Been busy

Haven't been feelin real great, but I've been knitting on the mystery shawls. Only got pics of the goddess knits one though. Here is the progress as of Monday.

A close up of the second clue.
And here is the 3rd clue.

I had picked up for the 4th clue and had about 7 rows done. The more I looked at it, the more I hated the way I picked the stitches up. There was a very very obvious ridge of stitches. So, I sucked it up and ripped it out. I picked up the new stitches from the very edge of the shawl. I think it looks much better. It now looks like some open work and not like I sewed 2 pieces together. poorly lol

Monday night, Mr. Nick had a musical recital at his school. Well next door to the school, but it was the kindergarten, 1st and 2nd graders. It was called Welcome to the Jungle. It was about a mouse and a lion that became friends. The younger kids were mice and the 2nd graders were lions. Needless to say, I took lots of pics.





Yes I'm weird and just liked taking pics of him walking into the building. :OP I just like pics of him when he isn't really looking at the camera. Cause y'all my boy is a ham.

This is him at the end of the program. He was quite proud of himself. hehe Blurred the faces of the other kids cause well they aren't mine and I duno if their parents would like their pics on the net and all.

Also cause the school is full of vampires and I don't want the devil children to seek revenge. hehehehehe (click to get a closer look at the devils)

It was dark in there and I swear that 90% of the pics I took had at least 3 or 4 kids in it that had freaky shiny eyes. And yes, I know what causes it but I swear they look like vampires. hehe

Anyways, I'm gonna go finish lunch and then knit some more on clue 4. I've got 8 rows of it done now.

What has kept me busy

The weather has been driving me buggy. Last week at this time I looked out front and saw this sight.

Today when I looked out back, I saw this!!

I am not a happy camper. They canceled school, so I missed my appointment with Nick's teachers. Amazingly the kids room hasn't suffered. Ya see, last Friday we spent all day going through Nick's room and weeding out stuff for the garage sale. His room looks amazing.

He has done a real good job of keeping it picked up. I'm working real hard to get rid of some of the junk in the rest of the house. My room is the last frontier. hehe

Sunday we had a real nice time at my folk's house. I handed over the hat that I made for my cousin.

It's kind of hard to see but I added some arrows of pearl stitches for some added texture and interest. Otherwise, it would have looked exactly like the last one I made her. hehe

Monday, her mom came over and picked the hat up and chose another one out of my stash of crocheted baby hats. I had said she could have 2 but would have to pay for any more that she wanted. So, of course, she only took 2. What she failed to realize is that on Sunday, the other one she chose spent a bit of time on the head of another family member.

Miss Dakota wouldn't sit still for a picture with the hat. It would seem that my lil bro has been torturing the poor thing by putting things on her head since she was a pup. I can't say as I'm surprised. We always bugged the shit out of our dogs. hehe

I modeled the hat on my baby doll I got as a little kid. It's also wearing a doll dress I made quite a while ago.

As you can see, it is a bit too big for the doll. Well that is cause it was meant for a real baby and the doll is a lil smaller. So now it is in 5 or 6 little balls. I've got about 3 or 4 rows done on the new neckline. I'm going to work on it in spurts while waiting for web pages to load up.

I've also been working on the mystery shawl some more, but I totally forgot to take pictures when I finished clue 2. I was at Mom's and after I whipped out the camera to take a picture of the dog, my mom got all upset. Turns out she bought me a camera with a photo printer and was going to give it to me for Christmas. As if I am patient enough to wait that long for a good camera. hehe I think she is going to sell it on eBay or at the garage sale. I should have the 3rd clue done tomorrow and I'll post a picture then.

I also started another mystery shawl. This one is the Galveston KAL. It's going to be a huge ass square.

I'm using the kettle dyed lace weight merino I got from www.handpaintedyarn.com. I swear it is like knitting with singles. It's think and thin in different spots. I'm not minding too much, but there are some spots that are a little over twisted. There are also spots with no twist to them. But anyway, that is clue 1. The second clue shouldn't take too long to do.

Plus, I've also uploaded another new tag to my tag site. I swear the people I make tags for don't know how to say thanks. I've gotten 3 responses out of over 50 members. sigh

Ok, time to get to knitting. Catch ya laters.

I'm not avoiding you

I swear I'm not.

I've just been a bit busy. Last night I had to knit a baby hat for my mom. She wanted a completed hat before I left her house. She has no clue just how slowly I knit. hehe I did manage to finish knitting it but I didn't get the ends weaved in. She will get the finished hat tomorrow. It helps that the baby was only 5lbs. Didn't have to make a big one or anything. I even added a lil bit of texture to it. I'll get a picture of it tomorrow. I'm a tad tired tonight.

I spent all day long cleaning house. I had let the dishes and wash pile up a bit. I've just got a couple pans and the dinner dishes from tonight to wash in the morning. The major part of the mess today was my son's room. OMG the kid is a damn pig. Ok so he takes after his mother in the neatness arena. :OP

But anyways, it took me and my mom about 3 hours to clean everything in there. We cleaned out his closet and his toy boxes. I already had 2 totes of his stuff out in the garage but I hadn't really gone through it for the garage sale, so I brought it in.

In total, we had 2 full totes, a small laundry basket, a duffel bag and a large black garbage bag full of things for the garage sale. There was half a tote of books. A tote and a half of clothes. The rest was movies and toys. We got him to get rid of his Power Ranger and Rescue Heros tapes and toys. I sooo hate the Power Rangers. We also got rid of all of his Rugrat and Tellytubbies tapes too. I will miss the Rugrats tapes. I quite enjoy watching them.

The kid's room is totally clean now though. I do believe I'll take a picture of that tomorrow too. hehe He has 2 half empty totes of toys in his closet and several small totes full of cars and legos. There is actually room in his dresser for all of his clothes now. hehe

OK, now I need to hit the sack. I really need to finish clue 2 of the current mystery shawl. I've got about 10 rows to go I think, but the new clue comes out tomorrow. hehe Night all!

Rediculous

Remember the other day I showed those beautiful pictures of the clouds? Remember how warm I said it was?

Guess what I saw when I went outside this morning.

SNOW!!!!!!!

It's freaking snowing!!!!!!


AAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG!!!!!!!

Man I suck

I'm horrible at coming up with snappy titles for my posts. lol I guess I'm only entertaining in person. And you are just going to take my word on that one. hehe

I did a little shopping last week. I finally managed to pick up some sock yarn from Perchance to Knit on Etsy. Susie has a great sense of color and I've been drooling over her yarn for months.

I tried to take a close up of the card and the lovely stitch marker attached with it, but the picture was washed out. It's called City Shadows and is superwash merino sock yarn. I'm not sure if I'll make some socks with it or a scarf with some beautiful dark glass beads. Not sure yet.

Next up are 2 skeins of sock yarn from Knitivity.

They are both 75% superwash wool and 25% nylon. Top skein is Milk & Honey and bottom one is Leather Sofa. Tasty stuff at a very reasonable price.

I did a little bit of work on a couple scarves today. Nothing worth taking pictures of. The next 2 weeks will be spent getting ready for a garage sale. Fun! Fun! NOT!!!!

Wow! Pictures!!

hehe I took the camera outside cause I wanted to get some pictures of my latest WIP.

That pic is with the flash on. The color is a little light but I think the detail is pretty good.

This one is without the flash. The color is a little more true. To me, it looks like the color of well worn jeans. This is the latest mystery shawl from GoddessKnits.com formerly Bo Peep's Wool Shop. It is going to be a triangular shetland. I'm liking how this one is looking. The pile of merino that pretends to be the 2nd mystery shawl is still sitting in it's bag waiting to be frogged.

I've been a bit distracted the last couple days though.

Man has it been just gorgeous here in Iowa. I do believe I'm going to be leaving the kitchen window open open tonight. :)

Dad had me distracted yesterday too.

He gave me this stupid frog painted plain green and a couple cans of spray paint. I painted it the way that he wanted. I think it is ugly as sin. I'm going to take a black sharpie and give it some irises before I take it over tomorrow. It was kind of tacky when I got it home, so I let it sit until yesterday. It is still a little tacky. In more ways that one. LOL

Boo

Finally feeling a little better here. For a few days there I just felt like hell. And I've been busy.

I went ahead and bought myself a domain name and got some hosting.

Introducing

Tags By Frod!

I've been making tags for several years now and I already had several web sites all cobbled together. It was impossible to put all of my tags in the same place because I've just got too many. lol But now that is no longer a problem.

I've still got lots more tags to add to the site. There are already 3 more pages of tags uploaded and I just need to adjust some html before revealing them.

I have been doing a little bit of knitting and I've been going back through my stash. Y'all I can NOT believe how many UFOs I have hidden away in my closet and under my bed. LOL There was one scarf that I found that I had no clue what the pattern was. I could picture the site it came off of, but I had no clue the name of it and no clue where my copy of the pattern went to. Thanks to Knitting Pattern Central I was able to find the pattern again.

Recognize it?

How bout now?

Yup it's the Irish Hiking scarf. Unfortunately, I decided to make the scarf from Jack Frost Wintuk. Umm yeah, acrylic. Old acrylic. And it is on flexible plastic needles. Can we say ick? lmao I'm going to dig into the needle stash and see if I can't find a set of metal needles. Nick can have the scarf for next winter. Lord knows any scarf of his is going to have to be washed numerous times. Maybe I'll make it again in wool later. But not until I finish some other UFOs.

I know of one UFO that is probably going to end up being ripped out completely. Off and on I've been working on one of the old mystery shawls that Renee put out. Well day before yesterday I realized that I just hate the way it is looking. You can see it here and here. The thing is just too small. I've added repeats to it but it wasn't enough. And I really don't like the way the color changes go in different directions. Maybe some day, I'll make it using a nearly solid sport weight yarn. Maybe then it will be a bit bigger and the way the color changes are won't bother me so much. The part that makes this hard is that I'm almost done with the edge on the first side. So, it's like a whisker from being done. But, I just don't like it. :O(

I'm going to let it sit for a while longer. I can't bring myself to rip it out just yet. But I also can't bring myself to finish it. sigh

Ok, I'm off to work on the tag site for a bit.

Groan

It's 4:30 in the morning. I haven't slept at all.

No matter which way I laid, I couldn't get comfortable enough to sleep. Not that I was in pain. I just couldn't shut down. Nothing major on my mind. I just couldn't shut it off.

Finally at 4, I got up because I had to go to the bathroom yet again. And now, I'm throwing up. Unfortunately, there isn't anything in my stomach to throw up. Just flem and blood. Not good.

Now I'm sitting here with a horrible stomach ache. And I've got to work today. It's not worry about the job that has me upset or anything. It's a job I've done before and I enjoy the people I work with at it. All I know is that if my stomach doesn't settle down soon I'm not going to be able to go in. I'm not going to be dry heaving all over the place at some poor unsuspecting person's house all day. But, I really could use the money. The longer I'm sitting here, the less likely going to work feels. Usually when I go ahead and throw up, my stomach settles down almost immediately. I'm thinking this isn't the IBS acting up though.

I do not need this right now.

She Knits!!

Yes, I do. :OP

First up is the bright green scarf.


OK, so it isn't really as bright as I thought it was going to turn out to be.

I'm really liking it though. I'm so glad I didn't go with adding in the yellow/orange/pink sock yarn too. I'm using a pattern that Sweaterbabe.com was giving away a few weeks ago. It's not available any more or I would link to it. It's really just a simple feather and fan though I do believe. I know I have the same stitch pattern in reference books.

The yarn is just so soft and squishy. I love it. I'm not sure what I'll do with the yellow yarn. Another scarf even though it is going to be getting warmer? Socks? lol That is what the yarn was meant for, but well I'm slow with socks. Ok, so I'm slow with all knitting. :OP

I've been working on enlarging Nick's nap blanket.


It's done in tunisian crochet with huge wooden hooks called MoEZ hooks. They are just awesome. I've had a couple for a few years now.


Believe it or not, the "white" in the main body of the blanket used to be the same color as the white on the border. lol It spent a whole year at school and it never got washed. Not sure why they never sent their blankies home for washing. I've washed it a few times since then, but it won't become white again. Oh well, he still loves it.

Didn't do much of anything today. I took a nap, but it wasn't a restful one. I have these weird terror dreams sometimes. Years ago I was attacked while I was asleep. So now, I have dreams about someone attacking me and I can't move or say anything. Well, I know why I have the paralysis thing going on. When you dream, your body is supposed to not move around and all. I know some people do, but as far as I know, I don't. Today I had one of the dreams and it lasted for quite a while. I couldn't move or scream. All I could do was kind of groan and try to force myself to wake up. It took me awhile to realize that I was dreaming. It does not make for a restful nap.

Nothing else interesting to report. I work tomorrow at the clinic. Hopefully it will go by real fast. I do really enjoy the job, but when it gets slow it can be very very boring.

Anyways, I'm off to bed.

Sigh :O)

Man it was nice here today.

It was in the high 50s to low 60s all day. I had all the windows and doors open. It was so nice to have the breeze blowing through the house. I live out in the boonies on top of a slight rise. It is always windy here. We have very few trees around to block the wind and the buildings are fairly far apart.

For most of the day, I had to fight to stay awake. I always get so damn tired when I get lots of fresh air. Right now I'm bout to pass out. lol I managed to get some cleaning done here on the blog and at the house. I've still got lots more to do around the house but it looks like I'm off tomorrow, so I've got plenty of time.

I spent quite a bit of time today downloading file recovery programs. I accidentally deleted a bunch of stuff off the new flash drive yesterday morning. This is stuff I wouldn't be likely to be able to download again. Lots of old crochet patterns I got off of Pando. I've got to say, that most of the recovery programs I downloaded just sucked 10 kinds of ass. The free to try programs only let you recover files below maybe 100k without buying the program. Ummmmm yeah ok whatever. Most of the free ones I found didn't find the damn files at all. I knew they were still there cause of the free to try programs. I just wasn't in the mood to pay at least $30 for these programs. The one I finally used came from a dang online game web site of all things. I didn't really take a close look at the web site, but most of what I saw was games. Not programs. Weird if ya ask me.

But anyways, I was able to save all my files and from now on, I will not be deleting any files off of the flash drive until they have all been copied to my hard drive. I swear I was just trying to delete one little folder and ended up deleting the main folder with everything in it. I was in the middle of getting ready for work too. So, I had no real time to try and fiddle with it. I had checked at Mom's to see if the files were still on her pc, but she ran a cleanup program that emptied the trash bin. I was not in a very good mood for the last day, I tell ya.

But, all is well on the pc front. Well mostly anyways. I've got a wonderful solitaire program on my other hard drive that I'm just addicted to. It's called Solitaires4Free, or something like that. It's by Tepui. Well I no longer have the install file for it and it would seem that they no longer offer the free version. So, I'm on the look out for a free solitaire program that has lots of different types and has pretty good graphics. I don't care if it has music. I usually don't have my sound on anyway.

Anyways, I'm gonna go put some lotion on my poor fingers. Long story made short: Do not try to turn over a hot crumb cake with bare hands. No blisters but it hurts and my frozen burrito cold pack is gettin warm. hehe

I'm outta here. I need me some zzzzzz Hope y'all like my new digs.

Testing

Ok, let's give this one a try.

Not real sure if I like all the pics up top. Might just go with the one.

We shall see.

Not sure who the artist is. I just really like it and messed with it a bit in PSP.

I'm also still wanting a 3rd column maybe. Maybe not.

Grumble

I hate XML!

Maybe it's because I've had a headache for the last 2 days, but I can't make head nor tails of XML. And with the way my head feels, I just don't have the patience to fudge with it.

So, I'm killing all the XML crap on here even though I really like the way the archive is with the new template. I'm just not gonna keep messin with it.

Under Construckshion

OK, I'm going to be playing with the template for awhile. No guarantees that it will be presentable any time soon. The kid is sick and I'm pooped. The new job isn't hard but my gosh when it gets slow boy does it get boring.

Go back to my last post and give me some ideas. Pwwwweeeeaaaassssssseeeeee

Question

So, I'm looking for a place to host a web site. Not the blog. Not enough people read the blog to justify spending any money on it. lol I make tags for a group of guys and gals. I've got them spread out between 2 different free sites, and I've still got another 5 sites worth of tags that need to be uploaded. Plus, I do the whole poetry thing and I like to save it online.

I'm looking for something I can pay monthly. I don't want to spend a mint on it either. I need lots of room to store the tags. I make roughly 130 tags each time and they add up to about 5mb of space needed. Bandwidth isn't much of an issue as I don't make tags all that often. Well at least not right now. I go in spurts.

I would like a host that gives you some cool toys to play with. I really like web site design. I mean sheesh, I do almost have a degree in it and all. If it wasn't for that damn marketing class, I would have my degree. Not that I would probably put it to much use. lol

Anyways, I have a few of the free Geocities sites. Are the pay sites worth it? I've also got a couple free Bravenet sites. That is where the tags are at now. Should I just upgrade and pay it every 3 months? I'm not ready to drop the full amount for a year at one time.

So, where are the good web hosting sites?

On an only slightly related note, I'm thinking of switching up the blog design again. I'll save off the current template first so I don't loose my links and such. I just really miss the 3 column layout I used to have. I just got tired of the posts knocking the right column down to the bottom of the blog. I'm thinking about maybe doing something with frames. I've got to admit though that I used to absolutely hate frames. Well I still kind of do. Maybe I'll do some funky stuff with css instead. But then again, I hear that css doesn't always play real well with IE7. Which frankly, I think is a POS. Mom installed it and promptly switched back to IE6.

And now, I'm gonna go get some rest. The new job isn't real hard, but it makes for a long day. Plus, the kid is sick. He is spending the night at my folk's house so that my dad can watch him tomorrow. Cross your fingers that he behaves and my mom doesn't have to kill him.

I am a ditz

I finished off the hat and booties for my cousin's baby last night. I tried to put the ribbon in them like my mom wanted. It just didn't work. The ribbon was just to wide. I would show them to you, but ya see, I didn't take any pictures. Cause, well, I'm a ditz. hehe

Mom and I had a nice time at the shower. We both won candles playing bingo. Sara made out big time. She is not going to have to buy the baby any clothes for at least the first year. hehe Everyone loved the hat and booties. Turns out one of my other cousins just taught herself how to knit, so I got to talk yarn with someone. Mom forbade me to knit during the baby shower though. She is mean that way. hehe

I'm about half a skein away from finishing the blue alpaca scarf. Well, I've got about half of the second skein left anyway. I'm not liking the length so far. I may have to start a 3rd one. I really just like long scarves. Right now, this is my main knitting. I really want to get some of my UFOs finished. I have way too many projects going right now.

I'm also working on the blue and white striped sweater for Nick. I ripped out the original and I've got about 3 inches of sleeve done so far. This is after ripping the same amount out once. My gauge was way off and it was skin tight. Not good. So far, the new sleeve is working much better. I'm really liking the yarn, Bernat Softee Baby. I don't care that it is 100% acrylic. This is some soft soft yarn. If the gauge wasn't so small, I would make myself a sweater out of it too.

I start the patient aid job tomorrow. Cross your fingers that it is just boring and not anything too difficult. Also cross your fingers that there is school tomorrow. lol The had half a day on Wednesday and then the rest of the week off because of the weather. Talk about cabin fever here folks. It is supposed to be nice this next week though.

Well, it's time to hit the sack. I got up way too damn early today. I just couldn't sleep for nothing last night. Hopefully, I'll be comatose 5 minutes after my head hits the pillow.

Wimper

So I do anything other than complain? lol

I had used one of Lucia's calculators to design a sweater for Nick a few months back. Well, I can't find my copy. Plus I really want to do a top down raglan instead of doing pieces. And right now I can't seem to get to her site. This could just be a case of my isp being a shit. Then again, she has had problems with her server before.

I have The Knitter's Handy Book of Sweater Patterns,



but their raglan sweaters are done from the bottom up.

In Knitting Without Tears,


EZ doesn't give an actual pattern stating, cast on xyz stitches and do this. And her patterns are bottom up too.

All of the reference books I have by my desk show raglans knit either from the bottom up in the round or in pieces. ppppppppbbbbbbblllllllllllllttttttttttttttt Not what I want.

Of course, I could go search through the 100 or so magazines that I have on my other bookshelf. But um that would be very time consuming. Anything I found would most likely be sized for an adult and not a child. It probably wouldn't work for the yarn that I want to use either.

I'll probably end up measuring the sweater I already started to see what my gauge is with the yarn and needles I used. I really like the fabric it created. I'll have to crunch those numbers with the pattern in the KHBoSW and do it bottom up. sigh

On the good side of things, we have survived the blizzard. Um yeah, so it really kind of missed us for the most part. The 2 foot drift of heavy slushy crappy snow I shoveled out from in front of the garage door sucked, but really I don't think that even 3 inches of snow was really added to the rest of the yard.

We thankfully didn't loose power either. I do believe there are still about 200,000 people in Iowa without power. The majority of them are in the northeastern part of Iowa. Thankfully, the folks have power too, because if my power goes out, I'm heading out there. hehe The longest I've dealt with a power outage was maybe 4 hours. The power went out in the middle of the night. It did wake me up though cause the silence woke me up! hehe I sleep with a big box fan on year round. Drives me nuts trying to sleep when it is totally quiet. When I was pregnant, my dad would come into my room in the middle of the night and turn my fan off because he was convinced it was bad for the baby for me to be cold. Um yeah, I would wake up 5 minutes later and turn it back on. hehehe I've infected the kid with the whole fan thing. He has woken up because of the fan going off in his room too.

Nothing interesting on the knitting front to report. I did wear my green socks today though. I so can not wear them with my black boots though. I think my left foot was swollen or something because boy howdy was it tight fitting. No problems when I switched over to my sneakers though. Looking at them now that I've taken them off, it amazes me just how freaking huge my feet are. The socks look HUGE now that they have been worn. I think I should have made the ribbing at the top a little longer. They are just a tad bit loose, but they stayed up pretty good.

I wore the socks today as a moral boost, because I went to the clinic for some training for the aide job. Well it turns out that it wasn't training I was going in for. It was a stinking interview. Yuck!! I hate interviews. That is why I work for a temp agency, so I don't have to interview for jobs. lol I dressed nice and actually did my hair. There was hairspray involved people! I don't do hairspray on a normal basis. I was only there for 15 freaking minutes. By the time I got back to the house, there was a message that they want to go ahead with my training though. That starts tomorrow. I'm going to have to go and buy a new pair of tan pants and a dark polo shirt. The tan pants I wore to the laundry have some black marks on the legs that just won't come out. Guess it is a good thing that the ex put some money on my debit card. :) And before anyone says anything about spending child support to buy myself clothes, think about it. I'm buying clothes that I need to wear for a job to earn money to support said child. Not like I'm going out and buying sexy lingerie. Not that I'm in any mood to be buying that sort of thing. Might make myself some though. hehehehehe

Ok, time to go cook some dinner and spend some time with the little hellion.

edit: Was just adding links to a few things in the post and I'm now able to get over to Lucia's site. Musta just been a temporary glitch.

I hate snow

I got a call about 2 hours ago from my mom informing me that the roads were clear. hint hint

So I got the snow blower going and opened up the garage door. There was about 2 feet of snow directly in front of the door and in front of the car. :( It took me about 5 minutes to work the snow blower through the drift and along side of the car. The main bulk of the driveway only had a little bit of snow in it. Unfortunately, there was a foot of sloppy slushy snow at the bottom of the drive. No way in the world was the snow blower going to move that crap. Took me over a half hour to do the end of the driveway with the shovel.

Next, I decided to try and use the snow blower on the sidewalk. One little problem with that. When I put the blower into gear and gave it a push, I realized it has a freaking flat tire. unnnnnnnngggghhhhhhhh When I try to push it forward it looks like the tire is going to come off, so I had to put it in reverse and back it into the garage. And that of course meant that I had to shovel the whole dang driveway by hand. My back is killing me. What is worse though, is my hands. Because the snow was so wet and it was so warm out, my hands got all wet and I've got raw spots on my palms and a couple fingertips. And yes, I did change gloves once.

I started out in my 2 work jackets with a scarf and a hood up. First the hood went, then I took of the scarf. Next I lost the second jacket and I even tried to go without gloves all together, but damn that hurt my hands. Not from the cold but from the shovel handle. I ended up putting on a crappy old pair of gloves that allow very little hand movement.

It took me almost 2 hours of digging, but the driveway is all clear now. I'm sure it is going to turn into a sheet of ice when the temps dip tonight. Not much I can do about that though.

I'm really looking forward to seeing the neighbor try to get in or out of her side of the driveway. hehe She has an even bigger drift of snow in front of her garage door than I had. And as soon as it gets a little colder, it is going to turn into a big ole block of ice. So is the foot tall pile at the end of the driveway. No way in freaking hell am I going to help her out. This is one time that she is going to have to shovel because there is no way to get into the driveway let alone into her garage. hehe I'm so mean.

Well, I'm off to take a shower and then head to mom's. Cross your fingers that my fingers won't be too sore to knit. sigh

Congrats

To Melissa for winning the yummy sock yarn. I'll have that out to you on Monday. Well that is if I can get out of the darn house that is. lol

Right now all of Northeastern Iowa is under a freaking blizzard warning. They are talking a foot of snow here in addiction to the ice and rain. Right now most of the roads are closed. Many large highways are closed because of multiple downed power lines. There are over 100,000 houses without power right now. Scary chit man.

I have a feeling that we will not be leaving the house again tomorrow. Today we stayed in the house and played games on the pc. I only opened the door once, turned back around and grabbed a blanket. hehe

I'm supposed to start training for the clinic job. I may not take it though. Got a call from my mom that they aren't even going to pay me $7 an hour for it. Ummmmmm I ain't going anywhere for less than $7. So Monday, I'm gonna give the temp agency a call. Plus I have no clue if the roads will be opened back up. If there is no school, I'm not going anywhere.

I finished the hat and booties for my cousin. I'll get a picture of them before I give them to her. My mom wants me to add ribbon to them. It's not enough that I made the damn thing without even using a pattern. They aren't "pretty" enough for her. My question is, who the hell puts ribbon on a stocking cap??

I've started a scarf using the bright green sock yarn. I was going to add in the yellow stuff, but upon winding it, I realized it had pink and orange in it too. It just would be too much competition with the variegated green yarn. I'm doing a basic feather and fan pattern. I'm thinking it looks quite lovely. The yarn is nice and squishy and stretchy. The only part I'm not liking is how the bottom of the "waves" rolls up. Depending on how much of the yarn I use up in knitting the length, I'm thinking I'll put a very simple single crochet edge around the whole thing.

What Your Soul Really Looks Like

You are a warm hearted and open minded person. It's easy for you to forgive and forget. You are a grounded person, but you also leave room for imagination and dreams. You feet may be on the ground, but you're head is in the clouds. You believe that people see you for how you are, not how you look. But deep down, you know that's not exactly true. Your near future is in a very different place (both physically and mentally) from where you are right now. For you, love is all about caring and comfort. You couldn't fall in love with someone you didn't trust.

Inside the Room of Your Soul

You Are 52% Abnormal

You are at medium risk for being a psychopath. It is somewhat likely that you have no soul. You are at high risk for having a borderline personality. It is very likely that you are a chaotic mess. You are at low risk for having a narcissistic personality. It is unlikely that you are in love with your own reflection. You are at high risk for having a social phobia. It is very likely that you feel most comfortable in your mom's basement. You are at medium risk for obsessive compulsive disorder. It is somewhat likely that you are addicted to hand sanitizer.

How Abnormal Are You?

hehe Always knew I was weird, but I thought I was weirder than that. :OP

300!?!?!?!

Nick says his momma is crazy for doing this stuff. lol I took that picture a few days ago before giving the kid a hair cut. He looks much better now. lol

And yes, this is my 300th post! More details on that at the bottom along with the crappy contest info.

Here is the bright ass yarn that I'm going to make a scarf with. Believe me, in person, this yarn is much brighter. Almost neon looking. I've got a black coat, so I'm not worried about matching colors. I'm pretty sure that it's from Fearless Fibers. She does some really amazing colors.

Now a bit of advice. There is an eBay store called Knittems. You might be tempted to buy one of their huge 2 lb "skeins" of yarn. Don't do it!!! Well not unless you have a huge, I mean huge, swift to hold the yarn. Otherwise you are going to end up with this.

Yes, that is all the same skein of yarn. This is after winding off a huge ball of yarn already. I'm not sure where I packed it away in the closet or I would have taken a picture of it too. Anyways, the yarn turns into a total mess of a knot no matter what I have tried to do. It started out as a nicely tied skein, but once it was untied, the "fun" began. Did I mention that I've been winding yarn off of this for at least 6 months? It's probably been closer to a year. I had to pack it away for awhile there. Someday, I'm hoping that this will turn into a sweater or even a twin set. I'm not going to hold my breath though. hehe

And now for the fun stuff. The contest.

The first person to comment on this here post, will receive this lovely skein of sock yarn.

It's from RubySapphire Yarns and handpainted by Lauri in Lavender Rose. I've bought several skeins of their yarn and it is yummy and very soft. This skein is approximately 4oz/420 yards of sport weight Merino.

I tell ya, I'm half tempted to keep this skein and dig out one of the big name brands and give that away. Goodness knows I've got lots of that hidden away too. hehe Contrary to the amount of pink and purple yarn I seem to buy, I really don't wear those colors much. I need to stick to the blues and greens. For some reason lately though, I've been really attracted to autumn colors though. Not sure why though. I'm not a big fan of brown or orange. heh

Anyways, I'm gonna go pass out now. I carbed out at dinner and I'm pooped now. Ok, now someone please leave me a nice comment and make sure you have an email address included. If I can't contact you, I can't send ya the yarn now can I? hehe Toodles!

Is it me?

Or is the blogging world a little quiet right now?

Not a whole lot to report here. I ripped back the purple baby hat because I forgot I wasn't making a preemie hat and boy howdy was it short. hehe I'm about halfway done with the decreases. Maybe I'll have pictures later.

I would have had the hat done, but I decided to work on the pink sweater. I do believe I've managed to teach myself how to knit backwards with a bit of speed and accuracy. I would have gotten more done on the darn thing if I the yarn wasn't so splitty. I keep finding spots where the yarn has split and there is a stitch made only with part of the strand. So, I had to keep dropping stitches back and fixing them. I've actually gotten pretty good at that too. hehe

I know I mentioned a contest the other day. Not that anyone asked me for details or anything. :OP This here post makes 299 posts. I'm thinking that if someone, anyone, comments on my next post, I'll just have to give the first person something. That is assuming someone actually comments. I think I'll have to get the big tote out from under the bed and see what pretty sock yarn I can come up with.

I'm thinking I need to make myself another scarf. This time out of wool. I've been wearing an old acrylic scarf I made a few years back and I'm really just loving it. It is super long and I can wrap it around my head twice, but it just isn't very soft. I think I have some bright yellow and bright green sock yarn in the tote. Maybe I can combine the two and get a bright ass funky scarf out of it. hmmm

Lots to do, lots to do.

Bout time

The laundry job is finally done!! I'm going to miss the ladies that I was working with, but I will NOT miss the job itself. The job was hell on my back.

Turns out I may not have to miss a few of the ladies too much. I've got a line on a part time job at the medical facility that is attached to the hospital. It is 2 or 3 nine hour days a week helping patients sign in and get to their appointments. I've got to call the lady at the temp agency and see about doing orientation. Hopefully, if I do get the job, I'll be able to have lunch with a couple of the ladies that I really got along with. :O)

In knitting news, I've started a baby hat in Caron Sayelle in Spring Blossoms Ombre (0391). A distant cousin is having a baby and they are pretty sure they are having a girl. The mom's favorite color is purple, so hopefully she will like the hat. I want to make a pair of booties too, but I'm not sure if I have a pattern that uses worsted weight yarn. I may just wing it with a toe up generic sock. Cross your fingers that the little dear will be able to wear them before she is 2 years old. hehe

I got out the nifty knitter and I'm working on a hat for myself. I've got a huge head, so I'm using the burgundy loom and 2 strands of white acrylic. It's left over yarn from Nick's sweater that I got off of eBay. Hopefully it will fit. If not, then Nick will just have another hat to wear. If it doesn't fit him, I'll just have to save it for donation at some point or another.

I still haven't gotten my other hard drive all set up. I can't seem to get it to see my modem. It works just fine on this hard drive tyvm. heh I think I'll reformat it again since I haven't actually installed much of anything on there yet. I finally got rid of the viruses on this darn drive, so I think I'll just use this one for my craft stuff. I'll move all the graphics programs and such onto the larger hard drive. If I can't get the internet working, I'll see if I can't find a 40gb or less external hard drive that I can transfer files on.

Once again my mail at Yahoo is locked up. I can't open anything received since yesterday afternoon. Why is it that this only happens on the account I pay for?? I've got a couple free accounts that I've never had a problem with. If my isp account would actually download with any sort of speed, I would go back to having this account be a free one. But unfortunately, my isp mail is twice as slow to download as my Yahoo account. sigh I swear I need to get out of this one horse town and get a cable connection. heh

Ok, I'm off to work on my hats.

OH BOY! OH BOY! OH BOY!

I am in nerd girl heaven here!!!! take a peak I'm a huge huge fan and this would make me so so so so happy!!!!

Knitting?

Yup, I've still been knitting. Not as much as I would like though. I'm starting to think I just need to cut back on the number of groups I'm in or switch them all to digest form.

I put a few rows on the pink sweater tonight. I'm thinking the pattern is in Big Knits or More Big Knits. I'm at the boring stockinette part, so I haven't actually looked at the pattern in a bit. hehe

This part was much more fun. I'm looking forward to getting to the front so I can do it again.

Although, I do have another cone of this yarn and I'm sure I can find another pair of circs to work with. hehe Who am I kidding? I would get the fun part done and then have two parts halfway done. hehe One piece at a time, sweet Jesus. heh

Got my hard drive back from my bro, but I won't be trying to connect it until tomorrow. In fact I'm bout ready to fall asleep right now. Better toss the wash in the dryer first or there will be no work pants for tomorrow. hehe

Talk about scary

I was sitting here reading email when I heard a strange beeping. I asked Nick if he knew what it was. He had no clue. I went out in the living room and couldn't hear it out there.

When I came back in my room I could hear it again. I shrugged it off assuming that it was my neighbor's alarm clock.

Then it hit me. It sounded just like our smoke alarms!! So I got dressed and went over and banged on her door.

Turns out that she was warming up her car in the garage and didn't open the door up all the way. The carbon monoxide detector was going off and she couldn't turn it off. She ended up having to call the maintenance guy. He is a nice guy and came over to check to make sure mine hadn't gone off too.

For about a minute there I was pretty damn scared. I've got tons of stuff in this house and if there was a fire it would go up like a tinderbox. shiver

hmmmmm

I've done a bit of cleanup on the ole blog. I removed my digital pets. I've saved the code or them and I'll make a little page for them later. I can't put them in a post because blogger doesn't allow javascript in a post. In the template is fine but not in a post. Ummmm ok whatever. heh

I also went back through to count up how many comments I've gotten on this crappin blog. Turns out I've had 211 comments on 293 posts. Doesn't sound too bad until I realized that most of my comments occurred in 2005. I would get 3 or 4 comments on each post. Any more I'm lucky if I get 1 comment on 1 out of every 5 posts. lol I guess I'm slipping.

Nobody loves me any more!!!! wwwwwhhhhhhaaaaaaaaaa

hehehehehehe

Well the major thing that has cut into my comments is that my biggest 2 commenters aren't in the blog world any more. Jon has gone and gotten him a man and deleted his blog. I can't even express how much I miss that boy. Anyone heard from him?? Laura still has a blog, but she hasn't posted in months and months. But, she has found a new calling in life with the Preemie Project.

Oh well. I'm just gonna have to start commenting on all the blogs that I read a little more often. Maybe they will come visit me too. hehe I read a lot of blogs, but I don't comment nearly as much as I should.

Btw, I wasn't able to find a dentist to see me today. I'll give my regular guy a call on Monday, but he isn't going to be happy with me. It has been far too long since I've visited him. He is a sweet guy but I have a phobia about dentists. Just have to be careful to chew on the left until I can get in to see him.

Well, I'm gonna go work on my gloves and then hit the sack. I'm pooped. I'm still thinking on which yarn to pony up to one of the few people who stop by here. Definately going to be sock yarn. Most likely something I got off of eBay or Etsy. We shall see. We shall see.

Someone up there hates me

I was sitting here a few minutes ago eating an ice cream cone and the fates smacked me in the head. Yes I admit, I didn't need the ice cream, but I was hungry for something sweet. I shouldn't have touched it because it was the last one and I should have left it for my son.

But nnooooooooo I had to eat it.

And now I have a broken tooth.

About 9 years ago, I had 2 root canals done but I never had the money to have the crowns put on. I hadn't had one single problem with them in all this time.

Until now....

The back of one of the teeth is loose and wiggling all over.

I have no clue if there are any dentist's offices open tomorrow. None of the dentists in the yellow pages says that they are available on an emergency basis or are open on the weekend. I haven't seen my regular dentist in quite some time. I wouldn't doubt it if he wouldn't see me. I know one time I got hurt and knocked my front teeth backwards and he just was sick that he didn't get my call.

gaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

I need to get my shit together and figure out what I have left after my bills are paid off and file my damn taxes. I have another tooth that is broken and I know he will insist on fixing that one too.

Excuse me while I go and have another drink and thank God that I don't grind my teeth.

One more day???

HA!!!

I suppose I should be flattered that I'm in such demand. Somehow, it doesn't make me all warm and fuzzy. Seriously, I think she just doesn't want to train someone for just one week of work.


The good news is that I won't be going in until 8:30. The bad news is that I'll be working until at least 3:30. I'm glad I'll have more time with the ladies at work. I do really like several of them.

Just a taste of the chill here in Iowa.

The neighbor lady finally decided to shovel part of her side of the driveway. I say part, because there is still a large portion full of snow near our garage doors. Something is better than nothing.

No new knitting pictures. I just haven't added much length to the scarf and I haven't worked on anything else. I do need to make a baby hat and some booties for a cousin. Her favorite color is purple and so far they are pretty sure they are having a girl. No sight of a winkie in any of the ultrasounds. I've got some variegated Caron Sayelle in a purple and cream color.

Nothing else of interest to report. Hopefully this weekend I'll be rebuilding my computer and I really need to get some housework done. Mom will be bringing the kid home after school all this week and as the house is now, she would freakin kill me. She is a total neatnik. I am not. hehe

Ok, I'm off to watch the news and eat a little dinner.

One

more

day

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Give me strength to survive it.

2 days

2 more stinking days. Then it is freedom!!!!

Finally got the whole kid getting to school problem. Not before I had a total freak out.

Turns out my mom didn't actually get permission to take the kid to school each morning.

I found this out at 5:30 this morning while driving to work.

Turns out Dad is working the overnight shift and will be home before Mom has to leave for work. So, the kid is spending the night at my folks house. Dad will be taking the kid to school.

I have no clue what I'll be doing next week. I'm actually hoping for a few days off. I need to recover from all this 4am shit.

I'm gonna miss the gals that I've been working with. I intend to give at least one of them my email address. I'm trying to infect her with the fiber love. hehehe She knows how to crochet and has knit in the past. I gave her two skeins of silver fun fur shit to make a scarf with along with a scarf that I knit up for my sister in law but never gave her. I've been trying to show her again how to cast on. She has a baby blanket she wants to get finished for a friend of hers first though.

Susie just had a contest on her blog. I jokingly asked if that was how people got all the comments, running contests. She told me I should run a contest on here. lol It might happen. This is post 291. Maybe I'll give something away when I hit 300 posts. I'm sure any comments I might actually get would be from someone who's blog I read since only about 5 people actually read my blather. lol All I know, is that whoever does win better like sock yarn. I've got more sock yarn than I could ever knit up.

Anyways, it's time to hit the sack. Might leave the tv on so I can watch LOST. Love that show.

Night, night.

pictures

Decided to play around with the new camera a little bit.

First my finished green socks.

The heel on the left one does fit. I just didn't pull the sock on all the way I guess.

The foot detail.

Instep/heal area.



And the blue scarf I'm working on. Skein included to show scale.


Close up.


I only did a little editing on the brightness and contrast. I didn't touch the hue and it is pretty true for both the socks and the scarf. And yes, I crocheted the afghan in the background. It is done in the afghan stitch with Lion Brand Homespun. The stuff pills like shit but it is soft and warm and that is the only thing that really matters.

So, is this camera a lil better than the old one? lmao

Excuse me while I cry

Life is trying to kick my ass.

For starters, it is freaking freezing here in Iowa. -10 before you add in the windchill. They delayed school 2 hours today and it looks like it will be delayed 2 hours again tomorrow.

The babysitter's car has died. She snuck the kid onto the school bus this morning, but we have no clue if they will let him ride the rest of the week. Mom has to be to work by 7:30, so she can't take him to school. Soooooo if they won't let him ride the bus, I have to say see ya to the job I've got right now. Well that is unless they don't mind me coming in at 8:30. Yeah right!!

Speaking of cars, my blower motor is going out. About 70% of the time, I have no heat in the car. Did I mention that it is -10 here??? bbbbbbbrrrrrrrrrrrrrr I really need to call my lil bro and find out if he is able to replace it for me. I would rather give him some money than a garage that will take me for all they can get.

To top it off, Nick just called me into the living room. There is no picture on the tv. There is sound, but no picture. uuunnnnnggggghhhhhhhhh It's about 7 years old. The tv in Nick's room is about 15 yrs old and still works just fine. I do believe his tv is gonna be going into the living room for awhile.

Cross your fingers that the kid can get to school tomorrow. So long as he can get to school, I can work the rest of the week. Now, I'm gonna go take a shower so the kid won't hear me throwing a hissy fit. sigh

Wheeee!!!

Bought myself a new camera finally. I haven't played with it much yet, so no pictures to show. It was already dark before I got home. I'll have to play with it tomorrow. I know I owe y'all a picture of the finished green socks.

No new knitting news. I just lazed around today. I might play around with the gloves idea in a bit. Or i just might head to bed. hehe Someday I'll be able to stay awake past 9:30 without turning into a zombie. lol

well crud

Turns out the laundry job isn't done. The boss asked me to come back next week. The kid is not happy with me. I promised him this morning that he wouldn't have to get up so early any more.

Whooops!

The other temps are not coming back. I'm the lucky one. That is because they trained me on a bunch of the jobs there. They gave up on trying to train the guys on how to do anything. Talk about some slow pokes. Neither one could find his own ass with a map and a flashlight.

It's also looking like the one chick that I can't stand at the laundry might just get her ornery ass fired. She has been getting yelled at a whole lot the last week. When I left today she was in the office again getting her ass chewed out. bwaaahhhaahhhhaaahhhhaaaaa Who knows, maybe they will offer me her job since they have me more than half trained to do it. hehe

Nothing much new in the knitting news. I finally spliced on a second skein of the blue alpaca and added a few inches to the blue scarf before taking my usual nap during the news. lol I'm also seriously thinking about making myself a pair of gloves. I'm not thinking about something real thick, maybe just something to wear under my leather work gloves that I wear for driving. I've got some rainbow Hot Sox sock yarn that I'm putzing with. I had half a sock done in it and I ripped it out last night. I know I would never ever wear the rainbow socks. hehe

Out of curiosity, do any of y'all have a paid Yahoo email account? It seems like every 4 months or so I'm unable to open new emails for about 4 or 5 days. Doesn't matter if I restart my computer and clear out the temp files. Doesn't matter if I use a different browser. I can open up the new spam mail but not my regular mail. Pisses me off. Plus, I have other free accounts with Yahoo and I can read the mail just fine. It's just the paid account that is fubar. sigh

Oh well, time to hit the sheets. Need to hit the stores tomorrow. Found out I've got almost $300 on my food stamps card that is about to expire. I had no clue at all that it was on there. I haven't gotten any food stamps in a year. Gonna stock up on spaghetti o's and chicken nuggets for the kid. heh

good news ... bad news

Ok, so the good news is kinda bad too but I think the good outweighs the bad. The laundry job is done tomorrow. :O) Yes, I'll be out of a job, but I also won't have to be getting up at 4 in the freaking morning.

Nick has NOT been dealing well with being woke up at quarter after 5 every day. Each morning this week he has complained about still being tired when I get him dressed. He has also been acting up at school. Not getting his work done. Sticking his tongue out at his teacher. Still trying to kill himself. hehe He came in from playing yesterday with a freaking fat lip!! I swear I can't take him out in public for fear the cops will question me about abusing him. I don't even spank the boy.

He isn't the only complete klutz in the house either. I've got the cuts and bruises to prove it. :P

When I went to get out of bed this morning, I completely lost my balance. I wasn't dizzy or anything but I didn't even make it standing straight up before I fell over. I've got a large scrap/cut on my left shoulder from hitting my small dresser. I also pulled a muscle in my back. I didn't realize until later that I bruised my hand up too. As if my left hand isn't usually painful enough without adding a bruise into the mix.

Plus, I'm getting a damn cold. sigh I keep saying it is some sort of sinus deal. I'm all stuffed up and my sinuses are killing me. I've had a huge headache all day. So either I have a sinus infection, or a cold. Not sure which one is worse. heh

I was hoping to get my other hard drive back this weekend. My brother is saying I'll get it next weekend. :O( The one I'm using has viruses on it and I can't seem to get rid of them. Not all of my programs will work. I was able to reinstall some of them, but not all will work. It's just drivin me bonkers.

Anyways, I figure I'm just going to enjoy having a few days off of work. Hopefully the temp agency will have me back to work sometime next week, but frankly at the moment, I wouldn't care if I had a week off and could sleep in until 7am. hehehe

cool