Alot has happened

Let's see, the 1st weekend in September, my sister (Leigh), a friend (Pam) and I drove to Walsenberg, CO to visit mom and dad (and Edla) over the Labor Day weekend. We had a great time. Mom had a garage sale that weekend, which she REALLY needed to have. We hauled boxes out to the caul-de-sac, where she and neighbors had tables set up ready for the early morning garage sale buyers to come buy all there wares. In Colorado, the hard-core garage sale buyers don't wander out until 9am or so. Even with the slow start, she made $114.00 the first day. (She could have made alot more, if we could have pried the good stuff out of her hands). We really just wanted to get rid of the junk, so we were selling boxes for $1.00 each, but they had to take the entire box and couldn't pick and chose what they wanted.

The second day, the girls and I headed over to see our good friend Elda, she owns the LYS in Walsenberg. She was so glad to see us (we made her sales go way up for the week). We bought way to much yarn, started a couple of new projects. I made the Fake Isle cap out of Boku and Encore. I haven't got a picture of it yet. But I'll add it later. I also started the Gone Fishing Sweater for my grandson. Leigh also started the sweater for her grandson. I'm sure they will only wear the sweater once, but we are going to get a picture of both boys in the new sweaters.

We left Edla's at closing time and drove over to LaVeta and had a couple of tacos at the Mexican Cantenna. Pam and Leigh indulged in a margarita or two and got a little loopy. But we had a good time laughing and taking pictures.

By the time we got back to Mom and Dad's it was around 7pm. We settled in for our evening of knitting and watching tv, and Mom decided to count her garage sale money. Remember the 1st day she made $114.00. She counted and had $106.00. I thought that's pretty good $120 bucks for a bunch of old junk. But she said that she hadn't taken the 1st $114.00 out of the box. I started thinking about that morning. I had gone down to the caul-de-sac with her to get things set up. There was a younger lady who came by and was looking at stuff. Then a friend of theirs came by and bought the old church pews for $10.00 he handed me a $20.00 I put the money in the box and gave him a ten. I noticed there wasn't much money in the box, but assumed Mom had taken out the bulk of the cash and just had a few dollars for making change. I walked back up to the house to get her drink and something to eat and when I came back, I noticed the cash box was on one of the sale tables. I handed her the box and said "someone will end up getting this if you're not careful" and she put it by her chair under the tent. The problem was that someone had already helped themselves to all the money. So, it ended up she made $106.00 for 2 days worth of work. We can only hope that the person who took the money needed it more than Mom needed it. And if the truth be told, most of that stuff was just old junk, that we should have donated to goodwill.

Monday morning we drove back home. I went ahead and took a couple more days off just because I needed to use up some vacation. I came back to work on Wednesday 9/9/09. Everything was good until Friday, when I was informed that my position as Operations Manager was being eliminated. The company decided to merge the Claremore and Tulsa office into what they are calling a Hub and Spoke model. Tulsa will be the hub, which does everything. Taking orders, placing employees on assignment, all administrative work will be done in Tulsa. The Claremore office will be the spoke which won't do much at all. The office will only be open by appointment. If an employee needs to come to the office for some reason and they can't get to Tulsa, they can come here and sign papers or do whatever needs to be done.

So, tomorrow is my last day officially. I'll get 9 weeks severance pay and the rest of my vacation, which is almost 2 weeks. This week has been torture and I've cried more yesterday and today than I have in a really long time. In fact, even when she told me my job was eliminated, I didn't cry. I think I had a tear or two, but I think I was more in shock. Thank God, my sister and niece had decided to eat lunch across the street. Because she was there for me. I've decided that I will finish out the day today and tonight before I leave, I'll send her an email and let her know that I won't be back. Tonight I'm knitting with Rita and Michelle and I'll give Rita my key to take back to the office tomorrow.

It's sad, I really enjoyed my job and my employees and co-workers. I spent 9 years with these people and they were like family. I'll miss all of them but one person. But, I'm the type of person that hates change. I would have stayed here forever, making low-mid salary and crappy bonuses. Maybe this is the push I needed. There must be something bigger and better out there for me. I wish I had the funds to open my yarn store. I think it would be a big hit in Claremore, there are tons of knitters who have to drive 50+miles to Tulsa to buy yarn. But in reality, I still have to pay the bills.

The Rogers County Fair is this weekend. I entered my Barn Raising Quilt, so maybe I'll win the blue ribbon. I'm going to go to the fair tomorrow afternoon and see if I won the prize. I'm spending Saturday with my BFF Sabina and we are going to work on my resume.

The summer blazed by!

I can't believe that summer is almost over. It seems like yesterday that school was getting out for the summer and now the kids have all gone back to school. Chelsea's got 2 more classes to finish before she can apply for respiratory therapy program. My nephew went back to Independence KS for his second sememster and my niece is going back to TCC and wants to get in the nursing program. I have to leave the house a few minutes earlier everyday to miss all the school buses. Unfortunately, this morning, the buses beat me. Why can't all the kids gather at one location to get on the bus? I was behind a bus this morning that stopped at one driveway of an apartment complex and picked up about 5-8 kids and then drove to the next driveway (approximately 20 feet) and picked up about 5 more kids. I guess it wouldn't be so bad, but why does it take the kids so long to get their seat and for the driver to take off. Then, he drove about 1/10 of a mile and picked up 2 more kids (well there were 2 kids waiting on the bus), but we had to wait approximately 5 minutes for Miss Priss to walk slowly up the street. If I had been the driver I would have told her to run or I'm leaving. I bet by the time we hit every stop, and before I was able to turn off the road, there were probably 20 cars behind me. I'm leaving early tomorrow for sure. I don't want to deal with the bus route again.

Mom and Dad came down from Colorado last week. We had a good visit. It was my great nephew's first birthday and Dad's 70th birthday (1 day apart). They headed back home Tuesday morning and Mom got a traffic ticket in New Mexico.

My sister, her friend and I are going to take a road trip to Colorado over Labor Day weekend. It should be alot of fun. I'm ready to get some new yarn from Edla.

Speaking of yarn and knitting...Rita loves the Susie Hoodie, I've started a 2nd hoodie for Leigh. Her birthday is Saturday, she won't get it on her birthday, but hopefully by mid to late September it will be ready to wear. Davy wants a black hoodie for Christmas too.

The Rogers County Fair is September 18th - 21st. I have to have the Barn Raising Quilt turned in as an entry on September 16th. That will be exciting to see if I can win something. The bad thing with this fair is that you can only enter one knitted item per person. If I were a crocheter I could enter upteen different things. There are categories for household items like dishclothes, there are seperate categories for afghans, clothing, baby, miscellaneous. But only one category for knitting. I was hoping to be able to enter the BRQ and the Susie Hoodie, but I guess I can't this year. I think I'll have to put a bug in the decider the the categories ear and see what happens.

Susie Hoodie is FINISHED

Actually I finished it about a week ago. I made the XL size and the plan was that this would my sister's birthday present. Her birthday is August 29th and it would be perfect for her to wear to the football games. So, I worked my fingers to the bone to get it ready for her. By the way it turned out gorgeous.

Once I had attached the sleeves, I had my daughter slip it on just so I could see it hang. I got a little worried because my daughter is no where near an XL size, she's a medium at best. But it looked like it would be a comfy size on her. You know, when you can overlap the sides in front of you and cuddle up. This concerned me, so I tried it on. My sister and I are about the same size except my boobs are bigger and the front panels didn't meet together. I could pull it together, but then it looked a little stretched. Okay, now I've knit this entire sweater and half of the hood and it's not even going to fit her. But I continued hoping that once the hood was complete a miracle would occur and the sweater would be the perfect size. Well, it didn't happen.


I brought the sweater to work with me, because we were having our girls night knitting that evening. I let Rita try it on. Now, Rita is about 5'10 and probably weighs 150ish. It was like the sweater was made for her. It fit perfect, the length was right, the sleeves were right, everything was right. We were standing in the bathroom looking at the full length mirror and I just said "Happy Birthday" (here birthday was August 10th). Her eyes got wide and her mouth fell open. "Are you serious? You can't give this to me, it's for your sister!" I told her I'd make my sister another one. This sweater wouldn't have fit her anyways and I want it to be worn and loved. "She said, I'll love it and wear it all the time."

Sorry Sister...I'll try and get yours finished by Christmas.


Here are some pictures of Rita modeling, she hates getting her picture taken and didn't want me to get her face in the pictures, but I had to get at least one with her smiling and happy about the new sweater.

Happy Friday

I'm the only one in the office this morning so I've been doing the Friday Happy Dance around the office. It's a lazy Friday, so not much real work is getting done. But hey, I worked really hard the other four days of the week.

Let's see, what's been going on in my world? Well, the most important thing is that Hayden is getting cuter and smarter everyday. He love riding on the lawn mower with anyone who will give him a ride. It's so cute to see him great you at the door, with his arms raised high, and shaking his hands as he continues to say "maw mo ah" until you pick him up and start the new John Deere.

The other day he found a really old picture of my sister and her family probably from 1993 or so, he picked it up and pointed to Brent, he looked at me and said "Bumpy? Bumpy?" I said yes, actually shocked that he could tell that the skinny young man in the old picture was Brent. Then he pointed to Alyssa's (my niece) and said "Sissa?" The only resemblence from the picture of a 5 or 6 year old to now is the red hair. But he's a smart little boy and he loves his Maamaw.

Yesterday, we had a guy show up in the office, he's been coming around for several years but I don't know his name. He peddels knock offs, Coach bags, wallets, sunglasses, etc. Well, I hope they're knock offs and not stolen. I bought three pairs of sunglasses for $20 bucks. He was supposed to come back today during our lunch hour with new purses in different colors. He also sells "blackmarket" DVD's not sure how he's getting his hands on these movies, since some of them haven't even come out on DVD yet. I didn't buy any, but the last time he came back with his wares, a couple of the girls bought some of the movies. I guess you get what you pay for...the movies are $5.00 each, but the lip syncing is off, so it's like watching a old Japanese movie. And, occasionally something will flash on the screen, Rita said it flashes so fast she can't make out what it says. It reminds me of a Seinfeld episode, but at least you can't see people standing up and you don't here whispering or laughing while you're watching these $5.00 gems.

So, do you watch Big Brother? I'm totally obsessed this season. Well, maybe not totally, I haven't bought the live feeds yet. But I do stay up until 2am in the morning watching Big Brother After Dark. I know who won the HOH, I know who's on slop and I love sharing everything I know, but I won't do it here, because some of you might not want to have the show spoiled for you.

On the knitting front...I'm determined to finish the Susie Hoodie this weekend. I've finished the body and I've started on the hood. My next project will be to design a cardigan style hoodie for my son. He's really the only person in my family who appreciates my knitting talents. I've never designed a sweater, but I'm going to give it my best shot. It's name to expand my designer wings and maybe even get published some day. Wouldn't that be cool!

Well, it's about time for lunch so I'll talk to you guys later.

Susie Hoodie

Progress Report:

I've been working on the Susie Hoodie for a little over a month and I think I'm about 60% finished. Notes: A few things that helped me stay on track.

A. I ended up having to write down the rows, like

r1 - cable row 6

r2 - p

r3 - cable row 8

etc. I would check mark each row as I finished it. This way if I sat my work down and came back I'd know which row I left off on.

B. I wish I would have researched the pattern a little bit more before I jumped in. When I got to the cuffs on the sleeves, I did it just like the pattern said, which in hide sight seemed screwed up, but I just kept on going. Check for errata before starting. It turned out okay, you can't tell because of the way I stitched the cuffs. Also, when knitting the sleeve, I had to make sure and use my row counter because there are so many repeats that I didn't want to screw up.

C. When working on the waist increases...do a little research on how you want to do the M1. I've always, well almost always considered when a pattern says to increase that it meant to knit in front and back unless otherwise noted and a Make 1 (even though it's an increase) was considered to be knitting the bar between the stitches. Well, if you do it this way, it will make a hole in your work. Someone told me I should have picked the bar up from the back with my left needle and knitted it twisted. Unfortunuately, I didn't stop and try to find out a better solution, I just kept on going, assuming that's what the designer wanted. I wish I would have watched the Cat Bordhi video on increasing before today. She talks alot about family, like the stitch on the needle is the daughter, and the one below is the mother and the one below the mother is the grandmother, and it got a little distracting for a second until she started knitting. She didn't knit the bar between the stitches, she picked up the mothers right leg and knit that. It made a very tiny hole, but much better.

Here is a picture of the cable up close. I can't wait to get this finished. It will be really nice for someone to wear to the OU football games.

It's because of Farkle

I have to come clean and admit that I'm addicted to that stupid dice game on facebook called FARKLE!!!! It has consumed my life, I have it minimized on my work computer just so I can pull it up and play a game between phone calls, I don't spend enough time with my Ravelry groups because I'm playing Farkle, I'm not getting my knitting finished because I'm playing Farkle and now my grandson sees me sitting at the computer and he runs over because he wants to play "caukle".

Why do I have such a competitive attitude with this game, it's ridiculous!!! My sister and some of my friends play it and I can't stand it if they are ahead of me. That's why I keep playing.

I think the makers of Farkle want you to become addicted, I finally had to turn the sound off on my computer because even when I wasn't playing the game, I could hear the noise in my head that the dice make as they are rolling.

The only positive thing about this game is that it's free, because if I were spending a quarter a roll, I'd be broke and in the poor house. And, that brings up another thing, it's a free game, so why do they have it programed that if you get a really great score on round one like 2650 points that on your second round it FARKLES when rolling all 6 dice.

There needs to be a detox program and a 12 step program for Farklers...I don't think we're bad people, I just think we're sick, it's a Farkle disease. We know we want to quit and that we need to quit, but we just can't help ourselves.

Hang on, I've got to click on the cup so the dice will roll again.

SEE, see what I mean! I can't even type in my blog without having Farking Farkle pulled up on the next tab!!!

Love it!

What do you think about it? I love it, the colors all blended perfectly. This is actually 2 columns wider than the pattern called for. It still needs to be blocked again, but before I do that, I think I'm going to knit 6 more squares. My original plan had been to knit 63 squares all along and make it a 56"x63", but I wanted to start another project so I decided 56" x 49" was fine. Because I couldn't block all of my squares to 7 1/2" it's not exactly the measurements it should have been. I've got so much sock yarn left over, it shouldn't be that big of a pain to knit up 6 more squares. I've already got 1 extra.

So I've decided I'm going to enter this in the Rogers County Fair. I just need to figure out who to talk to and how to get it entered.

Nothing left but the sewin'

This is a picture of the 1st half of the square that have been blocked. Look closely, do you see your donated yarn in one of those squares? I wish I knew how to make the names appear when you hover your mouse over a square. Not that I can remember exactly which person gave me which yarn, but I do remember some of them, like the dark turquoise, 3rd row from the bottom, 4th from the left came from a great competitor in the Amazing Race...Kara, or better known as Knit4ever. The bright orange with the reddish stripes on the 3rd row from the bottom. That is a joined effort. The golden orange came from Zoe, aka Tekgirl and the red stripped came from Michelle, aka Vaguegirl. See the one pink square, 2nd row from the top all the way to the right. That yarn came from Kimber, aka KnitKimberKnit. The picture makes them kind of hard to see, but I'm going to have to tag them somehow. Here's another picture of some that are still on my blocking board. See the light blue square at the top of the picture in the 3rd column? That came from my good friend in the Traveling Scarves Groups, Nancy aka MsPalmTree. She also sent the yarn for the turquoise square in the next row 2nd column. 3rd row down last column, the turquoise square with a hint of greenish yellow in the corner also came from KnitKimberKnit. In the 4th row down the 1st column, the varigated green square came from Jody26, and the denim colored stripes, came from Tekgirl. The pink in the 1st column at the bottom of the picture came from Vaguegirl.

I need to take some more pictures, I've got some other squares, I mean donors that I need to acknowledge. I'm planning on spending the weekend sewing this baby together.

Thank you all so much for your donations, and I'd like to pay it forward. If anyone wants to make the barn raising quilt, I've got lots of scraps that I can send out into the world.

Barn Raising Quilt

I don't have any pictures yet, but all the squares are knit and half have been blocked. I'm very excited to get this blanket finished.

This is a picture of the newest project on my needles... The Susie Hoodie. I'm making it with knit picks "Wool of the Andes" in cranberry color. I've completed about 20 rows, the celtic cable took a few rows to wrap my brain around, but now I'm catching on and it's moving along great. This will be the perfect sweater hoodie for this winter. I'll continue to post updates as I progress.

I should have completed pictures of the BRQ by the end of the weekend.

It's cool to be cool

I don't know if I mentioned in my last post that our AC/Heat unit was on the fritz. It is a Geo Thermal unit, the kind that has wells buried in the back yard with antifreeze and it keeps the water circulating through it at a constant 70°. This keeps the electric bill down and helps with the hot water costs. Anyways, the guy came out on Friday, May 29th to do whatever he could to make it run. After about 3 hours, he told me he could fix this and that and it would cost approximately $3,500 and maybe last a few more years. The unit was put in the 39th week of 1985. So it's old. Or, I could spend $7,600 and get a brand new unit that will last 25 to 40 years. I told him to order the new unit.

It was a hot, muggy week and a half, but on Tuesday, June 8th, two guys showed up at the house at 8am. They worked on it until 7pm, but it's done. They did have to make a couple of adjustments. The old unit had an air return in the ceiling of our hallway with the thermostate in the hall also. This unit being brand new stainless steel (did I say, it's really pretty) has a return on the side instead of the back so they had to cut a 24"x24" hole in my dining room wall and that's where the return and thermostate are located now. I was hoping that the hole could be cut closer to the floor, but nope. It's pretty much right in the middle of the wall, which really sucks. I asked them if there was anything else they could do and they mubbled off a few things that didn't really make any sense to me. Oh, I was at work during the installation, so the mubbling took place on the phone. And they didn't tell me the hole would be 24"x24". I thought it was going to be like 9"x9" (like an air vent). It's probably alot more noticable since my walls in the kitchen and dining area are a tuscan terra cotta reddish color. I wonder if I could paint the grate?

By the time they were finished it was 91° in the house. It took several hours to get it to a comfortable 75° and it was so nice to be able to sleep without sweating.

Let's see, my son moved out into his own apartment. That left a vacant bedroom and I had some big ideas of turning it into my knitting room. I wanted cubbie shelves on one wall and I was going to have all of my yarn sorted and displayed beautifully. I wanted to put a big chair in there and a tv so I could sit back and knit. Also, I wanted to move my desk and computer into that room. My big ideas quickly dwindled when Chelsea said, so is that going to be Hayden's new room......If you've been reading my blog for very long, you might remember that a few years ago when Chelsea was pregnant. I remodeled my house for the new baby. I turned the formal living and dining room into a mini suite. Chelsea and Brennan's room was the living area and Hayden was in the dining room side. I thought about putting a wall between the rooms, but ended up running out of time and money. They have a king size quilt hanging as a room divider. So back to my original story. Chelsea wanted to know if Hayden could move into the other room. Of course I wouldn't deny my sweet boy anything and off I went to purchase new paint, curtains, a book shelf, etc. We got everything painted and set up and last night was his first night in his new room. I was a little worried that I would be up all night. But he didn't wake me up at all. I never heard him even once.

So, I think my next plan is to go ahead and put up the wall between Chelsea/Brennan's room and Hayden's old room. I'll turn his old room into my new yarn room/office.

WOW - how time flies!

It seems like yesterday that I was typing about all the rain we've been getting. It's still raining occasionally, but but we don't need to call Noah to get the big boat out yet.

It's hard to believe that May flew by in the blink of an eye. So let's see, what's been going on this month?

The full moon run came and went. Yes, I had big plans and a goal to be able to run in the Tulsa Full Moon run this year. It didn't happen, my couch to 5k fell apart in March when I busted a rib on the baby bed. There's always next year!

Mother's Day was on the 10th, I won a Mother's Day basket from 94.1 FM, it contained a pair of Michael Kors sunglasses, a braclet, necklace, and a t-shirt. The kids cleaned the house and bought dinner.

Mom and Dad drove in from Colorado and arrived on Friday the 15th. We had a good week together, I took Hayden over to my sister's house just about everyday that Mom and Dad were here. He is still a little skiddish of everyone, but he's getting better around people he doesn't see alot. Except for Gramps, (that's my dad) I think Hayden is afraid of old men.

Yesterday was Memorial Day, didn't have a big weekend. The most excitement around our house was the air conditioner going on the fritz and the toilet backing up. To save a little money during this low economic period, we decided to do our own maintenance work. Starting with the AC, David tried to fix it, but he thinks it's a valve and he decided it was more than he wanted to try and tackle. So the AC guy is coming tomorrow morning. Then we moved on to the plumbing problem. Since all the rain we've had, our septic tank hasn't been very happy. If we flush a toilet or drain the tub, something in another room gurgles. Someone was in the shower on Sunday night and my bathroon toilet and the shower started backing up. The toilet was so close to spilling over on the floor it was scary. Monday morning, David and I decided that watching the plumber once or twice was enough experience to handle the problem ourselves. So, with our gloves and shovel, we started digging down to the septic tanks lid. Did you know, that snakes are underground? I was shocked when he dug up a baby snake. I couldn't tell if it was a baby cotton mouth or just a black snake. Do baby snakes that are poisonous have the triangle shaped head yet? Oh well, back to my plumbing story...by this time, the shovel has snapped in half and he's trying to just dig with the spade, but finally gets down to the concrete lid. Armed with the snake catcher, a big stick, two rubber gloves and 1/2 of a shovel, he pries off the lid to the septic tank.

OMG....is all I can say!

The snake catcher came in very handy with it's gripping mechanism. Apparently, Hayden has figured out that the toilet is a great place to drop things and watch them disappear. We found Hayden's baby comb. You know the cute little blue comb and brush set that you get at your baby shower? Yeah! That's it and then an entire roll of toilet paper was pulled out of the pipe. It looked like someone might have flushed a sock and some sheet rock. Yes, I said sheet rock! After a few flushes of the toilets, we made sure it was all running smoothly again before putting the lid back in it's place. Then we decided to just bury all our findings...It's now our time capsule. I'm sure we will be digging that hole up again in the next couple of years.

So that was my exciting weekend. Came back to work today, Mom and Dad left to go back to Colorado, Chelsea has been calling me all afternoon to talk about changing her major and it's now 4pm and I'm ready to go home and relax.

More rain in the forecast!

This has been one wet weekend. Friday, my town flooded, but not as bad as one of the neighboring towns. There was a drowning. A woman tried to drive through the water even though the road closed signs were up. It's very sad. As I drove home on Friday after work, I wondered what I would find as I got closer to home. The local dairy that I drive past was flooded, I don't mean a little water, I mean a freakin lake. You could just barely see the tip top of the hay barn sticking out of the water. Luckily, my road had cleared and I was able to get to the house, but the neighbors chain link fence showed the yuck and muck caught in the chain link and the water was either to the top or over the top of their fence. There is a pond in my backyard, thank goodness the house is higher than the pond, but I'm glad it was there because it took all the run off from the neighbors house.

They say we will have more rain over the next few days. I don't know if my septic tank can take anymore rain. Right now when you flush the toilet or drain the bathtub, the other toilet gurgles. Last night one of my son's friends used my bathroom at the same time my daughter was draining the tub. Bad combination, the toilet overflowed. But the worst part of this is that she didn't tell me the toilet was overflowing and just walked outside with the rest of the kids. So needless to say when I went into the bathroom about 5 minutes later, the floor was sopping wet. I could understand if she were a 12 or 13 year old, but she's like 23 years old. She just walked out and said "Thank you" and left. I don't know why she would say, "hey your toilet is messed up." At least I would have caught the mess sooner.

I didn't work on my BRQ squares at all this weekend. I was bombarded with TSG scarves. I received one from Group 39. I am the last stop for this scarf and it will be heading back to the original owner tomorrow. I meant to bring it with me today and get it in the mail and totally spazed this morning and forgot everything. I also got a scarf from Group 52, I think these are my favorite scarves. We are doing this group lengthwise, so we are each knitting on circular needles about 300-400 stitches per row. They are turning out really pretty. I then received a scarf from our Red Scarf Project. This is the charity for kids who have aged out of foster care. At valentines day the OFA puts together gift bags and gives each kid a red scarf. Last year we did this and each person sent the red yarn with the scarf and each knitter did a different pattern. This year, we are adding our own shades of red. They are turning out really pretty too. Then finally, I received my latest project the Friendship Chain Project. One of my buddies from TSG has started this group. It is her plan to make the longest continuing chain for the prevention of suicide. I was lucky enough to get to start the chain, so I'll be sending my link off to the next person so she can add her link to mine. Now that I have all my special little projects finished and ready to go to the post office, I can focus on the BRQ again. My goal is to be completely finished by the end of June. Let's see if I can do it!

Spring Showers

Spring showers around NE Oklahoma really means torrential rain storms. It has been raining so hard this morning that I could hardly hear the phone ringing. The ceiling in the back office is leaking, I just hope the ceiling tiles don't fall and cause a huge mess. I've called the landlord, but who knows if he'll call me back. It's supposed to rain for four days. I wish you could hear what I'm hearing. Rita (my co-worker) called and she's stil trying to get to work, she said that hwy 69 is like a river, the water is up to the doors of her jeep right now. She just made it to work and her husband called and said they've shut down hwy 69 and that the traffic is backed up 8 miles and that people are getting their boats out to get back and forth.

Now lets talk about work...things have been looking better this week. We actually had some jobs to fill. We were able to actually place 14 people in full time jobs. That will definitely help our numbers. And, it looks like we are going to need another 20 people to start on Monday! YEAH!!!

Has anyone read the book The Shack? My sister bought it for me last summer and told me I had to read it, I told her not to buy a new book, I'd just borrow hers. She told me she didn't want to give up her copy because she's going to highlight in it and read it again. I started it, maybe read about 10 pages (actually, I don't think I made it past the Forward section) and put it in a drawer and really just forgot about it. A few days ago, my friends Sabina said, "I'm reading the best book, my sister, Pam bought a copy for me, Jackie and Monica because she didn't want to give her copy up because she's highlighting in it and wants to read it again." I said, " is it The Shack?" and she said, "OMG, how did you know?" Anyways, I found it in my drawer and decided to try and read it again. I'm about 1/2 way finished and it really is a good book. It makes you think about yourself, God and the relationship that you have with God or lack thereof. It's not a shove it down your throat book about Christianity or religion. It's just a good book. If you haven't read it, it's definitely worth the $10.00 to get a copy for yourself. I'd loan you mine, but I'm probably going to highlight in it and read it again. LOL

Now on to the really important stuff...my barn raising quilt. I've just finished square #47, only 16 more squares to go. I'm making it almost 50% bigger than the pattern calls for. I wanted it to be long enough to really be able to cover up with and not have your toes sticking out from the bottom. Rita (yeah, my co-worker and Thursday night knitting partner) has finished her 6th square and excited to get more finished.

After I get the BRQ finished I'm going to try and find a pattern for a light weight sweater, maybe with a lace pattern. Just something that I can put on in the office when the AC is turned down to 60° and I'm freezing to death.

Okay, gotta get busy and find those 20 people to start work on Monday.

Sunday Squares

I hope everyone had a happy Easter day. We got up and watched Hayden open his Easter basket. He actually had more fun throwing the grass around than anything else. But he was introduced to Hershey's Kisses which he calls cacalot (chocolate). He ate a half of a kiss and then another and we put the rest of the bag up for later. I bought him a cute little blue monkey that was wearing rabbit ears, and some Easter stickers. He loves stickers now, he likes to stick them on everything and can play for an hour or longer with 1 sticker, he calls them ditters. I forgot to get the peeps, but it's probably better, he doesn't need all that sugar.

The kids went to Brennan's grandpa's house in Jennings for the afternoon. It rained most of the morning and into the afternoon.

I started to make a ham and all the fixin's for an Easter dinner, but since it was just me, David and Davy I decided we really didn't need all that food. So instead I made chicken breast with rice and then some brocolli and cauliflower on the side. I really didn't have a recipe, but it was pretty darn tasty. I put some rice in the bottom of a casserole dish, covered it with cream of mushroom soup, place the cut up chicken breast on top, poured some chicken broth over the whole thing and then dobbed some green chilis over the top of the chicken. Added some poultry seasoning, and pepper and baked it covered for 1 1/2 hours at 300°.

After we ate, I started working on my squares again for my barn raising quilt. I finished #35 last night. I wish I had kept better track of the square that came from yarn donated by my Ravelry friends. I'll have to go through them and see if I can remember which square came from what yarn. But I was smart enough to start keeping track with the ones I just finished. This is the square that came from the beautiful Koigu yarn that Mspalmtree (Nancy) sent to me.

Isn't it pretty? I love the colors and it is going to blend so well with the squares I've already worked up. This was also the first time I'd knitted with Koigu. It's quickly become one of my favorites to work with. She also sent me another skein that I'm going to start of very soon.

I've got another picture of a square that was from donated yarn. Well actually this yarn was won in a bet. I'm involved with the Ravelry pool (The Amazing Race). It's a pool where each person who signs up is assigned one of the teams racing on the show. The object of the game is to be assigned to the team who wins the race. All the other members of the group will then send the winner a prize valued between $15 and $20. It's a lot of fun. So I was assigned the cheerleaders, Cara and Jaime. One of my buddies Knit4ever (Kara) was assigned the blond flight attendants or STEWS for short. We had a little side bet going that the first team out between the two of us would send the other an extra gift. My cheerleaders outlasted the Stews and this is the yarn that Kara sent to me. It's Panda Wool, another that I've never used before. It's so soft, I'd like a sweater out of it. But I don't think I could ever
afford to buy that much of it to actually make myself a sweater, I'll have to stick with socks.

I had also gotten some sock blanks and started dying them. I've got pictures of the blanks on my stash page in Ravelry. But I decided it would be a while before I got around to actually making myself socks and really wanted to use some of the yarn for BRQ squares. I seperated the 2 strands and wound them up. I used the "Northern Lights" for this square and I think it's one of my favorites in the whole bunch. The funny thing is that this dye job was a total mistake and a flop, but the finished square is gorgeous. I'm going to have to block some of these pretty soon and start trying to figure out the best color scheme and sew them together in strips.

I hope everyone has a really good week and I'll try and post again really soon!

Teresa

Medication and Insurance Companies

Okay, I just posted a nice fun post, but now I'm irritated. As you all know, my daughter got married a couple of weeks ago and you also know that she has been diagnosed with a seizure disorder (epilepsy, is what they are calling it but they don't really know). Anyways, when she was on my insurance her medication was a $50 co-pay. On her husbands insurance, they are telling her it's going to be $86.44. When she told me that it made no sense at all because, I had contacted the pharmacy before she got married to find out the cost of the medicine without insurance and was told $150 something dollars. Her new insurance card states that prescriptions are as follows: Tier 1 - $10, Tier 2 - $20, Tier 3 - $30, all other 20% copay. Okay $86.44 is more than 1/2 the cash price. So I called the pharmacy, I know, she's married now and an adult with a child of her own, but I'm still her momma. Anyways, I called the pharmacy and they are now telling me the cash price is $331.72 for a 1 month prescription. What the hell happened in the last 3 weeks???? Okay, so if her medicine is that much and she has to pay 20% that's only $66.34, where is the other $20.10 coming from. The pharmacist technician, Mandi, told me that I would have to contact the insurance company because everything is done online and that was the price she was given. Chelsea called the insurance company and found out that her medication is actually a Tier 3 drug and should be a $30 co-pay. Wait, Chelsea just called me back and was told that because she has to take 100mg per day and the pills are 25mg each it is basically a double prescription each month and the price will be $86.44. I don't understand that at all, if it's a Tier 3 and should be a $30 co-pay, even doubled would only be $60. What a rip off.

Now my question, what if she didn't have insurance? How in the world is someone supposed to live with a siezure disorder and carry on a 1/2 way normal life if they can't afford $331.72 a month for medication. I guarantee you that the insurance company isn't paying near that for the prescription. They are probably only paying 1/4 if that. It's so sad, but shouldn't it be the other way around. I know Wal-Mart has the new $4 prescriptions, unfortunatly her medication isn't on that list.

Okay, my rant is over.

Did you get fooled?

I went all day long yesterday and nobody tried to get a joke on me until I had already left work. I stopped at the tag office to pick up the car tag and left my phone in the car. I came back out about 30 minutes later and had 5 missed calls. Just seeing that the calls were all from Chelsea and David made me panic just a little bit and when I noticed that they were all within minutes of each other I really started getting nervous. My mind started spinning out of control and all I could think was something has happened to the baby.

I immediately called David and he asked if I'd talked to Chelsea. I told him not yet and asked what the heck is going on. He said, "You know the wooden spoon that 'little dude' (Hayden) likes to carry around?" and I said "Yes". He said, "Well it's found a new home." I was confused and asked him what he was talking about. He replied with "Well let me just say, I can't move the big screen TV by myself." I gasped and said, "Is he okay?" "Yes, he cried, and it scared him when it popped and sparked, but we got him calmed down." All I could picture was him sticking the wooden spoon through the screen and hurting himself. It's not a glass screen, but I thought maybe he could have been shocked. David told me that the screen was ruined and the spoon had fallen inside and messed something up and the TV was dead. I guess once I realized that the baby wasn't hurt, I really didn't care about the TV. I just said I'd have Davy and Brennan move it out and put the TV from the bedroom in it's place. (The big screen is old, probably from 1995) I've been wanting a new TV anyways. After I hung up with him, I called Chelsea to check on Hayden. She informed me that it was April Fool's Day and it was Dad trying to get me. Okay, ha ha ha, you got me.

On to the important stuff, like knitting.

I've been working on my barn raising quilt and I've got 30 squares finished. The pattern calls for 42 squares but I think I want to make it a little bigger so I'm aiming for 56 squares. If I knit when I get home, I can usually get a square finished in about 3 hours and depending on what's going on during the weekend maybe 2 or 3 finished. This is Chelsea and Brennan's wedding present from me, I knew I wouldn't get it finished by the wedding, but it was a good start. When Chelsea saw the picture she asked if I could make it big enough to fit their bed. They have a king size bed and I have no idea how many squares it would take. I'm enjoying knitting the little squares because they are a fast knit and I don't get bored. I like being about to bind it off and put it in my stack of squares and start with another colorway. My plan was to have the 56 squares finished by the end of the month, but you never know, I may keep adding on squares until it will fit their bed. Maybe this will actually end up being their Christmas present. Here are some of my squares. In no particular order. What do you think?


I'm also working on a new Red Scarf for 2009. The Traveling Scarves Groups, better known as TSG has a group that is working on the charity for the Orphanage Foundation, they give scarves to all the children who were in foster care that have aged out and are now in college. Last year, the TSG - Red Scarf Project made scarves that started out as a 4x5 inch square with live stitches that traveled from person to person, each adding their own unique pattern to the scarf. All the scarves were made with the same yarn (which traveled also). This year we are going to have a free for all. Some of us are making lengthwise scarves, casting on 300-400 stitches and then each person that it travels to, will add up to 3/4" of their own red shade of yarn to the scarf. It should be very interesting, some are going with the traditional scarf like we did last year and sending their own yarn and others are going with a uniform pattern throughout but with different shades of red. The scarves officially start their travels on Saturday, April 11 and all the scarves should return back to their original starting place within 4 to 5 months as long as we don't have any snags along the way. I'll make sure and post a picture of my red scarf as it travels along.

Mr. & Mrs

It's finally over and they're married! Chelsea and Brennan said their vows on March 14, 2009 at 4pm.

My mom, sister and I started working on the decorating and food on Friday right after we got the call that the cala lillies didn't arrive. We took a quick trip to Sam's Club and were able to get some beautiful cream roses and white daisy. It wasn't what she'd planned, but they were very pretty.

We were able to get the sanctuary decorated and the punch made and in the freezer before the rehearsal started at 7pm.

Have you ever known someone who just carries stress and tension into a room with them? That would be Brennan's sister, Heather.

Let me give you a little background on Heather. She is 25 years old (2 years older than Brennan). Their mother died about 6 years ago, and their father has never remarried. Heather has now taken the role of the mother. When Chelsea and Brennan started dating 4 years ago, Brennan asked me if I could help his sister find a job, since I'm in the staffing business. So, it just happened that our Tulsa branch needed a receptionist for a temp position and I sent her there to fill in, a few months later she was hired as an admin. We've always gotten along okay I thought, until Hayden was born and that was when she decided she was in charge of everything.

So, back to my story...Heather shows up at the rehearsal and everyone is supposed to pay attention to her. I just tried to ignore her and get on with the business that we were there to take care of. At the rehearsal dinner, she asked me what time I was going to get to the church and I told her I had to be there at 9am to finish decorating for the reception. (I couldn't do it after the rehearsal because AA meeting in that room and I didn't want to take the chance of someone spilling coffee on a tablecloth). She told me she would be there at 9am...I quickly told her she didn't have to help us, if she could just pick up the cake at 11 and the sandwichs at 1pm that would be great. Guess what? She showed up at 9am and took over. I pissed her off a couple of times and then my mom pissed her off because she didn't like what we were already doing. Then out of the blue she says she wants a bouquet for her grandpa to carry, in memory of his late wife and she wants to carry a bouquet in memory of her mother. We didn't plan on this and with all the problems we'd already had with the flowers I was a little irritated. She wanted me to take flowers aways from Chelsea's bouquet so she could have flowers for the two bouquets that she requested. It was a nice thought, but it felt like she was trying to make the whole wedding about her mother and not about Chelsea and Brennan and the new life they are starting. But Chelsea decided to run to Wal-Mart and get a couple of bouquets of yellow tulips to keep the peace.

Chelsea got to the church around 1:30 to start getting her hair and makeup done. She was calm and relaxed and they were having a good time getting ready. Heather had left the church around 1:30 to go and take a shower and get ready. But at 3:00 Heather comes blasting into the dressing room wearing sweats and trying to get her daughter, Avery (the flower girl) dressed. I left the room to go get my sister (the photographer) to take pictures of them getting ready and Chelsea getting her dress on. We walked into the dressing room and Heather is standing in the middle of the room stark naked. We are trying to get pictures of Chelsea and keep the naked girl's reflection out of the pictures. That was about the time Chelsea started stressing and the tears started flowing.

The wedding coordinator (she tells you where to stand and when to walk) had the bride's family ready to go to the parlor and wait to be seat. Suddenly I see Heather hurrying around the corner with Hayden and he's screaming his head off. I went to him and she turned him away from me. He was reaching for me and she didn't want me to take him because she wanted him to walk down the aisle with Avery. Ok, that would have been a great idea and he enjoyed walking with her during the rehearsal and picking up the flower petals that she was dropping. But now it was a different story, he didn't want anything to do with anyone there except me or his grandpa. I took him from her and got him calmed down and walked down the aisle with him and my son Davy.

The wedding started and it was so pretty. They had made a slideshow of their lives. It started out with me holding Chelsea just minutes after she was born and went through pictures of her life, then it show pictures of Brennan's life, their lives together and then pictures of their family with Hayden. It was so touching, I cried through the entire thing. Then the preacher pronounced them husband and wife and I started bawling again.

After the wedding, we went back into the sanctuary to recreate some of the wedding pictures that we weren't able to get during the actual ceremony and that was when Heather told my sister that she wanted a picture of her family and Hayden but she didn't want Chelsea in the picture. What the hell is that about? This girl is a psycho. I think we were just a the same wedding and Chelsea is now part of your family. So here's the picture of Heather the matriarch and her family. (excluding Chelsea)

Here's Chelsea waiting while Heather get's her picture made.

Finally we were finished taking pictures and moved into the reception area, where everyone was having a great time.

The happy couple left to go on their one night honeymoon while I kept Hayden. He was so exhausted, it had been a couple of very busy days for the little guy and he was way past sleepy. He woke up a little fussy around 1:30 in the morning and I didn't want to make alot of noise and get him fully awake so I was trying to arrange him and his blanket without putting down the railing. I'm only 5 foot tall and it was a very bad idea. As I was stretching to reach the blanket, I suddenly felt my ribs seperate and the bar of the railing tear through the muscle. OMG...the sound of the cracking was enough to make me want to puke. It didn't really hurt, but I think it was because the nerves had gone numb. Yesterday morning, I hurt so bad and this morning it is almost unbearable to try and move around. I came to work, but all I can do is sit in one spot and type. I can just hardly answer the phone. I went to the dr and they took an x-ray and gave me some drugs so I can sleep tonight.

So that was my weekend.

The countdown begins

5 days and counting till the wedding...

Mom and Dad arrived on Friday night. Saturday we took the dress to Mom and she began the alterations. With a scare here and there and one point when I think I peed my pants it all ended up perfect. We thought for just a few minutes that the lop layer of chiffon had been cut wrong and ended up about an inch shorter than the other layers, but after Chelsea tried it on again it was perfect.

I've gone over the checklist several times today and with Mom's help (thank god for her) we are going to be able to pull this all together. Now I know why people hire wedding coordinators. The groom and his family are just laxidaisy (is that a word) about the whole thing. The bride is shutting down and won't communicate with us anymore, except with shruggs and or screaming. At this very moment, my mother is out getting the last of the decorations and stuff for the reception.

I still have to find shoes that will fit and not kill my feet 30 minutes after putting them on, I've got to get my son something to wear because I'm sick and tired of waiting for him to go get something. If he had his way, he'd wear holey jeans and a holister t-shirt. Thank goodness he's not in the wedding party.

I'll be happy when Sunday gets here!

The things I put up with for Traveling Scarves

Before I tell this story, I first want everyone to know that I am not making fun of anyone.

As most of you know I'm one of the Administrators for the Traveling Scarves group on Ravelry, so every couple of weeks or so I'm at the post office mailing off my next package. On Tuesday, 2/17/09, (the post office was closed for President's Day) so when I walked into the building I quickly saw the line off 20 people or so. I took my place in line to wait and said hello to the gentleman standing in front of me. The line moved just a smidgen and the door opened as another customer entered, I turned to smile and saw a older woman approximately 60ish with a man who was probably in his mid 20's carrying a blankie and was extremely mentally retarded. I smiled and said "Hi" and the man began parroting me. He said "hi" to everyone in the post office. The woman said "Hold Grandma's hand." which he repeated many many times in his grandma's voice. She said that he was a victim of child abuse when he was two years old and that's where his mind stayed. I didn't have a problem at all until he walked up to me and said "Hi, Good Lookin and squeezed my boob. (it was just one squeeze but multiple squeezes) I gently removed his hand and looked to Grandma for some guidance or help in what to do in that situation. She said, "BJ leave that woman alone." then he repeated that several times. At this point I was afraid to make I contact because I didn't want to encourage the fondling episode ago. He then let out a loud cry and then in a high pitched voice said "he's baulin'." Then he did it again and in the same voice said "he's pitchin' a fit." It was like listening to a parrot mimick the family he lives with. The line started moving again and he got loose from Grandma and grabbed my boob again. By this point I'm really feeling scared and uncomfortable. The line moved again and suddenly my head jerks back like whiplash and grandma said "BJ don't pull her hair." I completely understand how a two year old behaves because my grandson pulls hair, has hit, etc. But he's only 25 lbs and 30" tall and a little bit easier to control. BJ then began flipping his blankie at me and then I heard the postal clerk call next. All I could think was thank God there was some distance between me and the 6' 200lb BJ.

All I can say is Grandma is one angel and what happened to BJ's abuser? Did they get a short sentence or a slap on the wrist? Poor BJ is stuck as a 2 year old for the rest of his life and Grandma will never have a peaceful life. I can't imagine what strength you would need to be a fulltime caregiver for an adult 2 year old.

So I just want all my TSG friends to realize that I'm willing to be molested in the post office line while trying to get my scarves mailed out.

Couch to 5K

I've been meaning to update my blog for several days now and just can't ever seem to find the time to just sit and type.



A week or so ago I was watching TV, it was late, I was in my bedroom lying on my bed. A show ccame on about the one ton man, he was lying face down on his bed because that was the only way he could breath. The firemen had to take out a wall to get him out of the house and to the hospital. I was thinking to myself, how in the world can someone let themselves get to that point and then I caught my reflection in the TV screen. There I was lying on my stomach, just like the one ton man. So I got up and did a few jumping jacks to remind myself that I could still move and be active.



The next day I was on Ravelry, talking to one of my friends and she told me about Couch to 5K. It's a plan to get yourself off the couch and doing a 5K race in 2 months. If you've read my blog, I'm sure I've mentioned how much I absolutely hate exercise and don't understand how people can say they are addicted to running or weight lifting. But, I remembered how proud I was of my sister when she started running years ago. I was proud and jealous at the same time, I so wanted to be a runner, but I always made excuses about my knees (yes, my knees do hurt and crack and make it really hard to jog) but I know if I were to lose some of the weight, they might not hurt as bad.



So I recruited my sister to join me in the couch to 5K. I've got a goal! My goal is to walk/jog/run the Tulsa Full Moon Run on May 9th. I might not be able to run or jog the entire 5K by then but I'll finish it. We started our "training" last week and we walked the trail at the lake it's a little over a mile. It's a hilly little trail and it's really hard for me to walk and talk at the same time without being so out of breath. The shin splints finally went away. We drove 2 cars and parked them at opposite ends of the lake and walked to one car and drove back to the other car. We will continue this routine this week and then next week, we will walk from one end to the other and back again to the car. After we are able to do that for a few days I think I'll be ready to start adding some jogging into the mix.



Remember a paragraph or two back when I said I hated exercise. Well, last night I didn't get to go to the lake with my sister for our walk and I really missed it. Chelsea's neurologist appointment was last night. She's been on the Topamax for 1 month and no freaky side effects which is really good. The dr asked how she was doing and said "Okay, I'll see you in 6 months." and that was it.



On the knitting front: The girls and I started up our Thursday night knitting night again. After Survivor ended last season we tried to switch to Tuesday nights, but that just wasn't working for us. I think we only met 2 times since Thanksgiving. Since the new season of Survivor started last Thursday, we met up again. Michelle ordered pizza, Rita invited her cousin Pam to join us. She's a brand new knitter, never held needles in her life. She did really good, we started her on a dishcloth. I'm working on my TASK squares and still have a few to finish. I was having so much trouble with them and the gauge. Who would have thought that knitting a 12" square would be so hard. But, I found a great way to finish them up. The log cabin pattern is really working out great and it's easy to stay on gauge. I've promised myself that I will get them all finished and mailed out before I start a new project. My new project that I'm wanting to get going on is the Barn-Raising Quilt which is a bunch a squares. I'm not real excited about knitting squares again, but at least they have a pattern and they are with sock yarn which is so much fun for me to knit with.

Here's a couple of pictures of the Barn-Raising Quilt that others have made. Aren't they pretty?

I love this blanket, I think it will be a late wedding present for my daughter Chelsea. Yep, she getting married in less than 4 weeks and we are no where near ready for the big day. I've planned to take off on the 12th and 13th just to finish up the last little details.