A Wonderful Christmas Time

Okay, first things first - I did not receive a sculpture. Repeat, I did not receive a sculpture. Well, okay, I admit that I didn't really expect to get it this year, but I wondered if Shawn would decide to relieve himself of "reminders" for the next year or so until he finally caves. However, he could have decided that if he caves, I will come up with some other request that will be worse. Logical, I suppose. Poor Shawn :)

My last day of work was Thursday evening, and we grabbed some dinner and played the new Wii Party game Shawn picked up for me. Unfortunately, dinner made a rapid reappearance. Peking duck...eeww. I was not feeling well for most of the next day, headache, chills and other digestive complaints, so that totally blew our plan for

having lobsters and steamers on Christmas Eve, which I do every year. So the plan is to fit in today with our other plans. The oncoming blizzard may throw wrench into that, but we'll see. Yesterday I was fine, so we headed to Shawn's parents for Christmas.

They were very kind to us this year, which they always are.  Our dvd player in the bedroom blew so they got us a blue ray/dvd player, which we'll use in the living room and relegate the dvd in the livingroom to the bedroom.  I also got a new yarn swift from Knitpicks which is a nice upgrade from my old swift which is also on its very last legs.  I just wound a skein with the old one on Monday and wondered if it was going to make it through the skein. And the new one is larger and looks like it'll handle heavier skeins better.  

I made the spinach dip with tofu again, but this time, I added a bit of some Amazon Salsa Verde Picante Hot Sauce, an extra garlic clove and some Penzey's Garlic Salt.  You couldn't taste the heat of the hot sauce, but it perked it up remarkably.  I also made a tossed salad, which we still have gallons of in the fridge. I guess I'll have plenty to eat this week. I knew there wouldn't be any desserts I could eat there, and being sick the day before, I decided on Christmas morning I didn't feel like getting up extra early to make one for me.  So when I got home last night, I made some Hot and Spicy brownies.  I'd been having this idea running through my head for a bit, so I did a quick search and came up with a recipe. You just take a brownie mix and add a teaspoon of chili powder and 3/4 of a teaspoon of cayenne pepper.  They were good, you didn't really taste it until the after bite and then it was a warm heat.

I have been obsessing on the Tramline Cable Sweater.  I finished the front on the 20th, and I already have this much of the first sleeve.  I'm off this week, except for quick visits to the office, and I'm hoping to make major progress. I'll have to think about what to do next.  I am really focusing on stash reduction, so I'm trying to use worsted weight or larger. We'll see.

Stay tuned.