electronic wish list

- canon t2i digital camera
- epson perfection v500 photo & negative scanner

okay, it's not a long list. but that's a good thing, right?

cooperative chaos

when things go crazy and every one pitches in to control the chaos - that's when things get good.

burt has bloomed!

mustache socks!

i came home tonight to find mustache socks in my mailbox. that's right - mustache socks! i love them!

what i've learned

yes, i must do more driving. slow, relaxed driving. driving less for the destination. driving more for the journey. driving to drive. driving to photograph the drive. driving to breath.

burt's second appendage

not only is burt's first appendage continuing to grow, but he's shooting out a second one now, too!

the drive home

today's drive home included a pretty moth,



a drab-colored lizard,



a photo op i couldn't pass up,



a cupcakery at the base of the mountain,



and a firetruck. not a bad drive home. :)

sigh

i'm irritated. i should not be irritated.

yesterday at work i found myself fully revived by the thought of getting out of town for a couple of days. when i got home, i started running some numbers and looking at the weather map. as i saw both of them as detrimental to the dream, i found myself fully deflated. so this morning i chose to follow the joy and i started driving. i knew once i made it to southern kentucky i'd be out of the severe thunderstorm warning. and i knew once i made it that far, i'd might as well head to the smoky mountains.

so i did. and the drive was fabulous.






i stopped in greensburg for a bit to take some photos because the sign on the interstate told me i should visit historic greensburg. i had breakfast at an actual sit-down restaurant because i didn't need to focus on getting anywhere as quickly as possible.






i stopped at the artisan center i like near lexington and spent some time shopping through the unique wares.



i stopped at two fiesta outlet centers, buying several pieces that will augment my collection quite nicely. i even thought about continuing to drive past the smoky mountains because i was having such a good day.

but i love the preserve resort, and i love the smoky mountains. so of course i stopped. and so far it's been downhill from there. i'm supposed to be relaxed, and instead i just want to go home. if i leave by 10am tomorrow, i can make it in time to enjoy the lasagna party. and it gives me an hour to argue with the office folks about why i think i should get a refund for the second night i already paid for.

meh.

thoughts on tuesday

we're slated to get more storms tomorrow. strong storms.

i'm antsy. sitting in the house listening to it storm for two days does not sound interesting to me. or restful. or fun. i want to go. i want to do. i want to drive.

i've always felt the need for a destination, even though i know what i crave is the journey.

gray skies

when the storms started this evening, i thought to myself, "self, maybe you should do some yarn shopping when you get off work and wait out the rain." then my last guest was returning 35 sheets of scrapbook paper and her daughter was shrieking as i was locating each sheet on her 122-item receipt. add in the fact that three or four times she had me stop what i was doing because on second thought, maybe she wanted to keep that piece ... and i shot out of the store about as quickly as possible.

as it turned out, the rain wasn't that bad. hard enough i had to close the sunroof for part of the drive, but that's to be expected during a storm, i suppose.



the headband i showed you yesterday? it looks like a ball of yarn now. pretty, right?

magic number?

229. that's right. 229. i've posted every day for the past 229 days. except for yesterday. yesterday i forgot. completely forgot. i got home from work, and i never turned on my computer. instead i worked on the little crocheted goodness you see above. it's not done, yet, but i figured if i didn't post this morning i might forget again. ;)

it makes me giddy

when i watered the plants last night, my beans hadn't broken through the ground, yet. this evening when i got home, some were standing a good 2" high! they look happy and healthy, which makes me very happy.


i cut some lettuce and spinach tonight, too. and while i was out there, i couldn't help but pull the first couple of radishes. they were maybe 3/4" across. tiny. but ... they're my radishes! and they were tasty! :)

variety

i am loving the size difference of the dodecahedron points from a variety of yarns and hooks. i am also loving the brown & pink mixed yarn on the left. isn't it fabulous?

taking his time

burt still hasn't bloomed, but his flower stalk is still growing.

secret crafting

i sure do wish i could show you what i made last night. it's fantastic.

crocheted jewelry

so one of my goals for the year is to cut my yarn stash in half. the problem is, the more i look at crochet projects to use up my stash the more i realize i need to buy more yarn. for example, i've fallen in love with making dodecahedrons for all my friends who are popping out babies. so far that's meant i've purchased three new skeins of yarn because the yarn in my stash isn't well suited for that. so it's been a little self-defeating ... but totally worth it! i'm having so much fun! :)

the yarn in the picture above is what was left after making johnny's dodecahedron. (yup, that's right. i'm calling him johnny. i'm not even sorry about that, dear fred.) it's the first yarn i tried to use for a headband, but there wasn't enough. so instead i used it to make some jewelry, and i'm quite pleased. the front flower is attached to a ring. i'd crocheted the ring a couple of weeks ago, and i like how soft and comfy it is. the flower behind that is made to attach to a bobby pin so i can wear it in my hair. (i'm not sure if i will, though. it might be overkill. a flower on my finger AND in my hair? we'll see.) and the bracelet is simply a series of chains that i kept crocheting until the ball of yarn was gone. :)

that's right - the ball of yarn is gone. and that my friends, is progress. ;)

nccd - part 2

when breakfast plan b is almond french toast stuffed with magic* and chocolate chips - it's very easy to not feel silly for forgetting to pick up pancake mix. :)

*magic = cream cheese + cool whip + powdered sugar

national chocolate chip day

i'm not working today, so we celebrated national chocolate chip day at the store last night. would you believe no one else knew of today's holiday? thankfully they were more than willing to eat the cookies once they heard about it.

now if only i'd thought to buy pancake mix to make chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast. :)

lilacs

i brought some lilac shoots from my mom's house last weekend. the three little guys are doing quite well in their new home, but the taller one (you know, the one with a chance of blooming next year)is having some trouble. it's only been a week though, maybe it'll bounce back.

roma tomatoes

as i was working in the garden yesterday, my neighbors asked if i wanted a tomato plant. yes. yes, i did want a tomato plant. i got to see their garden, which is gorgeous. and they ended up giving me SIX roma tomato plants! SIX! plus, he said he may bring by a red bell pepper plant because he thinks he has too many. they've got a garden that's easily 10'x20', and he may have more peppers than will fit. crazy, right?

spinach

i thinned my spinach plants today. the thinnings made an excellent addition to my chicken salad sandwich. :)

shorter

key word for this week's haircut? shorter. shorter, shorter, shorter. it's not quite as short as i'd like it on the sides ... but it's pretty close. and i'll be back by my hair stylist in about three weeks, so i may have her trim it up. and go shorter.

thwarted, again

last night i tried working up a quick crocheted headband, but i ran out of yarn. so this morning i tried with a different yarn, but i ran out again. sigh. why does my yarn stash not want me to make this headband?

digging and planting

i got to help mom and dad with some gardening this weekend. by "help" i mean i was more than willing to take stray lilies, daffodils and lilacs off their hands. because i'm "helpful" that way. :) the lilacs have been planted under the kitchen window. i know they probably won't bloom for a couple of years, but when they do - the kitchen window will do a fine job of letting their aroma waft through the house. the lilies and daffodils are hanging out in containers (covered in dirt and watered) until their final destination is chosen.

and now i believe i'll spend my evening doing two things: crocheting and playing with my freshly cut hair. i do love freshly cut hair.

another good drive home

spending mother's day with my mother? superb.

weighing the options

i've got an appointment to get my hair cut on monday. the shorter my hair is, the better i think i look with contacts. in the end, i see better with my glasses, but contacts have a lot of pros. they don't steam up when i open the oven door. they don't have to be dried off when i'm walking in the rain. i sleep in them, so i can see as soon as i wake up in the morning. there's no edge to my field of focus. plus, i like being able to wear sunglasses. now if the clouds would just go away, i could enjoy that perk. :)

i took two sets of "glasses in the bathroom mirror" photos today. the first with my big camera, the second with my little camera. why both cameras? well, the big camera has more options and takes artsier photos (more customization for focus, mostly, and better use of natural light), but the little camera uses a memory card that fits into my laptop's built-in reader. yup. i'm that lazy. although as i'm typing this, i realize that the card reader for my big camera connects via usb, which of course fits in my laptop. so, maybe it wasn't so much laziness as a failure to think it through. i was thinking i'd need to get my big mac set back up to read the card from the big camera. nope. not so much.

you didn't notice the ten minutes i minimized blogger to go find my card reader and upload the photos from the big camera, did you? but i did. those photos at the top are from my big camera. they're better than the one i was originally going to settle for from the little camera. maybe i should just buy a new big camera that uses the cards that fit in the laptop to save myself the trouble of having to do all of that again next time. yes, the trouble. i'm not lazy at all.

well, my big mac is still sitting in the dining room from when i brought it home last week. that is because i'm lazy.

speaking of fungus

remember the fungus growing in the wood pile? this one is much larger. :) i found it today, though based on it's size i'd say it's been growing for quite some time. it's a good 14" long and probably 9" wide. yup. not a bad size, right? it's growing out of a bag of mulch in my garage. or, at least, it was. i probably killed it when i found it this evening. my poking at it disconnected it from the bag, which i'm guessing was its food source. i poked at it because i wasn't sure what it was. but now i'm pretty sure it's a fungus.




i mean, look at the gills on the underbelly. it's gotta be a fungus.

gills? i think they're gills.

what's that? a bud?

i do believe burt is going to bloom. i'm very excited about this as i've had burt for almost exactly one year and i love him very much. not as much as i love the gal who gifted him to me, of course, but the proper amount a person should love a succulent that was gifted to them by an amazing gal. yes. i love him that much. very excited.

frost warning

lawn trash bags and a staple gun might be a bit hokey, but it'll have to do. i heard at work today that we've got a frost warning for tonight, and when you're driving home at 11pm the options are limited. here's hoping the li'l guys weather the weather.

the garden, currently

box number 1: spinach (front four rows) and a mixture of lettuces (back three rows).



box number 2: watermelon radishes (front two rows), cherry belle radishes (middle two rows), albino cucumbers (back left) and pickalot cucumbers (back right).



in other news, my wood pile is growing some fungus. :)

happy early birthday, matey

tomorrow's my brother's birthday. he's in town for the weekend, so we had a birthday cake. a pirate birthday cake. yarrr.

sights of sunday

- a gorgeous sunset that lit the sky on fire
- a night rainbow (kid you not, we could see both ends and follow the entire arc across the sky)
- potted romaine lettuce (it was tasty, too!)