Broom, broom...

Jimmy had fun all weekend riding his quad! Broom, brooom!

Another FO....waffle stitch cloth! Also finished two big Christmas presents this weekend...can't show pics!:) Worked on my Loppem cardigan...took 45 minutes on one row because there is so much errata for this pattern...ug! Worked on the waffle cloth at a knitting meeting I went to. Had an awesome time...about 14 people showed! It was at a pastry shop with lots of yummy goodies! Hubby got our Christmas lights up today...looks so pretty and peaceful. I took a picture of it but it looked like the house was on fire!:) Hope you all had a wonderful weekend!

Another cloth...

Diamond in the Rough cloth done!

Yesterday worked all day on a Christmas present....gave myself a pedicure...changed beds and had a pajama day! Had a nice, relaxing day! Have a great weekend!

Gobble, gobble...

Chowing down with the family at my grandma's house!

Sitting at the table is....Grandma's boyfriend, Grandma, my other Grandma, my Dad, my uncle on the end, James and Jimmy...then my Mom in the corner by the island and my Aunt.

Lots and lots of food...mmmmm good stuff!

My Aunt got Jimmy this cute See's chocolate turkey...of course he ate the whole thing!

I watched the Macy's parade...did laundry...ironed...cleaned bathrooms....made some cookies...made my sweet potato casserole (with Christmas movies playing, I'm a big sucker for Christmas movies)...and even knitted a bit!

Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Anyone out shopping at 4am?!! Not me!:)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving!

This is what CA turkeys look like! ha ha
Thought this was too funny not to share with ya'll!

Going to watch the Macy's parade...Charlie Brown's Thanksgiving....cook...knit...and be with my wonderful family! May you all have a blessed day! Big hugs!:)

How Many Have You Read?

Jen had this on her blog and thought it'd be fun to do!

a) Look at the list and bold those you have read.
b) Italicize those you intend to read.
3) Reprint this list and leave a comment——————————————–

1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien (seen the movies)
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible
7 Wuthering Heights
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare (I’ve read a lot of them)
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37.The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

Wow, I've read 30 of them...granted a lot of them were when I was in high school!:) Ug, I hated some of them too....like Watership Down is all in rabbit language and you have to constantly use the "dictionary" that it comes with, and its soooooooooooooo long! Not too many I want to read either! There's too many smutty books I want to read!

Apples...Books...ABC

My obsession continues....apple earrings to match the Twilight book cover! Aren't they the cutest?! They even have a bite out of them! I bought this from the same seller as my Twilight necklace...Mary has awesome jewelry, check her stuff out!

Was told this Vamp series was good....we'll see!
Went Christmas shopping yesterday. Been knitting on the Loppem again and the baby blanket. Been dealing with sinus problems...all of us, ug!

Mystery Beret Finished!

Oui, Oui, I finished my beret!

Very fun to knit!

After the second clue, you worked that up but didn't know how long the third clue was going to be so it was hard to know if you'd need another repeat of the second clue....which it needed it!

It was awesome knowing that Dawn and I were both knitting it at the same time! Yeah!:)

Here it is blocking on a big serving plate!

And here is Chef Jimmy modeling it for me! We got the biggest laughs trying this on each other...and when he put it on he had such a disgusted face and said "I look like a chef."

Twilight Review...

Went to the 10:00 am showing of Twilight yesterday! It was sooooooo good! Of course, books are always better than the movies...it was still great! Hubby who hasn't read the books enjoyed it...said it was definitely a chick flick though! I think he's wondering why I'm so gaga over it!:) Jimmy is still reading the book but really enjoyed the movie too. I got to wear my Love Bite scarf, which looked cool with the black t-shirt, yeah! I was really shocked that no one in the audience was wearing a Twilight t-shirt, memorabilia, nothing and they were quiet during the whole thing! When Edward was first flashed on screen, I wanted to squeal...or during the ballet studio scene I wanted to clap...stone quiet though. I was a good girl and sat there quiet, except maybe a little to my hubby!:) Lots of great scenes and can't quite decide what my favorite was...loved the baseball scene, totally awesome! And of course have to mention the kissing scene...aaaah! The characters all did a great job! Can't wait for the DVD to come out so I can watch it over and over! Totally missed Stephanie Meyer's cameo in it too, duh, didn't even think of it till I got home! I also got to see Robert Pattinson, who plays Edward, on Ellen and Access Hollywood, yeah! This is where hubby thinks I'm going off the deep end...especially when I cried when we got in the truck because it was soooo good!:) My friend, Julie, found Converse hand painted Twilight sneakers on etsy....they're so cool and trying not to push buy it now! The only thing is if you were wearing pants it wouldn't show...they'd have to be worn with a skirt, wouldn't that look lovely....super duper ali uper cool though!

Twilight Day!

So excited and ready to see Twilight! Hope its fangtastic!

Love Bite Scarf!

My Love Bite Scarf is blocking in the school room!:)

So excited I have it done so that I can wear it tomorrow!

I still have 59 grams of Wollmeise left. I was trying to use up the whole skein but the scarf is already 6.5 ft. long before being blocked! I did 90 repeats of the pattern. This is an awesome, fun, pattern!

Save the Wolves!

Following several bloody months of wolf killing in Wyoming, Idaho and Montana, a federal court ruled earlier this year against an earlier version of the Administration’s proposal to remove Endangered Species Act protections for the region’s wolves. In response, the Bush/Cheney Administration actually withdrew that proposal just a few weeks ago.
But with the clock winding down on the Bush/Administration, federal officials are launching a last-ditch attempt to re-package and ram through a plan that could lead to the slaughter of as many as two-thirds of the Greater Yellowstone and Northern Rockies wolf population.
Don’t let them get away with it. Urge federal officials to come up with a responsible management plan that ensures a lasting future for these majestic animals. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is only accepting public comments until November 28th.

Twihard Fan....

Are we a Twihard fan or what? Look at this cool necklace I got on etsy. Mary has awesome things in her shop, beautiful, unique jewelry! Go check her out...her customer service is awesome! Plus she packages it really lovely too! Jimmy's even wanting to wear it! I even watched MTV yesterday for half an hour because they were supposed to have a big Twilight spoiler thing..well they didn't :(!!!!

Guess what also happened yesterday? ........... I sold six more hats! The high schooler said that this is just for the ones he's collected money from that there's more! Whoo hoo! He also mentioned to me that he wants to start a knitting group on campus and that he has four other boys interested! Very cool! Gotta get to whippin' these hats out...did ask him to give me a couple of days to crank these out! I've also gotta get my scarf done...

"If I could dream at all, it would be about you. And I'm not ashamed of it." -Edward Cullen
As you can guess this is inspired from the Stephanie Meyer book, Twilight!

Cuttin' the Soap!

Guess what? I waited the whole 24hrs. and didn't peek! Nell said it was ok too and I still didn't! Aren't you all so proud of me! It smells soooo good too. Now we have to wait and let it sit for three weeks! Going to order some more stuff so we can make more...hey Nell where do you order your stuff from?

Had a real busy day yesterday....cleaned all the bathrooms; ironed for about an hour; watered all the plants/trees which took about an hour; and had a bake - a - long with Jennifer. So used to calling her Florida Jen but she is now a California Jen! She had a great recipe for butterscotch pumpkin cookies but I didn't have the butterscotch morsels. Next time.... I did make my pumpkin chocolate chip cookies though....mmmmmm! She also sent me some great recipe links and going to try some of the crockpot ones this week! Since she knows I'm also having a vampire addiction she told me about some great books...put them on my wish list for Christmas and hinted big time to hubby:)! So funny, because we were watching Forgetting Sarah Marshall and the main actor dude does a whole musical play with vampire puppets in it and my hubby can sound just like it...he even has it memorized! Its hilarious! I should record him!:) He told me he was giving me my vampire fix for the weekend! Yes, we're easily entertained! Also watched Kung Fu Panda which was really good and War, Inc. which was kind of sucky!

Hope you all had a great weekend!

Soap Making...

James and I made Cinnamon Spice soap last night together!

I did have a goofy picture of us both together, saved it and have no idea where I saved it to. Can't find it at all! Felt like space aliens with our goggles on! Did get a pic of James though!:) After you get the stuff all mixed and poured into the mold you have to cover it up for 24 hours and not peek at it. The directions say DO NOT PEEK in big bold letters and its driving me nuts...I want to peek soooo bad. Its kind of like Christmas presents and someone telling me not to shake it..of course I want to shake it...and maybe nudge it just a little. James got wise many years ago and wraps my gifts with rocks or bricks in it so I have no idea whats inside! I've done this since I was little...guess I haven't grown up! Obviously considering the next pic you come to you'll see I'm just a big kid!:)


More Twilight obsession purchases'....Vampire lip balm!


Jimmy and I went to the Webkinz day at the candle shop too today. He bought a cool stuffed parakeet and an ornament; won a bookmark and free stuffed cat. I snuck and bought some of his Christmas and my yearly Christmas candle that smells like Christmas cookies. Speaking of cookies, I need to make some!:)

Twilight Magazine!

Look at what I found at Walmart! Its the complete story of the making of the movie, Twilight! Can we say obsessed? YES!:) Awesome magazine...talks about the books, the movie, interview with the author, and lots and lots of pictures! Also got New Moon for Jimmy's coach, Marissa...her birthday is today...Happy Birthday Marissa! She'd just finished Twilight too so it worked out perfectly!

That's the Love Bite scarf in the pic...going to work very diligently on this from now till next Thursday. It definitely has to be blocked because it looks like a snake right now from it rolling in on me. Fun pattern and easily memorized!

Whoo hoo...

Jimmy's swim coach last week wore his hat I made for him for the team picture. The high schoolers asked him where he got it and he pointed over to me and said she'll make them for you for $5! Well......one of the braver boys asked me to make him one...then he asked me again for his friend....then he asked me for his dad and also said there were a bunch of kids at his school that are wanting them! Pretty cool huh? I've sold 3, whee hee!

I really need to get cracking on my Love Bite scarf, especially since the movie is in a week...I have about two feet...maybe I shouldn't have done it in fingering weight, but really wanted the lacey pattern (fang bites) to show through! I'm sooooo excited about these books and movie that I feel like a teeny bopper! Dawn you have to go check it out at the library...you're girls would even like them, Jimmy's even reading it! I didn't want to read it either because I'd heard it was sci fi vampirish...just forget about that and read it, its sooooo good!

The Mystery Beret KAL last clue came out yesterday but I'm going to hold off until I finish that scarf...plus a lot of people are having to rip it out and do more repeats of clue 2 so it makes it slouch like a beret....have to wait and see what I'm going to do, especially since I didn't check gauge I have no idea how this is going to come out..might have to be a present for my niece who's 2.5! Which would look wonderful with her big blue eyes!

Tootleloo!

Miss you...

My Best Friend....Andrea

March 20, 1971 - November 13, 2006

Angel Cloth

Finished my Angel cloth the other day! Didn't want to post it till today because its for the lady in Apple Valley's birthday....hope she gets the package before she sees it on the blog...although I don't know if she reads the blog!:) It was very hard to get a picture of it, but this is the best I could do! She collects angels and thought this was a perfect thinking of you on your birthday gift!

For all you Twilight, vampire fans; etsy has tons of cool stuff, they even have vampire lip gloss (Dawn, perfect for Julie for Christmas!) They also have bath products in all the main characters scents! Fun stuff...I feel like a kid again or maybe I never grew up yet!

Back to the school today after a long weekend with hubby home...hope we have a great day!

Veterans Day!

Veterans Day is an annual American holiday honoring military veterans.

Veteran’s Day Tribute

When America had an urgent need,

These brave ones raised a hand;

No hesitation held them back;

They were proud to take a stand.
They left their friends and family;

They gave up normal life;

To serve their country and their God,

They plowed into the strife.
They fought for freedom and for peace

On strange and foreign shores;

Some lost new friends; some lost their lives

In long and brutal wars.
Other veterans answered a call

To support the ones who fought;

Their country had requirements for

The essential skills they brought.
We salute each and every one of them,

The noble and the brave,

The ones still with us here today,

And those who rest in a grave.
So here’s to our country’s heroes;

They’re a cut above the rest;

Let’s give the honor that is due

To our country’s very best.
By Joanna Fuchs

Snoopy House!

Jimmy and I went out shopping today. We needed to get the Hallmark Snoopy! Went to one Hallmark and they didn't have any left....So we went to Borders bookstore to get the Twilight soundtrack and was told only the BIG Borders have them, didn't even have a bookmark! Went to Toys R Us to look around then headed to the mall. Yeah, that Hallmark had 1 Snoopy left! Also got a bunch of ornaments. James, Jimmy and I have a tradition of giving each other ornaments each year for Christmas. Had fun looking at all the pretty stuff. Then went over to Barnes and Nobles and whalla they had the soundtrack...I wasn't going home until I found it! Its soooo good too! Lots of cool Twilight stuff on Etsy too...have lots in my favorites! :) Gotta get ready to go to swim practice...Tootleloo!

Yummy Dinner...

Well, we had the yucky post a couple of days ago with the chicken...sooooo thought how appropriate to show some yummy chicken! Smelling soooooo good...the whole back patio smells scrumptious! James is such a great cook! I would never be able to look at the raw chicken and get it ready to cook. It was bad enough cracking eggs for the cookies I made yesterday! I made peanut butter/chocolate chip cookies and butterscotch oatmeal cookies.

Jimmy and I made this today together. It goes perfectly in his jungle room and soooo snuggly! Perfect activity for a pajama day! Jimmy also made some cool little pillows with the scrap fleece...he did such a great sewing job on them!

Movie rentals for the weekend are: Speedracer; Forgetting Sarah Marshall; Get Smart; Journey to the Center of the Earth (very good); and You Don't Mess with the Zohan (funny, love Adam Sandler!)

Reading Material

Whoohoo, oh yeah....my books came from Amazon today! Now I have to finish the other book I've started then I can jump into the vampire world again! Found some really cool gloves that I want to make that matches the Eclipse book...very cool.

Normal chores today...ironing, vacuuming, etc.....did back knit two rows for over an hour on my Loppem cardigan. It took forever because the second row I back knitted had two cast on sleeve areas....ug! Going to go make some cookies...tootles!

YUCKY....

If you have a weak stomach, do not read this post!

James was a sweet heart this morning and went and got Jimmy donuts for breakfast. While he was off doing errands I was contemplating what to have for breakfast. I remembered the nice, farm fresh eggs we'd gotten from the lady near Apple Valley. I decided to have some scrambled eggs and toast. Got all the stuff out to make it and was ready to start. These are little eggs from a Bantam chicken so they're hard to crack because they're so tiny. I tapped it on the side of the skillet and it barely cracked. Tapped a little harder and pushed my finger into it and didn't see anything running out....looked closer at it and something was staring back at me! GAG, PUKE, dry heaving! This is what came out....

I'm still dry heaving as I type this! Of course James has to video me as I was taking the picture, which I will not post!:) I walk by Jimmy and he goes "pock, pock, pock!" I think this has cured me of wanting to raise chickens! Ug...I can't even look at the other ones...going to feed them to the crows because I don't want another surprise like this. James walks by and says "how's my little red hen"...I can tell I'm not going to live this one down! Even got a call from my mom saying she bought hamburger meat and there's a hoof in it! Very funny...such a wonderful family I have..a bunch of comedians! James also let me know that this is an Asian delicacy, balut ( a fertilized duck (or chicken) egg with a nearly-developed embryo inside that is boiled and eaten in the shell. They are common, everyday food in some countries in Southeast Asia, such as in the Philippines, Cambodia, and Vietnam. Popularly believed to be an aphrodisiac and considered a high-protein, hearty snack, balut are mostly sold by street vendors at night in the regions where they are available. They are often served with beer.) Yes, I'm still gagging!

Last night was team picture night at swimming. The kids had a blast swimming for fun and the coach bought pizza for the whole team. What a great coach and team! Came home from swimming and found our crayfish, General Grievous, no longer swimming. This time he was really dead...did wait awhile to see if he was faking it, but not. I'm surrounded by dead things today! Ick! Sure hope the day gets better....

Mystery Beret - Clue 2

Clue 2 was revealed today on the Mystery Beret! Very cool, fun, relaxing pattern...must be I already finished it! This is what I did today instead of working out. Needed to relax my muscles from the hard workouts I've been doing and instead worked out my hands!:) Gotta go get something to eat...can barely see the screen, blood sugar must be low....must be from all this hard knitting!:) ha ha

More progress...

Been working on my Loppem cardigan; a little bit here and a little bit there. I'm finally to the sleeve section of the pattern...I've bound off the stitches and am ready to cast on the other side of the sleeve! I also started the Love Bite scarf yesterday...I'd like to have it done by the time of the Twilight movie. I'm using my Wollmeise for it. I'm finding I'm not in love with this yarn...very splitty. Starting to wonder what all the hoopla is about this yarn? Anyone else had problems with this stuff? Tomorrow should be the next part of the Mystery beret knit a long...whoohoo; excited to see what the next part brings!

Election Day

I Voted!

If you think that your opinion doesn't matter, think again! The people in office now are making decisions that will affect your life now AND later! This is why it's important to get involved and be heard now, get out and vote!

Did you know that a series of national vendors are giving stuff to voters? They are. Who knew that the "I Voted" sticker was worth more than the pride of knowing you cast your ballot?Starbucks is giving away a tall cup of brewed coffee on the house.

Between 5 and 8pm, Ben and Jerry's is celebrating democracy by giving away a free scoop of ice cream.

Krispy Kreme is giving away a star-shaped doughnut with "patriotic sprinkles" to anyone wearing an "I Voted" sticker.

God bless democracy, huh?

Day of the Dead

The Day of the Dead (Día de los Muertos in Spanish) is a holiday celebrated mainly in Mexico and by people of Mexican heritage (and others) living in the United States and Canada. The holiday focuses on gatherings of family and friends to pray for and remember friends and relatives who have died. The celebration occurs on the 1st and 2nd of November, in connection with the Catholic holy days of All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day which take place on those days. Traditions include building private altars honoring the deceased, using sugar skulls, marigolds, and the favorite foods and beverages of the departed, and visiting graves with these as gifts. (Courtesy of Wikipedi)

I don't celebrate this but thought you'd like to know about it...it's why my avatar is in skully clothes!:)

Been reading the Twilight book this weekend and sooooo love it...so hard to put down! I ordered the other part of the series from Amazon and can't wait to read them too. I didn't even know there was a movie coming out...November 21! Joined the group on Ravelry too and found this cool link to find out your vampire name! Mine is......

The Great Archives determine you to have gone by the identity: Duchess of The Far East
Known in some parts of the world as: Cerridwen of Blood
The Great Archives Record: Thirsty, unstoppable and vicious.

Went to the Charlie Brown Farm store today to get me some more local honey and also got some Christmas presents. Then came home and took a nice long nappy! Got up and am knitting on my Loppem, have about 6.5 in. completed and am starting my third skein. My goal is to knit at least 2-4 rows daily on it. Also working on the crocheted baby blanket at night. Rented movies for the weekend so this crocheted blanket is the perfect tv watching project. Rented: The Love Guru (funny); Ironman (really good); Baby Mama; and Made of Honor.

Happy November 1st!

Jimmy was a dementor for Halloween...very scary and spooky!:) Had a wonderful time trick-or-treating...walked his legs off! Really fun day!

Today it's actually raining! Jimmy out doing the rain dance so it'd rain more than ten minutes! Where there is water, there is Jimmy! My water boy!:)