wool gathering etc

hello again, i have a feeling that this will be a long post, so hang in there.

first, here are some photos from the trip to the Brown Sheep yarn factory and outlet store. the roads were a bit crappy, but we made it! i bought a lot of wool to continue in my bag making schemes, and anna, sam and christine also did some major yarn shopping. look at those happy faces!

in addition to all of the felt-able wool (mostly Lamb's Pride) yarn, i bought some sock yarn. i have decided to make some crocheted socks. most patterns i've found are for things that closely resemble slipper socks, but thicker, since crocheting ends up thicker than knitting anyway, and people think that crocheting a pair of socks with bulky fuzzy fugly yarn makes neat projects. however, after much searching, i have found a pattern for socks that actually look like wearable socks. it calls for some tricky stitches, and i'm not that great at reading patterns (i mostly just wing it), but i have the first toe done! it is taking me quite a while to get the patter figured out, especially now that i'm into the crazy stitched, but so far, so good. here's a picture of my pretty sock so far:

now for non-fiber news:

the week after the wool gathering expedition, i bought raffle tickets, thinking that i was simply donating money to the alternative spring break group, as i almost never win raffles. well, it turns out that it was my lucky day! i won! the prize that i got was from corale west, and contained an ariat polar fleece vest (size small - hopefully i can exchange it, as its rather nice), a horse figurine (also by ariat), and a justin boots rodeo bag. it's a figgin nice bag! it's a good sized duffel bag, with pockets on each side for your cowboy boots, which is fortunate, since i purchased a pair of justin boots at the stock show and rodeo for riding this summer. and they even fit in the pockets! sweet! here's a picture of the bag:

the next week was anna's birthday, so we celebrated on monday night by going out to eat and then we had ice cream cake at my house. i bought a plain one so i could decorate it, and it turned out pretty cool, in a way that says that i should definitely not become a professional cake decorator. :) here are some photos from a flattering angle:

for her birthday, i gave anna HIV from thinkgeek.com. she loved it! there are also several other awesome giant plush microbes, and i can think of so many people who need one of them. so much fun. think geek has now become one of my favorite websites. :)

*oh! and, on the trip, we stopped at the local winery, did some tasting, and bought some wine. i'm saving my bottle (a semi-sweet called 'neighbor's choice') for when jessica comes to visit for easter. :)

oink!

this picture from http://icanhascheezburger.com made me snort with laughter. :) there is more to post, including my wool gathering trip, but no time now... i'm writing papers (well... procrastinating on writing papers, but can't relate whole wool story now, that would be too much procrastination. enjoy:

DddddddGggggDddddGgggAaaDdddddAaaaaaDdddddddd

i've learned to play a song from the camp songbook. exciting, no? i only need those three chords to play several songs, but 'uyaimose' is the only one that i have successfully tackled as of now. my index finger has a funny tingling sensation where it hits the strings - well on it's was to a callus, i'd say. :)

i should take a picture of the gitter and post it sometime.
i should also post pictures from the various recent sca events and other stuff i've been up to lately.
we'll see if the internets will hold out for my wee baby laptop, which seems to be having problems with wireless these days (i'm on campus and didn't bring the usb cords for my camera, so i can't plug into this computer as there is no sd card reader.)

anywho, tomorrow is the big trip. some friends and i will be going to the brown sheep yarn factory, to tour it and to buy bulk discount yarns from the outlet store. hooray yarn! someone asked this week why we would want to do that, and my friend and i replied simultaneously, 'we like yarn' with the exact same intonation and probably expression on our faces. it was good times.

news from the motherland

i have found this wonderful blog, full of rants pretaining to my home state. much of what the author says is not only entertaining, but true. one of my favorite quotes from the page is:

"Welcome to the SD Legislative Asylum...only days to go."

if you're keeping up with what's going on in the SD legislature, that is quite apropriate.

here's the link: http://dakotatoday.typepad.com/dakotatoday/

enjoy!

hmmm...

Congratulations! You are Katherine Parr.
Katherine Parr spent nearly her whole life married to crotchety old men: Henry was the THIRD old fart she was forced to marry. Is it any wonder she turned to books and religion to occupy her time?
Katherine wasn't just smart, she was a tiny bit uppity, too: she almost got herself thrown in jail for arguing with His Royal Fatness about some theological issues. After Henry croaked, Katherine dropped the prim and proper act and married Thomas Seymour, a handsome, dashing pirate kind of guy who was also as dumb as a post.
Which goes to show you that even bookworms know how to get it on.



Which of Henry VIII's wives are you?
this quiz was made by Lori Fury not sure that i want to spend much of my life being married to a crochety old man, or even a stupid but dashing pirate-type, but whatever...

farewell bunnyslayer.

well, i now have a new car. as carrie pointed out a few days ago, i was just talking about how much i liked my neon, and about how i just named it and everything, and then i got into the accident. my poor neon has now been totaled by the insurance company. after a crazy amount of time driving a rental 2007 chrysler 300, i now have a 1999 chevymalibu. so far, so good. it was a very nervous two weeks with the rental car, especially since it sucks in snow. i have never had such a hard time getting out of my parking lot. the thing was supposed to have all this fancy traction control esp stuff, but it sure as heck had trouble going uphill on snow. my neon managed it alot better. and i'm glad to report that the malibu is also doing well with it. so i guess the point is that you should not buy a chrysler 300 if you live in a hilly snowy place. other than that, it was nice though.

anywho, school had started, and i'm taking the last few courses i need in order to be able to graduate, plus a couple fun ones. i'm looking forward to guitar class. and, i may even be able to buy the guitar that i'm borrowing, so that's cool.

guitar will also come in handy for working at camp this summer. i can't wait.

has it really been THAT long?!?

wow. it's been a while. i'm sorry. i guess life just caught up with me. so, here's the run-down of my "break." it all started the day after my last post. the last day of finals week, to be exact. i was on my way up to campus to drop some stuff off before i headed home for the holidays. i had everything packed (as far as i knew at the time) and was going to leave from campus. it was a bit of a snowy day, but knowing that the city does not like to plow the streets in town, i figured that i would be ok on the interstate (that's usually how it is). as i waited patiently behind a pick-up in the left turn lane at the stop light, i looked up into my rear-view mirror and what did i see but another large pick-up pulling into the turning lane. pulling into the turning lane and not really stopping. not even really slowing down. next thing i knew, it was a pick-up and neon sandwich.

"neat," i thought to myself.

so, the three of us pulled into the gas station on the corner, and proceeded to find the non-emergency police number. the officer showed up almost as soon as we called, and after talking to all of us, proceeded to arrest the person who was driving the truck that rammed into me. apparently driving with a suspended license is not a good idea. the poor kid thought he was just going to be late for his final, but ended up missing it all together. i wonder how he explained that one to the prof.

by the time i got my insurance company called and all that jazz, i figured that it would be too late to head for home, especially since i had no driver's side tail/brake light or blinker. that would not be fun, especially in the dark. i ended up hanging out with my friend who was going to be moving to ohio (the third one in less than a year. am i missing something?), and later that afternoon the twinging started in my back. so, i went to the doctor, and he said whiplash. again, neat. i went home, took the prescribed muscle relaxer and went to bed. the next day, i left for home.

*i'll stop right now and apologize for the saga. it's been an eventful month, and i've been meaning to blog about each event as it happened, but there just hasn't been a whole lot of motivation. i'll try to continue to break it up with witty and sarcastic remarks along the way. and maybe even some photos. yay photos!*

it was a long drive. i had to stop frequently, since i was not allowed to take muscle relaxers and operate a motor vehicle at the same time. (i don't know, it could make the trip across the state a lot more interesting...) i got home fairly soon after dark, but probably should have left a bit sooner than i did. i somehow managed to forget ava's gift, (see the not earlier about thinking that i had everything ) so i had to stop in soo foo and pick something up. she'll be getting a random gift of little people next time i come home. if i remember it. :)

anywho, i can barely remember the week i spent at home, it feels like so long ago. i really enjoyed getting to spend some time with everyone. doom got to see a lot more of me that most others, except for the family. i spent some quality time chatting with doom and ho, and then we went to national treasure. it would have been a really great movie except for the fact that i am now bothered by really bad history and geography. as far as action goes though, it was pretty good. and despite what they show, sylvan lake is not directly behind mt. rushmore. i know it's just a story, but still...

so, i really miss the niece. she's too cute for words. i only got to spend a couple of days with her and my sister. i really wanted to be home that friday night, because there was to be a slumber party at the farmhouse, and i missed it. sadness. that meant one less day with everyone, which sucked. a lot.

christmas eve was wonderful. the family (minus the brother plus lord baron daddy) was there, and we had a good time watching the niece help everyone unwrap their gifts. thank you all for the wonderful loot! i scored a digital camera, luggage, yarn, a spiffy crochet hook, 'teacher' clothes, and a bunch of other wonderful stuff. thanks to you all!

the card my brother gave me was hilarious! see:

the rest of the week included the dinner at whimps with andrew, his girl, and her boy, which you may have read about on doom's blog. i was excited to see affreca there too, since i don't get to see her much. it felt i was home when i saw all of the people i hung around in high school (plus a few awesome others... jessica). i miss whimps.

at the end of the week, i got to hang out in the milk barn and make glass beads with pappa tom. it was fun, despite the fact that it was freezing! i also opted to stay an extra day so that i could go to church with my mom on sunday, rather than being home to unwind before a long day at work on monday.

here are some of the beads that i managed to make:


um... what next? well, i made it back, worked all day, and bummed around for a while. i helped hire new people for one of my jobs, which was interesting. i've never really interviewed anyone before. it seems like that time flew by too. i got everything figured out for school. i'm going to graduate in may with a history degree (minors in geography and english), and maybe i'll go back and finish the education stuff later. i just can't do it right now. it would mean yet another full year here, and that's not happening right now.

anywho, on her way to wyo, jessica stayed a night at my house. i hadn't brought her xmas, birthday or graduation gift with me to vermtown, so i gave it to her here. i got her some crochet hooks and a reference book, and for graduation, a flask. not just any flask tho, a holy water flask. the ladies at the jewelry shop where i had is engraved laughed pretty hard. here's a photo, you can't see it, but her initials are also engraved on the bottom.

i guess that's all for now. hopefully i'll be able to blog more often this semester. it's a goal.