Wednesday, June 28, 2006

Wednesday

As I mentioned in a previous post, Malik is having surgery on his spine on Monday. Links related to this surgery are following, if anyone cares.
http://www.pullthrough.org/ptnn13.html
http://www.neurosurgerytoday.org/what/patient_e/tethered.asp?ShowMenu=false&ShowPrint=false

Yesterday, the boys went to John Casablanca, and they got called back for tonight. I'm not really sure what this means. They probably want money - which they won't be getting from me. They are REAL excited! I will keep you posted on that.

In case I don't post tomorrow or Friday, I definately won't be posting Monday or Tuesday. I don't know about Saturday or Sunday, but that is a rare occurance.

I will post for sure late next week. Maybe I will have some news about a new job.

Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Happy Anniversary to me!

Well, actually, to us, and, actually, tomorrow, not today. (Is that enough commas?) 3 years.

I unexpectedly received a little bit of money out of the blue last week. Our anniversary is tomorrow so I decided we both needed gifts. Now, I realize that he is supposed to buy for me, but neither of us would have gotten any gifts if it weren't for this surprise money, so I decided to buy something for him and something for me. So I promptly made two purchases. The first was to GI Joe's. My DH has never had any golf shoes. He will have these as soon as they arrive - should have already been here, but soon (I hope).

The second purchase was (of course) to KnitPicks. It came today.

5 skeins each Wool of the Andes: red, cloud and evergreen. These will be Christmas stockings for Christmas.


3 balls each of Pallette in red and black. Socks


2 hanks of Shadow lace weight in color Jewels for an as yet undetermined shawl.

I just realized that this was detrimental to my SoSkal, but the Christmas stockings were preplanned and an exception, so I excuse myself of that, the rest was to add up to $40 for free shipping, plus I didn't really spend my money, right? Ok, justification, over.

I have progress on my lace scarf for the Amazing Lace.


This is actually not the "right" side, but between taking forever to scan and even longer to upload, this is all you get. It needs to be blocked desprately, though, so it is not a good pic, anyway. I needs to be straight at the bottom, not angled like it is, so... At least you can see the progress.

Daycare has people come in and take pictures of the kids every year. I got Ayanna's pictures back yesterday. These pictures are $12.50 per sheet, and we just had her pics done, so we won't pay for any of these except the class picture, but... they are scanned!




I am currently seeking new employment. I have had two interviews so far this week. Both of them went well. One is a lot more money, but I don't actually think I am qualified for it, so we will see. The other one is more money AND less hours. Think good thoughts.

Friday, June 23, 2006

A FO!

At swim class on Wednesday, I finished the sweater. All done (but the blocking)!:


And, as promised, here are the pics of Ayanna swimming:

This is a bad pic of Ayanna, but a good pic of the barbell - she really likes this thing.



I am working on my lace. I am done with two repeats on Branching Out:

Wednesday, June 21, 2006

GGGGRRRRR

I am sick to DEATH of my boss. That is all on that subject, now to other things.

I finished almost all of the baby tunic. I did all the knitting, and all the weaving in of ends. I made an I-cord chain for the hood. All that is left is putting the chain in the hood. This is my quickest project EVER!! I bought pattern and yarn on Mother's day. Needed needles. Bought needles on June 8 - cast on. Finished hood on June 13. Needed dpn for sleeves. Bought dpn on June 17. Finished knitting on June 20.

I may change my mind and enter it into the State Fair, instead of the blanket.

I got a pic of the Roving Larissa gave me


This week, Portland Parks and Recreation is offering free swim lessons. In order to sign up, you had to be at the pool at 8:00 (before that if you wanted a good place in line). There I was - knitting in hand. All three kids are in swimming lessons every evening this week. Ayanna's class is sort of a Mommy and Me class. I took some pics yesterday. I can't very well take pics of Ayanna's class, as I am in the water with her, but -


DeAndre'


Has anyone ever told you that it is really hard to get a pic (especially on a crappy camera) of a moving object? Please note that Malik used to be TERRIFIED of water. Now he is jumping into the 12 foot end!

Friday, June 16, 2006

No knitting content

Well, yesterday we had four doctor's appointments. Yes, 4. Ayanna had her six month check up. She is now 11 lbs, 12 oz. I had a check-up and a dentist appointment. Malik had an appointment because he will have surgery on July 3rd on his spine. I brought my knitting with me, just in case, but maybe got 3 rows done. I had on my list to get some size 8 dpn for the tunic, but never got around to it.

Father's Day weekend means my dad's house on Saturday, and dinner and bowling on Sunday.

Hopefully, something will get completed over the weekend.

Wednesday, June 14, 2006

I am so close to finishing the baby tunic. I finished the hood yesterday. If I had paid attention to the pattern on Thursday, I would have bought a set of size 8 dpns on Thursday when I went to the LYS to get the size 6 and 8 16" circs I needed. However, I didn't, so now I have to wait until I get those in order to continue. I am progressing on this sweater so fast, I probably could have finished at least sleeve #1 yesterday if I had made that purchase. I did a 3-needle bind off on the hood yesterday. I had the stitches on my size 8 16" circ, but didn't have any other size 8 needles to use as the third needle. So, get this, I used a pencil as the third needle and pushed the stitches around on the circular so that half were each on the needle portions of the circ and none were on the wire. Then used the pencil as the third needle. Necessity is the mother of invention.

Since it was Ayanna's six-month bd yesterday, I didn't post any other content. (I did find it interesting that she was born on a Tuesday, and her six month birthday was also on a Tuesday.) However, Monday I went to a meeting of the State Fair Knit a long and brought my spindle. A girl there named Kim (blogless, I believe) showed me how to spin! I would "get it" then it would drop. Then it would take awhile for me to "get it" again, just in time for it to drop again. The tiny amount of roving I got was, apparently, worthless. However, when Larissa read my blog and saw the teeny amount of roving I got, she felt sorry for me and RAOKed me with a big bag of roving she had and decided she wouldn't use! So sweet!!! (I have a picture, but it helps if I could remember to download the pic off the camera.)

Monday, June 12, 2006

Part 2

The first ride the boys took was:

This super big slide. I don't know, I might go on this one next year.

Up next was:

The fun house

This next thing they went round and round to some real loud music:




This was a swing that went up and out.


This one won't happen again for awhile. At least not for DeAndre'. I was scared, DeAndre' was scared, and even Marcus (who NEVER gets scared with the boys) was scared.


DeAndre' decided he needed a break, so Marcus and Malik went on the next ride.


Then DeAndre' took me on this ride next. Very tame.

Ok. End of fun center report until next year.

On to knitting. I started this Knitting Pure and Simple Baby Tunic Thursday so I could have something easy for KIP while at fun center and parade. This is where I was last night.



We went to Target yesterday, and look what I found:

That is it on my lap. It was in the dollar section for Father's Day. It is supposed to be used on the golf course, those holders in the front are supposed to be for your tees. I probably won't use them. It has a main pocket that cinches up, and a pocket on the outside that holds my pattern, and whatever tools are most important. Then there is a hook thing for clipping on your belt loop!! All for $1!!!

And for scale:


I got a replacement spindle today in the mail. Much better hook this time. I am going to go to the LYS for State Fair Along-ing.

Report on that to come tomorrow.

Sunday, June 11, 2006

Sunday?

Me?!? Post on a Sunday?!?

We went to the parade and the fun center yesterday. Also, yesterday I downloaded the pics off my camera. NEVER downloaded the pics the same day i took them - especailly almost 100 of them.

So - here goes:

The boys really did have fun, no matter what thier faces say here.


Try as she might, Ayanna got no sleep.


There were lots of these - pooper scooper entries.


This was the coolest float, ever. There are two Bikers in there. They went around and around that ball.

Same float - amazing!


One of my favorites - Clydesdales.


Look - Llamas

After the parade, we went to the fun center.

The boys got to have fun at the Radio Disney tent.

It seems that Blogger won't let me post any more pics. I will try again later. I have KIP update, too.

Friday, June 09, 2006

Friday

My 11 year old son was suspended for three and a half days for getting into a fight with a friend at school today. These would be the last three and a half days of school. A bit excessive, don't you think.

I was right about the spindle. The hook broke off. The lady is sending me a new spindle. She was going to have me just go get another hook, but decided since the hook broke off in the spindle, she would send me a new one. No spinning this week. Hopefully, I will get it on Monday, so I can maybe go either Monday or Thursday and get some help.

Tomorrow is the parade, the carnival and the ships. I plan to have LOTS of fun (even if my children may not be allowed to have fun)!

Tuesday, June 06, 2006

I’m sooo excited…

...And I just can’t hide it.

Ok, so I live in Portland, Oregon. Home of the Portland Rose Festival. This is a yearly occurrence. It gets a bit of a bad rap, cause a lot of the times the rains come right about the same time. Rose Festival is my favorite time of year! Tomorrow, is the Jr. Rose Festival Parade. (I don’t get to go, but the boys get to go with my step-dad, cause school closes early.)

The biggest deal, though will be Saturday. The Grand Floral Parade starts at 10:00. After that we will go to the Fun Center. For more on this, you can read Casey’s post. We are also going to check out the Navy ships. It also happens to be KIP day, which, of course, I will be KIP all day. There is a group here locally who are trying to get some KIPers at the parade. I’ll be there, regardless. And the weather forecast this morning was for Saturday to be 75 and sunny! (Of course, the forecast 4 days out usually changes 4 times, so I am still a little weary about all my dreams coming true.)

So, all this excitement is taking place in my head all morning after I hear the weather forecast. Then I get the mail at work. I don’t remember giving the lady my work address, but I must have. I won on eBay (Sing like “I lost on Jeopardy.”). This. I got it today. It actually looks like



…in real life. I must admit, I am a little bit disappointed at the smaller than I expected amount of roving. Plus, the hook at the top was bent when I got it. The hook is very pliable, so I was able to bend it back, but that makes me nervous about how well it will hold up. But, now I get to spin! More excitement today and it wasn’t even 9:30, yet. I really should have had this sent to the house, cause now I REALLY don’t want to work. I am going to go to the LYS at lunch and see if they can help me figure it out. I don’t know if anyone there knows how to use it, but I will see.

I joined two KnitAlongs over the weekend. I even updated my blog to reflect this. The first: State Fair Knit a Long. I don’t know the rules, yet, but this would be neat to knit something and enter it in the state fair. I am going to enter my blanket I am making from Knitty Gritty.

Second: Summer of Stash. Thankfully, I bought my spindle and roving before I found this Knit a Long. Of course as soon as I joined this, I got an e-Newsletter from a LYS telling me all about their Christmas in July festivities. They are having free classes all month long, but you have to pre-register and then buy the materials there. And I just remembered that I wanted to make Christmas Stockings for everyone. I have lots of stash yarn, but nothing Christmas-y. Oh, I get two exceptions. Ok. That’s easy, one will be an exception for yarn for Christmas stockings. Notice, I kept it very limited - yarn for Christmas stockings, not Christmas presents, but stockings.

Friday, June 02, 2006

TGIF

I just had to share, since in a previous post, I was so worried. I don't think I have to worry about Ayanna's weight, anymore. We went to Denny's last weekend. Since it wasn't a scheduled trip, and she has had pancakes before, I ordered her a pancake. Look at her go!!