No longer a loser

And other assorted tidbits.

See that?



That, my lovies, right there, is a box. With socks. And other stuff. Addressed. Postaged. Ready for dropping off at the post office to wing its way to the Great White North where people need their socks.



Only 10 months late.

ETA: Officially at the post office, even! Lene, 6-10 days, not counting whatever customs weirdness may happen. At least there are no bees, second-hand or otherwise.

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Midwife says baby measures big. That means I get more ultrasounds. I'm mostly okay with this.
Midwife also tells me that occasionally, a doctor at my local hospital (which I hope to avoid) will threaten to call CPS if you try to check out of the hospital with your child less than 24 hours after giving birth. Why do they do this? What is it about people who get off on being mean to women who are all hormonal, uncomfortable, straddling ice packs the size of Texas (hi Stacey) and just want to be at home in the comfort of their own beds with their new babies? Seriously, do they like making women cry? Do they have a death wish? Half the post-partum women I've known are weepy, half of them are raging lunatics. (Peanut gallery can keep to itself which one I am.) Seems like taking one's life into one's hands by pulling that kind of crap. Especially since they're just bluffing and there's no legal reason you can't take your healthy baby home when you wanna.

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It doesn't seem possible that fully-cooked humans can be this small.




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It's hard to try to teach my kid good manners when a) Daddy is teaching him bad ones, and b) I laugh so hard when he burps. It's the name. He says, "Oops, I barched." I dunno where "barch" came from, but it makes me laugh so hard. It doesn't matter how many times I hear it, either. Try it - say it out loud. Barch barch barch.

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Aunt Scarf #2 proceeds apace.



It's currently the only thing I'm actively working on, but I have this waiting to be cast on after Turkey Day.



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All of you and your damn silky wool are killing me. I DREAMED about it last night, people. Don't you know that I have a queue and that there are scarves, socks, jackets, and selbuvotter to be knit? You don't even care. You're so mean, you just want me to run out and buy gobs of beautiful soft yarn to make lovely garments.

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Yesterday we kicked back in our jammies.



Today we kicked back in our jammies.



Yeah, we got it rough.

Still a loser

But an organized one.
I got a wild (nesting) hair to clean again. I have been working in my bedroom for the last few days. DH has been nesting too, though his nesting comes in the form of removing every piece of greenery in the back yard that he doesn't want to maintain and that doesn't offer shade. (If he tried to touch my ash trees they'd never find his body.) So far we've lost two very ill citrus trees, some sort of tall shrub/short tree that had died, and its partner, and about 50 feet of shrubbery along the fence. I hear tell that the old cracked, leaking and scarily wired spa is going bye-bye too. The yard looks huge.
Since yesterday, I cleaned and rearranged the little stuff on the dressers in the bedroom, finished cleaning out my side of the closet, including the purging of shoes, installed my old stereo back again, and am currently in the midst of documenting and purging the rest of my stash. I started with this.



(That doesn't include the stuff in my yarn vase or in the WIP basket, but I think that's all catalogued on Ravelry anyway.)

I sorted through my box of no-longer-used needles, I made a pile of stuff to donate, I organized and photographed. Turns out that if you include the undyed sock yarn I have (roughly 1.5 lbs) I have a whole tote of sock yarn. (Well, there are three tiny skeins of laceweight in there too.)



I'm working my way through the bigger yarn tote, and a lot of that is going to Goodwill. (Why in the hell did I think I needed 10 skeins of black acrylic fingering weight yarn?) I had to stop and download photos since I'd filled up my camera card. I wasn't only taking pictures of yarn.







Back to the salt wool mines.

A random conglomeration of fantastamous junk.

So, the official "I'm done" poses of Aunt Scarf #1.



These are not actually "done". I have not woven in the ends yet, because I still haven't decided if I want to pick out the cast off edge (on the right in the top photo), redo it more stretchily (is so a word) and reblock that little end. I'm letting it marinate on my desk at home while I think about it. It's conversing with the Shetland Triangle at this time.

Occasionally he's extra cute even when awake. (You can't quite see it there but he had his hands clasped in his lap.)



Oh yeah, and I'm off the hook for Thanksgiving. Whee! I mentioned to DH that some of my Braxton-Hicks were a tad uncomfortable these days, and he kinda flipped and canceled the dinner. I may get to visit with my brother and his fiance (and maybe her family) but whatever we do, it will be low-key. I can't tell you how fond I am of the low-key these days.

Edited to remove stuff about not being a loser anymore. I still am, but I hope to remedy that by the end of the day tomorrow.

It's Sunday.

And I have more random.

First, I'd like to take this opportunity to wish terrible things upon all the people involved in the Bob the Builder videos. Extra fleas in the armpits for the writers and the people who do the voices.

Second, we did make it to the zoo yesterday after spending most of the morning cleaning. Somehow I managed to have this idea on the same day the city opened the zoo and train for free and had a festival in the park. This was neat, except that the train ride that usually had a 5 minute wait required Bug to stand in line for 30 minutes. There was enough going on to keep him mostly entertained and he only considered melting down once, but all in all he was great. He rode the train around the pond, then we went off to the zoo, and by the time we hit the ice cream store afterwards, he was out. We woke him up for the ice cream, which ensured that by 7:30ish last night, he looked like this.



Third, this makes me happy.



Fourth, so does this.



Fifth, have I told you how much I hate Bob the Builder?

Sixth, for Elizabeth and her shampoo-mohawked-son.

For Stacey

Yeah, I'm actually posting on a Friday because Stacey whined and told me I should, and laid the whole "I have a chronic disease and a brain cloud and my tummy hurts pity me" trip on me. If I didn't have a bunch of random stuff today, I'd have told her to get a hobby. Okay, I DID tell her to get a hobby, but it didn't work. (Personally, I feel like since she's got Super-Sexy-Cheese-Lovin'-Dude (SSCLD) who takes care of her when she feels ucky, and a new place, and gets to go to the beautiful lake all the time and roam around on acreage, she shouldn't be complaining. But that's just me.)

Aunt Helen's scarf may kill me. It's beautiful, I love it, it's soft, I had the pattern memorized ages ago so I can just pick it up and knit, and MY GOD WHEN WILL IT BE OVER? I got to the end of it, according to the pattern (31 lace repeats) and realized I still had about 20% of the ball left. Since that amounts to 20 grams and the scarf itself was probably a little shorter than I wanted and only weighed 75 grams WITH the needles, I figured I'd better go to the end of the ball. I'm having to bribe myself to do it, and wheedle, and whine, and cajole. Each lace repeat takes 3 grams. (Yeah, I know, the scarf should weigh more if each repeat really took 3 grams, but I don't care, that's how I remember it.) As of this morning, I had about 11 grams left in the ball. Three repeats more, plus enough left over to mock me. An hour and a half of knitting, then I can block this thing and admire its beauty instead of cursing its unfinished existence.
Gee, and then I can start on the next one.

The DH cleaned the stove. Yes, I WIN! (Yes, I am that childish, I can't believe it would shock you at this point.) He cleaned most of the kitchen, in fact, and acted like he'd be cleaning elsewhere in the house today. (I can't remember why I'd decreed it was his turn to clean the stove in the first place, but I'm sure I had a completely arbitrary good reason.
On the job front, he's updating and mailing out resumes, and also looking into the insurance he'd need for consulting with his old work. It's weird - he was told by the people who want to hire him that it should be in the $1500-2000 yearly, but he's been quoted up to $20,000 and most places don't want to write a policy on it at all. He has two promising leads today - if he can buy the insurance today it's likely he can start officially working on Monday, which means, YAY CHRISTMAS. (Cuz people? 41 days.) (And also, the other night I had a dream that between my normal Wednesday post and my Sunday post, I had the baby and had a REALLY good Sunday post. Alas, no.)(Which is fine because he's not done cooking yet, and all the baby clothes are in the box on the very bottom of the pile behind another stack of DH's heavy crap.)
Other randomness... Hmm, well, it's supposed to be in the low 80s this weekend, so I think we're going to have a family day and head to the zoo. We also REALLY need to get the Bug a hair cut. While it makes bath-time hair sculpting totally entertaining...





... it's getting a little ridiculous, especially since we usually don't brush it between bedhead and school time, unless he gets a shower. (If he had a bath the night before, it's Dennis the Menace hair for him.)

Anyway, Stacey, be careful what you wish for. A big fat post full of nuthin'. Maybe Sunday I will have a FO and some zoo pics.

Wednesday roundup

Since I mostly seem to post on Sundays and Wednesdays anymore.

First of all, a big fat political THANG. You may have seen it, you may have heard it, you may have read it. I'm of the opinion that it can't be heard or seen ENOUGH. (I know next to nothing about what else Keith Olbermann might have to say, nor what he stands for, but I can get behind him on this one.)



I am going to continue harping on the subject until it's fixed. (Myself included. I know it may come as a shock to you, but I'm not perfect. !!) And not just gay marriage, but discrimination in general. I'm fairly disgusted that discrimination in any form is even an issue. (Actually, if you want to read some interesting stuff on both the gay rights issue and racism, check out this post. Read the comments, too. With the exception of a few coughcoughminecough there's a whole bunch more learnin' going on down there.)

Ahem. On to the fluff and frivolity!

Thanks to Imbrium's comment on the last post, I have renewed my stubbornness obstinateness resolve to not clean the stove. I think he's going to cave, because I've been pointing out that until he has a regular job, assuming he ever does again, he gets to pick up a lot of the housecleaning. We'd made a deal that I'd give up my housekeeper and do it myself if ever I was home full time, and since we gave up the housekeeper (for different reasons) and he's currently home full time, the cleaning is mostly on him. He tried to weasel his way out of that one but he knows it's a losing battle. :-)

Regarding the coworkers and the extra work and all the complaining I was doing last time around, I should clarify. (Let's see if I can do this and still be sufficiently vague so as to not get dooced.) Our company is in the state it's in (at least partially) due to some serious gutting by our old parent company, who cut lots and lots of people (and refused to replace people who left voluntarily) to make the books look fantastic for a sale. We were bought by a new parent company who seems to take active interest in our well-being and growth, but we are a slow-moving company and it takes us some time to readjust our group mentality. This morning I was given the opportunity to speak frankly to The New Guy in charge of product development, and I was able (along with several others) to lay out my concerns. He's BRAND NEW, and so he's not going to go diving in and hiring a whole damn bunch of people, but at least I feel like he's hearing us. There is still much frustration, but the last few management-level hires have made me quite hopeful for the future. We just gotta work through the next few months while people get bearings and find out where we need the most attention. My coworkers are a fabulous bunch and they will do what they can, but if they're working on my deadlines, theirs aren't getting done. Ya know?

Hmmm, isn't this supposed to be a knitting blog?

Sunday means more of the same

I baked bread again last night. I am sick with what I'm fervently hoping is a head cold and not a slow-moving strep (I am particularly susceptible to strep, it seems) and am having a hard time sleeping anyway, so I cleaned the kitchen and finally used up those bananas I bought. (I was in the mood for banana bread, but the Bug eats bananas so quickly I had to buy two bunches and stash one in the garage.) No pictures, as they look very much like the bread from the last post, only less orange.
No, DH did not clean the stove yet, so that looks the same too, only the little pasta shells are charred. I. Am. Not. Cleaning. It.
Thanks for all the good wishes on DH's job. The company eliminated the vast majority of positions in DH's division in favor of using third parties and outside vendors, so his old boss suggested he get on the vendor list and keep doing what he had been. If it works out, it could be really good, allowing him to work from home during the better part of my maternity leave. There would be some travel, which wouldn't be fantastic, but we could deal. If it doesn't work out for any reason, it could be extra bad, since he is putting all his career eggs in this little basket. When you're not knitting, keep your fingers crossed for us.
Speaking of maternity leave, do you see the counter? 46 days plus a little. I am SO not ready to have a baby lying around the house in 46 days. There will come a point where denial doesn't work any more, and that point is barreling down on me. I have four million things to do at work and no motivation or brain power to do them. (I mentioned that to someone at work, and he was astounded that I'd even think about it. He kept saying, "It's not your problem." But, um, it is. There are 5 writers and 11 products. If someone covers for me and does my work? Their work doesn't get done. All our big products have big deadlines either during or immediately after my maternity leave. We are all a leetle stressed.)
Today, I am hoping for a tad more energy than yesterday. I think I went outside yesterday, but can't remember. Today I hope to take my long-haired hippy kid to the barber. And maybe take a shower. And maybe knit.

And this is entirely random, but did you know that angels occasionally fly with the RAF? Cuz WOW.

Beware of baked goods

Cuz it means I'm having issues.



Yes, my stove is really that dirty. It's DH's turn to clean it, and he likes to leave things to sit until I can't stand it and clean them myself, and I'm not falling for it this time.

Anyway, that is the rest of the pumpkin I made last weekend. In deliciously dense bread form, the perfect vehicle for a slab of cream cheese. That should be enough calories to drown out the fact that the DH got laid off today. (Yes, really.) I told him that the lesson to be learned there was that he actually really liked his job, and bosses can't stand it when you're not downtrodden and broken at work.
(LMAO - DH just now turned the TV on, and there was a news bit about how money stress causes pregnant women to go into early labor. Ironically, the story finished up saying that if it was the spouse who lost HIS job, most women went full term. Dammit.)

But look, I have a new button.



You know you wanna steal this button.

Domesticated

I stayed home on Friday and caught up on my sleep and rest. I got some work done around the house and did some laundry. I cleaned the kitchen and then destroyed it again getting all pumpkiny. I had four baking pumpkins, so I channeled the Pumpkin Queen and got to baking.


I made a little mess. I may have overbaked them a little, but they came out okay.



The DH made a comment about pumpkin pie, and would you believe that after 8+ years together I only just realized pumpkin is his favorite? Bug and I got to working.



And despite the questionable age of the condensed milk and the effed up crust (which was actually the best one ever, I'm going to eff up more often) it was pretty nice.



The Bug enjoyed the heck out of his Halloween costume. Turns out that all he really needs is a hat...



I think he'd still be wearing his Woody costume if he hadn't smeared chocolate all over it.

Yesterday we napped, cleaned, kicked around, and generally wasted our Saturday in the most satisfying way. Today the DH is off riding his Harley around the dusty state, and the Bug and I had a lunch date and went flower shopping. He picked out some purple petunias and a red amaryllis, and also some scilla bulbs, which I'll try to force inside. I got some stock and some alyssum, and at some point this afternoon I suspect I will be digging in the dirt with my boy. I think I'll try to get him to nap first, cuz I could sure use one.