Non-Knitting Things

This weekend was filled with non-knitting things.

I won my facebook contest for free LASIK surgery from Focal Point Vision Correction! I'm in disbelief that it's true, but I went Friday for the consultation and it's true. It's going to happen next year. If you're thinking about LASIK and you're in the San Antonio area, you should definitely go check them out. I'm not just saying that because I won either - a very dear friend of mine, Kat, had her lens implants done through them (much more serious than plain old LASIK). The professionalism and friendliness of the staff at the office and at the surgery center was the best I'd ever experienced (I was her driver). After she had her surgery, I looked up the doctors online because it struck me as odd that they were MDs. Difference between an optometrist and ophthalmologist - OD and MD. Look it up - very interesting stuff. Anyway - Focal Point Vision Correction - top notch ophthalmologist and staff. I'll keep you posted on all the goings on when we get down to the surgery time. It'll be good stuff - promise!

I am working on Christmas knitting but haven't finished anything yet, so gimme time on the knitting stuff. I'll get back to it!

We nailed up baseboards in the master bedroom, cut the cove trim, and painted it as well. We still need two pieces of corner trim. Then we'll have to cut, paint, and hang those plus fill the nail holes, caulk the seams, and finish up with a quick touch-up paint job. The main bedroom part of the room will have the trim completed!

Before we move in there we'll just need to replace outlet plugs and light switches and put on face plates! That is rather exciting!

Of course the bathroom will still be mostly unfinished, but we are sort of coming into a time crunch here. You see, we are pregnant. Six months, one week, to be exact. So this master bedroom push is in an effort to be out of our room so the baby can live there. Plus, what good is a master bedroom if the 'parental units' don't live in it?! Some things are supposed to be a certain way. Being a parental unit and occupying the master bedroom of a house is how it's supposed to be.

Whew! Now that that's out in the open - let's discuss this parental unit thing. I was never someone who envisioned myself being a 'parental unit' - meaning I wasn't one of those girls who wanted to grow up and start a family. I wanted to grow up and get a job. Strange - I know - I was a weird kid. I never really remember processing 'having kids' as part of the growing up scenario in my head. Here's the deal though, it's extremely strange to find yourself meeting the expectations of 'growing up'. It creeps up on you and you wake up one day thinking 'Holy crap, I just became a grown up.'
And you just sort of chew on it for a bit.
Because it didn't happen overnight... you don't just become a grown up. You grew up.
I still feel the same inside as I did as a little girl dreaming of what I'd become one day. Deal is - today is one day. And today, I'm on my way to becoming a mom. Weirds me out that I haven't reached my job goal but I'm going to be a part of a parental unit which is definitely a 'grown up' status marker.

#1 question from random people about being pregnant - 'how is it?' Well, it's happening... And I don't mean that to be a snot. But.... it's just happening. I don't really have anything to do with it. There's a living growth inside of me that going to become a human being - it's weird.
I'm not a fan of being limited by what I can do - and not in the 'I'm pregnant and can't clean' - I mean I can't clean every room in the house non-stop top-to-bottom from Friday night to Sunday evening (while cooking, baking, bathing the dogs, and doing some yard work that involves a chainsaw) and not pay for it somehow the next day. I can't go run three miles (as someone who doesn't workout regularly at ALL) and not hurt myself or feel like I'm going to pass out.
I never really thought of myself as 'extreme' but the biggest answer to 'how is it?' would be it's showing me I operate on extremes. I want to finish what I start without stopping and being pregnant has limited the ability to finish things without stopping. I'm not sure I'm explaining this properly, but hopefully you get the gist.

So, you may think - wow this chick is not digging this being pregnant thing - well, I'm not. I'm also not excited about how the pregnancy thing ends - childbirth. The logistics get me all hung up.
But I am digging the fact that there is about to be a small person in the world that is going to be a mix of the person I love the most in this world and myself. I am digging the potential of this little person to become whatever they wish and hoping they become a good person. I am digging that my husband is going to be a really great dad and that I'll be able to watch firsthand.

I know I've said this before - every life event is bitter sweet for me. I always get excited and the reality that my mom and dad are not here to share in it knocks me back down. This life event has been EXTREMELY hard on the knocking back down side. Questions about family medical history, complications your mom had during her pregnancy, people asking if your parents are excited, not having anyone to ask some questions about being pregnant who has the same gene pool as you - it's been heavy on the knocking down side.
Don't get me wrong - our extended family is excited and happy for us. My 'adopted' family have been AMAZING! Tears come to my eyes just thinking about the kindness, helpfulness, and happiness that has poured out of this family toward us. I cannot thank them enough.
But I still miss my mom. :P

Christmas....a little early!

Happy Tuesday!

This is me....blogging.

It's been super busy lately. There are multiple projects keeping me busy at work (big and small). Some are going to take months and some are less time consuming. We've been fighting Brisco getting old on us - he got an eye infection and now, a month later, he has a hot spot on his face that was/is festering - and shuffling him to the vet around work schedules.

 

We've been working on the master bedroom again. The floor is laid.





The sink area is primed and has thin plywood laid in preparation of the pressed tin ceiling tiles that are going on the ceiling. Copper is checking up on me!

That's what's been keeping us busy most weekends!

 

Plus all that, I've been working on the project I was hired to do for a very nice lady. Her mother had made her and her sister Christmas stockings from a Bernat pattern. She wants her children to have the same Christmas stockings! I love carrying on traditions! I was able to find a reproduced pattern on Ravelry that was published with Bernat's permission.

I was trying to not publish pictures of the work until I was finished, but it's taking me so long that I'm afraid it's going to appear that I've given up knitting completely!

This pattern has been a challenge in perfecting intarsia and adding the fact that a lot of the white doesn't allow you to carry a darker color yarn behind it. It's extremely important to work the pattern correctly or it doesn't come out looking very good. I got all the way to the candy cane in the middle on the first stocking and had to rip the entire thing out! I've since reknitted it and it looks way better. Check it out:

 



The second one is getting really really close to being complete.

 

The final product is slightly longer than the original stocking knitted for the mother of these children, but I checked and rechecked the pattern and I couldn't find anywhere that I added rows to the pattern. So hopefully, it's going to be okay.

 

Other than that, I took Kat to have a lense implanted behind her iris because she doesn't meet the qualificaitons for Lasik. The eye center she used is having a contest for free Lasik and I've entered! If you're reading this, please visit Focal Point Vision's facebook page and like the photo I posted here. I have never won anything in my life and this would be the best thing ever! I tried to get Lasik a couple of years back - qualified but couldn't swing the procedure financially. With the house project and everything else it's going to be a while before I'm able to justify Lasik. I would appreciate any likes from anyone and would also be in complete disbelief if I actually qualified and then were chosen! So help me out please!!

 

I also just finished another 'Painting with a Twist' class. Those are so fantastic! I love them. I'm not quite as crazy about the painting this time around, but it's still super fun! I can't wait for the next time!

 

Bedtime is sneaking up on me so that's all I have for tonight!

Happy knitting!!

 

-E

In search of things that don't exist

This is a non-knitting post.

Just thought I'd get that out there.

As I've mentioned before, I am in the process of attempting to update/redo our master bedroom. I have started laying flooring and trim in the closet as a practice piece.

Background on why I needed a 'practice piece': In 2006, when Jamie and I moved from NB to my childhood home, after my father passed away, we did a mad dash re-do of my old room because I refused to move into my childhood room let alone let a grown man live in a girl's childhood room that was decorated in sort of a horsey theme. It was the first major redo I've done as an adult (this redo thing comes from my mother and she did as much as she could to every room in the house) and needless to say things were less than perfect. We payed someone to lay the flooring but did the wallpaper, painting, panelling repair, and trim work ourselves. Hanging trim is sort of an art and I was a very novice artist. We are still living in this room until we get the master finished and it is less than perfect. I'm sure no one notices immediately the flaws in my trim job, but I sure as heck do. I also hung a small amount of trim in our kitchen when I repainted 1-2 years ago. It was an improvement from my childhood room, but definately not ideal.

So, all this being said, I want this project to look like someone who knew what they were doing hung the trim. And I started in the closet. We picked up two boxes of flooring, you'll remember. I needed one more to finish.
Weekend before last, Jamie and I went into town to pick up another box of flooring to finish the closet. Typically our local HD carries an entire pallet of the Pergo flooring that most closely resembles the flooring we put in our current bedroom (Pergo has since discontinued the exact flooring we used). We got to our local HD only to find there was no pallet and there was not a single box of flooring. We asked, someone called in to purchase the entire pallet.
So we went to the next town over to buy the single box we needed there. They had nine boxes, but all of them had crunched corners. I am not putting crunched corners into my 'perfect' remodelling job. The flooring gentleman was kind enough to explain that Pergo was discontinuing this flooring and it was on sale and being scooped up by the second. He offers to call around to find us an undamaged box.We waited about 30 mins while he called around.

All the while, Jamie and I are discussing what to do with the flooring in the rest of the room that is supposed to match the closet. I have already laid two boxes with the assumption that I am going to lay continuously into the bedroom with the same flooring. Do we buy the flooring we need for the entire project? Do we wait and see and hope that whatever Pergo comes out with also closely matches the other bedroom flooring because eventually the hall between the two bedrooms is supposed to also get the same flooring?

The closest store has six boxes in good condition and it's another 30 minute drive away. They'll hold them. We go. They aren't holding them, but we found a single box for me to finish the closet. We have to figure out what to do later. We can lay tile...cork...something else that is close...Jamie can call a local contractor to have them match what we have as closely as possible...none of these options are what I want to hear.
They are not what I was picturing in my head when envisioning this room. The flooring is SUPPOSED to match.
Match as in be the same.
My heart was crushing.
I was pouting like a little kid.
Jamie, bless his heart, was doing his best to assure me it was going to be okay.
We went home with one box of flooring.

And I finished the flooring in the closet.

I am a lover of closets. The place we rented in NB was the best rent house ever because it had an insane amount of closet space. Freaking loved it.
Jamie and I have been sharing a very small walk-in closet and it is seriously starting to wear on me. Things are hanging on shelves throughout the entire room this closet is in. Did I mention the said shared closet is not in my childhood room that we currently sleep in? No? Yeah, it's not.
I need a closet that sings to me when I walk in. The order and beauty of it brings calmness to my heart. I love closets.
I want my closet, this closet, to sing to me.

This past weekend, I finished the closet project. The baseboards, a small crown molding, and cove in the corners are hung. It is as close to perfect as humanly possible with super crooked walls.
I hung the Elfa system and Jamie was moving his stuff into it before I even had the system together on the other side. I think he was feeling a bit cramped in the shared small closet too.
Here's the finished product. It's a beautiful thing.

Fantastic Friday!

This week has been a bit of a blur for so many reasons - Jamie started his new job, I decided to start eating better, started a new crochet project, and all the routine/normal stuff. Jamie started his new job which is about a 40-45 min commute and he's working completely out in the 100+ degree heat so by the time he gets home he's completely wiped out. I've been doing my best to have as much done in the hour between me getting home and his arrival home so he can concentrate on sleeping. This heat has to let up sometime. It's super draining and hopefully he'll adjust - or he'll just go to bed at 8 every night. Oh well.

Decided last Friday that I didn't want to gain every pound I lost about two years ago (by eating better and working out, neither of which I do now) and bought lots of healthy stuff at the grocery store. I made myself an infamous 'green smoothie'. The original recipe I pulled from a friend of mine Claire and then I did a bit of research and discovered I could pretty much put whatever in the hell I wanted to in this thing.I know this is not the best picture in the world, but this was after round one in the blender. Here's what I put in it: 4 leaves romaine, 2 handfuls of spinach, 1 banana, 1.5 green apples, handful of frozen raspberries, 1/2 cucumber, one squeezed lemon, and some ginger. The smoothie won. I'm working with a 1970s model blender and there was a lot of chewing going on to get round one down. Round two got another banana, more ginger, water, and ice. I had this three mornings. I need to make another batch, but we're out of banana. I'd like to add some of the veggies that I don't really like - like beets/raddishes/etc to see if I can get some of those goodies without knowing I'm eating them.

In addition to the green smoothie, I'm eating 100-150 calories multiple times throughout the day. I've only been seriously trying this for a week and I've already lost 2 lbs. I only cheated once last weekend (we went out to dinner with friends). I'll also have to cheat today because we're doing a 'goodbye' lunch for someone at work who's retiring. 

Earlier this week, I sewed the sleeves onto my sweater. They look like this:

Not too shabby. I was having a bit of an issue with casting on the contrasting color neckband and was feeling pretty frustrated when I started another project that has to be completed in two weeks. I started it Monday. I'm this far:

It's a baby blanket for a friend of mine who's expecting. Her baby shower is on the 27th and I have a long way to go. It's crochet. Pound of Love yarn. And it's not even close to being complete. It's a free pattern from Lion's Brand Yarns - Jonah's Blanket...or something like that. I'm hoping they'll like it. It's giving me a break from the sweater frustration with a very specific goal to get this done in two weeks. Then it'll be back to the sweater. I am so close to finishing the sweater, I can taste it.

Tuesday, the deal of the century came in. We didn't get to put it up until Thursday. Here it is on our ceiling:

Fanciest light fixture in the house.

That's the excitement of this week! I plan on crocheting a lot this weekend in a mad dash to meet the deadline. I would love to get some work done around the house, but if the humidity and heat don't let up that will not be happening. I hope you all have a great weekend!

Buckle down

Hope you all are buckled down for a long post! Lots to share!

Lets start at the beginning. With knitting of course! 

The sweater project is progressing quite nicely.

Here's what it looks like at the moment --> 

Missing blocking and finishing steps.

Here's a close up of the fig leaf pattern at the neck. Badly needs to be blocked. But so far so good! I am trying to think of the best way to block all these pieces. Typically I do it on my ironing board because I've never had to block anything so large. Pretty sure a blocking mat investment is in the near future.



The latest and greatest from the super surprise brother-in-law project. I've come to the conclusion they will not be perfect. He's getting these different sized swatches with the real ones. The bottom one is the first try - double stranded grey yarn/too tight stitch/no extra stockinette rows above and below. The middle one is the last try - just finished last night/messed up on the red bottom portion of the logo/two rows of stockinette above and below before starting the seed border with smaller needles. The top is attempt two - using smaller needles for the seed border/looser stitching cause the first one was tight/one strand of grey/no extra rows/it's rectangle. Still working on it! I did however find a graph for the Empire symbol and I'm using it when I get to that.

I found this bracelet on pinterest and really wanted to make one. Then when I got my latest Crochet Today!, there was an article for broomstick lace. It was a sign. I tried acrylic yarn first and it was...well...ugly. I remembered a bit of bamboo blend left over in my stash and was sure that this little item wouldn't take that much yarn. It's not quite as pretty as the one on pinterest, but it's still damn cool. Might I add - it is very difficult to take a photo of your own wrist. Please appreciate this photo! ;)

 In the midst of all this knitting/crocheting gloriousness, my sister came over to make jelly and can salsa.

Wait, there's more! Nothing to do with yarn, but just as exciting. Three weekends ago we picked up two boxes of flooring and some trim for the master bedroom closet. 

Two weekends ago I cut and painted the trim. This trim matches what we put in my childhood room we remodeled a couple years back and are currently living in. I had a huge problem cutting it correctly - it was my first time hanging trim. I discovered this time around that my miter saw is too small for this "gaudy" [Jamie's words] trim. We also always get in a tiff about trim because my better half has zero patience for it. But my nickname is Tetris and I enjoy it. I used a miter box and saw to get it just right. It fits together perfectly. The background is the bedroom wall color: Creek Bend.

This past weekend, after jelly and salsa making, I laid the two boxes of flooring in the closet. I'm two rows short. It's going to be beautiful! The closet color is Oyster something or other.

The flooring/trim/wall color together. Love!

This is the last photo ya'll I promise! Monday our Americana hen layed a little mini-egg! Here's our normal egg with the mini egg for reference! Look how cute it is! I'm hoping she'll start laying normal-sized eggs eventually.

Thanks for sticking with me through all that! Have a great rest of the week!

Em