Grace Kelly

The latest addition to the family is Grace Kelly. I adopted her from my coworker after he got a video iPod for Christmas. She needed a good home and I had yet to venture into the land of fruited mp3 players. Her first download? This. (from iTunes rather than utube, of course) Now JT isn't usually my style, but there's something about this song that I love. It's the ring tone for my phone too. 2007 is the year to take stock and reclaim my life. I had a clarity moment on January 3rd. It was incredibly scary and it certainly renewed my faith in God. He was definitely keeping an eye out for me that morning. It was at that moment that I decided to let go and make strides to just be better. That's my motto for the year. Be a better person, mother, friend, sister, employee... No real set goals, just two words to keep in mind "Be Better".

This all starts with being better to me. That's part of the reason for the adoption of Grace. My neighbor and I started a new diet on Tuesday. In 5 days I've lost 10 lbs. My neighbor is down 6. Grace will be accompanying Peanut and I on walks with the stroller. It's big enough that I can snuggle Peanut and her baby with some blankets and zip up the cover if it's cold.

I've also started a plan to be a better employee. Due to recent changes in our family, I had to change my schedule at work. My entire life I've been perpetually late. It never fails. My reviews are always glowing with the exception of trying to stick to a set schedule. I'm so proud to say that this week I have been on time or early for work. A huge, huge accomplishment for me.

So, I'm going to be better. Better with Grace & Dignity and a little green iPod mini to help remind me.

**Baby Logan Update: I haven't heard much other than he's tiny, he's still putting up a fight and he's breathing ahead of respirator. Please keep your thoughts and prayers for him coming.**

Baby Logan

Stephanie repeatedly shows the power of the knitting world and I'm hoping to tap into that. If you have a spare moment or room on your prayer list, please put little Logan on it today. He is the newborn son of college friends of mine. He refused to wait and came into the world this morning being only 25 weeks along. He's little, 1 lb 15 ozs and 13" long and needs all the prayers and good thoughts he can get. I'll never forget how scary it was having Peanut at 33 weeks, I can't imagine how his momma's feeling today.

I don't have any knitting to post about. I've been way to busy to even knit a stitch. I will be knitting up a tiny hat to send to Logan this weekend, though. Peanut's doing ok with the switch to school full time, but has taken a step back in potty training. No big deal, she'll get it eventually. She's focused on what "bad" words she can say now. This morning she asked if "darn it" was ok. When I gave her approval she tested it out several times at many different volumes, smiling the whole time. She never ceases to crack me up.

Just a side note for those of you visiting my blog who were not drawn here for the knitting aspect of it. There will be no discussion of what's going on with Mister here. You're wasting your time continuously hitting my site. I do appreciate the increase in hits, but I would think your time might be better served doing something else like charity work.

An Open Letter to Step2

Dear Step2,

To help Santa out, I ordered a kitchen from your web site weeks ago. Late Saturday night, I got notice from Santa that he wouldn't have time to assemble it and I'd have to step in for him. It's a kitchen, how hard can it be right? Step 1: Using a screwdriver..ok, got a screw driver here. Oh wait, it's the right kind but it doesn't fit into the tiny 2" deep hole. Grab the flashlight and make my way out to the shed. Mister didn't leave another one and FNJ is in bed. I give up and go to bed.

Sunday afternoon, Peanut's next door and I have procured the correct screwdriver type to get past Step 1. I would like to strongly suggest you change the wording contained in the tools needed section. I would remove the word "Optional" next to the drill. Using a screwdriver to place 8 - 2.5" screws in undrilled, heavy duty plastic sucks. And would it kill you to pre-drill the holes?? Step 4 states to slide the fridge door upper peg into recessed hole in the counter top and then into the hole in the cabinet. Please let your people know that a 2mm size hole in the counter top will not allow the 3/4" peg slide into it. And they forgot to recess it. Emergency call to FNJ and a sneaky mission over to their house for some impromptu routing solves the problem a hot knitting needle could not. 2 hours later and I finish with Step 38. Step 39 is to place the stickers. That can wait.

Christmas Eve, it takes Peanut a while to get to sleep and the kitchen is in the spare bedroom next to her room. At Midnight, I fall asleep. I awake in a panic at 1 a.m. Who knew it'd take 90 mins to correctly place 35 stickers? At 3 a.m., the bow is in place and the kitchen is waiting for the Princess to awaken.
Who knows when the pain in my wrist from using the screwdriver will go away. It might be a while before I can knit again, but it was all worth it. When I recount my great accomplishments of 2006 Assembling $150 Step2 kitchen with just a screwdriver on Christmas Eve will definitely be near the top of my list.

And this is proof that it was worth it all.

PS: You can just ignore that crazy message left on your customer service line on Christmas Eve after finding out the recessed hole was anything but that. It was nothing personal, you understand I'm sure.

We Saw Santa

This just might have to be our Christmas card this year.

It certainly embodies the spirit of the season!

Santa Baby

I always loved Madonna's version of Santa Baby. Seemed a good enough reason for a posting title.

I had my office holiday party last night. By far, the best I've ever been to. It was a Casino Night theme. The idea was that you were given $500 in chips and with that you could gamble or turn it right in for a raffle ticket. Each raffle ticket was $500. The big prize being a casino getaway weekend to Soaring Eagle Casino & Resort. My friend and I decided to pool our winnings and put all of our tickets towards winning this prize. She won and we're going!! I've never been on a weekend getaway and Lord knows I could sure use one to look forward to right now.

Santa's almost finished with his shopping for us this year. Funny thing, when the Mister's out of the Christmas budget, there's more of it to go around. Peanut is getting this. I can't wait for her to see it. Santa has brought me this and he still needs to pick up one of these. The bags are really, very nice. I think I'll get an awful lot of use out of them.

Good news is that we never go the flu from Mister. We had a 24 hr chicken pox scare this week. Peanut's been vacinated, but I've never had them. Turned out to just be a rash on Baby Nephew and not the pox.

I'm off today for Peanut's 3 year physical and we're going to try and visit Santa at the mall. This could be interesting for sure. Pictures coming soon, I promise!

Liquid Weather

I watch Ben Bailey on Channel 2 each morning. I think he's so cute! He just said we'll be having a lot of liquid weather the next few days and that sounds like a good post heading to me. I'll take liquid weather over frozen any day.

My super secret project has been revealed to the recipient, so I can talk about it here. I'm working on the Fibertrends Felted Clog pattern. For something that's supposed to work up quickly, I had a really hard time getting through the first one. I couldn't get gauge using US13s, so I went and got a pair of US15s. Would you believe I'm getting the same gauge with those as well? I don't get it. The thing is absolutely huge, so I just went with it. I'll deal with sizing issues while felting it. No pictures yet. Probably won't be until I finish the second one.

I bought everything for the clogs from The Knitting Den. I'm not sure as to how I feel about the place. It's quaint as it's in an old house...but I certainly don't get a warm or welcoming feeling when I go there. It takes a while for anyone to recognize you're there and the layout of the place can make browsing difficult. They have a huge table in the pass through room to the back rooms. If there are people sitting at the table, you're not getting into the back rooms. And the sock yarns are on the walls behind the table. I took Peanut in there to get the new needles. It was her first time. We talked at length in the car about not touching and sticking close to me. I cannot tell you how good she was in that store. She asked me about touching each ball of yarn and waited for me to pull it out for her. Her hands were clean, so I didn't see any issue with it. I also let her pick out a skein of sock yarn for herself, so we did buy something she looked at. There were several ladies at the table and the two owners. No one acknowledged our existence there until one of the owners rung me up. And it's like that all the time. It would have been nice if they'd said hello or asked if we need any help. If I'm dropping $80 on supplies at their store, it'd be nice to feel welcome there. They are the closest but not the only LYS in the area. There's the one in Plymouth that I don't care for and I'd never, ever take Peanut in there. There's also the Whitmore Lake Yarn Company, but they're small and don't carry as much. Knitting Neighborhood is great, but they're a bit of a drive. I guess I shouldn't complain as some knitters don't even have an LYS.

Jennifer at Busy Hands Yarn is closing up shop. She has some really great deals on what she has left. If you get a minute, stop by and see if you can help her clean out the store's stash.

There's a lot going on, but not much I can talk about here. Mostly work stuff and a recent health change. Nothing new with Mister other than he's recently become a chatty cathy on the phone with me. I've been taking advantage of my new camera phone and the free month of net access. Here are a few new photos:

Happy Birthday Princess Peanut

XOXO,
Mom