Sorry for the day’s interruption in the progress report. I didn’t go to the office yesterday, but worked from home, or well my future home, aka folk’s house. Saturday morning I woke up with a pretty sore throat and a gooky eye. The throat and the gooky eyes had continued without any progress so I finally decided it was probably time to go to a doctor. Only appointment I could get was 10:45 yesterday. Makes for a lousy time when one has an hour long commute to the office mated with a sketchy non-rush train schedule. As it was, I didn’t get out of the doctor’s office until just shy of Noon. Anyway, I brought the kids and my laptop to the ‘rents house and worked before and after my appointment. I returned from the pharmacy with stuff for my nose (Flonase), my eyes (Tobramycin) and an antibiotic (Amoxicillin) and a confusing dosing schedule to this short term memory challenge fiber fiend. Two puffs once a day, two drops 4 times a day and one pill twice a day. Arg! I did get some bonus knitting time at the doctor’s office, but lost the whole lunch knitting and commuting I normally get. I’m feeling better now, or at least the throat is and the eyes are way less gooky. I do have a bit of a headache from the Flonase and might just take that before bed or something from hereon…..
But you don’t come read this for the state of my health. You come for the wool p0rn. I shall not disappoint. I have much to show. Yesterday was one of those good mail days. I found a plethora of packages outside my door. The first was a replacement battery kit for a 3rd generation iPod. Right I know I have the Creative Zen Micro and also an iPod Nano, not to mention a number of discarded eletronic music devices including a couple of other mp3 players and a Sony MiniDisc player. It bothered me that my 10gig iPod was unusable. I’d seen a replacement battery kit in CompUsa when mom and I were there with the twins last month. It tickled the back of my mind. Finally, I gave in and ordered one on Saturday. After a little bit of fun prying the case apart (I hope the screwdriver gouge in the palm of my hand heels quickly), it was relatively easy to get the new battery in. The thing is charging up now. We’ll see how it works. It has some funkiness on the drive so I’ll probably get it to wipe itself tonight and then can use it as a portable hard drive. But again, that isn’t wool p0rn is it?
I bought a skein of the Brooklyn Handspun sock yarn in the Flickering Flames colorway. Isn’t that just yummy looking? Of course I needed mor sock yarn. You can’t have too much of that stuff, and besides, I’m helping to support a local business. The skein is @480 yds of superwash which would be plenty for my small feet. Heck I can probably eek out a pair for the girl child too.
My favorite package was from my Better Pal. This is the final package and my BP revealed herself to be none other than Margene! She is the bestest better pal. Oh boy did she spoil me and this last package was just fabulous. Get a look:
Sara took one for the team and had to check it out to make sure all was right (and I figured I could get my kitty zen shot in too. 
Want a better view of the contents of the gorgeous basket, 
sans kitty head, and without flash under the OTT light? Tucked into the lovely lined basket are:
Two skeins of Regia to make socks for the twins and two skeins of Lorna’s Laces in one of my absolute favorite colors to make socks for me along with Margene’s favorite sock pattern! There’s also a tin of Altoids, yummy mint candies for Valentine’s Day, chocolate that believe it or not I haven’t eaten yet but was sorely tempted to. A heather plant to grow (I hope my brown thumb can manage that.. I love heather!), a lovely notepad and best yet lip and cuticle balm! She was also so generous to include gifts for the twins which I’ll let them open tonight. Thank you Margene! Thank you, thank you, thank you! You spoiled me rotten. I thank you again from the bottom of my heart.
Now there was something else I wanted to blog about. What was it? Sock yarn? Check. BP gift? Check. Tired of the same commercials over and over again while watching the Olympics? Well forgot that. Seriously enjoyed the Olympic diversion on Monday when gifted by FOX with a new episode of House and 24 all on the same night! Thanks to the ReplayTV for letting me know about House! I switched over to the Olympics at 10 to catch the ice dancing before falling asleep on the couch after watching the icy Italian pair. Olympics. … what else?
Oh yeah, my vest 
I finished the main body last night. The snow is over, the shoulder stitches are hanging around on waste yarn awaiting a 3-needle bind off. The steeks are all bound off. I did do one shoulder with the 3-needle thing but then undid it when I realized it would be a bitch in the extreme trying to get the thing on the sewing machine tonight to stitch up them steeks with the shoulder done. As I posted on the KAL, I had lots of fun doing the math as to where to place the back neck cast off as the patten continues to be pretty fubar. But that part is over. What’s next?
*Sewing and cutting the steeks
*Sewing the hem up
*Knitting attached icord along front edges, around neck and armhole openings
*Sewing in zipper
Most of those are making the knitting of 291 stitches a round (before figuring in steeks) in the newly developed skill of colorwork and two handed knitting seem quite tame. That whole steek business has me a tad twitchy. I’m going to pour myself a good stiff drink and have it sit to the side of the sewing machine. After the scissor business, I’ll need it. Best not do it before hand or I’d really make a mess out of it. We won’t go into my lack of love of handsewing (ignore that I prefer to hand quilt and do cross-stitch) and the whole distaste of i-cord. The next couple of days should be interesting! Wish me luck.
Finally, I snapped this photo yesterday while my short folk shared a bowl of cereal with their Pop-pop. Yes, all three ate out of the same bowl as the short folk think it tastes better that way, or some other weirdness!
Craft on!
