Short Week!

Short weeks always sound like a good thing at first, but then once you get into it you realize real quickly that you still need to get the same number of things done, but now instead of having 5 days to do you only have 4! Honestly 5 wasn't enough anyway! I know I'm a good worker, especially compared to most....but lately I am just not feeling it. My boss is going away for a month (she goes back home to China to visit), so she has got a firecracker up her butt right now. She wants everything done, and everyone to have enough to do while she is gone. Understandable. But after Thursday I am out of here for almost 3 weeks myself! And this must be why I am not the boss of anyone....all I care about right now is going on vacation! Today is 3/4 done, three more to go.

Something odd and wonderful (knock on wood) is going on at home.....my children are getting along and enjoying their Summer vacation with each other. I call and IM to check up on them through out the day and each time I get happy children on the other end....maybe I have the wrong number? Nawww....they're pretty good anyway, at least I think so, but I am bias. What a stress reducer though, to know that I can count on them to be cool to each other. Don't get me wrong I still have to intervine and so on, but way less then ever. Maybe they are starting to get it? But I guess just like the vicious circle of bad karma, there is the same circle for good karma and it really helps. It's so much easier to treat them to goodies, they usually don't ask for much anyway.....a trip to the candy store, a movie, whatever....when they are good it's so much easier to give, they're happy to get it and then they are good again. It sounds so simple, why is so hard to impliment. Well we all got our groove going for now, I am going to enjoy it as much as possible.

Mike's on days this week, so we'll be a mess. It was hard to get us both out the door this morning, but he got to work on time and I made it inside my "window" too. I am still getting used to getting in here at the crack of dawn and ended up eating my sub for breakfast. We are all trying to cut down costs and our carbon footprint. Brown bagging lunch is a good start, just I am hungry at 9am, lol!

This week is 4 months now that I have not been smoking. I thought having the MIL at home smoking (outside) would make it harder, but I think the awful smell has helped remind me how bad it is. Something about her body chemistry or about how quick she wolves a butt down, but she carries the worse smell after a cig. I can stand outside at work with the smoking peeps and be social, it does not bother me. She comes in after one and starts talking to me I have to cover my mouth and walk away. I think at this point she believes I hate her anyway. I don't, just the smell. Other tensions are there, but my own fault for not confronting her directly. Mike (the poor thing) addressed her this weekend about helping the house out. I don't think it was easy for him, but he knew he had to just get it over with.

We are so looking forward to our camping trip coming up. We will be at White Lake State Park in NH for over a week of my almost 3 week vacation. We camped there once a few years ago and it was so nice. We kind of blindly picked our site, we know it's close to the water, but we can not remember exactly what it was like. We'll find out. We are going after the holiday weekend, so it should be quite.

And last, but not least on my mind today is Kenzie's blanket. I made a couple squares over the weekend, not real nuts about rushing it. I have 4 small squares to make and the rest of a medium square. Some joining to do and the edging, which I will play by ear. It's easy to sit and crochet while I am waiting for Kenzie at karate. She has it this afternoon at 4:30. It's gonna be a bit rushed because both Mike and I are doing days. I'll post some pics on Ravelry later today or tomorrow too. I need to add a couple projects, like the karate felted bag.

Right now, I gotta get to it. I need to be working to keep the boss lady happy enough until vacation. It's really nice out, may 75F and real sunny. I hope the girls go swimming.

(PS. Click on the flag afghan above (it's not mine) it will bring you to the free pattern on the Lion Brand website. Not that anyone but a total freak would be able to finish that before the holiday weekend coming up, but I thought it was pretty cool looking for a flag afghan.)

I'd Wear That!

I want this shirt! There is a Threadless t-shirt thread going on at Ravelry (btw, all this fiber reference is killing me, lol!) and someone linked to this one. Go over there and click for a reprint, right now it is out of stock....but if enough of us bug them they'll put it back on the presses.

My Dream Job: Crochet at Home, 100K+/yr......Oh well, Happy Monday!

(shhhh.....I should be working, where is my freaking motivation!?)

But I have gotten something accomplished this morning.....

• Watched Drew's new podcast.
• Decided I am going to participate in a CAL mystery after reading about Bendy's new book Dying to Crochet by Bendy Carter on the Crochet Partners list and on Ravelry. There is a group on Ravelry called Hooked on Murder, apparently this kind of thing has been going on for quite some time, lol.

It's raining, guess it will be on and off for the next few days. Okay for me cuz I am at work, sucks for the kids though. They aren't used to being home on vacation yet so the rain makes them even more bored. I just want to be home with them :o( Chin up though, after next Thursday I am on vacation for over two weeks! I can not wait. Okay, I am going to force myself to get some work done. I promised the boss lady she would have her data today.

Has anyone tested the "washability" of Vanna's Choice yarn? Kenzie's circles to squares afghan is made with it, and I have scraps from other gift projects. Just wondering?

Kenzies Circles in Squares Afghan

Originally uploaded by happyhooking

Well this thing has been hibernating for at least a couple months now. I am adding an extra section to it, because the pattern (from Lion Brand Yarn, free online), is more like a throw than an afghan and I want Kenzie to get some use out of it. It may be long enough for her now at almost 9 years old, but not for long. She has a pink circle bed set from Target too, this will go nicely with it.

Speak of the devil, she keeps asking me to set up the tent in the living room. She had a sleep over last night and they slept in the backyard in our old tent. Guess she wants more. Right now we are having some strong winds and thundershowers, so I am really glad I didn't procrastinate getting the tent down.

I have one large square, 4 medium and 4 small to finish off the extra panel. I am trying to motivate. I should also get the last load of laundry in too. Sunday's can be pretty lumpy. Mike has to work tonight and I don't think he feels to good, he's been watching tv down in the bedroom....kinda detached. I hate to leave Kenzie by herself upstairs to go make him feel better downstairs. Blah. I guess pocking around the net isn't making either one feel better, so off I go.

Pattern layout with my extra panel (the pieces with the sideways letters are my extras):

Crochet, Ravelry & Water Bottle Holder Pattern

Crochet 003
Originally uploaded by happyhooking

I wanted some water bottle holders for camp so I whipped up a few of these. I've since made multicolor ones too, have to upload those pictures sometime. I wrote down the pattern after making a few of them and have since uploaded it to Ravelry for $1. It is my first pattern that I am charging for, but I am going to send half of it to the National Parks. I also uploaded the pattern to Lulu. If you'd like a copy of it and you're not on Ravelry yet you can find it there. It is $2 there, but if you're reading my blog and find it you get it for $1 too, just leave me a message ;o)

I've been on Ravelry since last November now and I am still amazed every day. Recently I joined the Welcome Wagon group to help send messages to new members. Right now I have the letter H (all I can think of is Sesame St. when I say that), which I like because I start with the letter H too. (Yeah, it doesn't take much.) Ravelry is a time suck though. I go to work and log on, next thing I know it's 2 hours later and I haven't done a thing! It cuts into my crochet time too, but there is so much inspiration there I don't count that as a negative. I love Ravelry and can not believe no one thought of this kind of formatting sooner. This formatting could be used to make anything more manageable. Casey and Jess should copyright the formatting, lol, I said the c word.

Right now I am working on a bag that kinda matches the water bottle carrier, except it is colorful and striped. (Gotta update the pictures!) I made Kenzie (my youngest daughter) a cool felted backpack for Karate a few weeks ago (post pictures!), and I hand painted the Japanese characters for Karate on it. It came out really cool. So it has inspired me to do more bag work. I think the bag I'm working on now will be a backpack too. In the style of the sling backpack. I should be working on Mackenzie's blanket. I started it months ago. I hate when I start something and loose interest in it. I really want it done, I'm just not motivated. Grrrrr...it's like a monkey on my back.....speaking of which I think I have one of those in process too. I want to add those process bars some of the Ravelry girls made to this blog, maybe that'll help me keep track. I have my Ravelry notebook, but that doesn't seem to scream at me like a progress bar does.

I'm posting this from flickr, lets see if it works. I'll have to go back and do spell check over at blogger though. Maybe while I'm here I should update my pictures.....no....must.....go.....do.....work!

Later!

Bringing it Back

Once again I will attempt to keep up with a blog. I have started several over the years and commit to none. I'm spending more time on the interweb thanks to Ravelry, and there is incentive to see an up to date blog going on my notebook page. I'm not to thrilled about the template options here on blogger, so I found this viney one. I just need to take some time to tweak it out a bit.

For those of you popping in randomly my blog is about crochet hooking, not the other kind ;o) After a bit of googling I found another Jojo's Happy Hooking, hers was NOT about crochet, lol. Guess that's what I get. I keep a Google pages site kinda up to date here. I'm going to keep that site going (it needs an update), but it's just not a blog. It's more of a gallery I guess.

Topics I hope to post about:

• Life in general, bitching and moaning to the faceless internet is always therapeutic.
• Crochet, cuz that's what keeps me sane.
• My husband and kids. They may drive me nuts sometimes but they are my world.
• Camping, another sanity keeper. Sometimes I wish I could stay in the woods forever.
• Getting green(er). My inner hippie has always tried, now my inner yuppie thinks it's cool.
• My cats and the dog that thinks she is a cat.
• Stupid people, guess that goes to bullet #1, but there are so many of them they deserve their own space in line.
• And whatever, isn't that what a blog is for?

Changes I want to make to this blog:

• Add a Ravelry button, and other gadgets related to it if there are any.
• Get rid of the ads that came with the template.
• Find out if I can import pics from either Pisca or Flckr.
• Add my most favorite links, not all of them, no need for clutter.
• Tweak out the templates layout. Add some useful gadgets.

I am not a big fan of the myspace kind of site, not even a big fan of blogging. I'm kinda partial to my Google pages site format, but like I said no place to really "blog". I will babble here, think out loud, bitch, fight with myself, whine and carry on about somethings that really don't matter. I'm going for the blog is cheaper than therapy approach.

Okay off to mess around with the template, hopefully I don't fuck it up!