hey, g'day--
la la la! well, twas so wonderfull to get back from visiting with the folks and have a emails and a post at knitblogs re; how to post links.
Thank you thank you thank you.
guess what?!?! my SIL (sister-in-law) is going to be adopting a baby!!!! a baby girl from Guatemala hopefully.
ok, let me give you the lowdown, and here is where all the posting some members of the knitblog have been doing about not caring if
perfect strangers read your blog vs. family and friends takes on a personal cast...
the lowdown is that I am jealous. I was jealous (admittedly- although not able to realize it until afterwards) when one of my best friends
got married before I did and now I am jealous not to be the first to have a baby. Nrr.
That is so dumb but it was good to get it out there.
I suppose that this blog is turning into a journal of sorts. Hm.
I went to the knitting night thing last Monday and it was the second place that I had to confessed to other women that I want to have a baby.
The first was my Bible study group (we split into men/women groups to pray at the end which is handy for this sort of confession). So when
I said it the first time one of the women said that she had had intense longing/desire for a baby about a year after she and her husband were married
and then it went away and then she was just terrified and scared of it in a way, but they were trying at that point (a later point, after the year out bit).

And then one of the women at this knitting thing was like, oh, my gosh, isn't it just so crazy, it's like a CRAVING!! So greeting my SIL's announcement
was sort of wierd on my part except I am a fairly expressionless person facially (that sounds terrible, doesn't it... hm) so I'm wondering if even my
husband picked up on it. I hope i hope i hope he did not give my MIL this address... hi Lee! Thanks for this weekend! yes i am craving babies.

So it comes and it goes and I'm not really sure I know how to deal with this yet.

Moving right along...
My MIL loved the scarf and it was admired and stroked (Chinchilla and the ?Fantastica? eyelash novelty yarn sooooo soft in stripes). Not much knitting.
I can still think when I knit so I was trying to not brood so I was reading my FIL's copy of Steven King's "Everything's Eventual" quite good or playing the computer
game "Black and White" where you get to be god and that was fun too except for the learning curve part.

Must...tell...husband...want....baby.
Better go up to the top of the post and typeDONT READ THIS IF YOU ARE MY FAMILY...

Biking was hard after 2 days not doing it but I muddled (and sweat, boy howdy) through.
The kitties missed us.
Must go now to the template and jam in my email addy.

clicky here if you are interested in finding secret treasure in your neck of
the woods and you have a GPS.

Hey,
well, we're heading off for the weekend, so I won't be posting again until Monday. Finished finishing the fluffy scarf (aieee- no picture ever because I'm giving it to the recipient this weekend) so just imagine a Chinchilla you could wear around your neck. Oh- update on the cat-- someone who just moved in came to ask (again) if it was ours and said that they asked the supposed neighbor who was taking it and they said no and the other side neighbor was gone, so they are going to take it for now. We hooked them up with a litter box, cat treats, catnip, cat food and cat food and water dishes. That felt great. Good to know it won't be randomly roaming the hall/outside this weekend!! Have a good one!

Hey, wow,
I guess that biking is paying off...
First I weighed myself and I weighed more, then I was all like, ok, well, it's just muscle, ya, gotta be muscle
and then I put on these pants that are sort of tight and my thighs were HUGE ha ha, that makes me happy.

Well, now I am eating this wierd goop I made with mashed up bananas and some graham cracker crumbs and it's pretty good!
Not much news on the knitting front- I'm going over to my friends house to knit with her this morning.
Did I tell you about that other cat that keeps being in our apt. hall? Well, we found the owner and she's moving out and so we bought her cat tower/tree/perch whatever you want to call it thingy so that's cool. Vacuummed it all up and carpet foamed it (now I'm worried that my cats will get cancer) and it's all good. I am so tricky- I put catnip on the perches to get them onto it.

I think that other cat's new owner is not down with it or something because last night we put out food and water for it because it was in the hall again.

Ok, have a good day.
-e.

oh ho-
tricky blogspot-- ?you can only link? to something within your site? I did the code for a link to my other website, and then when you rollover it, it stuck "www.centrepullball.blogspot.com" in front of it. Hmm. Well, don't click on that. So now at least I know how to jam code in where I want it. We're moving on up. Oh, do go and see my other website because I tire of all this dinking around here. At least if I do something poorly at the other one it will be my own fault and not because of trying to work in this interface. http:/home.attbi.com/~dwmclaughlin/

Good morning-

Well, I had thought that I would visit my friend who is now confined to bed rest (she's pregnant) to knit this morning, but I have a little bit of a sore throat and whether it's from allergies or strep (strep has been going around my work) I thought I should play it safe.
I should be sewing in the ends of that scarf...
My husband and I have been jokingly identifying our kitten-cat Penelope as a Norweigian Forest Cat. She does have the tail!! They sound like cool creatures. They get this really furry coat in the winter and then shed it in the summer. Except for the tail. We always were joking about how Penelope's mom must have gotten involved with a squirrel or something. IF I COULD FIGURE OUT HOW TO POST PICS and if I could get her to sit still long enough for me to take a pic, I'd post one.
Now she is trying to eat a shell from the peanut I just ate. Silly Penelope. I suppose if I were a good cat owner I'd stop her. Mostly she's just licking them.

I read this article about how you shouldn't put 2 spaces between the period and the beginning of your next sentence. How hard of a habit would that be to break? Now of course I can't find the link...
Ok, well, I guess I'll leave you with that. I'll try now to include a link to my other website.

Good evening---
when i wrote that I suddenly thought of that guy from, what was it, Masterpiece Theatre. Remember when they did a send-up of that on Sesame Street? Was it Grover? Someone in a wine colored leather chair.
Okay, so I made it around the Knitblogs ring- wow, that took some time!!
I'm sitting here watching the sun go down- the sky is all pinkish orange and the tree's bare branches look black and beautiful against it... my older kitty is in the window and the kitten-ish littler one, Penelope, is on the carpet here. So nice.
I finished my MIL's b-day present last night- it's a scarf which isn't really a springy gift, now is it? But it is soooooo silky soft and touchable and I put a slit in it ala Not Martha so she can cinch it up around her neck. Given that Friday it was freezing and this weekend it snowed, and then today was in the 70's, who knows?!? maybe she will get to wear it!!
What else, what else. I am working on a washcloth, woo hoo! a lime green one for a friend who likes that color. It has eyelets around the edges and is worked diagonally. Somehow, one would think that sort of garter stitch thing would be pretty obvious, but I spent a good while trying to figure out how to a) not increase too fast and b) not have it get all puckery in the middle. I used up some wierd non-identifiable yarn I (sort of) dyed a blechy red color and made a similar washcloth but not on the diagonal and with the eyelets every other row.
Working a few full days full time has led me to the verge of a headache. I know I get small sympathy from people who work full time all the time, so I will not whine or whinge. Maybe I need new contacts.
Okay, maybe I will go putz around and try to get up a new template. Putting the knitblogs 'button' in a sort-of right place has inspired me. Sorry about that whole hassle.
-e.

Oh, I AM a bad blogger. Shame on me. Well, what has been going on in this life of mine... Well, last night I went through all my knitting projects and put away a bunch so that in the Fall or whenever I need more to work on, I can go to my big 'ol Tupperware bin and they'll be just like bran' spankin' new! See, this is because I have waaaaaay too much yarn, and very nice yarn, and waaaaaaay too many projects that need working on for me to GET any yarn or START any new patterns. I think I have startitis.
Let's review. I got out a shawl that I was working on last summer using Lorna's Laces laceweight. It's a wool silk blend in very pretty greys and pinks. It's the EZ pi are square shawl and it is taking FOREVER. Now that I'm at the end part where it's like 100+ sts at a time. So I am leaving it out to finish. Trying to decide if I should just give up on the lace patterns at the end and just do garter ho! all the way to the end or what.
Then I have out a washcloth for nice simple mindless knitting and a cotton/silk tee I'm making for my MIL. I think that's it. I have all this nice Shetland wool and I just read "Alice Starmore's Book of Fair Isle Knitting" about her take on how Fair Isle knitting began. Very interesting. I'm thinking about making the Fair Isle socks from Vogue's "Socks, Socks, Socks". When I went to Milwaukee to visit my friends, my best friend Carmen gave me free reign in a yarn store there down in Whitefish Bay (can't think of the name off hand) and I TELL YOU it took me, like HOURS to finally decide. So I got many shades of turquoise. And I just found some old Bernat Shetland yarn at the thrift store- 3 skeins of a light grey SSHHHHHHHHH!! I swear it will be my last purchase of yarn.
We went to the zoo on Friday (my school) and that was fun. I got lost at the end and that wasn't fun. I felt kind of stupid. But I did the Boy Scout thing and went back to the last place I had seen my group but that didn't do any good as I found out later- they had already moved on... So me and a 3 year old walked a hundred miles at least that day and finally we met up with everyone at the bus. Lame. Rule #1: if someone leaves the group, the group does not move or at least leaves one person behind until that said 1st person comes back. Then I felt all stupid and didn't tell my husband who I usually tell everything to and then I brooded on it because we didn't end up watching a DVD and so I got all sulky and then finally told him amidst tears. Sometimes I amaze myself. Oh well, TMI?
Back to the yarn stash. For example, yarn that I feel guilty about not having used yet; yarn my MIL got me for Christmas which is handspun. All the handspun I scored at the thrift store that is enough to make a sweater (I envision an boxy cardigan in garter with seed stitch borders and cuffs). 2 skeins of Regia in purples and blues. One skein of Mountain Colors sportweight to hopefully become socks. All this angora I want to dye. Oh, and I bought this stuff called 'Touch' by a ?German? company- it is GORGEOUS, like buttah. Like really nice velvet. Okay, that's all I can think of for now.
Put away the KNIT IT cardi as well as the second sock of my first pair of socks, plus my interpretation of Loop-d-loop's capelet...
Ah well, how I do go on... but it's a knitblog so there.
I've been busy looking at other people's blogs and I put up my other blog at http://home.attbi.com/~dwmclaughlin/ if you want to go and look at some pics of my thrift store yarn or my cat (the little one I didn't get her pic because she is so squirmy and white it makes any pic of her with our digital camera look weird).
Ciao!

hey, what a beautiful day!
I went out to do an errand and stopped at one of my frequent thrift stops and found some laceweight brown yarn
BUT COULDN'T BUY IT mourn mourn...

Kate's been helping me figure out how to get pics posted, the nice girl, and we're slowly and surely working on it.
I have to email her back

The Knitblogs ring is talking about doing a 20things type exchange... that will be fun but I'm stumped for 'great' ideas...

Another grey day. Just finished writing up the conferences I have tomorrow. I keep wanting to post links, but then I can't remember if I got them off of Dangerous Chunky's website or not! Probably.
I did get the 'knitting blogger's' gif up, woo me.
got a bunch of links off of googleTM for HTML learning resources, so between cycling, learning HTML and blogging I'm not sure how much knitting I'll get done.
Yesterday I went to the sale annex of my local Barnes and Noble and bought Elizabeth Zimmermann's "Knitting Without Tears" yea yea yea!

Also last night I finished Kate's baby hat-cute- and decided to change who it's for as a) it's too big probably to be used right away for a newborn b) I know a slightly older baby that it will fit on and it will be seasonal and c) I gave the mother-to-be a book, Knitting for Babies by Melanie Falick (of Kid's Knitting fame) and some guy. Highly recommend this book, buy the way. Not too foo-foo, i.e. practical stuff you could actually knit up AND it gives you a do-able project in each chapter for what they present. They start out with garter, then purl, then color work and so on and so forth. I told the mom to be that I'd make her whatever she wanted out of the book.

I made the straps on the baby hat have a button. I'll have to take a pic and see if I can figure how to transfer it over to Blogspot.

I'm placing myself on a no more yarn-buying and knitting book buying until I get some of my projects done...
Here is a list for your viewing pleasure;
1. Cardigan from KnitIt mag. (getting toward the top of the back)
2. Short sleeved cotton tee for my MIL. (not started)
3. Thick THICK black wool sweater in the round from Rebecca magazine that my turn into something else and be felted. (gauge figured, barely a few rows started)
4. Fair Isle socks from the Vogue Socks book using Alice Starmore Shetland (not started yet)
5. Wool socks for my friend's b-day that I am totally not inspired to finish as getting wool socks just as Spring is coming on is sort of depressing...
6. Hey, I will have to finish this list later... gotta go to work. Don't die of suspense or anything.
-e.

Wow, it's sort of grey today. A grey going-to-the-laundromat kind of day, which is ok, 'cause that's what I have to do.

This template has to go, or I have to try to figure out something... the print is waaaaay too big. if you feel inspired to help, my email's at yahoo for anyone in the ring
I tried to fix the Knitting Bloggers gif, but no go. You'll notice I changed it to 'forward and back' which I realize now I don't like 'cause it's like my browser's buttons.
at least there is evidence that I did indeed go into HTML or whatever it's called.
enough about that.

Did you know that a wife of one of the policeman who went into the world trade center is also named my name? I would give you a link, but not many people other than me would probably be interested.

Here is a good link touting the benefits of a centre pull ball...
http://www.tradewindknits.com/tbctrbal.html
go to "The Bosun's Locker" too for many great knitting tips and not just like "Don't use rubber bands to keep your stitches from sliding off your metal needles- if forgotten they can corrode the metal." which is helpful, but more along the lines of, here are some good, detailed instructions about how to do Kitchener.

More for you later, I go off to do laundry. Mmmm, laundry.

may I tempt you with some teasers?
i have a picture of the thrift store yarn I bought- 10 skeins!

did you know that the guy who invented the Dewey decimal system, yes, that's Dewey himself,
actually wanted to change the entire English language to be written phonetically?
Hey, I'd be all for it.
apparently after his great success with the book cataloguing thing he got a little bigheaded.
he went down in popularity after the phonetic spelling English idea.
anyway, he signed his name Dooee.

okay, so when I was in the thrift store the man who was loading the stuff onto the shelves was wheeling around a cart with all the yarn on it and so forth
and I said, "Oh, can I look?" trying not to act too overeager...
and I picked up the bag and was like "OOooh!" and then I saw more bags and I started picking them up and more and more
and then I said to the guy, gesticulating with a bag of yarn in my hand, "Wow, this is handspun!! Somebody probably spun this on a spinning wheel!"
noticing the international sign for glee crossing my face he helped me get out the rest of the bags while I tried to stop drooling.
"I'm buying out your whole yarn section here, aren't I?" I said. Then as I was examining the other bags back on the hooks, he kindly placed another bag of the handspun down at the pile at my feet. Thank you guy.

ok, so I buy the yarn and it's getting pretty close to when I should be driving off to get to work and I'm in the thrift store parking lot, tearing into a bag of the yarn and methodically wrapping it into a centrepull ball. A few people walk past and they probably wondered at me.

ok, 2nd pic is of my cat, the Sassy Butt. another of her with some ooold cotton yarn I thrifted. also the baby hat I'm making designed by Kate and a pair of socks for a friend who's b-day is the 16th. Wonder if I'll get those done in time...

so if i can figure out how to get them up I'll be happy.

Have a good night!
-e.

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Good morning!!

I suppose I shouldn't have deleted that 'testing' post so that for all time I could remember the exact date and time of when I started blogging, but OH WELL.

I'm just so glad to be out here!
All week and last I've been jotting notes on scrap paper of 'cool ideas for my weblog' tee hee...
I feel like a giddy teenager.

even though I'm not. I'm a stolid, contribuing member of society (I teach) and I'm almost 30.
I was so excited to turn 30. My husband Dan was dreading it, and kept talking about it which made me think I was turning 30 too,
you can see I have a hard time with time if you know what I mean (I am a spaz) so I'm only 29. Ack, I hate odd numbers.
... but I was excited because I had this little rule/idea that I could give myself permission, now that I would be 30, to do whatever the hell I wanted and not care about what other people thought. It was like this now-I-don't-have-to-care milestone or something
and the best part was that I was going to start more KIPing. I mean, I do anyway, but I was having fantasies of knitting in such places as Bible study, at all kinds of meetings for work etc. etc. Basically everywhere except while I'm teaching because that would be negligent.
(But I've even worked it in there... this summer I'm teaching the kids how to knit and we're doing lots with yarn like KoolAid dyeing (we did it last year and it was a success!) and pom pon balls etc.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

so... I should look at my list.

here are some words I wanted to make a poem out of;
limpet
tendril
timbrel
lentil
limpid
lintel
temple

ha. If I had comments I'd make you all make one.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

silly blogger, it's a haiku...

on my template it's SUPPOSED to read;
skAYn that's like a knitbloggers inside joke (written phonetically- I know how to do that, I'm a Montessori teacher) of yarn
disorder becomes
centrepullball

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

ah well, that's it for now. maybe tonight I'll take lots of pics and somehow get them posted up or something

-e.