Where Do I Begin?

This is a very serious question. Really, I'm not sure. There has been so much going on, and I have no idea how to dive in. Do I update all together right now? Parts for a few days until I'm caught up? Divide into categories...finished objects, knitting events (yes, there were events--for reals), knitting friends' updates, yarn footage? I have always been a fan of the old chronological format, but I don't know if I can work from that far back.

Any suggestions? No? Well, then I think I'm going to go with stuff I'm excited about and can still remember. And maybe I'll work back a little bit. Okay? Okay.

First off, I will share that a while ago (yeah, maybe around the time that I suddenly stopped blogging completely?) we got some scary news. Brian had a routine physical and blood work and we got some bad results. So we did the whole series of tests. We did the worrying, and the speculating, and the general-freak-out-ing. Good times. But in the end, all is fine and he's back to normal. Stop wondering if I "could be any more vague", because that's what I would be thinking, and just chalk it up to me respecting Brian's privacy on this very public forum. You guys get it, right? So he's all set and back to normal, and that is why I didn't call, didn't write.

I'll be honest, too--he's been all right for a week or two, but I sort of fell out of the blogging habit. It wasn't part of my routine any more, and I was having a hard time fitting it in, you know? But I missed it. A lot. So here I am...

Now that that's out of the way, I have lots to share. Some things I finished since we last spoke:

The Shibui Knits baby sweater I was working on. Love it!





I still have to add a ribbon to the top of each side of the front so it can be closed, but that will depend on the particular baby who is receiving it. When I know who's getting it, I'll go and pick some ribbon out. I think I'd love some pink for a girl, though. This turned out so pretty, and I would totally make it again. Next time, I would pick up the stitches for the sleeves from the first half of the sleeve, instead of casting them on, so I don't have to seam under the arms. Not my favorite thing, seaming garter stitch. No idea how to do it, so I just winged it. I think it's o.k., though.

My first Umbilical Cord Hat from the Stitch 'n Bitch book:





It's in some leftover Knitpicks Swish (worsted) in Red Pepper, and I finished it in one night I believe. Kind of a long time ago, but I remember because I was SO excited to finish so quickly! Cute, right? Newborn size. I'll have to remember this one the next time someone has a baby, because it's a cinch.

The Scrappy Scarf:

This one was fun. I took some scraps I had from Elena's Baby Blanket and Brian's scarf and just went to town.



These are some different colors of Berroco Ultra Alpaca. I cast on horizontally--not sure how many stitches, maybe 240 or so. And I picked up a different color for every row. And I just left the ends hanging and made fringe at the end. It was about 5 feet long, or a little more. I believe it was girl-sized, but it was long enough that I would wear it for sure. Very fun, and it was mindless. I love the way it turned out. It ended up maybe 4 inches wide.



This picture gives you the idea. It wasn't finished yet, but it is now. Unfortunately I never took a shot of the FO. Trust me, it was cute.

What were the hat and scarf for? They were charity donations...for...the Pawsox Stitch 'n Pitch!! Yeah, someone from Ravelry (OTKate) organized a stitch and pitch for us in Pawtucket, at McCoy Stadium last Saturday night. About 150 of us met up to watch the Red Sox farming team! We had prizes (no, I didn't win) and goodie bags and lots of fun. The game the night before was called on account of rain, so we watched a double-header: the original game and the makeup game from the night before. Wicked good time.

I don't really have any pictures because my camera died about 10 seconds after I pulled it out of my bag. Irritating. If you belong to Ravelry, you can check out the Pawsox group here and the group page has a picture of my SIL Maura, myself, and Krista. Maura took some pictures, but I don't have them yet. I'll try to do something about that.

Funny story about the Ravelry picture. The three of us are at the game, and things are just starting up. We've got out knitting out and we're getting into the groove, talking and having a good time. A nice gentleman from a few rows down asks us if we would just all smile for a quick picture. But of course! We'd be happy to! We all smile and he takes the shot. We're not thinking about it...we just keep knitting and talking. I watch the man walk away. Like away, away. You know, to another section. Seriously. So I ask them who that guy was and did they notice that he just sort of walked away. At first, we'd assumed he was with our group, but now we were wondering if he was just some nice man who saw three young ladies knitting at a baseball game and couldn't resist taking a picture. Perhaps for his blog, even? Then we didn't see him again for a long time. We looked. In the end, we did see him with our group again, so we didn't worry about it. The next day, Krista called and told Brian to make me go on Ravelry and see the group page. And there it was, the picture from the nice man. I cracked up.

At least he's not blogging somewhere about these huge dorks at the ball game who were *gasp* actually knitting in public! Not that I really care, but it's one less thing to think about. Many thanks to Kate for a great event. We're already planning for next year.

Well, that's enough for right now. There will be more coming. For now, I have to get some stuff together for my knitting class at WEBS tomorrow. This is my first knitting class ever, and I'm pretty excited. The teacher is a well-known sock knitter...any guesses?

Where Have I Been?

....Just hangin' around.


Check out this video of Keegan reading to Spencer. I love it. They were like that for a while before I grabbed the camera. More tomorrow.

Lots of Fun, Lots of Knitting

Whew! Much has happened since I last posted, including lots of knitting (as promised). Let's get right into it, shall we? Right before I fell off the face of the Earth the posts became scarce, I was preparing for a girls' weekend. There was lots to do, and I put most of it off until the last minute. Naturally, I didn't end up finding time to update the blog right before I left. And you know I thought about posting while I was away, but I didn't have a spare moment, really. OK, maybe I did have a couple of moments--but it was a girls' weekend, so those were MY moments, if you will. Aw, I knew you'd understand.


Every year, I partake in a big scrapbooking weekend in Cape Cod. I know, scrapbooking is a little cliche, but seeing as I'm a mother in the 21st century, I believe I am in fact obliged to do so, if I'm not mistaken. Truth be told, I do enjoy it. So every spring, my CM consultant organizes a special weekend for all of us crazy scrappin' fools and we stay on the Cape at the Old Sea Pines Inn in Brewster. This year, I roomed with Krista and boy-oh-boy, did we have the ticket. Best room in the house, as far as I could tell.



We had a huge bathroom, separate bedroom, and this lovely living room. Lots of seating, so we planned to knit quite a bit, and a fireplace, too! Sweet. We even had a kitchen area to boot.



Krista was kind enough to bring along her coffeemaker, which was a huge bonus. Perhaps she was only trying to ensure that I'd have my morning coffee fix, thus protecting herself and all her limbs? Maybe. She does know me pretty well. The girl even remembered filters, the coffee itself, sugar and yummy creamer. We had all the necessities...



Um, things may have gotten a little bit out of hand. Yeah.

Much fun was had, though. This was my fourth year at the Cape, and usually I am all business. I want to make progress on my albums. I'm prepared and ready to go. I get up early for breakfast and get right to scrappin'. I stay up late cropping and pasting, etc. And I get home exhausted, but with lots to show for my efforts. This year, I didn't want to be exhausted. You know what I mean? I thought, it's a girls' weekend, and I always spend it working like a dog! What's with that? So this year, I had other priorities. Mostly, I just wanted to have a lot of fun, make some progress, maybe knit a bit.

I did meet my goal of fun. I didn't scrap like a crazy person (thought I did get twenty or so pages done, which is awesome) and I enjoyed myself. If I wanted a break, I took one. If I didn't want to set an alarm for breakfast, I didn't. I had a huge migraine on Friday night and I didn't worry about "getting stuff done", I just hit the hay early so I'd feel better. By the way, best decision all weekend. Krista and I enjoyed coffee in the morning together and sat around in our living room telling stories and laughing. I enjoyed several meals out, without any short people crying or whining or needing food cut up. Krista and I made Cosmos (seriously, the girl is *prepared*) Saturday night and just got silly and crazy.

We did not knit, which was sad, but we had fun. I enjoyed my weekend, my sleep, my quiet and my "girl talk". Yeah, like the kind you used to have in the dorms late at night with your girlfriends? When you were all kind of tipsy and just blabbing away? When you were afraid someone was going to knock on the door because you were all making way too much noise and it was like 2:30 in the morning? That kind. And it rocked.

I came back refreshed. Oh, yeah.

And it was a good thing, too. You should have seen the house when I got back.

Just kidding...thanks, Brian.



Ps. I didn't really get to much of the knitting progress, but here's a shot of the baby sweater I've been working on. It'll have to tide you over, and I'll show you more next post. I cast on for some socks for Spencer and a charity project. Pics are coming.

Oh, yes...

And Happy Easter!

We were very busy over the weekend.

First we jumped in the car:



Look at poor Spencer's hair. Static like you wouldn't believe. I couldn't even get a good shot. But let me say this--we started laughing at Spencer (Brian and I) and his crazy hair. The next thing we know, Irene is laughing at him, too. She makes a comment on how funny it is that his hair is so static-y. She sits behind him. When you're two and you don't reach the top of your carseat, but someone behind you can see your hair standing up, it's a very dire situation. Plus, you clearly need a haircut.



We did the Easter celebration with my side on Saturday. Good times. It was quiet, just my Mom and all five of us. And the guest of honor--my Grandma, who came down from Maine to spend the holiday with us. Such a treat! Grandma was in charge of making the mustard gravy to go with the ham...something my Mom's been "trying to learn to do for 20 years!", according to her. Somehow it never turns out quite right, in my Mom's opinion, so she jumped on the chance to learn again from her own mother, right in her own home. The gravy was delish.



All right, I know what you're thinking. Terrible picture. I know. I know. I just wasn't really thinking. Even you, my loyal blog readers, know that if I wanted a photo of this for posterity, I should have taken the camera from Brian. Can I tell you how many little movie clips we have on the camera that are taken sideways? Too many. And if you have a digital camera that takes movies too, you know that you can't flip movies like you can with photos. Yeah, that's right--they're stuck sideways. Fairly annoying to watch. The poor guy feels bad enough, but it happens a lot. I have no good excuse for not grabbing said camera away, other than that I wanted to be in the picture, too. You know, three generations and all?

Anyhow, if you could see their faces (not bitter) you'd see that they're both real cute. You'd probably comment about how we all look the same and all of that. I'm sorry to disappoint.

After much fun, basket opening and super yummy dinner, we jumped back in the car for the ride home. Ah, gotta love the travelling you do with little kids. Not too far--about an hour each way.

On Sunday morning, we did NOT hop in the car. That's right. We did Easter morning right at home. Nice. Naturally, I have to share the trails with you. I am reluctant to do this, as it very sadly puts a spotlight on my disgusting cream colored living room rug. I'm been trying to decide if I could deal with the embarrassment of having them out on display on the Internet for all to see (and gag) but I'm going to do it. This is just too huge a part of our Easter traditions to leave it out.

For the record, I would never, not ever, even consider putting this color rug in my home. This rug was here when we bought the place, and it's gotten considerably gross. I used to clean it with all kinds of harsh stuff, and succeeded in doing two things. I made these crazy super-clean spots on the rug, thus highlighting how dirty the whole thing was. (This was some time ago, so it wasn't nearly as dirty as it is now--yikes!) And I also made myself paranoid that my children were playing on a rug that was covered in chemicals and everything and that it wasn't worth it, blah, blah, blah. Anyhow, I'm counting on your not deciding that I'm a bad person/knitter because my rug is gross and your continuing to read the blog, grimy rug and all.

Here it is. The reason I'm showing you the rugs is this:

JELLY BEAN TRAILS


The Easter Bunny leaves them every year. Each child has his or her own trail (beginning with their initial) and it leads either to the basket or to a clue. This year, Irene's led to cute rhyming riddle-type clues. Keegan's clues were in the form of a picture with the word underneath. They each had three clues. Spencer's led right to the basket itself. We all enjoy this tradition immensely, and the kiddos have been discussing the trails for weeks in anticipation.


Keegan found his basket.


Irene's got hers.

Worry not. Spencer found his, too. But the picture Brian took was pretty much Spencer's butt sticking out from behind a rocking chair. I left it out.

And then, later in the day, we hopped in the car. This time it was to see Brian's side of the family at Aunt Judy's house. The drive was a little longer, about an hour and a half each way. This year we opted to stay home and let Spencer have his whole nap, instead of trying to nap him in the car, which never works anyway. We ate lunch at home, instead of having them wait until 2 o'clock to eat lunch. This all worked out so well, believe it or not. The lunch was not as good as the dinner Judy usually serves up, but we made due.


Spencer, Irene, myself, and Auntie Mo

Judy gave the kids recorders (did anyone else ever call these "flutaphones"?), a carrot shaped bat and ball, and bunny shaped racquets with a ball and a birdie. Big fun was had--outside.

The highlight of the visit was the piano.



When I asked Judy if it was all right if Spencer played, she said of course. She also said not to worry--it's not like he can make it any worse. (I'm guessing it's out of tune or something.)



Spencer played for maybe three minutes before the top of one of the keys fell off.



Yeah, seriously. That's what happens when you tempt the universe like that.

Next time, I promise...some knitting.

In Which There Was a Little Puff of Smoke

Early last week, maybe Tuesday, I had a problem. With my laptop. Again. You might remember when I had some issues a while back with my charger cord and it went on and on and finally had to be replaced. Gotta love Toshiba, but I digress. Things have been all right since the new cord arrived. Well, excepting of course a couple of weeks ago when my computer just slowed all way down and then got really bizarre, opening windows all the time (that I was not trying to open at all, for the record) and it just kind of freaked out. Sure computers can freak out--why not? So poor Brian was working and working on it and finally, it was a-ok.

Whew. What a relief. Thank goodness I didn't have to get a new one or anything. Just about a week to a week-and-a-half and I was in business. Pause for a moment to stop grinding teeth. And then, seeing as I was so happy and all...

You knew something bad had to happen, right?

I was on my laptop and something happened. First my cord (newly replaced, mind you) looked like this:



Well, mostly like that. There is a tiny green light on the charger thingy and that light was on.

Then Spencer ran by, as he often does, and runs over the cords, instead of going around the table. Big surprise, right? Those of you with kids are completely perplexed--that NEVER happens at your house, I'm sure. So I hear him kick the box and it annoys me. I'm fairly certain that the reason the first one broke is a direct result of him doing just this type of thing. I look down and expect to see this:



Light out. Cord unplugged.

Nope. I see this:



Light out. Cord still plugged in. Hmmm? Then I hear a tiny sound and see a little puff of smoke. I know, I should have snapped a photo at that exact moment, but I wasn't ready. This is clearly a reenactment for your benefit. I'll admit it, I did have a moment when I considered staging a shot of the cord, with me out of sight shooting steam at the charger with my Rowenta iron, but I thought that might be a little too "Yarn Harlot in the Tub" for me, you see. (Hilarious post, but a tad bit weird with the camera readiness. Later she explained that she had someone grab it for her, but you get the idea.)

I do think you need a visual of some sort, though, so I went with this instead:



Anyhow, it was horrible. Really a bad, bad feeling. I quickly unplugged all the cords, just in case. Then I gagged on the horrid smelling smoke. Next I checked the charger box and it was hot, which sort of freaked me out. A moment after the relief that all was o.k. and there was no longer any risk of fire and such, I realized that I probably had about 60 minutes of juice left on my laptop. And that is it. Luckily, most of what was on there was just backed up, because Brian had to erase the whole laptop in order to fix it last week. But still. The thought of having it die and then having to wait another week or more for a new cord (again) sank my spirits. I let Brian know what happened, and I stayed the heck off the thing to save the battery life. The problem is, without a new cord, anything on there is inaccessible when it's dead and can't be charged up.

Brian, bless his heart, suggested that we really did need a new one. This one's had many problems and it needed a new charger and a new battery, too. Plus, it's on the older side. I hated to do it, but we decided to just go and find something fairly low frills, so this didn't keep happening.

So here's my new laptop.



I really like it, and everything works, which is sort of a novelty for me.



It came with Vista, and I was nervous about that. But I do have to say that I really like how it works and I'm not having any problems with compatibility with older programs, etc. So far so good (watch out for falling tree limbs, sudden sparks, or spontaneously unravelling knitting).

It's lighter. Bigger, clearer screen. Longer battery life. All that good stuff. Gotta love improving technology...



Even the cord is better. Smaller, more compact, and the cords are heavier with three prongs!

Oh, and I forgot to explain the title. I'm seeing that all over the place lately. The whole "In Which....blah, blah, blah" titles. I can't remember who the blogger is who sort of started all of that by always starting her posts with "in which", but if I remember, I'll add a link. But I couldn't resist using the term, because how do you really start a post about a crazy power cord gone postal and smoky and all?

March Knitting Comes...

...in like a Lion,







...and out like a Lamb.

How do you like the Lion that Keegan made at school today? I couldn't resist...you know..."sheep humor". It's the Knitter's Achilles Heel.

I pulled out the Sunrise Circle Jacket last night. Figured, why not? It's not going to knit itself. Come to find out--I'd done a lot more on it than I remembered. How good does that feel? Awfully sweet. Sweet enough to bring back the mojo. Ah, yeah. Finally. I still am not sure why I was avoiding this project.

I came to the decision this weekend that if I wasn't going to work on it, I should really *gasp* change it's status to "hibernating". Now maybe this doesn't sound like much to you, or maybe it does. But I'll let you know that I've never put anything into Zzzzzzzz mode before, and it felt like a really big deal. Had to be done, though. That is, IF I didn't get to work on it. In a way I was relieved. So last night I took it out, expecting there to be maybe 2 or 3 inches done on the first sleeve, and much to my surprise, I pulled out maybe 7 or 8 inches! I started working on it and somehow, it magically transformed around my fingers. And I fell in love with this project for the first time. This style of sweater and tweedy type of yarn vary drastically from my usual M.O. Somehow, it all works, though. I thought of Jen and her good advice that if I waited, the mojo would just show up. Ah, she is wise beyond her years...



I'm thrilled with the progress and very pleased with the yarn and colors.



I have a serious and long-standing weakness for orange. The bright, happy vibe it sends works for me. In the past I wore tons of it, and then as I had children, my wardrobe dove into neutrals and more plain colors. I'm pretty much a brown, black, blue (as in jeans), white and maybe green girl. But I miss the orange.

Now, don't ask me why I'm making the baby sweater you see above. No good reason exists, except that I want to. The pattern called to me. I showed it to Brian and he said I should pick it up. So I said that I could always just wait to see if we had another baby before I started it. He suggested that if we don't have another baby, we could always give it for a shower gift or something. Combine that innocent suggestion with a sale I found for Shibui Knits yarn, and the pattern/fiber practically materialized on its own. After hanging onto it for a while, I just cast on. There wasn't much on the needles, and I wanted something mindless around.

It's fingering weight yarn and tiny needles, but it's knitting up quickly.



Another two inches or so and I start the sleeves. So pretty. So soft.

On Saturday I cast on for a plain pair of socks (using the Harlot's Basic Sock Recipe, of course) with Plymouth Happy Feet. I haven't worked much on it. The yarn's buttery and wonderful. Startitis seems to have a hold on me. Clever minds may have realized that Saturday was the 15th. Beware the Ides of March!

I picked up the Happy Feet at Webs with Krista, and she got the same yarn. OK, to be honest, she picked it up first. I am a total copycat (this time only), but again with the orange--I couldn't resist. So no pressure to cast on or anything.

But wouldn't it be fun to have these going at the same time!!? C'mon. You know you want to.

I Challenge You to a Duel

Duelling laptops?

I was on my computer, and I left the room. I come back and see this:



That's Spencer's little Elmo Laptop toy, set up right next to mine in the dining room. What a funny guy...

So everyone can rest assured that my laptop is now all set and functioning properly--virus free. Granted, Brian had to painstakingly backup everything on it. Which, when your systems are functioning at a snail's pace, is pretty irritating. Or so I've been told. And then he had to wipe the whole slate clean and reformat the whole deal. From there, we had to find all the software I use/need and re-install everything, ya-da, ya-da, ya-da. I have to say, Bri did a great job, and I pretty much have all the stuff I started with. Except, of course, the virus(es) and my email contacts. Yup. Not bad. I have all my old emails themselves, just not the contacts. So if you read the blog and we usually email and I haven't contacted you in a while--it's kind of not my fault, o.k.? Send me an email so I have your addy...

So back onto knitty business!

The Jacobean Socks for the SKP2008 are finished (have been for a while, actually). I love them, and I am dying to get my hands on more DIC yarn.

One thing I meant to share last post and forgot--I made a kind of big boo-boo. (Off topic: Have you ever had one of those days when everything you write looks weird? I'm finding I keep backspacing, believing that things aren't looking "right", and I'm not happy until I throw a hyphen in there. Odd, huh?) Anyhow, I read the charts backwards. Didn't matter so much for the middle section, but on the two outside charts, I read them left to right by mistake. And yeah, it does say clearly on the pattern to read them the other way, but apparently I sometimes read words and don't really bother to notice what they, in fact, mean.

See what I mean? It's not really a big deal as far as function, but I felt silly, none the less.

My TVyarn sock club package arrived today, and I can't wait to tell you all about it. I will wait a day or two, though, so I don't spoil it for anyone who hasn't received theirs. Oh, it is SO yummy, and I'm really diggin' the colors. Jana rocks!

Oh, and I wanted to mention something to everyone. You all know I do the Making Strides walk in Boston each fall to raise money to fight breast cancer. Cayli is doing the big 3-day walk (wow--go her, right?! I don't know if I have it in me. SIXTY miles in three days?!) and she's fundraising right now. Please check it out, and if you can, maybe help her out. It's such an important cause, and every little bit makes a difference. Oh, and did I mention that there's a contest, and some sweet prizes are involved?