The Usual Shenanigans

It's a good day. Why is it a good day? Anyone who knows me, knows that Monday is not my favorite day of the week, but I make an exception every once in a while. Like today. Here's why. Let's start with Saturday. It started not so wonderfully - it rained, sometimes poured, for the entire Homecoming game. But we won. Happiness and elation though, later in the day after Iwas dry and warm again, when Notre Dame took it to Michigan.

Liz and I had decided, based on the weather radar map, that we weren't going to the Indians game. Of course, watching the little on TV that we did, it didn't rain at all. Stupid weather channel. But we had a good time at home anyway, ordered some Mama Roberto's, had a visit from Bridget and Kaylee, went and got some Coldstone. Mmmm Coldstone. Proceeded to watch OSU get embarassed by USC. I'm not an Ohio State fan, but there are two teams that I will absolutely root against, USC and Michigan. I am a fan of whoever those two teams are playing any given Saturday. Oh well. The Indians lost, btw.

Yesterday, was Mason's first birthday party. The pictures will speak for themselves. And let's just say, my nephews are very very similar in their love of cake.
Getting close to the downward spiral at this point....
And there it is. That's the money shot. What's even funnier, is that he kept doing this. To heck with these hands, let's cut out the middle man. Seriously, you do not want to get in between Mason and his food. Trust me.See what I mean? Even with a fork, Elliott can't stay neat with cake. So we had some cake shenanigans. More was to come though...

Onto THE game. That's right Steelers-Browns v. 1 2008. Ellie decided that we needed to "get our game face on". Need I say more?
Yep, game face = eye black strips and powder puff hair. And it was all downhill from there...

Note the intensity on Ellie's face. Click the picture to make it bigger for full effect.Check out that stiff arm. Yeah, we're that crazy. But look how cute we can be.
Yeah, crazy game day shenanigans, that's just how we roll. But the main reason that today is a good day... STEELERS WIN!!! It may not have been pretty, and I'm sure that I'm going to hear about how the Browns were robbed, and some elaborate conspiracy theory that would have had the Browns winning when I go to work later, but the bottom line is, Steelers win the 10th straight game against the Browns. Woot!

And because this is a knitting blog. I'll show you my knitting from yesterday. I started yet another Christmas present. So this will probably be the only photo you see of it until after it's gifted. It's using Hill Country Yarn's Superfine Superwash sock yarn in "Salmon".
And because I couldn't be knitting something orange while the the Steelers were playing the Browns, I pulled out the long neglected November Ruffle. Perfect football knitting. Got several inches done on it, and have several more to go before I get to the ruffle part.
Here's a pic trying to convey the scope of the piece. Doesn't really do it though. Oh well, when it's done and off the needles you'll understand.
See, 11.5 inches done. I think I have to get to 15 before the ruffle?! Have to dig out the pattern to be sure.
Don't you just love the tweedy effect? Can you tell I do? And the lusciousness of the alpaca....

Ta Da

*Apologies in advance for the crappy quality of photos. It's very dark and rainy today, and I'm not exactly a professional photographer. My poor little camera can only do so much, and I'm not too great with the photo editing either.*

So this is being written and posted much later than I had anticipated. Oh well, that's what happens when life gets in the way. This past Saturday, I finished knitting the FLS. Sunday, I sewed in the ends and attached the buttons. Ta da!
Sorry it's not a live action shot, but I didn't manage to get a pic of me wearing it, Sunday or Tuesday. Next time. I love it! It's so perfect and comfortable. To all you knitters out there reading - knit one, trust me, you'll love it.

I got around to finishing the first Upstream sock on Tuesday night at SnB. Fits perfectly. Just need to get around to the second one...
I know I said I would get it done by the end of last week, but I was distracted by this.
Stimulating, right? How could you not be distracted from a fun crazy colored sock when there is charcoal and white yarn to be had? (Note: that sentence was dripping with sarcasm, in case you hadn't noticed) Seriously though, I spent most of Sunday knitting a super secret project with the grey and white yarn, thus ignoring my sock. And if you could see the pattern, you'd understand my delight and fascination.

That's all of the super secret project that you will see for a while on this blog - due to the fact that the recipient of super secret project is a regular reader. Really wish I could show it to you because it makes me feel all clever and cool, but it's not fun to spoil the Christmas surprise. That's right, I just said Christmas. The holiday knitting has commenced here at Annie's House of Yarn and Pointy Sticks. Look out.**

It's not all gift knitting though. Because this week has been especially trying on the professional level, I treated myself to a happy knit. I cast on the Hidecote Garden Shawl, using my recently acquired Jojoland Melody yarn.
Isn't it so pretty? It makes me happy just looking at it. When I get a little farther, I'll pin it out to show you the stitch pattern. Click on the link above if you can't wait that long.

And in more recent yarn acquistion news, I got enough of this,
Valley Yarns "Northhampton" in Dark Green Heather, for a sweater. I think that having at least one sweater's worth of yarn in the stash at all times is important. And as reward for using my stash yarn for the FLS (I got the Cascade in 2006) I let myself order some yarn for me when I purchased Ellie's birthday present (no photo, but I got her enough Mission Falls 1824 Wool in Raspberry, to make her own FLS).
The color isn't really showing up very true here, but I love the greeny heathery-ness of this yarn. Now all I have to do is find the perfect pattern....

And now for the yarn I'm currently drooling over...
Fleece Artist Trail sock in "Hercules". O. M. G. This yarn, is so amazingly gorgeous and rich and deep in color, I can't even explain it to you. This is my first Fleece Artist yarn, I found it at Simply Sock Yarn Company, and had to have it. It was the first time I'd seen this line of yarn from them, it's 80% merino 20% nylon (which is what I like for my socks), previously I'd only seen 100% merino yarn which I hesitate to use for socks due to the wear and tear they are subjected to. The nylon gives that bit of strength to make them last longer. I had to unskein it to try to convey to you it's true beauty.

As for spinning news, there isn't much. I haven't been doing much spinning lately. I got most of the Wander done though. It's about 230 yards.
And you'll notice that ball of singles next to it, that's what was left over on one bobbin after plying. Guess I wasn't so even after all. I'm working up to trying to ply it, but my history of plying from a ball is not so good, and I am procrastinating, big time.

Alright, that's it. That's all I've got. Big weekend ahead - homecoming is tomorrow at work, ND plays Michigan, Liz and I are going to the Indians game tomorrow night, Mason's birthday party on Sunday afternoon, and THE game, Steelers-Browns, is Sunday night. I'm busting out my Roethlisburger jersey and Steeler socks for the occasion!

**Family members - if there is something you would like me to knit for you for this holiday season, please place requests now. These things take time. All unreasonable requests will be laughed at, and dirty looks will ensue.

Visual Progress

Amazing. I have knitting stuff to show. And in showing it, I feel like I've actually gotten something done. Granted, no finished objects, but getting very close. As proof... the FLS.
OMG! It's seriously almost done. Just a sleeve left to knit. Then ends to weave in and buttons sewed on, and voila! Yay! And I love it! I mean, what's not to love? It's so friggin cute. Cute enough that my sister is contemplating a step up in her knitting know-how just to knit it!!! So go over to her blog, and leave a comment encouraging her to knit this sweater - or at least to learn how to increase and decrease.

So, I should have a new sweater by the end of the week! Very exciting, and not the only knitting I've gotten done either! What?!? I know... it's crazy! I started a sock (gasp) last week because it felt weird to have not knitted on a sock in a month. And I got through the heel last night, which means it's smooth sailing from here on out, and this sock should also be finished by the end of the week.
See what happens when my schedule goes back to normal? And my stress level returns to it's elevated state which in turn has me knitting more to keep me sane? The pattern for the sock is the Master Upstream pattern from New Pathways for Sock Knitters, being knit with Trekking XXL in colorway 100. Very fun. And that's about all the excitement in my life.

As Promised

Wow, a second blog post in the same week! It's getting wild and crazy over here. But I promised photos in the last blog and I wanted to make good. So first up, the Wander Corriedale. More than half of it is plied at this point, and it's coming out great.
To stay with the fiber theme, here's the progress on the February Lady Sweater (FLS from this point on, I'm lazy)
And the lace detail.
The color isn't very true in either of the photos. Sorry about that. I'm also being lazy about my photo shoots today. And now for the other craft that I dabble in. The scrapbook pages. These are all of the recent OBX Family Vacation. Click them to make them bigger if you'd like.
And that's about it. There's more pages to do, and I'll get to them soon, I hope.

Getting Caught Up

As you can see, I survived Two-a-Days. And so did all my athletes. Again. So, yay for me. It's been quite a while since I've gotten everyone updated on life though. So this may be a bit of a long post. Let's see, where to start...

It's been a very busy week. Football at 8am every day, and there were evening scrimmages every night except Monday - Tuesday and Thursday was boys soccer, Wednesday girls soccer, and Friday was an away football game. Drama in the land of girls soccer - the coach resigned after the game on Wednesday, after the parents and girls called him out on a few of his "methods". We'll see how it all plays out. And then Saturday both the boys and girls soccer teams had scrimmages.

That takes care of work for the week. So in real life, Tuesday was SnB night, and even though I didn't knit a stitch, it was good just to hang out with everyone. Wednesday night Mom flew in from her NJ trip. Thursday night was Tini night with Ellie and friends. For some fun pics, go to her blog. It was an unofficial birthday celebration for me. Lots of fun, wish my martinis had been better. Friday was my birthday - didn't do anything special - due to the afore mentioned football scrimmage. But here's a picture of my presents:From bottom left clockwise: a shawl pin that was my gift to myself from KotS, "A Fine Fleece", a bottle of wine, "Selbuvotter", giftcard for Half Priced Books and KotS, "Barbara Walker's Third Treasury of Charted Patterns", the new Gaelic Storm cd, and two "Amalfi Coast" scented candles. And up top on the right is the hand-made card from my nephew Charlie.

Saturday after work, Dad and I went to the Indians game. They lost, and it was "Turn back the Clock" day. Boo. The scoreboard was set to be like it was back in 1948 - no graphics, no stats, no nothing. The out of town scoreboard and the smaller side video screens were off. The music - all organ music of WWII era hits. Yikes. Not the best game I've ever been to. But still not a bad way to spend a Saturday afternoon. Spent Saturday night watching the Olympics, of course. Good stuff, although, my viewing will most likely stop now that they've moved onto all the track events. And, the LLWS is on.

Yesterday, we hosted a little get together for me. The Daleys, Aunt Ginny and Uncle Richard came over for burgers and brats, followed by cake and ice cream. I requested a marble cake with homemade chocolate frosting and cookies'n'cream ice cream this year. A nice change after a decade of DQ cakes. This is what I actually got:
It's not marbled, it's a checkerboard! Ellie outdid herself. It's so big, it won't fit in the cake-tainer. But it was excellent. So a big THANK YOU to everyone for my gifts and cookout and well wishes.

Alright, onto the knitting stuff. I cast on for the February Lady sweater. And am mired in the Land of Endless Garter - please someone rescue me!
This is a cardigan that gets knit all in one piece, from the top down. So what you're looking at is the front of the cardigan, with the neck line being in the middle. I know it doesn't look like much, but it will soon.

That's about all the knitting I've gotten done. I did manage to finish spinning up that Corriedale that I started forever ago.
Even started plying it last night during the Olympics. A pic of it plied tomorrow or Wednesday maybe. And because I finished a spinning project, and couldn't start plying immediately (I've learned that you're supposed to let the singles "rest" before you ply them, maybe that's why I've had so many issues plying in the past...) I started a new spinning project.
I pulled out my "Terminus" roving from Theytoldmesew on Etsy. It's 3.8 oz of Blue Faced Leicester - a new fiber for me, but I'm loving it. And I pulled out my Golding spindle. It's a .55 oz Purpleheart spindle. And oh man, looky.
I amaze myself at how thin I'm able to get this. Crazy thin. This will definitely take a while to finish. But wow. That's all I can say.

Alright, I think that's enough for now. Pics of the recent scrapbooking to come.

In Loving Memory

Mama Fox passed away Tuesday. She wasn't strong enough for surgery, and chemo was not an option due to an infection the doctors couldn't get under control. The family decided it was better to let her go peacefully, surrounded by everyone she loved. And she loved so many, and was loved by so many more than I think she knew.
This is how I will remember her. Dancing with her girls - because even though she had only one daughter, she treated the rest of us as if we were her own. I never saw her without getting a big smile and open arms for a hug, asking "How's my girl?"
Godspeed Mama Fox.

Let the madness begin

Greetings from Slap-Happy World! Well, ok, not this morning anyway. But the last few days I've been wandering around that strange wonderful for nearly all of my waking hours. That's right, it's football season again! Modified two-a-days started at 8 am on Thursday. So it's been a few long hot days in the life of Annie. I'm not complaining, I'm really happy to be back in my little world of high school sports, just trying to convey the full experience for all of you.

So, in the celebration of my life getting back to it's normal, crazy state, let me show you my training room. My training room in it's "this is as perfect and clean and wonderful as I'm going to be, so you better take a picture before the children come through and ruin it" state.

And this is from the other direction, just to give the full effect.

And the glorious-ness that is a fully stocked and organized training room. Oh tape, how the kids will try to steal you.

Seriously, that's 1280 rolls of pristine 1.5" tape, and though you can only see the one large box in the bottom right corner, there's 20,000 8 oz Gatorade cups crammed into my tiny office. What's sad, is that I'll probably run out of cups before the school year is over, and the tape will hopefully just get me through. Which is why, to the bewilderment of the athletes, I hoard them.

And a nice stocked and organized field kit before I destroy its beauty by having to rifle through it to find a particular size band aid in the 2.2. seconds before the bleeding kid has to be back on the field for the next play. sigh

And on an icky note, this is the stack of medical forms that I spent several hours inputting into the computer, sorting, alphabetizing and filing.

The icky part? This probably isn't even half of them. The really icky part, those are all the ones that I've received to this point. Which means that I will have to tell kids that they can't practice on Monday because I don't have their forms. The really really icky part, that's not supposed to be my job, it's supposed to be up to the AD to do this because it's a matter of eligibility, not medical reasons, that we have to have them.

So, as you can see, my job isn't glamorous all the time, in fact, it rarely is. I so happen to have an amazing training room. Seriously, I've worked out of broom closets before (literally) and been at colleges that hadn't updated the training room since the 50's. Maybe I'll take some pictures of the other training room I have, once I get it cleared out of all the junk that has been dumped in it over the summer. You'll see the difference.

Moving on, I've spent some good quality time with Kaylee this week, which has only added to my adventures in Slap-Happy world. BFF Bridget's mom has been in the hospital since last Thursday night with some issues that are related to the uterine cancer they diagnosed since she's been in the hospital. So, I've been trying to help out with Kaylee duty as much as possible for Bridget to be able to spend some time with Mama Fox. Yogurt popsicles make for excellent blog fodder.

The illness of Mama Fox leads me into my new knitting project. A comfort shawl for her.

It's the Tri-Aran-Angle from Knitty. For those not acquainted with the concept, a comfort or prayer shawl is knit to give comfort in a time of need, to be knit with prayer and love in every row and every stitch, nothing but good thoughts for the recipient.

Something that non-knitters usually don't realize, is that in knitting something like this, we knitters also take comfort. It gives us something to do in a situation where we feel helpless. It goes down to the reason that we knit. It allows us to put all the love we feel for the people we knit for into what we're knitting, so that we know, even if the recipient doesn't, that every time they happen to wear that knitted item, they are surrounded by that love, those good thoughts and well wishes and prayers. So to all you non-knitters out there, remember that the next time you receive a hand knitted item. That in all those hours that it took to make, the knitter was thinking of you, loving you, wishing you nothing but happiness.

Alright, I think that's enough of Mushyville in the land of Slap-Happy. Let's see if we can find something a little less emotional. How about a dishcloth?

My first attempt at anything resembling entrelac. It's the Garterlac Dishcloth. Out of some self striping kitchen cotton. Love it, as much as I can love a dishcloth anyway. Made me feel very clever. And here's a shot of where I'm at on the Spring Forward sock.

Close to the end of the leg. I'm hopeful that my motivation to knit will return after the insan- I mean two-a-days, have ended. The real fun starts tomorrow, when all the rest of the sports show up. Can I get a woot?!?