Beauty

How beautiful is this hummingbird in our living room window?

hummingbird

…..and a double rainbow in our back yard – more beauty from nature…..

double-rainbow

…….and tulips Corey picked me in his yard – they are my desktop on my computer at work – I love love love them…..

tulips

…..and Carrie and Chloe – the lovefest continues.  Carrie cannot just let Chloe sleep alone.  Carrie will go wherever Chloe is and squeeze her way in even if there isn’t enough room, and Chloe never minds – she enjoys the company.

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Socks for Mark and me (or is it I?? or is it myself?? – hmmmm) (Pairs #34-36)

socks-x-3These three pair took forever to make.  The red, white and blue pair – oh did I dislike that yarn.  Until I told myself ok, they’ll be my 4th of July patriotic socks, I just dreaded working on them.  After that, it was smooth sailing.  The middle pair are for Mark .  They were ok to work on except the solid color got a little boring but that’s because I love working with the self-patterning so much.  The other pair – oh my – they were my biggest sock disappointment to date.  They are Paton’s Kroy.  It worked up beautifully.  The pattern is the fluted banister pattern that I’ve always wanted to try and is actually brainless knitting and they turned out beautiful – until I washed and blocked them.  They lost some of their brilliant color and felted just a bit.  We’ll see how they wear but again, disappointed.

Helpful hint – don’t walk away from a photo shoot with cats in the house who adore and covet wool.

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**Teri’s 4th of July socks – Regia 5346

Mark’s maroon socks – Regia Stretch 32

Teri’s fluted banister socks – Paton’s Kroy Stripes 56615 Bronzed Berry Stripes**

Happy Mother’s Day to me!

I’m a lucky girl.  My family makes me happy every time I’m with them.  The kids all came on Mother’s Day – all four of them since Mark and I call them all “our kids” now – with great deference to their own “real” parents.  We made homemade pizza (a family favorite) for lunch.  The guys played baseball while Danielle and I played on iPhones and watched the men and laughed at them.  Corey taught Justin how to play baseball and Justin picked it up right away – he’s very good at sports.

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Keith changed oil in the Jeep and van.  This is Corey helping – under a tarp because it started to rain.

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Mark made me a cake – awwwww.

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Corey and Danielle gave me this beautiful plant.  It is a gloxinia.  We don’t have plants because we have cats who like to eat plants.  Corey volunteered to keep the flower at his house – nice boy 🙂  It’s safely where Carrie and Chloe can’t get to it but they’ve tried their darndest.

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Keith and Justin got us a big flat panel monitor for the computer for multiple holidays.  We had a small one but this is really cool.  Nice!!!  We think of them every time we’re on the computer.

We then all went to Corey and Danielle’s house and took the leftovers with us and had dinner there.  It was so nice and Stripes and Louie were entertaining as usual.

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It was a beautiful day.

♥I love you Mom♥ (Pair #33)

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Happy Mother’s Day to Mom!  I made her these socks and we bought her a wireless mouse and keyboard.  She was pretty happy.  I was not fond of this sock yarn – the color looked a little dull to me but Mom loves them and that’s all that matters.  Mom – you are loved.

*Paton’s Stretch Sugar 32415**

Corey, the foot model (Pair #32)

corey-camoDoesn’t Corey make a lovely foot model?  These are Corey’s newest socks, although these are from March 6, so I’m wayyyyyy behind on posting.  The socks Corey got for Christmas were not a perfect fit so I made him these to his specifications (mental note – Sock Wizard doesn’t work for everybody).

**Regia Stretch Nordic Oslo 124**

Happy Birthday to YOU!!!

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Happy 21st Birthday to Danielle!  We had a sweet little party for Danielle.  We had brownie sundaes and I knitted a scarf and fingerless gloves for her with yarn she picked out from my stash.  Clearly, she loved them.

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**Regia Crazy Chris 5439**

Corey and Danielle

corey-and-danielleCorey and Danielle have set a date to get married – September 25, 2010 October 17, 2009.  We love Danielle like our own so we are ecstatic to have her “officially” in our family.  Corey proposed and gave her the engagement ring on November 7, 2008.  We look forward to their future together.  Corey……you did good!!!  Danielle……we’d like to humbly say we think you did too!!!  We love you both.

A beautiful fence materializes in two days

fence1This is Corey and Danielle when we were leaving Menards with a whole bunch of fence.  This was the second load.  Corey and Danielle had already picked up the concrete, posts, screws, etc.  On the back of the truck, you can see we answered the age-old question “Where’s Waldo?”.  Who knew he was hiding on the back of a Menards truck.

fence2This is Mark and Corey working on the front corner.

fence3This is the first beautiful section finished.  The whole fence is finished now.  It took two days of working in wind and rain and cold.  Don’t let the beautiful sunshine in the picture fool you.  It was cold and Danielle and I both have fierce windburns on our faces.  All that is left to finish is the gates, which is the easy part.  We all agreed the worst part was setting the posts.  We also had our first sleepover at Corey and Danielle’s.  Since they only live forty minutes away, we have never spent the night there.  It was a fun and very productive weekend.

Sushi anyone?

sushi2Keith, Justin, Mark and myself went to this Japanese restaurant last weekend.  The tables were each in “pits” where you sit on cushions on the floor and your legs and the table are in the pit.  As is tradition, you also take your shoes off before you go to your table.  We had a blast, especially watching Justin with his wasabi.  His face would turn beet red with every bite.  When Keith suggested avoiding the wasabi, Justin said no, he liked the feeling when it got to his stomach.  Keith, Mark and I got the tempura chicken (typical Americans).  Justin ordered this beautiful plate of sushi.

sushi1Myself, I like sushi but not the kind with raw fish.  I’m not a seafood fan so I’ve actually never even tried the ones with raw fish.  I did it this night because Justin asked and I usually try whatever the food is that I haven’t tried yet unless it still has eyes in it or repulses me, i.e. squid and roe.  For the record, the brighter orange item on this plate is roe.  Wiki defines roe as the fully ripe internal ovaries or egg masses of fish and certain marine animals, such as shrimp, scallop and sea urchins”.  Wiki describes eggs as “usually chicken eggs, but also those of other birds and turtles, as well as those of fish”.  It even seems the Wiki definition is trying to scare me, even though an egg should just be an egg.

I ate a piece of the green sushi, which was cucumber.  Mark also tried that one and didn’t like it.  His palate is not adventurous.  He likes a good burger or some lasagna.  I also tried the raw fish one.  It’s not for me – it’s hard enough for me to eat cooked seafood let alone raw.  Keith had already tried the raw previously and is o.k. with it if you can get past the texture.  All in all though, we had a great time.