Weekend

I've come down with the nasty cold that is going around at the boys' school and the college, so a short post today.

Here's my favorite picture of what we did today:He is so serious. This is soccer, not just some game to him.

SDA Silent Auction

I made a goal to knit a baby hat and thumbless mitten set for a girl and a boy to send to the SDA Silent Auction. (There's also family bingo, but that has nothing to do with me.)

They are both done, with over a month to spare. (Well, really it's about 8 weeks away, but who's counting?)

Both are knit from superwash sock yarn, so are machine washable and dryable (perfect for those babies, eh?).

You've seen this one before:
My favorite detail are the little corkscrews at the top, although the picot edge is precious too.

Here's the "boy" version: A plain little hat, with a bobble on top. The mittens are similar to the ones for a girl, although they might be a little bit smaller. However, both hat and mittens are pretty stretchy, so they should fit a baby for awhile. (I actually tried the hat on the Wiz--it will go on his head, although it is a bit on the small side.)

I still have to decide if this will be going too:I really love this blanket. I wish it was big enough for me. I wonder how much yarn it would take to knit one that was big enough for me?

What are your opinions on the pinwheel blanket? Please leave a comment so I can decide!

Surprises!

I did say yesterday I was going to talk about the box my SP#9 sent me. I try to keep my promises.

This picture shows most of what I received from inkydinkydoo. There's a box of white tea (which will be great to drink as I begin grading 60+ papers in just a couple of weeks), wool soak for my knitting, a Knitty Meet Up sticker from Philly (I am not sure how many of us would show up if we tried to do one in KY), and some chocolate (which is residing in our refrigerator, as yesterday we topped 93 degrees). Warning: the best light we have is in front of our bay window. The dogs like to stand or lie on the windowsill and look out. Apparently, part of looking out of the window is slobbering on it. We wash the windows, but we don't do it constantly. Hence, we have messy window panes on the bottom half.

She sent some of it in this fabulous box:Isn't it great? I really love the takeout box. (Yes, I'm weird. I save all of our gift bags and reuse them every year too. Maybe this year I'll make cloth ones and finally stop using wrapping paper or paper bags at all.)

One of the things inside the box were two dpn protectors, that look like this:To make certain that they work, I need to cast on a pair of socks, right?!?

And finally, she made me this:Someday, someone will receive this card for some special occasion. For right now, though, I am going to look at it and admire it. Isn't she talented?

Thank you, SP. I do know who you are, and I really have enjoyed being spoiled by you. Thanks!

*******
In other news:

The Wiz's midterm report was *very* good. He's testing on 96% for reading, has two perfect spelling tests, and is doing well in math. The Collar and I have been doing homework (pulling teeth) with him and are actually stunned. Maybe he's saving his wiggles for home now? This is a huge improvement for him. :)

Game Boy is also doing well at school. He has one B and everything else is an A. He says he wants to bring up the B, but we are not pressuring him. Yesterday, he brought home a fat envelope that informed us that he was being invited to sing in the CKMEA honor's choir on November 2. He's really excited. It's going to be a very musical weekend for him, because he's also singing Mozart's Requiem up at Good Shepherd that Sunday. Whew! It's amazing how far music is taking him. Next summer, he's probably going to New York City and the following summer the choir is going to England. Remind me when I whine about driving up for rehearsals that he is getting to go places and do amazing things, and it will all be good for him.

New Things

Supposedly, it is a new season. Autumn, to be exact! However, if you look outside here, you'd never guess. It is currently 95 F, and we're shooting for a record! I think that this is better than cold, but...

Because it's a new season (HA!) I have started and/or made some changes around here. First up: office space for me. I'm teaching 6 hours on line this semester and 9 next semester, so I needed some place to call my own. Right now it is this:I'll be adding a corkboard and bookshelves and an actual office chair eventually. It's nice to have a space of my own. It's a corner of the guest room, but it still works for that, too. I'm going to add a curtain and buy new bedding, so that it can be my space. It might be the one place that's always relatively neat, too, so I'll have a refuge from everyone else's mess!

I haven't been able to buy yarn for the Collar's next sweater (it will be knitted from SUPERWASH!), so I'm working on two other things, instead. One is another hoodie. This one's for the Wiz.I've already completed the back, and I'm a good chunk of the way to the armhole on the front. I am using stash yarn, so I might not have enough for the sleeves. I'm thinking of a contrasting yarn color for the sleeves. I'll have to decide later. (It's boring stockinette, but he's a small kid. This is a combination of size 4 and 6 measurements. The kid is still skinny.)

I have also cast on for a shawl. I'm cold at church. The pattern is from Magknits. The pattern is Blossom. I am knitting mine in Fleece Artist Mermaid.
This is about 4 of 14 pattern repeats. I really like the colors, even if it is mostly blue! I chose the yarn because of the name. I always wanted to be a mermaid.

Last new thing for today (tomorrow I'm going to post about my SP's package!) is this absolutely soft and fuzzy alpaca yarn. It's a natural color (I believe the alpaca is named Prospector) and I'm going to make boot socks for me. The BB fanatics gave it to me. There's an alpaca farm near Augusta. (The Kentucky one, that is on the river. Not the Georgia one.)

Maybe some day it will be cool enough to wear boots...and warm socks.

Getting off of my rear

It's the only way I can maintain my weight (or lose it). Every time I've gained weight it has been due to inactivity. Mostly because some health issue or other has completely messed up all activity for me. This year was particularly bad because I had sinus surgery in January, finally became healed up enough to exercise again, then promptly did the thumb trifecta (broken, torn ligament, bone bruise--you know, three winners!). Between healing from surgery, casts and the like, I haven't been able to exercise as much as I like (and having two boys, one of whom is too young to stay home alone, yet is too old to stay at child care at the Y makes going to the gym hard during the summer).

Last Week (September 10-15)
Monday: Walked about 2 miles
Tuesday: 5 miles or so on elliptical trainer (1 hour)
Wednesday: 5.30 miles early, 8.77 miles later (so 14.07 miles) about 60 minutes total on Dew
Thursday: 20.24 miles (16.4 mph! Go me!) taking 74 minutes on Dolce
Friday: walked 2.7 miles, soccer practice later
Saturday: coached a soccer game

This week so far (September 17-19)
Monday: 5.32 miles early, 9.66 miles later, 14.98 miles total, about 60 minutes or so and coached soccer practice
Tuesday: knees hurt, rested
Wednesday: 5.31 miles early, 10.15 miles later, 15.46 miles total, about 65 minutes
Thursday:
Friday:

Hopefully, I'll be able to do some more miles on Thursday and Friday. I love cycling, and the weather and my body are both cooperating right now. Maybe it'll stay that way for awhile.

----
Happy Birthday to my youngest sister, Maggie! Today's the day! I remember when she was born. It happened while I was at kindergarten. No one else was born while I was at school!

One of those days

(or weeks.)

I've had one of those weeks that seems to turn into good news/bad news.

It started with the sweater. Yes, it does not fit the Collar. However, it will fit me quite nicely even over heavier clothes. It will be well loved and comfortable. So that was bad, but turned out to be good.

We have had rain twice this week. That's good. The bad part is that it happened on M/F, not T/R when I drive in anyway, so I had to drive and walk in about a mile. (For those who don't know: I refuse to give UK $244 of my salary for the privilege of having permission to park on campus. If I'm lucky.) Oh well.

Today was payday for me, after a long dry spell (try since mid May). It was less than I expected. They changed our pay schedule so that now we are being paid 8 times during the semester instead of 7. It's good that we will have my paycheck all the way through December, but it was kind of a shock to have $200 less.

Today, the Collar and I met for lunch. (Yeah! No sitter.) All good. Then we went to Sam's to buy groceries, laundry detergent, etc. Also good. Then we went to our respective cars. The Collar's didn't start. I hadn't left. We tried to jump his Montero from mine. No go. This is bad.
However, Sam's happens to sell batteries, too. So he was able to buy a new battery. This is good.

I keep trying to remember all of this. Big sigh. Big, deep breath.

Oh--I'm almost finished with something, but can't show it to you. It's good that I'm finishing a gift, but bad because I can't show it to you. You'll get to see it after Christmas! :)

One Extra Long

Sweater, that is.

I finished the knitting, seaming, and crocheting of The Collar's Cardigan. It's blocking, as we speak, and it needs a zipper. However, the really difficult parts are finished! I'm not sure when I started this, but I started the back piece in January.

I'm scared that now that it's finished, that it won't fit him. It seems very small, now. I think that the yarn felted just a tiny bit. I've measured it, but...

Here are some blocking pictures:

The whole sweater, pinned out and hopefully large enough.
This one shows the color better

Specifics: Knit in KnitPicks Wool of the Andes, color Pumpkin (however, I think it looks like butternut squash!)
Pattern: Ann Budd's Cambridge Jacket from Summer 2006 Interweave Knits.
I used size 9 and size 8 needles, just like the pattern called for.

It's a nice looking sweater, but it was boring to knit. Miles of stockinette and ribbing. Dull, dull, dull.

And now I'm worried that I'm going to have to reknit it in a bigger size. But it looks great right now, don't you think?

*Edited to add: It's too small for him. It's too narrow across the shoulders, and just a wee bit too short. So I tried it on, and it is big on me, but does fit. I'll get a zipper put in, and I guess we'll see how it fits then.

The Collar has picked out a new sweater pattern (I just can't knit the same pattern again right now) and a color. I'll order the yarn this week. I feel horrible. I'm casting on for a hoodie for The Wiz, and then I was going to knit BB fanatic feminine version her vest. But I have to knit the Collar a sweater! AAARGH!

Let's Play a Game!

See if you can find Game Boy in these pictures. In case you don't know what he looks like, here's a picture of him:He apparently has become very shy, and capturing him on film has become a challenge. We'll start with an easy one:
This one is a little bit harder:Can you see him here?

Game Boy, you need better camouflage!

Adventures in Karst

We drove there on Sunday afternoon and camped overnight. It was a blast, and the first time the boys have camped in a tent. Much fun was had by all. I'm just going straight to the pictures, because that tells the story better anyway!Hiking to one of the sinks. We also hiked to the River Styx Spring (where usually the underground River Styx meets up with the Green River but doesn't right now due to drought) on Monday. We probably wound up hiking about 8 miles or so on Sunday and Monday. Two of those miles were part of an underground tour.
A goofy Wiz showing us one of the entrances into Mammoth Cave. (Not that you can get in from there, but it is an entrance.) This is from the hike on Sunday evening.

Butterflies! Everywhere! Here's a shot of a giant swallowtail. We also saw some tiger swallowtails, but I didn't quite manage a shot of one of those.
We saw lots of doe/faun pairs this weekend. This mom doesn't look so great--I suppose the weather has been affecting foraging.

The boys want to go back and go on other tours of the cave. I'd like to also. It's a unique place. The rivers and streams are still carving out the cave (it has 5 levels at the moment, and is growing every year) so it is always different. It is the largest cave in the world--if you add up the lengths of #2 and #3, Mammoth Cave would still be bigger by 100 miles. It might not be the most spectacular in looks, but you can't beat the sheer size and enormity of the place.

Another reason why Kentucky is unusual.

Carpe Diem!

+ 4 or so hours.

We went here to celebrate the end of summer, and to visit with a friend and her son (yes, I do have friends).

Pictures tomorrow (and the next day, and the next, next day).

Not Fair.

The Wiz's blood work came back. His white counts are low, so he'll be taking antibiotics before his dental work.

Drat.