The Return of Thursday

Not that it was missing... but in the summer Thursday's are a bit different than in the fall for us. Thursdays in the fall/winter involve a bunch of friends coming to the house, watching Thursday night comedy (Office, 30 Rock, Community, Parks and Rec) on NBC, and enjoying dinner (typically made by me!). It is awesome. I look forward to it every week. Last week was the return of comedy, but we had breast feeding class (which W actually could not stop talking about... he is so impressed with breasts now... as he has told many people "They do so much... they are more than just good to look at!") and had to miss out. So, tonight is the official return of Thursday night. I'm making pizza. I'm excited.

Another thing that is pretty exciting is the fact that my first squirrel mitten is almost done! In fact, there is a pretty good chance it might get off the needles tonight (minus the thumb... I might have to change the chart for that, so it will require some thinking and alone time) which is awesome! I am loving them. It is amazing how once I decided to actually sit down and knit them instead of just think about them how quickly it went.  I've literally knit 85% of this mitten in the past two days. Here is the problem though... I'm not sure I want to just jump in and knit the second one. Sure, a pair would be super nice.... buuuuuut I also have some other mittens I would like to knit. Is it crazy to knit a first mitten of another pair before knitting the second mitten of this pair?? Oh, and I decided I was going to line my squirrel mittens, so really, when this is off the needles it is still only half done. (The lining should go way faster since there is no colorwork....) I don't have yarn to line them with (seriously, not even just joking around... it is laceweight and I don't buy laceweight yarn...) so I will be making a trip to the store tomorrow for that. I would love pink, but doubt I will find that. We'll see what I come up with.

Also, random side note on the mitten topic. I will wear one mitten out in public when it is done. I have no shame. I will show it off to everyone. And then when I have the first mitten of the other pair done, there is a good chance I will just wear the two mismatched ones as a pair. Whatever. I'm not trying to win a fashion contest, just keep warm....

Oh, and I'm still pregnant. :P 36 weeks and 1 day to be exact (I know you were keeping track...). I will take pictures of myself and of my mitten tonight perhaps. W is now predicting that the baby will be 2 days late (being born on Oct 29th) and a boy. I don't know anymore, so I'm not playing any predicting games. He also told me the other morning that he is really excited to meet the baby. He is so sweet. I never really thought about that... I guess I am too. (I'm actually really excited to not have heartburn and to have my body back, but meeting the baby will be a sweet bonus as well)

Alright, enough rambling about babies and mittens. (Speaking of, the baby has no mittens... does it need mittens?? oh my....) I am off to make pizza dough and enjoy my evening.

Termination Dust

It is here... termination dust... the first sign that winter is coming! Now, for a lot of people who live here, this is a sad time... but for me, I would have been dancing in the streets if I was not in a car when I noticed it!! I LOVE winter. Love it. (As long as it is a good winter, snow is soooo much better than ice or just freezing cold... but, either way, winter is amazing) It is my favorite season. And I'm sure I've mentioned that just a few times here, but in case you forgot, here is why: I love layers, I look so much better in three or four different shirts and then a scarf than I do in just a tshirt. I love snow, it makes it so sparkly and beautiful outside. My dogs love the winter... they are just so furry that this may be the only season where they are comfortable. I knit mostly with wool, so winter is just the best season for all of my handknits! I love to see my dad pull out his winter hat and wear it around... Basically, I think winter is amazing.

One thing I am happy about though, is that I am not working right now. I guarentee that a lot of people are going to spend the week lamenting the snow and complaining about the weather constantly. "We didn't even get a summer" (Which, May was amazing, and really, we have been spoiled... and we had/are having an AMAZING fall...) "I'm not ready for winter" "I hate snow" "I hate winter" "blah blah blah". Again, I know I have mentioned this before, but I don't really believe in complaining too much about the weather (or complaining in general... sometimes I will voice my frusterations to W and we will come up with a plan of action or I will just move on...) so I am very glad that I will not be around all the winter nay-sayers.

So, no matter how you feel about winter, it is almost here. After all, Friday is OCTOBER 1st! Crazy. Bundle up. Knit. Drink tea. Be happy.

Facebook

The Network (or whatever the "Facebook movie" is called) opens soon. And, truth be told, I'm a bit excited to see it.  It looks like it is well done and entertaining. The people behind it are pretty well known for making good movies.... I'll probably wait until it makes its way to Bear's Tooth just because I am frugal, but I am still looking forward to it.

Mark Zuckerburg, the founder of Facebook, has been in the news a lot recently. He is planning on donating one hundred million dollars to a struggling school district in New Jersey. Good for him. So the publicity is all positive, right?? Oh, no... for some reason the media has decided to turn it into a "why is he doing this?" story. WHO CARES!?! He is giving money to schools. I don't care why he is doing it... it is a good deed.  Do people question the motives of men who hold open doors?? Ugh. I just don't understand the media. Which is probably another reason I need to move to a small time and just live without all of this media saturation.

We had a cable box dropped off at the beginning of the week... (it is supposedly going to make our bill stay the same, but we will have unlimited internet... we will see GCI, I don't really believe you) but, we haven't even hooked it up yet. Maybe that is weird. But, that is just how we roll.

Went to the dr. this week and found out that everything is still going really well with Baby and me! So, I have been released!! I am OFF of bedrest... It was a nice anniversary present! Weston and I went to see Toy Story 3D at Bear's Tooth to celebrate. I had never seen a 3D movie, and it was ok. I did LOVE Toy Story though, they did a great job with it... Also had my breastfeeding class yesterday, and that was good. I learned a lot and feel a bit more confident that even if I don't know the answers to my questions, I know where to find them.

My knitting is still going well. I haven't been knitting too much... and only on my squirrel mittens. I did ply my first 3-ply yarn last night. It is a small skein (I only spun 1 oz of each ply because I didn't want to spin it all and then hate it...) but now that I know I like it, I plan on spinning the rest and getting it plied up. I also got back into my sewing room yesterday and sewed a little something for a special birthday boy...just need to hand stitch a button on and it will be ready to go for the party tonight!

Alright, I need to go be productive now.... enjoy your weekend!

EARTHQUAKE!!!

Oh, Alaska, how I love you. Even when you shake my house and kind of scare the crap out of me. We had a 4.92 magnitude earthquake at 1:24 today. The epicenter was only 13 miles WSW of Anchorage, so I felt it pretty strongly... (All of the earthquake info came from the Alaska Earthquake Information Center)

I realize that earthquakes can be an extremely devastating natural disaster. But, as far as natural disasters go, I much prefer and earthquake to a hurricane, tornado, or flood. Sure, those can be more predictable, but man... water is SO damaging. I can not believe how much damage water can do. So, I'll take a little earth shaking over that any day!

That's really all I had.... I just hadn't felt a big earthquake in a while... I did have another awesome mail day, but I will talk about that later after I have time to play with everything and take pictures!

Squirrels, Sundays, and Small Towns

I have cast on my squirrel mittens, and I am really liking them so far. The pattern can be found here (Rav link).  I have had these in my queue for a long time and I am really happy that I am finally getting around to them. Mine are grey and pink, which will match my winter coat wonderfully. I started knitting them on DPNs because that is how I normally knit in the round on things smaller than hats. I don't like magic loop... but I was finding with the long floats, it just wasn't turning out how I wanted it to. So my mom was able to pick me up some circular needles and I am now working the mitten on two circulars and it is turning out much better. I do like knitting on two circular needles a lot as well, but I just always feel like when I knit with DPN I look really smart... but I guess since I don't really go anywhere right now looking smart isn't a big deal. :) Instead of the year, I will be putting my initials on the mittens. This is for a few reasons... 1. I don't know if they will both be finished this year 2. I don't really know why I would want the year on them anyway... if someone was super curious what year I knit them in, I could look it up on Ravelry and 3. With my initials, they hopefully won't go missing! So I will keep you updated on the progress on those.

My Baby Christ-ma-kah sweater is going well. One sleeve is done and I am working on the second one. I keep that project in the living room and my mittens in the bedroom so I can work on both throughout the day, depending on where I am relaxing at the moment. I still REALLY need to finish up my wool baby nest. It is sad that it isn't done because all it needs is a button band. But picking up 150-ish stitches just doesn't sound appealing to me.... I should have thought ahead and knit the button band on as I went... sometimes I'm a goober. Oh well. I do plan on finishing it in time for Baby to actually use it, so I guess I better get on it. Maybe I will try to make that my goal for this week....

It's Sunday, which is one of my favorite days of the week. Typical Sundays are spent relaxing with Weston and cleaning the house, which sounds like a chore... but when we do it together is actually fun. Not that I can do too much right now, but I cheer him on and do the little bit that I can. It also means that the only thing on TV is football. Blah. I'm not a sports person. I don't follow sports, I don't really watch sports (I used to be pretty into hockey, but I'm even over that... I will occasionally go to a game, but seeing something live is so much more fun than watching it on TV), I would lose any trivia game based on sports... I do like to have the TV on when it is golf, tennis, or football because it makes it super easy to nap. :)

The last thing on the agenda today is my discussion of small towns. If you know me, or have read my blog for a while, you know that I want to move to a small town. I love my house (and if I could take it with me I would), but this town is too big. I want to live in a town where I can walk everywhere, most of the stores are local, and people actually care about each other and the well being of their fellow man. Weston loves small towns even more than I do. When he goes to one, he is constantly emailing me pictures and telling me how much he loves it... I'm sometimes worried he won't come home. (Except for the fact that he would come get me and the pups... he couldn't leave us behind) I am kind of the same way. The last time I went to Seward, I was very excited to go, but also kind of mad that I went. Upset because going there reminded me of how badly I wanted to live there and how much I didn't want to live in Anchorage forever. If I had made it to Valdez this summer, I probably wouldn't have come home... that is where I really want to live... they have amazing winters...

The reason all of this comes up is that Weston has spent the weekend in Talkeetna for a friend's wedding. He was in the wedding party, so he had rehearsal dinner Friday, the ceremony Sat, and is making his way home today. He is in love with where he is staying and told me about 15 times that we need to spend the weekend there together. We have it built into our long term budget and plan to be able to move somewhere smaller in 5-7 years, so I am looking forward to that. We haven't lived in our house long enough to make it profitable (or even to break even) to sell, and Weston needs to have a little more job experience to transfer around the state. Plus, he is working on his Master's degree and it will be a few years before he finishes that up, which will also make it a lot easier for him to get a job anywhere. Either way, I am looking forward to it. I love small towns...

Alright, off to work on knitting and relaxing. The pups had a play date yesterday, so they are still pretty tired. Weston is on his way home.... I hope everyone has a nice Sunday!

Locker room chat

So there is one hot reporter in the center of a controversy. Apparently there were some lewd comments made in the Jets locker room towards her. She didn't feel offended, but the NFL is still investigating. Whatever.

My only question is, are male reporters allowed in female locker rooms? Like after a soccer game? I honestly don't know. (If I had to make a guess, I would say no....)

Maybe we should all just respect the "male" and "female" signs on closed doors and wait to talk to people until they are dressed appropriately and in public. Just a thought....

Oh, and for those keeping track, today is 34 weeks pregnant! Baby and I are still doing awesome. 2 weeks until I have my freedom back... whoo hoo!!!

Baby Picture Mania!

This weekend I had "Baby Shower Weekend!" My friend threw me a shower here at my house and then a gal from work threw me a shower at her house. It was pretty awesome. I loved being able to see everyone (it is amazing how not being able to leave the house really puts a damper on seeing people) and everyone brought Baby such amazing things. And in case I haven't shared this, you can find a lot of the pictures I post here (and a lot that I don't) on my flickr page. Here are lots of pictures... be prepared....

From left to right, handmade burp rags from Whitney, a variety of toys from Karla,  bottles and music player from Carol

The music player is very cute! I love all the animals on it... and the wrist rattles, I think those will be amusing for me! :) And, who doesn't love handmade things (well, I'm sure there are some people, but I am not one of them... that is Baby's theme... handmade!)

Our shower "game" was to decorate clothes for the little one! This was the result... I love them all!

From left to right: duck set from Dee and Jessica (they also bought me a Boppy pillow which I forgot to take a picture of), onesizes from Allie (she is obsessed with being an Aunt.. can you tell!?), striped sweater and moose bib from Marlene, and farm animal clothes from Leah.. the caption on the cow is "udderly adorable" hahahhhaa.

Clothes and books from the shower on Sunday. Books and green chicken sleeper are from Brandy. The other two sleepers and the quilt that everything is laid on are from Kelsey.

A handknit Baby Surprise Jacket from Toni! It is knit from baby bamboo and is super snuggly.

Handknit bibs from Kelly. By baby will sure be stylish!

Farmhouse toy from Brandy. Have to make sure the dogs don't get a hold of those animals! They are so cute. 

Diaper bag made by Lynda. I picked out the fabric, but it turned out even more amazing than I imagined!

Quilt, booties, fish toy all handmade by Kelsey.  She also got me the alligator crocs and the socks. Those were cracking me up! The monkey blankies were made by my mom, she made me a quilt to match, but she took it back home to finish it. The bird fabric peeking out of the bottom right corner is a baby sling Becky made me! I will be so stylish with my matching bag and sling. :) 

Close up of the knitted booties.

Close up of the fish toy!

And last, but not least, the Zany Zoo toy I received in the mail yesterday from a Rav friend, April! I was playing with this toy constantly while taking pictures. I hope Baby is as entertained by it as I am.

Whew! If you made it this far... congrats! I think that is all. :) My baby is so lucky to be surrounded by so many people who care for it so much already! And I am super lucky to have such amazing friends and family. I'm hoping this weekend that W and I will be able to figure out where we are going to put all the furniture (well, the changing table and the bassinet... that is really all we have) and I can wash all the clothes and get everything put away. The house is kind of in a state of disarray and it is driving me crazy.  Also, only 2 weeks and 1 day until I am allowed to be off of "bed rest"! That means I will be allowed to WALK around as much as I want (so I will be heading to Target to spend our gift cards!) which will be pretty amazing. Not that I'm anxious about it or anything.... 

When it comes I want to yell, MAIL!!!!

33 weeks pregnant today... Baby and I are still doing well.

Last night we bought a changing table off of craigslist, which I am super excited about! (Pics of it later, I have lots of other stuff to show you) It is more like a dresser, which is exactly what I wanted because I wanted it to be useful for a long period of time. I'm not one for things that only have one use, or are only useful for 6 months. I don't want to spend $100 on something I'm going to use for a short period of time and then have to get rid of.  Which is why when we picked out a car seat, we got one that will last the child's whole life. I knew that I would never carry around the infant carrier one... it weighs a ton! (I'm lazy too, plus, I don't think I could get it in and out of the car by myself, and that has been one of the things that I am pretty set on... being able to do things by myself since W will still be working.) So, I knew I didn't want to get one like that. Plus, a kid grows out of it pretty quickly and then you still need another car seat. And the price difference between one that lasts 6 months and one that lasts until they don't need one anymore is maybe $50. And when you are talking about having to buy TWO car seats that are $150ish or one that is $200, it seems like the second option is a better deal.... BUT, I digress.  Anyway, I'm super excited about the new changing table. It even already has stuff in it!!

Which leads me to my next topic: I had a SUPER mail day yesterday!!! The mailman had put two packages on my porch, which I promptly ripped into... one was half of the cloth diapers I had ordered, and the other was a gift from a Ravelry friend! How exciting!!! Then, when W came home and checked the mail, I had TWO more smaller packages in the mailbox!! WHAT!?? Amazing. One of those was the other half of the cloth diapers I ordered, and ANOTHER present from a Ravelry buddy! What a great day! I felt super lucky.... so here are the pictures of what came in the mail!

First up, the cloth diapers. How cute are these?!? I'm totally excited about them. I do have more, but they are just flat diapers, and not as fun to take pictures of. These are the cutest ones. I bought a sampling of different types of diapers and covers to figure out what works best for us before I shell out a bunch of $$ for a ton of them. One of our friends was over last night and I was showing him how awesome they were. I asked him, "doesn't this look more comfy than paper?" And his response was, "Heck yeah, I'd rather wear those than my boxers!" hahahaha. So, there you have it, they are amazing....

This was one of my presents. I fell in love with this roving, but I couldn't click through fast enough to buy it during the Bohoknitterchic birthday party last week, so I was a bit bummed. So imagine my surprise when it made it to my doorstep anyway!! Complete with a baby catapult! :) (She was giving out goodies with purchases made during the birthday party) A friend on Ravelry decided to have it sent to me even though she bought it because I had posted about how much I loved it... isn't that sweet! I am planning on spinning it and knitting it into some fall type jacket for Baby for next fall... the colors are just amazing.

And, here is the other present I received! Three hand knit soakers for Baby! Weston is totally in love with the pants, which are pretty amazing. I was so excited to get these! I love that Baby has so many hand knit and hand made items already... such a lucky little one to be loved by so many talented people! 

In other news (besides the awesomeness that came in the mail), I finished the first sleeve of the Baby Christ-ma-kah (our Christmas/Hanukkah celebration) sweater.  It is pretty amazing. I knit it in three days, so it went pretty quickly considering it is colorwork on size 1 needles. I'm looking forward to getting more of it done, but I need to focus on the baby blanket today... I'm half way through that... I also need to sew the binding on one little baby quilt for the little one. It can't wait too long or it will be too small to be useful... it is just a little quilt for the car and things like that.  I also need to sew on the buttons for Baby's coming home outfit... that is pretty urgent too! 

Alright, off to get busy... well, not really, because I'm still taking it easy and staying off of my feet. I spend most of the day in bed listening to podcasts and knitting... but, I need to get to doing that! :) 

Labor Day Weekend

It's a holiday weekend. Which means it is raining. :) Luckily, I spent a lot of time outside this past week while it was still sunny... my sandal tan will be sticking around for quite some time. I'm spending my weekend watching The Office and knitting. I just couldn't lie in bed anymore. My hips hurt. All of the weight I have put on (about 20 lbs so far) has been in my stomach area, which is awesome... BUT it means that there is no extra padding on my backside or hips to help cushion the extra weight. So, I'm sitting like I'm allowed to, and knitting, and enjoying some great comedy.

I'm test knitting a blanket, and I'm half way done. SO, I'm rewarding myself by casting on my colorwork baby sweater as soon as I finish this post. Why am I not just continuing on with the blanket? Oh, because I have to wind yarn for it, and I have delegated this job to W while I am supposed to be resting... and he isn't home... and the baby sweater yarn is wound... and well, I feel like it. :)

OH! The one other thing I wanted to let you know was that Spilly Jane is having a labor day sale on her patterns. I love her mittens, and she has some wonderful cabled socks. The details can be found here on her blog. I will be buying a few patterns to work up for gifts. Just have to decide which ones I really want. If you have a favorite, let me know... and if you've knit any of them, please share!!

Quick Update

Just a few things.

* I'm 32 weeks pregnant today, whoo hoo! (If you want to see what that looks like, scroll to the bottom) So 5ish weeks to go. I'm still on modified bed rest, meaning I can sit up now, and I am just supposed to be "off my feet as much as possible" as opposed to "in bed at all times unless you need to go to the bathroom". So, things are going well!!!

* I am still stuck in my knitting monogamy rut. I'm test knitting a blanket right now (it is pretty small...) and that is taking all of my attention. It is an easy knit, but I need to stay focused to finish it in time... you know me and blankets. :) I did wind the yarn for the baby sweater I want to knit, and put it in a project bag... so I'm working towards my goal....

* I still really want to knit those mittens. I picked out the yarn, but didn't wind it, because of the previously mentioned monogamy problem.

That's really it. Baby and I are doing well. Off to get ready for bed....