A Cold, Some Knitting, and Some Pics

Well...I was healthy this season until late last week. It all started with a scratchy throat. By Sunday, I was stuffed up battling a good, old fashioned cold. I stayed in my pjs, watched the Olympics and picked up my needles.

I finished up a few dishcloths. I tried a pattern, new to me, using some left over colors. I love the diamonds. The other dishcloth is MasonDixon's ballband. It is an easy take with you pattern that you can do anywhere. I hope to get these two on their way to Hong Kong. I hate to admit they are late, very late holiday gifts!

The Big Guy desparately needs new slippers. In the midst of my cold, I researched some patterns. I remembered I bought the FiberTrends clog last year. After a quick run to my lys, I was well on my way. The second one is cast on and I hope to finish it soon. The pattern is lots of fun. It has some creatvie engineering. Of course, the felting is the biggest unknown. I have to think about where I am going to felt this as my low water washing machine may not fit the bill.

I've been documenting Pumpkin's freshman year by taking Monday photos. I want to create a collage of sorts displaying his growth. I've embraced the idea even more and will expand it to Peanut's middle school years next year. This shot is not the best of Pumpkin, but I took it to show off his curls. Look how they wrap around the top of the hat. I have bone-straight hair and am enamored with his curls. His hair seems to get curlier and curlier! He got brownie points by wearing the hat I made him.

Lastly, Peanut was officially inducted into the Jr Beta Club. He actually joined last fall but did not make it to the ceremony until this semester.

High School State Meet

Last Friday and Saturday, Pumpkin and I attended the TN High School State Swim Meet in Nashville. There was lots of fun and some serious swimming thrown in.

Here he is getting ready for a relay. In addition to the relay, he swam the 200IM and the 100 Breast. He matched his time in the 200IM and cut another 1.5 seconds on the breast.

On Saturday night, they used him as the "spirit" swimmer. I was sitting in bleachers far away and was laughing just watching Pumpkin "fatten" up. He was in rare form! It was fun to watch.



This was the team before the Friday night swim. It was colored hair, beads, and tattoos.

I got in trouble for taking this shot. Actually, I did not take it. I had someone else take it. Don't they look cute?

We had a good time. We even squeezed in lunch at San Antonio Taco with Rachel, Averie and Kevin. And, we made it home before the weather hit. I've officially morphed into a wimp and don't like the threat of weather. I have just cause - in the South, no one knows how to handle it!

The Valentine Tradition Continues...

We pulled off another Valentine's dinner using the china, crystal and silver. The menu was strawberry jello salad, asparagus, baked potatoes, shrimp & scallops roasted in bacon, and Pa's homemade bread. We had wine, sparkling grape juice and fresh brewed iced tea. We ended the meal with a very special Chocolate Chip Cheesecake.

I had planned to do the shrimp and scallops on the grill. But, the weather was pretty crummy. I ended up roasting these in the oven. They are seasoned with Corky's dry rub.

Here's Peanut ready to sit down.

Here's Pumpkin - looking too cool for school!

We were imitating Peanut. He was smiling with his chin sticking out.

The meal was great, but the ending was fabulous. The Big Guy made this cheesecake - with just a little help from Peanut. He made this while Pumpkin and I were in Nashville. This was a great Valentine's gift as the Big Guy HATES to cook. The cheesecake tasted good. But, I think we decided we like regular straight up cheesecake the best. Look how fancy he got with the drizzle on the top.

In case you thought we'd leave Buddy out, don't despair. Our table has bars that cross underneath it. So, Buddy could not claim his usual space under the table. He wedged himself in front of the Big Guy's legs. He just wanted enjoy the meal right with us!

Valentine Milestone

Friday marked the finale of Valentine school parties for my family. Peanut is in 5th grade and this is it. Ironically, I was in Nashville with Pumpkin and did not get to go to the party:(

We decided to take a step away from candy and give sunflower seeds. The kind you can plant and grow. We love to watch the sunflowers grow in the yard. We aren't the best at remembering to plant the seeds each year. We thought these Valentine's would help remind us. We got packets of seeds and little envelopes from the craft store. Peanut made his own little Valentine seed packets.

He punched holes in the hearts, packets, saying, and planting directions tying them together with red yarn.

One classmate was "mad" at him for not giving candy! Kids crack me up! Another child actually ate one of the seeds!! Fortunatly, the seeds are edible and I don't think that caused much of a problem. I am not sure what gave her the impression that she would want to eat these seeds. You would think these kids are deprived. That is hardly the case. Anyway, Peanut was happy with the Valentine's and we had fun making them.

My hairdresser is due with her second baby any day now. It is a boy. I went to have my hair done last week. I whipped this little hat up. It is based on Susan B. Anderson's Star Hat from Itty Bitty Hats. I used a varigated Knitcol in the one year old size. I love the changes in color. This hat calls for three needle bind off. It works great seaming the top together. This was my first attempt at making my own tassels. They were easier than I thought they would be.

I knitted these hats for the high school swim coach and assistant coach. Pumpkin bought this yarn for his math project and did not use it. For the stocking cap, I finished with an i-cord and looped it in a know. His coach did not try it on. I hope he liked it and will wear it. The other cap is knit from Kristin Nicholas' Quarters Cap. I added a tassel to give it some pizzaz. I made the adult small but it ended up pretty big. I had to go with it as I ran out of time. The assistant coach was grateful and happily turned up the edge to make it fit. She said that she will wear it when she walks the dog.

Tonight is our annual Valentine's dinner with china, crystal, and silver. I'll be back tomorrow with pictures. Here's to lots of love!

Mother Nature's Surprise

Yesterday morning, I pulled myself out of bed and threw on some warm clothes to walk the dog. I could hear Pumpkin in the shower. I walked down the hall and glanced out the sidelights. What? There was lots of snow on the ground. What a wonderful surprise! I ran to the TV to confirm school was out. I ran upstairs and told Pumpkin. He could not believe it! We were totally surprised. I know the east coast is getting lots of snow. But, this even caught the local meterologists off guard. Five plus inches in this area is lots!

Pumpkin and I took Buddy around the block for his morning walk. It was snowing so hard. By the time we got around, we had a thick layer of snow on us. And, our tracks were covered. The Big Guy decided to work from home. We all had bacon and pancakes (I got to use the cinnamon chips. Yum!) The Big Guy stayed back. The boys and I headed outdoors.

Gorgeous

We don't get to use the sled very often. We headed for the high school and some hills.

I can't tell you how many times I got beamed with snowballs.

Much to my boys' surprise, I even rode the sled a few times. I have to admit I've become chicken little. The boys had a blast. I took video of them sledding. We created an imovie to show the Big Guy.

The perfect snow angel

The snow switched to rain and sleet. The streets are just wet this morning and most of the snow is melted. The temperature hung right at the freezing mark. Again, our school district is so big that the boys have today off too! This is a record, four days off school this winter. Yesterday was the best, though. The perfect snow day, a gift we all enjoyed from Mother Nature.

County Champs - Combined Team

Yahoo! Pumpkin's high school swim team was crowned the County Champs for the combined team. The meet was delayed from Saturday to Monday night due to the inclement weather we had over the weekend. It did not seem to affect the team. It was a great showing by his high school. The women's team placed 3rd and the men's team took 4th. About a dozen kids will head to the State meet next weekend in Nashville, TN.

It will be all about swimming for the next few weeks as the high school season winds down and the USS short course season ends. Pumpkin has worked extremely hard these last months. There should be some exciting races to watch!!

Valentine for my Sweetie

I remembered my little Valentine suprise to the Big Guy from last year. After thinking for a bit, I thought of the perfect song for this year. Last week, I downloaded Always by Atlantic Star on his Shuffle. In addition, I used Garageband and taped a voice over on some bars of the song-with fading too! It is just my little Valentine gift to him.

I did it days in advance. He runs with his songs in the shuffle mode and I wasn't sure he'd hear "my" songs. Little did I know that the weather was going to turn South! He did not run late last week or on Saturday due to weather and a challenging cross country 8k he planned on Sunday. He doesn't wear headphones in an organized run.

Anyway, he comes in on Sunday night to download some new music on to his Shuffle. I was totally unprepared. I tried to cover up the look on my face and play it off. No such luck! He synced his Shuffle and saw the two additions immediately.

The idea was grand. I wish the implementation went a bit differently. He did not mind at all stating that he was just thinking about music we listened to when we first met. Always was definitely one of them.

If you need some loving and a throw back in time, give this a whirl.


To the Big Guy - if he happens to sneak onto my blog - and at the risk of sounding corny I will love you so, for always!!

Snow Day #3

Yes! The boys are home again today. Who would have thunk it? Our school district is so large. Our roads are fine but the ones to the north were still too icey for the buses. This makes day number three off of school for weather this year. I hope we don't have to make them up.

Here is a collage from Friday afternoon. It was sleeting, freezing rain and snowing. We were crossing our fingers for more snow but we got the ice. I made the boys go out with me. We were going to take Buddy for a long walk. Those plans quickly changed when we got out there. It was horrible. I was actually carrying an umbrella and snapped these pictures on my iphone.

Peanut conducted his own science fair project! Let's see if the basketball stays. I think it is still stuck in the net thanks to the ice.

Our poor birch trees suffered lots of damage from the ice.

The maples were beautiful to look at encased in ice. We are thankful they did not suffer any broken limbs as they are in the front of the house.

The grass was all iced over. Buddy did NOT want anything to do with it. It must have felt like needles to step on. He resorted to doing his "business" on the sidewalk. Too funny!

The crepe myrtle looks more like a weeping willow. It will be okay as we will trim back most of that growth to control the height of the tree.

This was our walk on Saturday morning. We did end up losing power on Friday night about 10pm. Peanut was at a friend's house. So, Pumpkin gathered some blankets and slept on the couch in our bedroom. It was great to see glimpses of the little boy coming out in him. We weren't sure how long the power was going to be out. And, it was pretty cold outside. The power came back on at about 3am. I never realized how reassuring the sound of the carbon monoxide detectors can be! The house where Peanut was did not get power until later Saturday afternoon. We considered ourselves very fortunate.

"They" are saying we dodged a bullet here in the Memphis area. But, the ice on the trees was pretty bad. We picked up some of the big limbs yesterday. There are many more waiting. The biggest bummer about all of this was the kids were off from school and did not have any snow to play in!!!