Saturday, December 06, 2008

Come on, get happy!

I swear, I am so behind the curve on this whole musicianship thing.

If we end up being the Partridge Family (as a couple friends have suggested), I'll be playing the role of Ruben, the dim-witted manager: benevolent, yet completely without a musical bone in my body in comparison to the rest of the family.

Look what greeted me this evening:


And the kicker? He put that thing in his mouth, and got a nice, even, rich tone out of that thing on the SECOND TRY! He's producing a tone that any middle school band teacher would be PLEASED to hear coming out of a 6th or 7th grade sax player.

I take limited solace in the fact that he hasn't got a clue about fingering.



In more 'come on, get happy' news, it looks like Midnight has recovered from whatever ailment he had earlier in the week. I was certain on Wednesday that I should be taking measurements for his Final Resting Place. He barely came out of his nest for 2 days. He staggered around. He didn't eat. He was weak. One of his eyes didn't open. He didn't appear to hear me. He wouldn't take food from my hand.

Then, suddenly on Friday afternoon, it was like he got an infusion of life and energy, and now he's back to his old self, although he's a bit slower, and a bit skinnier. I don't know what was up, but it hit him hard, and left nearly as quickly as it came. I still think he's pretty darned old for a European Black hamster, though.

Kelly is much buoyed, though.



One Christmas present down, several more on the needles.


This is the Elida Scarf, and it was a very easy knit. I think I might just do it again. I used a skein of Malabrigo laceweight in Apple Green, and 4.0mm needles. The thing is PLENTY long enough. Here it is stretching out to infinity...


(the first photo is a better representation of the colour, though).




I don't think I ever posted my Birthday Swag.

Kelly got me a lovely orchid. A lady slipper.

No. really. It's real. Honest.

It sits on my kitchen windowsill with the other orchids. It seems to be a good place for them. They thrive.




There was other stuff, too. Just nothing quite so organic (unless you could the alpaca yarn Ken got me for my next pair of socks)





We've met with our contractor. Kelly's BFF's dad just got his license, and he's gonna start tearing out our old ratty nearly-ready-to-fall-over-from-dry-rot kitchen in the New Year. I love what he did with his own kitchen, and he's got all the connections we need to get what we want. The fact that we're getting the "My daughter's best friend's parents" discount isn't too bad, either.




Question: How do you know that you're not a very consistent housekeeper?

Answer: When your daughter sees you washing the floor, and freaks out because "it might be dangerous!" and goes and makes you a sign for the day:



Ken was laughing at the fact that it was SO UNUSUAL to see the floor washed that Kelly felt she had to make a sign, so I said "Watch out, or I'll make an "Anion: Dry Floor" sign to go with it"

Yeah, I may not be that tidy, but I've got a good balance of Science Geek and Grammar Geek genes.



Another one of my Christmas decorations reminds me that I might have also had a 12 year old, if things had gone differently in 1996.



Our first miscarriage. I was pretty sure it was a girl, and I called her Hope. The picture is supposed to be a Christmas Angel bringing the Christ child to earth, I think, but when I saw this shortly after I got out of the hospital, all I could see was my baby being cradled back to heaven. I did the cross stitch on linen to work through the grief. Now, it's just a sweet reminder of God's comfort and blessings through hard times.


Here.


Have a bun.

You know you want one.

They're still warm. Just think how wonderful one would be with curls of Canadian butter melting over it's freshly-opened innards.

Heh. Did I mention I was trying to lose 10 pounds by Christmas?


Did I mention that I'm failing miserably at it?


Did I mention that Canadian butter is my downfall?

Excuse me. I need to go get a snack.



ps. I managed to score something from Kelly's Christmas List. Two things, actually.

1. she wanted a shirt with a star on it.

2. she wanted "sleeves" (these are like leg-warmers for arms. They have thumb-holes to keep them on the hand, and they go up past the elbow).

I killed two birds with one stone in this purchase:


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