I'mmmm baaaaack

Sorry its been so long but the times are weird around here. Since Rob lost his job my schedule is way off. Not sure when I'll get the computer since he's always on it job searching and networking, but nothing yet. He does have an interview at the end of the month in FL with Office Depot. Not sure which way to go with this one since I've always said I wouldn't want to live in FL...ever! I don't do that kind of heat, or humidity. And the bugs down there are legendary. And my dog is smallish and could be eaten by an alligator. And I'm large-ish and don't look good in a bathing suit so what would I wear in that kind of heat. And how's a knitter suppose to live in FL, what would I knit that I could use, other that light socks I guess. But a job is a job and we gotta do what we gotta do.

Big Blue Sweater....FINISHED!

I finally finished this sweater.  I love it, but knitting a plus sized sweater takes forever.  At least it seems like forever.  I started this in October of 2008 and finished in April 2009.  Not too bad considering the spring I've had but long enough.  If you knit a lot of small projects, scarves, socks, and such, something this big seems HUGE!  The hardest part of knitting something is getting the right size for you.  It seems easy enough, just knit and measure and knit and measure some more.  And if you don't have the right size, you can take it apart and have a do over.  Who wants a do over except a loser?  But I had to do this several times on the sleeves, the width was for a stick person.  Unfortunately I am not only fluffy in the middle, but fluffy all over.  It's a bit plain too, but when you are more worried about fit, you don't also want to worry about the pattern.  I am celebrating the purchase of the yarn, pattern and needles and a completed project.  Now what do knit next....something smallish I think.  

IT'S A BOY!!!!!

We adopted a new kitty this weekend. His name is Jac (like Jac Sparrow from Priates, which is my sons favorite movie). And that's the name he came with and we were "good wit it", as Captain Jack would say. He is the most affectionate cat we've ever had. And I hear male cats usually are. He's also the thinnest cat we've ever had but that's probably because he's only 3 months old. He still has his claws but hasn't used them on us or anything else yet!!! I hope to hit the lottery so we have have him declawed. Now Holly on the other hand isn't too sure of him just yet. She's hoping he just goes away. Holly tried to chase him and play but Jac just runs away for her.....for now.

Little Blue Riding Hood

Finally finished something - this Little Red (blue) Riding Hood's hooded scarf. I realized that all my winter coats have no hoods and with the snow we've had I needed one. Seems like we've had snowflakes that could knock you down they're so big and without a hood your hair gets wet. This has also been a distraction from knitting my sweater that it TAKING EVAH!!!

Hello, I'm back

Not that I was missed but here I am.
I just have to share the funniest thing I saw last night. We have deer running around our neighborhood. Nothing new but they are fun to see. Well, last night the family was coming home around 9pm and as we were pulling into the neighborhood, I noticed a huge deer in my neighbors front yard. Just a walkin' around like it owed the place. Ryan also noticed another deer just a bit further down crossing the street, not in a cross walk I might add. Anywho, since we were coming from a school concert, I had the video camera. Unfortunately it's new and I had no idea what I was doing. Dear hubby was whispering, rather forcefully, to just "turn it on". This thing is smaller that a wallet and loaded with buttons to push and pull and did I mention it was 9pm and dark outside. So I'm fumbling around with it, and finally get it turned on and start hanging the camera out the window because trying to video through the front window of a car, get a good shot of nothing but you. I was taping everything but the deer. Then they took off around the back of the neighbors house. So we continued pulling into our driveway and the car lights hit something rather large and weird in their backyard. I whisper, rather forcefully, for dear hubby to back up so the lights can hit it again. Here's the funny part, it's a huge deer, a buck with antlers that has a tangle of tree branched stuck in it's antles. I mean it looks like it's carrying a bush by it's antlers. Picture a deer with a boufont hair do, stacked up so high it looks like the hair on the bride of Frankenstein. It was the funniest thing. So now, we start to get out of the car to video it. Elliot, that what we've named it (from the movie Open Season) takes off. Heads into our yard and is now about 5 feet from the car with the headlights blinding it making it come to a standstill looking right at me. Ryan starts freaking out saying "it's going to charge", guess he's seen Are We There Yet too many times. It's a bit hard to be scared of something that looks like that, I was laughing myself silly. We got a small video of it but like I said it was dark and so is the video. Now we look for Elliot every night hoping he's feelings aren't hurt.

Hey Lucy!

Here's Ryan with the Oopa Loopa's at the PIB Chocolate Museum. Kind of looks like a cut and pasted his pic on another pic doesn't it? How old will he be when I ask him to stick his head through one of these things and he thinks it's totally un-cool.

I don't know why, but there is a Chocolate Museum on PIB. It's more or less a store to sell chocolates and ice cream than a museum. Here I am with Lucy and Ethal in the famous scene where they try to work at a chocolate factory on the assembly line and they can't keep up so the start eating the candies. Funny stuff.

Seein' ya!

Here's Kyle on top on Perry's Monument on PIB. If you look close you can seeRob and me in his glasses, cool huh?

What I did on my summer vacation

Here's the fam on a golf cart in Put-In-Bay. It's the only way to see all the island, other than just the bars. Imagine my surprise to see there is more to PIB than that.

We went to a Chocolate Museum, The Perry's Monument, shopped, eat and drank a beer or two. Just Rob and I not the boys!

New Arrival!

"Here she is, Miss American", that's the song I'm hearing when I look at her. She is my sister's new grandbaby - Kayleigh Michelle. I guess that makes me a great aunt, but I was a "great" aunt before. hehehe. She has a head full of jet black hair and looks just like my nephew. FINALLY, a girl to buy pink things for! YEAH!!!

Black Belt Dude

Finally, after 3 broken bones, the first happened on his first day, Ryan has his black belt. It was 3 long years of twice a week classes and he stuck with it. He is taking a little time off, thank God, this is one expensive sport. He wants to take drum and trumpet lessons now. Oh Yeah!

Prom Master

Yup, my little boy got asked to prom, by a Junior. Grandpa says it's those fine blue eyes that will get him into trouble - girls can't resist'em. He was very excited and looked very handsome, IMHO!!
These 12 young people all had to fit into 1 limo, thank God it was a big one. Some did double up. They're all from the band and had a really great time. With all the moms and dads there, the flashes from the cameras almost blinded them. I told them we were the paparazzi. Get used to it!

Kayleigh's bunny

I can't stop knitting tiny things. It's so rewarding to start and finish a project in less than two days. Love love love it.

It's this cute. It's a Bunny Buddy. Hope Kayleigh will love it to pieces, then I can make a new one.

Honestly - I do knit!

I can't believe I haven't posted in over a month. Please forgive me. Not that anyone reads this blog anyway. But it's a good log for myself. I have been busy, enjoying the weather - yahoo! Enjoying the 70s in Ohio. It must be a dream. I have also been knitting. Just finished a little project - this baby bid from One Skein. It's in a lovely purple yarn that will go to my grand-niece due in May. I have discovered I like fast, little projects, instant gratification of a finished project. Right now I am knitting a Bunny Buddy for her. I got the pattern off Ravelry. If you haven't been out to Ravelry yet - be warned it will suck up a lot of knitting time. I have amassed quite a few patterns from that sight. And that's where the bunny came from. Watch for it soon!

Fair Isle?

This is my most recently completed knit project, a skull wrist warmer for Kyle. I think it's Fair Isle but not sure. Also not sure if I did it right but as long as I am consistly wrong, it's right. Right? He hasn't stopped warning it and is trying to talk me into another one. But before I do another one, maybe I should look into what I may, or may not, have done wrong.

Meet Sheldon

It's he the cutest little turtle you've ever seen? I knit this little guy up for Ryan for Valentine's
day and he loves it. It was a little more fiddly than I thought it would be but I learned a few new things and it was fun. He's my first knit toy too. Ryan was surprised to know that I knit this while he was at school and I did a little right in front of him but he wasn't paying attention to whatever mom was doing. hehehe

Smile!

Don't we look happy? We should, we were on a cruise when this was taken. That was before the house selling and buying and Christmas! Why didn't they photo shop out my hips??

Who's cookin' now?

Yup, I hate to admit it but I kind of like cooking. Now I hate the whole go to store, buy ingredients and bring home and find a place to put the stuff until you use it part and I hate the clean up part but the slicing and dicing and creating part I love. And finding recipes to try is the best. The best way to find a good recipe is when I worked, co-workers would bring their leftovers to work and I'd smell it and want the recipe. Tried and true is always the best. My mom was a stay at home mom before there was such a thing. She always cooked, we hardly ever went out. If we did it was for lunch and not a big dinner. Dad worked the night shift so meals where somewhat odd but we had 3 meals a day and we didn't ask "What's for dinner...ewwww" back then either. You ate or went hungry. So that's the way I do it. There are very few exceptions to where I will let my boys make a PB&J sandwich but 99% of the time we eat what I cook. And they eat a wide range of foods too. Some things I eat now I'd never heard of before meeting Rob. My family are/is hill billy and we eat meat and veggies. But now we eat Mexican and Chinese and Italian foods. Where does one get hill billy food? You should have seen my dad's face when we announced where Rob and I were having our rehearsal dinner - the Kahiki. Polynesian food, whoa! I'm pretty sure he hit the McDonalds on the way home. But I digress, what we have here is my first attempt at Cajun Red Beans and Rice. With this recipe I learned what Salt Pork is. Now don't go assuming that because I cook hill billy I ought to know what that is. I know what fat back and a ham hock is but I hadn't heard of Salt Pork. Thank goodness the meat lady at Meijers knew. And it all turned out fine. Probably not as hot as it would be in New Orleans but hot enough for us. We all loved it. The boys especially loved it. Now I gotta add it to my family favorites. Don't ya want smell-a-blog?

What was I thinking??

Friends told me I was crazy but that wasn't news. I've been like that for-ever! Santa brought

the boys an electric guitar and drum set. As the boys are getting older it's getting harder to buy for them at Christmas. Gone are the days when a box of legos would do. And frankly they don't need anymore clothes. So that's my reasoning for saying yes to these instruments of torture. The good thing is they play or shall I say try to play music from my era. Music I can rock to. What I should have done is asked Santa to bring me some Bose noise reducing head phones.

Let's Craft a while

Finally back to blogin' and knitin' and just enjoying the new house. Spent this weekend organizing my craft area. Can't really call it a room, only has 3 sides but it's bigger than the room I used to have. Completely unpacked and only bought two new things to organize onto/into. Bought a 3 drawer plastic things and those shelves you see in the back. It was fun. And now when I need something, I know exactly where it is. If I can keep the boys out of it, that would be a miracle.

Moving Update

Sorry no pictures as I am too busy, can't find the camera, can't find batteries to go in it, probably packed it and too embrassed to show you all the crap I am moving. It's pretty sad when the movers say "Boy, you have a lot of boxes!" and you'd think they have seen a lot of boxes. Maybe crafty people don't use movers. Money should be spent on crafty things, like yarn.
In trying to save money for said yarn, we tried to find some kids to help us move just our boxes. But no! No one from the high school band, the church or the hockey team. I guess $10 an hour just isn't enough for them. Boy, are we in trouble when they get older and run the country. So we decided to have a mover do it all - yahoo! And they will deliver to me all the boxes I need for .50 cents each. No more dumpster diving stories for me.
As for the new house, the HVAC people came out and it needs a new motor! Now, I don't know much, or anything, about such things other than it makes me comfortable, but a motor sounds expensive, glad we had the house inspected. And the ants are an issue and we have requested a $1000 for the rest of the little things. Now we just have to wait for the seller to get back in the COUNTRY! and we can move on/in. Still on track for closing both on 11/21. This is the season of miracles, right? I also found out there was a judgement under me. Who knew. I guess they just search my name and Lisa Richards is pretty common. I was told just to sign a paper stating it isn't/wasn't me and all is well. Stay tuned for "Lisa's Young and Restless move of our lives"