It's all about the Star Wars my friends....

These pics are from a Star Wars day that our school district was holding. All of the games and fundraisers were Star Wars themed. Little guy absolutely loved it. Boba Fett is his favorite character and was he ever geeked when he was there. Boba's costume was fantastic! Amazing detail.
A friend of ours was one of the stormtroopers and it turns out you have to get a George Lucas representative to approve your costume (which has to be hand-made) before you can start appearing a fundraisers and such and then of course it has to be all voluntary and unpaid. Turns out if you accept a dime of money for appearing in a costume you have made yourself ol' Lucas himself can sue your pants off. There are groups all over the world that you can contact to come to a fundraiser if anyone is interested. The fellows that were at ours are here.





Here is the little guy and DH diligently assembling a Star Wars lego kit (this one is the X-Wing fighter). Little guy loves these kits and yes, we have went a little overboard on buying them in the past week. But, man, they are soooo detailed!
And what have I been doing whilst all this assembly has been going on?
KNITTING (and a little spinning)!
The Queen of Beads socks for the Rockin Sock Club have been done for about the past 3 weeks.
(Nothin like a little gratuitous Chewie pic to go along with some fan-tabulous socks, eh? LOL)
On the needles now is the Bat Shawl from the Anti-Craft. I actually don't have any work in progress pictures so far but I have the entire body of the shawl done and am about 7 rows into the edging. I am knitting it out of some discontinued Rowanspun 4-ply in the color Sludge that I have had languishing in my stash for eons. The color name just died to be something special, and what could be more special than a bat-themed shawl? Just sayin', lol.

I got March's Sock club shipment yesterday. Absolutely Yummmmmmmy. Can't wait to cast on. Must.......wait.....til........shawl......is done.
Hopefully I will get to update more often soon.
Happy Knitting

Sock Heaven!

After hearing all about Socks that Rock from Lime & Violet the past year or so I had my heart set on fondling some of the yarny goodness to try it for myself when I went to the Michigan Fiber Festival this past August. The Fold had a booth there and I seriously had my fingers crossed that they would have some.
Boy, did they! I got there right when the festival opened and marched through until I found the booth. WOW!!!! I couldn't get enough of it! I used restraint and only got two skeins of the lightweight. One in Kaw Kaw and one in Rauen. Needless to say, they just started a growing addiction. Since then I have bought Rocktober and I bought Jade for my mom for Christmas.
As if that wasn't enough, I signed up for the Rockin Sock Club. All I can say is FABULOUS!!!! I got my first installment for the year on Wednesday. If you would like to see that color the spoiler is here. Enjoy!
I am currently knitting the Marialis End-to-End scarf out of some spindle spun (remember that stuff) that I have had laying around FOREVER. About 10 more rows on that baby and I can dive into the socks!
Did I mention the kit comes with beads? BEADS! I'm geeked on that part since I have never knit with beads. Pictures to come soon!

Long time no post....

Hey all! I know, i know....it's been ages since my last post. I have had good reason though.

The last time I posted I told you about my son having tubes put in his ears. Since then, oh...let's see. He has had his tonsils out, DH has had hernia surgery and....well, ummm...I kind of strayed from knitting and not wanting much to do with knitting for a bit.

Let me explain.
I have deleted alot of my old posts, so for those of you who don't know, I work in the auto industry. I am an industrial electrician actually. Playing with robots and such. Pretty cool in a way. I actually started knitting as a result of being bored at work and looking for something portable to do during the slow times.
My very first knitted gift that I gave was to a girl that my DH works with. (We both work at the same place.)
I knit her a baby blanket for her daughter that was due just a few months after my son was born. This was in 2003. Fast forward to July 23, 2008. I had just come to dayshift (had been working afternoons since my son was born) about 1 month previously. I was working in my usual area with this girl's DH (Fred), who also works with us. He is what you call a diesetter. We talked about kids, spouses. The usual catch up with someone you know. It was a really heartfelt conversation. He had told me how much he loved her and the kids and wished he worked closer to home. He walked away to do his part of the job we are on together and literally 1 minute later I hear my other partner (a machine repair) yell and I look and Fred...........ummmm. Fred has been crushed between two bolsters. My partner and I work frantically to get him out but it was too late. The weight of these things is in the thousands of tons and he was crushed between the two. The one that he was moving moved the opposite way it was supposed to, you see, and there was no where for him to escape. Our work knew that the danger was there and had never done anything to make the job safer.
I will never forget that image of turning around and seeing him. He was only about 20 feet from me and yet there was nothing I could do to save him. I remember after we got him out from being pinned and the EMS team took over doing CPR on him. Watching them do the chest compressions, not finding a heartbeat, trying again........
I walked away at that point, telling myself that that is not the last image I want of Fred in my head and yet I still see him. Everyday. I think of that little girl I knit that very first blankie for, who had a 6-week old little brother when her daddy died. I think of his wife alot. I have talked to her a few times, although I still don't know what to say.
One's whole being is changed by something like this. I never understood the tremendous impact something like this could have on one person. On hundreds of people. He was such a wonderful person. He touched everyone's lives. There is so much more to say but I have run out of words for the moment.

Quick Note...

Hey everyone, sorry about the long pauses between the post. A quick note as I dash between Doctor's visits...
Little Guy's ears never ended up draining from his initial ear infection about 3 months back and after several rounds of antibiotics and a second ear infection they have decided to put tubes in his ears and remove his adenoids. His 4th B-day is Thursday and his surgery is Friday (hubby's b-day).
So I have just been constantly running between doctor's visits for him, myself (i've been sick also) and life in general and have left all of you hanging without a single word. :-{

The Simple Knitted Bodice is finished and I have acquired two large bags of extremely dirty fleece for FREE! Of which, I have been washing when I have a spare second.
I promise pics of all the dirty details soon!
In the meantime, Lori has acquired 17 lbs. of fleece, plus some suri alpaca herself and is doing a fine job of washing and carding her stuff. Check her out! Great job Lori!

Brief interlude...

Man, life has really kicked my butt lately!
I have been absolutely swamped with homework and dentist's appointments and doctor's visits and....man, you name it! For the past 3 weeks I have been running the roads like an idiot.
I finally forced myself to take a break and skipped school, skipped Gymboree, skipped cooking and sat still for a bit.
Want to see the result?

Sorry about the blurry picture but I was trying to sneak taking a picture without my son finding me and he was trying to come through the door as I snapped the pic. (If he sees me with the camera it is usually a 30 minute ordeal of letting him take pics and then arguing with him to give the camera back so that I can finish.)

When the simple knitted bodice craze hit last year I fell in love with the pattern but couldn't find a yarn that seemed compatible. Until...I found this post on the SKB knit-along. Fell in love at first sight and copied the yarn all the way down to the color.
Can you believe this is how far I have got in 2 days? At this rate I might have a sweater in a little over a week!
Oh, silly me. What yarn did I use? South West Trading Co.'s Phoenix yarn in the color Chocolate. Got a heck of a deal on it at Discount Yarn Sale too.
I also have a little bit of yarn porn to show you. It seems whenever I am in a pissy mood I seem to buy yarn.


Took a drive with the little guy to the lys and got a couple skeins of sock yarn. The cherry tree hill I plan on doing a little dyeing on and the other one is some Lana Grossa yarn that is mostly cotton. You also see the Twisted Sisters Sock Book that was part of an Amazon.com order. (I also got the Charmed Knits book in the mail yesterday but haven't took a pic yet.)