Merry Christmas!

Man, December has sure flown by...what have I been doing with my time? Oh yea, frantically trying to get caught up for Christmas, spend time with loved ones, and get into gear for our busiest time of year at work. Work work work work work.

Here is a little cutie that I made for my nephew for Christmas...from the Last Minute Knitted Gifts book again, I seriously love that book. I think he's a very cute little elephant.




Exciting news for the day: In a generous showing of Christmas spirit to myself, I just purchased a plane ticket to spend New Year's in Boston with Sacha and Toni! I am SO EXCITED, I love love love Boston! As many of you probably already know!

I hope everyone has a fantastic holiday (whichever holiday you celebrate) full of friends, family and lots of good food!

No rest for the wicked

Well, I've been a busy girl the last couple of weeks, that's for sure.

Thanksgiving weekend was out of control, with family everywhere. My dad's sister, two brothers and one sister-in-law, my brother, sister-in-law and nephew, and a cousin and his girlfriend. It was great to see everyone, but that's a lot of people. Never a dull moment, as they say.

On the plus side, hanging out with family gave me lots of time to knit, and I got quite a nice chunk done on the baby blanket I'm test knitting for Lynn ( http://www.colorjoy.com/weblog/ ). It's gorgeous, this yarn is totally to die for. I'm having great fun knitting it, it's so soft! Not to mention machine washable. Fabulous.

Also, I finished my Aran bag from Sarah's class ( www.handknitter.sarahpeasley.com ), well, all except for the actualy stitching of the lining to the bag. Let me just tell you how it's practically a miracle that I managed to get the lining sewn together with the interfacing and all that jazz to get the bag to stand up. Sewing is not my strong point. Still, it was a fun bag to do and now I feel as though I've expanded my bag creating horizons, now that I don't necessarily have to felt a bag for it to be practical to carry. At any rate, here's my almost finished bag:


Next, Grace and I have a friend, Leo, who is gearing up for his first winter in Michigan after having grown up in Costa Rica. Needless to say he'll be quite cold. So in an effort to keep him from running as fast as possible away from here in about mid-January, I'm in the process of making him a hat and scarf to stay warm. I'm using Lion Brand Wool-Ease chunky knit on size 10 needles, and this stuff is like armor. If wind gets through this hat, you should go inside immediately because it's probably dangerous outside. :) The hat is a pattern I found on the internet a couple of years ago, I'm not even sure it has a name, and the scarf is called Men's Rustic Scarf from Last Minute Knitted Gifts, which is probably the best investment in a book I've made. If you don't have it, I most definitely recommend looking into it. Someday I would like to knit everything in it. And that's saying a lot (I'm very picky).

And now I'm going to settle in for a cozy evening of watching the old Disney animated Robin Hood which just arrived from Amazon.com. Possibly followed by Pete's Dragon... I seriously think it's been about 2 and a half weeks since I've had an evening to myself to just sit and do whatever I want. I'm going to relish it and completely hermit myself in here (yes, I just turned hermit into a verb)

Trying to compensate for being a slacker...

So I'm taking this Intro to Aran class, and I'm diggin' the cables and all is going well and then... I messed up. I ripped out 16 rows and started over. Now I realize that 16 doesn't sound like a lot, but cables are TIME CONSUMING.

So, to cut to the point, I was unprepared for Wednesday's class. Lucky for me, I was not the only unprepared one, but still. As a lifetime brownnoser and overall goody-goody, it was stressful not to have my homework done. :)

So I worked really hard to make up for it and finished all the knitting for my bag today. Straps are done and attached and everything. All it requires now is washing and blocking (along with the washing of the lining). Phew. So that's a load off.

And here is a picture of the finished product. Actually, 2 pictures. One of the bag as a whole, and one close up of the cables. I'm not sure if I've mentioned before on here or not that I was also difficult in that I wanted to do a different cable in the middle of the bag. The original had diamonds in the center, but I have a fascination with braided/Celtic looking cables, so I found one that fit the chart and used that instead. I'm really happy with how it turned out, even though the bag turned out smaller than i anticipated and I have an entire skein of yarn left. Too bad I already wound it and therefore can't return it. Oh well, I'm pretty sure I'll find a use for it.

Now it's time to move on to new and interesting things. There's the charity hat knitting for the Mid Michigan Knitting Guild (of which I am a member and an officer...now how did that happen?) and these are the colors I got in my grab bags... the gray and camo goes together and the red/white/blue goes together. I'll have to try and come up with something creative to do with them.

I am also about to start knitting a blanket as a test for LynnH ( www.colorjoy.com/weblog/ ) once I go out tomorrow and get needles for it. I find it completely hard to believe that after 2 and a half years of knitting, working at a yarn shop for 10 months and acquiring more stuff than I can even think about, I still don't have size 9 needles. It's unfathomable to me. Anyway. It will be started tomorrow, mark my words.

Last but not least, at this past Tuesday's Guild meeting, we did a program in which we had a sort of mini- knitalong. We all knit little stars that will be strung together in a garland ( thank you thank you thank you Tamsyn for agreeing to crochet them on a chain) and given away in a drawing at our December meeting. I heard pretty positive things about the program, I think a lot of people left feeling excited about knitting more stars. And that makes me happy, I love seeing people excited. Here is the collection of stars we had by the end of the meeting, aren't they great? There are still a couple seams to sew and some ends to weave, but such a great variety, I can't wait to see it all put together!


Ok the for real last thing. My dad and I went to see the new Harry Potter movie today. It was the first one I didn't make it to on opening night, but last night I was at a party with my friend Jenny which was SO much fun! I loved the movie, obviously, and I'm sure I'll be seeing it again before too long... maybe IMAX next time? We'll see.

My promise to you

So I just made a quick decision that I'm going to try and go no more than 10 days without posting. I'd like to say it'll be more frequent than that, but I can't make any guarantees.

So phew, I'm getting in just under the wire.

I don't have new pictures to show just yet, but my bag for Sarah's Intro to Aran class is coming along, now that I decided to change the cable pattern in the middle about 5 rows after where I decided to start changing it. With Sarah's help and a lot of handholding I managed to get things to where they should be and I SHOULD be up to where I need to be for the next class (3 cheers for a 4 day weekend next week).

Tonight I'm going to the PwC holiday party with my friend Jenny as her date. An excuse to get all dressed up and go to a party sounds good to me. Especially with how disgusting it's been this week weather-wise.

Tomorrow I see Harry Potter with my dad! This is the first one I haven't made it to on opening night, but I'm working on being ok with that. Really, I'll be ok. It's not going to matter if I don't see it RIGHT when it comes out. Right? OK stop thinking about it.

Oh geez! I better get to work!

Quack attack!

daaaaa na

daaaaa na


daa na daa na daaa na


(ok that was my lame attempt at shark music. Just play along)

Attack!




No, silly, they're not really going to attack you...these are the baby booties I made for my friend Sarah whose baby shower Grace and I will be attending on Saturday. Aren't they so cute?


I believe this now makes the 3rd pair of these I've made...because seriously, can you think of a baby that DOESN'T deserve a pair of cute and adorable duck feet booties? Neither can I. So as long as people keep having babies, I'll keep making booties. Since I'm in approximately my mid-20's I figure I'll be pretty busy on the baby knitting front for about the next 5-7 years.

The pattern is called "Duck Feet" (very clever) and it's from the book 50 Baby Bootees (Booties? I'm not sure how they spelled it) to Knit. It can be found at your local yarn store. I should just buy the whole book. I love booties. Hint, hint, anyone out there looking for Christmas shopping ideas for me. ;) just kidding


(but you know, not really)

they say the first step is admitting you have an addiction...

Well, I've got one. A big one. For Target. It's like some sort of sickness. And I find that a lot of my activities these days take place in the Okemos/Haslett area, which is close to where I work. I live in South Lansing, so when I have activities after work, I tend to just try and kill time between work and said activity. The problem with this, of course, is the Target across from the Meridian Mall. It just sucks me in. For example, this past Tuesday I was wandering around Target because I needed to buy a couple birthday cards. CARDS. Well, after about 40 minutes I walked out with some hair products, some body wash, the cards I went in for, a gift, and these:

Yes, feeding my Target addiction has a nasty habit of feeding my movie addiction. I had to really cut myself off from buying more than just those three, too. I spend a good 3 minutes arguing with myself over whether or not to buy myself the complete Sex and the City dvd set. My checkbook won in the end, but I'm not sure how long I'll be able to hold out.

On the knitting front, progress is being made, sort of. Here's a picture of my bag for Intro to Aran class...although we'll call it the "after" picture. I was actually pretty far when I decided that I could use a little more practice (translation: I messed up and it was far more satisfying to rip it out than to spend the time trying to figure out where I messed up and how to fix it) so I'm starting the sides again. I like it a lot, I'm excited to have a finished bag soon! Of course I had to be a little bit of a problem child and change Sarah's pattern a little, but she didn't seem to mind and it makes me so much more excited to work on it!

Close up of the cables on the bottom:

And for now I'll leave you with this:

"I could think of things I never thought before. And then I'd sit and think some more..... if I only had a brain..."

Eureka!!

Phew! Just when I thought I was DEFINITELY going crazy (any comments about that can be kept to yourselves) I located the cord to my camera. For a reason that will probably remain a mystery to me, it was in the front pocket of the bag I take when I go somewhere overnight. Why would I have ever thought it necessary to pack the USB cable to my camera overnight? Your guess is as good as mine. But at least I found my cord...yay!

And now for the long-awaited slide show of knitted wonders....:)

I'm going to go in order of importance, least being first and best being last. You know what I mean.

I am (slowly but surely) knitting a dishcloth out of your typical Sugar N Spice or whatever it's called (cream n sugar? I don't know, it doesn't matter). Anyway, Andrea gave me these dishcloth patterns that I think are kind of interesting...this one is called Columns, and I think it's pretty (and we badly, badly need the dishcloths around here...it's lousy not having a dishwasher)

Next, are a pair of socks that started out with the intention of going to one friend, but Grace looked at them when I was halfway through and said, "I really like those. When are you going to knit something for me?" I politely reminded her of the ridiculous lacy shawl that took me SIX MONTHS to knit, but then she got pouty and said, "but that was a long time ago and you just finished knitting a blanket for Corene, so I should get the socks." What can I say, at the time it was a persuasive argument. Grace got the socks. Corene will get the next pair.

Now, I have no attention span for knitting one sock at a time, so I shelled out one day for 4 addi turbos in size 1 in order to knit them in pairs...however, the yarn (Opal handpaints, maybe? Opal something self-striping. Clearly I'm not too with it today on remembering what yarn I'm using) comes in 100g sizes (one ball= one pair of socks). So I took the two ends of the ball and wound them until they met in the middle. The result? The socks are mirror images of each other, which I think makes them look kind of cool and Grace didn't seem to mind. This was also a first attempt at the after thought heel, which I think looks about a hundred times better when the sock is actually on a foot (which is, of course, the best time to look at it). Next time I'll get really daring and go toe-up so whenever I get tired of them I can just stop and call it a day. Now if only I could figure out how to make the kitchener on the heel look a little neater at the ends...

Mirror images:

Finished product, modeled by the new owner:

And last but not least, the long awaited wedding afghan. The pattern for this is called "Pleated Afghan," which I got from my mother, and the yarn is Patons Decor (this one I'm sure of). It's a pretty simple pattern, but I think it makes a gorgeous blanket and I did I-cord edging along the sides, which looks nice and is easy to do as you go along, not to mention way easier for tucking ends in. And the Decor is so soft! It was VERY hard to give away. But I know Corene and Dan will like it and *hopefully* get lots of good use out of it.

This is a little blurry, but I wanted to show an up close picture of the stitches and how pretty the colors looked together with the way they pooled.



So there you have it...coming soon, duck feet baby booties for baby Allan, a pair (maybe) of socklets (what are they? you'll just have to wait and see), and whatever catches my attention to start next!

ahhhhhhh!

I STILL CAN'T FIND MY CAMERA CORD. I'M ABOUT TWO STEPS AWAY FROM FREAKING OUT.

But really, I'm ok. No, really.

I know, I know...

Yes, I know. It's been forever. You thought I deserted you. Several of you have yelled at me for it. But hey, I've been busy!

On October 8, my brother and his wife (well, more his wife, obviously) had their baby! Carter Allan finally showed up at 12:31am weighing 8lbs, 14oz. He's the cutest baby on the planet, of course, and I can't wait to see him again!

Work is busy because I don't know anything, but I'm learning!

Last weekend I went to see Amy's new house, which is incredibly cute and awesome and grownup. And it freaks me out a little, but then again I get a little more freaked out everytime someone I know buys a house, gets married, has a baby, etc.

Speaking of getting married, Corene's wedding is tomorrow! Her blanket was actually finished with like 3 weeks to spare, which is practically a miracle. :)

And lastly, I had all these pictures to show that I just took, of the blanket, the socks I'm making for Grace, this dishcloth I'm doing that's a cool looking pattern (I think) and the bottom of the bag I'm making in Sarah's Intro to Aran class...

...but I can't find the cord that connects the camera to the computer!!! aaaaahh. It's probably got something to do with the fact that my room is a total disaster area, but it's getting cleaned up by tonight, I swear. So pictures by the end of the weekend. I PROMISE.

Signing off :)

A satisfying sense of accomplishment

This week I did what I thought just a short time ago was impossible. I finished not one but TWO major projects this week. Major.

First, I finished the blanket for Corene and Dan's wedding next month. No pictures until after the wedding, however. Take my word that it's fan-freakin-tastic and a part of me wants to keep it for myself. People I know better stop getting married for awhile because after a little break I want the next afghan I knit to be for myself.

The second thing I finished (just minutes ago, actually) was my wallaby! It was, in fact, the second time I knit it. I got almost all the way through it once and decided that I didn't like the very bottom of the sweater so I ripped the whole thing out and started over. I then did a little knit along with Jessica, who was making a wallaby for Cameron (who is almost 3). It was a bit of a struggle at times, as I have a very short attention span and Jessica's was about 4 times smaller and therefore faster. But I persevered and I finally finished!



*Technically I used the pattern from Cottage Creations, but I change the bottom, the sleeves, the top and I didn't do the hood or the collar. It was, however, extremely helpful as far as the pocket goes.

Now it's time to get back to knitting baby things, assuming the baby ever decides to SHOW. (He was due the 25th, it is now the 29th. Patience is not my best virtue) :)

Go Cubs!

Hello to Stephanie, who found my blog through someone else and asked for the pattern that it came from.... and never let it be said that I don't take direction well:

As many know, I'm about to be an aunt (any day now, the due date is Sunday) and I've been knitting things like crazy...there was the sweater in July, a pair of booties that I made before I even started the blog, and I have about 12 more ideas. Basically, I'm completely out of control. But in a good way. Moving on...

First, here is a picture of said hat (it looks much bigger than it is, my little brother is holding it more in front than to the side. It's very small.)




The pattern is called "Ball Cap" by Pick Up Sticks! (I would imagine it can be found at www.pickupsticksonline.com I did things a little differently, however. Instead of knitting the cap and the brim separately, felting them separately and sewing them together, I picked up stitches and felted it as one piece. So, I didn't get the ridged effect you see in the picture on the pattern. Also, I thought the brim was a little too pointy (and I wanted a more rounded look, like a baseball cap) so after I felted the hat the first time, I trimmed the edge and felted it again. And that is how it became the hat it is today.

As for the letter, I just graphed a little gameplan to try and get as rounded of a "C" as possible (so it would look as Cubs-ish as possible) and the pattern said to double strand using a stem or outlining stitch. But since I'm garbage at embroidery and that phrase basically meant nothing to me no matter how many times I tried to figure out how to do it. So I took a single strand of the red and just duplicate stitched the "C". I don't really notice a huge difference after felting between the way my hat looked and the way the picture looked as far as the letter was concerned.

So that's that, the story of the hat. Oh, and I made the 2nd size. It gets pretty small and I definitely recommend finding a bowl or a pitcher or something to stretch it back out a little and get the shape you want.

And that's all, folks.

Somebody pinch me...

Let me refresh your memory.

For 2 years, I looked like this:


For the last week, I looked like this:


And NOW, as of around 9 this morning, I look like THIS:


Do you think I'm happy about having my braces off? Let me just say that so far food tastes better, the sun shines brighter, company is more enjoyable and everything just seems a little more pleasant.

Yes, I know. But allow me my one foolishly optimistic day of cliches and tomorrow I'll go back to my usual sarcastic self.

A blast from the past

As I was driving to work this morning, my heart almost stopped beating and exploded in my chest.

There, the car in front of me...

Was there something familiar about it??

There WAS. It was MR. UGLY! He lives on! I almost teared up...

For those of you unfamiliar, here is the back story on Mr. Ugly (for those of you who already know, feel free to skip to the end):

**********
When I turned 16, unfortunately my grandfather passed away (as is somewhat of a curse in our family when we turn 16). My grandmother decided to get a new car, and she negotiated a good deal with my dad so I could get her car. A red '89 Escort, that she effectively drove back and forth to the grocery store.

Anyway, one day at school I was having an argument with my friend Brandon (which was a frequent occurence) about whose car was less cool. I told him his car was pointless because it barely got him the 2 blocks between his house and school and the fabric on the ceiling was held up with push pins (seriously, imagine like 200 push pins holding up the top of your car). He very wittily replied, "yea? Well your car is ugly." To which our other friend Casey added, "yea, yea, your car is like MR. Ugly." The name stuck, despite all my efforts to fight it, and both the name and the car took on a life of their own. Everyone in my high school knew my car as "Mr. Ugly." For Christmas my freshman year in college my parents bought me a vanity plate for my car that said MR UGLY. Then the car became FAMOUS. My parents went to a restaurant and the waiter brought the check and asked, "who wants Mr. Ugly? haha, isn't that funny? I saw it on a license plate the other day." Pizza delivery men would never fail to comment on it, the fame even followed me to college. Two separate highway occasions:

1. A man pulled up next to me in order to scream, "HEY!!! I'M MISTER UGLY!!!" It's a good thing we were in moving cars, or he may have gotten fiesty.

2. I was passing a guy in a truck and as I'm almost past him he speeds up so he's keeping up with me. This always makes me nervous but eventually I look over and he's pointing at the back of my car with a huge smile on his face. So I slow down to get away from the creepy man and I see when I get behind him that his license plate says "UGLYMUG" He was just trying to be my buddy.

So you get the picture, he was famous.

Anyway, during my 3rd year of college, my little brother turned 16 and unfortunately, my grandmother died (the aforementioned curse) and I got her newer car, while Mr. Ugly was passed on to Sam. Sam drove him for two more years until he left for college and my parents donated Mr. Ugly to charity. It was a very sad day indeed, the end of an era...

**********

It was definitely him! He still had the US flag sticker underneath the top taillight, the dents on the driver's side door, the dent on the hood from the mailbox I hit when I was 19, a little bit of rust on the bottom of the driver's door.

It warms my heart to know he's still out there, truckin' along, carrying people to and fro.

I'll acknowledge that perhaps I'm a little over sentimental about this, but he was my first car, he's very dear to my heart, and it made my day to see he's still on the road. He's like the little Escort that could. :)

Ok, I'll stop now.

Oh and my braces come off in 38.25 hours. Yes!

beware, this post is not for the weak of stomach...

What is this frightening picture of?? A scary monster, coming to haunt your dreams? A sad little captive trying to break free? No, this is the rubber band configuration happening in my mouth for the next week until my braces come off. I'm trying to be optimistic enough to think that they just want you to REALLY appreciate having your braces off so they make it so completely miserable for the last week that you have them.

I count a total of 12 rubber bands I just removed in order to eat what my orthodontist laughingly refers to as the one meal a day I'm going to be eating for the next week. I believe the exact encounter went something like this:

"Now, you're going to be wearing spaghetti bands for the next week. You'll probably really only want to eat one big meal a day because they're kind of a pain. No, I'm joking. But really you might want to."

Nice.

Anyway, update on the job front: I love it, it's very interesting and somewhat overwhelming at this point. I think it'll all work out nicely once I get the hang of things!

Well, back to my one meal for today....

As promised, cool stuff to look at

Well, I've actually been a busy girl the last couple weeks, hence no posting. However, I did promise cool pictures once I got a battery in my camera, and lo and behold a battery is now in my camera!

First, progress on the wallaby. I'm up to the shoulders now, which is about where I got the last time I knit it and then ripped it out. It's looking pretty good, it's to the point where it needs to be split for the neck placket, so hopefully I will be able to wear it before too long!

Next: A friend of our family spent the last 8 months or so in Sweden studying hard and having interesting experiences. She came back a couple weeks ago and my mom and I went to hear all about her trip and look at all her pictures. We thought it would be nice to give her a little something to welcome her home, so I whipped up a little bag, which my mom filled with chocolates from Roma..yum!

Here is the bag and a close up of the stitch pattern. This is the staircase rib from 200 Knitted Blocks, which I bought a couple weeks ago when I was up north for another baby shower for Jamie. It's a great book, with lots of interesting ideas and I can't wait to do more blocks out of it!

Other than this I've been working on the top secret wedding gift for Corene and Dan, to be unveiled at the end of October, after I've given it to them.

In other news, on Friday I went to get my hair cut, only to suffer what was possibly the worst and most pointless haircut of my life. It was so bad, in fact, that I had to wear my hair in a ponytail for the entire weekend. There was at least an inch difference in length from one side to the other. Disaster. Luckily I called back on Tuesday to let them know it was clearly not going to work and they had me come in so someone else could cut my hair and I'm glad to say she did a fantastic job and I now have the haircut I originally asked for. And, in honor of a new season, I also decided to go red, so it's a whole new head of hair for me. :) I don't really have any pictures, because I was really not interested in documenting the travesty that was the first cut. Take my word for it, it was terrible.

My new job starts on Monday and I'm so so so excited!!! I can't wait to have somewhere to be Monday through Friday during business hours being all responsible and adult-like. Today I went and bought basically a whole new wardrobe in honor of it. Next stop: shoes.

Last but not least, a one day late happy birthday to Jenny and Marie, who turned 24 yesterday. We went to Royal Oak to have dinner and celebrate with them. It was tons o' fun and I wanted to give them a shout out on my blog. Happy birthday weekend, girls!

A productive member of society once more

First, my camera is currently suffering from lack of a battery, so no pictures at this time, but I do have an exciting announcement!

I GOT A JOB!

Today I was offered a job with WEYCO (a 3rd party administrator/employee benefits firm) as a flexible benefits specialist. I'll be starting at some point in September and I'm so excited!

Anyway, once my camera is back on track I'll put some cool pictures of some stuff up. I have no idea yet what that cool stuff will be, but rest assured it'll be worth the wait. ;)

I am a 7 course mosquito meal

I spent the last two days up north near Grayling at a cabin type place with some fine folks who work at MSU. My duty for the couple of days was to watch Cameron and hang out and get out of my house for a couple days, as I'm in danger of becoming a full-fledged hermit.

The trip was fun, and it ended up at a state park whose name escapes me for the moment, but we went to look at an old growth forest (very old, tall trees). The forest was cool and I'm sure I would have really enjoyed it were it not for the swarm of mosquitos eating me completely alive. My entire body itches, I'm not kidding.

Back home now, preparing for a garage sale that's being hosted by several different families (and some of us single folks as well) on Friday and Saturday, and I'm very tired. Also, having slept in a strange place with no air conditioning last night I will be very happy to see my bed tonight...

*yawn*

Victory Is Mine!!!!!

At last. A momentus occasion. A day two years in the making. A day that will live in my memory for years and years to come...

(pause for dramatic effect)

I'm getting my braces off September 21! Almost 2 years to the day that I first got them on. The level of happiness I felt leaving the orthodontist today cannot even be adequately described. I'm so excited.

Well, as my life is pretty boring this week, that's about all I have to say...

Cheers!

Wait! Come back!! I'm here!

Ok, Ok, I know it's been awhile since you've heard from me on here. Suffice it to say that it's been a pretty busy/crazy/whirlwind week and a half or so (maybe even longer, gasp!) I've had a lot on my plate and as some of you by now know, made some pretty big changes recently.

For the rest of you wondering what I could possibly be talking about at the moment, the first major change is that I am no longer employed at ThreadBear Fiber Arts. The time came for us to part ways, and I think that it will be a good thing for everyone, in the long run. I want to thank everyone who made my time there special and enjoyable, and I hope you're as eager as I am for what new adventures await me next. Here a picture that was a gift to me when I first began my job, from the lovely http://sharonstuff.typepad.com/knitknacks (that would be Sharon). This is a picture of a bag I made, hanging in the shop as a model to inspire others. It hung in my office until yesterday when I departed for the last time as an employee and took it with me. Thank you Sharon, I enjoyed looking at it every day!

The other major changes were slightly personal and a VERY long story so I won't even try to bore you with them here. Instead I'll move on to happy, happy things!

Like a baby shower! Last Saturday Sarah, April, Emily and I threw a baby shower for Jamie, and if I may say so we did an excellent job. :) We had good food, lots of friends and family around and little Carter got very spoiled, indeed! Which is just fine with me, because as his only aunt (at least for now) I intend to spoil him HUGELY.

Here is the cake...

which Sarah got from a bakery in St. Johns, whose name I cannot yet remember...Shorty's Cakes? Something like that... Sarah, if you read this, please correct me on the name because it was a completely DELICIOUS cake, very moist with rich, rich frosting, which I know my mom and sister-in-law both loved. If you ever need a cake and you're in St. Johns I definitely recommend them.

Next....Here is Jamie with the sweater I knitted for Carter (is that even right? knitted? whatever, I'm sure you get the idea)

I can't wait to see him in it! I know he'll be so cute...of course he won't be that big for awhile (I made the 1-2 year size) but he'll be the cutest baby you ever saw in that sweater. And so what if I have a completely biased opinion? Doesn't make it less true. :)

And with that I leave you all, but I promise to be around more regularly and keep up much better than I have in the last little while. I promise!

Weekend of Fun and Adventure!

I'm headed off to Jen's cottage this weekend, for some fun in the sun.

Don't worry, I'll be wearing PLENTY of sunscreen. :) I have no interest in turning into a cherry tomato this weekend.

I have big plans to start a new sweater this weekend, or at least work on my good ol' wallaby. I'm almost to where I will be attatching the sleeves (you know, once I get them knit). And I better get a move on by Wednesday so I can stay caught up with Jessica. And yes, I'm still slightly bitter about the difference in sizes in our respective sweaters.

No pictures, because I've been a slacker about taking them, but possibly this weekend? We'll have to see.

My adventure is nothing compared to that of Grace and Katie who are currently finding their way to Arizona, where Katie is moving. They'll be driving for the next two days and then Grace is flying back Sunday night, and I'll hear all about their crazy exploits when I pick her up Sunday night. I love crazy exploits. :)

Have a good weekend!

What's been keeping me busy (and not posting)

This is the sweater I just finished knitting for my future nephew.... I had a preview of it up not too long ago. It's extremely cute and small and I'm really happy with how it turned out. It was a little hard to photograph, but you can still tell that the opening of the neck is slightly off centered. This was due to my not being able to follow directions properly, but in the end I like it this way, so now we're calling it a design feature. :) I can't wait to give it to Jamie at her shower in a couple weeks!

Here is what the corner of my room looked like prior to my new acquisition. Many of you know how extremely bitter I was about sleeping on a twin bed at the age of 24. But no more! 

Yay! My birthday/Christmas present from my parents! It's sooo unbelieveably comfy and soft and way better than what I had before. As you can see. Isn't it cute? 

After it's all said and done...

Phew. Well, the birthday weekend extravaganza was delightful. Many friends were in attendance, good times had by all (at least that's what everyone said, so if nothing else they're good liars).

Friday's movie was fun, and Grace and Katie battled rioting people and a man with a sprained ankle whose girlfriend was prepared to go to the mattresses for the seats they were saving at teh bar (for 16 people!). Which is awesome. Bowling was fun, but a future reference should anyone find themselves in this situation. If you go bowling with a group of people you don't know, and one of them is the birthday girl, it is extremely not nice to beat her (because she would have won otherwise) and it's EVEN WORSE to talk trash to everyone you don't know while you're beating them all. Not cool. That's not a good way to get a return invitation to hang out. Moving on....

Special thanks to my good friend Matt who braved the outrageous heat and risked life and limb to cook hamburgers and hot dogs for everyone at Saturday's BBQ....

Also to Jen and Tom who came to celebrate even though they didn't think they'd be able to (and while we're on the subject, what ever happened to Michelle and Steph who said they were coming and never showed?????? hmmm??????) :)

And thanks to everyone else that was there, it really made my birthday special and I had a good time, despite massive amounts of freaking out worrying that I'd run out of food (completely unfounded fear, as it turns out)

Special apologies to everyone who went to Crunchy's later that night and heard me singing karaoke. Everyone who wasn't there but has heard me sing can only imagine what a horrifying thing that was.. :)

And, in other news, I'm happy to report that this time it only took me two trips to get my pictures printed...a vast improvement over getting my Boston pictures printed.

My movie review of Bewitched is this:
A cute movie, it definitely had its funny points, the end was a little bit of a let down, but I think it would be an excellent rental. Jason Schwartzman is hilarious.

Tonight, I'm finally going to see Batman Begins with Sam. He claims it's a fantastic movie, the best of the Batman series, so we'll see. I'll be sure and keep you posted.

It's My Birthday, and I'll Have An Extravaganza If I Want To...

The date: June 24, 2005

The event: It's my birthday! I'm 24! Yay!

My birthday is definitely my favorite day of the summer. Possibly even the whole year, aside from Christmas. Clearly I'm a little obsessive about it (see previous post)

So here's my weekend rundown:

Friday:

Go to work (sadly, but I suppose work is a necessary evil, right?)

Go to a fabulous dinner at Carabba's with my family (and Grace, I've been looking forward to this for a week)

Gather a small collection of people to go see the opening night of Bewitched (yay! A movie!)

After the movie, go with everyone who isn't too tired to a bowling alley and bowl/drink/be merry (you know the drill)

Go to sleep.

Saturday:

Get up early and go to my parents' house to cook 6 loaves of calzone bread, cut up some fruit for my big bowl o' fruit, and otherwise make preparations for...

My BBQ where I will have massive amounts of food and drink and merriment! I'm very excited to have all my best pals together (except for the ones who can't make it) to hang out with me. Of course I'm stressing out and convinced that I'm going to run out of food or drinks or something. Grace keeps trying to assure me that this is not the case and that it'll be fine, but I estimate that by about 2:30pm on Saturday I'll be hyperventilating and thinking that no one will have any fun. :)

Sunday:

Try and pry myself out of bed to clean up anything I leave at my parents' house on Saturday in time for them to return home from Traverse City and then sit in my apartment and recover all day.

Anyway, that's about it for me... everyone have a great weekend!

June is the birthday month

For anyone who does not know this about my family, all three of us kids were born in June. As a child, this was a terrible thing, because we had joint birthday parties and my older brother was a tyrant and always blew out ALL of the birthday candles. Never even left me one. Now he'd probably tell you that's not true, but he's a liar. :)

My little brother's birthday was a few weeks ago, on the 5th. He's 19 now, which really freaks me out. Far too grown up. For me, he's always about 7. Yea, 7. Only not quite that small, because when he was 7 he was small enough to pick up and throw. (yes, throw. he loved it. no matter what he says now)

Today is my older brother's 30th birthday. And when I did my sisterly duty to call and with him a happy birthday I asked how it felt to be 30. "Old" was the answer I got. So then I started thinking, yea he is pretty old. :) Married, a homeowner, a baby on the way, it doesn't get much more grown up than that.

This coming Friday (the 24th) is my birthday. I'll be 24. That's also pretty weird for me. But, in order to combat the weirdness, I'm throwing myself a birthday extravaganza next weekend. Which I'm pretty pumped about.

Anyhow, this is about as deep as I want to get on a Saturday afteroon, now I'm just knitting away, so you can hope for more pictures next week. Tonight: bowling.

How I Fill My Spare Time

This picture is of the shawl I made for Grace out of a really pretty varigated yarn made of silk and wool, and a little jewelry bag i made from a pattern in a book I have. The bag is made from hand dyed cotton. It's also a picture of my kitchen counter, complete with laundry soap and my wine rack (which actually has some wine in it now!)

An up-close view of the stitches on Grace's shawl. This pattern was the bane of my existence and I guarantee this will be the only shawl of its kind ever knit by me. Unless someone can come up with about $500 they're willing to part with to get one. 

This sweater will be a wallaby...which is just a sweater with a pocket in the front for those of you unfamiliar with the terminology. I'm knitting this along with my friend Jessica, who is knitting one for her son. However, I would like to point out that it is highly unfair that hers is about 1/3 the size of mine and we have to be at the same place this Wednesday....I know, I know. I don't have a 2 year old. But still. 

This one is an up-close sample of a sweater I'm knitting for my soon-to-be nephew, Carter. "Soon-to-be" will be sometime in September and I'm so excited to be an aunt!!!! :)  

This is the result of my Intro to Fair Isle class, where I could learn 2 color knitting holding yarn in both hands and following charts and such. I liked it, and now there are so many more interesting things I can do! This is a pillow cover, not to worry, it's not just a big square. 

solitary no more!

Well, it's been a busy week. After living completely and totally by myself since January, Grace finally (officially) moved in on Monday. It's a big change to come home and have someone already there when you're used to being just by yourself, but it's pretty nice, too. For example, yesterday I went home for lunch, and there waiting for me was yummy ravioli and broccoli. Awesome. And for anyone reading this who doesn't already know this about me (and therefore has probably never met me) I love to talk. All the time. And it's way, way more interesting when there's someone else around to answer and ensure that I'm not turning into a crazy person talking to myself all the time. At least, it will delay the inevitable for awhile.

Not only did Grace move in Monday but on Tuesday a visitor came to stay for the week as well. Grace's friend Carlos (originally from Ecuador, but currently living and teaching in North Carolina) is here for a few days. He's hilarious. And while I'm very jealous that currently Carlos and Grace are both enjoying their day at Michigan's Adventure (assuming he managed to get his 'Tom Cruise' haircut before they left) while I'm at work, I'll probably live. Hey, at least I get to go see Mr. and Mrs. Smith tonight. Which will be awesome, I don't care what you say. :) I have very great expectations for this movie.

As a special bonus for you, later today I'll put up pictures of the lovely things I'm currently knitting. :) You'll love it. Don't lie.

Static Cling!

So Friday I'm at work and my boss hands me a small bunch of papers. I pick one of them up, look at it, set it on my desk, turn around and turn back, it's GONE. Completely, 100% vanished out of thin air. So I start FREAKING OUT completely because I needed that piece of paper. I know it can't have gone that far because I'm still sitting in exactly the same chair I was when I received it. So I tear apart my desk searching, go through the entire store looking for it, question everyone currently working there, it's nowhere. By now I'm totally convinced that I'm crazy, I have finally lost my mind, that inevitable moment is here. THEN, I pick up a binder that I had out on my desk around the same time as I last had the paper (I've already picked it up and looked under it twice) . This time, I feel something stuck to the bottom of the binder. You guessed it. The paper I was looking for. Static cling cost me 20 minutes of frantic searching and preparation to pull my hair out. Lousy static cling! Toni and I have dubbed it the silent killer. Anyway, I found it and all was well in the kingdom once again.

And now to prepare for my laundry day at the folks' house.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SAM!!!

My Boston Trip!!

Fun statues of the tortoise and the hare. This is in Copley Square, in front of Copley Church, with the library behind us. There are lots of fun little shops around this area along Newbury Street selling all variety of things that I'll probably never afford. (that's Sacha on the left and me on the right...clearly)