, it looks like something my grandmother would wear (not too flattering on me though...). Let us never speak of the size 50 tree trunks again...

I made sushi last night for dinner and then made another roll for lunch today. I'm on a sushi kick for some reason. It's vegan sushi, but it's that wonderfully seasoned rice that makes the whole thing after all. Plus I'm getting really good and rolling up the sheets of nori. Now if I could just work on those chocolate chip cookies...

I've also been working on Grandpa's sock:

The heel has been turned and now it's just knit, knit, knit until the end. I need to finish that by tomorrow. Hopefully it'll be done. If not, then he'll open up one sock and I'll give him the other when I get done.

Tonight I'll be playing poker, trying to win some last minute Christmas money. I'll also be knitting.

Knit on...

Crunch Time

OK, knitters, it's crunch time. Do you have your gifts ready to go? Are you travelling and working on projects while in the plane or car? Are you done? If you are, you make me sick, but congratulations. If not, join the club.

I was reflecting on the amount of holiday knitting that I have been doing recently. I have knit four sweaters, 10 dishcloths, a pair of socks, and spun up three skeins of yarn as presents in the past 2 months. I still have to work on another pair of socks or two and the scarf for DBF.

Remember that secret project I was working on for him? I showed it to him since it wouldn't be done in time. Well, it's a scarf with poker suits going up the center of it and on the back of the scarf, it will have the Magic symbols going up the center. It'll be reversible and all made out of alpaca. It's very soft, but I only have one repeat of the suits done, so it won't be done for Christmas. Oh well, I'll work on it once I get back from visiting with my folks for a few days.

This weekend was all about Christmas parties. We ate and ate and ate and then watched Survivor last night (Ozzy should have won...). We also saw Apocalypto yesterday afternoon. I'm still not sure what to think about that movie. It was OK, very graphic, and sort of Rambo-ish in the end (how did that guy survive again?). But it was OK.

No pictures today. I was lazy. I will be seeming sweaters tonight, so I may have a picture of an FO to show you tomorrow. If not, then you'll get to see the sock in progress :oP

Knit on...

I Would Like to Thank the Academy

Last night was the camera club Christmas party. I made vegan chocolate chip cookies to bring, so I'll start out with that fiasco first. I used the recipe from the book Vegan Lunchbox for the "back to school chocolate chip cookies". Now it calls for lining the cookie sheet with parchment paper and then spraying it down with cooking spray. I didn't have any parchment paper, so I said, "Surely these will come out fine if I just load the cookie sheet down with cooking spray, right?" Wrong. These are the best tasting cookies I have eaten in a long time (they outrank the snickerdoodles for me now), but they look like hell. They stuck to the bottom of the cookie sheet. I used the spatula on them and tore them all to hell. I ate the broken pieces and had a good laugh about how to tell people why I didn't bring anything to eat, then scooped up the rest of the pieces into a pie pan, covered them with foil, and left for the club.

I got there about 7:30 after driving past the damn place about 15 times. I called my grandparents to see if they knew where it was, I called DBF's mom, but her cell phone was off, then I finally flagged down a student and asked them where the cottage was. Thankfully she knew and told me that the driveway was really hard to see at night. Telling this to someone who has night blindness is just cruel. I drove past it again, circled back and finally made it into the parking lot. Next time, scope places out during the day, Leah. I knew what the building looked like, and I saw it each time I drove past it. I just couldn't figure out where the hell to park. Oh well, I got there.

We looked at pictures of penguins from Antarctica, then they gave out awards. The past two years I have won both beginning categories. This year, I was in intermediate, and I knew I was in the running for an award there, but I also knew it would be very close. People were surprised when my name was called for Intermediate Photographer of the Year. The other person who was so close to me points-wise won a ton of first places in the competition, but while she was winning 1st, I was winning 2, 3, and honorable mention which gave me a higher amount of points. Woo-hoo!

I worked some more on grandpa's sock. I'm almost to the heel flap now. I always like getting to the heel because I feel like I'm 1/2 way there. The second half of the sock always seems to go faster for me for some reason. It's the same amount of stitches, so I don't know why I feel this way, I just do.

Tonight is the office Christmas party. I made vegan squash casserole which we'll see how well it turns out. It normally calls for condensed cream of chicken soup, so I bought a vegan substitute and I've never tried it before. Hopefully it doesn't taste all funky. We'll see.

Have a great weekend, everyone.

Knit on...

Excited Over a Lunchbox

I was excited when I drove home from work yesterday because I saw that my Christmas present to myself had been delivered via UPS. I quickly drove by my grandparents' house to pick up the package and then headed home to play with my new toy.

Yes, I bought a laptop lunchbox. It is extremely nice and I was amazed at how thick the plastic is on the thing. I had been eyeballing the lunches put together by Jennifer over at Vegan Lunchbox, and since I was going to buy her book, I decided to buy the lunchbox too. It's really cool. Here's my first bento creation:

Mandarin oranes, dried cranberries with almonds, rice, brocolli and vegan sour cream to dip them in, plus a fig jam heart sandwich and a peanut butter sheep sandwich. I was bored last night, what can I say? Oh, and don't forget the candy cane! I was having too much fun with the cookie cutters last night. I call this my "I heart sheep" lunch :oP Ok, feel free to make fun of me now.

I also did what Wednesdays are for:

Two more skeins of red roving. I don't know if the first two have arrived in Indy yet, but these are also for that cause if the original two skeins sell. Here's a close up:

Tonight is the camera club Christmas party. I'm not looking forward to the party because it will have lots of food, and probably very little that I can eat. I'm bringing vegan carob chip cookies so that I can at least have something sweet while there. I am also going to have to cook the squash casserole for my work Christmas party tomorrow. I don't know how I'm going to keep it hot until dinner is served at 6. Oh well, it will just be cold squash I guess.

Knit on...

Ding Dong the Final is Done!

The wicked final is done! Whoo-hoo! I need a beer now, but seeing as it's only 7:30 in the morning, I think I should maybe wait until I get home from work before I have one of those. I finished the final last night despite my internet connection crapping out on me at home. So, I lugged my laptop over to Starbucks and met the SnBers there, finished my strat column for the final, and then stitched away while sipping on my vinti peppermint mocha. That's the last mocha I have for a while since I don't even want to know how many points are in one of those suckers. Now I just need to walk the paper over to the department and call it a day.

I have no pictures for you today, sadly. I made a little progress on my grandpa's sock, but I still have a ways to go before I finish that one. At least I'm to the straight knit part now. I also did something last night that I have not done in what seems like forever. I read. Yes, that's right, I actually did some reading. I picked up Chicken Soup for the Traveller's Soul and read two passages and then read two chapters in the most recent Dragonlance book. I also played Final Fantasy on my Nintendo DS. I'm stuck in the land of the elves. I am wondering if I should have not travelled there first, but should have gone somewhere else. I may have to play some more tonight if I don't play pokemon instead, or Dragonquest 8, or any of the new games. I need more time in a day!

Wednesdays are for spinning, so I intend to do a little bit of that tonight. I am about done with two bobbins of red singles, so I will probably just finish those up and ply them. I have to start amassing a stash of handspun for the SnBers who will be getting gifts from me. Guess what everyone is getting this year? :oP

Knit on...

Look, a Sock!

This is the finished sock for my grandpa's Christmas present. I think for my grandparents, I'm going to go out and buy a stocking for each of them and stuff them full of little goodies like socks and dishcloths and their gift cards. Oh, and here's a dishcloth. I made two more yesterday at my lunch break: This is just a plain 30 stitch 12 row double crochet dishcloth. I can do two or more in an hour, so they work up quickly. My grandmother loves crocheted dishcloths more than knit ones, so crochet it is. Personally, I like knitted ones better since they have a better scrubby surface.

I got to thinking last night in between banging my head on the table and looking up coal depositional environments for my final exam that I have yet to post a picture of the giant Christmas tree that is dominating the front room. Without further ado... This is DBF's giant tree, trimmed in sparkly garland with a ton of Halmark ornaments and real candy canes. I couldn't get the whole tree in either. There's a pretty fiber optic angel on top of there too.

I came home last night and worked furiously on my final exam. After a couple of hours working on that, I decided I needed a coffee break, so I drove to Starbies to meet up with some of the SnB'ers. I stayed there for about an hour and cast on the second sock for my grandpa and got maybe a quarter of an inch done on the thing. I really enjoyed the company and the peppermint mocha (go, I know you want one now. Just go and get one), but I only stayed for a little bit since that final was screaming at me to go complete it. I'm not done yet, but I intend to work on it at lunch today and this afternoon if it's completely slow again. If not, then I'll lock myself in my house tonight and not come out until that final exam is in printable condition.

Plus I'll knit a sock. A girl has to knit you know...

Knit on...

The Trials and Tribulations of a Non-Carnivore

OK, so I can eat fish if I want, but I generally didn't eat much fish before I found out I couldn't eat meat anymore. So I'm basically a vegan, but I can have a little cheese and milk every now and again. It hasn't been that hard adjusting and making sure all my meals are veggie based, but this weekend created a new problem: The Christmas Party.

You never think about party snack foods containing meat products until you can't eat meat anymore. At least there was a veggie tray at the party, so I chowed down on brocolli, carrots, and celery dipped in a little ranch sauce (which judging by the way my stomach twinged, probably had egg in it). The rest of the food was meatballs, chicken fingers, chicken gumbo, chicken wings, brownies which I were sure had eggs in there, some sort of dip that I really wasn't sure what was in it, baked meat-filled ziti, and apple cider. Hooray for the apple cider! It was quite tasty and I really need to get the recipe for that.

So I ate veggies. Another problem that I see is eating out at fast food restaurants. We ran by Wendy's before sitting out at the Horse Park for the evening, since I knew that a small plate of veggies was not going to hold me for the next 5 hours. At least Wendy's has baked potatoes. So I had a baked potato with chives and no butter or sour cream. It filled me up at least. When we got to the park, there was a kettle corn dealer, so I also got some yummy hot popcorn straight from the kettle. Considering I had 15 points left for the day after the potato, I thought it would be OK to indulge in a little sweet and salty popcorn.

I will still be indulging in that some more today. It was quite a lot for only 3 bucks.

So the moral of this story is: Have more at your party for veggie eaters aside from just a veggie plate. While veggies are good, something with a tad more substance would be nice. Considering I think I was the only vegetarian at the party, I doubt they would have ever considered it. I wouldn't have until this past week and a half.

I'm still waiting for my final exam to be emailed to me today. There were email problems at the university over the weekend, so I'm not sure when the teacher will be sending it out. In the meantime, I suppose I could actually do some work :oP I'll have some pictures tomorrow of a sock and dishcloths and maybe more if I don't have to spend my whole night working on a final exam.

Knit on...

New Blogger?

OK, so I switched to the new version of blogger. They said they had trouble moving my old blogs to the new server, so we'll see if my blog is OK and if Spooky's blog is OK. They also say that your email address won't show up for other users. We'll see how that goes too. Anyways, that's what happens on a Friday for you.

Last night I went over to Jane's for SnB. It was just three of us last night, but we had a nice time, lovely conversation, and had fun playing with Jane's toys. I brought in the remainder of the Suri Dream from knitpicks and traded that with Jane for a ball of roving which I tried rather unsuccessfully to spin some last night. I think it needs to be refreshed some, so I'll flick card it a little and get those fibers moving.

I didn't feel like seeming last night, so my grandma's sweater and my mom's cardigan are still in their respective pieces. I'll maybe get to that this weekend, we'll see.

People have actually noticed that I have more energy than they have ever seen me have. I have felt the best I think I have ever felt this week. It's amazing what cutting out a food group you're allergic to can do!

It's a short post today. I have a bunch of stuff to do before I can go home at 4, so hopefully I'll get it all done. If I don't, I'm hourly, so oh well, I'll get it done on Monday.

Knit on...

Two Completely Different Looks

Ok, first and foremost, here's the roving that Emily gave me that blogger fritzed out on and wouldn't let me post yesterday:
It's quite nice and will go nicely with the skeins I already spun of kid mohair/merino blend from Erica. Last night my order from Veganessentials.com came in and I dug into the package, pulling out vegan cream of chicken soup (need this to make my favorite casserole), vegan "ribs" mix, no chicken soup, vegan jello, pudding, and ener-g egg replacer. I am impressed that it came some quick. They even sent me two eggless cinnamon rolls to try (um, yeah, they're both gone courtesy of desert last night and breakfast this morning). Last night I made a country type dinner:

It doesn't looke pretty, but it's the vegan "ribs", cornbread, and two pickles. I shouldn't have made that much because I'm still stuffed this morning and I have leftover ribs too. They actually tasted really good. I was surprised that the texture really was so meat-like. I will buy this stuff again, but I think it will just be one of those once-in-a-while dishes. I ate all that and after a few hours, I ate the cinnamon roll. That's the most I've eaten for dinner in the past month not counting Thanksgiving! It was good though, so I give the ribs a B+

Wednesday evenings are for spinning, so I did just that:

I played around with different color combinations from the same bag of roving and came up with two completely different looking skeins. I love the red and black one. I hate to part with it, but it's going to a good cause. Here's a close-up:

It's a thick and thin yarn, but not too much variation in there. The red one is similar too, just not as stark of a contrast of colors.

These came from the same bag of roving, but I ripped the black off in strips for 1/2 a bobbin and then did the same for red for the other 1/2. I'm really quite pleased with how it turned out.

In knitting news, I finished knitting my grandmother's sweater, now I just have to seem it up. I think that for SnB tonight, I'm going to take both my mom's cardigan and my grandma's sweater with me to start doing the seeming thing. I've let my mom's cardigan sit there for over a week now with no finishing done on it. I want to get them done so that I can figure out what to work on next. I think some crochet dishcloths are coming up for my other grandma who keeps dropping hints that she really wants some more dishcloths :oP I haven't made a dishcloth since last Christmas when I went through three cones of sugar and cream making dishcloths. I lost count of how many I did after 50. Everyone got dishcloths last year. This year they're all getting sweaters, socks, and scarves.

Knit on...

A Little Bit of Randomness

My brain hurts after writing that stupid paper for class and putting the finishing touches on my presentation that I have to give at class today too, so forgive me if I ramble on incoherently. First off, this is what I did before I played poker last night:
Lava colorway single for Impossible Princess and his etsy store to benefit the AIDS cycle. I'll finish single number 2 so that I can ply them tonight. Go donate to him, it's a great cause. If you don't feel comfortable with that, go buy my yarn once I finish it and it goes up at the shop. I also finished this:
Raglan sleeve number one for Grandma's sweater. I'm 1/4 way done with the second one and will finish that tonight while spinning and cleaning (I'll be doing a lot of that tonight). Here's what I did at poker last night aside from not winning:

In the words of the Yarn Harlot, "look, a sock!" I finished the heel flap and turned the heel at poker last night. This will be a Christmas present for someone. I'm calling it my poker sock since that's pretty much the only time I ever work on the blasted thing.

Last, but not least, we had to say goodbye to Emily yesterday at SnB. She's leaving us for some position at Yale. I mean, come on, what's more important? A good paying post-doc or SnB on Tuesdays? :oP We'll miss her a lot, but we'll all still be in touch, so it's OK. She may get a random visit from me and Kim every now and again (if we can ever find time to get away from classes and work!). We exchanged gifts/Christmas presents yesterday as well. Kim gave Emily a nice pink and gray scarf that definitely looked like the yarn was just dyed for Emily. Emily gave Kim some alpaca mix yarn that we all wanted to pet. I gave Emily two skeins of handspun yarn (the gray stuff I posted pictures of a few days ago) and she gave me some really pretty roving that blogger won't let me post a picture of. I guess you'll get a picture of that tomorrow! It's mohair/merino blend roving in a blues and greens colorway. I pulled out the four skeins of kid mohair/merino blend that I spun up from the roving that Erica sent me for my birthday and started comparing fiber. I think that these two groups of mohair/merino must go together. The white from Erica's will be accented by the blues and greens of Emily's. Now just what to make out of them...after Christmas...

Knit on...

What to Do?

So, I have this huge bag of fleece at home. I don't know how to handle a raw fleece or even store it for that matter. How should I store this thing? Should I roll it out or just leave it in the bag? I won't be able to work on it until next weekend at least because I'm being kicked out of the house for the weekend since the owners come back for a few days. Blah. Don't they know how tempting a raw fleece is to start preparing, especially when the high for yesterday was only 25 degrees?

Anyways, I went to a new bookstore in town yesterday and of course first went to the knitting books. They had a pretty good selection, but I ended up not buying any, despite the desire to especially buy Beyond Wool: A Knitter's Guide to Natural Fibers. I did however buy two vegan cookbooks since I only have two vegetarian cookbooks and both use eggs in about every recipe.

Speaking of the lack of meat, I had a voicemail message from my doctor on my work phone this morning. I am allergic to all common land animals. This means:

No Chicken
No Eggs
No Beef
No Poultry
No Game Animals
No Snake
No Penguin

OK, so those last two were thrown in there just for the hell of it since they are land animals. What can I have? Vegetables and Dairy. Lots of vegetables and a little bit of dairy.

Thank God I like tofu already!

Knit on...

Pictures Finally

OK, let's see how many pictures blogger will allow me to post before it freezes up!
The front of Grandma's sweater, being inspected by Spooky. It's rather meshy, but I think she'll like it. I now have the back done and almost one sleeve. I was lazy this weekend, so I didn't get as much done as I would have liked. I should have it done by Tuesday I think. At least I'm hoping to.
Two skeins of gray yarn for a special event on Tuesday. It's probably my most evenly spun yarn to date. It's DK to worsted weight yarn.
What is this? I won a fleece! That's right, a whole freaking fleece from Stone's Throw. I loved the dark color of this one. I had my choice of three different fleeces, bt this one just called to me in that fibery sort of way. I'll be cleaning this one once my paper is turned in for class this week. I also need some hand carders now.
I also got this. Two pounds of green superwash wool top.

Lastly, I will be spinning this up next for Impossible Princess' AIDS etsy store. It's called Lava.

I can't believe I didn't take a picture of the Christmas tree last night. DBF and I put up the big tree in the front room (it takes up half the room) and decorated it. It looks so pretty, but for some reason I didn't take a picture of it. I'll try to remember to take one tonight.

I have a presentation due for my class as well as a paper, so until Wednesday morning, there won't be too much knitting going on. I can probably finish my grandmother's sweater, but that's about it.

Knit on...

Windy, windy, windy

Yep, it's howling outside right now. I had to call in to work today because my car wouldn't start and since it was pouring rain and the wind was howling, I figured that was enough of an excuse to use a vacation day. So I went out to find out what was wrong with the car (as if I can tell what's wrong!) once it stopped raining and I noticed that one of the wires connected to the battery was loose. Well, I went inside, got a wrench, and tightened it. Lo and behold, the car started! I fixed my own car, even though it wasn't that bad of a fix!

Last night I went to Janes for SnB. We had about five people there, so it was a small turnout, but a fun one. We all made fun of my giant needles (uh-huh-huh in Butthead voice), wondering how one could knit with size 50s and keep their sanity (I didn't, I reverted to a sock after an hour and a half), and also making fun at all out projects. It was a good evening.

I made a batch of cookies to take there because while reading the ingredients on the cookies, I found out that they have egg in them, so I can't eat them? Why you may ask? I have found out that I am allergic to some sort of meat. My doctor is afraid that I am actually allergic to all land-based animals, so I am not allowed to eat any meat or eggs until the allergy bloodwork comes back and we can determine exactly what the culprit is. So I have gone vegan, rather unintentionally. I do have to admit that I feel the best I've felt in a long time, my stomach hasn't bothered me even one bit, and I've lost 7 pounds in 3 days. I'm not complaining. I've discovered a line of frozen foods called Amy's that I am now in love with too, so it's causing me to experiment some now.

Anyways, I made cookies to get rid of them. I saved the snickerdoodles for DBF because I know that he really liked those, so I'll make a batch up tonight or tomorrow for him (or both!). I'm also cooking the 10 pound turkey that I have in my fridge. I'll be giving most of that away to friends and family.

Pictures, you want pictures? I would, but I'm on dial-up right now and I can't get the computer to move fast enough to download them. I'll get pictures to you on Monday when I get back in to work.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Knit on...

WIPS

Um, yeah, so I took pictures last night with every intention of burning a CD this morning before work, and I was a lazy butt. What else is new? Tomorrow though, there will be pictures of all my WIPS and even an FO.

Last night I worked on my grandma's sweater some. It's the 5-hour raglan sweater pattern from lionbrand.com. It's very lightweight and loose which is what someone needs in Florida I think. Now, I'm not a big fan of lionbrand yarns, especially the moonlight mohair that the pattern calls for. 1, it's itchy and 2, it's expensive. So online I went to find a replacement (plus grandma said she wanted beige and they don't make moonlight mohair in beige) and of course my first yarn store of choice online is KnitPicks.com I went on there and saw the suri dream in a nice beige color and ordered 10 balls of it (seeing as the lionbrand pattern called for 12 balls and I know they always put down too much for me when I'm working a pattern). Instead of the incredible ribbon yarn that the pattern calls for, I used Homespun in a beige-ish color. With two strands of Suri Dream and one strand of homespun, I used the size 50 (yes, size 50, they're huge) and started working on the back of the sweater. I finished the back in about an hour. It's fluffy and nice and so soft. I think it would make a better blanket than a sweater, but for an almost 80 year old woman, it seems to be exactly what she wanted.

I also remembered that Wednesday is for spinning, so I grabbed some of the gray roving I have so much of and spun up a whole bobbin last night. I need to spin up another bobbin and get to plying, so I might do that tonight too. I was going to go to SnB tonight and I still might, but I want to see what the weather is going to do. I don't do well in storms. I have a litle anxiety over storms and it looks like we may get a doosy of one tonight, so we'll see. If it's not bad, I'll be going. I'm pretty sure I'm going to go tonight, just don't want to go out if it's storming like mad (yeah, night blindness and rainy streets are a no-no for me driving too). So send out good weather vibes so that I can drag my butt over to SnB tonight and get my knit on with the rest of the crew who I haven't seen in forever.

Pictures tomorrow, I promise.

Knit on...

Find A Cure

OK, so I normally don't post about fundraisers for organizations unless they are close to my heart. While going through my usual batch of knitting blog reads yesterday, I saw that Impossible Princess is doing a bike race to raise money and awareness for AIDS research. It just so happens that this is an issue close to my heart.

My cousin has been battling AIDS for nearly 20 years now. It's hard to believe that he's survived that long when you hear about all the cases of people dying so suddenly and rarely making it more than 10 years. He has been blessed with some truly great doctors around here who have helped him live a fairly normal life and a loving family who has supported him through these hard times. He's had some close calls in those 20 years and he's gone through some rough times mentally and physically. I love my cousin dearly and I will help him in his fight however I can.

I always donate to AIDS research every year, but when I saw the post on Impossible Princess' blog, I thought that this sounded good. First off, he's going to be in a huge bike race. It's something like 500 some odd miles of biking across the state of California. It's going to take some hard training, but it will raise awareness. He has to raise 2500 dollars to participate and is seeking donations from his knitting friends. So to raise money, he's opening up an etsy store where he will sell handmade items that he makes and other knitters send him. So, want to score some cool stuff and help a great cause? Go to his etsy store.

Why do I mention this so much? I'm going to be spinning up some red roving just for this cause. I will be spinning up 1/2 pound and will donate it to his store. Anything I can do to help raise awareness for this cause. So go visit his blog and consider donating. If you don't feel comfortable donating, go visit his etsy store once it's opened and buy some stuff and know that it'll be going to a good cause.

Knit on...

One FO At Least

I would have two FOs to show you, but I didn't get mom's cardigan seemed last night. I had every intention of completing her cardigan last night until I checked my email and found out there was a free poker tourney that first gets 50 bucks and second gets 20 bucks, so I ditched seeming (I'm not dedicated enough, I know!) and tried to win 50 bucks. Yeah, not even final table for me last night, so I should have just seemed. Anyways, here's DBF's sweater that I mentioned yesterday:

It's hard to see the striping pattern, but seeing as this sweater never really liked to be photographed, it doesn't surprise me. I still think the neck is slightly wonky, but with a nice collared shirt, you'll never even be able to tell.

Tonight I really will seem up mom's cardigan. I also intend to start my grandmother's sweater too. I opened up the door to the office when I got home last night and there sat the spinning wheel. I almost cracked it out then, but I think I'll wait and spin on Wednesday when I can devote some time to it. Unless something changes, I will be making an appearance at the Thursday SnB which I have not been to in forever. I have to decide what to make for it too, any recipe suggestions? They need to be vegan preferably since we do have a few in the club.

In other news, I had a conversation with my doctor which has led to me getting a test after work tomorrow. My stomach has been really bothering me here recently and it reminds me a lot of the time I had an ulcer when I was younger. She thinks I may have another one, so I get to go drink the crap and do the x-ray test. She said she would like to avoid the scope (I whole-heartedly agree!) unless nothing shows up on the barium crap test. I've had this test before and it sucks, but it's easy and I just have to drink barium crap like 3 hours prior to the test. We shall see. I'm not too worried about it though since I have had this before and it all cleared up with a month of treatment with Aciphex. While the crap is expensive, it works like a charm, so hopefully it'll clear it right up.

Do I have to do work now?

Knit on...

Giving Thanks and the Hummer

I had a pretty good Thanksgiving weekend this year. I travelled up to visit DBF's family for Thanksgiving day and ate way too much (as is expected at any Thanksgiving meal), lost 10 bucks at poker, and watched the movie Elf. Oh, and if you were wondering, I did get off at 1:30 on Wednesday :oP

So when we got up to his cousins' house, DBF cracked out the Hummer. So I now present, Boys and Toys:
DBF and his cousin play with the Hummer and then decide this:

DBF thought that baby Jesus would have liked to play with the Hummer. I have a feeling that this could be our Christmas card this year :oP

After putting the Hummer away (20 minute battery life), we socialized and ate, and then drove back home to hit a couple of sales. Circuit City was out of everything by the time we got there (DBF and I were not going to get up at 5 AM unless someone had PS3s), and Meijer didn't have a huge sale going on, although I did get a small present of cologne for my dad while we were there. Best Buy had the best deal that we saw all day and that was a 2GB SD memory card for 29 bucks. There were no mail-in rebates attached to that too, so that meant we saved 70 bucks on the spot. Woot!

Saturday we went to my family's Thanksgiving dinner and I once again ate too much. After the dinner we went to see a production of A Christmas Carol and it was pretty good. I had massive heartburn and stomach pain for most of the day, so we ran and got some Gaviscon and I drank a bunch of that to calm things down.

Sunday was a gorgeous day. We went and played some disc golf and I sucked majorly. After that we went to see Casino Royale. It was OK, but it's not my favorite Bond movie of all time by any means. I don't think I like this new guy that much, but he was OK. When we got home, DBF tried on his sweater after I made changes to the neckline and I took a picture of him in it. Blogger won't let me post anymore pictures now, so I'll post that picture either later today or tomorrow. Tomorrow may be for FO's anyways since I also finished mom's cardigan and now just need to sew the thing together and go buy one more set of buttons.

Hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving. Hope you had a good birthday too, Erica!

Knit on...

Come on, Come on....

That was in an Eric Cartman voice by the way. I'm ready for the Thanksgiving break! I have been told that around noon, the Survey usually announces that all employees can go home and enjoy the holiday, so I'm counting down the hours. Come on, come on....

So last night I was happily knitting on mom's cardigan, baking a squash casserole and some snickerdoodles (not to self, never, NEVER buy cookie dough from the neighborhood kid's fundraiser....you'll just eat far too many cookies), and watching tapes to catch up on my shows when aforementioned kid comes over. She wants to try to spin again. So I get up, take the casserole out, eat a cookie, and go grab the drop spindle. I told her that she couldn't use the wheel until she got really good at the drop spindle (seeing as I have no cheap roving left aside from what is on that spindle right now, I don't want her to spin up really bad singles out of merino that cost me a little money). She's the type of kid that gets bored after about 2 seconds, but she really likes the drop spindle. I'm thinking that for Christmas, I may make a CD drop spindle for her and her sister and give them that and a bag of cheap roving and let them go nuts. I can see the look on their parents' faces now :oP

After they finally left, I spun up a second skein of the kid mohair/merino blend and plied it and everything. It looks a little better than the first one, but they are both pretty consistent.

Come on, come on....

I'm going to go to Thanksgiving with DBF's family, so we'll be travelling tomorrow. His cousins have a very nice house and that side of the family meets up on Thanksgiving with way too much food, but the thing I always look forward to?

Quarter Poker.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Knit on...

Come on, come on...

Stupid Rabbit

OK, so last night Spooky got into the bedroom. I couldn't get her to come out, so I went back into the living room and fixed DBF's sweater's neckline as best as I could (I'm happy with it, but it just seems like there should be more or something) and spun this:

A skein of kid mohair/merino blend wool courtesy of Erica. It's so super soft before you spin it and it keeps that softness after it's spun. I love the silky luster to this wool too. I still have well over half the bag left too, so I need to spin the rest of it up and then figure out what to make out of it. I think it's soft enough that it should be a next-to-skin item of some sort. Once I spin the rest of it up, I'll see how much it yielded and we'll go from there.

So, I get ready to go to bed, take DBF's sweater into the bedroom to photograph it for the blog, and there is a bunny on the bed, surrounded by bunny shit and bunny pee, and I drop the sweater and charge the rabbit. I guess she got the hint that I was royally pissed (no pun intended) at her, so she ran back into the front room and jumped in her cage. She got no treat last night. So I angrily strip off the sheets, the comforter, and anything else that she peed on, go and get the See Spot Go urine remover and spray the stains to make them vanish, then tromp downstairs to throw the sheets in the washer. I couldn't get the comforter in there, so it will have to be washed tonight. I grabbed the first blanket I saw downstairs and went back up to go to bed on the mattress pad. Damn rabbit. Oh, here's a quickly taken picture of DBF's sweater. It's a pretty crappy picture, but I was mad, so this is what you get :oP

Yep, still have a lot of ends to weave in. I might still try to do something else with the neck, like make it more defined or something. We'll see how ambitious I get. I was too mad to worry about that last night. Oh, and I mentioned yesterday that it snowed. I would show you a picture, but blogger is apparently done letting me load pictures. I'm going to try to go into yesterday's post and put it there if it will let me. We'll see. I have to wash and dry a comforter tonight, so I may or may not get to go to SNB this week. Oh well. I'm still trying to find a way to meet up with Kim on Wednesday since she has the day off (really, truly, she has a day off!).

Knit on...

Snow!

Yes, I walked out the door this morning and it was a winter wonderland. The ground was pretty well covered, the evergreen bushes stood out in contrast, and my car was covered with the big white flakes. It's nice wet snow too, so I really wanted to make a snowball off the top of my car and send it flying. Maybe later in the season :oP So now I'm sitting in front of my computer at work, wondering why I didn't just run back in the house and download the pictures of snow off my camera so I would have a picture for this post. Oh well, you'll see them tomorrow.

Friday, DBF and I stayed home and watched TV. He helped get me out of my bad funk at least, so that was good (still calling the doctor today to get a refill for the happy pills). Saturday we went and played in a Magic PTQ sealed event. I was given what looked like a God deck. Two Avatar of Woe, two Sudden Death, one Jaya, a Lighting Axe, a bunch of other red burn and black removal, and I thought it would win. Silly me, I went 0-2 drop. The cards looked pretty, but they sure played like crap. I think I built the deck just fine too, so I'm not sure why the deck hated me so bad. Oh well. DBF went 1-2 drop. So much for going to PT Geneva :oP We drove back home and went to go see the movie Happy Feet. Yeah, kids will love it, adults will fall asleep. Although it does have the late Steve Irwin playing an Elephant Seal, so go see if you can figure out which one he played.

Sunday we spent a good chunk of the day in the car, driving to pick up DBF's aunt. In the time that took, I finished his sweater and started on mom's cardigan and got a good chunk of the back panel done. Seeing as there is no poker this week, I should be able to get a lot of Christmas knitting done. Being off Thursday and Friday helps too!

So when we finally got back to my house, I had him try on the sweater. Everything looked fine except the neck. Good lord, the neck is awful. I actually cried it was so awful. I'll be trying to fix that tonight. It seems to be a little off-center (I probably didn't rip even rows out when fixing it the first time), and definitely too wide. I think that I will just pick up the stitches and decrease a few rounds and see what can be done that way. I'll try it on and see how it fits after that. If it'll look OK on me, it'll look OK on him. Overall, I wasn't too pleased with how it came out. I think I'll be knitting him another sweater in the future, but it'll definitely be made out of nicer yarn and definitely not that Cape Cod pullover pattern again. Oh well, nice thing about knitting is that you can always fix something. You may have to rip out 100 rows, but you can always fix it!

Knit on...

388 dollars

388 plus tax. That's how much it will cost to fix my car. I was right, the alternator had died and the reason my car was running hot was due to the fact that the damn cooling fan had broken too. Next time I pray, I'm going to ask for the minimum that I want to pay for the car and not the maximum. After tax, it will be right at about 400 bucks which is what I had allotted to pay on the credit cards, so I guess they will just get minimum payments this month. Wish the minimum payments weren't so high...

Oh, and no tickets to the game tonight. This sucks.

TGIF

Yep, I'm glad it's Friday. Last night I had a depressed night. I don't know why I went into such a depressed funk, but I had all the lights out and was in my bed watching tapes by 6 last night. That's really unusual for me and it rather concerns me this morning. Why did I suddenly go into such a funk? Did something trigger it, or was it just a random depressed moment. Should I go back on medication?

I'm still a little depressed this morning and the anxiety is up some too. I wish I knew why. I have been doing so good since I've been off the Lexapro and on an herbal supplement on reccommendation from my doctor. So what's the deal? Did that vitamin B shot I got on Tuesday screw something up? I'm going to have to wait and see how much the car costs me today and then I may call in my prescription to Lexapro today or tomorrow and get that sucker filled again. My doctor said that if stuff like this happened that I should stop taking the supplement and go back on Lexapro. We were just seeing if we could find a cheaper route to take than Lexapro, but right now I need something to kick me out of this funk I've been in.

I didn't even knit last night. I didn't spin, I didn't cook (thank God for Chinese delivery food), I didn't do anything except curl up in bed and watch Heroes, My Name is Earl, SNL, and the Book of Daniel, all on tape from DBF. On the bright side, I finished two tapes that I can give back to him now. I just sat in bed all night and went to bed at 8, woke up at 6:30 and came to work. Blah.

If the guy at work remembers the tickets, DBF and I might go see UK play tonight. I've never been to a men's basketball game before (I've been up here for 5 years now and have yet to go), so I'd really like to see them play in person. Maybe that would snap me out of it. Who knows. Right now I'm just dreading the phone call from the car place.

Knit on...

So Much For My Turn To Win

Um, yeah, I was the first person out. I raised pre-flop with KJ suited and got one caller. Flop comes up and there's a King, so I bet 200 on it. The guy calls. Turn is the third diamond on the board, so I checked. River comes up a King. Yep, I have trip Kings with a J kicker, so I'm thinking since he didn't raise when the third diamond came out, he has a pair maybe. I go all in, he calls, he has 8 6 of diamonds.

OK, for poker players out there, suited cards only raise your likelyhood of winning a hand by 3%. He calls a pre-flop bet with crappy suited semi-connectors and wins the hand and puts me out of the tourney. I don't get pissy about bad beats very often, but believe me, I was pissed about that hand. It was the only hand I played too, so that made it even worse. Oh well.

In knitting news, I am almost done with DBF's sweater. I hope that after knitting on it some at lunch today and after work that I might get it done. I will have to seem it up tomorrow, but it is almost there. Once I get his done, the emphasis goes on Mom's cardigan and Grandma's sweater for Christmas. I'm thinking about buying some of the cards from Knitty.com about why people didn't get their hand-made items on time for the holidays. I don't know if I can get stuff done for everyone up here. Hopefully I can, it just means I have to knit, knit, knit. Not that that's a problem or anything, but I have this spinning wheel at home and it calls to me.

Yeah, I know the drive band is off. I had to take off a bobbin and then didn't put it back on before taking the picture. Last night before poker, I spun up the rest of the turquois merino and white merino to make more of the Ice Princess yarn. I should have enough spun to make at least three big skeins, maybe four total. We'll see how far it goes once the plying is all done. I'm almost done plying one skein of it.

My car decided to do strange things this morning. I managed to get her into work, but I think she needs to go to the mechanic right after work. I'm not an expert, but I think my alternator is dying since the battery light is on and the battery won't recharge. It's a freaking new battery too, so it makes me wonder. Also it's running hotter than usual and I should really get that checked out. It better not be more than 400 bucks to repair, that's all I'm saying. I can allot my paycheck's worth of credit card bill payment to it, but I do need to pay the utilities and maybe have a little left over to buy some food. Car, you picked a sucky time to break down. Why couldn't you have waited until after the holidays?

Knit on...

Crappy Prizes

Yes, that is my complaint for today. I didn't win any of the prizes, but DBF did last night. He won a bowling party from the place we play poker at, but it's so limited that it ended up being the crappiest prize there. It was just worth more than the 6th place prize, so it ended up being for 5th. Blah. At least he finished fifth and got something, but it would have been nice if he had gotten a better prize for it.

Me? Yeah, I was out before the final table. AQ suited looks good until the big chip stack calls with pocket kings. Blah.

Knitting news! Yes, there is knitting news today, with pictures and everything. So here goes:
Dad's finished cardigan, but the thing is so dark, it barely even shows up. It looks good, trust me :oP
A little something I've been working on with the spinning wheel...now where's the dye? Here's the skein of yarn I made yesterday and I now feel the need to make more of it because I want, no, NEED something made out of this. I'm calling the colorway Ice Princess:
Close Up:
100 percent merino wool. A single spun with tourquois and a single spun with plain old white then plied together to make a bulky weight yarn. The other white yarn up top is closer to a heavy worsted weight. I wanted to spin some merino before working on the kid mohair/merino blend that Erica sent me so I didn't screw it up. I would really hate to screw up good roving. Another interesting occurrence at my house yesterday:

Spooky will not leave the roving alone. There's no angora in there, but I guess the smell of other animal fiber makes her go crazy. Go figure. She eventually crawled into the bag and then freaked out, but I was laughing too hard to get that picture. Silly rabbit, roving is for people!

Tonight is the last of the final tournaments for the poker league. DBF and I will once again try to win a prize. I think it's my turn to win tonight since I haven't even made final table for one of them yet. I'll be bringing DBF's sweater sleeve with me (number 2!) to see if I can finish that tonight. It'll be close, but I realized that I have knit this sweater only while playing poker. Interpret: I have been playing so much poker that I have had time to knit an entire sweater. It's kind of cool that I'm almost done with it and the league ends tonight. There's a party for the league tomorrow night, so if I don't get it done tonight, I'll have to take it there and finish it so that it can truly be a poker sweater.

Knit on...

DBF Kicked Arse

Not arse, ass. He kicked ass last night. It was the final tournament of the Monday night poker league and DBF was the fourth highest chip stack starting out. He looked very much like he would go out pretty soon, but he is the master of the short stack, so he managed to come back and win the whole tourney! He won a two night stay at one of the local casinos and some gift certificates for food and stuff. I however went out with pocket queens. It seemed like a good idea to go all in with those, until the other guy flipped over pocket aces. At least I got beat by a better starting hand.

Today I have a doctor appointment, so I'm home, trying to relax before it. This doctor rarely ever has good news for me, so I don't like to go see him more than once a year. Hopefully it will be just a nice routine check up and no other "needs to be documented in a medical journal" things will come up. Anyways, I'll have pictures of the finished Dad cardigan (sewing on the buttons as I speak) tomorrow.

Knit on...

Pictures!

Yes, I finally got the picture thing worked out. I just gave in and brought my laptop in to work and burned a CD of the pictures this morning. Maybe I'll actually remember to download the pictures at night and burn a CD from home so I dont have to bring in my laptop. Anyways, here is the SnB birthday party at ReBelle:
Kim made chocolate cupcakes and loaded one with a bunch of squiggly candles. I was very entertained by the candles. We all devoured a good chunch of the cupcakes and then came the feeling time. Erica, this is for you:
Emily feeling the kid mohair/merino blend roving.

Kim pondering if she can run away with the roving. Sarah also was fondling the roving, but for some reason her picture did not make it on the CD. I don't know why, but if I can get it to burn on a CD, I'll post it. We all just wanted to put little ears on the roving and call it a pet, it's that soft. I have not spun that up yet since I was working on a couple of other rovings this weekend. I got four skeins of yarn done between Saturday and Sunday, now comes the fun part...dying them. We'll see how this turns out :oP

Saturday I went to my cousin's baby shower. She had the cutest cake:

Obviously she's having a little girl. I gave her the sari silk baby kimono and she loved it. She jokingly asked if she would be getting her own adult size for Christmas. I looked at the stash when I got home and decided that there is enough to make a little shrug, but not enough for a full size jacket, even though she is quite small. If I have time, I might make one after I get all the other presents done.

Spooky and I moved back in last night and Spooky had to check out the spinning wheel. I may have to move it in the other room because it apparently tastes good to her. Tonight is about Poker and trying to win a trip to the casino. I'll report more tomorrow :oP

Knit on...

Friday

Yeah, I couldn't come up with a snazzy name for today's post, so Friday will have to do. I'm sleepy and cold, and the cold is making me sleepier here at work, so I have a feeling it is going to be a long day.

Last night I came home and I cleaned. I ran Spooky over to my grandparents' house where I'll be staying for the weekend and then ran to camera club. After camera club, I came home and cleaned some more. Yes, it was a very exciting evening.

I got up early this morning to finish some laundry before coming to work, so another reason I'm sleepy. I may go take a nap at lunch today. I did get the spinning wheel all together last night and it appears to be in working order. I will be taking that with me this weekend.

I always hate when the home owners come in for a weekend. It does create a hassle since I have to pack up all my stuff and make sure it's tucked away so that they don't get into it, clean the house, move the rabbit, and then leave. Oh well.

I'll have pictures on Monday. I'm lazy today. I did very little knitting yesterday with the camera club and cleaning and all. Have a good weekend, everyone!

Knit on...

The Wheel Is In

Repeat, the Ashford traveler box that had my name taped to it with masking tape is in! I have been avoiding using the credit cards for anything so that I can get out of debt, but the idea of taking home the wheel last night made me break down. Yes, I charged the remaining 150 bucks to the card that was almost paid off. Next month, next month...

I packed up the wheel in my car and headed over to poker where I qualified for the third tournament next week. I now qualify for all three tourneys, so I'm ready to go kick some arse! I went out pretty quick, but seeing as only 5 of us showed up to play, it was OK.

I quickly sped home (thankfully there were no cops around at 8:15 last night) and drug the box into the living room after I had checked the house thoroughly (there was a light on that shouldn't have been on, but it was later decided that a ghost is playing tricks on me). I opened the box and there were all the little parts (8:45 as of this point). I grabbed the screwdriver, hammer, oil, and hex wrench and started assembling my new wheel. I got down to the screws that attach the treadle to the driver for the wheel and I couldn't take it any more. My hand cramped up and that was the end of the assembly. It's almost all done, and I shall finish it tonight.

I realize now that my hand cramp was actually my body telling me that it was way past my bedtime for a work night. I put the screwdriver down at midnight and went to bed. I'm sleepy this morning, but I am more wanting to get that dumb wheel put together.

I'm still working on the pictures issue. I need to go get my CD's from the grandparents' house so that I can get them into work. Maybe I can find a computer here that will read a DVD...

Knit on...

Happy Birthday

While I still work out kinks with getting pictures burned onto CDs and then brought into work (apparently work computers can't read DVDs), I decided that I would dedicate this post to my DBF. Today is his birthday and I wish him the happiest day of his life (come on lottery winning!)

DBF and I have been dating for well over three years now. Those have been the happiest three years of my life without a shadow of a doubt. We met at a local game store where he and a few of his friends were playing the Star Wars TCG. I just saw dice, so I had to go see what the game was all about. I beat the first two guys and then came DBF. He utterly crushed me. I immediately liked him because he didn't take it easy on me. A few weeks later, I was supposed to go to Shakespeare in the Park to see Robin Hood (I know, it's not a Shakespearian play...) with one of my friends. Well, the card gamers played every Sunday and I had joined up with their group, so I was waiting to go to the play when my friend called. She tells me the absolutely horrible news that her mother had been trampled by a horse down in Georgetown and that she was going to the hospital to see her (her mom was fine, so don't worry). I came back in from the call and said, well, guess I won't go since I won't have anyone to go with me. In chimes DBF saying he'll go with me. It sounded good to me, so we went on our first date then. We've tried to go to Shakespeare in the Park every year since.

DBF is a strong competitor which works well with me since I'm also super competitive. He introduced me to the world of tournament Magic, tournament Star Wars TCG, Origins, and many other gaming related things as well as photography. He even puts up with this quirky yarn obsession that I have and the endless babbling that I go on and on about that I know he has no clue what I'm saying. He's good like that. He has also been there for me in many hard and difficult times. He was the one who encouraged me to get counselling when I started going through my severe depression. He was the only one who seemed to understand what I was going through and has been there for me every step of the way. He's held me when I've gone through anxiety attacks and he's just been there for me.

The past 3+ years have produced some of my greatest memories. I hope he realizes how much he's touched my life and I can only hope that I've touched his life as much. I can't imagine my life without him and I look forward each and every day to new memories that we will make with each other. Happy birthday, to the man that I love. DBF, you hold such a special place in my heart. Happy Birthday.

A Letter

Dear Weight Watcher of many years ago,

I think it has been so long since I truly addressed you that I have forgotten that you truly exist. So last night while rummaging through my closet for something to wear, I found signs that you were not a myth that I created and keep telling myself I used to be. No, you were a real person. I have the jeans to prove it.

Why, dear Weight Watcher, did you run away? Why did you leave those size 10s and opt instead for the size 18s that you are now? Is sugar that damn good. Well, yes, but is it worth it?

Did you ever think that when you were 24 that you would be a size 18? Did you ever think you would get to a size 18? Do you like saying you are a size 18? No, I didn't think so.

So would you like to come back, dear Weight Watcher of old? Will you please come back so that my grandmother will stop buying clothes for me and telling me that she bought that size because she was afraid it would shrink instead of just saying, I bought that size because you are that size?

All your old material is still hanging around the house and the office. It really is here, you just need to pick it up and start reading it again. I know it's been a while, but I need your help. I can't do this alone and I need that reminder of the size I was four years ago when I lost all this weight originally. I would like to be any size smaller than an 18 right now. I'll be thrilled with a 16 as of this point.

Plus, if you help me get smaller, dear Weight Watcher of old, it will cost us both less money on yarn to make things for us. We will be able to knit objects for the 6 skein size instead of the 8 skein size. We can spin a pound of roving instead of a pound and a half. Will you help me do this, Weight Watcher of old?

Today there will be cupcakes at SnB. I need your help, Weight Watcher of old. I need to only eat one cupcake, not 2 or 10. Please come back. I found your jeans, and your pictures are still on my desk, curled up in the arms of DBF. Look, there you are! Proof that you are not a myth! DBF has even seen you. Well, he's seen the size 12 you, but I think he would like to see the size 10 you as well! Come back and help me do this, dear old friend. I've got your jeans, and I've got your books, so now I just need your help.

Sincerely,
The Weight Watcher of Now

Of Hangovers and Pokemon

OK, so last night I had a relaxing dinner with my grandparents, opened up some presents (got a new rolling yarn tote, PJ's, and a digital camera that takes much better pictures), then went to play poker at the league. I had already qualified for the final table for the Monday night league, so I mainly went there to play in side tables and drink. I had three malibus and coke, but I swear I felt like I had ten. I stayed at the poker joint much longer than I had intended, waiting for the effects to wear off (cheese sticks seemed to help this dramatically), then headed home.

Once home, Spooky started chewing on my feet. The rabbit has developed a foot fetish now and just seems to take great joy in chomping on toes. I took my socks off, thinking this would help, but instead she bit my toe. Dumb rabbit. She probably enjoyed it too. Anyways, I played Pokemon last night. I played that gamecube game and got stuck in one section that is driving me crazy. I'll probably go home this afternoon and breeze right through it since I won't have any alcohol in my system. Anyways...

Today is SnB over at ReBelle, so I'll be heading there at lunch. Kim has already said that she is bringing cupcakes in for the birthday celebration, so woot for cupcakes! I brought in my rolling tote to bring to SnB and carry Dad's ever growing cardigan sleeve. I'm hoping I can get it done today at lunch so that I can sew the sucker up and run over to Hancock Fabric before poker tonight. I need to qualify for the final tournament for the Tuesday/Thursday league. That is the best prize out of all of the prizes and it's the one tournament that I'm not qualified for! I just haven't been winning enough there I guess. So, I'll try and qualify so that DBF and I have a slightly better chance with two of us in there.

Tomorrow is for spinning. I will also have new pictures tomorrow. I brought the new camera with me, thinking that the computer here might be able to read it directly like it did the craptapulous one, but apparently I need to install Kodak software and of course, I can't do that since I'm not a computer administrator. I would hate to ask the IT guy to let me install it so I can put blogging pictures on my computer :oP I'll just download them at home and email them to myself.

Knit on...

And eat a cupcake!

Lunch With Kim

So Kim grabbed me away from work for a little while and we had lunch together at a hamburger joint. That was a really good hamburger, good fries, and a wonderful peanut butter milkshake. I'm stuffed. She picked up lunch which was really nice of her and she also got me this:

Blurry sock yarn! It's Opal in the rainforest collection, specifically Chameleon colorway. It's a nice shade of blues and green. She also got me a card which I feel needs to be made into something. It says:

Only the Good Die Young...We Bitches Live Forever!

Anyways, back to work.

knit on...

They Say It's Your Birthday

Yep, I'm a year older today. I'm a whopping 24 years old, but I feel older than that. I don't get along with people who are my own age for the most part (there are a few, but they act older as well), so most of my friends are significantly older than I am, but that's fine with me.

Tonight I will go over to my grandparents' house and have dinner with them, open presents that are there, and then go play poker perhaps if I am done in time. If not, then I will go to the Liquor Barn, buy a bottle of coconut rum, some pina colada mixer, and try out the new blender that DBF's mom got me for my birthday. DBF and I bought each other video games that we both had been wanting. I do have a confession though. The game that I had been wanting was a dumb pokemon game for gamecube. I am addicted to pokemon games. I don't know why, I just am. Perhaps there is an adult recovery group for pokemon? I also am addicted to Lego Star Wars, any Final Fantasy game, Kingdom Hearts, Dino Crisis, and many others, but I am really addicted to pokemon.

Here's a quick bit of knitting content for you:

That is dad's cardigan in pieces. I am almost done with the last sleeve and then I can sew the sucker together and go get some buttons for it. After I get done with that, I have to get to work on mom's. Then I have to do Grandma's. Dear Lord, I need another month. Christmas comes too soon. I will have some time to knit here soon though I suppose. The poker league will be ending next week and hopefully it will end with either DBF or myself winning a trip to the bahamas. We'll find out.

Well, I'm going to go plug away at work. I don't think anyone here except Kathy realizes it's my birthday today. I was secretly hoping for decorations on my desk, but that didn't happen. Maybe I'll get a cupcake instead...

Knit on...

Clickety-click-glug

If you can't read it, it's from today's BC comic. It reads:
"What goes clickety-click-glug, clickety-click-glug?"
"I give up, what?"
"Granny slamming a Jack Daniels in between knits and purls"

Kudos to DBF for sending me this one!

Friday, Friday, Friday!

Sorry about the lack of post yesterday. I was home all day because I woke up with a fiery throat and I have a tendency to go into strep really easy. I soon realized that it was actually my bi-annual larengitis stint, so I took the day off anyways and knit, did laundry and dishes, and sacked out. It was rather nice. I did have to get over to the campus anyways to help Kathy out with a lab that we were partnered together on, but that wasn't too bad. It just took two hours to do, that was the only bad part. We did go get Chinese afterwards, so all was well!

I played poker last night and made the final table, but was knocked out with my pair of queens to trip 6s. Not much you can do there. Oh well. I went over to my grandparents to pick up my mail and there were two packages there. One was an order from Knit Picks which Kathy and I placed the other day. I bought some of the suri dream to replace the moonlight mohair from lionbrand in a pattern that I really liked. That yarn will be turned into a sweater for my grandmother in Florida. The rest was wool of the andes for felting for Kathy (and a little for me too!). Then I had this little box sitting there from the Yarn Tree in New York. I didn't remember ordering any yarn from New York, so I opened the box and there sat this:
10 grams (though it looked like a ton more than that) of kid mohair/merino blend roving. I had to touch it...

It's got a beautiful luster to it. I have to admit that I fondled this stuff the rest of the evening. It was gorgeous and so super soft. I cursed the lack of spinning wheel at the house, but fondled the roving nonetheless.

Inside the package was a card. It said something along the lines of:

Happy Birthday, have fun spinning (and dyeing!) from Guess Whooooooooooooo.

Yes, that many ooo's. I'm going to say that this was from my wonderful secret pal a year or so ago (who also happens to be a good friend now) Erica. Thanks for the present! I love it!

Oh yeah, as some of you know, and all of you know now, my birthday is coming up. It's Monday to be exact. I will be 24 years old (though no one believes me, they all think I'm older) and then DBF's birthday is on Wednesday. Erica's birthday is also this month, so now I must work on the present for her :oP

And in other knitting news, I am almost done with my dad's cardigan. It's so close. I'm on the last sleeve and then I can sew it all together. The only thing that concerns me is how wide those sleeves are on the thing. There were no pattern corrections listed, so I suppose they are made to be that wide. I'm on the second sleeve now, so I really don't feel like ripping it out and trying again, so we'll see how it tries on. I looked at the pattern for mom's cardigan and it has much smaller sleeves. Go figure. Hopefully it will work. I hate frogging an entire 22 inch cardigan sleeve out of wool-ease thick and quick. DBF's sweater is coming right along too. I have a little more to fix on the back panel (front is done, now I have to add a little more length to the back) and then I can move on to the sleeves. It won't be done for his birthday like I had hoped, but it will be done soon. He needs a nice wool sweater to wear to work since it's cold there.

Oh, and something else that sucks arse, he has to work tonight! He got called in for tonight because the company has to produce more stuff I guess. At least it's not a full shift this time, but it still sucks. At least I got to see him on Wednesday night. It just sucks because tomorrow the prints for the annual camera club print show are due and tonight they all need to be framed. I'll just run over there after work and get as much framed as I can. Hopefully his mom will have them done printed by then and I can start framing. We'll see.

Hope everyone has a good weekend. I'll be a year older on Monday, so we'll see if I have any insights then :oP

Knit on...