WIP: Little Treasure Jacket - Front Right

I've cast on for one of the sleeves and decided to knit it in the round for a portion of it and then go flat on the top.

WIP: Little Treasure Jacket - Front Left

Self explanatory.

Reviewed:"A Thousand Splendid Suns" by Khaled Hosseini

I initially didn't want to read this book as I find Hosseini's stuff a little sad, but the ladies at church highly recommended it. Initially the story seems to be two separate stories, but midway, Hosseini pulls both women's lives together in tragic circumstances.

I liked being able to try understanding how women will allow themselves to be treated as second class citizens, but Hosseini explains it very well. It seems that it's mostly a function of survival.

The characters of this book will live with me for quite sometime and I won't soon forget them. This is a great read.

WIP: Little Treasure Jacket

This is the back of the jacket. I initially did the bobbles wrong. I moved the yarn to the back, slipped 3 stitches and then knitted - this put the bobble on the wrong side of the work. Once I kept the yarn in front while slipping, the bobbles popped right out.

Maker Faire

DH gave me the best present ever!

We had a couple of obligations that popped up this weekend, and it was looking like I was going to miss being able to go the the Austin Maker Faire this weekend.

http://makerfaire.com/

Well, DH said he'd cover the obligations and encourged me to go alone.

I am so excited!

So, I'm off to Maker Faire tomorrow! Whoo Hoo!

FO - Little Treasures Baby Booties

Yarn: Sandnes Garn Mandarin Petit (White)
Pattern: Little Treasure Booties from Simply Knitting 31, August 2007
Size: 3 - 6 months
Needles: US 3
Thoughts: I knitted this flat, so I had to sew up the bottom/back. I'd like to try to convert them into knit in the round. Super fast knit.

Dexter

Well, a new season of Dexter has started and it's been fun to watch. I never would think that I'd ever root for a serial killer to allude getting caught, but I do with this series. Jeff Linday has another Dexter book out (Dexter in the Dark) and I'm next on the library list to get it.

I'm currently reading A Thousand Splendid Suns. I am borrowing it from a lady I met at Westside UU and it's started out pretty good. Hosseini writes so well and there's usually a thread of sadness that runs through his work.

Oregon Vest

Here's a photo of my progress on the Oregon Vest.

I'm just a little tired of knitting on the Arwen. :( I'm starting to feel the need to knit a toy!

Tandem

J found a deal on our local Craig's List:

We bought the little tandem bike in hopes of getting M a little more used to being on a bike. We have rented a tandem twice - both times was when we were in San Francisco - and M LOVED being on the bike.

But when we come home and tries to ride her own bike, she panics and ends up crying. Bicycle riding in our household is just not a thing of joy.

So, I got an idea to see if we can find a tandem in order to get M more acclimated to riding bikes.

Well, she didn't want to get on because the bike will tilt. She didn't want to get on because she didn't want to go fast. She just kept on making up excuses. So, I did an evil terrible thing. J & I told her that if she would not ride on the bike, we will sell it. She didn't want that, either. So she braved getting on the bike with tears streaming down her face. So, I took her around the loop, all the while M was screaming at the top of her lungs. She was screaming so loud that some of my neighbors came out to see what the racket was all about. I rode the bike to all the places M refused to go. J was watching and encouraged me to keep going. So I did.

Well, I guess it was the best medicine, because M now LOVES riding the bike. Every day last week whenever she got home from school, I would HAVE to take her bike riding.

I guess sometimes we have to terrify our kids for their own good. I just hated having to do it while it was going on.

Knit-In 2007

I belong to the Bluebonnet Knitting Guild of North Texas and we had a knitting event last Saturday. We basically show up at Stacy's Furniture and use their community room. The price is $10, but it's worth it. We get a great goodie bag complete with a 10% off card for Joann's, yarn, craft scissors, a cloth tape, and two project bags. This year the guild asked various members to put on a "Circle of Learning" where we'd teach a new knitting technique. I taught how to bead while you knit. It was fun.

I cast on for my Oat Couture Oregon Vest with some Eggplant Lion Brand Suede. I thought I had met gage, but after I've knitted quite a bit of the vest, I'm off by two stitches, so I think the vest will be smaller than I want. I may have to frog the thing - which isn't good with the "Suede". LB Suede is really a chenille yarn and doesn't frog well. (sigh) I guess I'll be pulling out my calculator to see if I can recover from this.

Disney ride photo's

Ride photo's are fun to look at after you get off the ride, but we rarely buy them. Below are the sum total of the photo's we've ever purchased - and it's really because we think the terror-filled faces are funny.

Reviewed: "An Ice Cold Grave" by Charlaine Harris

This is the latest Harper Connally novel by Charlaine Harris. Harper is called into a small town by a newly elected sheriff to help her find some missing boys. Harper finds them and the killer goes after Harper and lands her in the hospital.

I have to admit that I don't like Harper as much as I like Sookie. Harper seems to be a bit more fragile and more dependant upon her step-brother. I did like the big plot point that happened in this novel - I like it when a writer who dangles a big plot point through several novels finally meets it head on rather than keep on dangling it. Now I'm looking forward to seeing how Ms. Harris will handle this in future novels.

I also have a confession - I think the young black psychic is FAR more interesting than Harper Conally and I'd actually like to see Ms. Harris spin off a series about him.

Reviewed: "A Pawn for a Queen" by Fiona Buckley

I have enjoyed the Ursula Blanchard series. So much, in fact, when my local library didn't have the rest of Ms. Buckley's series, I found them for a reasonable price from on-line and will donate them to the library once I'm done reading them.

A Pawn for a Queen finds Ms. Blanchard a widow once more and is summoned to her girlhood home - the Faldenes - and asked to go after her cousin, Edward, who is working to try to usurp Queen Elizabeth.

General observations of this book: I like where Ursula is in her life. She's not having to be a spy anymore and she's enjoying raising her daughter. Her family, however, brings her back into her former profession. Ursula is shown as a bit of an adventure junkie as she allows herself to be used by the family that really doesn't care for her.

There are some BIG story plot lines in this book. I won't spoil them, here. I'm just glad I pushed through and bought the book.

Summer

Here's the summer panel.

More M Fashion Sense

She loves wearing her baseball socks with dresses and she loves her new sparkly princess shoes.

I love her headstrong sense of what makes her feel pretty.

In progress - Arwen

I have about 20-inches knitted (out of a total 28-inches from the bottom to the shoulder) of the front and back of the Arwen. I've divided the top into three areas (left front, back, right front), so I'm knitting with three different balls of yarn at a time. It allows me to keep the pattern going along the front all at the same time.

In Progress-season panels

I've been intrigued with quilting for quite some time (my grandmother did it a lot) and never felt that my sewing skills were up to snuff. My mom said that if I can sew my daughter's princess dress that I can do a quilt. We were bumping around a quilting shop in Granbury and she encouraged me to buy a kit. I bought a kit to make the Every Season Quilts.

I'm really intimidated by appliques and dragged my feet to start doing this. So I finally dragged everything out this past weekend - mainly because I'm getting tired of knitting on the Arwen and needed to change up my crafting projects.

Here's the front part of what I've got done - I still need to cut out and iron the Summer stuff. I'm happy with what I've done so far but have learned that I don't sew 1/4" consistently as my blocks don't line up. But that's part of my type A showing, so I'm pushing on.

Next: Embroidery, sewing a zig zag around the appliques, adding batting and a back, sewing around the words to "quilt" the design.

Reviewed: "The Sleeping Doll" by Jeffery Deaver

I picked this book up from the library to take with me on the Disney trip - I needed good trash - something that would go quick.

Well, this book didn't go quickly.

I picked it up mainly because Deaver had introduced a new character to his Lincoln Rhyme series and I liked her. Her name is Kathryn Dance and she's a body language expert. I enjoyed her in The Cold Moon and thought this book had some good possibilities.

The story started out good and fast. Daniel Pell was a very smart cult leader who found himself being very intimidated by Kathryn because she wasn't easily moved by him - which spooked him. Daniel busted out of the jail, and the rest of the story is about catching him.

I got bored when Deaver would talk about how Dance was able to watch the "subject" and become a human lie-detector. It just got repetitive and was something I already read about in The Cold Moon.

I became impatient when Daniel Pell kept getting away - and the way he got away was similar each time. Hyper observant criminal is able to foil the cops because the people around him gave it away. Deaver used this device way too much and it became - yeah - repetitive.

But I kept reading because I had to know why Pell had stayed around and not just disappeared. The end of the book was pure Deaver with a twist that was good and interesting. I'm glad I stuck with the book because I enjoyed the end.

I wouldn't recommend the book, though. Too slow.

More Disney Photos

Areiel spent some good time with M in her Grotto. Here's M with Ariel:

The tail would occasionally flip. I don't know how these girls do the whole Character thing. Their mouths must hurt at the end of the day and be blind from all the flash photography. Thank goodness the Grotto was air conditioned.


Here's the whole crew! Of course, M had to do the pop star pose. . .And this pose is funny as my sister used to make this same pose when she was this age.
I call it the princess pose.

Princess-y goodness

Here are the photo's of M with Cinderella, Aunt K, and the family.

She was very hungry when this photo was taken, and thus, grumpy. It was nice, though, because Cinderella noticed that M's dress was homemade (squee!) and gave me some props!

Arwen Update

I've finished knitting the 17-inches below the arm hole and tried to figure out how to modify the pattern the way Kate Gilbert wrote it.

Um. Nope.

I could try to figure it out, but just casting on and knitting the sleeves separately will work out. I'm working from three different balls at once, but since I'm used to keeping track of the cables by knitting it flat, I just switch from ball to ball in each panel area.

Here's a photo of the cardigan so far

And a close up of the cables - see how nice the Comfort keeps its stitch definition? I love the seed stitch border on either side.

M's School Photo

Okay, M was right, the headband wasn't bad. . .

But for some reason, Mom screwed up and didn't have the pig-tails centered.

Wednesday & Thursday - Days Five & Six

Wednesday was spent at the Kennedy Space Center Visitors Center. J & I had been several years before and weren't allowed to go to the Gantry part of the center because there was a shuttle launch scheduled. This time, we were able to go and it was really cool.

They were also redoing the Rocket Garden in the late 90's. It's been redone and I have to say, I always thought the rockets were mock ups at smaller scales. It was cool to find that they were the real things - and shocking because they were so small. I mean, the rocket Alan Shepard rode is down right puny!

We also went to the Mad Science Mission to Mars show. M was able to participate as well as her dad. It was cute.

While we were checking out at the gift shop, I noticed some folks behind me with "DAWN VIP" badges on. I, not being the shy one, asked if they had anything to do with the upcoming launch. Yes, they were payload specialists for the Delta II rocket.

You see, the next day was a launch of an un-manned rocket. Specifically, the Dawn mission will send up probes for two asteroids located in the Asteroid Belt. They won't get there for 8 years.

After we went to KSC, we headed back to the hotel and spent some time on the beach again. This time, we ate dinner at the Sand Bar as it was free chicken wings with the purchase of a pitcher of beer. M had a grill cheese and there some great live music. M loved it so much, she had to tell the musician that she really liked his music. I gave her a dollar so she could tip him. He was really tickled and came up to us to tell us what a great kid we had.

The next day, we woke up early and headed out for the beach again. We got there and it took some time for the launch to go. We thought that it may had been scrubbed, but it wasn't. . .
(sorry it's sideways - still don't know how to operate my camera phone well)

We headed back to the hotel, checked out, and got to Orlando early - so we tried getting on an earlier flight - successfully! M was ready to be home, and so were her parents.

Tuesday - Day Four

No more Magic Kingdom - Yay!

My in-laws wanted to have a going away breakfast, so we ate at the Whispering Canyon Cafe located in the Wilderness Lodge. The staff basically had license to abuse you - in a fun way. The table next to us asked for ketchup and the waiter made a big deal about it. J needed some ketchup and asked me to grab the ketchup from the table next to us so he wouldn't have to suffer the humiliation. WELL! That backfired. The waiter noticed we had ketchup on the table and told the whole restaurant that J had STOLEN the ketchup.

They also had occasional events for the kids. M participated in a broom horse race and was deputized - if she promised to never go to Sea World. :)

After breakfast, we went to the airport and picked up our rental car - Cocoa Beach, here we come!

We stayed at a great little mom & pop hotel, the Fawlty Towers. We were just one block away from the beach and it was a perfect location. We checked in and headed off to the beach. I forgot how much fun the beach is.

Well, M LOVED the beach. I think it was the first time she wasn't stressed out on the trip. Collecting shells with her dad was great fun to watch. She wasn't a fan of swimming in the ocean as she didn't like getting knocked around by the waves or the taste of salt water.

The hotel also had a pool, and M wanted to swim in it. Later on, J & I hung out at the hotel's "tiki bar" and found a new to us beer: Yuengling Traditional Lager. It's yummy!

We noticed a beach bar on our way back to the hotel, so we ran over and had some great fish taco's there. Great fun and another early night.

Cool Construction Geek Photo

I love watching stuff being built. I had a meeting in Arlington and had to stop my car to snap this photo.

This is the new Cowboy's stadium under construction in Arlington, Texas. It's massive and they still haven't hit the top elevation yet.

Very cool.

Monday - Day Three

We woke up at a decent time, ran downstairs to eat breakfast and ran into the rest of the family. For some reason, we didn't get our acts together early on, so we hit the Magic Kingdom at 9:30 am. We thought that the crowds would be smaller, since it was a Monday. We were wrong.

Since it was so crowded, we headed over to the Jungle Cruise. The line went surprisingly quickly and the kids had fun. M got scared when we went through an old "temple" that was dark, but all in all, I think she enjoyed it.

The Aladdin Flying Carpet ride was just next door, so we rode it. The kids were great as each kid got a turn to control the carpet.

Of course, for me, a trip to Disney isn't complete without riding the Pirates of the Caribbean. The ride has been updated to include Johnny Depp's "Captain Jack" and the hill you slide down was longer than I remembered. The updates are very small and the ride is essentially the same as when I was a kid. Poor J, he sat it out with M.

Next up was Splash Mountain. M is okay on roller coaster stuff and loves the log ride at the local Six Flags so she was receptive on going on the Splash Mountain ride. The ride has a lot more puppets and dark places than I remembered - it's also surprisingly a long ride. I guess this has more to do with worrying about M's fear of the puppets, but it seemed like the ride kept on going. She did great on the steep drops.

We then tried to get on the Thunder Mountain Rail as M has ridden similar rides with no problems. She panicked as soon as she saw the cars go through a couple of tunnels. As we were in line, one of the workers said that they will not start the ride if a kid is screaming that they don't want to ride. M was almost to this stage as we got closer to the front. J, once again, took M to sit out the ride. He's a great dad. The first part of the ride would have sent M into fits, but the rest was just fine and she would have had fun. Oh, well.

We were hungry about this time and had a mediocre meal. Afterwards we watched a parade. The in-laws got tired and we started back towards the hotel but decided to ride the Monorails to go see Epcot. The kids and my SIL got to sit in the front of one of the legs of the Monorail rides and the kids all got cute "Monorail Co-Pilot" cards. Sitting on the Monorail wasn't enough down time for my SIL's kids, so they headed back to the hotel, too. We stayed behind and went to watch a show that was put on in front of Cinderella's castle. We then did another ride on the carousel and It's a Small World. By this time, we needed to head over to the final character dinner held at the Liberty Tree Inn. This was where the kids got to see Chip n Dale (my youngest nephew was really cute and kept hugging them when they came by), Goofy, Pluto, and Minnie. The food was really great (beef, ham, & pork with corn bread dressing, mashed potatoes, & string beans topped off with an apple cobbler with vanilla ice cream). I think it was my favorite dinner the whole time we were there.

The SpectraMagic parade was going on and we actually found the BEST observation point where we could see everything. M hit the wall, so we headed home and got into bed around 9:30 pm again.

Since M was so distressed with most of the rides, I have to say that the Magic Kingdom wasn't all that magic for her. I am looking forward to when M is a little older and braver. Her 7 year old cousin was really great and tried to encourage her to go on the rides. I am always impressed at how well the nephews and her get along.

Reviewed:"Here, There & Everywhere" by Chris Roberson

I really enjoyed this book as I've been going through an interest in the whole alternate universe theory lately. Roberson did a great job showing how a young girl who was very interested in Physics because her father encouraged it (he was a professor). The girl received an object she called the Sofia. The Sofia would allow her to explore different time lines - including being able to travel forward and backwards within her own time line. It's a lonely life, but she's very happy with her lot in life. I won't divulge the ending, but I was satisfied with this story. It's a very light read and Roberson does a good job explaining some difficult physic concepts.

Texas Legislation

J pointed this out to me this morning. I can't believe it - our State Reps are voting more than once! I am very surprised this happens and would like this to stop.

Sunday - Day Two

We got up pretty early - I think we were excited 'cause we were going to the Magic Kingdom. Ate breakfast at the Roaring Fork again and were at the opening of the park at 8 am (we got in early because we were on-property). We had M wearing tennis shoes, t-shirt, and shorts. As soon as we got into the park, M wanted to wear her princess outfit. I swapped out the t-shirt with the dress and she was set. Of course, she needed a tiara!

We were able to ride the following rides (warning: some of the links has music that I don't know how to turn off)

The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh was too scary for M. She cried through the whole thing and started us off on the wrong foot.

Since she was so scared, we decided to try a ride she could see. We stood in line for Dumbo the Flying Elephant for about 20 minutes. M was just fine on this one, although she didn't want to go all the way to the top.

Next stop was to see her favorite princess Ariel in Ariel's Grotto. The gal who played Ariel was great and gave M plenty of time to talk to her.

M calmed down enough by this time, so we decided to try another dark ride: It's a Small World. M was terrified and cried almost the whole way. We finally got her to point out three silly things in each room, and that calmed her down quite a bit.

We got a call from J's family and they were in the park. We told them to meet us over near Cinderella's Golden Carousel. M & I rode on horses.

She was really happy with this ride.

Once the nephews joined us, M was a different kid. She still wasn't really interested in riding the "puppet" rides. We went on It's a Small World again and she had no problems with the ride this time. Then we went to go see a new attraction; Mickey's PhilHarMagic. It was a really cute 3-D movie that was really about Donald Duck. They had some jewels that looked like they hung in the air. Grandpa found some gems later on in the trip and gave them to the kids saying that he was able to grab a few from the air in the movie.

We all ran over to watch Country Bear Jamboree. This was a favorite of mine when I was a kid. I even had the record! Watching it as a 40-year old adult, though, it was just sad. The sound was bad, the lighting bad, and each bear looked just worn out. They need to update this show in a bad way.

About this time, we needed to head over to Cinderella's castle as we had a lunch date at Cinderella's Royal Table. We got into line to meet Cinderella. M got three photo's because the nephews really didn't want any.

Our name was called and M was given these:
The nephews got swords and were called Princes. M was able to meet Belle, Jasmine, Snow White, and the Fairy Godmother. MA gave her an autograph book before we left. She used up all the pages!

The food was really good and it was fun seeing my daughter so happy.

After lunch, we headed over to Tomorrowland and rode the Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin ride. M hated it. We then rode the Tomorrowland Transit Authority. M was fine until we went into Space Mountain. She hates the dark and loud noises.

By this time, M had had it and wasn't having any fun. We left the family and slowly headed over towards the hotel. As soon as we got into the room, M had all her clothes off and was looking for her swim suit. She wanted to go back to the pool. J & M headed out by themselves as I wanted a little down time. My down time didn't last long. I put on my swim suit and joined them. We swam until 8:30 pm ran upstairs and fell into bed. We were all out by 9:30 pm - and that's Eastern time!

After we finally understood what M would ride and be okay with, Disney became a little more fun for all of us.

Saturday - Day One

We woke up at 4:30 am on Saturday morning 'cause our flight left D/FW at 7:35 am. My dear friend MA graciously got up and took us to the airport. The flight was uneventful.

We had tagged our bags with the tags provided by Disney - we were staying on property at the Wilderness Lodge. Disney picked up the bags at the airport and delivered them to our room. Sounds good in theory. We didn't get our bags till 6:30 pm that night. I'm just glad we were smart and brought our swim suits.

We also took the Disney Magical Express. It was a bit of a mad house and we had to wait in a long line. But the lines were handled fairly quickly. We landed in Orlando at 11:30-ish and got to our hotel about an hour and a half later. They gave M this button when we checked into our hotel and she was really happy to get it. We hung out at the pool all that afternoon and had a really terrible hamburger in the Roaring Fork fast food restaurant. My in-laws had paid for the Disney Dining Meal(pdf). It was just so confusing. Somethings were on it, others weren't. Other's required two table meal tickets. After a while, we'd get our food, give the cards to the cashier and ask them what was covered. It seemed like we always owed more money. Like I said - frustrated.

The pool was a perfect pool for M. Half of it was 3.5 feet - which means she could stand up and touch. It also had a really fun water slide. It took a couple of tries, but once she slid down the slide, she was okay. "Do it again! I want to do it again!" J & I just hung out at the bottom and watched her have fun.

I insisted that we go and get a nap after a while. Do you know how hard it is to get a 5 year old to nap when there's a great swimming pool with a fabulous slide? Fortunately, she was so tired at this point, all we had to do was get her to sit still for a few minutes and she dropped off for about an hour or so.

We met up with J's family and headed over to the Wilderness Fort Campground - we had 7:15 pm reservations for the Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Review. The nephews were disappointed because they didn't get to meet Mickey Mouse but we all still had a great time. The food was fabulous - fried chicken (so-so) and ribs (really good). They also gave us pitcher upon pitcher of beer. The show was interactive and my nephew was called "Cowboy B**". We sang and clapped and stomped our feet.

M got tired, though. About 3/4 the way through, the players said that the song they were about to sing was sad - and they kept saying that it was sad. Of course, the words were sad, but they camped it up - making it funny. Poor M had hit the wall. She started crying because the song was sad. Luckily, the song finished up and the actors were up-beat and told jokes that she understood. She left happy.

We headed back to our rooms around 9 and fell into bed. The first day in Orlando was successful!

Home again, home again

We got home last night from our trip in Florida. We had a great time, but were really ready to be home. M broke down yesterday when we went to breakfast and said she really missed being home.

I'm not sure how to document the trip, so I'll try to do it day by day.

I have to admit that it was SO nice to sleep in my own bed last night.

Happy blog anniversary to me!

Yesterday marks year two of my blog.

I must admit that I'm surprised that I'm still blogging. It's fun to do!

One more sleep

We leave for Orlando tomorrow. I'm so excited.

Kid Nation & 5 YO Fashion Sense

CBS has a new show with 40 kids who are in charge of living in an old western town. M is really intrigued and we HAD to watch it together.

She loves the show and it's fun watching the expressions on her face when things happen that trigger her emotions. She confided to me while I was tucking her in that she would be like the eight year old boy who decided to go home early. She said she would just miss us so much.

There's a bratty 15 year old - who really reminds me a lot of my 15 year old nephews.

I am really trying to savor the time I have with M now as it's such a good age. I know it'll change.

When I was at Weight Watchers, the leader mentioned that she is having a difficult time liking her 14 year old. She asked when will she like her child again, and the members joked 10 years.

Ugh.

I am *so* not looking forward to the teens. M is stubborn now as it is.

Case in point: Today is picture day for school. I helped her get dressed and let her pick out her clothes. I had to hold up every dress in front of her while she modeled it in a full length mirror. It had to pass the PEACE test. She would shoot her left hip out, flash a peace sign and said "PEACE". If the dress failed the test, she'd look up at me and shake her head "no". As you can imagine, we went through 90% of her dresses before one would work out. I don't put up with this very often and end up giving her 5 minutes to dress or I would find an outfit that she'd have to wear (this is pretty effective and gets her moving).

I also wanted her to leave her hair down, but she wanted pony tails.

I went to Weight Watchers this morning, so J had to get M to school. Apparently, she decided to wear a headband and a necklace because they "make her look pretty". I have no idea how her school picture is going to turn out. We just may have to get it so it can remind us of this period in her life.

The teachers at school get a kick out of M's fashion sense. It's almost becoming a bit of a game to see what type of outfit she can dream up next. Her favorite accessory for the past couple of months has been the green striped socks she got from softball. She'll wear them with shorts, dresses, you name it. I also love it when she decides to purposely mismatch her socks.

Reviewed:"The Harlequin" by Lauren K. Hamilton

My husband and GOAM wondered why the hell I even picked this book up to read as I've trashed the author at least three times before.

Well, Shelfari struck. I got suckered into the hype from other readers.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

The other reason why I started reading it is because Ms. Hamilton is writing a companion graphic series (READ: comic) that goes back to the roots of the series. It reminded me how much I enjoyed reading the earlier stuff. She also started explaining how she met Edward in an offshoot comic series. I was hoping Ms. Hamilton would realize that it was much more fun to write story than porn.

I was wrong.

I've come to realize that Ms. Hamilton is a lazy writer. Porn is easy to write. Story is not. Unfortunately, Ms. Hamilton chooses to not write story.

The Harlequin stated off promising. Anita was in her office and it looked like there actually was going to be some action to the story. But then - da-da-dum - she went to the Circus of the Damned. Well, as soon as Anita goes there, we might as well keep turning the pages till we actually see story because the Circus of the Damned is just a big plot hole for Hamilton to just write porn.

Buh.

Never. Ever. Again.

And this time I mean it.

FO-House Slippers

Of course I forgot it was my SIL's birthday yesterday, so I quickly made some house slippers for her.

Pattern: House Slippers in Knit 2 Together

Yarn: Plymouth Outback & Lion Brand Fun Fur (basically stash stuff)

Needles: US 13

Comments: The pattern knitted up quickly. I'd say it takes about 3 hours to knit both slippers. I saw them on Ravelry and people love having them.

I bought some leather soles to help reinforce the bottoms, but the 10-inch long soles are too long. I should have stayed with the 8 3/4 inch. I'll have to go and exchange them. :(

Arwen Update

I have about 9 inches knitted on the Arwen. The pattern calls for 12-inches, but I'm going to knit this a little longer - my torso is longer than most.

It's not perfect, but you'd have to look really hard to find the flaws. I'm finally getting the zen of cabling it. I am also very happy with the yarn. It still splits, but if I slow it down a bit, then it's not so bad.

The flip cards are great until you have a 5 year old close it up and you lose your place. :) I think I need to add a paper clip to the page that I'm on so if it happens again, I know where I am.

It's funny, I just noticed that the colors in the Arwen are similar to the purse. Purple-y Blue.

TD 8 is now TD Ingrid

I have to resign myself to the fact that Disney is going to be soggy. We'll have to pack accordingly.

At least it's not a hurricane!

Man oh man

I'm watching Tropical Depression Eight right now.

Why?

Because on the 22nd we're flying out to Orlando for the time of my young 5 year old daughter's life

Yes. We're going to Disney.

So now we're going to have to plan for rain. :(

I hope it's *just* rain we have to worry about.

The Lives of Others

I rented The Lives of Others from Netflix the other day. While it is subtitled and moved a little slow, it was really good.

Basically, a Stazi officer is charged with monitoring a well-known playwrite and he gets caught up with their lives. It's a great story about how a government took listening into private citizens lives to an extreme.

With the recent bill that Congress passed in August, I think this movie should be manditory watching. FISA was good because it required court oversight. This latest bill is just awful. I hope Congress rolls this back when it comes up for review.

Identity re-framed

Have you ever rocked along in life and had your identity briefly be reworked over?

For example, on my 21st birthday, I was sitting at a bar, drinking, and mentioned that I was a preemie.

My sister did a spit take.

"Oh, my God! You bought that!" she said incredulously.

"Well, yeah."

"You can't be a seven pound preemie"

So, my folks were married on May 1st, I was born seven months later. Of course I had done the math as a kid and my folks told me that I was a preemie.

It came as a shock at 21. I felt foolish because I knew better, I just decided to hang on to the lie.

Funny, but a shock none the less. My folks had SEX before marriage!! They were pregnant when they got married!!

Anyway.

I had a similar experience just the other day.

For years I've thought my height was 5'-10 3/4" tall. I would round up and felt like I was cheating, so I'd tell folks that I round up.

I went to a physical for a study I've enrolled in last week. They measured the length of my legs, distance between joints, etc.

They also measured how tall I am.

I am 5'-11 1/4" tall!

When the heck did I grow that extra 1/2 inch? Thinking back, high school was the last time I measured.

Weird.

Now I can say that I round down a little. :)

Domestic Goddess

Okay. I am SO not domestically oriented. Not at all.

I loved having my home cleaned once a week - but we let our housekeeper go and the duties have fell to us.

It's a struggle and we're not the best at keeping the house cleaned up.

J bought a vacuum shortly after we let the housekeeper go - and the vacuum wasn't all that great. Last week, I finally figured out that the vacuum wasn't working properly.

Yesterday J & M came home from school a little later than usual - complete with a new vacuum in tow.

I love my new vacuum. Once I had it assembled, it actually sucked. Really. It was a strange feeling.

I vacuumed as much of the house as I could. It's nice to be able to vacuum the vinyl areas without having the dirt fly everywhere.

I ended up emptying the basket twice. It's mostly Mel's hair and fine dust.

Graceland Knitta

When we visited Graceland over Labor Day weekend, we came across some Knitta.

Here's a photo of M & J just before we go into the mansion. M is doing another pop star pose.

We asked M if she understood who Elvis was after we left Graceland. Elvis is Jesus.

Such is the theology of a five year old.

Bleedin' Jesus

Yesterday we were in Austin on our way home and we stopped at a Cracker Barrel. M is currently trying to read EVERYTHING she sees - but she does a lot of guessing.

J asked her what she wanted to drink and showed her the "Beverages 'n Juice" section of the menu.

"Bleedin' Jesus!" she exclaims very loudly.

I honestly don't know where she got that. We are trying to teach her to be respectful of others - really.

I'm just glad I wasn't drinking my coffee at the time - I know it would have been a spit take for sure. It's hard to not laugh when you're trying to teach her to not do such a thing.

Reviewed: "The Wheel of Darkness" by Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child

I like the series these two authors have created with Aloysius Pendergast, but this book was a disappointment.

The majority of the story takes place on an ocean liner. I hate ocean liner stories. It's too Poseidon Adventure. The story just didn't have the scenery their usual stories have. I also didn't like the whole "anti-Buddha" theme. It was really silly.

The other thing that I dislike is it seemed like the story line from the previous books was lost. The author's note at the end of the book was a cop out. They maintain that their books are stand alone books.

Uh, sorry. They just aren't. I think they just had trouble writing themselves out of the previous novel. That's just poor story telling and I felt ripped off.

That being said, I love the main character and his "ward" Constance Greene. I'll still read their next novel. They seem to be writing a summer novel each year, so I have another year till the next book.

Did I mention that I love the library?

Arwen Redo

Okay, so here's my second attempt at knitting the Cardigan for Arwen. I love the way the yarn feels when it's knitted up. I hate how it splits while I knit it.

In my knitting future

I just ordered the pattern. Aren't they cute?

Reviewed: "Queen of Ambition" by Fiona Buckley

Ursula is biding her time in her new digs and is called early to go on Progress with Queen Elizabeth I. Of course, there's what seems to be a plot brewing to assassinate the queen, and Ursula is pressed into service earlier than she wanted.

This was a good continuation of the Ursula Blanchard series. She actually goes undercover this time and uncovers the plot and solves a murder. Ursula is enjoying coming out of "retirement" and ends up using all her skills she's learned for spying. This time, she was able to discover a code that the royal cryptographers weren't able to solve (because she found the Rosetta stone located in the place she was working under cover).

This moved well. I am a little disappointed - my library doesn't have the next three books! I'm going to have to wait to see if they'll purchase them so they will have a complete series.

In the meantime, I'm reading the first Sherlock Holmes book and am a little shocked. Sherlock is a bit of a dick!

FO-Pi Topper Chemo Hat #5

Pattern: Pi Topper Chemo Cap

Yarn: Elann.com Esprit (6287 African Violet)

Needles: US Size 7

For: Meg. This is going to be it for chemo caps for awhile.

FO-Pi-Topper #4

Pattern: Pi Topper Chemo Cap
Yarn: Elann.com Esprit Jade(5382)
Needles: US Size 7
For: Meg. I'm working on another one and should be finished within the next couple of days.