I'm back.

I'm tired. I'm sick. I have lots of rocks and some great photos. Here's a photo of me at the 45th Parallel, half way between the equator and the north pole. We've got a few beautiful waterfall shots and the leaf one is my "postcard" shot. I was just struck by the beauty of it and felt the need to capture it. It'll make a nice wallpaper for my computer screen I think. It was a seriously intense time, but oh what fun we had! Except when I got sick right after breakfast yesterday. I don't know what's up with me but I am still queasy today. That was totally annoying I'll tell you. Here I am in Marquette, what, 10 hours or so from home and sick while I'm suposed to be out hiking around, learning and collecting. Well it pased by lunch time and I enjoyed the remainder of the day. I just had to sit out of one thing and a lady in class collected samples for me. These photos are not in order of how they were taken.

The one of me was first, the second is the skinnny waterfall (Munising), 3rd is the leaves, 4th is Miner's Castle and the last is Bond Falls. To see more photos go to the right hand side and click on My Picture Trail. I made a new album for this trip. I thought I'd spare the blog the rock images LOL. We ate at this great Italian place Friday night and my instructor got a bottle of wine and poured me two glasses of his wine after I already had a glass. My instructor got me drunk, LOL. We (the ones over 21) were all good and happy by the time the dinner was over! It was a good, good dinner and the garlic bread is to die for. I found some great chunks of copper and Thursday in class we're having a copper cleaning party. One of mine looks like a sea horse and I'm wondering if I can make it into a necklace of some kind.
So that's pretty much the trip in a nutshell. No I didn't get a shot of the socks on location because I wore them at night in the hotel and didn't do one stitch on any knitting while there. I was too focused on the rocks. Now I'm having a hard time remembering the names of them because I'm so over loaded. I'll have more posts in the next week or so of the rocks I collected if it won't bore you all too much. I so want to go back with my family now. This may have to be a spring trip next year for us. We could just throw the tent in the van and go because you should see my boys eyes light up when they check out the rocks and photos. I just can't let that slip past and it will help me learn better. Michigan is seriously a nice place to live and explore, but even more so when you have someone with you who knows what they're talking about. This is seriously cheesy I know, but this trip/class ROCKS! Yes it does.

Socks in the Mail yesterday!

Here are two photos of the awesome Socakpal-2-za socks that were made for me by Carol, with some help from Carol. LOL I love that. I can not believe how perfectly she got the stripes to match up, that's something I'm afraid I may never accomplish. I tried three times yesterday to post these babies so I'm really feeling the pressure to hit the post button.

OK one last time before I run out the door and off to be a rock geek. The socks are beautiful, the socks are soft, they socks are colorful and the socks let me know just how damn big my feet are! Damn! Carol(s) thank you both for making me some wonderful socks! I'm taking them on the field trip and I hope to get at least one photo of my foot in them up there. Again, THANK YOU, I did a happy sock dance in the kitchen! So this will be the last post for a few days, play nice while I'm gone everyone! Bye :-D

Rember this Shawl? (remEMber how to spell?)

Sorry Kids, seems I need to use the word varification again. I posted this post two minutes ago and already have two spammers. Thanks for understanding.
This is the Charlotte's Easy Shawl by Lily Chin for Fiber Trends. This is also an old photo and it's a bit longer now. Well, today, I got two whole rows on it! Yeah, I know, TWO, that's it. Argh, it has a 4 row repeat and I try to NEVER leave anything in a middle of a repeat for fear I'll forget where I stopped. I'm pretty sure I won't, but well, I've been having these moments lately... Tomorrow, oh dear, oh dear, there just will be no knitting at all. I have to get the boys off to school, then set up split pea soup in the crock pot, then I have to shower and stuff and read chapter summaries because I have a test that I have to go to the college testing center for. After that I have to go to my counseling session and then home to pack everything up for my trip and eat and go to work. No knitting. None. Nada. Zilch. I sure hope I get a chance to work on my sock while I'm gone.

Now, about yesterday. Well... the MESTA conference was awesome! I had just the best time and bought all kinds of really cheap little rocks. I got a nice little clump of quartz crystals that will sit up and I put them up in my lighted cabinet next to the tv. I did buy a few more things that were a bit more expensive: a spinosaurus tooth and an ammonoid w/ orginal shell for my oldest for christmas. The third thing I bought was a small slab of floridite that has purple and green bands running through it. It now lives next to the quartz crystals on the same shelf. I didn't win any of the really big things in the raffle but then I only paid a dollar for 5 tickets. There were people there who bought probably 50 dollars worth. Over kill I think. LOL. Anyway, I really enjoyed myself, it was a good way to spend the day. So since I may not be able to post before my trip I will have a nice long post for you on Friday with hopefully many many photos of rocks and such. *grin* Have a great week!

A girl and her cat.

Here's a photo of Miranda and Albert. This last week of cast wearing gets to be punctuated by a bright blaze orange cast. Like the cat is going to do any hunting! geesh. LOL Anyway, since I've done no knitting yet today and have errands to run I decided to entertain your eyes with this.

Kitty Update!

Today Albert had a vet's appointment and he got his leg X-rayed. It's healing really well and next Thursday the cast comes off! Is that not the best news to come home to? I am so happy to hear this, I love that cat, he's mine, my familiar. I love Sticky too but he's all bent about Albert joining our family and if he'd calm down enough I'd be able to let him know he's still #1.

Have any of you walked or driven by a street lamp and had it go out on you just as you are under it? This happens to me all the time. When I was a kid it used to scare me when I was walking home in the dark because I was afraid someone did it on purpose you know? It's just something I've been thinking about. When I get stressed I think of strange things it seems.

Oh, and I'm done with classes for almost two weeks because Tuesday I leave for the field trip. This Saturday is the Michigan Earth Science Teachers Assoc. fall conference at Washtenaw Community College and I'm going. My geology teacher would probably be a bit disappointed if I didn't go. They are having the son of the man who made the tornado rating there to talk about the tsunami, Dr/Mr (?) Fujita, from MSU. And of course there will be ROCKS and great minds I can pick too. I'm looking forward to it though I wish I had a friend to go with.

So a bit of knitting tomorrow and I have some meds the psychiatrist perscribed that I need to try and get filled. It seems I'm bi-polar, I'm depressed for sure, but bi-polar too. I sure hope they help me feel more normal again, and fairly soon. I think tomorrow I want to work on one of my shawls, but my sons sweater is calling out to me to practice my continental style too. ROFL I love having this dilema. Maybe a photo tomorrow, maybe not.

LOL yeah right, I'm a photo hound or so I was labeled earlier. *wink* Right Suz? *grin*

Remember the Sockapal-2-za Socks?

Well she got them today and has already posted about them. Go meet freecia and see her reaction to them. She truly warms my heart to no end and it means a lot to me. She such a vibrant lady, I truly enjoyed making these sock for her while "getting to know her" via her blog. Thanks for the great response Freecia, it really does mean a lot to me.

No knitting going on here.

I have been working on my darn homework constantly I swear. I think I have a book growing off the end of my nose. Anyway, next weeks field trip preparation is going well. I'm making it through my homework but now I have to go run errands. Thank you for all the advice about trying to find it at a library. I swear I feel like an idiot for not thinking of that, and my library has a copy too. So, perhaps I'll have some knitting news this weekend. Let's hope, because I really miss my needles and yarn. The photo is a couple of months ago, but I love it, have it framed. I was gardening so am at my best you know (not) LOL.

Looking for an out of print book. Help?

I'm looking for Geology of Michigan by Dorr & Eschman. I would love to have it before my field trip next week (tues-thurs). If you have it, want to sell it, PLEASE let me know! I'm begging. Amazon has some for sale but I'm not sure I'd get it in time.

Third times the charm? Lets hope so.

the hat, tried posting Saturday, Sunday and now Monday.

Thankfully that worked. FINALLY. Man I was getting so mad. So it's done and I've put a few rows on my son's sweater. I think I'm going to focus a bit on that item since I watched a young girl at school knitting continental and it clicked for me. It's a great piece to work on to learn to go from knit to purl and back (ribbing yes). I just need to train my fingers now. Well, I've not made much progress on my homework since I've really been feeling pretty bad lately, but I'll refrain from sharing the gory details because it would just be way TMI. Extreme TMI? LOL So I'm off to make dinner and try to get some reading done while it cooks. TTFN

It's Friday, too bad I'm not that glad about it.

I now have to work four days in a row with a tremendous amount of homework to finish before my field trip to the Upper Pennisula. Soooo, that said, I went and rented three movies (Hello Kitty, Space Balls, and Brahm Stokers Dracula) for the weekend. I popped popcorn and it's waiting for the boys to walk in the door within the next five minutes, I bought two $5 pizzas from Little Ceasar's and they're in the oven on warm. Dinner is taken care of, snacks are taken care of and I get to watch Dracula tomorrow morning. Did you know that it's the same guy that plays Sirius Black in Harry Potter? He's also the bad Dr. dude in Lost in Space. It so funny. Well I have one more section to do on the hat and I'm thinking maybe a pair of booties.... We'll see. I'll have a photo of it tomorrow at some point. Have a great weekend.

Lots to do!

I have a lot of reading to do today so I'm trying to break it up with knitting the baby hat. 2 sections of a six section hat are complete. I now have a bravenet map so you can go pin yourself to it and give me a HI. It's down on the right side somewhere. If I make any great progress on the hat I might share a photo but seeing as how tomorrow is my 13 hour day on campus it's a good guess that I won't be back until Friday. Play nice until then.

The Lost Baby Sweater Photo

Ta-Da, all it needs are some snaps and a tiny little bow at the upper right. All in garter stitch and taken from the last IK mag...or maybe the summer one... not sure right at the moment. I used Plymouth Encore Chunky and it's a great yarn. So there. That's it. bye!

The Tale of a Furry Little Trickster

Once upon a time there was this little furry trickster who loved to play. His owner, trying to better her life, was going to college full time and went off to class leaving the little critter home....alone.
Well this furry little trickster got very bored because there wasn't anyone around to play with, the boys were in school, the girl was with his mistress and the master was at work. The older furry critter that also lived there was outside somewhere hunting or sulking or just being plain vacant. So the furry little trickster ran around the house trying to see what there was to play with and low and behold, hanging from the kitchen table was a beacon, the holy grail of furry trickster lives! There, hanging from the table was a piece of yarn! Oh glory, oh joy! The furry little trickster had something to play with and he had a delightful time.
He ran this way and that, around the chairs and across the hall and even decided that the tennis shoes in the front hall wanted to play with the yarn too! So around and around he went then brought the end back into the kitchen where it stopped. When his mistress got home the first thing she noticed was yarn all over the place and got worried that her furry little trickster unravelled the baby sweater she just finished the day before. She was so relieved that she laughed out loud when she saw that the yarn had come from the ball that she had left on the table just that morning. It's a really good thing that she had done so well on her test that morning or this might have made her mad. So she ran to the desk and grabbed the camera because this was just too classic of a kitty moment to not document. And the little furry trickster, he was pleased as punch with himself and and sat nicely for his mistress to get a good photo of him. The yarn he played with was fine and destined to become a baby hat and they both lived happily ever after. The End.

Ok, back to reality. Yes, Albert pulled out yards of yarn, it was so cute. I did well on the test, but the part I was worried about was a mineral ID test and I got 15/15! So awesome since I guessed on 3 of them. The post ate the photo of the baby sweater so I'm going to have to do another post after this one. Now I'm off to work on the baby sweater and watch some movie, maybe LOTR Return of the King. A good movie I don't have to watch while I listen & Knit. The red thing to the left of Albert is his cast, he seems to be healing quite well and they're going to do an X-ray Thursday to check it. Later gators!

Quick morning post.

I have to study for a test tomorrow, read a bunch of boring text and I didn't get the baby sweater done, though it's farther along now. I'm hoping I can get it done this week, hat and all. If I feel like I have time I will post a photo later on. Otherwise, you can find me in a book. LOL

Quick late night update: I got the baby sweater done before my cold knocked me for a loop. I will get a photo of it tomorrow after I get back from class and before I leave for my evening one. It's not TOTALLY done, it needs snaps and a piece of ribbon, but I'll still show it to you. It turned out not all that bad, except for ONE mistake and I hope no one will notice it. And if you get a chance in the next night or two, check out the strangeness of the moon. It's been "harvesty" looking for two night nows... really orange in color and well, extremely pretty that way, and we're talking like right now at 12:30 am.... neato-peachy-keen! Yikes! Is that the time? I need to get up in 6 hours! Oh I'm soooo doomed. TTFN!

Left Over Socks (...well, socks from left over yarn)

Well here they are. Done. I had to use more black than I wanted on the toe of the one because I had more black and I wanted to make sure that I had enough green for at least the heel on the other. I obviously had enough to do the toe also. She didn't want to put them on for a photo because she said they made her feet hot. Even though I told her she could take them off right after. I'm now working on a pair of really big ones with Lion Brand Magic Stripes in Blue Brown Pattern #205. They seem really big right now but I think I'm just used to working on small socks.

This pair I just started will be for my hubby or his father for Christmas. We'll see just how large they turn out. Both have seriously wide feet (like EEEE or something) but my hubby has shorter feet than his dad, but still just as wide. I think they look like hobbit feet because his hair is dark and really stands out on his feet, though it's no where near as hairy as a hobbits LOL.

Talking about socks all the time and along with them, feet, I am starting to feel like I have a foot fetish or something. I guess the next time I have a photo to post it will be of that baby sweater since I'm trying to save the socks for in between class knitting. Maybe, if the knitting goddesses are smiling upon me and mine I will get it done this weekend. Now that would be totally groovey and far out man, ...yeaaaaahhh baby.

You all are too funny!

See the problem I have? I love them all and there is NO way I'm doing them all in one sweater. Two like the first, two like the second, and there are two for the beech leaf one that I didn't even offer as an option, though I have to say I really like that one too. I just saw on another blog a post about a lace cardigan thing from the new Rowan (which I don't get) and it's similar to what I want to do but, well, not quite ya know? For one thing it's a cardigan, I don't want a cardigan.

Ok, when I get around to doing this project I'm going check the patterns out again and maybe go with which one might be easier to follow... It is my first time trying to design something eh. Tomorrow I should have a finished sock to show off, just need to do the toe. So see you then!

Three times the charm???

Third time trying to get this posted. So you are going to get the quick version. I want to design a sweater that's flattering for me. I like these two patterns, Fern Lace and Vine Lace from The Knitters Bible, a very cool book. I'm round, over weight, apple shaped, look pregnant, at high risk for heart attack and stroke, does that give you enough of a visual? Whatever. I just want a pretty sweater that doesn't make me look like I'm wearing an afgan with sleeves made out of a nasty yarn. I found a thin pink suede like yarn in a pretty light pink color so it won't be too bulky, the pattern will be smaller though. I just want an opinion on which one might be more flattering on me. I love them both so how about some opinions? I'm not sure when I will get to this but it's in my head all the time. The top will be stockinette because my sisters are too big for eyelettes (they'd be windows LOL). Anyway, help? *grin*

7am, need to wake up, need to wake up....

Ok, we are going to try this again. My cable went out while I was editing this post...so very irritating. Anyway, I finished turning the heel on the sock today. I've only touched the baby sweater to move it to a safer location and I'm more interested in the sock for some reason. HA! I know why LOL. I have two balls of striped sock yarn I want to get working on. I'm really interested in seeing if it will stripe for me. I managed to get up and ready this morning, minus makeup. It was a very important day for me to do this because my oldest went off to 5th grade camp this morning. He'll be gone for 3 days/2 nights. Not an issue since he spends weekends over in Chicago with his best friend who moved there two years ago, but it was an issue with me... It could be that I've been severly depressed for months and I'm still waiting for my psychiatrist meeting to happen (on the 22nd). I need meds, there's just no denying it anymore. I have just way too much going on in my life right now to lose it at this point. So there's the rest of my post.

Cutting caffeine out of my life rots. My stomach doesn't hurt anymore and it tends to give me panic attacks so it's a good thing; except at 7 in the morning. This is a quick post to show you the very little itty bit of knitting I've managed this last week. It's pathetic I'll tell ya. The baby sweater is well on it's way and the second sock got started on it's heel last night (it really needs to learn to knit faster LOL). So here they are for you.

Hot Damn I get Han Solo!!!

Dear Blog, it's me again...

I'm not sure if I'm alive except for the pain in my body is telling me otherwise. Work made my feet, legs and lower back hurt but the rest of me (including my poor brain) is numb, vacant, empty of many of the racing thoughts that usually reside there. (I'm also wondering why I'm complaining about this, having my mind quiet is kind of nice.) I did buy some more yarn today. I got another ball of sock yarn, the kind that is suposed to stripe (that's two now), and a ball of some Plymouth something or another. I'm too tired to think about names, all I want is to wrap the yarn around needles and manipulate it into the baby sweater and hat that I need to make for a gift. I want to make socks, lots of socks, and I have an idea for a sweater that I hope will be flattering on my apple shaped lumpy bumpy well plumped torso, an actual Kat's original kind of thing. I just want to knit. That's all. I don't think I'm asking for too much, but alas I am! I'll take a photo of my very small yarn purchase tomorrow unless I'm in jail from beating my kids for waking me too early. I wonder if they'd let you knit there......

This is me to a T LOL! Thanks Suz, I think...

Pure Nerd
56 % Nerd, 39% Geek, 43% Dork


For The Record:

A Nerd is someone who is passionate about learning/being smart/academia.
A Geek is someone who is passionate about some particular area or subject, often an obscure or difficult one.
A Dork is someone who has difficulty with common social expectations/interactions.
You scored better than half in Nerd, earning you the title of: Pure Nerd.

The times, they are a-changing. It used to be that being exceptionally smart led to being unpopular, which would ultimately lead to picking up all of the traits and tendences associated with the "dork." No-longer. Being smart isn't as socially crippling as it once was, and even more so as you get older: eventually being a Pure Nerd will likely be replaced with the following label: Purely Successful.

Congratulations!

I decided to delete it and post this way. Take the test yourself here: Nerd, Geek, or Dork? Test