Life Goes On

I really meant to post again before now, if for no other reason than to move down that depressing post.

So what have we been up to? Well, we moved into my mom's house at least for now. I'm afraid it will always be "my mom's house" and never "our house." But it is a house none-the-less and beats the stuff out of paying rent for an apartment we can't stand and barely fit into. Junior has a yard that he loves, Jaime has a grill that he loves. I have room for my yarn and new spinning wheel (post on that to come...soonish).

And for our inaugural event, Junior's birthday.



It was a pretty small party; Jaime's parents, my dad, Junior's babysitter and her two kids. Just the right size. The kids had fun playing with all of Junior's toys and we all enjoyed the food from the grill. We're already planning a few more cookouts with friends.



I can't believe my boy is two. He is getting so big, talking more and more everyday. He must know over 30 words by now (and of course Spongebob or "pa-bob" is one of them). He loves playing with his cars, running down the hill in the backyard and watching a cartoon whenever we can get him to sit still long enough. He is so full of energy and life it is sometimes exhausting to watch, but sometimes it can rub off on the rest of us. He's still such a joy.

A Title Would Require Too Much Thought...

School Update
School is finally over and I'm just beginning to catch up on my usual laziness. The school website is down so I can't find out what grades I got, but I'm sure I did well enough. Well enough for me at least. My dad won't be thrilled because I didn't get all A's, but whatever. At least it's OVER! I'm actually taking an online course through the community college over the summer, but it shouldn't be too big a deal.

Fun finals week story. So, I had two finals scheduled for 7:30 AM, one Monday and one Friday. (7:30 AM is an ungodly hour for a final to begin by the way) And one of them got pushed back to 8 (thank god!) because it wouldn't take the full time anyway. So I study Sunday night for a few minutes and show up Monday morning at a couple minutes to 8 with nothing but my notes for that class (for some quick cramming before the tests were passed out). And for some reason there's another class in the room. Uhh, did I miss something? Yeah, I call Jaime to check my Palm calendar and I've mixed up my 7:30 finals. I'm supposed to be in the middle of the other one, which is an open note test. Did I mention I had nothing with me?? So I cried and I drove back home and emailed the teacher begging to take it another time. Fortunately he let me, but I was completely terrified for the rest of the day until he got back with me. Yeah, my mind was soo not on finals, obviously.

Mom Update
My mom is doing pretty well. She made it through surgery all right and has only made me crazy a few times. The pathology reports said it was a recurrence of the sarcoma she had last time and she'll be starting chemo Friday, assuming they ever confirm the appointment. More than her annoying me, although like I said there have been moments, I've mostly been annoyed at doctors. We've spent so much time waiting for calls back and for appointments to be confirmed. I do realize that the nurses and doctors are very busy, but it gets frustrating. We actually went to a "Cancer Action" center yesterday and she picked out some scarves and a wig for when she needs them. She seems to be taking things pretty well right now. I'm just trying to prepare myself for whatever I may need to do to help her. I'm generally a patient person but she just gets to me for no reason, so I've been trying to work on that. Ahh, personal growth here I come.

Knitting Update
There still hasn't been a whole lot going on. When I get a chance to veg out I don't even have the energy to knit. I did manage to knit my mom a really nice washcloth for Mother's Day. And I finished up a child sized hat for Dulaan. Nothing terribly exciting. Oh, and I knit a bit more on my spiral scarf. Enough to finally conclude that me and Addi's don't mix well. Every pair I've had now the finish eventually starts wearing off. I'm thinking maybe it's like those people who can't wear a watch cause their chemistry makes the watch stop working. Something in my chemistry just erodes Addi needles. Yes, I am a freak :)

This doesn't relate to my knitting, but I just wanted to say a public thanks to my new friend Erica and her mom for knitting up a bunch of great things for Dulaan. Before winter break I mentioned on a knitting list on Facebook that I was knitting for Dulaan and that I'd be happy to send along stuff from anyone else who wanted to help. I am so glad that I decided to get the word out, Erica and her mom were awesome and put my donations to shame.

Random Stuff
*I've actually been reading a lot more lately. Hmmm, escapism much?? I just finished a great book by Jane Green. She is now one of my favorite fun authors. No, she probably won't change your life, but that's just fine.

*I totally owe you guys some pictures! I have a whole series from Polski Day with my dad. It seems like it was AGES ago. And I have a couple cute ones of my mom and I. And I might even get around to taking some pictures of my knitting eventually...

*This weekend is Memorial Day and therefore party weekend at Aunt Cathy's. It sounds like it'll be packed with random relatives this year, so it should be interesting. My family (and when I say family I refer to my dad's side) is unique and wonderful and beyond description. Gotta love em :)

And Things Get Crazy

Somehow it's only a week and a half till we move. How did that happen?? Things have just been nuts. I'm trying to get all my wallet stuff taken care of (thanks for all the well wishes), Jaime working a TON. We haven't packed a SINGLE THING. Oh, and my dad, our moving helper, he's going to be in Dallas at a school for his job (read: he'll be hanging at the pool in a nice hotel getting paid for it) the week we're moving. So we're all on our own! Isn't that great? Luckily my dad's letting me borrow his truck while he's gone, and Jaime thinks he can give a guy at work a few bucks to help with the bigger things we have to move. Oh, and we'll be on the third floor God help us. And we're completely broke. I had noodles with butter and couple slices of peperoni for lunch (yeah, so much for healthy eating). We found out like a week ago that we have to get renter's insurance before we move in and we have to have August's rent ready when we move in. And Jaime's having issues with his parents and his car insurance, long story. So it's like everything is happening at the same time. So yeah, I probably won't be blogging for a couple weeks at least. I'll try to check in with everyone when I can. Sorry for all the whining here.

And a huge thanks to the sweetest girl ever over at Shamrock Crafts. Jenn sent me some yarn for my shapely tee, which I guess means I have to start working on it again, as well as a nice note, some beautiful stitch markers (which I'll try to get a picture of before all this moving stuff starts) and some scrapbooking supplies. I really needed that today, thanks for making me smile! I'll have to think up a good thank you gift.

Hope ya'll have a great couple weeks! I've been reading Aunt Purl too much.

"If I Had a Million Dollars..."

Bonus points if you know who did that song.

Knitting has been coming along. I have been working on Jaime's socks when I get the chance, it's still small. I swear I keep knitting and it doesn't grow at all. I actually started working on my Blue 'n' Brown Stripey scarf some more. Nothing like spring weather to make me break out the double layer wool haha. Actually I got a good tip from someone on one of the knitting lists about using a Russian Join. I had to try it and it works soo well. Now I don't have all those ends staring at me as I knit. Much less scary. No pictures as it also looks just like before but with fewer ends and a couple more stripes. Clapotis is looking great. I'm still on the increases, but I'm much more happy with it now. Here's how big it is so far.



And here's a close-up.



Not the best picture... But what is that you see? Why yes, it's a new pretty stitch marker. Ignore the cheapy plastic ones. I finally went to the bead store and got some supplies to make a few stitch markers for myself. I adore them! Unfortunatley I only bought enough to make 4 (sort of a trial). Here are the other two.



Aren't they pretty! And they had sooo much other cool stuff there. This is where we get to the title of this post. I'm dying for some new craft supplies! I need some new wire cutters and pliers and such. I need some more stitch marker supplies now (I used closed jump rings and head pins if anyone's curious). And then there's the yarn. Ahhh the yarn. And there are so many fun classes I'd like to take to learn more about knitting, jewelry making, scrapbooking, crocheting. Not enough money in the bank or hours in the day.

Luckily I have great friends who will treat me with stuff and make me feel better. I got this in the mail from Cathi. I traded her some yarn for her extra copy of Stitch 'N Bitch. She sweetly included some other goodies.



The other books is Knitticisms and it's really fun. It has some great vintage type knitting pictures in it and some funny little stories by knitters on our obsession. And there was a great card and one of those little "LUV @ BLOG" posty-note pads that so many people have now. I've already used it a couple times. Thanks Cathi!!

Yesterday I took my mom to the gynocological oncologist. We were there for a couple hours, but it went pretty well. My mom has a couple options for treatment. Aparently the information she was getting wasn't necessarily factual. I don't know if she'll decide to go with a treatment, she's kind of anti-medicine and paranoid about side effects and such. After the appointment (and getting up really early to make it there in time) I was supposed to go to class, but I kinda gave up on that after being there 2 hours. So afterwards my mom and I went to Whole Foods Market for some lunch. They have some pretty neat stuff in the grocery section; I'm not thrilled by their hot meals selection, but my mom loves it. The lady behind the lunch counter knew my mom and asked how her surgery had gone, it was so sweet! After lunch we went back to my mom's house and talked some before I headed hom. It was a really nice day. I didn't miss class at all haha.

And speaking of school, I finally took a few pics today (once the sun decided to come out). Here's the view from our appt straight out.



It's Memorial Stadium where the football team plays. It's directly across the street from us, which bugs Jaime to death. I sorta like being so close to the action. Here's the view from our appt up towards campus.



You can see the Campanile (the tower) which everyone walks through during graduation on their way down the hill and into the stadium. Superstition says if you walk through before that you won't graduate. Here's a picture of the building I spend most of my time in, Summerfield Hall.



It houses the Business School and the Economics Department. So I gues it sorta makes sense that it's about the most boring building on campus. Not the ugliest mind you, I'll show you that one next time. This is the view up another large hill on campus from across from Summerfield (another reason to hate the building, too much walking up and down hills).



Not the best picture, but you can see the tops of some buildings and some trees that aren't quite green yet. And this is one of the prettier trees on campus (as well as the remaining tulips), next to the Physical Education Building.



I would have had some great pictures of tulips, they were all over campus. Key word "WERE". The grounds people were ripping them all out today to rotate to another type of flower. It amazes me that they do this. They planted them probably a month ago, they were amazing for like a week, and now they're being ripped out. Craziness! So that was part one of your tour. Next time I'll get some pictures of the the main campus road and buildgins, as well as maybe a few of the amazing Greek houses. Those houses are enough to make me want to rush (ok, I'm secretly desperate to be in a sorority, don't tell).

Have a great day everyone!

Such A Nerd

Do you know what I spent nearly 3 hours doing today? Making a database of Jaime's video games and "special" movies. He has 108 video games (plus a few more older ones that we didn't have out) and 112 special movies, I'm not sure what this says about my boyfriend, but I'm not going to spend much time trying to figure it out. I think I'm such hot stuff because I know how Access works. I loved it actually, and only partly because I should have been reading a book to write a paper. I haven't done anything for school all day. I think I must be insane. I am worried enough to have a dream in which I sleep with someone to make up for not writing the paper (which I would never do in real life, I think...) but then I don't bother to do anything to get started on it. Well, I did reread the choice of topics for the paper, that's something :)

The other exciting thing I did today was get back in touch with one of my very best friends from high school. I skipped out of school a semester early (graduated early that is, not dropped out) and went with Jaime to CT for a couple months. I sorta lost touch with all of my friends in that time. But now I'm so happy that we're talking again and stuff. Friends are so great!

Nothing Much

new here. I keep thinking about writing but I can't think of anything interesting to say. Hmmm. Haven't read much more. I started Persuasion. It's the book I read between classes. Unfortunately, my time between classes has been pretty full with school reading, so I haven't gotten very far in it. I love reading it though; the language and writing style is so great! My scarf is going well. It is getting much faster and I've gotten to where I can read it so I don't have to count to know where I am in the stitch pattern if I get lost. It's still working up pretty S..L..O..W..L..Y, but I still love it. I may finish it eventually. Then I'll have to weave in all those freaking ends though. There are 2 every 2 inches! ICK!

I've spent nearly all day watching movies on tv. First I watched Drive Me Crazy one of my favorite teen movies (yes I'm 20 and still love nearly every teen movie that comes out). Then I saw the end of Final Destination and then Resident Evil. Both of these are really good movies too. I love scary type movies! Then Bourne Identity was on. Man, that was great! I've never seen it before, but now I think we're gonna have to rent the next one. And I really wanna read the book, even though I'm not sure it's really my kind of book, the movie was so good I think I'll have to give it a shot. And now Princess Bride. I haven't seen this movie in like forever. Cary Elwes is soooo hot! And you have to see him in Saw. It's super good. Ok, enough movie reviews...

So Jaime and I are supposed to go to his boss' house next Thursday for dinner. I'm totally nervous. It's going to be the boss and his wife, another asst. manager and his wife who also works there, another asst. manager, Jaime and me. They all know each other already! And of course Jaime's told them everything about me (including the fact that I'm nervous which I'm so mad at him about). I'm soo shy around people that I don't know. I'm excited to meet them cause I've heard a lot about them all, but I'm still nervous. Hmmm, what to wear?

PS-My daddy's getting me a camera phone next weekend. Not a full camera, but enough to get some pictures up here. And enough to stop me from whining about not having a camera every couple posts :)

A New Friend!

Why does school have to be so demanding and get in the way of my crafting?!? Grrr. Hasn't been much getting done the past few days due to responsibilities and pure exhaustion. In good news, the mysterious missing x-stitch reappeared Monday. Of course that's after we spent all day cleaning out the closet because I swore that was the only place it could be (it was under the couch, *shrugs*). The contents of our closet literally took up our entire apartment, how sad is that? So now the bf is getting WAYYY too cocky about our bet, so I must finish the x-stitch by New Years.

My mittens are finally starting to come along. I finally got past the 4th row without dropping multiple miniscule stitches or otherwise screwing up. I even was able to rescue a couple stitches that I did drop (it required 2 extra dps and a ballpoint...). I haven't gotten to any of the shaping, but am hoping to make something resembling progress this weekend.

And I wanna say hi to Knitting Virgin (http://treasuregoddesschic.blogspot.com/), the first person to comment on my blog :) I feel so loved!