The Candy Shop

I am not the most literate when it comes to computers. Though I am pretty good at looking stuff up and figuring it out on my own. You can see a couple of examples of this over there on my sidebar. Creating links, thumbnails, the name of the FO when your cursor moves over the thumbnail, I pretty much figured it out on my own with a lot of luck.

So why has it been so hard for me to figure out how to create a PDF link? I looked it up and for the life of me could not figure it out. In fact I have been trying to figure the whole PDF link thing out since I first finished the Toe Socks pattern with no luck. Fortunately for me I was able to ask my cousin to come over and help.

When we were waiting for him to arrive last night the doorbell rang. The kids ran to the door, looked out the window, and then just started walking back. I looked at them with a puzzled look on my face and asked them who was at the door.

B looks at me and says, "Oh, it was only a mail delivery."

Hubby looks at me with that what did you order now look on his face as I am sprinting to the door and me not being able to open the door or the packages fast enough. I had been expecting these:

I have been eying Butterfly from Rowan 37 for quite sometime now and finally broke down and ordered a copy. I can't wait to get it on my needles.

The yarn is for my first Fair Isle project.

I can't decide which one I am going to work on first. I am thinking Butterfly because if all goes as planned, then I may wear it to a Holiday party. The fair isle is going to be a Christmas gift for my mom. And since the party will happen before Christmas, well, you know.

My cousin finally did make it over last night and if you look in the sidebar there is a link for the Toe Up pattern.

You know will all that happened yesterday, I mean with the yarn, the book, and my cousin coming over and helping me with the whole PDF link thing, I felt like a kid in a candy shop.

Rinnnnnnnnnng

After having the same service provider for our cell phone coverage for oh, I don't know one hundred years or so, we finally decided to change over to the company they supposedly merged with. Afterall, the incentives and discounts are much better with the new company.

With the old company, if you wanted a new phone then you had to pay full price for the phone. No exceptions. Not even for customer loyalty. Customer service with the old company was/is horrendous. Even though we clearly weren't happy we stayed because we did not want to lose our numbers. Once the companies merged we thought our coverage would get better. Wrong.

Finally hubby decided that it was time to change. We knew that we could keep our numbers and the price was finally right for the change. Some of you may be saying that we are essentially staying with the same company because of the merger, but get this, after spending no less than four hours on the phone with customer service, even though the companies are "merged" they will not be completely merged for approximately five years. WTHeck???

Anyway, in all of the frustration with trying to switch and program the new phones, I somehow closed the car door on my car project and bent three of four of my size 0 needles. Thank goodness they were metal. Can you tell which of the needles were bent in two different places with at least a thirty degree bend?

I hope not because I have spent all the time that I was not on the phone with CS fixing the darn needles.

BTW one good thing about the change. I finally have a camera phone. Now I don't have any excuses to miss out because I forgot my camera. Though I am know to forget my phone quite often.

Did Someone ask for a Superhero

You would think that I have not been knitting anything around here lately with all of the non-knittin' pictures and stuff. In actuality, I have. I have been knitting. The thing is I have also been busy with a few other things. But after all those other things are done, I usually sit in my chair and knit. I will usually knit until my hands just don't want to work any longer and start dozing off. Unfortunately for me, that (me getting tired) happens earlier and earlier every evening.

For one, I am not used to getting up with the alarm clock every morning. And because I am using an alarm clock, I actually start waking up at least forty-five minutes before the alarm goes off because I am so paranoid that I am going to wake up late and then the kids would be late for school. So needless to say, the knitting has been suffering a bit.

Though, I thought that I'd finally bring this to you.

Don't you love the model. I told him that he looks just like a superhero in a cape with it on and that I would give him candy if he did a good job. I think he did.

The reason I needed B to model the shawl was because I had been asking hubby to take pics of me for a couple of weeks now and as you can see, it still has not happened. So this was my plan C.

Plan B was this:

I think plan C had much more fun running around the house like a superhero afterwards.

Friday Eye Candy

One of the fish in the tank at Ceasar's Palace. From our trip to Vegas last month.

Have a great weekend!

Signs

They say there are signs to old age. Sight. Body. Mind. They all start to go. But at what rate do they actually go?

I started wearing glasses when I was eight. Did that make me old? My sight was so bad that in order to see a person I was having a conversation with without corrective lenses I literally had to be within eighteen inches of their face. Thank goodness for Lasik. The only thing that I have to worry about now is reading glasses. When that times comes, I think I'll just stop reading. HehHeh.

I am really starting to feel as though my body is next. It seems as though every other week I am hurting something. Though that was an extreme case for me, lately it seems I am walking around with a pulled leg/ankle/arm/hair muscle of some sort or other. The sad thing is, I keep doing whatever it is that gets me like that.

I think that it must be my mind. I forget what I was doing that injured me and I continue doing it. Though I have to admit, I have always been forgetful, in fact my mom used to say (and probably still thinks), "You'd lose your head if it wasn't connected." She's probably right. I can't tell you how many times I'll go someplace with the intentions of bringing X with me, only to have forgotten X at home.

Though I have never forgotten my shoes. Grandma, who has always been as sharp as a nail, did forget to wear shoes one time about fifteen years ago. We still laugh about it and occasionally will ask her if she remembered to put on her shoes. Usually she will just look at us and start laughing hysterically.

That's besides the point. I am forgetful. I am surprised that I never forgot my shoes.

I think the signs of old age are all wrong. Something that goes out on one person at eight doesn't go out on another until they are eighty, yet for the person who is eight it's just one of those things, for the person who is eighty, it's because they are old. If grandma forgets her shoes its because she's old, if I forget my shoes it's because I am forgetful. It could be the other way around, I could be the one that's old and she just happened to forget that day.

What has brought this up? This:


It is a swatch that I made a while back. I think I made it at my mom's house because I don't own nor have ever made anything with that particular yarn. I found it on the bottom of one of my bags as I was cleaning it out.


Now here is the shocker. I forgot what the stitch pattern was. I know it is some sort of triple decrease and the WS of the swatch is purled, but how I actually achieved it and then got my stitch count back is beyond me at this moment. Must be the old age.

Try and Try Again

Have you ever noticed how one bad experience (or two) can ruin something for you?

I always have my toe nails done, but I have almost always done them myself. It is one of those things that I have always just liked doing.

Towards the end of both of my pregnancies I physically was unable to do them. So I went to get them done. Both times, I ended up having problems with my nails. I even went to different shops both times. I haven't had a pedicure since. Though I really want to go and get them done, I just don't want to have any problems afterwards.

Another example, a restaurant that we would go to on occasion. The last time we went the food was so awful that we were honestly shocked. In fact the food was so bad that no one wanted to eat, yet we were all afraid to send our food back. I was talking to a friend about this same restaurant and he said that he has had the same bad experience there but when he talked to the manager, the manager tried to justify the bad food as his (the customers) problem. Wow! I don't think I will be going back there again.

I could go on about how a bad experience has soured something, but I think you get the idea. Imagine if I was like this with my knitting. I mean really. If I went off of the first few (dozen or so) things that I had made, I would have just stopped. I mean I would have just given up and not found something that now is such a big part of me.


While I was in the backyard last week the kids came out and started playing with the Peb's. Please don't mind the garden (or lack of). I am constantly trying with the whole gardening thing. I am good at it for the first few weeks and then I seem to forget about it and things, well, just happen. Plus nothing seems to want to grow in that particular corner except for weeds.

BTW: I am working on getting the toe sock pattern out. I just have a few things to figure out about the whole web and pattern thing. But as soon as I do, you will have a pattern.

Buy More Yarn

I think I may have a problem. No, not a serious type problem, but a problem none-the-less. See, whenever I go shopping and something is on sale and I think I am getting a good great deal, I will buy it. Regardless if I need it or not.

Don't get me wrong, I won't buy something that I don't want or something that doesn't interest me, but if it is clothes or say yarn, then it is mine. That is actually how I acquired most of my wardrobe.

A skirt that I wouldn't pay full price for, what $12.90...it's mine. After all,I saved about seventy five percent. Who doesn't need a tank top that only costs $2.85, and it's beaded too. Do you see where I am going with this?

The same thing applies to yarn. When the LYS had their fifty percent off sale last year, I bought yarn. Lots of yarn. Though some of the yarn I only bought one skein of. Like the ball of Noro. I only paid $12.50 (yes, my LYS is a little over priced but I bought it).

Now here is another problem. I have been knitting that one ball for the last four days. I started doing a pillow cover in entrelac, but there was not enough for the entire thing. I frogged it. Then I started to do a mitered square. Didn't like the way it was turning out. I frogged it.

Finally I am doing a log cabinesque type thing. I think it's a winner. I am finally going to have a pillow cover, though it will only be one side. I think I will sew a back onto it or something.

The moral of the story, uh, I dunno. Buy more yarn? Yeah, that's it. Buy more yarn, especially if it's on sale.

And now for some Eye Candy.

Have a great weekend.

The Bomb

First day of school went without a hitch for B. Can't say the same for me. I think I must have balled for about fifteen minutes after I dropped him off. But you know what, I was fine after that. Whowouldathought?

Our annual first day picture.

After dropping B off, I came home so K could finish his breakfast and got ready to go to the gym. I was trying to make an 8:30 class. I pulled into the gym parking lot at 8:28, opened the car for K, then noticed that he had no shoes on. I asked him where his shoes were. His reply, "I left them at home."

#$%$@*&!!!!!!

I did go home and get the shoes and was still able to do about three-quarters of my planned workout.

When I picked B up from school, he was so happy. He loves his new school and loves his new teacher. "Mom, my teacher, she is the greatest. Mom really, she is the best! And mom, my school, it's just so so so. Mom, it's the bomb!"

I can't complain about that.

I also have a FO over in the sidebar. They are my grandmother's Christmas gift.

Do As I Say

As I was sitting here getting ready to post, K comes in and attempts to take my drink. I kindly told him that he was not supposed to drink next to the computer because I didn't want him to spill it. No sooner than he walked out did I do exactly what I didn't want him to do. Classic do as I say, not as I do.

Me spilling kinda sums up what it has been like lately. My mind has been wandering in a thousand different directions and as a result I become clumsy. I know I just need to take some time and focus. Easier said than done.

One of the things that has been on my mind is B starting kindergarten tomorrow, then in two weeks K will be in pre-school for two days per week. I am just having a hard time with the whole thing. Afterall, I have been their main caregivers for the past five years.

I joke that the first day I will cry, the second I will stalk the schools, and by the third day I will probably throw a party.

When I first started B in pre-school two years ago. I had him in two days per week, then three the following year. In my mind I thought that the gradual transition from two to five days would be the best thing for him. You know ease him into the whole school thing. I think I was actually easing myself into the whole school thing.

I still have my knitting though. I got this awesome Garterlac Pattern from Dave. I have always liked entrelac and have always wondered what it would look like in garter stitch, but was too lazy to figure out a pattern for myself. It was such a fast knit.

Oh, that is Icarus under the dishcloth. The pins are out, but it has just been sitting there waiting for someone to take pictures of it. Soon I hope.

Eye Candy Friday

It doesn't get much better than this.

First annual Stitch 'n Pitch at Dodger Stadium. Five hundred sixty plus needlecrafters.

And we won. This win put us in first place in the NL West (for the time being).

I love L.A.

My Blocking Saga

How many times does or should one pin and re-pin while blocking? I ask this because I think I must have done the whole pinning and re-pinning about a thousand times before I thought that I could leave it alone and there is still a part of me that wants to go back and fix it again.

In fact after seeing this picture above and noticing the white pin was crooked I got up and fixed it.

The whole time I was pinning, I kept thinking is this what it is to have OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder). I mean I honestly thought that I was going to go insane with the whole pinning thing, but then I thought that it must be that I just don't want to ruin all of the hard work that I put into the shawl with a crappy block job. But in the back of my mind I think there may be something to the OCD thing with me.

Think about it. I can not leave my house for a trip with out cleaning the whole thing. Not just a superficial clean either. I mean I really clean it. Every. Single. Room. I even have friends who have called the day before I was to leave and when I mention that I am cleaning I get the, "Oh yeah, that's right you are leaving for __________ tomorrow."

But then thinking about my personality, I couldn't have it. I don't stress over many things (at least not too many in my opinion). One example was my wedding day, the photographer stepped on my dress and ripped the entire train of the dress. My reaction was one that shocked people. I looked at the rip and just said, "Oh well, it's not like I am ever going to wear it again." (It was after the ceremony and people already saw me walk down the aisle)

Also, when I ask people to do things (like hubby washing dishes as an example), I really don't care how they are done, just that they are done.

But, when I do things I am pretty neurotic in the way that I do them.

Though, when I am knitting and I realize that I made a mistake forty-five rows back, I more often than not will just leave it (if it doesn't make the garment look too off) and some how incorporate it.

I honestly don't think I have OCD, but the whole time I was pinning really made me think. We all probably have some degree of OCD that shows up more in certain things we do. Me from the examples above are the way I clean and when and the pinning of knitted items.

I know, I don't have OCD, I am just particular.

It Was Meant To Be

I walk in to the LYS and immediately I see the mohair across the store. The ladies inside don't even notice me or my kids because they are discussing what and where they want to order food from and there is also another kid in the store yelling and screaming. This is highly unusual for this store (the kid part). In fact I only bring the kids with me if absolutely necessary and my kids have been warned that if they act up they will have to pay the wrath of me. I have never heard the store that loud with or without kids in. But that is another story all together.

Back to the story. I have my kids sit on the couch and I walk over to the mohair which is on the very top shelf. I reach up to grab one and it isn't even the same brand of yarn. At this point I think I sigh a loud %(*^#@. Still no one notices. Then I reach for another one and still wrong brand %*#&!

Now I know I should have just given up, but something told me that I had to look at every single skein of the baby blue mohair. Next I stretched out every inch of my five foot seven body while holding on to the shelf in order to get a few more inches out of me to get to the very top of the stack of yarn (I pulled the other two from the bottom) and look what I found.


The same brand of yarn and the same dye lot. I was so happy I almost kissed one of the owners.

On my way home I was thinking that after all this time they still had the same dye lot of yarn. Wow. Wait. Um. Then this thought came to me, is my taste in yarn so off that they still had the same yarn from a couple years back because no one else wanted it? No, it can't be. It must be because mohair is such a pain to work with that no one really wants it for that reason. I would definitely agree with that.

So Close, Yet So Far

As you can tell, I have been making progress on the Icarus Shawl from the Summer 2006 IK.



Ok, you really can't see the progress on the shawl itself, but this is the last chart from the pattern and as you can see from the chart I only have thirteen rows left plus four rows written out which makes seventeen rows. Not bad, but here is the problem. I only have enough yarn for maybe one row.

I know people are always saying make sure you have enough yarn for your project and blah blah blah. I can't tell you how many times I have been on the last row or few rows of a project only to run out of yarn. Now usually I could just go back and make some minor adjustments, I can come up with some type of solution like I did here, or just cave in and go buy more yarn, no biggie. But, there are a couple of problems here.

The first, where would I make the adjustments? I am far to lazy to actually frog forty-five plus rows and of mohair. I don't think so. The second problem is this I have had this yarn for at least a year or two, I don't even think the LYS would have the same dye lot in stock anymore. Though I did remember seeing the same yarn there a couple of weeks back.

So now I am off to the LYS with the kids in tow just hoping that the yarn matches close enough. Otherwise, I may just buy some random funky color that matches in no way, shape, or form and have a different color edge.

Friday Eye Candy

Some scenic pictures from my weekend away.


Have a great weekend!

Seedlings

This summer has really been a doozy. Afterall, we had 19 days of 100+. Let's just say that I got my electric bill yesterday. My eyes almost popped out of my head when I saw it. I guess there will be no yarn purchases for a bit. Thank goodness for the change in weather.

This is the first year where every morning when we wake up there have been these little seeds on out balcony. I guess they really are not all that little, they are about the size of corn and remind me of coffee beans. I have collected about one hundred fifty or so of them. We think the birds are bringing us a gift or something (better this gift then the other gift they normally leave). Hubby and I don't know what the seeds are, but he is leaning towards the idea of it being some type of fruit.

I got the bright idea to try and sprout the seeds. I have started with about a dozen, we will just have to see what they turn out to be. That is unless someone know what the seeds are.

BTW: I am having trouble uploading pics with blogger is anyone else having the same problem?

Ahhhhhhhh

I feel so invigorated. I just got back from a "girls" weekend. It was just the thing the doctor had ordered. Two days with no kids, no hubbie, and no real responsibilities. What's not to love? Afterall, this was our transportation for local driving while we were there.

I know you can't see it in the above pic, but we even had an Oldsmobile hood ornament on our cart. We all got a kick out of it.

Though I have to admit, the best part of the trip was coming home to my family and the nice weather here in LA. When I left it was 100+, but since I've been back it has been much cooler. I want to say no more than 90. How cool is that (cool meaning awesome and cool at the same time, like how I did that).

I did do a little knitting while I was there, but not much. The shawl is starting to take the type of concentration and attention that I just have not had in me the last few days. I have only the last two charts of the pattern remaining. I'm hoping that I can be done with it by the beginning of next week. Let's cross our fingers.