Knitty Otter is having a contest and I thought I would join in!

Getting to Know you Contest Questionnaire:

1.) How long have you been knitting?

Since 2004. I was pregnant with my third child and was visiting my parents. Mom was knitting away and I decided that I needed her to reshow me how it was done!

2.) How long have you been knitting socks?

Socks were my second project. I took a practice pair to the hospital when I gave birth to my son and once I got home, I knit a pair for my FIL.

3.) What do you do with a problem like Maria?

Do what the Catholic Church always does...... Move her to a new place and cover up her past :-)

4.) What is your all time favorite sock yarn?

I have a HUGE stash of sock yarn. It's so big that I don't NEED to buy sock yarn for years. My favorite that I have worked with is Twisted. I LOVE LOVE LOVE my socks that I knit with her DK weight.

5.) Toe Up or Cuff Down?

Top Down. I have no idea how to knit toe up.

9. What's your favorite color (this week or for all time)? Do you have a color family/season/palette you prefer? Any colors you just can't stand?

My all time favorite color is yellow. But I am picky. It has be the perfect yellow. Most time I gravitate to earth tone yarns.... and I can't STAND bright red.

10.) Do you have a pet(s)?

Yup. One cat and we are taking care of a old, decrepit, hamster for the summer. Thank goodness he belongs to the school and I can give him back.

11.) Babies: Oven Roasted or Barbecued?

What? What the hell does this mean?

12.) Besides socks what is your favorite type of thing to knit?

Hats and mittens. I have never knit a sweater. I am really chicken. I should bite the bullet and make one....

13.) What's your favorite scent?

I like food smells for candles. Right now I have a hazelnut coffee candle and I LOVE the way it smells. I don't really wear perfume... but if I do, I spray on Love Spell from Victoria's Secret.

14.) What music are you really loving right now? Like a song or a band?

I really listen to everything. Country, Rap, Rock, Pop....anything. I am loving One Republic, not the remix stuff, just their original songs.

15.) How many pairs of socks have you hand knit?

Not too many.... 4 maybe? Maybe 5...

16.) What's your favorite treat? Salty or Sweet?

Both. I have a bad sweet tooth. But I like rich treats. The richer the better!

17.) What was the most interesting thing you smelled yesterday. Not good or bad necessarily, just the thing that stuck out most so that you actually took notice of it.

I spent most of my day at the pool. Not too many smells there. Just the chlorine. I did spray the Love Story on in the morning :-) Oh wait, I made Kettle Corn last night and ate the whole bag. I had never had Kettle Corn until a few weeks ago and now I am in love!

18.) Needles - DPN's: Wooden, metal or plastic?

Depends. I used to love wooden but then I tried the Knit Picks metal sock needles. I really really like them. I want to get the whole set!

19.) What is your favorite sock pattern that you've knit? What do you recommend?

I really like the Embossed Leaves that I made. The pattern was fun and the finished product was beautiful. I just wish that I had used better yarn.

20.) The last Question: If you were stuck on a deserted island who would you want with you, what knitting would you want with you and would you ever want to leave?

Hummmm, I think I would want my hubby and Catherine. Cath's husband can come too. I would want patten and yarn for a sampler afghan. You know, the ones with the cables and motifs.... Also my sock stash. You need socks on a deserted island. Leave? probably not :-)

Everything is bigger in Texas

I had a great time in Texas with Cath. I should say, I had a great time while I was in an air conditioned environment! OH MY GOD IT WAS HOT! Now I grew up in Virginia. It was hot. It was humid. But I have lived in California for 10 or so years now (wow, has it been that long?), and I am obliviously not used to the humidity anymore. I really thought I was going to die.

Other than the heat, I had a great time. Cath had her party to celebrate two years of Mama Llama business at an awesome Tex-Mex restaurant. There were a lot of people there, and it was really fun to see all of her "fans".

Me and Cath's Family

I also got to see her super secret dying process. She was even so kind as to let me make my own colorway. She dyed it since I was too afraid that I would screw it up! I really like this color....so proud of my first creation! I can't remember if Cath named it, or if I did. So I present you.....

LillyPad

If you must have some, and I know you do, MamaLlama can help you out!


Also in Texas, I introduced Chris and Cath to geocaching. Both thought I was a big dork when I explained it to them, but once we got out and actually found a cache (pronounced cash. CHRIS), both of them thought it was fun! Even Brandon got into it. He was the "leader" when he carried around the GPS.

Follow me guys!

While we at one cache site, I saw a beautiful bug crawling on the ground. It was HUGE and bright RED! It really was pretty. No one knew what it was so when I got to the computer I searched for a big red fuzzy ant. Turns out it was a Velvet ant. The name is deceiving because it's not an ant at all.... It was a wingless WASP! Now if you know me at all, you know I am terrified of bees and wasps. TERRIFIED. To the point that Greg wants me to go get hypnotized to get over my fear. It's that bad.

It's also called a cow killer.... Yikes!

Guess everything really IS bigger in Texas!

McDonald's has stolen my heart

It's no secret that I like McDonald's. Give me one of their smushed, greasy, tiny cheeseburgers any day and I will gladly eat it. But something has happened that has made me swoon at the thought of going to McDonald's. Are you ready for it?

McDONALD'S HAS PUT SWEET TEA ON THE MENU.

The remarkable part..... I'm in CALIFORNIA!! I thought I would die last week when I saw it. I bought the largest cup of it and immediately called Catherine. (Catherine didn't care. She lives in the land of sweet tea and hates it. Traitor.)

Now I grew up in Virginia. Northern Virginia. Sweet tea wasn't as abundant as it is in the southern part of the state, but you could still get a decent glass of sweet tea at many places. Check out this Virginia Experiment. Cracked me up! Once I moved to California I realized that SWEET tea wasn't in anyone's vocabulary. Shocking isn't it?

Now I am as happy as can be. It's a little taste of home. Anyone that knows me knows that I get so homesick for the east coast that sometimes it's unbearable. Fall is the worst with summer right behind.....

Now you must excuse me before I get homesick..... I am going to McDonald's!

Stash

Stash
Originally uploaded by KnitWit Momma

Just a small portion of my stash that I decided to photograph the other day. Got to get the Rav database all caught up!

Houston.....There's Gonna be a Problem

Texas look out! I am headed to Houston at the end of the month to stay with Mama Llama herself!

She and I have been friends for about 10 years now and I hate that she moved to the hottest place on earth Texas. She is celebrating 2 years in business as Mama Llama by throwing a party. Now how could I not hop on a plane and be there for that?

Three more weeks and I get to have a relaxing weekend with my best friend! And this time she is going to teach me to dye!

Schools Out for Summer......

Ok, who's singing the Alice Cooper song? Admit it, you were! Yesterday was the last day of school and boy am I glad. I'm not looking forward to having all three home everyday, but I am looking forward to not dealing with the other parents for a while. I thought I graduated high school....and that's all I have to say about that :-)

I put together two large fund raising projects for the Parent Teacher Club. One was a cookbook. I collected recipes, typed them ALL in, proofread, ordered, marketed and sold. ALL BY MYSELF. I have to say that I am pretty proud of how it turned out. $10.00 each and I ship :-)

The other one was our Spring Carnival. At least that one I had some help. I was the chairperson and I had two awesome woman help me out. It was a great time and we raised $4000.00 in 3 hours. Now for a town as small as ours, that is a huge amount!

Now that school is over, I have my time back. Although I need to learn to say no. We have a organization that is trying to stimulate economic growth in our town and I was asked to head up a committee in that as well. I am not sure how much economic growth there is going to be with the economy the way that it is.... but I have kept that opinion to myself.

Since I have been volunteering so much, knitting hasn't really happened. I have been working on a blanket for my Father in Law. It's kind of hard for me to knit it. Part of me feel that he can't pass away as long as I am knitting it. Then I think about how I would feel if he passes and I haven't finished it. I've never had a WIP that is so emotional! I am close to finishing and really need to plug through it. I don't have much time. He's forgetting most things and people now, and I would like him to remember who I am when he gets it. The tumors in his brain are affecting him the most.

Right now I have to go start reading. I start school on Tuesday night. 3 hours of English, 2 nights a week. Could I be any luckier? Of course reading is better than what I doing right now. I'm watching Work Out and eating cheesecake..... two pieces of cheesecake. I find that very funny ;-)

I just couldn't resist

I Like to MOOOOOVE It!

I know I said I would post more.....

But I just haven't. So many things on my plate right now, and I just feel like I can't give attention to them all.

The big thing that I am involved in now has nothing to do with knitting at all. It's not all that exciting, or at least you wouldn't think it would be that exciting. I have immersed myself into the Parent-Teacher Club (PTC) at my daughters school. It been an eye opening expreiance for me. I have never, and I mean NEVER, been a part of a group of grown woman that act so much like teenagers before. I really have no idea who reads my blog so I won't go into specifics here, but really, it's drama ALL THE TIME.

It exhausts me to even think of all the back stabbing, name calling, and sabotageing that happens and this is a ELEMENTARY SCHOOL. I have been regretting my decision lately about getting involved with the PTC lately. I have decided to stick it out one more year. If next year isn't any better, then I am out of there. I think to some degree, things happen with every parent group, but I am sure that this one is just out of control.

Ok, vent over. Thanks for reading that.

Last weekend I went to Stitches West with my Mom. It was a great time. We drove down and stayed Thursday and Friday night. We hit the Rav meetup and the market on Thursday night and then did the market again on Friday. We stopped by the market on Saturday morning before we left and oh my goodness...the people were WILD. It was a great time with my Mom and a wonderful and relaxing weekend trip.

Photo's of knitting and Stitches stash next!

Wow...... It's been a long time!

Three months? Seems like it's been even longer. So much has happened since October..... Halloween, Thanksgiving, Emotional visits with in laws, Christmas, My 30th birthday, and on and on.

It's a new year and a new start right? I wish I could say that I resolved to blog more in 2008, but that just isn't the case. I will say that I won't feel like I have to blog regularly in 2008, and I can tell you that this blog will be more than just knitting.

It's winter now and winter isn't a good time for me to be doing much with my hands. The swelling, pain, and just feeling not like myself is back. And with all that comes the endless doctor visits. Each time, telling me I need to be poked, prodded, or scanned some more. I'm tired already just thinking about it. I stopped going to the doctors last winter because I just couldn't take it, but I have to try again.

I'm 30 now. 30. I always thought that at 30 I would feel grown up. Let's forget that I have 3 kids...that in itself should make me feel like a grown up...but it doesn't. So here I am 30 years old. Some ways I feel so much younger and some ways I feel older.

I always feel younger when I am with the kids. They make me laugh every day and they remind me how precious life is. In an instant I can be transformed into a robot, or a tickle monster, or even a princess trapped in a castle. Of course they have their moments, times when I have to be the grown up, but in general, I feel like a kid with them.

Then the flip side is when I go to school. I started classes again this semester. Sitting in a classroom full of freshly graduated high school students, I always feel out of place. Not only out of place, but a little envious as well. I didn't finish college when I was their age. I could have, but life took me on a different path. Now I sit and listen to them complain about homework and not having any time to study. I really want to shake them and tell them to TAKE THIS OPPORTUNITY. Never again will they be able to focus so totally on school. Once they are married and have children, their focus will shift and nothing will be just for them anymore. Never will they again feel only responsible for themselves. I want to yell at them, tell them not to squander this opportunity, tell them to use it to their full advantage.

But I don't. I sit and smile as I listen to them talk of parties, of who said what, and where they were going this weekend. Maybe one day I will have the nerve to say something. I doubt it, but you never know.

Now that I have rambled on and on about pretty much nothing, I will leave you with a promise.

I promise that I will blog at least once a week. I have been known to break promises, but I will try to keep this one. Next time I will tell you about the new thing that I am involved in, and how it has taught me so much about people.

Stay warm and dry! It's snowing like crazy here and I think I am going to go bake some bread...bread like this Yummmmmmm.