Seven Days

Actually, it's been more like two weeks since I blogged last.  I've had a rough couple of weeks, and last weekend I skipped the blogging.  I was attempting to recover through fiber therapy; therefore, I did nothing but knit and spin the whole weekend.  I even blew off going to Concord for knitting last Sunday because I wasn't motivated enough to get out of my pajamas. 

Suffice it to say, I haven't written my goals for this week or last. The week before last, I was out quite a bit, and I don't think I made it home before 8 pm any night before Friday.  I did get to see my friend Vera K for dinner, as she was speaking at our alma mater, Wellesley College.  I was last at Wellesley about three years ago, when I visited the career services department, to meet with the career counselor who specializes in assisting alums who wish to leave the legal profession (i.e. lawyer burnouts).  During that visit I was astonished about how much had changed, and this time I was astonished about how much had change since the last visit.  It was great to see Vera again.  I'll spare you with the blow by blow for that week, but I also finally made it down to Derry for the Friday night knitting group at Yarn and Fiber.  It was really good to see everyone.  I'm going to have to make a serious effort to show up more often.

Last weekend, I started spinning some fiber I bought from Ingrid Byrd either at NH Sheep & Wool or at the Wool Tour, many long years ago.   I'm not sure why I bought it as I'm not really into browns, but I do like it, even though earth tones are not my thing at all.  Maybe I'll make something with it and give it away. 

Still plugging away at the Kyoto jacket.  Jury's still out.  And I'm using up more yarn than I thought, but we'll see.

Last Sunday, I decided to take my absence from guild as an opportunity to dye up the Optim and the 4 oz of  Cormo & Silk Roving (75%/25%) from Foxfire Fiber & Designs at Springdelle Farm that I had spun up.  I'm not thrilled with the color of the Optim, it was supposed to be jade, and I think it's closer to a kelly green.  I may attempt overdying it.  The Cormo & Silk roving dyed a darker shade of plum than I intended, but I like it.  I love the way the silk picks up the color differently. 

This weekend my mother came down from Maine for the weekend.  She's back there for the summer, and she'll be going back to AZ in the fall.  We ended up at Taipei Tokyo twice, once on Friday night and once for lunch today.  We do weird things when she comes down. Friday night, we hit Ocean State Job lots and bought a bunch of random crap.  Saturday we went to the Used Book Superstore and bought way too many books.  I was seduced by several ridiculous titles, I hope the books live up to them.  Then we went to MacKinnons in Salem, and saw the biggest lobster I have ever seen for sale.  It was crazy.  So of course, I had to take pictures with my blackberry.  Notice how its claw is as big as a regular size lobster.  We didn't buy it, but we really wanted to.  It was crazy.

Today, we did a little field trip to Lowe's across the street.  Kiwi had pretty much destroyed the tray of her table top perch, and the laminate was coming apart, because the Princess of Destruction likes to shake her water and slop it over the sides to aggravate us.  After repeated dunkings the laminate particle board had begun to deteriorate and she'd begun to start ripping it apart.  So I bought a board about the same width and twice the length as they didn't have square pieces, some 2x2's, wood screws and a handsaw to cut the board in half, and I built a new tray bottom today with my Dremel.   You will note that although she was very suspicious of the new bottom at first, it took her no time at all to start gnawing on the 2x2's.  So I'm sure I'll have to replace it again, but it was a heck of lot cheaper than buying her a new playgym.

I also bought a some brackets to hang the window boxes on the railings so I installed those today too.  And I picked up a topsy turvy thing for pepper plants.  I intend to do some container gardening this year, even though I've been saying that for a few years.  I'm going to make it easy on myself and buy plants this year though.

We also managed to book the flights for our cruise in December and book the hotel in Miami for the night before the cruise.  Shawn and I were able to use our miles, so that was cool.

In allergy news, I got my epi-pen.  I was shocked by how huge it was.  Also Shawn and I tried rice milk ice cream and a cashew nut based ice cream.  They were both a no go for me.  Didn't care for them at all.  I tried rice milk in pancakes last weekend instead of the soy and they were an improvement.  This weekend, I tried the Ener G Egg Replacer in blueberry muffins.  I thought it was fine, and I didn't taste anything off putting.  I also tried applesauce in brownies as an egg replacement.  They were okay, but just okay.  Next time I do brownies, I'll try the egg replacer and see how that goes. 

Today I had an unintended egg exposure, because I'm a moron and forgot there's egg in fried rice, until I ate a big chunk of egg in it.  My face swelled up again, and I did have some mild digestive distress, so I guess egg is completely out.  Sigh.

Anyway, that's all she wrote for this post. Stay tuned.