It's here, y'all

Merry Christmas, or happy Saturday, whatever you choose. If you celebrate a holiday around now, I hope it's magical with moist turkey, perfect wine, and everyone genuinely happy. If you don't, I hope the rest of us keep the noise to a dull roar and you have a relaxing and joyful Saturday. I'll report back, assuming I make it through the next 36 hours unscathed. (Or even partially scathed.)

It's Go Time.

I think it's safe to say that your schedule is out of control when you need to color-code it.



It's go-time here. Supplied are ordered in bulk to do Christmas projects with the kids for their grandparents, aunts and uncles. They're still little so there will be a great deal of directing by T and me. Schedules are made indicating what needs to be mailed and hence what must be finished/purchased first. I'm down to counting down how far I need to be on what day in order to keep a schedule and get things mailed on time. It sounds a little insane, but once I get the schedule I feel a little more relaxed knowing that nothing is falling through the cracks. Poor T is probably going to wonder where his relaxed, somewhat low key (SHUT UP SQUISH) girlfriend went. He saw a hint of it at Thanksgiving, but turkeys got nuthin' on Santa. Christmas card photos have been snapped, snowmen and chrismooses are displayed, plans are made for the procurement of a Christmas tree. I even went to his office Christmas party, where he was employed as the photographer and therefore spent most of the time roaming about while I fended for myself, and I didn't say or do anything that might get him fired. (I think.)(The boss's wife was WAY more drunk than I.)(Also, whoever invented the Ruby Slipper is my new best friend.)

I think one of the drawbacks of making my own Christmas presents or decorations is that I start early enough to give myself time to finish, but slack because I think I have all this time, and then I feel far far behind just as the season is picking up.
Anyway.



So, the shawl is blocked. Two dropped stitches (urgh) need to be dealt with, and ends woven, but I am still happy with it. Perhaps a photoshoot will be forthcoming for the weekend. The required scarf is being knit now, with plans to exchange it for one of the same pattern, similar color, not-as-nice-yarn that was in my OFA box if I don't get it done. (If I resort to that, the OFA box will get the finished gift-scarf instead.) One mitten to finish for Smacky, with ends on the first mitten and matching hat to be woven. Still need to bind FIL's quilt. Two parties this weekend and the possibility of driving off to Tucson to attend the 4th Avenue Street Fair. (If I'd gotten that watercolor I liked for Aunt C in April, when I bought the one for Aunt H, I wouldn't even consider it, though 4 hours of car knitting time might be lovely). Something like 16 tshirts to be stamped this weekend by the children. I have 48 whole hours if I forego sleep. If someone would hurry up and invent a Star Trek transporter I'd have an additional week to craft. (And think about it - insta-delivery on internet and catalog orders!)(But there would need to be a blocking option on unannounced visits.)(Hmm, I seem to have gotten off topic again. This will be a surprise to you, no doubt.)

It's so much harder to live in denial when I insist on trying to stay organized.

Progress of a sort

Last week I was bored, so I wrote the post about how my shawl was done, I dyed it, it was beautiful, etc, intending to add the photos as they happened. From the moment I did that (which coincided with the moment I started the border) it was FRAUGHT with problems and issues. Not to mention the fact that no matter how loosely I do my nupps, give that there are so many YOs around them, they stretch and the looseness goes away, causing a purl-back row to go from 30 minutes for a nupp-less row to 2 hours or more for one with nupps. (Cuz there are like 60 nupps in most of these rows.) That being said, I am approaching the end. This last row had a few errors that I fudged, rather than pulling back two rows (or more) of nupps.



Later when I get the thing out to work on it, I'll pseudo-block the area to see if it's noticeable, but I can't really believe that it is. (In most cases it was an extra stitch, likely caused by missing a k2tog or knitting one of the loops of a nupp separately, a few rows previous.) I couldn't be chuffed to care last night, though. I am near the end of this monster, and it IS a monster, for all that I think it will be lovely and it will be a wrench to give it away. I have been 100% monogamous to this puppy, and I'm looking forward to a nice cabled scarf for a change.

Otherwise, life goes. I have been doing Christmas shopping early, in an effort to make this Christmas as relaxing and lovely for myself and for T as it will be for the children. Bug is super-excited and loves the glitz and sparkle of Christmas as much as I do, and Smacky has taken to saying "Oooooh" when he sees pretty things, in his tiny little voice, and it melts my icy cold heart all over again. If I can keep the cats and the Smackster off the tree, I will consider it a success. (Anyone know how to anchor a live tree to the wall, in any case?) In the meantime, though, we're still purging and working like crazy on the house to get it ready for Thanksgiving. T's parents are coming and my family is descending like locusts. My brother promised to make a Thai dish, we're making spicy chili cranberries in addition to the regular, and a few other non-traditional dishes that T wants thrown in. Can't wait. I love making T-day dinner. Now to decide whether to make a pumpkin cheesecake, or a milk-chocolate kahlua one. The shopping for this dinner was epic.





The cats are adorable, smelly, finger-biting, yarn eating monsters too. Yesterday I got out some yarn to show T, who's helping me figure out what to use for his dad's scarf. I left the hanks on the bed and went downstairs. A few minutes later, George came down skulking, and hid under my desk. Little jerk had one of the hanks of yarn and was carrying it like it was his latest kill. I rescued it (there was no noticeable damage) and the little bastige went up and got the second one. Then I noticed Smacky's hat out of the knitting basket, and one strand of the yarn stretched over the chair, mostly because George went over to bat at the strand in consolation. Icicle seems to have no interest in yarn or knitting, and will happily sit on my lap and purr away, so long as the yarn doesn't tickle his ears.

Christmas is in the bag

I am totally cruising on my shawl, have plenty of time to finish it and the other (already well in progress) projects I want to gift - the scarf, the hat, the slippers... I have a plan for baking cookies and freezing them to frost later. I have the Flylady to organize my Thanksgiving dinner, and I sit in my car at lunch with the windows open, feeling the beautiful soft breezes and knitting away.

I'm totally going to get there this Christmas.



Oh. Damn mail.

A day late and a dollar short

For Eye Candy Friday, and two days for Christmas. I couldn't buy enough of this card to send to everyone, so consider yourselves Christmas-carded.



I need to get caught up, but Christmas dealt us a cold that has flattened us all (well, except the Noob, he's so far managed to escape it) so it will have to wait a little longer.

Insert witty post title here.

Thank you for all the congratulations on the previous post. As you can guess, we're all over the moon about it. Bug thinks Noob is the bestest thing ever, and wants to kiss him and pet him every five minutes or so. Even tried to help me feed, but since I'm breastfeeding I didn't really need him to hold my boob for me. (Add that one to the therapy list.)

What the heck day is this, anyway? I can't even tell, they're kinda all blurring together. I can tell you, though, that compared to last week, Christmas is a bit...anticlimactic.
However, SOME PEOPLE are accusing me [winkwink] of having a baby just to get out of finishing my Christmas knitting, and here I have photographic proof that it didn't happen that way. (As a matter of fact, I removed the blocking wires and unpinned the second Aunt scarf after my water broke, before I went off to the birth center. I know where my priorities lie.)



Stats on Ravelry, here (for the green one) and here (for the other one).

Hmm, what else? Oh yeah, proof that it isn't only Christmas-knitters who procrastinate.



Does that look like a newly installed laminate floor and a new full-sized bed to you? Don't worry, the DH has, like, 47 whole hours to get it taken care of. o.0

Amaryllis watch...



I have a few more pictures of the Noob. (Yeah, like you're going to get away without looking at more pictures.)

Grampa came to see him:



The rest of the time he does this:



Unless it's 2am and then he's wide awake. You will forgive me for not having pictures of that. o.0

Now, I must brave the crowds for some last minute shopping. [weep]

My Christmas Spirit

Has been sucked into the ghost containment grid. It's hard to be all Christmassy and cheerful (even if you're inclined that way, unlike some certain someones, who for some reason fear sweet lil me) when you walk outside and think, "&($)@(&(*&$@), it's hot."



75 frickin' degrees. It's hard on a knitter who lives someplace where it's not all that unusual to have it be 75 frickin' degrees on December 12.
That means I have 13 days to get in the spirit. Don't see it happening, but the DH swears he'll have the floor in the guest room next week (which means he'll have tidied the shed and emptied the guest room of its current load of crap first) which will get me close. I did finally suck it up and get most of the rest of the Christmas decorations out last night. Behold, my hypocrisy knows no bounds, as my heathen self displays a nativity scene on the gingerbread horror. (I can't help it, I painted it, and I really like the camel and the sheep and the kings. At least I didn't bother with the tiny hay bales this year for authenticity.)





Knitting on the secret thing continues. Well, I don't suppose it's truly a secret thing - I'm test knitting for Sock Madness III. I just can't show you what it looks like. I don't feel like I'm giving away any details when I tell you it is, indeed, a sock.

[picture sock here]

I finally remembered a place to block and dry Aunt Scarf #2 - Bug's bed! He hasn't used it yet, preferring to sleep crossways on mine with either his head between my shoulder blades, kicking DH in the face, or with his hot hot feet and sharp toenails digging into my back. Sigh. At least I can make the best of it and block my scarf on his Thomas the Tank Engine sheets, right?

And because it goes so well with Christmas,

Which creature of the night are you? Your Result: Werewolf   You are a vicious fighter and a vicious lover, absolutely dedicated to your pack. You are pushed to anger by disloyalty and injustice and have a tendency toward sudden, periodic bursts of wild behavior.
Vampire
Cthulu Spawn
Demon
Sorceror
Incubus/Succubus
Ghost
Which creature of the night are you? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Courtesy of Rabbitch.

Finally, because when I touch the camera, Bug says, "Would you please take a picture of me?" Then he demands to see it, and when I show him, he says, "Awwww."



Oops, I forgot to post this: proof that Texas (blech) doesn't have a lock on the pretty sunsets.

So Cookie doesn't worry

No, I have not had any babies yet, I just WORKED. Yes, it's true, and some people were worried that I wasn't stalking their blogs as much as usual and sent in the Marines.
I did have A Day, though. It was going to be busy enough - going to view a dinner table/buffet set we'd seen on Craig's List at lunch, the ultrasound appointment in mid afternoon, etc. Effectively hosed my whole afternoon. However, about 12 minutes before I was supposed to leave to go see the furniture, the daycare called ME and the insurance people called DH. Long story short, Bug has pink eye, and DH needs more info for the insurance people. (Apparently, when talking insurance, the receptionist is really the only person who knows WTF is going on, and don't even bother talking to the agent or anyone else in the office.) Anyway, I picked up the Bug, dragged him to the house to look at the furniture, bought the furniture (whee, storage), came home and worked for an hour, toddled off to my ultrasound, then came home while DH took the Bug to the ped. Since he does indeed have pink eye, tomorrow will be more of the same since he can't go back to daycare until he's been medicated for 24 hours.
As for the furniture, it's nice enough. Someplace to hold extra dishes and napkins, whee! It has a hutch on it that I find mostly hideous, but DH insisted on putting it up, hoping it would grow on me. I put my snowmen on it and might let it stay until after Christmas. Maybe I will have the fortitude to take pictures of its gingerbread horror tomorrow.
Hmmm, nothing else new. No pics, because the knitting I'm currently doing is Not For Public Release, and I didn't take a pic of the furniture, and I haven't had the time or the space to pin out Aunt Scarf #2 yet. Earlier this evening I came out of the office while DH was mopping the floor (finally) to see what Bug was doing, and found him running around naked, covered in marker. I would have taken a picture of that, but I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have been able to make it come out family-friendly without losing the whole effect of the marker.
So, you get nuthin'. I'd be sorry, but I had A Day.

Sunday Funday

Okay, not really, but it wasn't all bad. This was actually a pretty productive weekend. I cleaned a little, purged the guest room a little, knitted a little, decorated a little. I even planted the amaryllis I bought a month or so ago, which is a good thing because it had started without me.



That's about 6 inches of stalk there, and I'm doing my level best not to make jokes about its appearance. Sadly, it's quite crooked as a result of growing in a box (it's also as pale as a software programmer, same reason) but I have hopes that exposure to some warmth and indirect sunlight on my kitchen table will straighten it up and turn it green. Alas, because I am mentally 12, I have the only "boy" amaryllis out there.

Other than that, nothing new. We got the Christmas tree up and lights on it, but haven't made it to the decorations yet. I have an entire cargo area full of stuff going to Goodwill, and I might actually drop it off in a reasonable time period since it quite effectively blocks the view out my rear view mirror. I even found DH's missing pants and about ten socks I'd been looking for mates for - the cleaning lady used to use the guest room bed if she folded my laundry, and DH came in one day and dumped all the camper stuff on top of it without telling me. I only just excavated down to it today. SIGH. Anyway, the room is still a wreck but at least there are a couple of pathways available that allow someone to get TO the bed without breaking necks or ankles. I'm pretty sure there will be another Goodwill trip or six happening in the next week. You'd think DH would feel a little guilty seeing his gigantically pregnant wife hauling stuff out of the guest room for the arrival of HIS daughter, but you'd be wrong. o.0 (No, Cookie, you don't have to kill him. Yet.)
Oh, I did finish Aunt Scarf #2, this time using the EZ sewn bindoff as described here. It looks to have done the trick, but no photos until I soak and block. I'm pretty happy with the scarf itself and the appearance of the bind off, so I'm certain I'll pick out the edge of the green scarf and sew it EZ style. Then I'll wrap them and congratulate myself heartily, which will ensure I will either forget to deliver or forget to mail them for two months.

D'ya ever wonder

Why all my posts are about Random? (Hint: it's cuz my life is like that. All. Over. The. Place.)
No babies yet. This is the good thing about posting infrequently - if I posted every day and then missed a day or two, I'd get a thousand emails (okay, like two) saying, "OMG did you have the baby yet?!?!?!!!1!!" Instead of that, I just get to hear it from coworkers, daycare people, and random neighbors. "What, you STILL haven't had that thing?"
No, I had it, but I had the doctor insert a basketball into the empty space because I so enjoy the preggo cow look and the inability to fasten my shoes. o.0
DH can't even help me these days - he threw out his back. And yesterday, instead of going to the hairy male chiropractor like I suggested, he went for a massage to the cute little blonde with the blue eyes. And now it's worse. Since I can't say it at home for reasons of marital harmony (or maybe I already did, I can't remember) I'll say it here: HEY HON? I. TOLD. YOU. SO.
Whew, I feel much better.
He's figured out how he injured it, too. He was in the recliner the other day and the Bug came along and hung off the back of it, tipping the whole chair and the DH over on his little legs. DH said it took a minute to figure out how to get out of the chair and get it upright and off the Bug without putting more pressure on him. You'd think the kid would learn, but the reason DH figured it out is that Bug tried to do it again last night while I was off knitting.
Wanna see my favoritest new-to-me thing ever?



Yes, my friends, it's a bookshelf. A grown-up bookshelf. From Craig's List. DH thinks it's tacky. He thinks all bookshelves are tacky. (Before you ask, no one in his family is much of a reader. I can't think of a single bookshelf I've seen in any of his family's houses.) See that top shelf? With a few exceptions (mostly stuff that's tucked away that I haven't found yet) that's my whole knitting library. The bottom shelf holds half the Bug's books, that until now have been stacked in odd places, tucked here and there. He keeps finding ones he hasn't seen in a while and saying, "This is for MINE?" like he's received a great gift. I love that he can get at his books now. And that they're easy enough for him to put away. And that the bookshelf is securely anchored to the wall. o.0
I knitted a whole repeat of Aunt Scarf #2 last night and weighed, and determined that I have about six repeats left. This makes me happy, since even with the nesting and cleaning and laundry I can manage 1-2 repeats a night. I will be doing a sewn bind off, and if I like it better I'll pick out the bind off on Aunt Scarf #1 and do a sewn bind off on it too. That will mean my Christmas knitting is complete. WOOHOO! That gives me a little time to finish the remaining 2.5 votive sleeves, but since my aunts know nothing about those, if I don't finish them I'll still have Christmas knitting done early. Heck yeah.

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.

Sigh

Tomorrow is Halloween, people. Oy. I have no costume for my kid, no candy to dole out, the punkins are uncarved, and we have an appointment tonight. I should totally not be wasting time going to work when I have this much to do.
We're making lists about what we want to do with our house. There are still projects to be done in almost every room, and we're looking at the best ways to use our space, make our place as cozy and homey as possible, and enjoy the heck out of it, since we've decided to stay. (The appointment tonight is with a pool contractor, which will go a LOOOOOOONG way toward making this house livable in the summertime.) VUBOQ's recent pottery is inspiring me with the color (I haven't stopped thinking about the rose, blue and brown combo of the coffee mug since he posted it), and we're talking about flooring and colors in the bedrooms and office now. We have a little bit of a schedule for at least the guest room - it needs to be livable by Christmas since we have a series of family and friends coming to stay from Christmas week through the end of spring. Gimme some color ideas, y'all! It's currently a dark sagey green, but as it has one north-facing window and is a rather narrow room, it's pretty dark. Ultimately it will be transformed into a shared office for DH and me (when we turn what is currently his office into a better guest room) so it can't be anything DH will veto. Furniture so far is medium to dark wood. I'm thinking a medium golden peachy color. (VUBOQ's color combo is being saved for MY bedroom! DH is going to have to deal with the rose walls, he gets no say. Okay, he gets a little say, but I'll probably get my way anyway.)
Knitting proceeds apace. Same ol' same ol'. Bor. ing. All the cool kids are knitting with beads and I WANNA! I could do the votives but it's not the same. Wahhhhh. I shall continue to knit away on my WIPs, because do you see? That little counter on the sidebar? 56 days to Christmas, and counting.

Sunday recap

This was a nice weekend, I'll say. The weather was fantastic thanks to a fast moving storm that brought rain and wind to the area, then cleared out and left blue skies. (I don't mind blue skies when the temperature is nice.) Yesterday we had a high of 82, and today we never made it out of the 60s. HEAVEN.
Yesterday we drove down to Willcox to let Bug run in the punkin patch with his buddy S. They must have run miles, back and forth, S's mom and DH chasing them while S's dad and I stood in the field and watched them and laughed. (Hey, Mama don't run, and C told me he didn't want to just leave me standing in the field. Heh, smart man.)



Finally the only way we could get them back to the tractor for the hayride back to the barn was to carry them.



Two of the three loves of my life. (The third is currently not available for closeups without heavy-duty equipment.)



The boys were in heaven with all the tractors.



Today I did my housecleaning and sat on my butt looking out the window and knitting on various projects. It was all I could do to put the sea silk aside for the beaverslide or the alpaca, but I managed it. The alpaca doesn't photograph well, mostly because I'm too lazy to pin it out to make it look right.



Linden is just a big rectangle (well, truth be told it's a trapezoid) but here it is.



It's the sea silk that I'm loving most right now.



Of course, being lace it looks like boiled ass without blocking, but I'm loving it. I switched from scarf #1 to scarf #2, as I liked the waviness better. That picture does nothing for the color of the yarn, though. Here's one that shows a little better the glow of that fine stuff.

Okay okay

So everyone noticed my tagline-o-swears. Sheesh. Subtlety is lost on you people. o.0
(Actually, that was a line from the beginning of Love Actually.)
Anyway, it's changed, and I've had the Vatican Rag stuck in my head for two days now.
Yesterday I promptly returned Lynn in Tucson's size 7s (and she only laughed at me like six times in the ten minutes I was there - I consider it a success) and came home and swatched with what I think are 9s. I think they're 9s because my dear son has managed to lose my needle gauge, and I'm not entirely sure I'm reading my calipers correctly. Either way, whatever they are, I get within half a stitch across 4" on the washed swatch, so I'm calling it good. Since it's supposed to be a loose coat anyway, I think the extra half stitch every 4" won't be noticed too much.
In other news, I threw my restraint out the window and ordered yarn for two lace scarves for my aunts for Christmas. SIGH. They're lovely but simple, and they each use a single skein of Sea Silk, so I think they're not too ambitious. I'll be doing the gold scarf (in this - Moss) and the green scarf (in this - Agate) from this post. I hope they're not too ambitious to allow me to finish them, my other WIPs plus Linden, pack a whole house, have a baby, and move to a new state in the next, um, 12 weeks...