Monday, February 22, 2010

Knitting, Road Trip, Libary.

I want to share how ridiculous my local library is (yes mom, I spelled it wrong in the title on purpose. I mean porpoise).  I searched their website for "secret life of a knitter" (shut up about what I was searching for).  And this appeared:

Searching for: secret life of a knitter  No titles found (0 hits)   Did you mean secret life of ah knitter?

Get that?  Of AH knitter?  Strange, I think to myself.  I was almost positive that it was the regular "a" not "ah", spelled out phonetically.  Now, correct me if I'm wrong (no), but usually those prompts are there because they know something I don't know.  They're all in their database like "This chick is CRAZY.  Doesn't she know it's Ah Knittah?  Sucka."  So I click "secret life of ah knitter" like they want me to:

Searching for: secret life of ah knitter  No titles found (0 hits)

Now that's service.

I haven't blogged in a while.  And I had all these ideas to blog about and it became TOO MANY IDEAS for how long it's been so here's a recap.

I made Jesse a hat the weekend before last (cast on Friday night, weaved in the ends on Sunday afternoon):


Brittney, Susan and I had our craft night last week with all original members:



HEY BRITTNEY HOW MANY PEOPLE DO YOU THINK TOUCHED THAT CUP?

Jesse and I went on a road trip down the coast and then spent the weekend at Judi and Darin's last Friday:




And we did what we did best.  We ate, drank, and were awkward.  As follows:


And unfortunately while we were in Blind George's getting ice cream, I saw this:


That is a genuine play from Coos Bay.  Coos Bay is known for many great things, such as Prefontaine, Katie Williams-Baxter-Williams-Bray-Blom, and, apparently, that play.  It was in the discounted $1 section, and after holding it for a second I put it back and got ice cream instead.  And am I the only one who noticed what their initials spelled?

Moving on...

Having a Nana is awesome.  I don't think I've been the best granddaughter yet, but Hank has been making me go out so much lately.  See her Valentine gifts to me:


"But Katie!  What about the cats!"  Avast ye, hordes.  Here are pictures from the cats just tonight.  A very chic photo of Cinnamon, and a classic example of how Suki needs to be touching one of us at all times.



Thursday, February 11, 2010

Karma Police, Craft Night, Granddaughter.

Yesterday was the third installment of the new and improved (okay, just new) Craft Night!  Only two of the three original members were in attendance, but that's more than half so it's not bad.

Brittney at said Craft Night:


Remember that scarf I was supposed to be making for Susan?  For her birthday last month?  I WEAVED IN THE ENDS. (craftster link - leave comments if you have a profile there.  I'm desperate for attention.)

 

 

 

 

It's gorgeous.  And when held length-wise it goes from the floor up to Jesse's shoulders (he's 6').  It's huge!  I really want to make one for myself now.  But you know, I get distracted:

 

Hence the Karma Police reference.  What goes around comes back around.  I put Susan's scarf on top of some books on our bookshelf and left it there for over a week when all it needed was to have the ends weaved in.  And then I started that hat.  And got really really far into that hat.  So you know what happened?  DO YOU KNOW WHAT HAPPENED, INTERNET?  Of course you do, because I know you're the one who tricked me into not taking my own advice (after having to order more yarn twice for Susan's scarf).  I ran out of yarn not 5 rows after I took that picture.

The good news?  I'm a granddaughter now.  That's right!  I sent a letter off to Brittney's nana to apply to be a granddaughter.  I typed up a resume.  I hand wrote a cover letter.  I got a letter of recommendation (thanks Judi!).  Was it worth it?* 

(For the record, I attempted to format my original resume from Google Docs so my 9 readers could see it.  Google Docs and I are not speaking right now.  Pretend you saw it.  I talked about how I peed in a heater vent one time.  Maybe twice.)

*Yes.

This is her reply.  The glorious white scrap paper is covering MY NANA'S (oh yes) full name and address.  Did I do good Nana (click on the picture)?

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Multnomah Falls

Internet, I've got an unfortunate bone to pick with you.  We've been through a lot.  Yahoo games.  Attempting to learn German three (drei) times.  Neopets.  Wikipedia.

It's happened before, I understand.  I'll accidentally click out of a page and it'll delete the heart-felt email I just typed up.  But if you ever, ever, delete a blog post I've been working on for two nights again, you're going down.  You're going down like a freshman.   When I press control z, I expect you to undo my last move.  Not delete my entire blog entry and immediately tell Blogger to SAVE AS FAST AS POSSIBLE AND DON'T REMEMBER ANYTHING ELSE.  I'm glad we have that worked out.

Moving on...you may have noticed I have eight, count them EIGHT, followers.  Being famous is a little harder than I thought it would be, but at least I can still go grocery shopping without many problems.

Side note, you should go over to Jesse's blog and start following him.  He's posting projects and art that he's doing in school.  He also pointed out to me he discovered he could follow his own blog.  So guess what?  I now have NINE followers!  Suck on that, Globetrotters!

So this last Saturday Jesse woke me up at seven o'clock in the morning (slowly trying to kill me) and told me we were going out with Hank.  Oh, Hank.  You almost make me forget about the loss of Ford Escort #1.

Hank took us downtown for breakfast and then over to Multnomah Falls.  While I am very excited for Hank to be in our lives, I do not appreciate the exercise all these trips bring.  She said something about how she knew we were going to be eating at Chili's later or something and that's why we had to go on a hike.  I'm not really sure, I couldn't hear her over the NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM.

FOTOS (the first one is worth clicking to see it full size):


Jesse thought he couldn't go on the trail because we didn't have a leash.


THAT IS SILLY, JESSE.


What ever could he be looking at?


Yeah, I'm kind of a creep.



Luckily they had a Rash receptacle (often forgotten necessity at waterfalls).


And luckily my husband is super adorable.


Look at Hank!  And check out the zoom on this camera!  We were, you know, really far away and all.




If you look closely at that last picture (except if dad is reading this...  he is not allowed to look closer), you can see a rectangle outline on my left boob.  That my friends is my license and debit card.  Come on, cleavage caddy.

You want to know how lame we are?  We've been going to the gym regularly for some time now, and while I thought we weren't too out of shape, this hike (while uphill) wiped us out so much we missed church the next day.  And it's not that we didn't get enough sleep.  I think an exercise intervention might be in order.

You're probably wondering where the poor cats are during all of this (no you're not).  You know, same old, same old.


Yeah, yeah, yeah, these are old photos (re: Cinnamon's shaved arm after his surgery last October) but the technique is still the same.


Oh, and I know I originally took this picture because of it's cuteness (post Multnomah Falls hike):


But Cinnamon and Suki are making the exact same face.  The exact. same. face.  Look.  Just look, please.  Different fur, SAME FACE.  Confirm that I am not crazy.

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

The Mattress.

When Jesse and I were first married, our mode of sleeping was on my futon.  It was classy.

Then friends of ours asked if we wanted a king sized -- excuse me, California king sized mattress.  No frame, no box spring, just the mattress.  We said yes.  To a mattress on the floor.  That was another level of classy.

We have had that mattress since like the 3rd month after we got married.  It's lived through a lot.  Two previous owners before us (that we know of -- I try not to think about it), the Lord of the Fleas epidemic, the first time Jesse admitted he loved Cinnamon (Cin had an "accident" near the bed and I said we might have to put him down if this happens more and Jesse, who previously hated the cat, had a small conniption fit when I mentioned putting him down).

Needless to say, it was a long time coming to get a new bed.  We were both very excited when we decided to spend 2009's tax money on a new bed frame and mattress from IKEA.  We love Ikea.  The lady who sold us our car told us she hated Ikea because it made her feel like a sheep, like everyone was getting herded while there.  If that's the case then, baaa.  Sign me up.

Last night Jesse informs me that no, I will not be weaving in the ends of Susan's scarf, but we were going to Ikea to buy our new bedframe and mattress.  Originally we thought we would have the mattress delivered.  And then I was reading on Ikea how much it weighed, and the mattress comes ROLLED UP.  I am not kidding you.  



Please ignore the mess.  While the mess itself isn't completely out of the ordinary, we've been so preoccupied with Hank in our life that we haven't been spending much time at home, except of course to leave our plates in the sink and not put our clean clothes away.

Now, I suppose many people out there would enjoy putting something like a bedframe together.  They may feel that it makes them more safe, because they know they did it right.   I am not one of these people.  While I do enjoy putting things together, I don't enjoy thinking about spending upwards of $700 just to have the bed break on me in the middle of the night.  Also considering I had us waste about half an hour trying to shove some dowels into a hole that THEY WERE NOT SUPPOSED TO GO INTO.  My bad.  Suki however had a great time playing superintendent.


Note her astutely letting me know that I shouldn't have tools laying around on the floor.  Please don't write me up, it'll never happen again.


She would come in every 5 or 10 minutes, walk around the joint, lick herself a little, and leave.  I think she was impressed.  We at least pretended to work hard whenever she came in.  Cinnamon however hates change and commotion and spent most of the night hiding from us.  I have no photos of this.


Here is the before (well, "after" before, we had stripped the bed to move it into the second bedroom and Jesse was about ready to move it and I said WAIT I HAVE TO TAKE PICTURES FOR THE BLOG):


Here is the after:


Yes.  Shut up.  That is a "made" bed.  I'm not a big fan of making beds.  I do not find it offensive when someone shows me their bedroom and the bed is thrashed.  Sure, put your clothes away, your belongings in the proper place.  As long as the comforter is somewhere on the bed, your room is clean.

I immediately removed my pants and crawled into bed after taking that photo.  I was trying to convince myself to take it in the morning, but WE ALL KNOW THAT WOULDN'T HAVE HAPPENED.  And the bed will never be "made" again, so it was then or never.

As Jesse stated it, we are officially grown ups now.  But I'm not going to lie.  It depresses me a little bit that I can't jump on the bed anymore.

Sad face.

Monday, February 1, 2010

Hank, Hanks, Shower, Confession.

I know, I know.  "Where have you been, Katie?"  Well, there's someone new in my life.  Someone I'd like you to meet.  Internet, meet Hank:


Oh, Hank.  Stop that.  You're making me blush.

I was thinking about it, and I don't think we have any pictures of the truck.  The truck was a very sturdy '92 Toyota pickup.  And we both hated it.  It's been a long haul, especially for Jesse (it was given to him 4 years ago), and after our car accident (2+ years ago), the truck was the only car we had.  I tried to be grateful for the truck.  And that's what I kept telling myself, JUST BE GLAD YOU HAVE A CAR.  But I was ungrateful.  And when we realized that we could afford a new car, we abandoned him in the parking lot of the Kia dealership faster than we could say "sayonara".  I'm sorry, truck.  I mean, not really, but kinda.

And not that this is relevant at all, but this little piece of crap kept me from taking a shower this morning:


Right in the corner!  He knew I wouldn't disturb him that far above the tub.  He was trying to lure me to my death trying to kill it.  I took a picture with the flash on our new camera that turned out so good I had to delete it and take one without the flash.  I wanted to throw up on the screen.  But you know what, spider?  You know what?  You have an appointment with the vacuum cleaner later tonight.  That's right, I'll be seeing you at death o'clock.  I don't take having to wash my hair in the sink lightly.

Yesterday my amazing, wonderful, loving husband bought me some more beautiful yarn.


I ended up carrying it around the rest of the day because it just felt so pretty.  And so you know what happened in my dreams?  My amazing, wonderful, loving husband was knitting gloves with my yarn! How DARE he!  The jealousy, the rage.  I got over it (maybe), but it did make me work more on my sock cuff with the birthday yarn he got me.  With all that time I saved not having to take a shower I just stood in front of the sink knitting.  With all that lovely yarn in the house I have to use it up to make sure he doesn't knit something before I do.  Nevermind that he has no idea what I'm doing.  One more row, one more row.

There's something I've been avoiding talking about.  Yes, Susan.  It's about you.  You know how I was going to finish that scarf of yours over a week ago?  You know what happened?  I ran out of yarn right here:

 

In case you can't tell, that sucker just needs to be made into a tip and that's it.  The heartache.  You readers cannot imagine, unless this exact thing has happened to you.  



Oh my.  It's so frustrating.  I realized what I did wrong, and yes, I learned to always buy a little more than I think I'll need.  The order comes in tomorrow.  Oh, I just realized I didn't say why this predicament is SO frustrating.  I, like a dummy, used different yarn than the pattern called for, and didn't check the yardage.  I've already had to order twice as much yarn because I bought 50g balls instead of 100g.