blackmoondog

Woohoo! I finally finished the Cal Throw! Instead of doing intarsia, I decided to take it easy on myself and did the script Cal logo in duplicate stitch. I took the picture then folded it back up and put it in a pillowcase in the back bedroom to keep it as cat-free as possible while it is still in this house.

(pssst ... "FO" is knitspeak for "Finished Object")

This is my first try with knitting a stuffed toy and with doing short rows. It is the Pasha pattern from Knitty's Winter 2004 edition. I'm planning to use this as my new baby gift for a while. This one will be shipped off to our friends that just had a baby girl in November. Can you tell that I'm trying to wrap up the projects that have been sitting around for a while? :)

Apparently, I am the place for napping today. I expect that from Socrates. He's taking full advantage of the promise I made through tears when I thought he was gonna die at my feet while I slept. I told him that I wasn't ready for him to go and that if he could make it through the night so we could get him to the vet, he could sit on my lap whenever he wanted. I'm just surprised that Squeak tried to crawl on top of the laptop first today. I had to type this entire post solely with my right hand.

I'm currently working on the Candy Stripers Laptop Bag from Stitch 'N Bitch Nation. My only other felting experience was with Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride Bulky (the yarn called for in the pattern) and I wasn't really pleased with the results. I decided (after consulting the forums at knitty.com and craftster.org) to head over to elann.com (this place is doom, I tell ya) and get Peruvian Collection Highland Chunky instead. I'm using "grape heather", "charcoal heather", "mid-indigo", and "light grey heather". It is looking a lot taller than I'd expected. I'm hoping that will scrunch up when felted. If not, I guess I'll just put my laptop in lengthwise. Last night I finished off the front panel and got started on the back panel. The picture shows the front panel, bottom panel, and back panel (left to right). I'll probably work on it again tonight if Mark decides to hole up in his office playing WoW.

I started off the morning doing my normal 30 minute walking route with Luna in hopes of loosening up my hamstrings a bit before my 10am yoga class. Thursday's Group Power class was pretty brutal. I think that after three weeks in a row my muscles are getting to the point where they're just strong enough to get me into trouble. :)

We ran into the neighbor whose backyard connects to ours. She was walking her little Pug and she asked if Luna could meet him since they all keep barking at each other through the fence. They were ok at first but spending way too much time nose-to-nose and Luna got a little snippy. I reeled her back and chatted a little bit with the neighbor then went on my way. When I got home I had the bright idea to try to take Kira out and find them again so Kira could meet the Pug. (If I ever get a Pug, I'm gonna have to name him "Pugsley". It is a moral imperative. Just like naming my future chocolate lab "Toblerone"--"Toby" for short.) This extra jaunt clocked my morning walk in at 45 minutes. Woot!

Yoga rocked today. I did my first un-assisted shoulderstand EVER!!! This is huge for me because the shoulderstand is one of the postures that freaks me out. All previous attempts involved using the wall as a prop but today it just kinda happened. My theory is that because I've been strength training an hour a week for the past 3 weeks, I've built up enough stability to be able to hold the shoulderstand. I didn't hold it as long as everybody else but part of that was probably that I got so excited that I lost my concentration. The class ran about 30 minutes over time so instead of 90 minutes it was 2 hours. Double woot!

The slight downer is that the instructor for this class will be leaving the resort after next week. But she will still be teaching in the local area so I left her my email address and I plan to attend next week's Full Moon Yoga (a 3 hour evening class that runs through "aqua yoga", tai chi, meditation, etc.). Since I haven't managed to get myself to one yet and since this may be the last one she teaches, I'm gonna make extra effort go.

After yoga I usually hit the local farmer's market and today was no exception. It felt fantastic to be outside in such great weather and after class I could not be grumpy that it is too warm for January. I got navel oranges, clementines, meyer lemons, tomatoes, chinese broccoli, bok choy, snap peas, and swiss chard. I devoured an orange as soon as I got home and had sauteed chinese broccoli & bok choy in garlic and soy sauce and a clementine for lunch. Farmer's market after yoga is dangerous in that I'm always hungry after class and I crave produce. So the only real danger is spending every penny on my person and buying a bunch of food that may just sit in the rotter.

Now I think I'm gonna relax for a while with Mr. Socrates and watch some SG-1.

After waiting a week for an email response from our salesguy at Toyota, I called the dealership today. Unfortunately, he's no longer working there. It is a real bummer because we really liked him but not terribly surprising, as we've heard that dealership has a really high turnover rate.

In any case, I got an update on where we are on the Prius waiting list. We are #16 on the list and 6th in line for a package #1 (barebones, cheapest Prius you can get) in Seaside Pearl (blue). I had him go ahead and add the package #3 (adds on the Smart Key System, Rearview Backup Camera, and MP3 + front panel jack on the stereo) to our interest list in case there were fewer people waiting for that.

The person I spoke to is in charge of sending the orders to the factory and seemed to have a pretty good idea of when they expected to get batches of cars. His estimate is that we should have ours by the end of February. That's about 6.5 weeks! Simultaneously really soon and ages away!

I planted two apple trees today! One is a Golden Delicious and the other is a Standard Delicious (a grandparent of Red Delicious). They were planted in one hole (which really means 18" apart) so the trees will grow together and we'll have yellow and red apples from what seems to be the same tree. It is going to be hard to wait the 3-4 years to reap our first harvest but I'm sure it will be worth it.

I also planted a Provence Lavender in the corner of the yard bordered by the driveway and the sidewalk. Provence is one of the nicest smelling varieties and I love the dark blue/purple flowers it produces.

I need to keep pulling out the lawn but I also need to get some more plants in to keep the weeds down. I've got 3-4 volunteer tomato plants from last year's crop and 3 volunteer sunflowers. I think I might have finally killed my potted pineapple sage. :( I forgot to water since the last rain and we've been having warm clear days and cold clear nights. I watered it today so we'll see if it bounces back.

I know it is past time for planting citrus but I really want to get my Meyer Lemon in the ground before I kill it too. I need to check my drawing again to refresh my memory on where I had decided to plant it.

Hopefully, this will be the year that our front yard actually starts to look like a garden rather than a mine field!