It's HERE!!!!

Yes, this weekend is the AVON WALK and I am ready as I will ever be. I will update you all as to what happens, of course! I am charging my camera battery at this very moment. To date I have raised $2175 which I am very proud of so the walking is just a bonus to me. As long as the money was raised thats what counts.

On the knitting front I completed another Boheme in a larger size for a patients niece born in July. I used Spud & Chloe's Sweater yarn in a beautiful turquoise color and followed the directions for the 18 month size. My gauge was off a bit but I figured so what if it was a little big. It came out to measure 25" around the chest which says should fit a 4-5 year old! I am not so sure about that. Maybe a 3-4 year old the way these kids get so big so fast these days! Here it is:






Don't you love the contrast of the buttons with the color of the sweater? I absolutely love it!



I have another baby to make something for now and I havent started yet! My kids school principal had a baby girl this summer and I didnt even know about it until the kids started school again last month. I am thinking of booties with a hat or something simple because I have a lot of baby knitting to do for my sister who is pregnant and due in March.

Things seem to be going well with her and I. I know there have been problems in the past but I am hoping thats where they will stay.

My husband seems to be doing well and healing from his surgery back 3 weeks ago. He is going to start PT in another couple of weeks and if all goes well will return to work early January.

October is one crazy month! Starting with the walk this weekend then my sons birthday next week, the NYS sheep and wool festival the following week and finally Stitches East the last weekend of October. WOW! Crazy right!

Gotta go. See you at the walk this weekend!!

Boheme Baby Sweater

I finally completed this baby sweater for my friends niece that is celebrating her first birthday next month. Right on time with this 18 month size sweater. The pattern is BOHEME on ravelry and I used one skein of Blue Moon FIber Arts Socks that Rock Heavyweight in Rare Gems colorway. I like it so much I want to make one for myself. I think that I am addicted to making seamless sweaters now because they are so easy and fast.






On another note I reached my fundraising goal of $1800 for the AVON Walk for Breast Cancer. This doesnt mean that I cant go beyond my goal because I have a few checks that I sent in that havent been put towards the total yet.

The first week of school is over and so far so good. Both my kids like their teachers but I do have a few things I need to iron out with my sons teacher. When I bring them in to school Monday I will have a chat with the principal about my concerns.

Wonky II

This little knit was such a quick and easy, fun knit that I had to make another. I am not sure who this is for or I should say that I do know who it's for but I don't want to mention it as to give the surprise away. This Wonky cowl from the latest Knitty is made with Sheep Shop Two yarn which now is no longer available (which is sad because its a great yarn).






I am in the process of working on a gift for my Mom's birthday, a baby sweater for my best friends niece, a couple of pairs of socks, and the finishing touches on a crocheted shawl. I can't figure out what type of crocheted embellishments are needed on it because I don't want it to look to overdone. I have a load of gorgeous crocheted leaves and flowers but I am saving them for another idea I have.

The summer is almost coming to an end and I can't wait! I had a nice summer but it was crazy. I am definitely not a hot weather person. I LOVE the Fall and cant wait for school to start. My husband is scheduled for major surgery the middle of September and am going to be working a lot more to make up for the 3 months of work he is going to miss. He's going to be getting workmans comp but we all know how its not your full salary. Its 75% of your salary and I really hope they dont dick him around when it comes to giving him what he is due. I can't work as much as he does but I will be filling in for him on his other job and picking up his regular patients. Then I have jury duty in November which is going to suck ass because there is no way I can serve on a jury. Even though I would love to do my civic duty and serve it would be a severe burden on the family at this time. No one to watch the kids, no one to take hubs to physical therapy, no one to work per diem. You get the point. Well, last time I went to serve for jury duty I drove though an ice storm to get to the court house and waited there for the lawyers to show for 3 hours. After waiting all that time with 100+ others in the same boat as me, they told us we all served for the next however many years (cant remember) and sent us home. Thats because the lawyers didnt show on account of the ice storm. So it was OK for US to risk our lives to get there but the lawyers no, God forbid! What a joke. I hope that doesnt happen again.

Good News! I am almost at my goal for my AVON WALK!! I am at $1625 and my goal is $1800. My friend is sending a check for $100 so once that registers I am at $1725 and only $75 away from my goal. If you are interested in donating to my walk please click on my link in the sidebar thank you from the bottom of my heart!

Time to work on my Mom's birthday gift...

Never a Dull Moment

I should know already that there is never a dull moment in my life. A week before my daughters hand surgery which was the 28th of July, I had an episode with my blood pressure where I had to go to the ER.

I had a migraine for a few days and it just wasn't relenting. I started to have horrible dizzy spells and problems with my vision. My blood pressure (BP) usually runs extremely low and when I say extremely I mean VERY low like 90/50. When I took my BP it was 158/110. OK, don't panic, take it again, and again and again. Every time I took it the numbers were worse and worse. It got to 180/120. By that time my husband had come home from work and he had taken it and got worse then I was getting. I put in a call to my doctor who was on vacation for the week so he had an asshole filling in for him. She doesn't know me and she is a real jerk. I know my body well and I know when something isn't right. My doc listens when I talk because he always says, you turn your back on me for one second and the shit hits the fan with my health. Off to the ER we went and my husband drove while I popped one of the old BP pills I had left over from when I had issues with tachycardia from my Graves Disease (before I had my thyroid removed). I thought what harm could it do and at this point I thought I was having a stroke.

When we got to the ER they brought me right in when they heard what my symptoms were. They hooked me up to a monitor and my pressure was still high at 146/99 but much better than the last reading my husband got at home. The ER doc ordered a CAT Scan of my head to rule out a stroke and an EKG which was done within an hour of me being admitted to the ER. They started an IV to give me pain meds for my migraine and drew lots of blood for cardiac enzymes and other tests. All the tests were negative and my pressure was still hovering in the 150/90 something range. They were unsure if the Atenolol that I took before I left my house had anything to do with it going down. I definitely think it was lowering it. I almost forgot to mention that my Mom and Dad were away on vacation and my husband had no choice but to take the kids with us. You could imagine how much fun that was for them! They admitted me to the hospital and I stayed for a couple of days. They did a renal ultrasound to see if I had stenosis of the renal artery which would cause a hypertensive episode. There is also another condition of the kidneys that causes hypertensive episodes (complicated name that I can't remember) and the ultrasound ruled it out also. So after all that they couldn't find anything wrong which is comforting but aggravating also. I still don't feel right but they seem to think it might have been related to my thyroid levels being totally off.

A week later my daughter had her hand surgery. They initial thought it was an aneurysm of the artery or something vascular. When they got in there it wasn't vascular at all which turned out to be very good news. No reconstruction of the artery needed meaning no scary side effects and less healing time. Pathology hasn't come back yet but I am hopeful it's not serious.

The same day my daughter had her surgery I had my PET Scan which I go for every 4 months. Results were negative and I can breathe again.

During that time I knit a few rows on a couple of new socks and I COMPLETED the "Wonky" cowl from the Knitty Summer Issue. It was a very quick knit that was also very easy. I used Spud & Chloe yarn which was a dream to knit with. The first two pictures are pretty much true to color which is a natural brown color. I made it for my husband because he's not a scarf person. Here are some pics of the completed project.





I am planning on making a few more of these!

Only A Year in the Making

I FINALLY finished another project that was lying around unfinished for a VERY long time. The Gumdrop Socks were the July 2008 shipment of the Blue Moon Rockin' Socks Club. Well, it only seems fitting that it's July 2009 and I have completed them! Here they are and right on time for the next shipment of the RSC due any day now. Now if I can only finish the tank top I started last spring! lol

Why I Walk-AVON Walk for Breast Cancer 2009

I just completed my page on the AVON Walk for Breast Cancer website! You're probably thinking FINALLY! The walk is in October and I am just started my fundraising. The paragraph below is what I put on the site and the link is in my sidebar (AVON Walk for Breast Cancer 2009) if anyone would like to donate to my walk.

Most of you know that I am a breast cancer survivor. I was 34 years old when I received my diagnosis in February of 2006. I am walking for many reasons. The main one being that I would like to see a cure for breast cancer in my life time. I walk because I don't want my daughter to live in fear that breast cancer will do the same thing to her as it did to me. I walk for the women who can't walk. It took me 3 years to be able to wake up in the morning and not have the word 'cancer' cross my mind. I did not let cancer define me but it did change me, and the way I view every day life. I like to say, I may have had cancer, but cancer never had me. With your donations breast cancer can be a thing of the past. Please help me eradicate this terrible disease and give hope to those fighting it now. Thank you so much!
 Jeanann

My Knitting Mojo is Back

I finally finished the sweater I was making for my son's teachers new baby girl who was born in March. I made sure to make it a 12-18 month size so she can get a lot of use out of it when the weather gets colder. The yarn used is Great Adirondack Handspunlike cotton with a #6 needle. I absolutely love this pattern because it's a seamless kimono so no seaming when you are done! I made one for my cousins baby with the lion on it. Enough talking here it is:





I know that I have told everyone that I wanted my hair to grow so I can wear it long like I used to but I changed my mind. The other day I decided that I liked the way my curls looked when I had it in a bob. So I went to a curly girl salon to my usual curly girl stylist and she did a great job. I'll try and get a pic up soon, I promise. Jesse, the stylist says that it definitely looks better on me than the style I had before because it suits my curly personality which is so true. Crazy curls, crazy me.

I have been working a lot to make money to pay bills and all that jazz but I am sure everyone is trying to do as much as possible these days to pay their bills. I haven't had a chance to work on jewelry or knit but since I finished the baby sweater I can feel my knitting mojo coming back. I ordered a couple of books on Amigurumi so I can use the scrap yarn I have collected these past few years for something productive like a knitted pumpkin pie to be exact. I also got my hands on the Sookie Stackhouse series of books that the HBO series "True Blood" is modeled after. Barnes and Noble had a few of them but not the whole series so I bought books 1 and 2 at the book store and books 3-7 (or 8 I cant remember but it was just the paperbacks and not the newest hardcover) from Amazon.

School is out for the summer on Tuesday and my kids are not doing camp this year. God help me! My son is going to do a summer school program for the month of July which is only until 12:30pm M-F. My daughter is having hand surgery the first week of July so she wont be attending the Y this summer. We promised them that we would still do things so they will still have a nice summer break.