A Day Well Spent

First, as of 9:26am, we were out of our apartment. It's amazing how big it looks when there is nothing in it!



Not sure what is up with all those fuzzy dots - probably the gazillion dust particles I kicked up while cleaning. And on that subject, may I say I *love* my Swiffer WetJet?

My friend Asami had emailed me the day before to ask if we wanted to go to the zoo today, and I countered with a picnic, then the zoo. And what did we find at the picnic park? That's right, Ter - cherry blossoms! Look at them and weep, my snowbound sister :)



They are just starting to bloom here and I imagine that in a week or two we will be in a pink wonderland. Here's a pic of Asami's cutie-patootie son Ray pointing out the hyacinths we saw in bloom at the zoo:



And Willow enjoying the swings afterward:



I know she is big enough to do this without the baby apparatus, but this is the swing she likes to use. She just freaks out when she wants to get off and do something else and can't without someone's help.

And another new flower...



There are daffodils galore around here now, but these were the first tulips I saw blooming. I love spring flowers! We didn't get to go to the Philadelphia Flower Show this year because of all the moving and packing, so I will have to make the most of this last blooming (pun intended) Spring.

Not much knitting has been going on here lately - the only times I have been able to sit down and do it is at my SnB. I need to get some baby booties finished, however... and the clock is ticking. Babies don't seem to want to wait until you have finished their knitted objects before coming!

I Always Keep My Promises

The timing I am not always great with, but I do keep them...



Look at this wonderful package my SP gave me! As I mentioned in yesterday's post, the package actually arrived on Friday, but I have been so caught up with the moving and unpacking that I kept missing my opportunity to take a half-decent picture of the haul. And what is in this haul?

• A beautiful sea green aqua Lantern Moon knitting bag (I cannot wait to show this off to my SnBers!)
• Two cobalt blue baskets which I think I am going to put on my knitting shelf for bits and bobs
• Two new kitchen towels in blues and greens - I had to smile at this one. A few SP rounds ago I was paired up with someone who was also moving in the course of that SP round, and I sent her a house-warming present as well. Although in my case I sent her a shot glass...
• Some chocolate candies I am currently hiding from Willow
• A blue Chibi needle set
• Some luxurious dark green homespun - I want to find a special project for this because I just love the colours in it
• And something you can't see because it is currently in the Lantern Moon nag to give it some shape for the picture, a tub of foamy stickers for Willow (I have thus far hidden these from her until we get everything in her room put away!)

Thank you, SP! It is a great package and I can't wait to dig into it all!

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On a more somber note, I was at a volunteer function at work today - we were baking cookies at the Ronald McDonald House. I had a special helper - his name was Jamir and he is the sweetest little three year old boy you could imagine. There weren't many kids around while we were there (most being either at school or in the hospital itself), but since Jamir is only three and his nurse comes to him, his Mom has him all day at the Ronald McDonald House. I think she might have needed a break, because she was more than happy to have him help me scoop out cookie dough and roll it into balls for the cookie sheets ('fess up, Moms - we have *all* felt this way at some point!) I was talking to Jamir's Mom about his condition - he has no hair and has the puffiness of recent chemo and she confirmed that he has cancer but that the doctors have not figured out yet what kind of cancer. This is an easy one - I am not an overly or overtly religious person - but Willow and I said a prayer for him tonight and I ask that you please do the same.

Four Different Kinds of Flowers!

And four reasons why I really need to get a better camera...

Andrew and I spent the entire day packing and cleaning today and still aren't done. Jeez - it's a good thing we had a month to do this in - because if we only had a weekend I think a) we would have killed each other , and b) it just wouldn't have happened. The work is almost done - what is left in the apt is Andrew's corner desk, some stuff for Goodwill or stuff we don't know what to do with, the big TV, and stuff to clean. Trust me, Saturday cannot come soon enough. I don't care if I have a gazillion boxes scattered around my new house, come Sunday morning I am doing nothing. Not a bleeding thing. I may lay in bed all day and read paranormal romances and eat Trader Joe's Flaxseed tortilla chips and wheedle my husband into making me gin and tonics.

Anyway - it was a very nice day today, which made it even more painful to have to move and clean indoors. I snuck my craptacular camera in my bag and tried to take some pictures to prove to you all that Spring is making some inroads here on the East Coast.

Some tiny blue flowers (weeds most likely, but they were the first flowers I saw of the day) in front of the old apartment building:



Some purple crocuses in my in-laws' front yard:



Some daffodils doing their best to bloom along the driveway:



And one of the camellia bushes around my in-laws' house has started to bloom. My father-in-law told me about this one after dinner - I bet I would have caught it in more of a full bloom in the middle of the day:



And I need to send a big apology to my upstream SP - twice now I have promised to take some pics of the super package I received on Friday in the bright sunlight, and both times I didn't get home until it was nearly dark out. Pictures tomorrow come sun or shade, I absolutely promise. There is a gorgeous dark aqua Lantern Moon bag in there I must show off to all of you :) And dark green homespun... and candy... tune in tomorrow!

Look Ma! (And Blogstalking...)

For a minute there I thought I was going to have a good excuse for buying a new digital camera... I had looked high and low and it was nowhere to be found. Silly Andrew found it somewhere today... note to self... find a better hiding spot next time! I really want to get a camera that I can take macro shots with!!

My Mom wanted some more pictures of the house - although I have to be honest and say we are still living in a sea of boxes. We have managed to sort of clean up the kitchen and living room, but they are by no means put together yet.

Here is the living room:



Nice floors, huh? Neither of those bookcases will be in those spots when all is said and done, but we needed something in the meantime to put the TV on. We haven't had cable hooked up yet, so all we have been watching are DVDs. From this vantage point I swung around 180' to the left and here is a picture of my kitchen:



I need to get a bakers rack or something like that because I need more storage space. See the door there in the corner? That is the door to the sun room. The door to the basement is just past the refrigerator on the extreme right.

And now for the blogstalking! I haven't done this in quite some time due to the packing, move, and subsequent unpacking - but I knew this was a topic I could make a quick post on. The subject is 'Spring Changes' and I bring you... clumps of weeds in my backyard!



This weed - a horrible designation, but true - grows in nearly everyone's yard here in Delaware. What is it? Come on Dad, you can guess... It's wild garlic. It is sort of more like chives, but when you mow over it there is the definite smell of garlic in the air. I have never tried to actually eat it - but maybe one of these days when I am making mashed potatoes I will go clip myself some and see what it turns out like.

We're back!

Mind you, the computer is a cold basement and I've done absolutely no knitting in the last week, but we're back!

The weird thing about our house - apparently no one had updated the electrical outlets in a while - so the rooms that had cable jacks for the broadband service didn't have three-pronged outlets, and the rooms with three-pronged outlets didn't have cable jacks. We plan to get a wireless connection soon, but for the time being the computer had to go in the basement... which in itself only has one free outlet, which we found out the hard way is controlled by the light switch at the top of the stairs.

I'm itchin' to knit, but most of that stuff is still packed away - and I don't think I am going to hit my goal of having a major finished object in March... let alone a hat for Dulaan. I've been catching up on a lot of reading, however - we don't have the TV set up yet, so I have gone through 3-4 paperbacks in the last week before going to bed.

Pictures of the partially set up house to come soon!

Sorry! Temporal Difficulties...

I have not yet learned to be in two places at once. We didn't return the moving truck until close to 11pm last night, so I wasn't able to post the winner as planned. However, without further ado, the winner is:

Krista from Stitchin' Sheep

Nine people put their names in the hat, and I used a random number generator to pick the winner (Krista, your lucky number was 5). If you will please send a mailing address to jochibi AT yahoo DOT com, I will endeavour to get the sock yarn in the mail this week.

I will be taking a week's haitus (or maybe just spotty posting) because of the unpacking and cleaning I have to do - but I will be back.

Announcing Jo's First Ever Blog Contest!

The Prize:



One Skein of Colinette Jitterbug in the Jay colourway. This is 267m of 100% Easy Care Merino (the label says you can machine wash and dry it!) sock yarn.

What do you have to do to win this lovely skein of sock yarn?

Be one of these people:

1. My Life In Stitches
2. Sandy’s Knitting
3. Knitting the Blues
4. Wool is Wonderful
5. affiknitty
6. Amylin
7. Yarn & Order
8. Can’t You See I’m Knitting Here?!
9. Fidget
10. The Knit Sisters
11. The Keyboard Biologist
12. Purls and Pugs
13. Green Moon Knits
14. Gelsomina Lucchesi
15. Alianne Knits
16. Curlerchik
17. Etherknitter
18. Sarah’s Threads
19. Streets and YOs
20. Purls Beyond Price
21. My Virtual Sanity
22. littlelambsyDivy
23. Purple Duckie
24. Knitalia
25. The Stripey Tiger
26. A Thing for String
27. The Knotty Gnome Knits
28. My Eclectic Mess
29. Scorpion Goddess Knits
30. Kitty Cafe
31. Bagatell
32. The Stitchin’ Sheep
33. Bienvenue à mon monde
34. Sweet Georgia
35. Midgeling
36. Bramblestitches
37. Alternative Knitting
38. Clickety Click
39. Jofrog is Knitfrog!
40. Wooly Headed
41. Divinely Crafty
42. Knitting With Rubber Gloves
43. Yarn Over Manhattan
44. WoolGatherer
45. Bella Blu Mama
46. Knit Me A River
47. Domesticat
48. Longwool
49. Island Knitter
50. Tricotine
51. Traveling Stitch
52. The Crochet and Knit Chat Room
53. Lady Knitterly
54. Brooklyn Knit Chick
55. The Knitting Patch
56. Gwibbles ‘n’ Knits
57. Wraught and Fraught
58. Kiriosity
59. It is Rocket Science!
60. A Chance to Knit
61. Tightly Wound Loosely Knit
62. Knitting in the Valley
63. Vintage Fusion Knits and Crochets
64. Elliphantom Knits
65. Knit Me
66. Knit and Play With Fire
67. Isis Rising
68. Knotty Mouse
69. Pink Monkey Knits
70. Imagine Creative Name Here
71. JenLa
72. An Ent Knits
73. Ceallach Knits
74. Auntie Ann Knits
75. Lacefreak
76. Quantum Tea
77. Plumpy Blogs and Knits It
78. Warrior Knitter
79. Madisonienne
80. Flippy the Wonder Squirrel
81. Javajem Knits
82. Kifknits
83. Pink Purls
84. Chicken Knits
85. A Good Yarn
86. Mixed Up Beauty
87. A Knitted Frenzy
88. Knittibell
89. Wine and Needles
90. Fickle Knitter
91. Crafting Jen
92. The Knit’Nabler
93. pieKnits
94. nuttinbutknittin
95. kelp! knits
96. Purl Jam
97. Yarnageddon
98. Skein Street
99. Christina’s Knitting
100. The Bitter Knitter

These are the one hundred new blogs that I visited in the last 20 days and left comments on every single one of them. If you are one of these people and would like to win this skein, please leave a comment with your first name and blog name and tell me what is your favourite word and why. This contest is open until 7pm EST Sunday night - at that point I will collect all the entries and make a random drawing. If you know someone whose name is on this list, make sure they enter - your chances are anywhere from 1 in 6* to 1 in 100! Good luck!

What did I get out of this experiment? Well, six* new people signed up to subscribe to my blog :) That aside, I saw some truly breath-taking finished objects and objects-in-progress, and not to mention a gazillion ideas of what I would like to knit next. I found places to buy online patterns from, some darling pets, cute kids, and even cried a moment or two along with bloggers. I would encourage other people to conduct an experiment like this - it really was an enriching experience.

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And... I'm letting go of my Lenten Resolution. With the packing and move I just can't keep up with it. I know I have constant internet access at work, but I refuse to blog from work. I *like* my job and would like to keep it.

To prorogue or not to prorogue

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Word of the Day 14:
prorogue
verb
1. hold back to a later time; "let's postpone the exam"
2. adjourn by royal prerogative; without dissolving the legislative body

WordNet® 2.1, © 2005 Princeton University
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I may have to postpone the beginning of my blog contest until Friday because of weather. The snow started to come down this morning and there were accidents all over the place so I was unable to run out and pick up the prize from my LYS. I hope the weather has cleared up by tomorrow! Perhaps I will still give the details of the contest tomorrow and post the picture of the prize on Friday - we'll see what happens.

The pictures of the winder and swift will have to wait a day as well - I came home today and was a whirling dervish with the packing and the place is not fit to have its picture taken at the moment.

New Toys (but no pictures! ARGH!)

I have the best knitting group in the world. My friends in my knitting group gave me a ball winder and a swift fashioned from recycled walnut furniture as a housewarming present. I would love to show you pictures, but my husband has the camera at the moment. I promise I will post some pictures tomorrow. I can't wait to unpack my stash and unwind many skeins!

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Word of the Day 13:
gasconade
Pronunciation [gas-kuh-neyd]
noun, verb, -ad·ed, -ad·ing.
–noun
1.
extravagant boasting; boastful talk. –verb (used without object)
2.
to boast extravagantly; bluster.

[Origin: 1700–10; from F gasconnade, deriv. of gasconner to boast, chatter. See Gascon, -ade1] —Related forms
gas·con·ad·er, noun

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.
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I hope all of you can deal with my gasconade; I have the coolest friends :)

Tantrums

I was looking for a cool synonym for temper tantrum, but came up with this word in my search:

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Word of the Day 12:
disapprobation
noun
- an expression of strong disapproval; pronouncing as wrong or morally culpable; "his uncompromising condemnation of racism" [ant: approbation]

WordNet® 2.1, © 2005 Princeton University
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My daughter threw the mother of all temper tantrums this morning. I know she is coming off the ear infection and is stressed (as we all are) about moving, but every single bleeding thing this morning set her off in a yelling/crying jag. I had kind of hoped that at nearly 5 reason would have taken a stronger hold...

I want to knit so bad but all my knitting stuff is already packed up :(

Edited to add...

I wanted to remind all new people of my to-be-announced blog contest. If you have stumbled back here because I left a comment on your blog for the first time within the last 17 days, you are eligible for the contest. Come back Thursday for the announcement!

The Pain and The Agony

You know that part of the Lord's Prayer where you go, "...the power and the glory..."? I always seem to associate that in my head with the intro to some sports program - I think it was ABC Sports - probably in the early 80's where the announcer would say, "...the pain and the agony of defeat..."

I'm definitely feeling the pain and agony right now. My left heel is killing me and my back and um, glutes, are feeling the burn. Andrew and I have divided up the moving as follows:

1. I pack all the boxes.
2. He moves the boxes from Point A to Point B.
3. I unpack the boxes.
4. He enlists his friends to help move the furniture.

I'm quite happy with this deal - and I've been purging quite a bit of stuff. There's the pile to go to goodwill, the pile for the used bookstore, and the pile of simply garbage. We had dinner in our new home tonight - mind you, the gourmand in me said frozen pizzas were quite enough, thank you. We sat on the floor in the kitchen munching on our pizzas and watched "Charlie and Lola" on the portable DVD player.

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Word of the Day 11
antiodontalgic
a. (Med.) Efficacious in curing toothache. --
n. A remedy for toothache.

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.
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Too Tired for Anything Else

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Word of the Day 10:
sedulous
1540, from L. sedulus "attentive, painstaking," probably from sedulo (adv.) "sincerely, diligently," from sedolo "without deception or guile," from se- "without, apart" (see secret) + dolo, ablative of dolus "deception, guile," cognate with Gk. dolos.

Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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We have too many damn books. Fully half the boxes I packed today were books. We are in a two-bedroom apartment and moving into a 3 bedroom house... and are already plotting to buy more bookcases...

Cute Kid in a Dulaan Hat

So, I was going to stretch out the knitting of this hat since I can't work on anything too complicated right now because of the whole moving thing. I was going to watch the American Idol results show I had taped and then go to bed at 10pm. But then one of my favourite movies came on TV and I had to stay up to my favourite scene - the funeral scene from "Four Weddings and a Funeral" when the W. H. Auden poem is recited. So, the cool stripe hat magically got finished last night:



The model was actually in a posing kind of mood - although she wanted me to take a picture of her with her french fry hanging out of her mouth. I declined. Here's a side view:



The cool stripes did get smooshed a bit when it came time for the decreases, but I kept them to a quick (over 8 rows from start to finish) decrease - so it kind of looks like there is an aqua berry on top of the hat.

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Word of the Day 9:
salmagundi

1674, from Fr. salmigondis, originally "seasoned salt meats" (cf. Fr. salmis "salted meats"), from M.Fr. salmigondin, coined by Rabelais, of uncertain origin, but probably related to salomene "hodgepodge of meats or fish cooked in wine," (early 14c.), from O.Fr. salemine.

Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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It's funny - some days it is harder to find a good word that I don't know the meaning of. I usually start on Dictionary.com and do a free-flow association with a theme in mind. Today's theme was 'mixed feelings', and somehow I lucked into a word meaning 'mixed salted meats.' See? You never know where you'll go!

The reason for the mixed feelings? There was a freaking lake in the backyard of my new house today! Granted, we had about 3 inches of rain in less than 12 hours last night - but I had gone out yesterday afternoon and bought a 10 foot section of corrugated pipe and an adaptor to connect to my drain pipe in a valiant (and pretty damn smart, I thought) attempt to divert the water away from the corner of the basement with the known water issue. For those of you who don't live in Delaware, this is not a shocking thing - We are near the ocean and two large rivers - the ground is pretty damp here. I didn't know what a sump pump or french drain was until we started looking at houses. So, at lunch today I stopped by my new house (how I love saying that!) to drop off some stuff. I was standing in front of the kitchen window pulling stuff out of bags and I looked out the window and saw a FREAKIN' LAKE! I dropped what I was doing, ran downstairs to the basement, half expecting to see a few inches of water in the basement... and all there was was a small trickle from the known corner, moving straight to the drain. I turned on the dehumidifer and went outside to investigate. My new piping system apparently worked because that corner of the yard was dry. The water is at the back of the yard - it doesn't start until about 15 feet away from the back of the house. I checked out the neighbour's yards and saw similar pools, to lesser degrees. I frantically called my father-in-law, and he assured me this had to to with the fact the ground was frozen and the water had nowhere to go. Willow and I went back to the house after work and saw the lake had receded quite a bit - so keep your fingers crossed that we have a few dry days, okay?

The good thing that happened today? Willow was accepted into the Kindergarten program we were trying to get her into. Yay! One less thing to worry about!

Random Stripage

Isn't this cool?



This is the same TLC Essentials 'Surf and Turf' yarn I made Willow's Calorimetry out of a week or two ago. I love how I have the thick aqua stripe going up around the hat. Right now I am just trucking along in a 2X2 rib, and I am a little afraid to start the decreases at the crown because I know it will mess up my snazzy stripes.

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Word of the Day 8:
recreant
Pronunciation[rek-ree-uhnt]
-adjective
1. cowardly or craven.
2. unfaithful, disloyal, or traitorous.

-noun
3. a coward.
4. an apostate, traitor, or renegade.

[Origin: 1300-50; ME <>
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