I love my major

I get to write a research paper on the clothing of the ancient Greeks, probably with a focus on the clothing that was sacrificed to the gods. How cool is that!

I never got to write on such cool stuff the first time I was in college.

The bad part is that my back pack weighted about 50 pounds after my trip to the library this afternoon.

Souvenir

I took the girls to see a local Civil War battlefield. We came away with a souvenir.

Not a blue or gray cap. Not a Confederate or Union flag. No, we got a cat.

I think it was dropped off by someone. It wasn't at all shy about people like you would expect from a "wild" cat. It was living in an old (Civil War era) abandoned (of course) shack. We looked for Mama but there was no sign of her or any other kitties. A lot of traffic goes by there, so it would be easy for someone to leave an unwanted kitty, OR easy for Mama to not quite make it across the street.

The girls decided to name her Arwen (they just saw Fellowship of the Ring) but after our first visit to the vet this afternoon we have changed the name to Pippin. It seems more appropriate for him.

Pippin was checked put today for feline leukemia and worms (both negative) and got his first vaccination. His only trouble seems to be that he is a little on the scrawny side and has fleas. The scrawny shouldn't be too hard to fix, and I am sure we'll do ok with ditching the fleas too. (It helps that our entire floor is tile, no carpet for fleas to hide in.)

The vet says he looks to be about 5 weeks old. He is white with tabby spots. You can especially see the stripes in his head, or you could if I could get a decent picture of him. The little guy won't stay still long enough to get any kind of good shot.

Birthday Chaos

Getting ready for the party tomorrow. Too busy to blog. Pics when I get a chance, promise.

Beautiful Stash

I had the lack of good sense yesterday to visit our local (and sadly soon closing) yarn shop.

I couldn't help myself. 40% off! I bought sock yarn (I am determined to learn to knit socks.) and needles (I have many needles already.) These are NEEDLES! Wooden needles. Wooden Needles. Indian Rosewood and Vietnamese Palmwood to be specific. They are beautiful, especially the shorter set of size 10.5 rosewood needles that have thee lovely little knobs on the ends. Wow

I just feel all giggly. I have bought EXPENSIVE wooden knitting needles, and they weren't expensive, since they were on sale. now, what to knit on them? They seem to call for something important and lovely. I'll have to think.

I don't have any yarn worthy of these incredible needles. I need to go back to the shop tomorrow.

Unfortunately, they didn't have any size 2 double points, which the sock pattern I have calls for. So, the girls and I had to trip over to Hobby Lobby and buy a set of plain old aluminum size 2 doubles. And you know (or can guess) what happens when I go into a Hobby Lobby...I bought more than knitting needles.

I am just heady with the possibility of it all. Wooden needles, wow.

Ice Cream

If you are blessed enough to have a Baskin Robbins in your area go see if they have Baseball Nut. Dang! That is good! (but sadly, I have the feeling it is limited time only :( )

One Word

Nabbed this off of Suz.
I love these things, so sue me.

Respond with One word.

1. Where is your Cellphone? - charging
2. Relationship? - incredible
3. Your Hair? - grey
4. Work? - home
5. Your sister? - censored
6. Your favorite thing? - roleplaying
7. Your dream last night? - bureaucratic
8. Your favorite drink? - Pepsi
9. Your dream car? - Saturn
10. The room you’re in? - living
11. Your shoes? - sneakers
12. Your fears? - falling
13. What do you want to be in 10 years? - archaeologist
14. Who did you hang out with this weekend? - hubby
15. What are you not good at? - confrontation
16. Muffin? - banana
17. One of your wish list items? - laptop
18. Where you grew up? - military
19. Last thing you did? - teach
20. What are you wearing? - jeans
21. What aren’t you wearing? - hat
22. Your pet? - fish
23. Your computer? - slow
24. Your life? - busy
25. Your mood? - content
26. Missing? - pendant
27. What are you thinking about right now? - stitching
28. Your car? - SUV
29. Your kitchen? - dirty
30. Your summer? - finished
31. Your favorite color? - purple
32. Last time you laughed? - now
33. Last time you cried? - yesterday
34. School? - soon
35. Love? - forever

A Little Teaching

DD6 was sitting alone in the livingroom with me. (I was reading blogs.) Her sisters and Daddy are in the other room watching Jurassic Park, which she is not allowed to watch yet. A bit of inspiration hit and I asked if she wanted me to teach her something, knitting or criss stitch, or whatever. She piped right in with "chaining" (meaning crochet). My DD8 can make a chain and nothing else, but she sits for hours sometimes to present me with yards of chained yarn. She doesn't do any other stitches.

So, I taught DD6 how to make a chain. It is interesting to try to explain to a child exactly where all of her fingers need to be to perform this basic stitch. it is so natural to me after all this time that I have to actually be holding the hook and yarn to see where they go. 10 minutes later and she is happily sitting over on the coush chaining away.

I tried to teach her a single crochet stitch, baiting the hook (haha) with "Even DD8 can't do this, but after watching me do 3 singles she decided to just chain for a while. I can respect that.

Our Christmas tree is going to be so covered with yarn this year...

Photo Hunt 69- Funky

I couldn't think of anything to photograph for this, so I decided to peruse my files.

This shot makes my middle hurt just looking at it. This is my 8 yr old DD's winning Twister move. It really looks funky to me how her shoulders are turned almost 180 degrees from her hips. I don't remember ever being that flexible.

I have a DATE!

Yay! Woohoo! Yahoo! We set up a sitter and DH and I are off on a night of whatever we want. (I'm thinking Outback, but who knows?) Dinner, of course, maybe a movie, some shopping, spending some alone time; this is going to be great!

What should I wear? My new jeans and a nice shirt. What nice shirt? Maybe the white one...

Simpsonize Me

TWCOE

That stands for Teresa Wentzler Christmas Ornament Exchange. (see here)

I saw some of the ornaments that went around last year. They were really lovely. Unfortunately, I was way too late to join in. This year I plan to get an early start and take part in the fun. I have already gone through my TW patterns to find what could be used as ornaments.
There are ornament patterns in her Christmas collection book. Those will do for a start, I think. After that I think I will look into using the corner pieces from the various borders of hers that I have.

I figure if I take what I need for an ornament every Monday when I go to class (the bulletin board encourages working on a TW every Monday) I could have quite a few done by the deadline in November. I'll keep you posted.

blah blah blah

I have been meaning to blog ever since we got back from Kentucky...over a week ago! but well...stuff happens.

Homeschooling is going well. The girls really enjoy Story of the World, so we have been focusing on history for a while 9and math when I need a break) DD8 says she wants an Ancient Egypt themed birthday party. That sounds like fun, I think we'll do that.

We went to the city pool Monday. We all had lots of fun.

I feel like I am coming down with an ear infection. Unfortunately, I am in that phase of "if I ignore it it will get better." Once I fully realize that it won't, I will go to the doctor.

I have been enjoying a renewed vigor in my motivation to cross stitch. This is because of two things. #1- July is over. If I am going to give this as a Christmas gift I need to get cracking. Unfortunately that didn't motivate me much during April, May, or June. #2- I took the piece (Smokey Mountain Christmas) with me to Kentucky to work on if I got bored. I did a few times and got the chance to work on it. That got the juices flowing and it has continued even after we got home. I finally finished those blasted bears. I didn't want to start the sleigh so I am working on the forest behind Santa.
The snow on the largest tree calls for pearl blending filament. I am almost certain I bought some but I cannot find it. I'll just go without for now and stitch it over later if I need to. White alone looks alright, but I think the pearl would give it some extra sparkle. We'll see.