How do we start this thing?

I have secretly been stressing out over the whole Sockapalooza thing. See my Sockapalooza pal is blogless which makes getting to know my pals preferences somewhat, how should I say, impossible. Not that I am complaining, I just really want to make my pal a pair of socks that they do not already have.

So basically I have to guess. Do they have Jaywalker's, Monkey's, something from Knitting on the Road, Sensational Knitted Socks, etc. I don't know what they do and don't have and that stresses me out a little. Stress is probably the wrong word for what I am feeling, it is probably more apprehension about the whole situation, you see I want to knit the perfect socks for their recipient.

As a result of not knowing, I have decided to design my sock pal's socks. This way I am pretty sure that they won't have a pair already.

Tuesday I started the whole deciding on a stitch pattern thing. Easier said than done. I would find a stitch pattern, make a swatch, and then decide that it wasn't right. When I was making my fifth swatch, the swatch didn't look like the sample from the book. So I did it again. Still not right.

I decided that I would chart the stitch pattern from the book so I could see what was wrong. What I charted was not even remotely close to what the pattern looked like. I don't know if it was me or if it was the stitch pattern, but man I had to have that stitch patter. Afterall, that was the stitch pattern I wanted, probably because I couldn't figure it out.

Then my bright light moment came, Eunny's tutorial.


You like?

Well, technically this is not the sock. It is actually the swatch. See.

This is the yarn that will be my sock pal's socks.

Thank You

Thank you, to all who fight and have fought for us.

Happy Memorial Day!

A Day Fourteen Days Late

With all of the lists and things I almost forgot to post about the Mother's Day gifts that I had made for my mom and grandmother.

You may remember this one. Actually I never mentioned who it was for. In fact, I forgot that I had made it last year. They were sitting in the closet ready to be gifted, but oops. Now they are wrapped and ready for Bachan (it is what my kids call Grandma, their Great-Grandma).

The other pair of socks are these, for my mom.

You see, my mom has a not so subtle way of demanding asking that I make things for her. You can see one example of it here. With these socks, she basically told me she wanted some tabi socks for when she travels so she could have something on her feet when airport security has her take her flip-flops off.

After she initially asked me, she would mention the socks every time I would speak to her. I finally decided that I would make the socks for her for Mother's day.

The only problem is that they are still sitting on my desk. I am pretty sure that my mom knows what she is getting because she has not mentioned the socks for a while. The reason they are still on my desk was because on Mother's Day we were running about half-hour late for dinner because K had a bloody nose that wouldn't stop. When we were finally on the road, I realized that the gifts were still on my desk. And I have forgotten to give them to her each time I have seen her since. My bad!

Even though they don't have the gifts in their hands, I thought that you might like to see what they are getting.

Lists

I am one of those. You know those people, the ones who are constantly writing lists.

If we are going on vacation, I have a list of the things that we need to pack. When the house needs to be cleaned, I make a list. Errands, there's a list. You name it, I write a list, if I didn't then I wouldn't do have as much stuff as I needed to.

The good thing about having a list is that I seem to finish a bit faster than if I didn't have one and things don't seem quite so bad because I am constantly thinking things like, I only have four more things on the list. Oh, only three things left. Wow, after I finish this, then I am done and I can mess around.

Generally I have a list for my knitting as well. At the present time I don't. After I finished my last list, I never updated it.

Good thing I read Jean's blog. She mentioned that Ali is having a contest. And this contest is just my thing...lists. So here is my list of things that I want to get done over the summer, most of which are going to be holiday gifts.

1. Entrelac socks for my mom.
2. Fair Isle socks for my grandmother.
3. Ankle socks for my other grandmother.
4. Sockapalooza pals socks.
5. Lace tank for me.
6. Swimsuit for me.
7. Baby gift for neighbor (she's having twins, a boy and a girl).
8. Finish mystery project (I'll let you know about this one later).

Wow, now that I have it all down, I think the list is a bit adventurous. I will try to get the majority of it done even if it means that I will be working well into winter.

Oh, look what they put in our neighborhood.

Now all I have to do is mail something so the kids could actually use it.

I am no Chaka

First I am super-excited because I recieved a comment from my sockapalooza pal. WooHoo!

Now that I got that off my chest, look what I have on my finger.

Let me give you a little background. A little over six years ago, Hubby and I were having problems with our mail. You know the kind of problems where mail was missing and so forth. So Hubby and I decided to change our mailbox from the type that do not lock to one that does. Unfortunately for us, we couldn't find one that was the same style as the rest of the mailboxes in our neighborhhod.

We eventually did find a mailbox that locks, but it was in a different color. Though the color matched the pole that our previous mailbox was attachted to. Our neighbors who shared the mailbox pole aggreed that we should just change the mailbox to the new style and that was that.

Fast forward to about three weeks ago. Hubby and I recieve a letter, as well as a few other neighbors on our street, from our homeowners association stating that we needed to paint the mailbox to match the others in the neighborhood.

Hello, it's been more than six years, they just noticed?

Well rather than fight it I just painted it because I think technically they could try to get us to change it to one that looks like the rest of the neighbors. The finger was just a victim of the new neighbor who has nothing better to do than to complain about mailboxes of the homeowners associations request.

One of my neighbors and I decided that we could never be taggers/graffiti artists. Because both of us ended up with blisters on our fingers from the spray paint.

So there goes a futre career if I need one, but man, does my mailbox look shiny.

BTW, Chaka was one of the names that could be seen tagged all around Southern California for years.

What Matters

Look at this sock.

Now look at this sock.

Now look at the two together.

They are both the same sock pattern worked from different directions. If you have been reading this blog for a while, then you know that the toe up method of knitting socks is my favorite. Afterall, when you knit them toe up you can pretty much guarantee that you will not run out of yarn with only a few rounds left because you can adjust the pattern when you are about to run out and start the cuff a little earlier.

Usually all I have to do is work the stitch pattern backward and the socks look fine. That is so not the case with the Monkey sock. With this pattern, the stitches didn't do what I initially thought they would.

Oh well, I guess this one will have to be worked from the top down. Both of the socks will have to be frogged...it's a gauge thing.

Mother's Day started for me a little early for me this year. On Thursday K's class had a tea as did B's class on Friday.

So accordingly the boys started their Mother's day things with me then. I was gifted with tons of hug, kisses, and B telling me, "You're the best mom ever."

Followed with, "Happy Mother's Day...Wow, I must have said that at least six times mom...I sure do love you."

On the actual day of the boys made breakfast and then we went here

While we were there the four of us went for a nice little bike ride. I was so proud of K. We rode for about four miles and he rode the entire time (with many, many stops). Towards the end of the ride he was slowing down and said, "I am tired, will you pedal for me?"

That is much better than him saying his legs weren't working.

After the bike ride we had lunch and then later went to dinner with my mom, grandmothers, and the rest of the family.

It doesn't get much better than that.

Enough

Ever since the California fires in October 2003, I have had a very difficult time with fires. That year one of the fires was so close that I had to take the kids to my parents house because of the smoke.

The following year, I could see this fire from our bedroom as I would lay trying to sleep.

Ever since the 2003 fires, when there is a fire within twenty miles, I can smell it and I get extremely emotional.

This year, as many of you may know, has been an extremely dry year in terms of rain in Southern California. As a result, fire season has started a little early and two places that are very near and dear to me have been affected.

The first area is Griffith Park. I grew up less than two miles from Griffith Park. I remember going to the pony rides as a child, and now it is something that my children enjoy doing. While Hubby and I were dating we would often go on jogs over there. Every year during the month of December there is a light display.

There is so much that Griffith Park has to offer. To see that it was on fire, well, it hurt.

The other place that is near and dear is Catalina Island. See Hubby and I got married in the Casino Ballroom on Catalina. Enough said.

For the last three nights there has been coverage on these places, places that I love.

This is B and I (I was seven months pregnant with K)

B and his mischievous self

Uh-oh! He got caught

I hope that the Catalina fire is put to an end soon and hopefully Griffith Park can get back to what it once was.

BTW Those pics were from the last time that we went to Catalina.

Big foot, little foot

See these little feet.

They belong to K. Every time K comes home from school and/or the park this is what we have:

Shoes full of sand.

How it is possible for him to walk while that much sand is in his shoes is beyond me. I get a couple of grains in my shoe and I have to take off the shoes and clean them out because it bothers me so much.

Maybe he wants a sandbox at home and this is his subtle way of letting us know.

See these big feet.

On them are my second completed pair of Jaywalkers and oh are they comfy.

There was something about the first pair I made that I just didn't like. After all the rave I had been reading about the socks, I thought that I was the freak because I was honestly not convinced of them. Initially I thought that it was the yarn I used, but I deep down I knew that couldn't be it. After making the second pair I realized it was the heel I chose for the socks. After all, the socks were written to be done top down and with a gusset heel. The first pair I did from the toe-up and I used the short-row heel.

This pair I also did from the toe-up, but I used a gusset heel and it the sock feels so much better. Like butter baby!

Doddurs

Say hello to my little friend (in your best Tony Montana/Scarface voice).

For those that don't know, this is Nomar Garciapower Garciaparra, actually he's not the real one, but the bobblehead version that was given away at the Dodger game.

A couple of weeks ago, B mentioned that he wanted a Nomar bobblehead and asked if we could go to a game and buy one. I happened to notice on the Dodgers schedule that there was a Nomar bobblehead night. The conversation that ensued sounded like this:

Me: Hey B, do you want to go to the Dodger game or do you want to go to open house?

B: Open house

Me: Do you want to go to open house or do you want to goto the Dodger game on Nomar bobblehead night.

B: Nomar bobblehead night, but you are the one that is going to tell my teacher.

The kid has his priorities. Initially we had reservations about taking the kids out on a school night, but I figured that it might be a good test run to see if things would be okay for Stitch n Pitch, but things don't look so great.

Last year they would fall asleep part way through the game, this year they are both into the game (and the concessions) and were up way longer than I thougt they would be. We even had to leave the game early just so they would fall asleep in the car.

To say they had trouble waking for school the next day is an understatement. So it looks as though they won't be going to anymore weekday games until school is out for them.

It was fun though. My favorite part was every once in a while, K would stand on his chair and scream at the top of his lungs, "WETSGODODDURS!" It was hilarious. All the people around us were cracking up as Hubby and I just looked at each other and nodded.

It hasn't all been baseball around here, though during the weekends it seems as though that is all there is. There has been some knitting going on as well.

One of the projects that I finished is a gift for my mom and after Mother's Day, I'll post about it in the off chance that she happens to read this. The other project that I am working on is this.

It's my second go around at Jaywalkers. All I have to say is the new heel that I have been doing makes these soooooo much better than the last pair that I made. I can't wait to finish these.

BTW if you haven't done so, go and check the Sockpalooza4 blog. There are over 1000 participants...WOW