Lazy morning

L is home from school today. He has a cold (which is not bronchitis--yet) and sounds absolutely miserable. We're hoping that keeping him home today plus the weekend will give him a chance to recover without this turning into something else. This is how he has spent the morning:He also watched Finding Nemo (twice) and sniffling. He's missed 11 days of school already this year and will be missing at least two more for specialist appointments. Next year when he starts kindergarten this will be problematic. After 10 days, the schools have to start informing you about the absences. Luckily, we can easily get doctor's notes about his absences. I just wish we didn't have to worry about these things. Don't worry about him, though. He's still his energetic little self.

I spent the morning finishing up my lecture for class tomorrow and knitting a sock. The yarn has aloe vera in it and I'm just hoping that it helps soothe my poor dry winter skin.

M has choir practice tonight and outdoor soccer practice starts tomorrow! Yes, spring is here. We have dandelions in the front yard, tulips and day lilies popping up, and B is probably going to need to mow in a week or so.

Next week is spring break for me. Only 27 hours until I am finished with my duties and can mostly ignore students and the college for one entire week. I will be taking a course to learn how to teach online (teaching from home in my pjs sounds pretty good to me) but otherwise, I am going to do as little as possible. I'm not going to clean the house. I'm not going to run errands the entire week. I'm going to do fun things, like ride my bike.

Now it's only 26 hours and 59 minutes.

Another knitting post

First, a big thank you to my secret pal. She sent me sock yarn (yay!) and a great sock pattern book, by what may be my favorite knitting author/designer Nancy Bush. The yarn is from Dale of Norway (can we all say ooooh?) and I think will be great to knit with. The yarn is for the Norwegian sock pattern which has fair isle knitting in it (a new favorite technique), so I will have something to keep me busy next week (on spring break, woohoo!). I will also be casting on for MIL's sweater vest next week, because I know that I will need something that I can take breaks from the fair isle.

Speaking of fair isle, I finished the fair isle class that I was taking. We made headbands, a nice fast easy project. I'd show you the headband on my head, but it's too big (I have a small head). I'm going to make another one with 12 fewer stitches. M wants one, too. It is pretty, though. I suspect that I'll be doing a lot of fair isle as it is fun and it makes really warm garments (the stranding doubles up the yarn).

I'm going to stop here, as L will be home from school soon. He's been something else lately.

Oh, my worries about M never wearing the sweater have been completely unfounded. It's the first jacket he grabs whenever he is going outside or is chilly. He's even wearing it more than the beloved Reds jacket that his grandparents gave him for Christmas!

The sweater and its use

As I was writing before, I finished M's sweater. He loves the color green and has since he was able to identify colors. He wore the sweater to school and the principal saw it and asked him who made it. He's pretty proud of it. Here it is, in a mannequin pose. The sweater won't fit him long--I made it extra long in the body and the hood and it's just right. B measured M on Monday, and he was 51.5 inches tall. I measured him today and he was 52 inches tall. I can't wait until summer when he can wear shorts.

We had a very nice day today and spent it watching the boys play with all of the neighborhood children who were at home. We had soccer games, bike riding, scooter riding, playing on the playset in the back yard, playing with the dog, and a huge variety of activities. It's nice to live in a neighborhood with a lot of children. It also seems that our house is the one where every one wants to come and play. I like that--we know all the kids and we know were everyone is.

The second picture is the boys in their matching sweaters today (L's sweater I made last spring. It still fits). It was a bit chilly but the sweaters were just right. They also like their helmets. The scary thing is that M's wearing my helmet (I have two). We have the same size head already (he's 8.5 years). I don't think that he's going to be shorter than me that much longer.

I Lied.

I finished M's hoodie last night at 10:20. No pictures yet, as he wore it to school today. I'm amazed that I finished it already! It is convenient though, as now I can start a new project that will keep me busy through proctoring three exams today.

It always feels good to finish things. I hate having too many things left undone. The only unfinished project I have left is B's sweater. I have to think when I work on that one, so it is pretty slow going. Fun to knit, but slooooooooooow.

I'm going to have to go now. The highway awaits (and 110 students who tried to convince me to put off the test until Monday).

Finished!

This week, I've actually finished two projects (and a third may be finished by Sunday). I finished socks for me which are definitely fraternal twins. I couldn't have made them match because the pattern of the stripes was completely random.





The other project I finished was a purple lace scarf for someone else, who I think does not read the blog. I'm pretty sure that she doesn't know it's for her, even if she does. (No, she's not related to me, so don't hold your breath if you are.) It's knitted from bamboo yarn (yep, made of bamboo fibers) and it was really kind of interesting with which to knit. I used size 8 needles (which seem huge since I knit socks on either 1s or 2s usually). I like the way it came out.

No cycling for the last couple of days. I've had asthma attacks for some reason, so I thought that riding 3 miles and then having to stop out in the middle of nowhere wasn't exactly wise. Especially if I can't talk on the cell phone to get someone to come and get me. Hopefully all of this is just the weather changes (it was 76 yesterday and 68 today and there's a cold front coming later today) and I can get some real cycling in next week or so.

Time to go--the boys have choir in about 45 minutes, so I need to corral the smaller boy.