Tiff Crochets

Can you take those seven letters and spell a word?  Don’t worry, I can’t either.

I discovered a great non-crafty blog.  Visit Minor Tweaks.  I manage to laugh out loud, smirk, or even giggle at least once per post.  I check it every day after lunch and it makes at least part of the workday afternoon brighter.

I think I need one of these - felted coffee cup cozy.  It’s just cute. 

I’m tired of the rain.  And the cold.  Oh, and the clouds.  The wind too. 

I’m going to attempt to organize my yarn stash and list some for sale.  It looks like I’m in need of at least two tickets to see Hannah Montana at the Houston Rodeo in order to make Laura’s day (or year) and they’re going for $300+ for two on ebay.  I know that she’s going to be okay if she doesn’t go because we’ve talked about it, but it’s still fun doing the cool mom thing. 

We’ve been on our own eight months with Andy driving in from Dallas about every other week and I’m worn out.  It’s as close to being a single parent that I ever want to be.  I’m thinking about getting my passport and as soon as the job situation works out where we’re living in the same home again, I’m going on a vacation overseas.  Without kids AND him.  Preferably somewhere with a steady supply of pina coladas and a white, sandy beach.

It’s because of cute, quick little projects like Calorimetry that I pushed myself past my purling problems and stuck with learning to knit.  I gave up on finishing the scarf and turned it into a little purse for the girls.  (I think I said that in my last post, but I still haven’t taken a picture of it!!)  So, I present to you my second ever finished knit project -

Laura wanted to model it before her bedtime.  I’m thinking of using a smaller yarn to make her one.

Now the details - I used a handdyed worsted weight wool yarn that I picked up in Flagstaff about three years ago.  I threw away the label when I wound the center-pull balls (egads!) so I have no idea of the name.  I believe it was made in the region, but I can’t say for certain.  I cast on 96 stitches instead of the 120 that the pattern called for.  It fits perfectly at this size.  I started it Friday evening and finished it Saturday afternoon after a great gathering at Starbucks with a couple of my CGOA chapter friends.

Just because she needs some photo love too, this is how patient Buffy is with the girls, particularly Maddie -

Did you know that the Scrabble Page-a-Day Calendar is the greatest daily calendar ever????  Why is it such a great calendar?  For the simple reason that I am a perfectly reasonable human being except when I’m losing at Scrabble.  Losing-but-not-really-losing (Tiff term) is okay because at any time you could move into the lead, but full blown losing, the kind where you’re hundreds of points behind your opponent, that kind of losing takes me on an emotional roller coaster that has no equal (Really - ask Andy.  He says that he’ll never play with me again after the last time, but we shall see about that.). 

My solution?  Nab a copy of the Scrabble calendar from the 50%+ clearance of calendars at Barnes & Noble.  Every day I sit here at work and complete the day’s puzzle.  By December 31, 2007, I will be the Scrabble master of my house and then I won’t have to worry about turning into the worst sore loser ever.  Today’s puzzle is titled “Same but Different”.  What letter in the word J-I-M-M-Y can be replaced to form a word with exactly the same meaning?  What the heck does jimmy mean?!?  Does it mean pry something loose??  Fix something???  What-does-it-mean??!?!?!  How can I replace a letter if I’m not sure of the correct meaning???!?!!? 

Whew.  See?  I told you Scrabble makes me loony.

Have you ever seen a four year old disco?  I’ll have to video her during one of her kareoke sessions and share her version of YMCA.  It’s funny yet strangely creepy.  Speaking of Miss Rock Star, I picked her up a new pair of tennis shoes yesterday.  They’re a cute brown and pink Hello Kitty combo athleticasual look (oh you can definitely picture them now after that description, can’t you??).  Here’s our conversation:

HER:  Mom, are these rock star shoes?

ME:  (Doing something on the floor with Laura, avoiding the question.  I think I was knitting, but hey, that was last night, I can barely remember this morning!)

HER:  MOM!  Are these rock star shoes?

ME:  No honey, they’re Hello Kitty shoes.

HER:  No, they’re Hello Kitty ROCK STAR shoes.  See??  (points to them)

ME:  Oh yes, I see now.

HER:  (skipping back to her bedroom singing) “Me have rock star shoes.”

I went with the little purse instead of a scarf.  It’s not that I didn’t want to finish it, I just thought that a nice warm scarf would smother me here in Houston (even when it’s in the thirties) so it’s now going to be a carrying pouch for the girls.  They love the Littlest Pet Shop and always want to bring at least one with us everywhere.  This way, they’ll have a cute little home for their travels.  I didn’t leave a button hole so I think I’m going to go with a snap or velcro, both options better for little hands.

Did you hear about this - If it’s yarn, it has to be a terrorist front (most likely you have, but just in case!).  I love the Freakonomics Blog by the way.  Good read.

I finally moved my blog to just being at www.tiffcrochets.com instead of residing at www.tiffcrochets.com/blog so my rss feeds should have changed.    It turns out the ease of transfer (keeping the blog stuff at the blog address while keeping the main url as where you go to view the blog) was a whole heck of a lot easier than I thought it would be.  It was one of those things that I just thought it had to be difficult so I’d look into it when I had a spare moment.  I never had the spare moment so I forgot about it until today, months and months later when I really should have been working on other things…like organizing my paper clips since the office is so slow right now (can’t make concrete cylinders for strength testing when it’s freezing and raining and 30-something degrees in Houston).

Back to the point of this post!  This is a test.  Did I mess up my feeds so bad that I can’t even find my blog in Bloglines?  possible.  Did I get it right?  HA!  historian I am, tech geek I am not.

I’m now at 5 inches on my ribbed scarf.  That means if I make 5 inches of progress every two days I’ll be finished with a nice 60 inch scarf in 30 stinking days!  But, the colorway of this yarn is beautiful so it’s not destined for coin pursage… yet.  What type of yarn is it?  It’s 100% wool from….. (had to do a Yarndex search since I long ago lost the tag and wound the yarn into two center-pull balls).  All rightey then.  The yarn store where I bought it in Arizona has closed down and I think it was a regional (Arizona-made) yarn so it’s now classified as a yarn-to-be-named-later. The scarf -

Update:  I officially finished 7 inches in two days.  I managed two inches during a 50+ minute episode of Brotherhood, so now my projected finish date is closer to 17 days. I live in Texas!  We’ll be having spring-like conditions in 17 days!!   

I’m going to try to finish this -

before January 27th so if I work on my scarf during lunch and Striped (well, isn’t it?) during my evening movie watching, I may finish it in time.  I’m on the fourth stripe combination and I’m thinking that I’ll need 12 in order to have a decent length.  I’m using Lion Brand Homespun in Antique, Mediterranean, and Prairie.  If I finish it in time, it will be a birthday present for my dad and stepmom.  The only time I enjoy working with Homespun is when I’m using an N hook and a single crochet pattern.  Every other time, I have issues. 

Eureka!!!!  I finally had the “aha!” moment with my very, very lacking knitting skills.  Come to find out, wrapping counterclockwise means wrap the yarn counterclockwise around the needle, not clockwise.  No wonder my purls were so tight and I could accomplish next to nothing.  I now have three inches on a 2 x 2 ribbed scarf after watching half of Good Night and Good Luck and half of a My Name is Earl episode. 

I did watch more than just half of both shows (because that just seems like I’ve taken my short attention span to the next level and that wouldn’t be a good thing).  I was just griping at my failures at knitting for the first half of Good Night and washing dishes during the second half of Earl.  Tonight my goals are:

1. Take my prescription to the pharmacy
2. Spend less than twenty minutes looking at Burts Bees stuff at the pharmacy or else Number 4 is a definite.
3. Make dinner instead of picking up something on my way home, even if it’s peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with Cheetos (the best combo EVER).  Although, chinese sounds really good….
4. No take out!  Fattening.  Bad! Bad!
5. Make sure to comb Maddie’s hair after her bath.  Tangles are getting out of hand.
6. Make the girls’ lunches with their help before they go to bed. 
7. Listen to Laura read.
8. Lay out the girls’ clothes for tomorrow.
9. Watch at least one episode of Brotherhood, if it arrived from Netflix. 
10. Hang up the girls’ clothes while watching Brotherhood.
11. Wash at least one load of clothes tonight.  Preferably whites.  Need those essentials!
12. Try to get at least one more inch (high hopes!) on my ribbed scarf or else it’s destined to be a coin purse.
13. If there’s time, run the vacuum in the living room.  Too much popcorn evidence from my late night popcorn addiction.
14. Replace 9 & 10 with finishing at least one assignment from this week’s module if I cannot finish it during work this afternoon. 

Ah, a normal, relaxing night at home, or at least what has become a normal, relaxing night.  Tomorrow, both girls have dance class so the goal list will be much, much shorter.

This is what happens when you mix a four-year old, a T-Rex, and a Barbie - Barbie v. Fred the T-Rex

After dinner and presents, Christmas gets a little crazy with my clan.  Even though it’s dark, you can just see the hat the stepdad is wearing.  It was a Miami Dolphins inspired custom hat.  It’s all he wanted from me for Christmas.  Talk about an easy person to “shop” for!

I wish this was a finished project for 2007, but it’s from December.  It’s the Shell Stitch poncho in Patons Shetland Chunky Tweed.  I love this yarn!  I will eventually get around to making Berroco’s Creole bag in it.  One day…

Since this is a very Maddie-themed post, the next model is going to be Laura (as soon as I finish (a) her second shrug or (b) finisher her knifty knitter muffler thingy-mabob).

Okay, back to work on my last projects for my “Foundations of Education in Middle and High School”.  They’re due by midnight on Sunday night.  I have to create a short essay, reading comprehension questions for the essay, and a measurement guideline for grading purposes.  I’m “cheating” by using exerpts from some of my past history papers.  After this I have two more mini-modules, “Getting Ready for the Classroom” and “Foundations of Education” (lesson planning, etc.).  This past one was mostly theory-type things.  Truly, truly exiting.  The coolest part about my internship training is that my partner for this big project is an ex-NFL football player.  I haven’t mentioned football yet, but I want to… badly!!  Do you know how hard it is to resist asking him on Sunday when we have little projects due why I seem to get my first email from him AFTER Sunday Night Football???

Laura wants to know why I’m writing about football on the computer.  She’s at a second-grade reading level.  I wasn’t prepared for this.  She reads EVERYTHING.  No more spelling out bad words.  Dang it.

See this??

I ordered the materials for it today.  It’s the new Cotton Ease from Lion Brand and Lion Cotton.  I can’t wait!