springading.com

From my informal poll of the providers I talked to while taking hotline calls this week, I’ve learned that my company is one of the few that have Martin Luther King Day off. No wonder why the day after MLK day is the busiest phone day of the year–the providers are trying to get two day’s worth of stuff done in one.

At any rate, I do have a three day weekend and an agenda to match:

• Bread machine! I love my bread machine. So far, I’ve only made the one, plain, white bread recipe in it several times, but it’s just so good. I might try one of the other recipes this weekend, though. Just because.
• Craft stores! I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned the giant Warhammer 40K army that Jim was commissioned to paint a while back that he’s still working on. Anyway, Jim told Phil and me last night that he was going to Hobby Lobby today to get something to make one guy glow-in-the-dark. Of course, you know I’ll be going with him…and that I’ll drag him over to Joann Fabrics while we’re out because I still have money on my giftcard, which brings me to…
• Knitting and crocheting! I’m thinking of using aforementioned giftcard to get the needles for this cthulhu dice bag pattern. Phil asked me last night if I thought I could make that, and I said no way, it’s above my skills, but then I started looking at the pattern, and you know what? I think I might be selling myself short. Sure, I’ve never done the magic loop on knitting needles and I’ve never worked on circular needles period, but I think I could do it. Of course, I wouldn’t be able to get to this right away, as I’m still in the middle of crocheting Piper’s cat mat. I ended up having to rip out just about everything I got done on New Year’s.
• Sewing! Ha! Okay, yeah, I’m not about to sew just yet. But my other plan is to take my sewing machine out of the box, dust it off, and just figure out how to put the thing together. Even if I had time to try a project, I don’t have the stuff. One thing at a time.

Now, as to how much of this list I’ll actually attempt is anyone’s guess. For now, I’m gonna watch some season 6 of Supernatural.

I’m taking a break from torturing myself. The torture comes in the form of trying to master fair isle knitting. No matter how I try it, with one hand or two, I’m finding that it can become a messy process.

Now, you may be wondering why on earth I would be trying to learn something new when I still have all those squares to sew up for the baby blanket. Well, that’s because they’re in the blocking process. Look:

Blocking!

More blocking!

No, this is not all of the squares. This is only about half. I realized that I had more squares than towels, so I’m doing it in two batches. This is the first, and it’s currently drying. They’re still damp, and I’m not sure where I’m going to put them overnight. Have I ever mentioned my apartment was tiny?

Still, I feel like I’m actually getting stuff accomplished. Add that to going out to lunch with Paul, knocking out a couple chapters of my book, getting one of the rugs (somewhat) cleaner, and baking brownies for Jim, I actually feel like I’ve been semi-productive today.

And yet…I’m still not ready for the weekend to be over with. SIGH.

Hey. Things are okay. I’ve been trying to keep my mind off sad stuff and keep focused on everyday things. Mostly, I’ve been keeping myself busy with work. Last week, I worked a lot of overtime, more than I normally do, mostly because I want to fill up our savings account. I want to save up to move into a bigger place next spring, as well as try to replace all our tires before winter, since they’re all almost completely bald. Yeah, if it rains even a little bit, we start hydroplaning. So it’s kind of becoming an issue.

Gremlin isn’t helping, though. About a month ago, he had that bladder infection that wiped out almost half of our savings account. Well, this past week, he started peeing in the bathtub, which is supposed to be a red flag that the infection isn’t gone. So, yesterday, we whisked him off to the vet. 10 minute visit, a little bottle of medicine, $150.

This cat is costing me more than even my cat who died of pancreatic cancer did. Geez.

But better $150 now than a bazillion dollars later. Also, it would kill me and Jim to see Gremlin in that much pain again. But it’s still hard because right now, we’re doing our best to save money with only my income. We’re actually doing fine, but I’m desperate to get the savings account back up so we have a nice net to fall back on when emergencies happen. Jim’s quitting smoking is helping a lot, and I just froze my Warcraft account.

No, Warcraft isn’t a lot of money. But it’s dumb to spend $15 on something I almost never play. And I would play it again as a way of cheap entertainment, but since Cataclysm came out, I found I can no longer do dungeons on my laptop. The game overheats it. Recently, I’ve found that this is becoming an issue even during regular game play. So until I get a desktop, which I don’t see happening for a very long time, my account is frozen.

Although I might try to play a little bit before the official freeze date.

Besides, that $15 could go towards yarn. I’ve been getting more into crafting hobbies, anyway. Oh, and by the way, it turns out I will not be doing those 5 scarves for work. (Don’t even get me started on why.) I’ll finish the third one up because it’s almost done anyway, and I’ll still give it to some charity because I’ve always wanted to make stuff for charities, but right now, I’m knitting a baby blanket for my niece Amber, who is due next month with my soon-to-be great-niece, Lily. After that, I want to wrap up the Lego Pirate Ship blanket for Jim, which has been hibernating FOREVER, and then make him a crocheted D20. I’ve already bought the pattern. Phil has expressed interest in one as well, so I’ll probably make him one, too.

I’m a little wary, though, as I’ve seen picture of others’ crocheted D20s, and most of them look kinda…sloppy. Not like the picture. And I’ve never made anything “stuffed” before, so I’m already at a disadvantage. But we shall see. Knowing me, if it comes out looking overstuffed or understuffed (as just about EVERY SINGLE ONE I’ve seen has been), I’ll rip it all out and start over. I can be a bit of a perfectionist that way.

After the crocheted D20s, I’d like to crochet a blanket for my great-nephew Isaiah (my niece Jasmine’s little boy), but I can’t seem to find the pattern that I want to use anywhere. I had this PERFECT one for little boys, once upon a time, and I always wanted an excuse to make it, but it seems to have gotten lost with all the moves. Argh.

Actually, I’ve been wanting to make that same blanket for my nephew Seth, too. Grr, I really need to find that pattern!

What else is new besides work and crafts? Oh! I finally finished A Storm of Swords, book three in the Song of Ice and Fire series. It took me forever because I can’t seem to stay awake these days. But it was fabulous. I’ve been chatting more and more with Jim’s friend Ben on Facebook about it because, truth be told, we don’t really know each other, but we DO both really love these books. Jim’s all happy that I’m talking to some of his friends; I’m happy that Jim has another friend aside from Phil who isn’t an asshole, heh.

Okay, admittedly, the friends that I have met–the ones that Jim actually considers friends, anyway, not the ones he pretty much has to deal with because of other people–haven’t been assholes. But trust me, if you’ve heard some of Jim’s stories…he’s known a LOT of assholes. No wonder why he wants to stay home and be a hermit all the time now.

Speaking of being a hermit, I must return to my hermit-hobby of knitting and continue working on Lily’s baby blanket. I need to get that done within the month. This week, though, I don’t plan on working nearly the amount of overtime I did last week, so I should (knock on wood) be able to stay awake long enough to get some work done. Keep your fingers crossed for me. Because, frankly, I’m just too tired to do it myself these days.

First, the awesome:

Grocery bag dispenser

“What is that goofy-looking thing?” you might be asking yourself. Well, I’LL TELL YOU. It’s a grocery bag dispenser! I used to have one with sunflowers on it, but it got lost somewhere in the shuffle, and truth be told, I don’t really like to keep anything I had during my first marriage, anyway, know what I mean? It could be tainted with evil by now. But I did want another one–grocery bag dispenser, I mean, not evil–and lo and behold, I found a pattern on the web for it! And guess what? It only took maybe 1/2 to 3/4 of a skein of yarn I didn’t really like anyway, two hairbands (when I have dozens), and one afternoon.

And now I don’t have a ton of bags floating around loose underneath my sink. Which was driving me nuts.

Okay, admittedly, if you don’t understand my excitement for it, be assured, Jim doesn’t really either. The mess of bags under the sink never bothered him, either.

Okay, the not-so-awesome: Monday morning, Gremlin was acting odd–looking like he was trying to go to the bathroom everywhere, and eventually, growling and hissing when Jim tried to pick him up–so Jim took him to the vet. The poor little guy had bladder stones and an infection that was starting up. The vets recommended that they keep him overnight so they could cath him–and gave Jim an estimate.

Jim started to panic. Monday was his first day after quitting his job to go to school, and it figures that THAT was the day to get hit with an estimate that would nearly clean out our savings account. He picked me up from work, worrying.

Yeah, it had me worried, but here’s what I figured: We have the money in the savings. This is what savings is for. It wouldn’t touch our checking. It wasn’t earmarked for bills or anything. And I work a job where I can work as much overtime (at least for now) as I need, so I can just work more hours and fill ‘er back up again.

I think that reassured Jim a little, but what helped is that the actual bill was only about half of what they quoted. Big sigh of relief. Because I was planning on pulling 11-hour days. I did that yesterday, and I was already exhausted just from that.

So, actual bills being about half of estimates: More awesome. Add that to Gremlin feeling better = even better yet.

Also, awesome: Jim is in school, although with a twist we didn’t expect. He thought his class was 4 hours long. Turns out that it’s only an hour and 15 minutes. And he’s already quit his job, and it’s too late to find another course (plus, I don’t want to pay out of pocket for another one), so basically…Jim has a lot of free time on his hands! Hahaha. He seemed to feel bad, but I figure he might as well enjoy it while he can. It’s a nice break.

So far, though, Jim doesn’t just sit on his ass, like I expected him to. Every day, he’s cleaned, run errands, and he’s done a beautiful job of it. Now I’m thinking he wouldn’t be a half-bad house husband, heh. OH. And to top it all off, when he picked me up from work today, he said, “Hey–wanna listen to your new CD?”

“What new CD?”

“This one.” He handed me an Evanescence CD, one that I had had before but, again, was one of those things that got lost with all the moving.

Have I mentioned that I have the best husband ever? Anything that was ever “not-so-much” awesome, Jim makes better, always.

Hey, did I forget that I (for the most part) wrapped up scarf #1?

Scarf #1.

Yup. This is my scarf that I made to get me back in the swing of knitting. And, of course, is one of the five scarves I’m making to satisfy my goal at work. I still feel like my tension is off, and some things are not as easy as I remember (namely binding off), so the next one will probably be knitted too. Except that I’ll work some purls in there as well.

And since we’re in picture sharing mode, I thought I’d post this one:

Anime girl.

Thanks to waybackmachine.org, I found an ancient doodle I did while waiting for my ex-husband to get up and get dressed one morning. And I thought it was lost forever. I know I didn’t keep it. I mean, who keeps their doodles?

Waybackmachine.org, that’s who.

Anyway. All’s well here. It started off rocky on Monday. Actually, it started last Friday. I was crabbier than usual, which didn’t really let up over the weekend, and Monday, when I sat down to work, I realized I was in an abnormally bad mood–seriously, I’m in a good mood most of the time–and that what I really needed was a “me day.” Since Jim’s and Karac’s game folded, Jim’s around all the time. And while I love him, as I’ve mentioned a bazillion times before, I require more alone time than the average person. So, on a whim, I requested PTO for Tuesday. To my surprise, it was approved.

And it was glorious. Tuesday, I did nothing but surf the Internet, watch TV (Charmed! Supernatural! Angel! The Last Unicorn!), knit, and eat cookies. And, apparently, that is exactly what I needed because I was in a much better mood the rest of the week, even with overtime. Jim and I even skirted some sensitive topics later that week, and when he started looking nervous, I said, “Relax. I’m not mad about it or anything. Just want to talk.”

So, yeah. My “Prevent a Mental Breakdown Day” was so successful, I’m thinking of making it a regular thing. That is, unless Jim does another game with his friends. Because if I get Friday nights alone to recharge again, I might be okay with just that.

On that note–gaming, that is–Phil is talking about starting up a Birthright game, to which he invited me last night. I thanked him because that was nice of him, but I’m going to see how it pans out. If they need more players, sure, I’ll play. Jim is always wanting me to do more stuff with him and his friends, and I’ve heard that Phil runs good games. But Phil’s game would also be a good opportunity for me to have my alone time if Jim goes to it alone, and frankly, I think the guys enjoy having “guy only” time. I would, too, if I were them. No having to watch what you’re saying or doing or edit past stories because someone’s girl is there? Yes, please.

Anyway, I’m going to get going because I hear lots of thunder. Not sure what the posting schedule will be like next week, as Jim will be starting school full-time on Monday (yesterday was his last day at work!), so he’ll probably need the computer more for papers and stuff. That’s okay. More time to crochet and knit and read the books from A Song of Ice and Fire series, right?

Confession: I rarely look at my stats. I figure because I don’t exactly tell people I blog, most of the incoming links are coming from spammers anyway. My spam filters backs this theory.

However, today, I did happen to look at it, and guess what I’ve noticed? A lot of people are coming here looking for Jayne hats from Firefly. Which is odd because I think I’ve only mentioned it once, and I’ve never actually sat down and made one. For a very good reason: I have neither circular nor double-pointed needles to make them with.

One could point out that I could crochet it, but I’m with Jim: After you see the knitted Jayne hat from Firefly, the crocheted ones just look wrong. Not terrible, mind you. I’ve seen some good ones, actually. Just…not what you saw on the show.

For those who have no idea what I’m talking about, the Jayne Cobb hat is from this scene in the episode “The Message”:

And if you really have an itch to make one yourself, you can find a knitted version of the pattern here. This is the one in my queue at Ravelry right now. (Although I do think the yellow color looks a little off and plan on changing it to more of a marigold.) But if you really want to crochet it–hey, some people do–you can also find a pattern for that, too.

Did we get that out of our systems? Good, then. Carry on, Browncoats!

As I’ve mentioned, I ran out of yarn for scarf #1 for work. So I started–and finished–scarf #2 this weekend.

Scarf #2

Hm, one day, I’ll have to find a way to take better pictures. More light would be nice. Until then, suffer.

The pattern is the Shimmer Lace Scarf one that I mentioned a couple posts ago. And, by the way, rotating the work does mean to flip it upside down. This scarf was several firsts for me. One, this was the smallest yarn I’ve worked with to date. Two, I’ve never done lace before. And three, I never use patterns, and I used a pattern for this. Well, you could argue that I’m using one for the Lego Pirate Ship blanket I’m working on, but that’s actually a latch-hook pattern that I’ve altered for the blanket.

All in all, though, I’m pretty happy with how it turned out. Hopefully, tomorrow, I can get more yarn for scarf #1 and get that one wrapped up as well, and then I can start on scarf #3. Woot! It’s nice to actually finish things for a change!

I spent a better half of yesterday knitting. Well, there was a brief excursion where I left to go for a walk and ended up coming back with nachos instead. But other than that, I was a girl on a mission. Knit, knit, knit, the thing’s getting long, I can see that the end is near and then–I ran out of the dark gray yarn.

Which is SO annoying  because, honestly, I could get away with just a couple more rows, switch it out with the blue (which I still have left), and call it done. But now I need to buy more yarn for just a little bit more scarf. ARGH.

To make things worse, I came to this realization that I needed more yarn at 10 o’clock at night, past Hobby Lobby’s bedtime. Hobby Lobby isn’t open on Sundays, and my guess is that it won’t be open for Monday either, since it’s a holiday.

So, onto scarf #2 for work. I decided to make this scarf. One of the reasons why I decided to make this scarf is that 1) it isn’t horribly ugly (do you know how many ugly scarves are out there? And people are making them! On purpose!) and 2) the pattern is easy. I’ve never made a project from a pattern, and I wanted to give it a shot–but I do want to start with something easy. And 3) it’s lace. I’ve also never done something “lacy” before. I wanted to do something a little different.

Already, I’m running into problems.

First of all, I can’t seem to get the gauge down. Granted, I’ve never really worked from a pattern before, but I have made a few swatches in my time, mostly just to see if I can match whatever’s on the yarn label. And I always nail it, with the exact dimensions, exact stitches, and using the exact hook or needles (depending on if I’m knitting or crocheting) that they recommend.

Well, this thing says rows rows 1-7 should be 3″ X 5 1/2″. I crochet the first seven rows with the I-9 hook. Measure across. 5 1/2″ inches. NAILED.

Measure upward. 2 inches. Hmmm.

Rip it all out. Try again with a larger hook. Measure. Now it’s too wide across and still not high enough going up.

Oh, I’m confused. How on earth did they get this gauge? The only thing that I can think of is that I’m misinterpreting some of the pattern because of Row 2:

Rotate to work in unused loops of beginning ch

When I saw this, I just stared at it. Rotate? I thought. ROTATE? WTF, what the hell do you mean by ROTATE? I was expecting a nice, normal “turn.” Is “rotate” the new turn? Looked further in the directions; they use a “turn” later on. So “rotate,” most likely, means something different.

In the end, I remembered reading somewhere that some patterns will tell you to flip the work upside down to work on the stitches on the other side. I decided that this is what the pattern is telling me to do. And if it isn’t…well, it looks cool, anyway. Also, other people who have made this scarf have posted pictures on Ravelry, so I checked them out, and mine is looking like theirs.

Now, to figure out the gauge thing. I’m thinking that I’m just gonna end up going back to the I-9 hook to get the 5 1/2″ inch width back and then crochet more rows upward. Screw you, gauge!

And to think, this pattern is EASY. I fail.

I have been knitting. A lot. When I realized that I needed to complete 5 scarves by the end of the year, and that there were definitely other projects I’d like to work on besides the scarves for work, it’s like I became obsessed. Normally, when I start a project, I work on it for maybe an hour, then I put it down and forget about it for, oh, a couple of months. No kidding. Why do you think it’s been taking so long to work on Jim’s Lego Pirate Ship Blanket?

Now? I started the first scarf not long ago. I did leave it for a few days, with only a few inches done. However, I started working on it this weekend, and I’d say it’s already almost halfway done. And I plan on it being 6 feet long.

For me, that’s fast. This is the most focus I’ve ever had on a project.

Maybe the focus is coming from stress. Life has been good, but at work, they’re training me on something new. Yet again. We have something called the portal at work, and unfortunately, it’s not the cool kind of portal that takes you to another place. If only. No, it’s where providers do all the submitting of things electronically rather than via snail mail. My training was a whopping 30 minutes, during that time of which I didn’t see a single thing worked from start to finish. I finally got a chance to try it my last hour at work on Friday, and because I never saw all the steps for working an item from start to finish, I don’t know if I’m doing it correctly.

I think I won’t mind it once I get used to it. Like most things, as long as I just work and not have to be too social, I end up not minding.

Speaking of the social side of our work, after some internal shuffling, they’re estimating a bunch more calls to our office Monday. Most of the written staff is guessing they’re going to put us on phones at some point. Not like we can really afford it, being behind and all that. That could be the good thing about working the portal though; not as many people are trained on that, they’re really behind, and there’s a very quick turnaround time that we have to meet to respond to an inquiry, so in some ways, I’d be surprised if they did put me on the phone. But I’m getting myself mentally prepared to be put on the phones.

Which means I’m dreading Monday morning a little more than usual today.

Too bad the weekend’s coming to a close. Okay, yeah, we still have today. Yesterday was fun, though. Jim and I babysat Jen’s boys while she and her daughter did a mother/daughter spa treatment thing. (She had a gift card.) Jim initially had plans to go help Phil move stuff from the trailer, but he decided that he really wanted to see Jennifer’s kids again before they move later this week. And it was good. We took them to the Jeremy “Boo” Rochman Memorial park (aka, the D&D park) and then McDonald’s. I took some pictures, but they’re on a disposable camera, so I need to get the film developed first.

Tonight, Phil and Shannon may or may not be coming over for Game of Thrones. I think they’re getting moved into their new place after being flooded out from their old one, and they’re not sure if they have HBO yet. Admittedly, I’m not sure what all they’re up to because when they came over last night, after I made sure everyone had drinks, I went straight into our bedroom to knit. One, we don’t have enough seating in our living room for all of us to sit comfortably. Two, I figure Jim’s a grown man. He can handle making sure everyone’s glasses stay full and that nobody goes hungry.

And three, most importantly, I SAID I was obsessed with the knitting. Did you not believe me?

Boy, it doesn’t feel like I had the entire day off, but I did. It wasn’t a day for fun stuff, either. All of it was about starting the name changing process and adding Jim to accounts. The big ones I wanted to hit today: social security card, driver’s license, bank, and  insurance.

Well, now I have my receipt for the social security card and am waiting for the card in the mail, my driver’s license has been changed over, and not only did I get my name changed on my bank account and get Jim added, we managed to open a savings account there with no problems whatsoever. (If you recall, I had issues when Jim and I tried opening a savings  account at his bank.) And I feel much better with a savings account. Furthermore, I feel much better with a savings account that just had a nice, big check put into it. (Thanks, brother-in-law Dan!)

Also, the other Check of Awesome went into our checking account. Why is it called the Check of Awesome? Why, because it’s going to pay off that Credit Card from Hell, that’s why. The Check of Awesome will enable Jim to quit and go to school. Sure, we’ll have to live frugally, but without that ginormous credit card hanging over our heads, I know we can swing it. Mostly, it just means eating in more.

Big deal. I got a new set of great cutlery and silverware for our wedding. Cooking might actually be fun again, for a while.

The only thing that hasn’t been completely done is the insurance. I called them, but the form they told me I needed is only accessible through the intranet at work. As I’ve mentioned, I’m not there today. But I got all the other information, so I’m going to leave work without doing overtime tomorrow (luckily, it’s not mandatory this week), go to the library, and make/fax copies of everything I need to get to them. And I’m going to have to do it fast. Jim needs to be added within 31 days, or we have to wait until the next open enrollment period. I am NOT doing that.

After that, next up: Car. Bleh, car. Yeah, this whole name-changing, adding-Jim-to-the-policy stuff is probably going to take me up until our one year anniversary, heh.

Anyway. Now that you’ve all been as bored as I have been all day, I present proof that I do, indeed, occasionally do something other than goof off on the Internet:

Scarf #1 for work. A work in progress--obviously.

Unfortunately, I forgot to buy batteries for our digital camera while I was out, so you’re stuck with the cell phone for now. And my messy bed. (But let me tell you, that comforter? We got it from Jim’s dad and step-mom, and it’s like sleeping under a cloud. LOVE IT.) If you remember a couple posts back, I had mentioned that I’m making scarves as part of a goal for work. This is the first one. It’s hard to tell, but it’s actually two colors, kind of a dark gray and a blue. You can see it better close up:

Extreme close-up! Sorry for any cat hair...

See what I mean?

Anyway, it’s all done in the garter stitch, which isn’t normally my favorite, but it’s been a while since I’ve knitted, so I’m still trying to get used to it. Garter is probably the best way to get back in the swing of things. And it’s still not as easy as it once was. Oh, well. Practice, practice, practice.