Proof that I really can, when I want to, knit heels.
And that Keaton is cute when he is chillaxin’.
Monthly Archives: July 2011
It totally counts
I didn’t do anything for Tour de Fleece this year. I should have made a goal and then tried to meet it, but there is so much going on and so much decluttering and organizing that I want to get done. If part of what I want to get done includes getting the yarn and half finished afghan out of a basket in my room that is taking up much needed space, it follows that crocheting counts as decluttering. Right? I need more room, or less stuff. How do I get both without getting rid of stuff that I want to keep and not moving to a bigger house? Well, my stash is taking up a lot of space, so again, crocheting and knitting and spinning to use up the stash that is taking up space counts as organizing and decluttering. I like this plan. I proud to be a part of it.
This afghan was sitting unfinished in a basket at the foot of the bed. Since I finished it, it now lives in Danica’s room instead of mine. Decluttering at its best 🙂
I have recently created more spinning stash and I’m dyeing (heh) to create more. I’ve made one batch of each of the Neon food colors.
It looks red on my monitor but it really is more of a dark pink, I promise.
Here is another batch of fiber that I dyed. I’m not sure if I got what I was going for or not.
I was trying to recreate some colors I had admired in an old Spin Off magazine. I wasn’t happy just after I gave up finished dyeing it, but it looked a lot better the next morning. I think the dyeing fairies must be related to the tole painting fairies in that they come in the night and fix things while you sleep.
So, I’m plotting new things to dye and now that my bare yarn is here (and I still have fiber left) I can spend another day in the kitchen having fun. While at WalMart, I found condiment squeeze jars that will be PERFECT for hand dyeing some fiber and yarn.
I just have to decide on what colors I want to use. Wait, I want to use all of them, so I need to decide on what colors I want to use NEXT. Hmmm… still all of them. I may have to resort to putting colors in a hat and have a kid draw one out. Well, not the bottles of color, that could make a huge mess and we all know how well I avoid messes. *cough*
Birthday, stash, fireworks and a relocation of knit night. Oh my.
Birthday
The fireworks were for my birthday. Mom always said so. 🙂 She told me while growing up that the 4th of July fireworks were for my birthday on the 2nd, it just took them a couple of days to get them set up. Every year, I get a little verklempt watching the fireworks and thinking about how I dislike living so far away from my family and so far away from a mom who made a cool event even cooler for a little girl that loved fireworks. She tells me that we would go down to the beach to watch them and I vaguely remember this. I don’t remember going anywhere to see them when we lived in Houston. Later when I moved here to Utah there were many places very close to the places I lived where you could easily see the fireworks going off in all the big parks and in BYU stadium. From my front yard in Lehi we could see the fireworks from Thanksgiving Point. Here at my new house it’s a little harder to get a decent view but you can still see some of the high ones. This year regular folks were allowed the buy the 150 foot fireworks so we got to see quite a few of those from just in front of my cute little townhouse here in Orem. They were very enjoyable and I hope they didn’t cause a lot of extra work for our fire and emergency crews.
I had a great birthday. The kids blew up a large number of balloons and I even had a few minutes to enjoy them before they all enthusiastically began popping them. Joshua and Chynna made a cake and Joshua wrote LIE in large letters across the top. AWESOME.
Many candles were then placed on top and happily we didn’t burn the house down.
Stash
My birthday stash arrived 🙂 My friend Wendy and my MIL Dawn gave me Knit Picks gift certificates and I went hog wild. Behold:
The bare yarn will be dyed with all sorts of fun colors, I just have to decide which. The circular knitting case will hold my ever growing pile of circular knitting needles. I purchase three more of the Knit Picks nickel plated needles as part of my birthday stash. The palette yarn is for a mitten pattern called Swedish Fish by Spilly Jane.
My combo birthday pressie/Christmas pressie/everything else for the year pressie from my mother was my fabulous spinning wheel. From my hubby a little over a month ago I got my really cool Toshiba Qosmio laptop. 18.5″ screen (yes, size does matter) Intell Core i7 processor with 8 GB of RAM 🙂
My poor knit night 🙁
For the past year I’ve been attending knit night at my local Borders. We met in the cafe starting around 6:00 pm and staying until they tossed us out. I loved that place, it was my first real encounter with a knit night and I adored being among “my people” as the Yarn Harlot calls it. Borders is closing all of the rest of their stores and last night there was a sign saying that the cafe will close this Thursday. We have to find a new place to meet. Because we met in a bookstore my daughter Danica would usually come with me and sit and read books while the rest of us spun or knitted. I enjoyed having a regular night out with her and I’m going to miss that. The Border’s cafe was a wonderful location. My knitting magazines were in easy reach for me grab as soon as they hit the stands. Fabulous caramel machiattos, and strawberry kula smoothies were nearby. We had comfy chairs and it was really close to my house. I’m really going to miss that place. We’re not even going to go into the social anxiety of going to a new place and probably without my support system in the form of Danica.
Fun at the DMV
It was time to renew my driver’s license. Long gone were the days when the DMV would just send you your new license in the mail. Thank you to illegal immigrants, terrorists and identify thieves who have caused our government to deem it necessary to jump us through more hoops to prove our identity.
Knowing ahead of time this process can be complicated and time consuming, I went online to find out what the DMV requires. I found the application that I could fill out and print in advance to save time. I arrived to find out that the form had changed long ago and no one has bothered to update it. I had to go back, fill out the “new” form and get in line again.
Somehow I’ve lost my registered copy of my birth certificate. I’m not sure how since I’ve lugged that same envelope with the registered copy and a photocopy in it around for the last 27 years to wherever I’ve needed to show a birth certificate. It is possible that during other fruitless attempts to update/replace the social security cards of myself and my children that the registered copy was lost. Thankfully I was issued a temporary and thankfully the DMV guy either didn’t notice, or didn’t care that my SS card had my old name on it.
So, I get to show my driver’s license to a notary to swear to them that I am who I say I am so that I can order another birth certificate. Yes, you read that correctly. Show my driver’s license. What do people do if they have lost everything? The flood, hurricane, tornado victims… It’s crazy in the making. And because there are some people out there that are not honest, we can’t take your word for it that you are who you say you are.
And a few days later when I finally make it to the bank…yep, no notary is in that day. Gah!
A few days after that I went to the bank again and this time there was notary available. My check and my letter to the Bureau of Vital Statistics in California will shortly be on its way and hopefully in FOURTEEN WEEKS I will have my replacement birth certificate.
Ditch wasn’t happy about it either.
A hubby’s birthday
Happy Birthday to the most wonderful man I have ever met.
He is amazing, fabulous, kind, considerate, loyal, and my very best friend. Life with him has truly made me see that marriage is not God’s ultimate joke on Mankind (yes, I said Mankind, cope).
He is also knit worthy 🙂
