Hilarious Stuff

Yesterday we went for a little drive down to Rothenburg-ob-der-Tauber. It's a beautiful Medieval town that is renowned for it's Christmas decorations and festivities. I've been dying to get there since I've heard it's a wonderful time. Here's the funny part: apparently Rachel went there yesterday too. Imagine that! Two bloggers in the same town taking the same pictures and we didn't even know it! Go check her post. Shots of the wall St. -Jacob-Kirche Rathaus and Franciscan Church Street performer part of the Reichsstadtmuseum overlooking the Tauber We hope to get back there for the Weinachtsmarkt for a good dose of Christmas cheer. Do I have some knitting content??? Why, yes, I do. FBS is off the needles and waiting in line for it's turn to be blocked. (snorts to self ) I loved knitting this up. I think that the lace bug may have bitten me. I just have to figure out whether I'm going to keep it, or give it away as a present. Originally I had started it for Royd's Nanny, but we know that that plan isn't anymore. Decisions, decisions... See? I casted on for the Hanging Vines Stole I got from Elann awhile back. I just can't decide if the yarn fits the pattern or not. Is it competing too much? BTW I'm able to get my pictures from the camera, but can't take any more. Darn thing needs to be sent for repair. Aargh.

Hey Y'all!

Nothing like spending a week and a half in Virginia to kick that southern accent into high gear. Actually I'm from Pennsylvania, but we'll blame three years in Georgia for that. Anyhow, I am back. Have been since Tuesday morning. I've been trying to post all week, but life kinda got in the way: four people with wicked jetlag, two sick children, some two million loads of laundry to do (not done yet), a lack of knitting to show and some major stressing over the state of our future here in Germany. To address the latter issue, here goes. Our division is slated to tentatively relocate back to the states sometime next spring/summer. The plan is to split the division up between Texas and Kansas. No offense to anyone, but those are two bases we haven't any desire to go to. So, we've been trying to figure a way out of it. Ideally we'd like to spend an additional year in Germany (we'll never get a chance to live here again!) to make it a full three years. Well, Royd works with someone who knows someone who may be able to help get him transfered. Whoopee! Uh, no. We have now gotten word that his unit may be disbanded (ceasing to exist) sometime in the near future. Great. Now what? Granted this could just be another rumor, but considering who it came from, it holds validity. Honestly we have no idea what's going on. People are getting orders to relocate left and right. People who shouldn't be getting them for another year or two. There's absolutely no security right now. Perhaps I'm stressing way too much. We've had "on the fly" moves before, it's sure to work out. I guess I'm just getting to a point where I'm over it. I want to decide where I'll live and for how long. Whispers to self: only five more years... That feels better now. Thanks. I also wanted to thank everyone for the nice sympathy thoughts. What began as a very sad occasion turned out to be an awesome "vacation". Royd and I got to have time away from the kids when there weren't family obligations. Pretty sad, but our first date in a year was a few hours drinking coffee at the Barnes and Nobles followed by a plate of appetizers at Chili's. I don't care, it was heaven! Of course I just happened to drop by a few yarn stores. I'm having all of my goodies mailed (along with the other five boxes of American goodies we couldn't live without) so once it gets here, I'll show it off. That is if I have a camera. Somethings wrong with it, and I can't get my pictures! I may have to find the old one. Okay, I'm tired. Hopefully I can get things to work tomorrow, 'cuz I've got things to show.

A Little Late

I do hope that everyone had a wonderful Mother's Day. Sadly mine turned out to be not the best. We received a call early on that Royd's Nanny had passed away that morning. She'd been in and out of the hospital for awhile dealing with recurring bouts of pneumonia, so the news didn't come as a surprise. So, we'll be hoping on a plane Thursday morning to fly back to the states. We'll be gone for a week and a half. Until then, friends-I've got a million things to do.

A Case of Startitis

Okay, so I wasn't completely honest yesterday: I did cast on for my next projects. First, I started the Flower Basket Shawl. I'm using Knitpicks' Alpaca Cloud in Stream. I love this yarn, it's so soft and yummy. I managed to get through the upper chart but can't continue. I need to get pointier needles. All of my 5 mm's are pretty blunt and I'm having a dickens of a time catching all the stitches for the decreases. I guess a trip to the yarn store is in order. Shucks. I also wanted to have something to work on during the knitting group. I contemplated taking the Heart-Motif Sweater, but didn't feel like dragging all those different balls of yarn along. I figured I'd might as well start Connor's aran sweater. Yeah, I finished the back up this morning. I'm amazed at how quickly it works up. This is the Aran Pullover from Knitting for Baby and I'm using Woolease in Loden. I finally figured out the trick to cables; don't use the cable needle. I always tend to shy away from cables because they were tedious. Not anymore! I see many more cables in my near future. My first night at the knitting group was, well, interesting. The group consisted of me, the lady running it, and volunteer from the center that was just hanging out. Another lady stopped by to get some info but didn't stay. Then the lady running it left after 40 minutes. Since it was my first time alone without the boys I wasn't in a rush to go home, so I stayed and chatted with the vounteer. I do hope that word spreads and more people start coming. Hubby says that I'm not allowed to go anymore. Apparently his time with the kids was "trying". Welcome to my life, baby!

Happy Cinco!

Well, the boys succeeded in their mission: get me sick. I spent the better part of three days with my butt planted on the couch. That is, in between cooking, cleaning and playing with the kids. I believe I heard my husband mutter something about it being his weekend and wanting to relax. Ha! When do I get a weekend to just sit around? Yes, what you witnessed last week was truly an exceptional event. I did manage to drag myself to the flea market across the street on Saturday. It's an annual event and huge. I couldn't not go! There was your usual crap, overpriced junk, antiques that would't last a day in my house and of course the beer tent. In between all this, I did manage to find something of interest: Look! Old yarn! I mean, just look at those labels: I also saw some really old and really decrepit spinning wheels. I thought about it for about half a second and then realized that it would probably cost a fortune to fix them up. There were just too many parts missing. Onto knitting progress... That would be two sleeves of the Basket Weave there. You know what that means-start something new! No, really I have to block these bad boys and have a little seaming party with myself. Ya'll know how I am about finishing, so we'll just leave it there. Yup, we also have one sleeve of the Heart-Motif Sweater. Which brings me to thoughts of finishing this up. Here's a question to anyone who's done this kind of stuff before: should I weave in the ends before or after blocking. I remember reading somewhere which way was best, but do not recall where. Any ideas would be appreciated.