Spice Kitten

Well I completely fell off the wagon. I made it half way through Knit And Crochet Blog Week and Fell off on Day 5. I didn't realize how long I would be working on each post! Friday night after a long day of work, grocery shopping and getting ready for a weekend of planting trees at my brothers house, I decided enough was enough. I looked at my hubby and said "Well, I can either blog about life or I can live life - but I can't do both!"

Here is a picture of my cat Izzi. I brought home this awesome spice organizer and set the box on my floor so my cat could have it. She LOVED jumping in to a box. As you can see - she is using her laser beam setting to locate any stray spices and DESTROY them as she hates a disorganized house as well. I am still plugging away at my house - bit by bit. Little improvements here and there.

Well - today is the last day of April and I am going to celebrate by cranking up my grill with some veggie kabobs I have marinading in the fridge. Seems like a nice way to say farewell to April.

 

Busy day!

I had a very busy day today! I woke up at 3:00 this morning and could not go back to sleep so I got up. As is the hazard of getting less than enough sleep, I ended up buying a little something something on-line. (Oops!) More on that when it arrives. Insomnia is getting expensive!

Since I was up early I decided to go in to work a little early. And then I had the "Can't stand my job-idis" hit and ended up taking a half vacation day. (Again - Insomnia and impulse control!) On the way home I stopped at a gas station and filled my car up and got a MUCH needed car wash. Then home to a light lunch and a hello to the hubby and kitty. I then made an appointment to get my hair cut this Friday (WOOT!) and managed to get my dog in to the vet today! Love it when I can get an immediate appointment! So Emma got poked and prodded. She has put on a little weight since last time (She was 34 lbs and is now 37) but she gets less running time in the winter. We are naughty parents and don't take her for many walks. Partly because she is cold sensitive and mostly because we are lazy people.

Emma was great at the vet and is in really good health. She has a cyst that showed up a couple months ago - which they said to watch - but that they didn't think anything needed to be done at this point. So yay for that! I picked up her heart worm and her flea and tick stuff while I was there since there are already reports of ticks! That is insane!

One other thing I did today was to organize my cowl bin. I have this in my closet in my den and it's been just a hot mess. Today I got fed up and dumped the whole thing out on my table and sorted it out. I had not only cowls in here but headbands, a pair of slippers, a pair of leg warmers, several hats, several scarves... it was a mess.

And I have a few things in there that I really should just donate or ... something. I know when I made this pink and black striped cowl I was thinking ooh la la french something. Yeah. I never wear this because it's just straight up a hot mess. This might actually be a cute purse with the right lining? Or a good item to go in the donation bin. :)

 In the end I have all my cowls neatly folded in the large bin and the smaller bin is all headbands and one pair of leg warmers that I had no idea where to put. This is MUCH better! I actually tried on several of my cowls that I didn't love before and found that they look much better (and fit much better) on me now that I have dropped a few lbs. YAY for that!

And to top all this off I hit the treadmill on my new program tonight. I have been struggling with wanting to hit the treadmill lately. So when I was watching the Biggest Loser this week I had the thought of changing my approach to the treadmill. So now I am going to do 5K (which is only 3.1 miles!) every time and I am going to try and do my best every time - pushing my speed and my length of runs and so forth. I am hoping to get to the point where I can jog the whole thing. This is just shocking to me. I spent years telling people I would only run if I had a bear chasing me, and now I am trying to get to where I can run on my own - without the aid of giant hostile wildlife spurring me on! Who the heck am I turning into?!?! :)

If anyone reading this has any treadmill tips or motivations that work for you I would love to hear them!

In the meantime - I am off to a MUCH needed shower. ;)

January - Thy name is ORGINIZATION!

I am slowly trying to dig myself out of all my stuff. Have I watched too many episodes of hoarders? Maybe. Regardless of the reason, I find getting organized an exciting endeavor. Especially when I get to fondle my yarn in the process.

Recently I started collecting my WIPs and all my bags of FO's that I abandoned once the project was done, and cleaned them up. Needles were reclaimed. Stitch holders. Small scissors. I found a bag with a scarf I started years ago that I had completely forgot about - and finished it. I found three wash clothes I knit this summer and had never wove in the ends. (Done now!) And I organized my scraps. I have three bins of "left overs" that were pretty disorganized. I think my original intent was to organize by weight. Now I have decided I would rather separate by content. So now I have a bin of cotton, a bin of wool and a bin of acrylic. 

I have fantasies of making crazy afghans out of my scraps. My cotton bin is attracting my attention in particular. I keep thinking how wonderful it would be to use all my scraps to make a blanket for our camper as it would be machine washable and kind of awesomely ugly.

I am a little amazed and appalled at how many wips I have found wandering around the house. Knitting materials seem to just wander about. Free ranging yarn? Hmmm.

Saturday Morning: Weight in - Check in

It's been a busy busy week around here! This week was filled with: Insomnia, projects galore, work (but not much of that...), Thanksgiving Holiday, and (joy of joys) my period.

So after last weeks OUTSTANDING weight loss I was a little concerned about this week. I knew I was due for my period. I knew it was Thanksgiving and that it would be really hard to face that meal. I haven't had to handle too many celebrations since going on Weight Watchers and I admit - I was scared! I heard statistics all week about how that average American eats 4500 calories on Thanksgiving day. And I love our Thanksgiving meals. Turkey, Mashed potato's with thick brown gravy. Rolls. Cranberries. Stuffing. Green bean casserole. Pumpkin pie..... The list goes on and on! So I was trying to gird my loins for going into celebration mode. My motto was: "Eat with intent. Enjoy what you eat." Oh - and the period hit the night before Thanksgiving, so I went into the day with cramps, feeling fat, and wanting to eat the house down. (Yeah - thanks for THAT body!)

So on Thanksgiving day I ate my normal breakfast and then went to my parents for Brunch. My mom really tried to cut back on the amount of food and tried to go leaner on things which was really nice. I ate a little bit of everything I wanted. The taste of these foods was just amazing and so rich. I wanted to gobble it up just because it smelled and tasted so good! I ate a minimum of snacks and then when we sat for dinner I had a small serving of everything I HAD to have. I was shocked at how full I got so fast and I actually never made it to eating my Turkey! I had to stop before I got to it and ended up taking it home in a doggy bag. So I was really pleased with how I handled myself and now I feel just a little more confident about handling food situations like this in the future. (Which is good because we are in full holiday mode!)

So this morning was weight in and I was trying to be prepared for what could be a bummer with the factors working against me. (Period, Thanksgiving eating, insomnia at the beginning of the week, and a really good loss the week before.) I did my usual pep talk (You are on the right path, have faith in the process, one week is not the whole picture of your journey......) and then did my weight in. Yay! I LOST weight this week! I did a snoopy dance and celebrated losing my 1.1 lbs! YAY! Every success just strengthens my faith in myself and my belief that I can really get myself to a healthy weight and feel healthy. It's just such a wonderful thing to feel in control of your body and to know you can handle situations that come up. Crazy to be 40 years old and just getting my feet under my body in this area, but I am happy to FINALLY be getting there.

So I had insomnia this week which generally means less knitting. I had to rip out a few things I attempted because I just can't focus when I am exhausted and I make mistakes. But I did make a little headway on two projects.

I started the Pocketbook Slipper pattern that had been in my Que on Ravelry forever. I wanted something very simple that I could work on over Thanksgiving and it is a very simple pattern. I am anxious to get the other one done and to seem them up so they are done. I think they will be perfect for taking with when I go to friends/family homes this winter. You can't really tromp around in snow covered boots at other people's houses so having a little pair of throw on slippers that I can just have in my purse is pretty ideal. I chose a lighter color so that dog and cat hair doesn't show us badly. (I have learned that lesson well in my own home!) The yarn is a stash bust, Knit Picks Wool of the Andes in the color Green Tea Heather. The first one weighted in at 25 grams - and the skein is 50 grams, so I might just make it in 1 skein. (I have a second one standing by just in case.) I love the construction of these and think they would make great X-mas gifts too. (Free pattern on Ravelry!)

My other project I made progress on this week was a pair of gloves to go with my

Hood and Shoulders above the Rest hat I made a couple weeks ago. I had most of one skein of yarn left over from the hat, so I thought a nice set of mittens to go with it would be wonderful. (My hands are already cracking and bleeding this winter and we have only had one snow so far!) I have a pattern I really like for using the Lion Brand Thick & Quick yarn, the Wool-Ease Mitten pattern by Stephanie Taylor on Ravelry. (Also a free pattern.) I need to weave in the ends on mitten 1 (Pictured above - inside out so I can just grab a needle and get to it!) and then move on to mitten 2. It makes me twitch to be EXACTLY half done on two projects. I do not want to come down with half-done idis!

 

The other project we have been working on this week was to get my basement craft/treadmill room updated a little. I did not take a before picture (Argh!) but what I wanted was more storage and a place to have my sewing machine out and ready to use at all times. Previously I would take my sewing machine upstairs and set it up in my dining room everytime I needed to make something. This resulted in me sewing almost never because it was a giant pain in the toosh to set up! So now I have two new bookcases on either side of the tv that are housing craft books, which really opened the space up a lot. I am so happy to be able to see all my craft books! They were stacked previously in a way that I could not see what I had - so I am very excited to see all my books! The Tv is set up better for tread milling. AND I have the ability to listen to my Ipod as well! It's very exciting!

I am still organizing and tweaking the space. I want a rolling chair for my sewing table and I still have stacks of stuff laying all over. My Yarn Balling station fit perfectly next to my sewing table and that made me really happy. I used to keep my swift and baller in a drawer and then set it up every time I needed to ball my yarn up. It's awesome to just have stuff in the ready position!

I am pretty excited to treadmill this morning in my new and improved space!

Have a wonderful weekend all!

Sunday Snippets: October 23, 2011

Sunday Snippets: A Snapshot of this Sunday in photo's with no other explanation's......