Isn't this cool?

So, like, just so you know, I really don't talk about one little thing. Here is the pattern:

Another really long post with numbers because I didn't feel like writing anything all week.

I suck. I know it.

1. First off, I sent like a dozen people over here to have a look, and then didn't post anything for several days. Hi new people! Hope you stay a while! If I don't post, then just feel free to look through the archives. I wrote some good stuff. And some junk too but just ignore that.

2. Anyway, I finished the little brown socks, and they are in an envelope. And the envelope is in my purse. I forgot to take a picture first, though. So yeah. I frogged that mitt thing, back to nothing, and I have restarted it, but I am still not happy with it and I am starting to worry about wearing the yarn out. It is really nice, (plus pricy) and so I don't want to wreck it.

3. I baked brown bread, it turned out GREAT. Even better than the white. So I have the bread down now. I also baked these awesome cookies. They are chocolate with white chips on one half, and the other half is regular chocolate chips. I even took pictures, but I don't feel like hooking up the camera tonight. Actually, I haven't felt like hooking up the camera for the past few nights, and that is mainly why I haven't posted. Maybe I will do the pics in a separate post.

4. Travis's birthday is coming up very soon. I asked Ian what he wanted to get Daddy for his birthday, and he said "a special car shirt". This is the first time Ian has ever come up with something on his own that he wanted to give someone. So I took him to the mall. We went to EVERY SINGLE STORE and the only one with a car on it was bright blue with a pink hatchback. I could have driven out to Bayers Lake to go to the little store that sells model cars, but I decided to check Zellers first, and I found this t-shirt that you are supposed to put hand prints on. It says, "World's Greatest Dad Hands Down" So we did up the hand shirt, and I drew a car on it with the paint. Plus it is white, so he can wear it under his work clothes. Mission accomplished! Daddy will get a VERY special car shirt for his birthday.

5. I told some people this tale, but I don't think that I wrote it in here. You all remember I got a new computer ? Well, I cleaned out the old one and got it all geared up with Windows XP. Then I put an ad on Kijiji. This woman called me, and she wanted to know if her hard drive would work in it. She said she builds computers, so I assumed she knew what she was doing. So she puts her hard drive in. Doesn't work. Then she puts mine back. Doesn't work. She fiddles with it for a while, and then it doesn't work, so she says "I can't deal with this right now, call me when you get it working" and leaves. Of course, I don't know what is wrong with it, so I got ahold of a guy I know to have a look at it. But he has been busy, so he didn't fix it until today. Luckily, it works again fine. Good as new. So I guess I have to put the ad back up now, anyway. Anybody want to buy a computer?

6. That was my good news, my bad news is I am an idiot. An idiot who sucks. On Sunday I was out at the CO's briefing for the ship, and when I left, I got my sunglasses out of my case and put them on. I then put my glasses in the case, went to the car, and put the glasses on the roof. I then proceeded to put the kid in the car, then I got in the car and drove home.

Do you see the problem?

ANYHOO...

So I went in on Monday, and $203 and 4 days later, I will have new glasses. Hopefully, by 4 days, they mean Thursday (tomorrow) because I reaaaally don't want to wait until Friday. I am currently wearing glasses from 1998, with chipped paint, a broken nosepiece that stabs me, and a big crack in the arm that is threatening to come loose at any moment. Also, the prescription is off a bit, and I have a headache. (another excuse for not posting)

7. Last but not least, I am supposed to have the Day Off tomorrow! Woot! Ian is going to Uncle and Auntie's to play with his little cousin and spend the night. What will I do? Well I have BIG PLANS! I plan to go to the MFRC and drop off Travis's birthday parcel, and order my Homecoming T-shirt. I plan to go to the stitch n bitch in Dartmouth, and I plan to SLEEP PAST 9am! Sooo excited. Hopefully it all pans out for me.

Anyway, I am aware I could have done a post a day for the last few days and gotten all of that in. But isn't anticipation more fun? Stay tuned tomorrow (or not) for the above pictures. With all the comments and new readers, I have an OBLIGATION to keep my word, don't I?

Thanks for TMI, Ian!

Running by me on his way to the loo:

"I have to go pee, Mama! But poop will help too!"

This n that. (Plus knitted stuff and lots of links to old blog posts)

First off, I want to thank everybody for the well wishes. I was having a lousy day and needed to vent. It's not all bad around here. We have good times as well. Besides, I broke down and asked the local relatives, and Ian is going away over night a week from Thursday. And I heard rumours of a Knit Night in Dartmouth....

I know my posting has been a bit scarce as of late, but honestly, I have been really busy. Here are some highlights:

1. We went for a walk. Here is a picture of Ian and our cat. She is not allowed out, so we were a bit surprised to see her:

Want a previous picture of Phoebe? See here, and here.

 

But then she turned around and I was all like "wait a minute..."

OMG! That's SO not my cat! It is just an eerily similar lookalike!  Here it is standing on its little hind feet because it WANTED to be petted. (clearly not my cat at all)

2. We drove out to the valley. We stopped at Hennigar's, of course. Ian was a little short for Corn:

But just right for Pepper!

You can see previous pics from Hennigar's here. (It's the one with the tractor)

Eventually we reached our destination:

 

Some of Ian's even made it into the bucket!

Successful Picture Of Nature! (It was bound to happen sooner or later... previous attempts here)

We picked about 13 pints of blueberries, which cost me $11.75 (plus about $985,678,987.87 for gas to drive to the valley, but still) They are running about $3/pt in the city, more or less, depending where you go. I worked my tail off and made jam, syrup, and pies. I also baked bread. My busyness has probably contributed to Ian's misbehaviour, as he has not been the centre of attention.

It may have been worth it. Pancakes with my own syrup! This plate is in my own kitchen!

 

3. I have been knitting. Fantastic, wonderful things!

I finished these a few weeks ago. They have been gifted already:

I threw out the ball bands already, but they were knit with DGB Confetti and a plain sock pattern.

The following projects are gifts for people. If it is for you, you will know it when you see it, please forget you ever saw it and/or act surprised.

I finished this scarf:

 

When I got this yarn, I started a spiralling rib pattern but the scarf was curling badly, and I was really unhappy with it. So I ripped it back and did this instead. It was knit using James C. Brett Marble, shade MT6. I used one ball, 100 grams, but the scarf could have stood to be a little longer. The pattern is based on the Swelligant Scarf from this book, which I have made before here and here. I modified it a bit, I took out the middle cable, and I made the second cable twist in front so it would be symmetrical.

Then I did this:

which was supposed to be done about a month ago, but isn't. And yes, just the one. It shouldn't take long to do the second one, because it is little, but I a) don't really like socks. I feel like a bad knitter, but it's true. And b) it is knit using the remnants from this, and I am terrified of running out of yarn. The pattern is the same as above, just a basic sock, only littler. Maybe I should try another pattern, and I would enjoy socks more. But I had a lot more fun knitting the scarf, let me tell you.

I also noticed while looking for the post about the original socks, that I never blogged about them. I guess it just goes to show I knit more than I let on. A lot of the time stuff I knit is meant for gifts, and I don't like posting it until they get it. But then I forget to post at all. So that being said, from now on I will post when I finish stuff, and if you like being surprised, you just need to get over it. This goes hand in hand with my other vow for Low Stress Knitting. What I was doing was to have a birthday or whatever coming up, and I would work my tail off to get a project done, and I wouldn't, and it would be late. Sometimes, so late, they wouldn't go out at all and I would end up buying something. So instead, I am going to knit whatever I feel like, and if it is for someone, it will go in a gift box. Then if it is their birthday, I will just look in the box, and if there is nothing for them in there I will go buy something. Before the birthday.

And so, since I don't feel like knitting a second sock right now I am going to work on these:

 

Which are going to be fingerless mittens or wristwarmers from the uber yummy yarn I mentioned here and here. I couldn't find a pattern I liked so I am just kinda winging it. I love how the yarn is striping in the opposite direction of the ribs. I am doing a spiralling rib, and I am currently stuck because I need to increase for the hand, but I can't quite figure out how to do that without disturbing the pattern. As I said, I have never made this before, so it is taking some thinking. But I know when they are done they will be awesome. And they will be MINE ALL MINE!!! Mwahahahahaha!

The Results are In!

Five people voted on whether or not they would swim in the harbour. Sheesh, people! Five votes? You should have been telling all your friends!

Of those five, two said Ewww! No!, one said Yeah For sure!, and two said they were coming to visit.

I am really looking forward to having the both of you, but.... ummm... I don't really have a guest room any more, you know!

The poll is closed (for like a week, I know. But hey, I suck) and I will be removing that feature. Because it reminds me of my laziness.

Rope: At the end of.

You know, I had all kinds of cool things to say, because we got a lot of stuff done this week. Not only the bedrooms, but we drove out to the valley and picked blueberries, and then I made about everything you can think of with blueberries, and then canned it. I sorted my yarn, and organized my projects, and I wanted to post some pictures of it and actually write something about the knitting I have been attempting.

But really, I am just fricking tired. Ian is driving me crazy. Now don't get me wrong, he's a good kid. But he has selective hearing. He is completely unable to hear the sound of my voice. When I say something, he either ignores me completely or actually laughs in my face. Sometimes, I will ask him to pick up his toys and he cries as if he is being horribly, painfully tortured. And this is not just sometimes. It is all the time. At home, in public. I had to drag him out crying half way through a birthday party today because he was deliberately trying to wreck things and knock over drinks, and he ignored me when I asked him to stop. I had to buy one of those backpack harness things because he likes to run away and hide in stores.

I.
Am.
Going.
Nuts.

Seriously.

I counted. Since Travis left, I have been away from Ian a total of six times. That's it. I don't get to go to work and think about something else. I don't take him to preschool yet. I hate wasting money on a babysitter, and I hate imposing on people.

This is really getting to me.

My temper is running out with the kid too. I usually have a lot of patience with him when it comes to stuff. I will just keep telling him, show him, whatever. But I am losing my grip. Plus, I don't have a lot of friends here, and I don't get to talk to anybody BUT Ian most days. And believe me, the endless "Thomas has six small wheels" conversation is wearing thin.

That's not to say he is all bad, he doesn't throw temper tantrums, he goes to bed good. He eats like a pig, but he isn't picky. I would just like to be able to say "here's your clothes, put them on and come upstairs" without having to hold him down and dress him after telling him 80 times.

Is that too much to ask?

I also had a solo vacation for myself in mind for November, or so, but that is looking like it is going to be kiboshed as well. So it is looking like no end in sight for me.

Oh well. Only 76 more days until Travis gets home. Then I am going to get a job and let him deal with this.

Large Job...Done!

So I had one large room, which was my "spare" room aka huge junk depository, and one small room, which was Ian's room. I decided to swap, because Ian is getting too big for a little room and a toddler bed.

 

I started off the day when Ian pointed out that I had an "owie"

 

Freaky, eh? I don't even know how it happened. It doesn't hurt or anything, but its a pretty big, dark bruise to not know how it happened.

 

Anyhoo, here are some shots of Ian's room before (the small bedroom):

 

And this is the old spare room. It was getting seriously out of hand, and it seemed like such a big job I was afraid to tackle it. I couldn't even close the door anymore!

 

I moved all of Ian's stuff to my room, and scrubbed the walls and vacuumed, then started putting the spare room stuff in Ian's old room. Here's how things looked at lunch time:

Small bedroom:

Big bedroom:

 

I gave Ian a huge pile of stuff and told him to put it in the laundry room. Then he kinda disappeared. I found him in the dirty laundry trying to take a nap:

Yeah, that is a LOT of laundry.

I finished all of the work about 4pm. Here are Ian's old room (new spare room) finished:

 

 

I know it looks messy, but it is very tidy, and accessible. When Travis gets home, we need to go through it all and get rid of a lot of it. Also, no yarn in there, I took it upstairs to be sorted out.

 

Ian's new room, (old spare room)

The bed wasn't made yet because all the double size bedding is in the wash. I did get a foamy mattress topper and a vinyl mattress protector. I didn't buy any special bedding for him because I haven't decided if I want to get him a twin bed or bunk bed yet. I am kinda waffling on that. In the mean time, I am looking for a free or next to free dresser so I can use that shelf for something else.

This was such a huge job, I have been meaning to do it since Christmas, but I just couldn't get started, and it wasn't something I could do in bits, either. Once I started, I had to finish that day. I am sooooo glad to be finished. Sorry to say, though, if anybody comes to visit, I am not really sure where I will put you. At least the couch pulls out, ha ha!

Amidst all the kafuffle, Ian found his carefully hidden drum set. (Thanks again Chrys) So I set it up for him, and he treated me to a Job Well Done concert. Beats Elton John any day! (Ok, it doesn't, but if I keep telling myself that, maybe I will start to believe it)

 

 

 

(The video is taking forever to process on YouTube... if it isn't working, check back later. If it is not working by tomorrow I will upload again and edit the post. But the post is ready except for the video so I am going to go ahead and post it.)