Farmer's Market

Well, the surgery went fine, my recovery went fine, my scar seems to be healing nicely, and Joe & I have finally resumed our nightly walks, so I'm in a much better mood than I was a week ago. I was pretty gloomy last week because I couldn't walk or stand for very long, plus the freakin weather around here was like the dementors were looming or something. Friday was great though; the sun came out, I got to take off work and go to the GHO (as we call it around here), and I got to do lots of walking around the golf course. We had terrible storms Friday night though, and lost power for 8 hours. I taped the refrigerator door shut as soon as the power went, so all the food was totally fine, and we didn't have any other damage in our neighborhood, unlike the town next to us! Saturday was errand day, but Sunday was the Farmer's Market! This was the best one I've been to yet. I finished my market bag last week during the doom & gloom and filled that sucker up yesterday:
That giant green thing coming out of the top is a head of garlic with the tops attached! I had never seen this before, so I totally fell for that one. I also got the first corn of the season, bread from the baker dude, goat cheese from the goat people, and some sugar snap peas.
I got Rocco a little catnip fishy at the pet stand:

He likes it, but it's not nearly as exciting as watching the little black kitty that wanders around our neighborhood:

I wonder what he would have thought of this little one:

She (he?) was only 4 days old and SO cute! I had a feeling I might see Kris there, and I did! I am officially hooked and I have now convinced Joe to take me there on the motorcycle next weekend. It didn't take much convincing; It's Brew Fest next week! Free beer samples!

It's Back!

The knitting mojo that is! It came back just in time too. I have to have surgery today to have some skin cancer removed from my leg, so I'll be off my feet for a while. Hopefully knitting will keep me sane through my down time! I'm particularly bummed about the surgery this time (I had the same procedure done around Thanksgiving last year) because I've recently become obsessed with Jillian Michaels workout Dvd's. I LOVE them. They are pure torture, but very effective. I also read her weight loss books, and while I'm not doing everything she suggests, I have removed a few things from my diet that I didn't even realize were bad, and I've learned what kinds of food combinations work best for me. So, to do all this work only to find out that I won't be able to continue doing it is really pissing me off. Plus, if I keep needing to have these melanomas removed, I'm going to look like Edward Scissorhands' abused girlfriend. Public service announcement for the day: MAKE your kids wear sunscreen!

So anyway, back to the knitting. I started crocheting a market bag last week out of some CotLin I got from WEBS last year, and it's done except for the straps:

I dug Central Park Hoodie out from under the couch last night and knit about 4" on the back, realized I made too much ribbing, frogged & then reknit the 4" of work. Not bad for one night!

One last thing I have to tell you guys about is my new blender:

It's the Bella Cucina Rocket Blender, and it is amazing. I make these awesome smoothies every morning, it grinds coffee, parmesan cheese, spices, pretty much anything! And I made Joe a margarita last night with it when he had a rough day at work. Perked him right up! Have a great week everybody!

Updates

Hi there! Let's catch up, shall we? When Joe & I were in Tampa, we walked just about everywhere. When we got home, we started walking after dinner every night & gradually started walking into the center of town every night (4 miles round trip!). Then we turned it into walking to run our errands (library, CVS, jug of milk, etc.). While this is great exercise & all, it completely drains my ambition for anything else besides TV or reading afterward, so there has been no (and I mean NO) knitting since then. Not even mindless sock knitting or anything. Meanwhile, we've been on a couple adventures. We went on our usual spring ride for the Children's Hospital:

Isn't he cute? This year had around 2500 bikes & was a great time. And, bonus, they reached the fund raising goal! Sewing Hog Wild was there as always:

The following weekend, we went to Maryland Sheep & Wool and a NASCAR race!

Our guys didn't win, but we still had fun! Oh, yeah, the haul from MDSW; Some Brooks Farm Four Play:

And some Aussi Soxxi:

I made my Hermione sweater out of Aussi worsted, so I figured I'd give their sock yarn a shot. And when I bought that Four Play, it was teal. Why it's navy blue in Connecticut and teal in Maryland, I have no idea. Good thing I like navy, I guess! I actually tried to buy some Tess yarn, but they only had one skein of the color I had my eye on. Oh well, their loss. I have been petting the Four Play a lot, so hopefully it will inspire me to dust off the needles soon!

Tampa!

I had pretty much had it with the cruel joke that is Spring in Connecticut, so I had to convince Joe to take me somewhere warm. We just finished paying a HUGE, annoying debt, so we decided to take that first payment off and go away for a long weekend. The Yankees training camp is held in Tampa, FL, so I knew I could lure Joe down there for sure. We went down Friday morning and had a fantastic lunch at J. Alexander's, and went to Whiskey Joe's for fish tacos and cheap beer for dinner (SO GOOD!). And we caught a game that night:

Richard Gere threw out the first pitch (that's him in the dark jacket near the mound) & it was hilarious to listen to all the swoons and giggles coming from the crowd! Then Saturday we went to Busch Gardens for the day and went to a place called Skipper's for dinner. I had my first gator nuggets (tastes like chicken!), and some awesome Florida stone crabs. We also had their key lime pie and damn near licked the plate, it was so good.
Sunday morning, it was raining, so we slept in and had granola bars from the vending machine for breakfast & headed out for the stadium around 11:30 after it stopped raining. It was only 2 miles from our hotel, so we walked to & from there. Half way there, we got a little residual rain cloud overhead, so we ducked into Subway to escape it. They had such a good deal on their subs (some of their footlongs were only $4 instead of $5), that we decided to just eat there & save ourselves a cool $50 on ballpark food. We had GREAT seats that day:

Seats that close at Yankee Stadium would have been at least $300 apiece, and ours were around $30 each. So, IMO, definitely worth it to go to Tampa to Yankee games! We went to Oystercatchers that night for dinner & had such an amazing meal & even more amazing view:

Everything we had there was simply grilled, perfectly seasoned, and really healthy and light. I was so impressed with the all restaurants we ate at, Oystercatchers especially, because of all the healthy options for Joe (and me), and how MOST of the menu was that way.

All in all, it was a really fun trip and we are ready to go back NOW!

Darn Pretty

Well, Joe LOVED the kitchen. He took a minute trying to figure out what the heck happened, but he finally caught on. He even surprised me with a dozen roses the next day! Little did he know, I had already rewarded myself for a job well done. Somebody's got to stimulate the economy; might as well be me, right? I decided I would finally let myself get some of those Darn Pretty Needles by Grafton Fibers. They are sooooo expensive normally but they were having a great sale on their Bubblegum Stripe sets, so I got a couple to try them out. It took me about 5 seconds to decide that I wanted more. I instantly got inspired to finish my socks made with Lorna's Laces in Black Purl:

And I had a gift certificate to Creative Fibers that I needed to use, so I got some of their newly-in-stock Malabrigo Sock yarn. Between the Malabrigo and the DPNs, I am in sock heaven!

I did end up getting more sets of the Darn Pretty's, especially since they came out with size 2.5. If you you use wood dpns at all, I would highly recommend trying these out. They are so smooth and velvety, they don't hurt my wrists when I work with them, and since they're only 5 inches long, they don't snag at the sleeve of whatever I'm wearing while I'm knitting. And they're on sale! How can you resist? ;)

Home Alone

Joe's annual conference in Vegas was this week, so Rocco & I were left to our own devices for the last few days. Typically I have a sewing marathon or a knitting marathon or just plain girly time, but this year I am on a home improvement kick. Just before he left, I saw a commercial for Lowes Creative Ideas magazine, so I went to their website to subscribe (it's free, so why not). One of the ideas on the site was to update your kitchen cabinet hardware & paint your cabinets for an updated look. My cabinets are already painted, but the hardware was definitely questionable (I didn't remember to take a before shot until I was a little bit into the project, but you get the idea):

So, $100 later, I came home to install my new hardware. OF COURSE the holes from the new hardware didn't line up with the holes from the old hardware, so I had to drill new holes, spackle & paint the old holes, and while I was at it, touch up paint the nicks & scrapes that suddenly became painfully obvious. But since I had nothing else to do all weekend, I didn't mind too much. I think it looks WAY better this way:

These pics were taken with my cell phone at night, so sorry if they're blurry. A shot of my prized jade-ite chicken:

Rocco was pretty pissed that my lap wasn't as available as usual, and my knitting productivity was nil this week, but I think it's worth it. I can't wait to see Joe's reaction when he comes home tonight!

Holy Crap, I Finished Something

So after I finished the lace edged hat, my knitting mojo completely left me. I had no desire to finish CPH and even less desire to start something else. My sewing mojo left around the same time as well. The only thing I've been doing really is reading cholesterol books. Fun! So, this weekend I got the cleaning bug & I've been wanting to get the serger off the dining room table for a while because it really bothers me when it's there & I'm not using it. Before I could do that, I had to finish Joe's robe. All I had left were the stupid pockets, so I went for it.

I was even distracted enough to embroider his monogram like he wanted:

I figure it's close enough to Valentine's day to count as a present, and since he sent me this very yummy, very expensive fruit arrangement, I figured I owed him:

After I finished the robe, the cleaning bug totally left & I actually felt like knitting again! I started the back of CPH & got about an inch or so done last night. I'm so glad the mojo's back!

Progress Report

It's been a rough few weeks, but i am ALMOST caught up on blogs. I had them down to 18 unread, but then I worked on the house all weekend last week, and it went back up to over 100. Sigh.

On the weight loss front, I lost 4lbs! I was doing OK on the diet part, but not so great on the exercise part. But all that changed this past Monday. Joe got a bad report card from his Dr. on his cholesterol. It's 282, which isn't horrible, but his good cholesterol is way too low, and his bad cholesterol is way too high. So major changes are going on in our house. He & I re-joined the gym & have been going every night, I am cooking or preparing everything that goes into his mouth, and eating out is back to every two weeks. The restaurants we like cook pretty healthy food, but I just don't want to chance it. I have him on 300mg or less of cholesterol per day and 16-20g of saturated fat. So one tablespoon of accidental butter could throw off his whole day. He's also having to take his coffee black now and he is NOT happy about it.

But it's not all doom and gloom at our house; we got a new TV!

It's a samsung 52" 650 something. Obviously, we haven't upgraded our sound system yet (I guess it says a lot about Sony sound systems though, as that's my old stereo from 1990 & it still works), but we're working on picking one out.

In knitting news, I'm done with CPH's sleeves & fronts & plan to start the back this weekend. I also made a chemo cap for a friend's MIL:

It's Lace Edged Women's Hat (free Ravelry download!). I used one ball of Zara that I had in the stash & I think it came out pretty cute!

In sewing news, I made a new cover for the ottoman at the foot of our bed, but the fabric was really floppy & slippery, so it didn't come out so perfect. I'm done with Joe's robe except for his monogram, but I need to whip out the manual for that. After that's done, I'll tackle the mending pile, and I don't really have any solid plans after that. Well, that's all for now!

Christmas Vacation

I took a little internet break this holiday season in addition to my work vacation. I still get email and facebook updates on the Blackberry, but I have been blog and ravelry free since the 23rd or so. As punishment, I have 432 unread blog posts, but I'll tackle them during this afternoon's playoff game and tomorrow's down time at work. I have a LOT to show and tell you guys though! I got Joe to model his Anniversary sweater (Don't feel sorry for him; It only snowed 12 inches that day!):

I made some Christmas presents:


I got some Christmas presents:


And I started a couple new projects:
Central Park Hoodie for me:

McCall's 4244 for Joe:

I'm still working on my pirate themed socks, but my size 2's got splinters, so I'm contemplating which needles to try next. The finalists are Darn Pretty Needles and Knitpicks harmony's. I got a gift card to Creative Fibers in the office Secret Santa, so I might see if they can get the Darn Pretty's as a special order. My criteria for dpn's are flexible, slippery, and short (under 6"). My absolute favorites are Bryspuns, but I've yet to find the size 2's in the short length.

One project that is a priority this year is my increasing ass size. I gained TEN pounds since our Aruba trip in November (I currently think it's funny; we'll see how long that lasts), so I'm on grilled chicken salad for lunch and one hour of exercise every day until it's gone. In my defense, I was on light duty/no workouts for 2 weeks due to surgery on my legs, but that's really no excuse. I just fell off the wagon big time.

Our annual trip to VA on Christmas day went well as usual. We were able to stop in Arlington this year since Aimee is a new mom & stayed home this year, which suited us perfectly. This allowed us to avoid the family for a good 3 hours! And with all the in fighting going on this year, that was a GOOD thing. My mom was crazy as usual & I forgot to photograph it, but I did manage to finish her annual knitted giftie (Socks made with Spunky Eclectic yarn). As some of you know, if she had it her way, I would knit exclusively for her 24/7. But, sadly, I have a JOB so I am unable to do so, and she "only" gets a couple things a year. She actually said she had been cursing Aimee's baby thinking that he was getting all the knitted goodness this year. Who the eff would curse a little baby? My mother, that's who. Although, Hewen DID get the best gift this year:

So cute. Hee hee.

Back In NYC

Joe & I took our annual trip to NYC last week, but work's been so crazy, I haven't had time to tell you guys about it! We always stalk the Waldorf Astoria in hopes of spotting Nascar drivers walking around before their annual ceremony, but this year we only saw some executives and the Sprint Cup trophy:

Then we headed over to Bloomingdale's and Serendipity 3. This is the first year ever we have been able to get a table at Serendipity (yes, I know it's probably because of the bad health department scores). We had the famous frrrrozen hot chocolate & Joe had some seriously rich apple pie. His pie was only $7 or something, and they have a $8.50 minimum per person, so he had to get some over the top coffee thing to bump up his bill. Conclusion: Probably never going back. While pretty, it was way overpriced & so sweet we couldn't eat/drink hardly any of it.

Next stop, ToysRUs. I love all the Lego sculptures. Here's King Kong attacking the Empire State building in Lego:

Then, we were off to the garment district! I was tempted to do a "stupefy" pose with this guy, but there was too much foot traffic near him & I didn't have my wand handy. hee hee.

I got some purple corduroy from Mood, and a couple zippers from one of the trimming stores (not MJ).

I was hoping to find some awesome knit prints at either Mood or Spandex World, but everything seemed to be neon pink or green. WTF? Is Broadway putting on some 80s play that I don't know about?

Houston, we have a baby!

Aimee had her baby! It's a beautiful little boy named Hewen Joseph, and he is so cute! He's not really named after my Joe, but he's telling everyone that he is. lol. Check him out:

Recognize a certain monkey in that picture? Don't they look like best buds already? Too cute! I must admit, I got a little weepy when I saw the picture of the monkey with the baby. It's a huge honor to make it into the hospital bag!

So, tomorrow's my birthday, and being the spoiled brat that I am, I already know what I'm getting. My parents always send money, so I bought some yarn for a Central Park Hoodie from Elann with their check:

I have recently been accused of buying yarn based on the color name, and this time it's absolutely true. It's Twilight Blue. Yes, my name is Jenny and I'm a Twilight-aholic. Or a Twi-hard if you prefer that term. hee hee.

Joe got me one of those new Blackberry's from Verizon, but they apparently don't care that it's my birthday tomorrow because it didn't get here yet. :( Oh well, looking at the picture of it is ALMOST as good:

NOT.

Back from Aruba!

We got back Sunday from our annual Aruba trip. What a huge bummer it was to come back to 35 degree weather! The 50 degree climate change has done my sinuses no good, I tell you. Before we left, we exchanged our anniversary gifts. Since this is our second, or 'cotton' anniversary, we gave each other cotton gifts. He got the sweater & he got me all this:

The Sew U knits book! Also, this awesome apron pattern from Sew liberated:

And, the (cotton) fabric to make the apron with:

That is one side, this will be the other, the plain brown will be the straps:

I love that it's reversible! That way, I can switch it around to match what I'm wearing.

Aruba was so great. We mostly relaxed at the beach and went shopping, except for one day of atv-ing in the desert and one early morning fishing trip. The week went by too fast, as usual. Now it's back to reality, Blah.

I think the mojo's back

Hi there! Sorry for the radio silence, but I haven't finished anything in a while, so I didn't feel like I had anything "blogworthy." But I do now! I finished Joe's anniversary sweater! And our anniversary isn't until next week!

And by finished, I mean finished knitting. It still needs blocking & some of the ends woven in, but I'm counting it as done. What a beast this thing was. All those cables! Joe's commute has been particulary brutal the last few days because of daylight savings (people forgetting how to drive in the dark), so I've actually had a bit of sewing time for a change! Last night I got started on a bikini bottom (FYI, that's the waistband and the bottoms that need to be sewn together, not the top & bottom of the suit):

And the night before that, I got the better part of the top to match these done:

Our annual Aruba trip is coming up, so these will definitely come in handy if I can get them done in time. In other news, I finished my first pair of Socks that Rock a few weeks ago:

These are the ones I started on the flight down to Aruba last year, then lost for a while, then pretty much forgot about. To celebrate their completion (and to give myself a little head start on my airplane knitting), I started two more socks:

The left ones are STR Silkie in Pirate's Booty, and the ones on the right are Lorna's Laces Black Purl. I guess I'm feeling piratey lately!