All the stuff I need to post about but am to lazy to do so

We bought a treadmill this weekend. We got a good deal at Sears ($1200 model on clearance for $600). Well, we (meaning Greg) had to go pick it up at the Sears warehouse in town. That involves following on of the Sears guys to the warehouse so that he can unlock it and get it out of the back (pretty high tech, huh). Greg schlepped it home and we managed to get it in the living room (with the help of our neighbor). It took Greg about 2 hours to put together. ( I tried to help at first, but I got upset with him not following directions and left in a snit.) After it was all put together Greg turned it on and it didn't work! The screen was back lit, but that's it. No beeping, no numbers, no pressing start and having the treadmill start up...nothing. Greg, being the good little handyman that he is, took it apart to see if he could troubleshoot it. No luck. He called customer service. They said that they could send someone out to look at it during the week (during work hours, naturally), but the guy would probably have to order a part and that would take another week or two. NO DICE!! We broke apart the treadmill and returned it Sears to exchange it for another one. Same routine about two hours later. But this time, the treadmill works! So we start it up and test it out. We raised the incline and lowered the incline. Or, I should say tried to lower the incline. We raised it level 12 and it wouldn't go back down. So, Greg took apart this treadmill to get to the bottom of the problem. He must of done something right because the incline went down and the treadmill works great now. (Ssh...Don't tell anyone I said that I don't want to jinx it.)

On another note, I got a great package from my Sock Yarn Swap from Your Stash partner, stabuluos! It really took the edge off dying the day before. I love the yarn, i can't believe she let it go from her stash. It's Knitting Notion Supermerino Supersock Yarn in Wildflower. yummy!

I'm dead

My assassination came in the mail today. They are a great pair of socks, I'm just really bummed that I'm out so soon. Oh well, I guess it was just the luck of the draw.

My assassin emailed me last night so I knew that they were coming. But, when I was watching the postman today, I was still hoping for the best. No luck.

Socks of Death

Sock Wars started on Friday and I've reached my goal! I have successfully finished my first pair of socks without being killed! I call them my Socks of Death #1. I was pretty lucky that my target had the same size feet as me. It made it a lot easier to measure foot length.

The pattern was a lot quicker than I thought it would be. The leg is only about 4 1/2 inches long. I was able to finish them even though I worked a full day on Friday, did the March of Dime Walk on Saturday morning and went to a Bunco game Saturday night. However, I did take the knitting to Bob Evans for breakfast this morning. (Greg was making fun of me for that.) I know a lot of people said that they had problems with the pattern, but I found it pretty easy to knit.

They are being sent on to Utah tomorrow morning.

A whole lota shakin'

I am such a bad blogger. So much has gone on since my last post. I keep on meaning to blog, but always find other things to do whenever I have the time. First, I went to see the Yarn Harlot in on April 9th Nashville. Totally rocked!
Here's me in the crowd (picture is from her website).

I finally finished my Pomatomus socks. They are totally worth the effort.

I am also working on two other pairs of socks. Anastasia in Creatively Dyed and some basics in Regia. Anastasia is the first sock I've done toe-

We had an earthquake in the region this weekend. (Hence, the title of this post.) Both the initial tremor (at 4:37 am) and the aftershock (at 10:15) woke me up. DH was working that night so I had to call him to confirm. There was lots of excitement on the news. They're still talking about it.

I started a swap on Ravelry this weekend. It's called the sock yarn swap from your stash. I know it's a long title, but I couldn't think of a witty name and this was the most descriptive. It filled up (actually overfilled) within 24 hours. And I though nobody would want to join.

The reason it overfilled was because I went antiquing with friends in Hazel, KY. It was Marra's birthday and that's what she wanted to do. It was A LOT of fun. I got some good finds.

Big Knitting Weekend

It was a wet spring weekend and Greg was out of town, so I watched bad (and good) TV and knit away (when I didn't have a migraine). Last weekend I knit up a Debbie Bliss Baby Shrug and a pair of booties for a baby shower. I blocked the shrug and knew that there was no way that I'd get around to seaming it up, if I didn't bring it to Sit'n'Stitch on Friday and get some help. I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out.



Then while at Sit'n'Stitch I continued to work on my Pomatomus Socks. These things are easily kicking my ass! I've spent longer on this single sock then I have on any sing PAIR. It's not because the pattern is hard (it's actually pretty intuitive), but because I keep on making stupid mistakes (like slipped stitches or forgetting yarnovers) and having to rip back. Anyway, I still love them...




...but, they frustrated the hell out of me and I had to put them down for the weekend. Instead I started my Sock Yarn Blanket. A whole five squares. Until now I didn't realize that most of my socks are blue. Weird, considering that most of my stash is purple.



I joined the Guilty Pleasure/Good Karma Swap. In it you buy your partner high-end yarn and other little luxuries and the relieve the guilt by kitting for the Warm Woolies Charity. My downstream partner is Jacqui. Bought her yarn yesterday and I really think she's going to like it. I off course had to get free shipping so I ordered myself some Zen Yarn Garden Merino Tencel Sock Yarn in Orchid & Lilac. Bad yarn dieter, bad!. So, anyway, I knit up two and a half hats from leftover yarn (mostly Cascade 220). I'm loving all the bright colors. Do you think three is enough?



Oh, and I'm going to see The Yarn Harlot on April 9th. Don't hate!

Ice Day

I'm going to back it up a bit. About a month ago, they started repainting and putting in new carpet in my usual office building. All those chemicals can trigger a migraine for me so I was relocated to a subcontractor's office. Well, we had another ice storm blow through yesterday. I tried to got o work, but the office I'm in was locked so I had to go back home. Aw shucks, a knitting day.See all that white stuff? It's not snow, it's sleet. The roads cleared up around noon, but then we had another round come in around 4 P.M.

We had sock club on Monday night, I'm making my first magic loop sock! I wouldn't have picked these colors for myself, but I like them.

I joined SOCK WARS III today. It starts May 9th. My goal is to take one person out before being eliminated.

Out of Town, Again

I had to go out of town again this week. This time it was for a workshop in Oak Ridge. While I was gone we were hit with a pretty bad ice storm. I got back on Wednesday afternoon and here is what our back yard looked like:

However, we were pretty lucky. We had some extensive branch trimming done in the early winter and that really saved us. Our neighbors, not so lucky:

They has so many large tree limbs fall that they couldn't get out of their driveway. But, thankfully, no house damage.

While I was stuck in my hotel room, I just about completed (I didn't bring my sewing needles so, I couldn't kitchener the toe) what I'm calling my Not So Matching Socks. The colors pooled completey different on both socks. Don't you hate when that happens.

On Wednesday I had to stay in town until the late morning to hedge my bets against the winter weather. I stopped by The Yarn Haven and picked up some yummy All Things Heather superwash sock yarn in Empress.

I think I'm coming down with the flu that is going around. Greg had it three weeks ago and I didn't catch it, so i thought I was safe. But, now I'm starting to feel sick. Not a good sign.

Long Time

It's been a while since I've posted. that is because I've been traveling and knitting. I went home to Connecticut two weeks ago. It was my mom's 60th birthday and my godson's 2nd. I made my godson, Jack, a puppy sweater from Roo Designs. I don't have finished sweater beacise I finished seaming it 15 minutes before the party. But, no stupid handknit present could compete with the ultimate in two year old fun. A Power Wheels four wheeler.

I didn't have a chance to visit any LYS, but since it takes over 8 hours to fly from Paducah and 8 hours back, I was able to work on some socks. Which for some reason my mom thought was very amusing.

Then this week i had to go to our corporate facitiy in Eastern Tennessee for training. While there I knit up a pair of Evangaline for my friend.

I was also able to stop into a couple of LYS (Yartiques and the Yarn Patch) and bought some great sock yarn.

creatively dyed yarns

Dream in Color

I have to go to Knoxville next week for a workshop. I hope to stop in at the store formerly known as Knit'n'Purl and Loopville.

Knittin' On

Now that I got the Modern Romance done, I've turned into a crazy knitter. I finished one project I'm not going to talk about here (Hi, Mom!) and the November sock club socks! This is the first sock club pair I've finished since the first pair in June. They are made out of Frog Tree Chunky Alpaca and are just perfect for keeping my toes warm in the cooler weather. They are especially useful this week since Greg in Michigan for training.

With Ewe in Mind had their Christmas Open House today and I went a little crazy. Look at all the stuff I bought:

Most of this stuff is for birthday and Christmas gifts. But, if you notice, there is a swift. I finally got the swift that I wanted for my birthday. I'm so excited! It's taking all that I have not to wind up all the skeins in my stash.
One last note: I'm going to go see the Last Comic Standing Tour tonight. I'm so excited that my friend Jessica was able to go with me. I've been so looking forward to it and with Greg having to leave for Michigan today, I thought I was going to have to sell my tickets.

Sock It To Me Socks!

I finally finished my Sock It To Me Swap Socks. I'm almost a month late, but they are done. I had the worst case of second sockitis. I think it's because if you drop a stitch in the pattern, you essentially have to rip the whole thing out and start over. And, since I felt so bad about not working on the sock, I really haven't been knitting. I made a chemo cap for charity and two baby hats for a baby shower, but that's it. Know I can start back up in full force. (And, I'm ready!) Ravelry has really gotten me re-motivated to knit!

The Socks are Modern Romance from The Sock Calendar knit with Schaefer Yarn's Anne.

Another day, another drama. Our St. Bernard has been acting sick the last few days. Vomiting, lethargic, not pooping. She has a penchant for socks, so I took her to the vet. Sure enough, he thinks she has an intestinal blockage. He gave me some medicine, told me to watch her closely and call him with an update in the morning. He said we are now the No. 1 patient on his worry list. If she starts to show any sign of distress we have to take her in for emergency surgery.

I was supposed to do the MS Walk tomorrow, but now I'll probably have to stay home to keep an eye on the Idiot. When I got home from Sit'N'Stitch tonight she seemed to have more energy and has been staring at her food bowl. Hopefully that's a good sign and she'll pass the sock tomorrow. Also, she doesn't want the other Idiots around her. But, the Rotten Idiot keeps her eyes and ears clean. (I know it sounds gross but it really is quite cute when you see it.) Know she has eye boogers that she keeps on depositing on my pants when I massage behind her ears.

When I realized she might have a sock stuck in her the first thing I though of was the pair I knit last week. But, I found both of them under the bed. Wouldn't that have been a tragedy...to have your first pair of knit socks cause your dog to have emergency surgery?

Oh, and I had to rip out everything I knit on Sahara (typical) because somehow I accidentally lost a stitch at the provisional cast on row. The expert at the S'N'S tried to help me save it, but there was also something funky going on a few rows lower.

I finished the second sock this morning. I had to wake up early and wait for the cable guy who should be here sometime between 8 and 12. It is now 10:30. I hope he doesn't show. I wanted to sleep the whole day away, but that plan is now shot.

This weekend I'm going to take care of all the little knitting things. Swatch for Sahara, put an edge on the baby blanket. Speaking of swatching, I think I learned my lesson with Wicked. I swatched it without washing. The sweater fit really nice when I knit it. Then I threw it in the washing machine because of all the dog hair and the run in the front where I had to pick up a dropped stitch. When I took it out to block, it increased by almost to sizes! The neck is huge. I'm going to try to rewash today and throw it in the dryer. Hopefully it will shrink some. Wish me luck!

So, I finally did it. I learned how to knit socks! I broke down at Sit'n'Stitch Friday night. Just a simple ribbed sock. What could it hurt? I'm not even in love with the color or the yarn, I was told that it is a good yarn to start off with. I'm not going to become a sock addict, right? Right?We went to Mammoth Cave today. It's the longest cave in the world. It has over 370 miles of known caves. We took a 4 mile tour. It kicked my butt. The description said that it was physically demanding and they weren't joking. The first part of the trail, I was like OK, I'm in shape, this is like a brisk stroll. Then, after lunch the "demanding" part hit. It was all up the stirs, down the stairs, up the stairs, up the stairs, up the stairs , down the stairs, up the stairs... I definitely got my cardio on. And, I totally blame my windedness on dehydration (yeah, that's it, dehydration).

This is one of the entrances to the cave.

This is a cool pictures of stalactites. They've put new lighting in the caves which makes pictures a lot easier to take. If you were there, you would say that they looked very alien like.

And, of course, since it was a 3 hour drive each way, I brought the socks. Here is a picture of the first time I tried it on. (I'm so happy I had a pedicure.)

And, here's a completed picture. Finished with 20 minutes to spare. (Notice the White Castle cups. My husband has this weird obsession with White Castle. Every time we pass one on a trip we have to stop. Then I have to put up with White Castle gas for the rest of the trip.)