Favorite Things Monday – Halloween

Little Man insisted on being ‘100% up in my grill’ while I was sewing on Saturday, so I insisted that he help. See his cute little paw on the back-stitch knob?

See what I mean by ‘up in my grill’? He shot this photo at very close range.

And here’s what happened when he jumped on my back one too many times. Also his photo.

Ultimately, it was a huge success.

We dashed next door to meet his next-door-BF (aka Tinkerbell, also a Mafia creation) and traipsed through the neighborhood gathering candy.

I must confess — I trained Little Man to grab the “orange squares” whenever possible. tee-hee…

Seasonal change

New profile picture
Made at Portrait Illustration Maker

Notes to myself:
avatar 40-40-0-27-2-0-0-0-8C8554-53CC88-FFFFFF
-0-19-37-29-0-63-19-F7DEAC-FFCDDD-black

Crazytudinal Spectropic Mapsanity Life

Good friggin lord — I love you people!! I am completely bowled over by the incredible comment love. You rock!

***** read on if you like TMI *****

I’m only 1/2 awake, so it’s a list day:

Monday:
- Planned a Saturday trip to see Cate and snuggle wool at the Fiber Twist.

Tuesday
- Found references to myself as a “fat bitch” and “dyke” and “tyrant” online and posted here and felt a little better, and then felt TONS better when the comments started flying in, and I discovered new-to-me bloggers.

Wednesday:
- Finished TinkerBell costume for a Thurs ballet class. Burned gallons of midnight oil to finish it.

- Barely started Little Man’s Peter Pan costume, deadline: T minus 6 days.

- Found out from Alison that our town scheduled Halloween on Sat. 10/28. Crap! deadline: T minus 3 days! Must sew faster. Must cancel trip to Cate.

Thursday:
- The mayor watched the forecast, and re-scheduled Halloween for Sun. 10/29. Yippee! I can still visit Cate, and have enough time to finish the costume. Phew! Read Cate’s beautiful post and felt strong need to hug her asap.

- Scheduled closing for new house – Tuesday 10/31 10am. Yippee!

- Interviewed for a new job. Felt the chemistry, rocked the skills questions, and will know more in January. Yes, January.

- Got call from my Mom at 3pm – she’s coming to visit for the weekend, and will arrive at 9pm. Huh?? She lives -6- hours away; I never expected a surprise visit.

- Cancelled plans with Cate (major grr!) and a former colleague who is now taunting me with really really juicy gossip that I can only hear if I come to Northampton. Damn her! This is seriously juicy, people. She’s killin’ me.

- Alerted Wifey to pending Mom visit. We both freaked about dirty house. Soothing occured. Soothing helped. Then I reminded Wifey that I’m going to the BSO with a former MIT colleague who now works at the BSO (i.e. free tickets!). I’ve never been. I want to go. I struggle. Mom says go. Wifey says go (with a little guilt thrown in for good measure).

- I see my girl; we eat Thai. We go to the BSO. We enter through the Stage Door. We share a bathroom with musicians. It’s amazing and intense and scary and upper-class and beautiful and strange. They perform Schoenberg’s Moses und Aron. I know nothing about the Bible, so I read and try to keep up, and my girl is fabulous with the lay explanation: “Now Mafia, Aron is Moses’ PR guy. He’s trying to make the Israelites understand this unseen god, but Moses is kinda hard-line about the whole thing/ … \so they’re having crazy orgies and drinkin’ and smokin’ pot and acting all crazy, and when Moses comes back from his spa trip in the mountains, he’s horrified. They say, “well, you didn’t tell us we couldn’t have orgies.” So Moses gives them the 10 Commandments so everyone has clear expectations….” Thank Dog she was there to enlighten the Heathen-Mafia. I’ve never read the Bible, and perhaps I should. It’s like, kinda important, huh?

- I ride home, sleep on the late-late train, and walk into a clean house and NO guilt-attitude from Wifey. In fact, Mom and Wifey are chatting away, and Mom’s drinking my favorite beer, that she bought it because she knows I like it. Wow. That’s pretty cool. We talk until 1AM! 1AM! I’m tooooo old for this, because I’m hurtin’ today. snoooooze. honk. shuuu.

Privacy

If you know my real name, please please please don’t use it, in the comments here or anywhere else. There are many reasons I choose to write anonymously, the most emotional is because I’ve been stalked before.

But as of today, I have a new reason – I found a horrible evil bitchy post about me on a blog. It’s 80% inaccurate and uses my real name and my picture. The post makes the author sound like an immature idiotic crybaby, and makes me sound like a responsible adult. Clearly she doesn’t know me well. But it still hurts.

If you know my real name and feel the need to go hunting for this blog, please open a new browser window so it can’t be tracked through SiteMeter or some other tracking tool. I’d hate to see her show up here. Ideally, I’d prefer that you ignore her little rant, and spend your hard-earned blog-time writing an emphathetic supportive glowing and virtual-hug comment to this post. I need a little boost today.

Fanks.

Favorite Things Monday – Fall

Favorite Things Monday has been in time-out these past few weeks. I apologize to the people who kindly told me they like FTMon, only to see it disappear. You know how it is — you stop exercising and before you know it, you’re five pounds heavier with a daily craving for cookies at 4pm on the dot, and you rationalize away your guilt by saying you never really liked walking anyway. Avoiding? No, not me.

So here I am, getting over the proverbial hump with a photo of my kid. Can you find my favorite thing?

In other weekend news, I saw two antique school desks on the side of the road, screeched to a halt and tossed this one into my wation-stagon. A little refinishing and she’ll be perfect in Little Man’s playroom in the new house. [new house? did I really just say that? who am I?]

In honor of my commitment to sew all of Little Man’s Halloween costumes until he fires me, I’m cutting and cutting and freakin’ cutting fleece for his Peter Pan costume. In a moment of pre-house generosity, I offered to make his next-door-best-friend’s Tinkerbell costume too. But now Little Man is jealous and wants to be Tinkerbell too. Oy. I bought extra Tinkerbell supplies, so I hope to tame the gender-bending beast with a nice flowery headband. Who said that Peter Pan must wear a feather in his cap? Anyway, these piles represent many hours of my time, two costumes, and DULL scissors. Note to self, call the scissors guy asap.

I caught the Eris bug again this weekend and worked about 30 rows on the collar. I know it’s not terribly exciting, but it’s progress.

I’ve also been working away at my Sophie’s Toes socks, and I LOVE the socks just as much as I love the yarn. Just to prove how spot-on Emily was in choosing the color, I’ve included my favorite tea mug, something I consider a fashion statement, not just a cup.

Wifey’s been busy too. She’s 6 months into the surrogacy that I can’t (contractually) blog about (hrumpf). What a cute belly.

Everyone says this, but for sure, I know the best knitters in the whole world. First of all, my MIT SnB Katie placed an order at Patternworks and bought me a Knitter’s Rule Junior! Ever since I saw Jess’s, I’ve been wanting one, so I was completely surprised when Katie delivered it to my office. Thanks!! Finally, I’ll be able to measure my gauge without my gauge ho. Yes!

Next up … Kim. After exchanging emails for a few weeks prior to the Boston KnitOut, I bailed at the last minute. But Kim, giver of door prizes, saved my door prize and mailed it to me! Isn’t that the sweetest, most thoughtful thing ever? Kim – what’s this yarn? It’s lovely! And big thanks for the chocolate. Cappacino chocolate, jealous? Yum!

Mafia, signing off

A Cardigan for Arwen KAL

Ever since I laid eyes on the Cardigan for Arwen, I’ve been smitten. Cables? Love ‘em. Kate Gilbert? Love her. But there’s also a slightly less knit-noble reason: Arwen is a strong sexy character and Liv Tyler is breath-takingly beautiful. I’d move to Rivendell for her. What’s not to love??

Now, if only someone would design a sweater for Galadriel. Meow.

…hello, Mafia? get your mind out of the gutter and back to the knitting…

I’ve been obsessing about this sweater for the past few days, and whenever I see Beth on the train, we discuss little else. So clearly we should invite more people into this conversation, right? Well, we did.

Go see the brand spankin’ new: A Cardigan for Arwen Knit-Along!

It’s still a baby blog, but Beth’s creating a button, and we’re planning contests and prizes. For now, since the Interweave Knits Winter 2006 issue won’t hit newstands until November 14th, we’ll be discussing yarn options and hunting for sale prices.

To join us, drop an email to ACardiganForArwen AT gmail DOT com and we’ll sign you up. Fun!

MP3 hosting?

Can anyone recommend a good FREE service for hosting MP3s, so I can post them to the blog?

Cheering

I woke to Little Man and Wifey engaged in a festival of stubborness. I arrived to clouds across Boston, and my office tea stash completely depleted. I’m sleepy, crampy, anxious about our pending real estate ‘investment’ and generally feeling mopey today.

So I called my little brother and sang HAPPY BIRTHDAY as loudly and dramatically as I could. He’s 25 today, as well as cute, smart, single, 6+ feet tall with sparkling blue eyes and a joyous smile, able to fix a car, loves his crazy sister, mows the lawn for our Mom, speaks his mind, and enjoys a handknit gift:

Any takers? Hiring standards are rigorous. Merely adequate candidates need not apply.

Then I clicked through the Interweave Knits Winter ‘06 preview again. Must knit, in this order:
- A Cardigan for Arwen (as if my crush on Kate Gilbert needs any assistance),
- Refined Raglan,
- Old World Booties (adorable option for those small baby gifts),
- Venezia Pullover (watch out Sta*more, here comes Eunny),
- Pewter Coat (with a smaller collar), and
- Arctic Diamonds Stole.

I’m cheering up.

From the Mouths of Babes

Friday
“Mom, you were on the train?”

“Yes honey, that’s Mommy’s purple train.”

“Wow Mom! That’s coooooool.”

Sunday
“I can paint your face if you want.”

“OK, sure.”

giggle.giggle.giggle. “Green on your nose?”

“OK”

“That tickle you?”

“A little, but it’s fine.”

giggle.giggle.giggle. “Mommy, you a crazy boy.”

Blueberry Pie socks

Lots of house stuff. Lots of negotiation. Lots of emotional roller-coastering.

But I have socks. Socks.save.sanity(what little is left). And the yarn, oh how I love this yarn.

Aren’t they purrr-dee? Look ma, no pooling.

However, there’s one potential problem. I may have started the heel too late. Mind you, I’m not a knitting perfectionist, so I tend to leave mistakes in my knitting. But I’m worried about having a mistake that I’ll be stepping on constantly. What do you think?

Heel pooch in its natural habitat

Heel pooch after a good bear tug

ETA: 24 Yes. 4 No. Now that’s a majority.

I confess. I ripped it out on the train on Friday. The man sharing my 3-seater was staring at me like I was crazy. As if knitting isn’t weird enough, apparently frogging is especially weird. Who knew?