Life, Knitting and the Pursuit of Roller Coasters

I’ts been a crazy week around here. I came down with the nasty cold/sinus infection that’s been going around and that knocked me out for several days. I somehow still managed to attend my cousin’s wedding reception last weekend despite that fact that I looked like death warmed over. Then while still quite sick but grocery shopping with my parents, I stumbled upon 3 Wii Fits on a shelf and quickly snatched up two of them (one went in the mail to my brother and his wife who have also been on the look out). Now that I’m feeling better, I’ve been playing with it quite a bit and enjoying the forced activity.

And then at work on Tuesday they held a raffle and I came home with another new toy…

It’s  a Panasonic  Toughbook CF-19 tablet PC. Still not sure what all I’m going to use it for, but it’ll be nice to have a working personal laptop again.

I’ve been working on a bunch of knitting projects, I’ve had a bit of a fit of startitis and I’ll have a few more projects to show off soon, but for right now I have a sneak peek at another stranded mitten pattern I’ve been working on.

Mom wanted monkeys and the purple is a dead on match to her winter coat. There will be a hat to match as well. If anyone is game to test knit one or both patterns before November, leave a comment and let me know.

My mom has been working with Paws with a Cause to get a service dog for well over a year now. She’s finally started her part of the training and met her dog on Monday. The dog will come home with her in November. Her name is Jade and she’s a Black Lab/Golden Retriever mix. She will help pick up dropped items, provide companionship, sound an alarm if there’s an issue when dad’s home and sound an alarm that will alert 911 if there’s an issue when he’s not.

So, meet Jade.

I seriously did not intend to take 2 months off from the blog, but it is what it is and things are starting to settle down enough to bring me back around to the blogging again. It’s honestly been a relatively knit-free couple of months which hasn’t contributed to my desire to post anything.

I do have two finished pairs of socks to show off though.

Early on after my last post, I completed my pair of Something’s Shady from SockMadness.

I also completed the pair I had at work during go live. They were a pair of Monkeys in Socks that Rock Fairgrounds.

Beyond that, I’ve got plenty of started projects and just haven’t been knitting as much in general.

I am halfway down the foot of my first Odds n’ Sods sock, another Sock Madness pattern. I have a baby sweater started that just needs some sleeves. I’m turning the heel of the second Pomotomous from a pair that I started in January of 2007. Also on the heel of a first Embossed Leaves sock, and part way up the foot of a new pair for my brother for Christmas.  I’ve made a handful of yarn purchases this summer including a stop last week on my way back from Minnesota at The Fold.

My travels haven’t been as extensive this summer because of work. My season passes for the various park chains aren’t getting their normal workouts. Although in the last few weeks Mike visited and we visited Indiana Beach and Waldameer parks, and this last weekend I spent 3 days visiting in Minnesota.

I took advantage of the no sales tax on clothing thing and re-wardrobed myself at the MOA, and visited a very crowded and hot state fair as well as a fly by at Valleyfair for their newest coaster.

I don’t even have new Rainbow Sock photos since Craig has been having some computer issues. I think he’s working on a video of some sort though.

My dishcloth finally made an appearance on ARN&R  although their write up was a bit of a cop out.

It’s just been a bit of a quiet layed back insanely busy summer without a whole lot to report. Now that I’m current and posting again though, I’ll poke around some more. Christmas is approaching faster than I care to admit so I need to pick up the needles again and get moving.

And will be returning to the blog thing shortly with plenty of new stuff to report. It’s just really hard to restart the momentum when I’ve unintentionally taken two months off.