It's all over but the shouting.

I'm slowly but surely getting things set up on my laptop the way I want them. I'm up a little late, letting the fabulous dinner and dessert I had digest. My mom's outdone herself, although there was of course a bit of help from yours truly. I'm also trying to squeeze the last little bit of this three-day weekend. It's the first one I've had since.... gosh, September of '06, I think? Maybe that's a sign I need to work a little bit less and take a little more time off.

My mom loved the socks I knit for her, in spite of all the poo-pooing she's previously done about my knitting socks (it involves a whole lot of "what's the point of knitting socks? They're just socks after all.") The tea cozy I'm finishing up was quite a hit as well. I finished everything but the weaving in during the break between dinner and dessert. Other than that, all that's needed is a ribbon to (pardon the pun) tie it all together. She was a rather excited mom indeed.

While sitting in front of the fireplace, knitting the last bit of the tea cozy, my friend Tim started to take an interest in what/how I was knitting, especially the part where I can knit while holding conversations and paying attention to other things. It was kind of fun to give a sort of mini-lesson to one who's barely ever even seen anyone knit before.

For now, I should probably head to bed. The workday waits for no woman.

She's pretty damn wierd.

I'm pretty sure that no one other than my mother would ask for a meat thermometer for Christmas. I shouldn't be suprised, as this is the same woman who once asked for a rack of ribs for Mother's Day. It was amusing, if only because I got to tell people I gave my mom raw meat as a gift.

I finished another One-Row Scarf for my dad last night. I have to start another project so that everybody (Dad, his wife Pang, and Wyatt, the new kidlet) gets something handmade, but all in all it's working out pretty well. The way I see it, if I can knock out a second scarf and a child-size hat (for another family), I'm going to consider this holiday season a success with more than 50% of goals completed. All that leaves is the other half.

The sort-of birthday outing of this weekend was a rousing success. I had an awesome time seeing the Red Elvises, and afterwards we popped over to the dive bar across the street and caught the Hot Roddin' Romeos. I lost one of my favorite scarves, but I'm going to check back and see if maybe it turned up. That makes three handmade scarves lost over the last couple of years-- one in the Baltimore airport security check, one at the (no longer open) 3B Tavern, and now this one at another bar. While none have been particularly fancy--heck, the 3B scarf was thrown together in two hours while watching a movie-- it still irks me that I have such trouble holding onto things. I'm going to start pinning things to my clothes, like they do in elementary school. This will go well with my plan to put locators on everything I own.*

For now, I'm on the move. I've got to get myself a shower before I go have a birthday lunch with the lovely Stephanie. After that, I have a full afternoon of Christmas tree hauling, knitting, and eventually dinner with my super-awesome boyfriend.

*I find I have a really hard time keeping track of things, but I thought of a way to remedy this. Know how you can call your cell phone when you lose it and it will ring to tell you where it is? Well, my plan is to put beepers and bells on everything, then create a big board of buttons that I can push to find things. The buttons will have labels like "keys" and "purse" and "left shoe".

At long last, I finally got to update my ravelry and flickr accounts. I've been meaning to add pictures to my projects for some time now. It sounds silly, but it helps me feel like I've actually accomplished something recently to see it in list/thumbnail format.

I took a break from Christmas project knitting by doing some other knitting last night. I swatched for The Spencer Jacket from Fitted Knits, but still haven't quite gotten gauge yet. I also started in on the Little Sky Sock, and so far it seems to be making sense!

For now, it's back to the Christmas grind-- time to recast on the Pirate Mittens (my gauge got way too tight and they had to be frogged) , start the tea cozy, dye some sock yarn and make some rice! (I made curry.)

I might actually make it this year!

I have to say I'm a little proud of myself. So far I've gotten quite a few Christmas presents 97% done. The final 3%, the weaving in of ends and use of kitchener stitch, I'm saving up for last so I can take one day and finish everything at once. I'm not sure if this is a good plan, as I'm probably going to avoid "The day of stupid fucking end-weaving and seaming" until the last possible minute, but it seems like it won't be so bad if I know I'm getting it all out of the way at the same time.

Barring that, nearly half of my gift list has now been crossed off, including a super-secret gift for a friend that I can't even tell Eric about. (Actually, I just mostly can't tell Eric, even though it isn't for him. Don't ask me to explain that, it might give something away.)

All that's left is to knit a pair of mittens, socks, a hat (or possibly two) and a tea cozy..... in three weeks. And figure out gifts for four other folks, the most difficult being my 16-year-old sister. For starters, knitting doesn't exactly get used much in central Florida. Also, I'm a bit nervous that she wouldn't really like anything I made for her, just like I was last year. And did I mention that she's sixteen?*

I'm also contemplating throwing another holiday party, Festivus '07, into the works as well. I wasn't going to, but I wouldn't mind an excuse to drink things out of the martini glasses I haven't used since last year.


...on second thought, maybe I shouldn't be jumping for joy just yet.


*I think I may spend some time tonight perusing Etsy. If I can't make her something she'd like, maybe I can find something made by someone else.

Pluses and Minuses

Reason I don't like always like my job:

I worked eleven hours today, including the almost four hours I spent in rush hour traffic driving to North Seattle and back (From this day forth, I'm going to start lobbying for a cd player in the delivery rig.) I got home at nearly ten o'clock, just in time to eat a quick meal with Eric before he went to bed.

Reason I still mostly like my job:
The customer that caused me to work so late spent five minutes apologizing after I proceeded to read him the riot act. Only in my line of work can I look at my customers and ask, "what the fuck?"

In other news, I am eight stitches away from finishing another sock! Two socks in the last week alone, woohoo! Too bad they are socks for two different pairs! I'm almost done with one of the matches though. Hopefully my mom will like them, but even if she doesn't she's kind enough to fake it.

It's been kind of neat trying out different fibers of sock yarn. My mom's are in corn-fiber based Maizy, specifically the hibiscus colorway. They almost have a cotton sort of feel to them, which would kind of bug me in a sock, but should please my wool-sensitive mother. The other pair (that I think I might actually keep for myself this time) are in Panda Wool, a bamboo/wool blend that has a gorgeous sheen and really soft feel. I threw in some leftover Shibui Sock from the Mermaid socks for the heel and toe. The colorways are just different enough to contrast each other while still being semi-blended colors.

Once I finish these, it's back to the still-lingering Uzume socks and a knee-high number that I'm kind of making up as I go along. For now, I think I'm going to head to bed without binding off my new sock. I'm still not great at kitchener stitch, and it would probably best to attempt it when I'm no longer slightly stoned from wood stain fumes.