Just Some Thoughts

We have had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday and I am now sitting in my recliner, my yorkie Willow is tucked up next to me and my knitting is in the basket on the floor beside me. I have been trying to figure out how to use a sport weight yarn for a pattern written for a DK weight. I know it's all about changing the needle size and I have swatched more swatches than I care to say - and I still don't have the right gauge. So it's sitting in the basket for awhile. I have learned that it's best not to try to figure too hard when I'm tired - it never works very well.

We went to the mountains and spent Thanksgiving with my husband's mom, brothers and their families. Our kids and grandkids went with and we had a great time together. We ate good food, enjoyed each others company and watched the snow levels grow and grow. As we were saying our goodbye's my sweet mother-in-law and I were telling each other how blessed we are to have such a great family. My husband's family is just the greatest bunch of people and I truly love them all.

Jess is home from college for the weekend and our empty nest is enjoying having our youngest chick home for awhile. When it is just the two of us at home I do very little cooking. But since Jess has been home I have made potato soup, french toast and today I made cinnamon rolls. I am feeling rather stuffed as I sit here this evening.

No early morning shopping for me. Shopping isn't my thing in the daytime. I find I do more and more of my shopping online and that suits me fine. I love getting packages in the mail.

So last night we watched the BSU/Nevada game and what a heartbreaker it was. All our BCS bowl dreams were ended and we just watched in amazement as our kicker, Kyle Brotzman-

the leading scorer in Boise State and WAC history and soon the highest-scoring kicker in NCAA history, unbelievably missed two field goals, either which would have ended the game in a much happier way. It's kind of felt like a funeral around here today as I keep reminding myself, "It's just a game!" But I have found myself praying for Kyle today as I cannot begin to imagine how horrible he must feel. I find myself feeling even worse for his mother - can you imagine having a child hurting so much and there is nothing you can do to help? The whole thing is just so sad. My poor son-in-law has taken it pretty hard too. It's just such a bummer - we really thought we would be playing in a national championship game - and just like that - nothing. It's over. But the great thing about college football - there's always next year.

I hope to get some of my Christmas decorations up tomorrow. I was just too tired today from all the eating and traveling and football games. I am jealous of all the bloggers who already have their trees up! I did spend a couple of hours at the church this afternoon decorating my portion of the foyer today.

Well, that's it for now. I see an early bedtime in my future. It's 8:30 and that sounds good to me.

Books - For Free!

So, does the phrase "free books" make your ears perk up? Right now you can sign up to review books for Waterbrook Multomah Press. Just go here to get the details.

Basically, if you have a blog and you agree to write a review for each book you read, they will send you a book of your choice for free. After you read it and post a review, choose another book. The selections are awesome - both fiction and non-fiction.

I chose my book today and I can't wait to start.

Being Monogamous . . .

. . . . . in my knitting life, that is.

Knitting monogamously means just having one thing on your needles at a time, which is the kind of knitting I have always done. However, lots of knitters like to have several projects going at once. Listening to knitting podcasts as much as I do, and hearing all these women talk about their various projects, I started to feel a bit strange about my monogamous state. Like I wasn't quite measuring up as a knitter or something.

And so, in anticipation of Christmas and my seemingly endless Christmas-gift-knitting list, I decided to join the ranks and cast on for several projects at a time. I began Top-Secret project #1, Top Secret project #2, a sweater for a grandson and a pair of fingerless mitts for me.

It's not working so much. I'm not very good at being a polygamous knitter. I started Top Secret project #1 and set it aside to work on Top Secret project #2 when it got to a hard part. After finishing the fingerless mitts, I cast on #3. Eventually I picked up #1 again but I totally had lost my place and ended up ripping the whole thing out and starting over. I never did get back to project #3, it's still languishing in my basket. Oh, and then I started a pair of socks, don't ask me why.

It seems that monogamy works well for me in more areas than marriage.

November 1

It seems that I have been MIA for the last couple of weeks. No reason really, other than the busy-ness of life. In our world, September picks up speed with new or re-starting programs in our church. There is also some kind of internal alarm that goes off inside of me telling me it's time to start getting ready for the holidays. I love to make many of my gifts and I have to get an early start if I want to get all I want to do done.

So, life marches on. Funny, I always thought when the kids grew up, the crazy pace of life would slow down and I would have all kinds of time on my hands to be organized and competent and together. Ha! Not so much! But to be honest, I wouldn't trade the days of my life for any other life. I know how blessed I am. God has been so good to me when He didn't need to be and His love and mercy simply overwhelm me at times. I have done nothing to deserve it, indeed quite the contrary. But He loves me. And I am blessed!

This weekend was busy and fun. Our church hosts a fun Harvest party every year. It caters to the children who get to wear fun costumes and play games to earn candy. We have cake walks and random drawings. We serve chile and have apples and caramel dip. Then we all join together in the fellowship hall and play bingo. There are kid prizes and adult prizes. The people who are in charge of this get the most incredible prizes - nights in hotels, dinner certificates, tickets to sporting events - it's amazing and they get it all on donation. This was the first year that Tyler and Ava Claire were old enough to participate and we had such fun with them!

Ava was a sweet cupcake and won the costume contest for her age division! Tyler was a Bronco football player and he was SO excited. Sweet Aiden was his football! I knit his little costume as well as Ava's hat. Ava's hat literally came off my needles minutes before we walked out the door to go to the church! We invite our community to attend this party and we always look forward to Sunday morning to see new people who came to the party.

Saturday ended up being a very busy day as well. Our MOPS group at church had a presentation last month on once-a-month cooking. Some of the moms, including two of my daughters decided to give it a try. They decided to use the church kitchen which was a very good plan and they spend the entire day cooking. I donated a few hours to their efforts. It was fun but lots of hard work. I was so impressed with their efforts. They also cooked food for their MOPS leader, who is a young mom of two and having some problems with her third pregnancy. That really blessed me. Here is a link to one of the girl's blogs who gives a run down of the day. I was really proud of them!

Today is my birthday. I have made a decision that I never intend to go to work on my birthday again - a sort of pre-retirement benefit! So this morning I drank two cups of coffee in bed, read some blogs and watched a little bit of news. Perfect so far. I plan to spend some time in my sewing room and tonight my family is going to treat me to dinner at a local Mexican restaurant that I haven't tried yet. See what I mean about being so blessed? Having a husband that spoils me, children who love me, and grandchildren who think I hung the moon - what more could I ever ask?

So there's a re-cap of my weekend. The days keep rolling by. Fifty two years old will only last for a short time. I hope to make the most of it.