Thankful Tuesday

Today's Thankful Tuesday is about charities. I think being thankful of life and your opportunities in life makes you want to give and be a part of something that helps others. I wanted to share a couple charity ideas that I'm participating in.

First off there is the Dogs on Thursday Snuggle Project. For the Snuggle Project: Each person who chooses to participate will knit a doggie Snuggle, or blanket and donate it to a local charity of their choice. This project will run from March 6th to the end of April. I had already cast on a snuggle a while ago but never finished it so I am bringing it out of hibernation and plan to finish it before the end of April.

The second charity is Stitch-It Podcast's Charity Blanket. Meghan, the host of Stitch-It is organizing a charity blanket. Each participant will knit 3 inches of the blanket and write their experience, hopes, or a story in a journal and send it to the next participant. In the end the baby blanket will be donated to a charity. I think this is a wonderful idea and am very excited to participate. Her podcast is great and very inspiring for me so please check it out if you haven't.

I hope you enjoy those charities and if you want to join you still can.

I'm also planning on exploring a new Stitch n Bitch tonight at a local yarn store a bit north of where I live. I'm still on the hunt to fondle yarn for my wedding shawl so my friend Sheryl and I are meeting up there and plan to hang out and search for yarn and knit. I think it sounds wonderful. I will let you know in tomorrow's Wedding post if I get something or not.

I'm still waiting for my knitpicks order.

Hope you all are having a wonderful Thankful day!!

Happy Knitting.

Chores, Podcasting, contests, and some knitting!!

I had a pretty good weekend. Saturday was spent doing the chores I've mentioned. It was fun...ummm...yeah fun. :) The dogs and house are clean and laundry is still being done. So it was a productive weekend. We went bowling saturday night. Well, Special K went bowling and I sat and knit while talking to his friends. I actually had a great time.

Today was a great day. I woke up and spent the morning podcasting. There's a new episode up by the way. I talk all about Jackjack's accident and I get really emotional. I realized after I finished there isn't much knitting in the episode but oh well. Hope you guys enjoy it.

The afternoon was spent at Panera knitting with some friends from the SnB. I had a wonderful time and I actually taught someone else how to do something. Big moment for me!! I still feel like such a new knitter that when I can help people it makes my day. We ended up staying for 4 hours. We talked a lot and hatched big plans. hehehe.

Since I got home I've spent some time with Special K because he's not feeling that great today. I cooked dinner and we sat on the porch for a bit in the nice weather. I'm off to get ready for bed and knit a little more. We have standardized testing this week so I'm bringing my knitting with me and plan to knit all morning long.

Hope you guys have a great week.

There's a contest over at NH Knitting Mama's blog. I mentioned her in my last podcast but she has a wonderful etsy site that you should check out and tell her I sent you.

Warmth in the North is also having a contest. Go over and let her know where you would like to visit in Canada and say I sent you.

A New Week and A New Outlook!

Thanks for all the supportive comments from Friday. I had a wonderful weekend and took time to think about my outlook on all this stuff going on. I like what Janice said "Rotten things seem to come in groups and clusters, don't they? That sucks. But they're usually followed by goodness, so that's to look forward to." Made me think I just need to focus on the positives to come. :) Not always an easy task but remembering that there are positives in my life and on their way made me feel better.

It's been pretty cold here in Florida so it's been nice to sit around and knit. It's nice to have today off. I'm heading over to Panera to meet up with some of our knitting group to sit and enjoy the afternoon.

Hope everyone is having a great time. I've been really distracted on the computer lately with organizing all my music in Itunes for my new Ipod. Now that I have one I like all the songs to have the right name and album art. They don't always come off CDs properly.

Happy MLK day!!

Wedding Wednesday

This week is a little bit about our wedding and a little bit about our future marriage. And yes, I do think they are different yet connected. :) So...wedding wise we are still figuring out how many people to invite. We are stuck at somewhere between 150 and 200. Our original guest list was 200 but last night Special K mentioned he only wants us to mail out 150. The only response to that I had at that time was "who are we going to cut?" I don't want to cut anyone but I know that I'm being unreasonable if I think that. So....I'll have to look at the list and make some people part of a list B so if we don't get RSVPs we can add some more. I think that is a compromise.

Another wedding related item I'm working on is figuring out what yarn and color I want to make my wedding shawl. I've already decided that I'm making the Summer Shawlette now I need to figure out what yarn I want. My wedding dress is diamond white so off white or cream I don't think would work. I'd love to make it out of malabrigo but I don't know what color. My friend recommended cashmere but I've never worked with it either so trying to figure out which brand to use. Recommendations would be great here. :)

We have also been discussing our plans for after we are married. With all this health care talk we are researching how much it would be to put me on his health care plan. How much would his company cover for me and if his plan is better than mine. My company does not cover too much but does cover some but we have a HORRIBLE plan. Most the teachers at my school have husbands who are the bread winners and who they get their health care from. The rest of us take what we can get and we choose the plan that won't cost us the most. Which in turns means a huge deductible and horrible coverage. So...hopefully Special K's plan is better and I can get on his. We'll see.

The second thing we discussed was bank accounts. We already decided we will have a joint bank account but now it's deciding whose bank we are going to have this account in. Naturally he wants his bank and I want my credit union. I think our compromise here might be getting one from a completely separate bank. Any suggestions on banks would be great. We are going to set up a savings account soon for our wedding savings.

Ok...hope everyone is having a great week. It was so nice taking Monday off and spending most of it with Special K.

I'm excited about tonights SnB too!! I am almost done with my first Monkey sock so that is exciting!! I just need to graft the toe and cast on for the second one. I'll take a picture and share it with you when it's done.

Happy Knitting

Dogs on Thursday, toe update, SnB.

For todays Dogs on Thursday I wanted to share my napping puppies. They had gotten baths and Special K decided to cover them up because Jackjack was cold. He's such a big sucker. They sure are cute. :)

Jackjack tends to act funny during the cold weather but he's been really funny lately. He gets excited about almost anything it's so cute. :) Abby is still itchy but we are saving up for her to go to a specialist for her allergies. It may take us a bit but I think Special K and I both feel bad that she's itchy.

I almost forgot!! I mentioned to Nichole from Lapdogcreations about my escape artist Jackjack. I actually have video of him getting out. I used to have him on a webcam when I worked at an animation studio. All my friends at work would watch him on it all day. :) It was funny. I even made him his own website www.jackjackinthebox.com. But I thought I'd share the video of him escaping one day. I had to get a new crate and re-enforce it after this. He is no longer crated because of an incident where he broke the crate and pierced his tongue. That was the day it was put away. It kind of sounds like he wasn't crate trained but he was. He just was better when he had a routine and when it got disrupted is when things would happen. The piercing happened when my roommate was taking care of him. Jackjack also spent more than 2 months in the SPCA before I got him and is not a fan of being confined.

The video is kind of long but you can really see him thinking. :) Well...hope you enjoy the video.



Well...a quick update on my toe. The doctor didn't have the x-rays so he said he'd look at them this afternoon when he went over to the hospital but he said from the review of them he got that we might need to remove it (the bone chip). He spent about 20 minutes trying to figure out what he could do now and I ended up leaving with some cushiony thing around my toe. It hurt at first but then felt really nice. I'll spare you the pictures of my un-manicured toes. :) I won't find out for sure what he plans to do until my apt next Thursday so I'll let you know.

Last nights SnB was so much fun. We had about 7 people and everyone seemed to have a great time. :) I worked on my Monkey sock but didn't get too much done because I was kind of tired.

I'm going to head to another Knit night tonight at Needles and Knobs. Since I've decided to take the season off from softball, I can skip the practice today. I'm kind of sad that I won't be playing but have been for almost two years so a break will be nice. I wish it was a choice and not because of my toe though. Oh well.

Well...hope everyone is doing well. Happy Dogs on Thursdays!!

PS...Paula and I are going to try to come up with a great spring activity for the DOT group!!

Christmas Decorations, Dogs on Thursday, and Backyard Fun...

Please keep Sharimom, Special K's mother in your prayers. Her father's funeral was today and I know it's not an easy day for Special K's family. Also..Happy Birthday to Sharimom as well. Her birthday was yesterday.

I promised Sharimom pictures of our house a LONG time ago. So...finally here they are.

Our lights outside.

Our pretty Christmas Tree!! We got a fake tree this year from Special K's boss. I miss the pine scent but I love my tree. The crucifix that is hanging next to the tree was my grandmother's and has been in our family for a long time. She passed it down to my father and I asked him for it and thankfully he gave it to me. I've never been too fond of crucifixes but this one has a lot of meaning.

Dogs on Thursday post is a BIG thank you to my DOT Ornament Swap Pal, Vivian. She did a great job on my package. She sent Jack and Abby toys and treats. This picture was great but notice they won't even look at the treats because they were told to leave it. :) I'm actually pretty proud of both of them for not stealing it early.
I was really proud of these pictures too. They sat there until I was done taking the pictures and then when I said "ok." They looked at me like are you sure and then both separated and chowed down.

Again Thank you so much Vivian....from Jackjack and Abigail.

Last but not least our weekend outdoor fun... our sod....And yes, we laid sod in December....only in Florida can you do that. :) Special K's dad, Coach Dad, promised it should turn green in a week if we water it every day. I've been diligently watering and hoping to come home to green where our sand pit used to be.

Also we have this shed in our backyard that holds our washer and dryer and it must be the oldest shed that was not put together well. The door has been driving Special K and I crazy for months. This weekend Special K, as I was laying the sod, decided to rehang the door and replace the latch so it will stay closed. Kind of a bad picture but the latch totally works and is great!!! GO Special K and his handy work!!!

Well, I hope everyone is having a great holiday season. Today was technically my last day at work but since I'm saving up to pay for the rest of my dress I decided to work extra-care at school for the break so I can make some extra money. That means I'll be back here really early tomorrow to take care of the elementary school kids...and a couple times over the break. I don't mind extra-care on most day so we'll see. I'm going to bring my knitting so I can finish up on my Christmas knits.

Happy Knitting/Dogs on Thursday!!!

PS....Our St. Pete Stitch n Bitch is going great. We had so much fun last night. I organized a small holiday gift exchange and it went well. I'm so glad I started this group and have met such great people!!!

Library!!

Last night while watching the baseball game, I cast on the hat for Special K. It's my first knitting in the round experience and I think I started out pretty good. I made one mess up on the second row but you can't really tell. I concentrated really hard on not twisting the stitches on the circular needles since that seemed to be everyone first comment when I told them I wanted to knit on them. I'm doing a patter of ribbing and I think between my knit stitches and purl stitches there seems to be a little bit of a loose edge. I was hoping to show it to the Audrey at Needles and Knobs but it's closed on monday. I only realized this after I showed up to show her. :) And yes if you notice I got her name off the newspaper article hanging on the window of the shop. I'm going to stop by tomorrow and show her. I might frog it and start over, we'll see. I'll take pictures of it tomorrow and post them.

On my way home I stopped by the library and checked out Stitch 'n Bitch, the knitter's handbook. I figured checking books out is a good way to keep my budget for actual yarn and needles. If I think it's a book I need to keep in my collection then I'll buy it. I'm finally trying to be financially savvy.

I also signed up for Ravelry today. Everyone's doing it....I also figure in the almost a month that I've been knitting I'm already got a bit of a stash started. It's not much but by the time I get my invite...since I'm like a billionth on the list then I'll have more projects and a bigger yarn stash to add.

Well...off to do some reading before bed. I've got to work on my classroom tomorrow so I won't get much knitting done until I get home in the afternoon and do laundry.