Ho, Ho, It's Over

Actually, I did manage to get a little bit into the spirit after all. My celebration manifisted itself in the way of baking cookies. Five batches worth. This is down from my traditional minimum of seven or eight. One wouldn't know that I had been baking for two days though. There isn't a cookie left in the house. They were either given to various neighbors or eaten. I won't say which disposed of more. I hope that Santa was good to everyone else this year. He brought me lots of goodies. This picture showes a sampling. Four balls of Gedifra Scarlet, two skeins of Koigu in #403 (which I have to say is one of the pretties colors I've seen yet) and three of TSC's Donegal Tweed. My lovely family also indulged me in other things: wooden dpns, a set of Lantern Moon needles, a copy of Socks, Socks, Socks and a copy of Simple Socks. Such wonderful things! I can't wait to play with everything. My hands are still bothering me, but are better than they were. I've been wearing splints, taking Motrin, doing back and arm exercise and avoiding knitting to try to make them better. Avoiding knitting is proving to be very hard! I do sneak in a few rows everday, just to get my fix.

Secret Pal Revealed

Awesome goodies were awaiting me yesterday at the post office! My secret pal, Pam, sent me a bracelet, a spindle and a knitting calendar. Wow! Thank you so much, Pam! You really, really spoiled me. I'm sad to see the end of SPs, I had so much fun doing it. I probably won't be doing SP4, maybe the one after it though. Actually, the package got here on Monday, but I didn't know about it until yesterday. The clerks forgot to put a notice in my box and then had the nerve to give me a nasty second-notice. It's now the second time this has happened and I'm quite annoyed with them. I'm in denial that Christmas is only six days away. My house shows no signs of it's short arrival, except for a lonely wreath on my front door. There will be no tree this year, only a tabletop artificial with some bows stuck on it. This is so weird for me, usually by the first week in December I'm dancing around, giddy like a school girl. All of this strange phenomenon has to do with Royd not being here. It just doesn't feel like the holidays without him. I've tried to get Reilly excited in the hopes that it'll rub off, but he doesn't quite get it. All he knows is that presents are coming. The concept of Santa isn't quite sinking in. Next year. Today's my birthday. I'm making a carrot cake to celebrate. Since Reilly has dairy allergies, I made him some cupcakes with some of the batter. I could have chosen a cake and icing that he could have eaten, but it's my day and my cake. Besides his birthdays in less that three weeks. I got an awesome present from my sister Laura. She sent me a gift certificate to Elann!!! Oh, the trouble I'm going to get into... Actually, I haven't been knitting too much this week. My carpal tunnel is acting up very badly. Just doing one row sets my hands and arms on fire. I'll need to go to a doctor pretty soon in order to get a referral to a therapist. I can just hear my mom(an OT herself) saying "I told you so" right now. But all is not lost. I've spending my lost knitting time cleaning and organizing my house. I'll leave you with the latest picture of Connor, sporting his booties and a hat I made him:

Three Weeks!?!

Honestly I can't believe it's been that long since I had a baby and last posted too. I'm not sure where the time is going. It seems that each day is a blur and before I know it, it's 9pm and time for all of us to hit the sack. Royd left last Saturday morning to go back. Saying goodbye again was harder than I had thought it would be. I just keep telling myself that it's only 2-3 more months and he'll be back home for good. That is unless he gets extended, which we have yet to find out. His visit home couldn't have worked out better. We got to spend two days together before Connor was born, he witnessed his son's birth and then a week and a half to bond with him. Reilly really enjoyed having his dad home too and is now having some issues with him being gone again. Thanks to a quick recovery from labor, we were able to go out and do things. Mostly we did alot of shopping for Christmas, both for us and for his guys. My poor, poor credit cards! One day we all headed down to the Weihnachtsmarkt (Christmas Market) with my in-laws. There were all these vendors set up in the cutest little outdoor buildings. They have a name, but it eludes me right now. I didn't see anything I couldn't live without, but Royd spent some serious euros on Gluhwein (spiced hot wine). We now have quite the collection of mugs that it was served in. You pay a deposit for the mug and can either return it and get your money back or keep it. There was also a pen with some goats in it and Reilly had a blast feeding them. Of course the day wouldn't have been complete without a stop at the bakery and loading up on some yummy treats. Can I say yummy again? I have gotten a little knitting done. I've been working on these socks. They were intended for me, but turned out a little too tight, so I'll end up giving them to my mom. I also started on Mariah from the latest issue of Knitty. I'm about half way through the first sleeve. I had been going through all of my patterns looking for a cabled sweater and then I saw this. It's perfect. I love hoodies and the cable isn't so complicated that I'll get tired of it before completion. Also I wanted to show what my friend Jean sent me. Aren't they just the cutest little booties? She also sent Reilly a book that he very much enjoyed. Thank you, Jean, you're awesome!