Happy Thanksgiving!

A little silly, happy music to get you through the holiday! :)

Happy Birthday To Me!

Ok, my birthday was actually yesterday.. but still! :)

First off, I want to thank everyone for their wonderful comments & support!! It really meant a lot to me! You guys rock!!

My birthday was very nice. My sister, niece & parents chipped in & got me a sandisk mp3 player so that I can listen to music at my new hip job! Whee! Its 2GB & holds about 500 songs! Perfect! :)

And my honey? Well... He overheard me admiring Jillian's Jordana Paige knitting bag a few months ago at her "Big Girl Knits" signing at Nicola's Books. He REMEMBERED the bag! I never even mentioned it to him! So, the beautiful bag you see below is currently on its way to my door. He ordered it a few weeks ago, but its not scheduled to arrive until Monday. Poor thing was really bummed that it didn't arrive in time. Is he the best or what!!

My mom is doing better (actually able to sit up & feed herself) and has gained a little bit of weight back. Right now her condition seems to be stable, but we don't know for how long. Hospice is unable to tell us what her "status" is, they just don't know if this is a temporary recovery.

I am still without a computer at home. The harddrive crashed a few weeks ago & I haven't been able to get it fixed yet. That's the downside of my fabulous new job, no pay check for 3 weeks...

Quick Update

My harddrive crashed at home, so I haven't had a computer in over a week! (sigh)

Just a few quick little updates for ya...

I HAVE A NEW JOB!!!! Everybody say "WOO HOO!!" XD

I started at AMG yesterday. Sooo happy! No more psycho boss!!! WHEEEEEEE!

Ok, so now the bad news.
My mom came home on Friday. She was enrolled back into hospice. They came out yesterday and changed her status to "Active"... which means she is actively dieing. I don't know how long she will last, but I don't think it will be very long. She hasn't really eaten in days (when she came home on Friday she weighed 85lbs!) and she really isn't drinking anything.

Hospice has taken her off all her medications except 3: morphine, a drug for congestion, and a drug to ease "restlessness".

So that's whats going on right now. Probably won't blog for awhile. :(

WOW! I have a BLOG?!

Yeah, so its been quite a while. Crazyness ensuing everywhere. blah blah blah...

So, major points of whats going on right now...

1. Mom was back in the hospital, now is in nursing home... for how long we don't know. She has been enrolled in hospice care.
2. Job, which has always sucked ass, has taken the penultimate turn for the worse.. nearly walked out on Wednesday. Now, frantically looking for a new one. Have received an email interview invitation from honey's company. Will probably have an interview this coming week. WHEE!
3. Diet & Exercise - SUCKS! I have been pretty faithful to the eating right thang and have been working out 2-3 times a week. Not an ounce or inch has been lost! GRRRR
4. Honey & I went to an infertility doc... again. Previously we just weren't really ready to go through it all. I am starting on Progesterone today and should have a period in 2 weeks. Then, all the tests begin... blood draws up the ying-yang & a sonohystriogram, which is supposed to be very OW! Boys got it easy! All they gots to do is make love to a plastic cup! sigh.

So, that's the scoop. Yes, there is knitting in there somewhere. I am working on a pair of socks using some Lorna's Laces that I got at ThreadBear, and am making this...

Lift & Separate Sweater from
Big Girl Knits

with some Alpaca with a Twist's Baby Twist in Fawn.. so soft, so yummy...

So, I will try to update more often.. but ya know, the crazyness just keeps ensuing...

OW. Feel the Burn... (whimper)

First off, thanks to all the well wishes & encouragement! They are greatly appreciated!

Last night I went to Contours Express for my first workout. I must say I was greatly impressed. Everyone there was really nice, the place wasn't crowded & the equipment was in great shape. I am going back for a second trial on Friday, but I think I'm going to go ahead & sign up. The only downfall to this place is the fact that there is no shower.. :(

Needless to say, I totally hurt! Its not an all-over-my-god-it-hurts-to-breathe kinda hurt. More, wow I feel good... I'm just going to reach for my mouse, son-of-a-bitch-where-did-that-muscle-come-from kind of hurt.

But its all good.

Really.

(whimper)

Because I'm Fat, I'm Fat (Shamou)

So, its official. I'm fat. I knew this, its quite obvious thank you.

But today I had my annual check up, and let me tell you that scale is a BITCH!

So my wonderful doc & I had a nice little chat... he really is a great doctor! He was trying to help me come up with a plan that will work for me, and he was really supportive. So, ehm, my plan.. today I am to research fitness facilities in the area and try to visit a few this week. I am to make a decision by the end of the week and call him back to let him know what I've decided. Right now I have it narrowed down to the Ann Arbor YMCA and Contours Express. I'm leaning more towards Contours to start with because a. there are no men and b. there won't be any skinny co-eds there for me to hate! Plus, a co-worker used to go to this particular Contours and recommends it highly.. and she has lost 70lbs since last August!!

So. This is the deal. I am going to be more diligent in eating properly and start working out 3-5 times a week. You all have to keep me motivated!!

And, in the interest of full disclosure and so that my progress can be properly tracked, my current stats are:

5'5" (gotta start off gently)
236lbs (eek!)
size 20
49" bust
44" waist
52" hip

Hey, at least I still have the hourglass figure... mostly...

told you I was fat...

I'm a Complete Failure!

I totally failed Le Tour de Fleece! Its over & I don't think I even got 2 ounces spun!


(sigh)


At least I have adorable pets...

Use for Left-Over Sock Yarn

One of those questions that plague us, what to do with all that left-over sock yarn. Not enough for a third sock, too much to just (gasp) throw out.

Well, here's an idea...


Nope, it's not a premie cap! Maybe this pic will make it clear...

I love the way the bottom looks!!

I adapted the ice cream pint cozy from Knit Wit by Erica Hohmann. I used the leftover koigu from my mom's socks on size 3 needles and cast on 84 sts. Because I used more stitches I decreased a few times more than the pattern called for, but it seems to work. Plus, it only took like 2 hours to knit up! WHEE!!

btw- mom loves the socks!! She said she was hoping I would make her some! awww...

Happy Birthday MOM!

Ok. I'm a day late, her birthday was actually the 10th, but I was laid up with ickiness (sore throat, congested lungs, general ookiness) and was not up for the blogging. Yeah, I know... I get sick a lot. But hey, not as much as I used to!

Anyways, mom will be getting her b-day present later this week. I want to make sure the ookiness is completely gone before visiting. The last thing she needs is to get sick on top of all her other woes!

Anywho, y'all are gonna get a sneak peek at her b-day gifty!


The eagle-eyed reader may recognize these as the finished Hedera socks! I decided to gift them to mom for 2 reasons.
1. The pattern & yarn are super stretchy, which means they will still fit her when her leg swells up like a balloon.
2. She needs something soft & warm, and I haven't knit her anything in a while.(Yes, I am still working on the sweater for her for x-mas, but the pattern was lost in the move and I have to order it before I can finish it. There's still 6 months, I can do it!!)

In Tour de Fleece news, I am still chuggin along on the cotton, however I am woefully behind. There are only 10 days left & I am not even halfway through the 1st 4oz roving yet! EEK!

So, are you ready for today's big news? Crazy lady gave me a raise! This is shocking! Especially when you consider that my extra $.40 an hour will probably cost her 3 times as much since I am still a measley temp! Granted, this reinforces the idea that I will never get out of this place.

But hey, Google is opening an office in Ann Arbor, they must need admins!! :)

Saturday in the Park

This afternoon we drove out to the Saline Dog Park, which is located in the Mills Pond Park.

Corrina had an absolute blast! She made a few new friends, a little Jack Russell named T-Bone in particular, and got to romp in the river for the first time ever. The retriever in her certainly came out!

Here's a little video of her first river romp! :)

Bountiful Beans

Lookie what I just picked from my little garden of eatin!


Squee just doesn't seem to cover it! XD


And there's just enough for me! I knew there was a reason I married a man who hates veggies!

The Feline/Puppy Conspiracy

Oh.. you may scoff, but I know that my animals are conspiring against me!
See Exhibit A:

Note the missing earpieces and thouroughly chewed sides

Notice the tiny holes in the lens, caused by
sharp little puppy teeth!

Yes, this is the sight that met my eyes a week ago Saturday. Actually, the lenses had been popped out & I later put them back in to see if there was any way of salvaging my glasses.

I know what you're thinking. Tragic, yes, but a conspiracy?

Yes. Please note that on Friday night, my husband was in Chicago at a concert. The animals had no way of knowing when this man, aka "daddy", would be returning. The cats know my habits. Before going to bed, I place my glasses on the dresser in front of the alarm clock so I can see what time it is first thing in the morning. You see, I am blind! Not legally, but close. Without my glasses, anything more than 10 inches from my face is a complete blur! The cats, they know this. They seized upon the opportunity presented by daddy's absensce and knocked my glasses onto the floor once they were sure I was asleep. This is easy, they just need to wait for the snoring to commence.

All they needed to do now was get the puppy to chew them up. Easily achieved. All they needed to do, really, was put them in front of her. She is teething & will chew anything.

Once this was accomplished, they thought they had won! Mom would be rendered incapacitated! Unable to leave the house, but still able to work the can opener! Brilliant!

Luckily, their plot was foiled by the expedient return of daddy. He was home by 6am on Saturday. This allowed him to drive me to the optomitrist so I could get an eye exam & new glasses the same day. Because of the need for new glasses we were actually gone longer than I had planned on being away. Their plot back-fired!

Damn animals.

But, at least they're cute...

Arlo "Brains" Truzzi

Corrina "the mouth" Truzzi

Tour de Fleece status: Filled my spindle & wound it off onto one of my Lendrum's bobbins. I think I may have managed a full ounce. Granted, I have no idea what I'm gonna do with the singles... but that's for another day. :)

A little bit of this, a little bit of that

Well it has been one jammed pack week. I don't know where to start!!

I suppose I'll begin with the spinning. Yesterday was the first day of Le Tour de Fleece. Carla was extremely generous & loaned me the use of her Ashford Charkha for spinning up the cotton.


I've never spun off the quill before, but I kinda like it! Unfortunately, the drive band snapped at the join & I had to switch over to my drop spindle. Luckily this beauty if very light-weight, so the cotton has been spinning just fine on it. I must admit I was very nervous about spinning cotton, I've heard a lot of horror stories. But my experience has been pretty nice. I think its because I have high quality cotton in a roving, so the tiny staple length hasn't been a problem. I actually find it easier than spinning silk, at least it cotton wants to grip onto itself!


All in all, I think I got about .5 ounce spun yesterday, which isn't too bad. The Tour lasts for 21 days & I have 8 oz to spin. I think I'll be able to do it, especially if I can get a replacement band for the Charkha by then. :)

In knitting news, I finished the first Hedera sock & am about 3 repeats into the leg of sock #2!


Notice the tiny foot? Between the stretchiness of both the koigu yarn & the pattern, there wasn't much knitting needed after turning the heel! See?


It was passed around at knitting on Tuesday & it fit practically EVERYONE! Yippie for stretchy socks!! :)

Sadly, this past week saw the departure of sweet Emily from our knitting group. She left Friday for Salt Lake City, UT, where she is gonna shack up with some guy! ;)
We will sorely miss her & wish her (and Ben) the best!!

Here are some pics from her last Knit-In:



Wow. This is turning into one long post. I guess I will save the rest for later. Don't worry, puppy will be involved. Maybe even kitty if you are good! :)

Choices, Choices, Choices

HELP!!!!

So my fellow spinsters, who has spun cotton before?? I so blythely stated last night that I was going to spin 8oz of cotton and all I needed was a proper spindle. Well, I didn't realize what I was in for. Who thought finding the right spindle would be sooo damn hard?!

Do I go with a Tahkli (support spindle), Akha, or Featherweight?? Or, do I throw caution to the wind & get one of these babies?

Any ideas??

Join Us

Ya know you want to! :)

Props to Carla!

My challenge will be to spin 8oz of pima cotton on a drop spindle. So, I guess I'll need to get an appropriate spindle by July 1st... darn! ;)

Warning: Knitting Content

Wow!

I am totally knitting! I haven't done that in like WEEKS!

I even bought new yarn! :)

Wanna see?
Koigu sock yarn using the Hedera pattern from the last Knitty. Its so purty & girly!! I have been having a crappy time at work lately & this totally cheered me up!!


And it is knitting up rather quickly! I'm already on the 4th pattern repeat on the leg. Amazing how fast it seems to go when you use size 3s instead of 1s! lol

Well, off to knit. But before I go...

Gratuitous puppy pic

Cat scares Bear?

So, found this story on Yahoo!... poor bear! ;)

Not much is going on here... but I have more puppy pics!!

Here my precious darling has stolen uncle Smokey's
favorite toy & is playing with it on his bed!
The fiend!

Autumn & Corrina playing under gradma's bed

Here you see her spurn her silly squirrell for Smokey's
toy... Oh the shame!

And, my absolute FAVORITE picture!

Corrina had her 2nd puppy kindergarten class this week & she is doing very well. She knows "sit" & "down" and we are working on "stay" & "come". She is starting to identify her name as well!

We took her to taste of Ann Arbor last Sunday and walked around Depot Town & Frog Island on Friday. She is one social puppy!! And, she had her first ice cream!! I have pics, but haven't downloaded them off the camera yet!!

House Officially Warmed!

Saturday was the big house warming party. Thanks so much to everyone who came!! We had a great time!

We had knitters, coworkers, old friends, neighbors, Ark-ies, and a couple family members. Not to mention a few puppy-dogs for Corrina to play with.

Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures... I was too busy running around making food & trying to socialize to find the dang camera.

It was such a full day that poor Corrina had to be carried to bed - she was too tired to move! lol

So, thanks again to all who came & I hope you had a great time!! XD

btw- we have so much beer & wine that we may have to have another party to get rid of it all!

Corrine, Corrina

Just a note to let y'all know that little Corrina puppy is doing fine!

She came home Tuesday & has been terrorizing the cats more than ever!

Last night she got to meet her grammie & papa, as well as aunt Dawn, Autumn, & uncle Smokey! She had an absolute blast!! At one point she stole Smokey's favorite toy and usurped his bed! Yep, now that she's healthy, she's a handful!

Pictures of the terror will be posted as soon as my sis emails 'em!

Blog? What Blog? OH.....

Yeah, I suck. I have a ton of excuses... moving, work, puppy, the exciting season finales of 24 & Lost, global warming - they all conspired against me! But the simple fact is I was just too lazy.

There! I said it!

I just couldn't be bothered to type! How lame am I?!

So, due to my super-lameness I have much to relay, but most would bore the bejesus out of you! I will just give the highlights.

Moving - yes, we are pretty much settled in, although there is still a tower of boxes in my garage. I am hoping it all magically disappears cause I have no idea where I'm gonna put any of it!

knitting - I finally finished a pair of socks for me! I used the lucious barefoot Mountain Colours yarn that the fab Joanne sent me for my b-day back in October. Yum!



As I said in a previous post, I went to Jillian's book signing at Nicola's for Big Girl Knits, which is a simply awesome book! Everytime I look at it I find something else I MUST knit! XD Here are a few pics from the event:

Jillian with her Jordana Paige knitting bag -
I soooo want one!

Lynne starting her hubby on a scary new hobby!
btw- doesn't she look great!

Carla, Anne & Elisha knitting away!

So, you may have caught that little mention of a puppy. Yes. We have puppage! We adopted our latest baby on Tuesday, May 23rd. She is 13th weeks old and is a chow/golden retriever mix.

So dear reader, I introduce to you Corrina


She is Kris' first puppy ever! He is totally smitten. OH! And she is already house-broken! Can I get a woo hoo!!

Sadly, our little girl came with kennel cough. She appeared to be getting better, but Friday night she was lethargic & not eating. We took her in yesterday & found out she had developed phneumonia! :( She is in the hospital right now. We have been told she is responding very well to treatment and should be able to come home on Tuesday! My poor little girl. We have been so worried about her.

So, that pretty much catches this up. I will try to remember to blog. Really.

;)

Oh, SNAP!

Stephen Colbert has ginormous, steal balls!

This is his speach from the White House Correspondents Dinner on Saturday... DUDE!!

I could so kiss him!! XD

btw - sorry for all the smut on this site.. this is the only link I have for the video! :(

What the heck is all this stuff?

Spring has finally hit Michigan and the yard of my new house has tons of plantings. Now, the obvious stuff I can identify.. hastas, tulips, daffodils (yep, that's about the exent of my gardening expertise)

So what is all this other stuff coming up? What do I do with it?

Here are some pics of my sprouting yard. How many plants can YOU identify?? :)











Now, this last plant is particularly important for me to identify. My mother in law thinks it's lilac. This would be bad. I am very very allergic to lilac and would have to find this a new home (although Ingrid seems interested). Does anyone know for sure what this is?


Here is a close-up of the blossom


Please help a knitter out!!

Speaking of knitting, I went to Jillian's book signing tonight for Big Girl Knits! Awesome! I will have pics & description tomorrow.

g'night.

Still Here

Hi y'all!

Well, I have survived the move... barely. The last 2 weeks have been insanely crazy (redundant much?).

We closed on the house & 15 minutes later I get a call that my paternal grandmother had a heartattack, was in a coma & not expected to survive. We quickly unloaded our first truck load of crap at the house & went up to the hospital. Dad was hanging in there, but not doing good.

That weekend while grandma appeared to be getting better (out of coma, coherent, bitchy self) my dad helped us raise the upper cabinets in the kitchen, Kris took the nasty mirrors off the wall (about 50yrs bad luck!), & we painted.. there was also moveage of cats.

Cats adapted to the move very well. We had them segregated to just 2 rooms for the first day as we were still painting & such. During the night they staged a jail break though. They were so excited to show us everything they found during the night.. cats! Too cute to kill! ;)

Anywho... movers came last monday & brought all our furniture over. Only one casuality: my computer desk. But they gave us $70 to replace it & it only cost $60 1yr ago.. whee.. I think I'm gonna hold out on getting a new one until IKEA opens June 7th!! (mmm, swedish furniturey goodness...)

Tuesday: got a call from my dad that grandma died Monday night (sigh)

Wednesday spent at work & the funeral home. Thursday was the funeral.

Thursday night my geekster Autumn spent the night at our new house! Whee!
She brought her knitting stuff I got her for xmas & knit about 6 inches of garter stitch! So proud! I would have taken a pic, but my camera wasn't charged (bad, bad Kimmy!).

Friday afternoon my sis came to pick up her daughter. I was giving her a tour of the house when I noticed a lake that was previously my basement. Water heater broke. $950! Nice way to ease us into that home ownership thang.

The weekend was pretty uneventful. We moved most of the rest of our stuff & did some cleaning at the rental property.

Oh, and my mom FINALLY came home from the hospital on Saturday! XD

Things seem to be calming down. Hopefully my house will be vistor ready this weekend & I will be able to get back to my knitting!!

And have computer access at home...

Proud Aunt

My sister called me today & told me my geekiod niece, Autumn, got her hair cut.
13 inches of it!
The best thing? She's donating it to Locks of Love!
So proud of her!!

Before...

After...

My little Dakota Fanning lookalike

Love you Autumn!!!

BTW- I'm officially a homeowner! SQUEEAGE!! XD

C-Day

It's almost here. C-day.

Tomorrow we actually close on the our first house!! It's still so unreal!!

But we have been busy.
This truck contains all but the barest necessities of life.

my bare necessities - tea & knitting

We have put everything in a box... somethings seemed to have packed themselves. XD

We will unload the truck after we close & our furniture will be moved on Monday. My computer will probably come down Friday or Saturday.

Oh, here is a close up of the toe-up sock seen above. This is Mountain Colors Bare-Foot yarn what I got from the lovely Joanne for my b-day in October.


To keep you amused until I am back up & running, here are a plethora of kitty pics.

Bailey tummy - must touch...

See y'all when I'm a homeowner! XD