A Rogue?

Get Me - more yarn!!

Rogue: A variation from the standard varietal type.

I've been deviating from my "standard varietal type" (cheap) lately when it comes to buying yarn. I'm actually buying it, for FUTURE projects! Or, in the case of this weekend, because the hubby gave me money for the specific purpose of buying yarn, just for fun.

Anyway, usually when I buy yarn for a project, I don't buy the "suggested yarn." Last week, I'm pretty sure for the very first time, I actually ordered the suggested yarn for a project. I usually substitute yarn because the suggested yarn is too pricey for me. I still do not have the confidence to spend $80+ on something I'm not sure will fit, or I'll even like when it's finished. Many times, I'm just a rebel and don't like being told what to buy, and have my own ideas - which don't always work out, but I've been pretty lucky so far.

Anyway, I've been wanting to make Rogue for a long time now.... and after you were all so encouraging that I could be Extra Spicy if I really wanted to, I figured there was no time better than the present to tackle Rogue. And this time, I could actually afford the suggested yarn, and ordered it up from those great gals at KPixie. BEAUTIFUL color! Burgundy Heather, Bartlett Yarn.

However - I have to say, beautiful as it is, if I had been in a yarn store to buy it, I would have been tempted to substitute. This stuff is scratchy!! I guess I'm used to petting all that alpaca I bought over the weekend, or maybe it's because all the wool I've ever used is Merino, or a blend, and softer. This regular ol' wool is pretty darn rough - and a little smelly - but I'm gonna take their word for it that this is the right yarn for the project and stick with it - at least until it gives me a blister from knitting it or I can't stand the smell any longer! I've got it all spread out, airing out.... waiting for me - so maybe that'll help the sheepy smell. But I don't think it's getting any softer...

But first, as tempted as I am to start Rogue and see if I can figure out those cables, I have to finish Spring Fling... I still can't deviate that far from my "standard varietal type" and have two sweaters going at once. That's just crazy talk, and I'd start to twitch. Unfortunately, Spring Fling has been a little slow going lately. I hate it when I'm too busy to knit! All this yarn is starting to stare at me!

PS - Thanks for all you kind words for Kaity- I passed them on.... she's on the mend, but still doesn't have her "twinkle" back. It's been a long time since I had a barfing kid - gotta say - don't miss that ONE BIT! She better not have breathed on any of us!

Love That Hubby!

Conversation last night, while watching something about Titan missiles on The History Channel...

Kaity: Where's Vandenberg?
Me: Up near Solvang
Kaity, Me, and D#2 (in unison): Ahhh, I want to go to Solvang again!
Me: They have yarn stores!
Hubby: Why don't you go?
Me: It's only fun if you have money to spend
Hubby: How much do you want?

The best hubby and dad in the world handed out $$$$$ and said "I think you 3 should go tomorrow - you'll have fun!"

AND WE DID!!

Man - you can hardly beat an impromptu trip to spend money you didn't even know you had!

That beautiful grey-brown is 1330 yards of 100% Superfine Natural Colored Alpaca (musk), spun for the store. Very pretty and super soft, and destined to be a sweater - I'm just not sure which sweater yet.

The teal and purple are Khroma KD, in Aegean and Plum (50% baby alpaca, 50% Merino), and I think they're destined to be these handwarmers, from the Spring IK

We had a great day of shopping and eating... although poor Kaity ended up getting sick.... all the way home, .. poor thing, but she got some great yarn too! Check her blog, but maybe tomorrow, when she's feeling better ;( Right now, she's still hanging out on the couch, with her bucket... She's even too sick to play with her new yarn - poor thing - that's no fun.

Extra Spicy Wannabe

You know how Knitty rates the difficulty of it's patterns - Mellow, Tangy, Piquant, and Extra Spicy.... Well, we all remember Ella, she was only Tangy and nearly killed me.

When I told Kaity I was going to make Spring Fling, her exact words were, "Mom, are you kidding- you are NOT piquant."

Well, maybe I'm growing as a knitter. Maybe I AM piquant. I've looked at the pattern, I can obviously do the simple lace pattern, and I think the piquant part is that this sweater is made in pieces and then seamed together. Now, I've only made the top-down, bottom-up, sleeves included - whatever-they-call-that.... that kind of sweater before, but I've done a lot of sewing in my day and know basic and even advanced (read, piquant) garment construction and think I'll be okay.

Yeah- I'll let you know when that little piquant factor shows up and bites me in the butt.... I'll be whining about it to all of you, just wait. But, for now - so far, so good. So far, I'm piquant.

but.... and you knew there was one.... I SOOOOOO want to be Extra Spicy!!! Every day I go on the blogs and drool over what some of you are making. I plan, I dream, I say to myself.... someday. Someday maybe I really could make something like that.

Have you seen Theresa's Am Kamin??? Absolutely gorgeous. I want to do that SO BAD! And, Heather - she's starting this beautiful sweater.... I REALLY love this one - I want that Demi sweater so bad there's still drool on the keyboard. So Extra Spicy. Don't even get me going on the stuff Eunny creates - unbelievable. Not only does she knit the most beautiful stuff I've ever seen, she usually makes it up herself!! Or, Wendy and her amazing ability to make her visions real, and then turn them into patterns for the rest of us! Then, there's Jill - who can wrap her head around all the math part of knitting. I just love her, and you know what - I don't care HOW Extra Spicy I get, I'll never get the math part of knitting - I was dropped on my head and damaged my "math section" when I was a baby - so that's just not gonna happen (a story for another day).

That's just the tip of my wanna-be iceberg. And, you are all so nice and encouraging... telling me I can do it.... Really - do you think I'll ever be Extra Spicy??? I so want to be.

We'll see how piquant I am first...

Spring Fling

I don't know that I'm up for a "spring fling!" I'm pretty sure I'm not up for Spring Break - not that it's gonna be like "Spring Break Miami" or anything around here.... as it was not-so-politely pointed out to me last night, I make my teenage daughters "live in a bubble" and "don't let them do anything." Oh yeah, I'm a mean mom.

It's a hard balancing act with teenagers, one minute they "don't think it's safe to walk to and home from school" (in a town of 13,000), and the next minute one of them is complaining that they live in a "bubble" and why can't they walk around downtown (one street, half a block) after dark with their friends.

Do you know my poor kids are the ONLY ONES who: don't have their own car, a phone with a "plan with unlimited minutes"(we use prepaid phones for the kids), or unrestricted access to the internet in their rooms. Yeah right.... Poor babies....

Of course, on the other end of the balancing act, these are the conversations I heard last night between the 17 and 18 year old daughters (well, they will be next month)-
In the back seat of the car:
D1: I can't believe you just stuck your finger in my eye! On purpose!
D2: Yeah, I licked it first
D1: Ewww, how gross! Why did you do that?
D2: I can't believe you didn't see my finger sneaking up on you.

later:
D2: Mom, she just threw a crayon at my eye! It hurts like "no other!"
D1: laughs
D2: and it was a "chuck" - not a lob, or a toss, she totally chucked it at my eye!
D1: I wasn't aiming for your eye, just your face.
D2: And it was a yellow one! The yellow ones are hard.

HUH???? the yellow ones are harder - I didn't know that, did you?

Yep - you heard me right, they're not 3 and 4, they're almost 17 and 18 - and want unlimited internet access and their own cars - these eye stabbers and crayon chuckers.... yeah- I'll get right on that!

Man - Ok, got that off my chest.... sorry.... just trying to work myself up for "Spring break" where they'll be bored out of their little bubble and REALLY driving my crazy.

My Spring Fling knitting, on the other hand - giving me no problems at all.....I'm loving it.

Productive Weekend

Some weekends go by, and you wonder where they went. Some weekends go by and you feel like you got nothing done.

This weekend was one of those great weekends where I can't believe it was only two days

This weekend I: made homemade marshmallows, took pictures of my scarf and blogged, cleaned my house, went to my not-so-local yarn store, and then even my more not-so-local Ulta for much needed makeup, watched FOUR chick flicks, went to church, a 4-year-old's birthday party, knit, and let my daughter have a sleepover. Somewhere in all that the guys were even home for awhile (they decided to go motorcycle riding in the snow). It was one of those great, cold, rainy weekends, perfect for movies, a fire in the fireplace, hot chocolate, and knitting.

After reading about hot chocolate and marshmallows on Amy's blog, I just couldn't think of anything else for the last few days, and had to see if it was worth the trouble. And, what do you know, when I checked her blog yesterday, she had made her own marshmallows too! Check out these marshmallows! I made them about twice the size of a "regular" store bought marshmallow.... but the kicker is, the recipe said it would make 12 marshmallows!!! Now, those would have been huge marshmallows. I have some big mugs, but not THAT big!

Anyway, it was something different to do, they were easy to make, tasted good, and it's kind of cool to have hot chocolate with your own marshmallows floating on top...

While I was getting ready to check out at the N-S-LYS, with something completely picked out.... I noticed this new Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece. At least it was new to my LYS. In fact, she only had a few skeins on the counter and hadn't even unpacked it yet, and had to go get the "big box" out from the back for me to dig through. I picked the color Malibu Blue, for this project.

I think I must be getting better at picking nicer yarns, because I seem to be saying this a lot - I LOVE THIS YARN! It reminds me of Rowan Wool-Cotton, which is what I had originally intended to buy (what the pattern calls for), but that was a little pricey for me, so I was looking for a substitute. Instead of 50/50, this is 80% cotton, 20% Merino wool, but was very similar when I compared them side to side. I think it's gonna be a winner.

I may need to step out of my comfort zone in terms of color, though. When I got home and started knitting I realized I have already knit a sweater almost this exact same color! That one is a warm wool long sleeved sweater - so this can be it's summer counterpart.

One of the things I didn't get done this weekend was blog maintenance, like updating my tunes, and adding to my Finished Objects sidebar, etc. I can procrastinate forever when it comes to doing blog maintenance.... let's see how long it takes me to get around to it...

BTW, if I've tempted anyone to make marshmallows now... I just Googled "homemade marshmallows" to find a recipe, but this is the one I ended up with.

Lady E!

Woot Woot!! She's finished! This sucker is 90" long!!!

Ok - it's not your typical Lady E, but I like it. I kind of broke a lot of style rules here... but isn't knitting about making it your own? I made a scarf instead of a stole, and I didn't use the typical Noro or yarn that makes it's own blocks.

And, well, you know my "random block" dealio....

So, going back to my reference that this Lady E would be more likely worn by the Court Jester rather than an elegant damsel.... Here I am, trying to juggle in the backyard. Look at that little birdie fly!!! Thank goodness for the 3-shot-burst feature on the camera!

Can you tell I have NO idea how to juggle? Are my eyes crossed? And, you definitely have to hold your tongue just right. I actually had them all up in the air for a few seconds! Short photo shoot, though, my photographer (Kaity) was in her jammies and bare feet and shivering, so we had to cut it short. Wimp.

Specs: Lady Eleanor Entrelac Stole, out of the Scarf Style book by IK
70" long, 6-3/4" wide
Yarn: - Schaeffer Yarns, Miss Priss (100%merino wool), colorway "Mr. Funny"
about 1-2/3 hanks - LOVE THIS YARN!
- Various coordinating colors of Cascade 220
Needles: Size 10, Boye Needlemaster circular

This was fun to learn and fun to knit - I like stitch patterns that keep me interested, but aren't too hard to memorize. Ok, well, truthfully I knit about half the scarf before I had it memorized... but I'm slow like that. AND, there is a MAJOR mistake, but I'm not gonna tell you where, and I don't think is too obvious. (lost my mind for a minute and I have one block going all wonky the wrong way - don't even know how I did that!) Really, though, Entrelac only looks hard - IT IS NOT.

Anyway.... it's cold and rainy today - even hailed a little bit this morning! - so Lady E and I are off to my not-so-local yarn store today to find my next project.

Yes! We Have A Snowflake!

You can bet there was big excitement in the car this morning, and - yes, Kaity still had to go to school. (this only makes sense to those who tuned in and read yesterday's post!). And, yes, this is only "cold" by California-wimp standards. Hey- we take what we can get. This is the only snowflake I'll see where I live.


And, this is for my Dear Donna, she's wanting pictures of the views from people's front doors. Okay, I stepped off the porch and onto the lawn to get this, but I think it still counts.

Okay - I know I'm sorely lacking in knitting content lately, but really the scarf STILL just looks like more of the same old scarf, BUT it will be finished this weekend. And.... I'm shopping tomorrow for my next project - so I promise pics of the new project AND the finished scarf when next we meet.

Same bat time, same bat channel.

An Old FO On the Go

Can you tell I have no new knitting content to show you? I keep hauling out old stuff..... well, the entrelac scarf just looks like more of the same scarf - even I'm getting bored at this point. But, I'm on the home stretch. Maybe I'll finish it tonight. Thursdays is a good TV night. Maybe ER won't be a rerun - maybe I actually won't fall asleep in the middle of it.

Anyway - this is to prove to you that I actually wear what I knit (most of it, anyway). Here's my Essential Stripe, going out the door on the way to Bible Study. Bonus - they'll be impressed, I'm the only one who knits, so their an easy crowd, in knitting terms.

The last few days the weather has started to cool a little (FINALLY). So, this morning we're in the car on the way to school and, poor Kaity- gotta love her, the conversation went something like this:

Kaity: Dah!!! It's 46 degrees outside, I'm gonna freeze! I can't believe I have to go to school and we almost have a snowflake! (explanation here, in my car we have a readout of the outside temp, and if it gets cold enough a little snowflake appears next to the temp to warn you of "icy conditions." We had the car for three years before we ever even new we had that feature - and we've only seen it once - and we were way out of town where it really gets cold - so that's our criteria for "really cold")..... anyway.....

Me: You've been moaning for weeks about how it's too hot to wear anything you knit! Why don't you have on a hand-knit scarf?

Kaity: I don't have any scarves I've made for ME, I gave them all away, and I never finish mine!

Me: (chuckle, nice and warm in my Essential Stripe)

Kaity: I should be wearing a hat! I have lots of hats!

Me: Why aren't you?

Kaity: Dah! I didn't know it was gonna be this cold!

yes..... "this cold." We are major California weather wimps. 46 degrees and we're whipping out all the hand knits - well those of us who remember, anyway.

Actually, at about 2:00 it'll heat up to 70-something, Kaity will be fine without her scarf and hat, and I'll be peeling off the Essential Stripe and putting back on the standard issue Old Navy tee.

But, hey - it's supposed to be "cold" again tomorrow!

Oy

This is only about a foot-and-a-half of the nine feet of hell that await me when I finish this scarf!!! Oy - someone remind me next time to weave my ends in as I go.

"Oh - I'll just knit in a few random blocks of color!" The random blocks of color from hell... now in more ways than one! Argh. I really should think things through...


But - check this out!!! I finally found an Olympic knitting team for me! And, best, I don't even have to do any Olympic knitting - I just have to have curly hair! Finally, the industrial strength curls come in handy! I'm all over that. Thanks JessaLu (another curly head)!!

Ok - back to work, then tonight "Olympic" knitting without the Olympic pressure - but, believe me, when I get all those ends woven in, I'll have earned the gold!

It Really Is The Thought That Counts!

1. Put on the pink Valentine-y cardi
2. Write heartfelt sentiment on plate
3. Line up shot in bathroom mirror
4. Suck in gut and take picture
5. Realize you have to write backwards on the plate to make this work....

Can we all say it together - DORK!

Oh well. Happy Valentines Day from me to you.... hope yours is wonderful!

And, here's a little yarny goodness that came in the mail the other day. I mean, I had to buy it, Kaity didn't have enough for the free shipping. So, MORE lace weight (like I can even handle the lace weight I already own), and a pattern for it - some day.

And, yes, that's my Marilyn's Not So Shrunken cardigan I'm wearing. I still love this sweater, and wear it all the time!

Georg!!!

Kaity and I spent much of the weekend knitting in front of the TV, watching the Olympics. You know, there in spirit for all our Olympic Knitting friends. We, however are doing the no-stress version, as Olympic Knitting Observers. Neither of us are too keen on self-imposed stress or deadlines... okay, we're lazy, too...

Now, our Olympic rooting strategy is quite scientific.... we root for the American, and if there's no American in this particular event, then we root for the cutest guy. If there's no cute guy (we really miss the swimmers) -we root for the guy with the best name.

That's how we came across Georg (loudly pronounced in our home as Geee Org, emphasis on Org). There was an almost-cute Georg competing in the Nordic combined, so we chose him as our guy and, based on our strict criteria, after two ski jumps and a 5000? meter cross country ski race, darned if Georg didn't win! Every time they'd mention him we'd yell out "Georg!" I told her, if we were in college we'd be yelling "Georg!" then slamming back shots of tequila.

Not that I ever did that...

Later we found a couple of other Georgs to root for - so unless there's an American in the bunch, we're going with the Georgs.

So, I'm on the home stretch on my scarf, getting all that knitting done during the Olympics, in a sober Diet-Coke-drinking state (Kaity's only almost-18, and I'm a lightweight drinker). I try not to drink and knit at the same time, anyway. That can't be good for my knitting.

I'm trying to decide if it needs fringe or not... any opinions?

Georg!

Things You Don't Appreciate Until They're Gone

You know.... how, back in the day... before kids, when I busted my butt at Jazzercize because I thought I was "fat" at 130 lbs. Give me a break...... I would KILL to be 130 again.... and it would be skinny. I wasted all that time, not appreciating what I long for now.....

I still have "test pants" from way back when.... you know, pants that are a million years old in your closet - just to prove that you actually did wear them at one time. My teeny, tiny, skinny teenage daughter can't even fit into my "test pants." Those are the 118 lb pants. Talk about never-never land!!!

And this - the Super Yarn Mart. Are these still even around? Ask anyone my age who grew up around here and they will tell you childhood horror stories of the Super Yarn Mart. The HUGE (I'm sure it was the size of a football field - at least that's the way I remember it) yarn store every kid of the 60's and 70's remembers being drug through... for hours at a time. The HUGE, boring, bright pink Super Yarn Mart.

Ok - I may exaggerate, but only a little. Such vivid memories. Mom would announce where we were headed and in unison we'd all whine, loudly "Nooooo, not the Super Yarn Mart!! Please.... we don't want to go!!!!" It was pure kid torture. Wandering around acres and acres of endless aisles of boring yarn. It was kid hell. And, of course, all this with our "hands in our pockets." Mom was big on keeping our hands in our pockets.

It really was the MOST dreaded place, I don't think we hated going anywhere as much as we hated going to the stupid, big, pink Super Yarn Mart. At least when we had to go to the market we could entertain ourselves by going down to the end of the meat counter and grossing out at the beef tongue. "Ewwwww, told you no one wants it, it's still there..." you could even do that with your hands in your pockets.

Now, I know I'm only exaggerating a little, because YEARS later, we were all sitting around one night, with my sister and her husband, and my sister or I brought up the kid hell of the Super Yarn Mart, and BOTH my husband and hers (both of whom grew up within driving distance of the dreaded Super Yarn Mart) both loudly moaned, "Ohhhh, the Super Yarn Mart - my mom used to drag us there.... I HATED that place!"

You know where I'm going with this..... the Super Yarn Mart is no more... at least in our neck of the woods. And I'd KILL to go back to the Super Yarn Mart. It would be heaven.... acres of yarn (I'm still sticking to my story that the place was HUGE).... Come on - "factory direct to me!!" - what's not to LOVE? Discount yarn to touch and buy. (Well, you could touch it if you were a paying adult customer, not a kid who had to keep her hands in her pockets). You didn't even have to wait for it to come in the mail! I'm digging back in the memory files right now, in what's left of what used to be a rather competant mind, trying to picture the yarn, what did they have???, - but of course, I could have cared less back then.... so I don't really remember.

Oh well, like weighing 130 lbs, they're both just fuzzy memories now.

OK - on another note...., for all of you who doubted that I could be random..... you were right.... I caved.

Yes.... that's graph paper. The solid boxes are note the placement of the "random" solid squares I've already knit into my LadyE scarf.... and I've mapped out the placement of the rest.... I couldn't take the stress.

I'm much happier now, though..... and I am still picking the colors at random... that I can handle.

I'm A Knitter on the Edge!

What Now!! I got your randomy goodness - right here! Encouraged by ya'll yesterday, I'm out there now baby! No holds barred. Randomness all over the place - throwing caution to the wind. Stand back - there's no tellin' where this could lead.

(Ignore that wonky light blue triangle and the blue line of "stitches" in the square to the left of it... I'm obviously doing something wrong, and, actually I figured it out this morning. The pattern says pick up and "purl" ....hmm - not.been.doing.that... Oh well, too late now. Get me, with the blase attitude! Live and let live, baby - live and let live)

Random Is Hard!

I'm kind of beginning to wonder if my idea of putting in random blocks of color was a good idea, or if I should have thought it out further. For someone who eats M&M's by color and French fries by size, maybe random isn't my forte. I am beginning to obsess over this.

Where should the next block be, which color should be next? As you can see, it's not even all that random - I don't have two consecutive rows with solid blocks. I don't know... I'm obsessing....

I think the problem is, as much as I love the yarn and the colors in it - I really wanted it to make blocks of color on its own. I should have thought this out better when I made the yarn purchase in the first place, but the lady at the yarn store assured me it would be "perfect" for entrelac. Perhaps were were not thinking of the same "entrelac."

Oh well, it's too late now, and it is what it is. It's about 2-1/2 feet long, and I'm not one to start over when I'm invested this far into a project. I keep telling myself maybe I'll make another Lady E later, one with Noro, something I know will make "blocks."

The truth is - I have never knit the same thing twice, with the exception of socks. I was always going to make another Sitcom Chic, and do the eyelets right. I was going to make another Branching out, for me this time. I was going to make another Ella, but bigger. Truthfully, the chances are slim and none that any of these will ever come about. I bore too easily to repeat projects.

So, I'm going to stick with it as it is. Yesterday and the day before, I LOVED it, today, not so much. Maybe I'm just being wishy-washy - I'm good at that. Maybe it's that it really is pretty - just not what I envisioned.

Hmmmm, I've just got to love it for what it is, not what I thought it would be, and look at it again tomorrow. Maybe I'll love it again. I hope so. It really is pretty.

Court Jester

Here is the progress so far on my LadyE. Now, the text of the pattern describes this as a "stole," a combination of "rich, elegant colors and soft yet rustic hand - a garment that might be worn by a medieval lady..."

Yeah - well, mine is loud and fun - drama and jeweltone colors.... and I've decided mine would be worn by the Court Jester- but I love it! And, what could be more fitting, the name of this colorway is "Mr. Funny!"


This is fun, fun, fun to knit! I bought four colors of Cascade 220 that match perfectly to colors in the main body yarn - and it's kind of fun to try and decide where to put a block of solid color - I'm just randomly throwing them in there. I'm thinking when I'm done I'm gonna make fringe that incorporates all the colors...

I'm thinkin' I might need to learn to juggle...

My Kind of Day

Check out all this goodness. This is a LOT for me.... I rarely buy anything, but yesterday after going to see Dad at the hospital I figured I'd go over to my not-so-local yarn store because, after all, now that I was in town it was only a couple of miles a way.

Not only did I buy the Miss Priss yarn I've been visiting and petting every time I go there, I also splurged and got the Scarf Style book... and then at Trader Joes bought myself some flowers. I'm a happy camper.

Yep - I'm doing it - I'm joining Jillian's LadyE-Along and I'm gonna teach myself to knit entrelac. Both Jillian and Heather assure me I can do it. And, speaking of Heather - go over to her blog and check out her GORGEOUS finished Lady E scarf. oh.my.gosh..... so pretty.

So, last night I actually got the book out and started entrelac-ing. Ooooh, ooooh oooohhh - This Is SOOO Fun!!! I have to say - I am so impressed with myself that I can hardly stand it!!! I'm showing off my meager progress to anyone who will stand still... Look! Look! Look what I can do!

My yarn is beautiful - but it isn't exactly making color blocks like I had hoped - so I was a little torn when I went to bed last night. I love the yarn and the colors - but I really wanted "blocks" - really, really wanted them.

So, like always happens when I learn something new in knitting - I knitted entrelac and obsessed over what to do.... in my dreams.... all.night.long. And this morning - voila! I had my answer!! I'm going to add some Cascade 220 and knit random blocks of color into the scarf. Oh just you wait - this is gonna be gorgeous, oh yes it is - if I do say so myself. Gorgeous.

Pictures tomorrow - you'll be impressed, just you wait and see. Entrelac is amazing. I'm a total convert.

Two FO's!!

Two FO's yesterday - hubby's hat and Dad's surgery. They both seemed to take for- ev- er..... but both came through with flying colors! Thanks for all your kind thoughts and prayers for Dad, they were very appreciated.

You can get a lot of knitting done - sitting in the waiting room. I was noticing that out of all the hospital waiting rooms I've sat in over the years - this was the only one that didn't have a TV. At first that was fine, but seven hours into the operation, we'd knit, talked, knit, walked, talked, ate.... and by then we all figured we'd even be happy to watch a little Jerry Springer - anything.

We were there longer than ANYONE else. People came in, had surgery, and LEFT while we were still there... We swore we saw women come in pregnant and leave with babies.... we're still sitting there... No, they didn't really - it just seemed like it, but we definitely won the prize for longest waiting room sitters.

We sat next to the wall with the big marble slab with all the donors, patrons, and benefactors names - we about have that memorized now, and dissected the names up every way possible, and all agreed we didn't want a doctor who's last name was Skankey (apologies to anyone out there named Skankey - but we were getting a little punchy). We tried to guess how much money you'd have to give to get your name on the wall at all... much less up top in the BIG brass letters.

Hey - I've seen that doctor, I went to school with that guy's kid, that's the family from the car dealership, I used to work with that guy's kid, hmmm, why do you think they stole the W out of that guy's name.... how come there's no one named David up there - oh wait, there are three, never mind.... - Oy - the giant marble wall of entertainment - NOT! One of those benefactors seriously needs to consider buying a TV for the waiting room - I'd give you the BIG brass letters for that!

Anyway - it's all good, Dad's fine, and the hat's done.

Specs: Dr. Silverman
Time: 7.5 hours of surgery..... oh wait, not dad, the hat

Specs: Pattern - out of "The Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns" - Ann Budd
Yarn: Knit One Crochet Two, Ambrosia, color 455, 1-1/4 balls
Size 3 circulars

Here it is on our lovely model, Kaity. It actually fit's the hubby just fine.

This weekend I'm thinking I'll buy some pretty Miss Priss for my next project. I'll let you know what I decide on...

Good To Go

Two knitting projects (hubby's hat and new Lorna's Laces blue footies) - check
Chocolate - check
Bottle of water - check
Cell phone - check
Reading material/Bible - check
More chocolate - check
iPod - check
Snacks - check
Knitting accoutrement - check
Vending machine $ - check
Kid's schedules, drop offs, etc, all figured out - check
Money left on the fridge for dinner - check

I'm good to go. Tomorrow the sis and I are hanging at the hospital all day, keeping my mom company while my dad undergoes surgery. We're all bringing our knitting, to keep our hands and minds occupied. Should get a LOT of knitting done!