A non-fibery post.... sorry!

Last Thursday I started working again. This is partially the reason why I haven't blogged in awhile. Anyway, I started work and Thursday night I had to learn a new computer system an hour before I was going to be on the floor waiting on people.... That was a little scary going into it, but it turned out to be just fine. No problems, I even made a decent amount of money. However, having been out of work for about three weeks, my feet were not used to standing that long and my energy level was pretty low by the time I got home.

But I can tell you, these things pick up the energy level real quick when they're waiting for you when you walk in the door...

Gabe bought me flowers for my first day back at work. Is he not the sweetest? Slap me and tell me I'm an idiot if I ever think about letting him go! Flowers were the last things I was expecting when I got home. And not only were flowers waiting for me, but so was dinner! It wasn't a fancy dinner or anything, but the fact that I didn't have to go and make anything after working some long hours was definitely appreciated!

So I've pretty much been working this whole time since Thursday, except yesterday started my four day "weekend" (you gotta love that about being a waitress, short(ish) shifts, long weekends and plenty of money!). Gabe asked me if I wanted to go climbing again, so we went. This time was definitely interesting. Before I tell you the story, here's a picture, lest you disbelieve that I actually climbed up the side of a mountain!

We went to this one spot that had several climbs to it. The easier climbs were being used by some other people, so Gabe and his roommate, Chris, started on a harder climb. Once Gabe got the rope up to the top and came back down they had me try it. I could tell, sitting down at the bottom, that this climb was too hard for me. I've really only done a few climbs, my last one being the one where I fell, so I was a little wary of trying this one. Gabe and Chris assured me I could do it.

Their faith in my abilities was much stronger than my own. The first 7 or 8 feet I actually needed Gabe to pull me up on the rope, it was impossible for me. Then I managed to get up about 20 feet or so, with about 10 breaks so I could rest. I maybe got up a little farther before there was this slight overhang and I just knew I couldn't do it. The guys were trying to encourage me at the bottom, but I just knew and I was totally scared. I made them lower me down where I started crying. Isnt' that awful? It was such a strange mixture of emotions. I was crying because I was scared, I was crying because I felt like I couldn't do it, that I just wasn't cut out for it, I was crying because I felt like I had let Gabe down for some reason and I was probably crying because I was relieved that I wasn't up there anymore.

Gabe and I talked about it a little bit. I'm the type of person who needs to gradually ease into something like this. I really need to start on the easier climbs and not be challenged right away. Here I don't even know what my abilities are because I haven't climbed nearly enough to know and I'm being tested on climbs that are hard even for intermmediate climbers. It just wasn't really all that conducive to me liking climbing.

After I had calmed down a bit, the easier climb opened up and Gabe put the rope up at the top. He told me I could do it only if I wanted to and only as high as I wanted to go. That picture is from the easier climb and you know what? I actually had fun. The whole time I was whistling a tune in my head and it seemed like much more of a climb that I would enjoy. I need more like that before I can move on to the harder things. I just don't feel like challenging myself yet when I don't even know what I can and can't do.

Sorry there's no fibery-related subjects in this post, but there will be soon enough... and by fibery, mean cotton DMC floss and some cross stitch.... sigh... I'm a little hooked...

Obsession doesn't begin to describe it.

These past couple of weeks I have been, for lack of a better word, obsessed with cross stitch. I don't even know what started it. On a whim, I picked up a kit from the craft store while I was buying yarn... I don't even know what made me think to get it, but I did, and now I'm totally obsessed.

I haven't started working yet (don't get me started on how nervous that makes me in the money department... incidentally, today is my first day back and it's really only for filling out paperwork and starting on some extra training I need) so while Gabe is at work I've had to entertain myself. Usually knitting does the trick for me, but not this time. You see, with knitting, I need something else to occupy my mind while I do it and this usually involves movies or TV. Well, we don't have cable here (which I'm actually quite happy about, I can't stand commercials and it's been really nice to not have to see any!) and for some reason, I haven't felt like putting on any movies. That left me with my cross stitch.

I made be dim witted for saying this, but it totally occupies me. I just love seeing how each of the colors fits together and plays off one another to create an image. I was endlessly entertained by that.

Yesterday morning I finished all the actual cross stitches and all that was left was the detailing. I didn't think I'd like the detailing as much as I liked the stitching, but you know what? I loved it! So much so that I finished it by yesterday afternoon.
The minute I finished it I was itching to start another one. I haven't felt this way about any craft in a long time. Don't get me wrong, I still love my knitting, in fact, I worked on that tank after I finished this because my hands really needed to be doing something. I'm pretty sure I'm going to be shortening the length on that and making it less of a tunic and more of a regular old tank top, but anyway...

I was thinking I'd give this little cross stitch away for Christmas. I washed it and blocked it and all it needs now is to be stretched onto some cardboard, matted, then framed.

I'm thinking, I'm going to be heading down to the craft store before work to see what else I can find.... oh... it's evil...

A post with some substance.

Finally I get to update you on what's been happening these past few days...ok, more than a few days... Well, the minute I picked Gabe up from the airport he and I were running around like crazy people. There were a million things to do and only three days to do them in. First of all, we had to visit with his mom, then we had to drive about an hour to visit with one of his sisters, then drive two and a half hours to get to my apartment, then drive another two and a half hours to get to where my old roommate's wedding was taking place, then drive back to my apartment, then pack up the car, then drive the two and a half hours again to visit his dad. Oh, and did I mention that somewhere in all of that I had to take my car into the shop to not only get the oil changed for the road trip, but also get an inspection and, on top of that, the AC stopped working so I had to get that fixed too...you just gotta love the timing. Like I said, I had three days to do all of this... It was, to say the least, hectic.

The wedding was fabulous. I had so much fun catching up with all my friends from college. Not to mention it was nice to finally introduce them to Gabe. Here are a couple of pictures from that.

Here's one of the bride and I. She was gorgeous, as all brides are. It was definitely a fabulous dress and I wish I'd taken a picture of the back of it because the details were just amazing.

I knew right away that the wedding was going to be fun because the bride walked in to disney music playing where Goofey would intermittently laugh throughout it. Not to mention, the several whistles bordering on cat calls that were thrown her way as she was walking in... yeah, it was going to be that kind of wedding.

This is one of my roommates and I. I can tell you, I probably have about a million pictures just like this one of the four of us at various parties, graduation, in the dorm, at other weddings, etc. It's pretty much our standard pose!

And of course, there's the obligatory picture of Gabe and I. It took some major effort on my part, but I finally convinced him to dance with me. He's not much of a dancer, so he really needed some encouragement! It's a good thing I got him to finally dance when I did because it ended up being the last song of the evening!

After the wedding there was still so much left to do before we could finally take off for Colorado. I swear it was the most hectic thing trying to do so much in so short a time, but really, it didn't matter, because Gabe was finally there and that made just about everything alright.

By the way, somewhere in there, I did end up giving Gabe his sweater. He loves it. The only problem is there are a few things I need to tweak on it. The neck is a bit snug so I need to redo that. Also, the arms a little short and a little to tight for how he likes them, so I'm going to fix those too. So it turns out that it's a good thing I didn't wait to give it to him because then I wouldn't be able to fix it.

So, let me tell you about the drive.... It was long. Other than that, nothing to spectacular or eventful happened. I didn't take any pictures because, let's face it, Kansas has a whole lot of nothing to it. Not to mention, we didn't really want to stop for anything. We managed to make it here in about 26 hours. We did stop at a rest stop and slept for a few hours but actual driving time was 26. I don't think I've ever been more happy to get out of a car in my life.

So what have I been doing since I got here? Well, I've been trying to get back to work but it seems to be taking more time that I thought it would. Gabe has taken me hiking and rock climbing already. Rock climbing is....unique. I'm not too bad at it, but I still don't know a lot of technique and that's kind of frustrating. During one of the climbs I actually fell. It wasn't more than a few feet before the rope caught me, but I banged into the side of the rock pretty good. I have bruises all over my legs and muscles I didn't even know existed hurt, but to be honest, I've never felt better. I was so proud of myself that I actually got back up there after falling. Part of me wanted to say, screw it, I'm done, that's enough of a scare for me, but I didn't and that was a really nice thing.

Here's a couple of pictures from one of the places we climbed.

This is one of Gabe. He makes it look so darn easy. And from the bottom, it really doesn't look so hard and it really doesn't look so high. I can tell you, from the bottom, everything is deceiving. That large looking rock that Gabe's standing on with his right foot is actually not as large, or as easy to stand on as it looks. When I got up to that spot I was having major difficulties.

What I find funny about rock climbing is it's really easy to psych yourself out. You stand in one spot too long trying to decide the best way to tackle the next couple of moves and you may find yourself convincing yourself you can't do it. But when you finally do, it definitely makes you feel great.

This is one of the crazier sections Gabe tried.
He's been doing this for a long time, so sheer rock faces with just a few cracks to climb up apparently seem like fun to him. For me... not so much.

I have no idea when we're going again just because it seems like this weekend is already going to be a little bit full. A couple of Gabe's friends who used to live here will be in town and he mentioned something about wanting to take me to the zoo. I suppose we'll see.

As for knitting. If you can believe it, I haven't been doing all that much. I did start that lace panel tank top out of the Spring IK. I haven't gotten very far, but I'm happy with the results at this point. This picture makes the purple look a lot lighter than it actually is.

So what do you think? Is this post long enough? I'd say it is so I'm going stop there. But now that I'm back to having internet, I'll definitely be posting more of my adventures here in CO.

I'M HERE!!!!

And I'm alive. Sorry I haven't posted but Gabe's new apartment didn't get internet until this morning! I still won't be able to post pictures until the wireless router is up and running so be patient with me.

As for now, all I can say is that I love it here and I'll probably never want to leave.

Hopefully I'll be able to post pictures tonight or tomorrow, until then I'll be trying to catch up on my bloglines...... all 315 of them....

I've been seduced by the dark side... of crafting that is

I've been a busy girl! Hard to believe now that school has ended, but I've still been busy. I suppose the difference is I've been busy with fun things. Like finishing up this:

Can you believe it? I've finished Gabe's sweater before he will even be here (another 3 days!!!!) Now I have a bit of a conundrum.... when do I give it to him? His birthday was in February and I'm not sure if I can wait until Christmas. I was thinking I'd bring it along with me to Colorado and give it to him right before I leave, but I really don't know. Any suggestions?

Some other things I've been busy with are working and going to the park. I love going to the park. Now that the weather is nice it's so refreshing to get outside. The other day my roommate and I took her turtle to the park and let him run free for a little while. His name is Pewee and he's super cute. Especially when he gets going. We've all heard turtles are slow, but not him. When he wants to he can really book it!

I have to admit something. I've been busy with something else too. I have been seduced by another craft. I know... I should have started another knitting project when I was finished with Gabe's sweater.... I even bought the yarn to start it.... but while I was at the craft store... well... I happened to walk into another aisle and... well.... I haven't put this down since...
I haven't done cross-stitch in so long and I can't even tell you what made me want to do it again. I suppose maybe the fact that I'm going to be in the car for close to 24 hours might have something to do with it. A girl needs a bit of variety, you know!

I'm sure there will be knitting in my future, but as for now, I just can't get enough of the cross-stitch.

So there are three days until Gabe gets here. Once he does get here, it's going to be crazy busy until I get to CO. I may not get a chance to blog in between. I'll try, but I can't guarantee anything. What I can guarantee is that I'll have some awesome pictures to show you once I do finally get a chance to blog!

I suppose that's it for now. If anyone has any suggestions as to when I should give him his sweater, I'd love to hear them!

So I was tagged...

By Satori. Usually I'm not one to do these things, but I'm bored. Like I said earlier, two days off with nothing to do. Sooooo......

The idea was to show off your favorite coffee (though in my case, tea) mug and tell us why it's your favorite. So here it is. My favorite mug. I bought it while I was in Wales...at a castle no less. It was hand made and hand painted and you know how much we crafters love things like that!

I guess what I like about it most are the colors and the hint of celtic design in them. I'm Irish, I love all things celtic... it's in the genes. If I were to ever get a tattoo (which would require me to get over my fear of needles) I would get a celtic design as a tattoo.

Even the handle of this mug is detailed. I have another mug from the same place. Instead of green and purple it's green and blue and instead of a swirly thing on the front it has a Welsh dragon. I love that mug too.

I love the shape of the mug and I love that it's unique.

So there you have it folks, my favorite mug. Anyone else who wants to give it a try, be my guest!

Patience is a virtue...

And mine is severely lacking. I know it must come as a shock... (on what planet, I don't know) that it is becoming harder and harder for me to wait for my exciting summer to begin. There are, officially, 8 more days that I have to wait. My patience is almost non-existent.

It has helped that these past few days I've been busy working long hours. It not only helps with the passing of time but it also helps my checkbook. I can tell summer is coming with how busy I've been at work. I didn't even have time to think. Unfortunately (but also fortunately) I have the next two days off. I had today off as well and I am going slightly out of my mind. Better to be busy when you have to wait for something than to have nowhere in particular you have to be and nothing in particular you have to be doing.

Though today I've worked non-stop on Gabe's sweater. I'm nearly finished the second sleeve. I'll spare you a picture because, let's face it, it looks just like the first sleeve. Hopefully I'll get that all finished up so I can start something else. Something that's a little more exciting than stockinette!

I wish I had more exciting things to post about... unfortunately for me, there's just waiting...

What a way to start the summer "right"....

And by "right" I mean start a kitchen fire... Don't even ask. I went to put on the kettle for some tea. Everything was going just fine. I stepped out of the kitchen for literally a minute and I heard the water boiling. It occured to me that it usually doesn't boil that quickly... how right I was... I go back into the kitchen to find my tea kettle surrounded by flames! What the hell!!! Turns out earlier on, something had boiled over into the resevoir underneath the burner and whatever it was caught on fire. I put it out just fine, but let me tell you, it's hard to even think what to do when something like that happens. Luckily nothing was damaged, not even the kettle, so I was lucky. A little freaked out maybe, but no worse for wear!

The semester is over, all of my finals are finished (by the way, I got A's on all of them! So much for studying.. I think I'm not going to study much anymore if I can still get A's without studying!) I only have to wait 12 more days to see Gabe! That also means 12 more days to finish his sweater. I'm so close too. Look how far I am on the first sleeve:

It shouldn't take me too long to finish that up and start the other one. I only see one thing that might interfere with that. It seems I've rediscovered my love for video games. It has been quite awhile since I've had the time to play any of my games (we're talking maybe a year or more) and now that school's over and I only have work, I've found myself with a lot of extra time on my hands. Time I thought I'd use knitting, but the games are just so tempting. Well, I'll just have to balance the two and get this sweater finished. That's my goal.

Oh, by the way, some of you asked if I'd still be able to blog while I'm out in CO. Absolutely! I think I might go insane without the internet! I think Gabe would too, so not to worry. I will be blogging all about my adventures in CO!

Two down, one to go...

That's right, two finals finished. In fact, they were the two I was "worried" about (I say "worried" because they were the important ones... I wasn't really worried at all.) To my surprise, I think I did quite well on them. I'm surprise because sometime on Saturday when I was supposed to be studying I decided to screw it and not study at all. So I didn't. My motivation for studying was at about zero so I didn't try to fight it!

I bet you can guess what I did instead of studying... If you guessed knit then you'd be correct! In fact, I knit so much my wrist started hurting. That bummed me out because I was on a roll! I'll post pictures soon, but for now, I have to get ready for work!

Woot Woot!!!

HUGEST SIGH OF RELIEF! My classes are finished! I still have three finals left, but I am not worried about those. I'll spend my weekend studying and then, by Tuesday afternoon of next week, I will officially be finished with school this year!

I went down to my parent's house on Weds. because I had to do go shopping for a dress for the wedding (the dress selection up here just didn't do it for me). I spent almost all of Wednesday morning at the mall... this is definitely something I did not enjoy. I really, really, really dislike the mall and shopping in general (unless it's for yarn). It's just not my thing. After a ton of searching, I finally found a dress I could live with. It's basically a little black dress, a-line, strapless, with eyelets. Very cute. I'll be sure to post some pictures of it once the wedding comes around.

As for the rest of the time spent at the parents house, I basically vegged. I did spend some time outside and took some really beautiful pictures, hence the flower pictures. I'm quite sure spring is here now.

Nothing makes me happier than the sun shining and the flowers blooming!

I also found some time to work on Gabe's sweater. In fact, I'm more than half-way finished the front. I have a feeling this sweater is going to be finished before he even gets here (which, by the way, is in another 19 days!!!!).

Well, now is as good a time as any to start studying so I'd best get to it! Wish me luck!

It's gonna be a busy summer... for knitting that is

Despite my crazy schedule, despite my crazy workload and despite the restlessness, I decided to reward myself. This is mainly because I finished one of my projects in record time. (For some reason I thought it would take me a lot longer). It felt so good crossing that off of the list I have. As I was looking at my list I realized that I only have two more things to do. One paper, which I'm already more than halfway finished with and a very quick project. I can tell you the weight of all this work I have to do lifted quite a bit with that realiztion!

So last night I knit.... and knit... and finished the back of Gabe's sweater...

The color definitely isn't right in this picture, it's not as grey as it looks here. It's slightly more chestnut.

I love this type of knitting sometimes... mindless. Exactly what I need right now. So I knit and watched some TV, talked with Gabe (which, by the way, makes me more and more excited about going out there with all the things he's talking about wanting to do!), and I didn't worry a bit about the last couple of assignments that need finishing.

Then today I rewarded myself again. With these:

With summer coming and no real projects in mind, I had to do something! There are definitely quite a few patterns in that IK that I'm planning on making. I was surprised because a lot of times there are only one or two things I like, but this one kept surprising me.




Here are the ones that I like:


























I'd better get to knitting huh?

Feeling restless

It is down to the home stretch now. I'm so close to then end of the semester I can taste it, not only can I taste it but I can see it... in the form of a massive break-out on my face. Nothing like stress to make the pores on my face want to retaliate.

Despite the large amounts of stress and looming deadlines, I feel restless. I feel unmotivated toward any type of school work, which usually isn't the case when deadlines are near. I feel the way I feel when things in my life are about to change. More than just the obvious change of moving to Colorado for a summer, but the kind of change that redefines who I am. This happens to me, more and more frequently it seems, and it's alway preceded by this restlessness and an urge to get back to my spiritual side. As if I've spent too much time caring about the dramas of life and not enough time caring about my soul.

Everything I do now seems to be under intense spiritual scrutiny. Every action I make makes my mind wonder if that action was demonstrating the type of person I want to be. And if not, what can I do in the future to change that. Because if I want to make any sort of change to this world (and if you've looked around lately, we are in desperate need of change), I must first make a change in myself.

I can tell you, it's tiring to constantly evaluate yourself, your actions, and probably most especially, your thoughts, but I can also tell you, it's extremely rewarding. I've grown so much as a direct result of this. Looking back on the person I used to be up to the person I am now, I can say with confidence that they are two different people completely. Not to say the person I was before was bad, it's just that I've seen that the decisions I used to make didn't work, so I changed my choices to what does work... or should I say did work, because now it seems, I'm about to change again. Into what, I can't really say yet, but it's exciting.

It's hard to focus on school work, which seems so inconsequential compared to soul work, but I'll get through. Only six days of classes left, one paper, one lab report, one portfolio and a couple of finals and I can really focus my attention.

As you can imagine, no knitting has been done. I'm afraid you'll have to wait for awhile longer to see any sort of stitch on this blog.

Two and a half more weeks...

You might wonder what's been going on with me and well... I wonder the same thing. When I think about last week all it seems to be filled with is working, studying and bird watching. The bird watching is because I have to have 14 hours worth of bird observations in by the end of the semester and I only have two and a half more weeks left to do it.

Two and half more weeks... It feels so good to say that I only have two and half more weeks left of school. Of course this brings the realization that I only have two and half more weeks to get all my assignments finished. This includes a research paper that I haven't even thought about starting. My problem is finding the time. For me, I have to sit down with a nice chunk of time with no other obligations before I can start a paper and all I seem to have is a couple hours here and there. Usually once classes end I have a couple of hours until I have to go to work... Definitely not conducive to getting a research paper written.

I haven't even had any time to knit very much on Gabe's sweater. For those of you who asked, the pattern is called Castaway and it's in Rowan magazine number 30. It's always been my experience when knitting for men the more basic the sweater, the better. Most guys aren't interested in bells and whistles. Classic is best.

So I've been swamped up to my eyeballs with school work, I've been waitressing non-stop it seems, and I've had no time to knit... what the heck keeps me going? It's the conversations with Gabe on the phone, planning what we're going to do when we finally get to be together over the summer. He plans to take me rock climbing. We had a thorough discussion as to my safety (I'm not an adrenaline junkie, so the safer the better).

He wants to take me up to the flatirons (I think that's what he called them) so that I can watch the eagles and hawks fly up on the thermals. I have to say, since taking this ornithology class, I'm much more interested in bird watching than I used to be. And it's really kind of nice to hear he's willing to fuel that interest.

Pretty much the thought of seeing him everyday is really keeping me going. It makes the school work and the work work not seem so bad at all....

I am a project tramp.

It's true. There was that purple sweater that I started. It lost it's flare quickly to a pair of green socks. Those green socks did entertain me for a short while. Not long enough for me to finish them. Such is the way of being a tramp because when something like this:

arrives on your doorstep you're pretty much obligated to cheat on the projects you have going for something new and exciting.

To be honest, most of it is mom's. She wanted me to order it for her. Not only that, but she wanted me to knit most of it for her. Most of it is yarn for some cool fairisle socks. But some of it is for me and that, my friends, is what I cheated on my green socks for.

This 100% baby alpaca, simply irresistible yarn is going to one day be a sweater for Gabe. He picked the pattern and he even picked the yarn. He's actually very excited about it. So he knows he's getting a sweater, but he doesn't know when. Christmas is so far away, but this yarn is so hard to resist. I had to start it.

Did I mention we had a field trip on Monday to Montreal? Well, let me tell you, that definitely gave me some excellent time to sit and knit (and cheat on my green socks). I'm already about 10 inches into the body and it's on size 6's.

This picture actually makes it look a lot lighter than it actually is, but let me tell you it's gorgeous and it feels great. He's going to love it.

As for the field trip, we went to the Biodome in Montreal. It was actually very cool. It had four different ecosystems and you had to walk through each of them. It was definitely a bit of a shock to walk through a tropical rainforest and then go through a temperate forest in early spring!

Here's a slideshow of the trip. I got the idea from Grace . She had an awesome slideshow and I thought that would be a really cool idea rather than upload a whole ton of pictures! By the way, you can make your own slideshow at Imageshack.

Edited to add: Having a bit of trouble with the slideshow, if you want to view it, you can go here.

Don't Cry for me Argentina....

Don't ask me about the title. It was just the first thing that popped into my head when I thought about the events of yesterday, events that I think everyone of you would be interested in hearing about.

I received a letter in the mail. A letter from the Denver Zoo. Here it was, my ticket (or lack there of) to Colorado for the summer. This is what I'd been waiting for....

Well folks, I didn't get it. And I suprised myself because as I read the rejection letter I didn't get upset. I learned awhile ago not to let my happiness ride on circumstances that are outside of my control. This doesn't mean, however, that I just sit idly by when there are choices I can make and circumstance I do have control over.

So why, you might ask, was yesterday one of the most exciting days of my life? Well, I made some choices and changed some circumstances. I talked to my boss and he agreed to have me transferred to the restaurant in Colorado for the summer! Things really couldn't have worked out better!

I called Gabe as soon as I got home from work and we already have the whole thing planned! My roommate from college is getting married in June. I can't miss the wedding so he's going to fly out for it, then we're going to drive across the country in my car! What an adventure that's going to be!

I'm so excited! I know I'll be nervous having to start work at a totally new place with totally new people, but to be with Gabe for the summer, it's going to be worth it.

Three and a half weeks left of school, then it's just a matter of a couple more weeks till I will be in Colorado!

Title? Who needs a title?

My spirits have been feeling better and better. I did a little yoga, I spent some time outside... I just needed a little time to readjust. I got to see him 24/7 for six days straight. Go from that to barely even having the time to talk to him on the phone (we both went back to extremely busy lives) and you can see why I was a little down in the dumps.

Never fear though! Spring is here. The sun is shining, the weather's warming up and the pigeons have made it their duty in life to wake me up every morning with their mating calls. Have you ever heard a pigeon making it's mating calls? For lack of a better description, it sounds as if they're constipated.
Ludo, my cat, is enthralled by this. He's made it his mission to do whatever he can to get to those pigeons. He has found every suitable place in the apartment to sit by a window and watch them. And when he gets tired (because you know it's hard work trying to claw through glass to get to the birds) he just curls right up and goes to sleep... right on my sweaters of course!


So, I got to knit those couple of inches I wanted to and now I can show you this:

Let me tell you, it was a pain in my butt to try to photograph this. First I tried putting it on, but every angle I could shot it at didn't show the pattern well. So I had to settle on the flat shot.

I've actually already turned the heel and am working on the leg portion. But now that I only have 4 weeks left in the semester (4 weeks, can you believe it???) I'm down to the wire on some school projects and haven't had a huge amount of time to knit. Well, 4 weeks isn't a long time so once school is finished I'll be knitting up a storm!

What's a girl to do when she's feeling down?

Play with baby chicks of course!

We hatched these little guys in ornithology lab (ornithology is the study of birds.) They are so darn adorable I can hardly get over it.

They're definitely good for raising the spirits. Especially a spirit that's bogged down by the stresses of school, work and an aching heart!

Knitting news will be on it's way. Just give me a few more days to add a couple more inches!

So damn bittersweet

We had such a wonderful time and the majority of it was spent hanging out. Just being together was enough. But of course, as these things go, my mood gradually went from euphoric at the beginning of the week to somewhat depressed last night when I knew he'd be leaving this morning.

Some of the highlights of this week were little things like taking a walk together when the weather was gorgeous. It must have been 70 degrees outside and it was sunny. I loved it. We also spent a lot of time at his mom's house visiting with her and she let me spin some greased wool on her Louet. I've never tried spinning in the grease before and I have to say it was awesome. I've never spun anything so fine and your hands just feel so healthy with all the lanolin (unless, of course, you're allergic to lanolin.) By the way, she asked me if I wanted to do the Sheep to Shawl competition with her and her daughters this upcoming fall! If I can get the time off, I will definitely be there!

Also, spending time playing cards with my mom who was laid up after having knee surgery was really great. She actually had the surgery the day Gabe arrived and she's already up and walking around!

My favorite times with him, though, were all the times we'd just sit around and cuddle. I know it sounds sentimental and sappy, but it's true. We'd just lay there for hours, talking, cuddling, just being together.

I wish this post could be a bit more upbeat, but I'm so heartsick right now. I still haven't heard anything about the internship yet and to be honest, I really want to spend the summer out there. Gabe really wants me to look into transferring within the company/restaurant I work for to one out in Colorado if the internship doesn't work out. After this last visit I'd do just about anything to be out there for the summer. He said he'd even drive me to and from work if that's what it takes!

I'll keep you updated. Until then I have a crap load of homework and projects to do. Looks like that monster finally caught up with me so if I don't post for awhile, you know why! I'll leave you with some goofy pictures of Gabe and me.

Is there a sock shortage that I'm unaware of?

Because, seriously, there must be. (Though my overflowing sock drawer seems to indicate otherwise.) When I make an honest attempt to knit something other than socks, I feel completely uninspired and the only thing that could even remotely satisfy me is another pair. How crazy is that?

It may have something to do with the fact that every time I pick up the sweater to work on it, I feel like I really don't have time to knit a sweater, after all, I have a million school projects I could be working on instead....I mean should be working on instead. But socks... well... they're just little projects. They can easily be picked up and put down. I don't feel I'm about to be bit in the ass by that monster when I knit socks. But the sweater..... I might as well have a sign on my butt that says "Bite Me."

Here's the newest pair in the works. It's this pattern. It's simple and it looks great. I first tried it out on 2's but it was just so flimsy, I couldn't stand it. So I went down to the 1's and went up a size.

I feel so much better now that I'm working on another pair of socks. Maybe I should just make a bunch of socks and give them away for Christmas. Seriously, I have no more room for socks!

So I'm officially on Spring Break right now. Gabe flys in tomorrow and words do not describe how excited I am! This will probably be my last post until after he leaves. (I know I've been sporatic with the posting but I've just been so busy... I know, I know, broken record over here)

One more thing I wanted to mention. My friend Jill makes awesome needlecases. If anyone is interested in one she has a little online shop set up here. Go check it out!

For now, I'm off. Have a great week and weekend!

All I've been doing!

Finally blogger is working and I have a few minutes to post. Well, here's the haircut I got last week. Like I said before, it's pretty much the exact same haircut I had, only now it's shorter and all those evil split ends are gone!
There's nothing like a good haircut to put you back in the right mood. Don't ask me why, maybe it's symbolic. Cutting off something that's weighing you down... eh, who knows?

So there is now exactly one week, that's 7 days people!, until Gabe gets here. Can you tell I'm excited? Of course, I have three days of school left, each of which has either a test or a quiz, then three (or four depending on how they schedule me) days of work and then I get to drive to the airport and pick him up. I actually think it's better that I'm going to be busy before he gets here because if I wasn't I'd be driven insane by the anticipation!

Oh, right, knitting. I've done a little bit of that. Remember me throwing caution to the wind and starting a sweater? Well, here's what I've done so far.

It's a pattern out of Rowan Magazine #30. I thought it was fairly appropriate because the pattern's name is Erin! I've been wanting to make this sweater forever but I just haven't gotten around to it! This is what it's going to look like when I'm finished, though I'm planning on tweaking the arms a little bit.

Just click on the picture to see it a bit better. White sweater against a snowy background doesn't exactly make it easy to see.

Yesterday I had so much to do. I made a list of all the things I need to work on and I just sat down for hours and got a ton of it done. There's something about making lists and crossing things off of them that feels so gratifying! Anyway, I rewarded myself by doing something I haven't done in such a long time.... I spun! Woohoo!

This stuff may look familiar to you if you've been reading my blog for a long time. That's because it's the exact same stuff I bought at Rhinebeck the first year that I went and made some nice yarn out of, which I then made a pair of nice socks out of. Well, my friend, Jill
bought the same stuff last year because she liked how mine turned out and I agreed to spin in for her.

Well, I'm off to class now! Ta Ta!

Short update

I was going to upload pictures of what I've been knitting and my new haircut (which looks almost exactly like my old haircut only shorter) but blogger is being not so nice right now.

Anyway, I've been busy (what's new right?) And yet, even when I have some down time I feel restless. Not even knitting helps. I'm excited to hear about the internship. By the way, thank you to everyone who wished me luck, I really appreciate that so many people are rooting for me! I have no idea how long it's going to take to hear about it though. I'm also excited because in a week and a day, Gabe will be here! That might have me the most excited I think (shocking, I know.) I've finished the project I wanted to have finished before he arrives. I can't believe I did it with a week to spare. Don't you worry though, I have plenty of projects I can start on to get ahead!

Hopefully blogger will start working again and I can show some pictures!

I did it.

I can't believe it. Let me explain...

Gabe suggested awhile ago that I should look into doing an internship at the Denver Zoo for the summer. Apparently he wants to see me for more than just a week at a time (go figure!) Almost immediately I shot down the idea because I could think of about a million reasons why that wouldn't work, all of them revolving around money. Not to mention I might not have a job when I get back. I hadn't really thought about it again until this past weekend.

I was talking with a roommate of mine and something about our conversation made the idea pop into my head again. And not only that, but it inspired me to look into it. So Saturday morning I used the wonderful, glorious internet to see what kind of internships the zoo has. I found out that they have paid interships!!! I immediately reworked my resume, wrote an awesome cover letter and e-mailed my professor to see if he would write me a letter of recommendation.

Apparently I really like to cut these things close because the deadline for applications is Wednesday! Nothing like doing it last minute huh? My professor was great and had his recommendation all set for me today. So I went to the post office and spent an obscene amount of money to send it all guaranteed next day delivery.

I did it. I sent them and it's in fates hands now. Wish me luck!

I live in a fantasy land.

I think most knitters do. You see, we sometimes greatly overestimate the time we can spend knitting. We put off things that we'd otherwise get done were it not for the draw of some new and exciting project. But here's the problem, our time management skills, though great compared to some, may not allow for those things we've put off until eventually they come and bite us in the ass.

Oh no, I haven't been bitten in the ass.... yet.... But I'm constantly turning around to check and see if something is poised and ready, teeth barred, mouth open in the classic ass-biting position. Why you ask? Well, despite being so busy I can barely keep up, I finished these:

They didn't quite make it knee-high, but they're close. And they're COMFORTABLE!!! The past two days I've worn my socks-that-will-not-be-named and these and my feet have never been so warm. I'm in love with this Knitpicks sock yarn. It's great.

Anyway, back to my fantasy land where I have decided, even though I have many school projects to work on, that I am going to start a sweater. After all, I only have a good month left where fuzzy, mohair/wool is suitable knitting. After that, the sweaty hands are a little more than I can handle.

Hey, did anyone see that little monster just now getting ready to bite my butt?

Being busy is not good for blogging.

I'm sorry it's been a week since I've written. There are really two reasons for this... 1. I'm busy with school and work. If I'm not doing one, than I'm most certainly doing the other and 2. When all you do is school and work, you don't have much time to knit and show off your knitting. And aside from even all of that nothing really interesting has been going on that I could even blog about... (this, of course, excludes my lovesickness and extreme missing of a certain person in CO.)

Right now I'm focusing on getting a ton of projects at least halfway finished so I don't have to work on them when Gabe is here during my spring break. Hopefully I'll find some time to pull away and do something interesting that you all would like to read about! Until then.... have fun knitting without me!

I have been knitting... I really have!

It's been a week since I've been back, but it seems like so much longer. Lucky for me a plan is in the works for Gabe to come back east at the end of March/beginning of April. That is, of course, if everything pans out. If it doesn't we're just going to have to wait until the end of the semester. I can tell you right now that that is going to be extremely difficult. My only saving grace is that I'm going to be so busy with school and work that the time is just going to fly.

My friends and I just realized today that next week marks the first half of the semester being over. If the second half flys by as quickly as the first did, I'll be seeing Gabe in no time!

So is this a knitting blog? I know it might seem questionable, but I promise it is still a knitting blog. I finished the socks that will remain nameless while in Colorado:

I'm very happy with how they turned out. I finally got the tension right so that I can actually fit them over my heel, but at the same time making them tight enough so that the leg is not so loose that it falls to my ankle.

I wore them yesterday and I'm extremely pleased with how comfortable they are. I bought this yarn from KnitPicks. It's one of their merino sock yarns and I'm telling you, you can't even tell you're wearing wool on your feet. (My feet are pretty sensitive and anything slightly itchy are just too uncomfortable).

I finished the socks-that-will-not-be-named while Gabe was off giving a lecture. Luckily, I thought ahead and brought some more sock yarn to keep me occupied. (Don't ask me what is up with me and socks right now, I think it's because they're small and quick and I can pick them up whenever. This is important for a college student/waitress with no time on her hands). They are also made from KnitPicks merino sock yarn.

It may look to you like I'm finished with this one, but I'm not. I'm planning on knitting the leg up as far as the skein will take me. I guess I'm in the mood for some knee-highs! I knit the toe-up method for the first time with these socks and I love it!

I'm starting to feel like I could knit socks in my sleep...hmmm, that's either a really good thing (more time used for sock making) or a really bad thing (I'm really not sleeping at all!)

After these socks I'm either thinking about knitting another pair of socks (shocker, I know...) or starting a sweater. After all, I only have so much time left until the weather turns warm. I don't have a huge stash, but what I have in it is mostly wool and unless you have an air conditioner, wool is just too warm in the summer!

The trip of a lifetime...

So I suppose you'd like to know what I did on my trip other than reconnected with the love of my life huh?

Well, we certainly did some amazing things. He took me to Rocky Mountain National park. That's where the picture of us was taken. By the way, his name is Gabe. I figured I should just get that out of the way because it makes the telling of this so much easier! I would have knit on my way out there but the scenery was just too gorgeous. I couldn't take my eyes off it for a second. Here are some of my favorite pictures from there:This next one was awesome because of the way the sun was hitting the clouds from behind. The picture just doesn't capture how truly beautiful it was.
He also took me to the Denver Zoo. It was amazing. It was huge compared to the one I work in. You could tell they take great care of their animals and they do everything they can to keep them happy and entertained. One of their gorillas had a baby and I tried so hard to get a good picture of it, but my camera battery died just as I was getting one.

This is one of my better pictures of Nemo! I actually took quite a few pictures but none of them turned out very well.

We did many other things like hang out with his friends, go out to eat dinner and hiked a bit on some trails about 10 miles from his apartment. Unfortunately the hiking was a bit trecherous because he didn't tell me to bring my boot so I was hiking in shoes with no traction...that was interesting.

He cooked for me several times which was excellent. He is an amazing cook. Not to mention he's vegetarian too! He made probably the best tofu stirfry I've ever had. I'm drooling just thinking about it!

Now all of those things were exciting, but nothing compared to where we went on my last full day there. He took me to the yarn shop in Boulder. It was called Shuttles, Spindles and Skeins. I have never seen such an awe inspiring shop in my life. Not only did they have the largest selection of my kind of yarn (my kind of yarn being the more classic, non-novelty type) but they also had spinning wheels, roving, weaving looms and spools of thread everywhere. It was amazing. And what's more amazing is Gabe actually had a good time too. He was very tempted by the looms (He used to weave and spin back in high school because his mother owned sheep and he and his sisters would help his mom with the Sheep to Shawl contest at the fair almost every year) To say the least, it was great.

I ended up buying some more sock yarn (because I obviously don't have enough) and another set of needles. Right before leaving for my trip my brother was fooling around and he ended up breaking one of my bamboo sock needles. I could work with just the four that were left, but I much prefer having five.

So there's your brief overview of my trip. It was fantastic, I wish I were still there. It definitely makes being back here much harder!

I just want to leave you with a picture (sorry for the quality, I don't have a scanner so it's a picture of a picture) of Gabe and I back in high school. This was taken at the Junior Prom in 1997. *SIGH*

I left my heart in Colorado

I hadn't said anything about this earlier, mainly because even I wasn't sure what was happening. Now I know and now I can tell you, however, it may need a little bit of back story.

When I was in high school, I dated a guy for nearly two years. Considering how young and immature most people are in high school, two years is a really long time. Not only did we date for such a long time, we were in love. There's just no other words for it. Just about the time when I was going off to college (he still had one year of high school left) we broke up. It's been so long now that I don't remember the actual details as to why but it positively broke my heart. I spent most of my freshman year in college depressed, but eventually it got easier and the days between thinking about him got more numerous. I thought I had gotten over him and in many ways I had, but he was always in the back of my mind.

At this point, I don't really remember how it happened but probably a year or two after we broke up he called me, or I called him, I don't really remember, but ever since then we've talked maybe twice a year. Around Christmas he'd always come home to see his family and I'd be home visiting my family so we'd get together for dinner and just catch up on how the last year has been for each of us.

Every time we'd get together it threatened to stir up old feelings for me, but knowing that it just wasn't an option (either I was with someone that year or he was, or it just wasn't the right time) I'd pretty much squash those feelings the minute I felt them. That is, until this year...

This Christmas we got together like we always do, but something was different. That invisible line we never use to cross had disappeared and it was just us. And then he kissed me. Apparently he had felt the same way I had been feeling, but we didn't really talk about it. We both just sort of knew.

We made plans for me to come out and visit him in Colorado. It was probably the best trip I've ever had. Not only did the scenery take my breath away, but he did too. We finally talked about everything we'd been thinking about and everything we'd been feeling and now I can tell you with confidence that I left my heart with him in Colorado and I took his home with me.

It's nearly here!

I feel like all I've been doing is apologizing for how busy I've been. But it's true. I'm busy. So busy, in fact, I'm almost to the point of breaking down. Thank all that is holy this coming Friday I will be on a plane to Colorado for 5 glorious school/work free days. Of course, I have 5 quizzes and a test before that sweet day, not to mention three more nights of work.

You may have guessed that I haven't been able to do much knitting. I haven't been able to do any knitting and I'm thinking I won't until I'm sitting on the plane. Then I can knit. Zero interruptions, just knitting.

Nothing much else to report other than we took Ludo to the vet last week and besides some ear mites, he's as healthy as can be. I have to say I've never seen a cat so relaxed in the car. On the way out there he was only mildly nervous, but on the way back...

Yeah, he was totally asleep.

Never in my life have I met such a laid back cat.

There probably won't be any more updates before Colorado, so I'll be catching you up when I get back!

Good luck!

I just wanted to add a quick post to all of the knitting athletes out there who are gearing up for tonight's opening ceremony. I won't be participating this time around. I have far too much on my plate at the moment which is why I haven't posted in so long. Just know that I'm still around, very busy, but around none the less. Again, good luck to everyone! I can't wait to see how everyone does!