Author: Sarah

Stash Overload!

Sarah Crafts

I’m in the process of cleaning my craft room again…and the guest room/soon-to-be nursery into which more craft supplies have somehow crept. (I swear they got up and walked there by themselves!) In the past week, I’ve realized that I could easily not walk into another craft store anytime in the next, oh, maybe 3 years or so (maybe even 5), and still be able to happily knit, cross-stitch, quilt, spin, bead, draw, paint, crochet, scrapbook…

And this is despite the fact that I’m even getting rid of some of the yarn I know for sure I will never, ever use. (Someone out there must really love acrylic baby yarn in lemon yellow and variegated green, even if I don’t.)

Of course, we all know this isn’t going to stop me from walking into another craft store, right? After all, although I have a fair amount of supplies, I don’t exactly have batting for quilts just laying around, or buttons for finished sweaters. I’m not going to go on an all-out craft-supply-buying ban. But I am planning on being a little more careful about what I buy, and try to knit/stitch/quilt from stash first. Hopefully, this will prevent my craft room from taking over the whole house.

Be Kind To Your Web-Footed Friends…

Sarah Music

…for a duck may be somebody’s mother…

Oh, sorry, those lyrics to Stars & Stripes Forever will forever be ingrained in my head. Too many cartoons when I was little or something…

Our outdoor concert last night went, well, ok. It went from gray and rainy to pleasant and sunny just in time, and it really was a nice night to be playing outdoors. The performance wasn’t the best we’ve ever done, though. It’s hard to hear each other and balance when you’re sitting in the great outdoors. I did make it through both Sousa marches we played without hyperventilating, though!

I’m a little sad – I won’t be playing again for several months. Band doesn’t start for the next season until late September, for the holiday concert. Somehow I think I’ll be a little busy for most of those rehearsals. If I’m feeling up to it, though, I’m going to try to go back for the spring concert, since rehearsals for that start in late January. (Of course, in the interim I’ll be practicing on my own so I don’t lose my chops, really I will…)

Quick Baby Note: Today marks 20 weeks of being pregnant. If you go by the standard 40 weeks (which can be off by 2 in either direction) I’m halfway there! Oh, dear…there’s still an awful lot to do before the baby comes…

This is News?

Sarah Dogs

Study finds dogs understand language. Well, of course they do, as anyone who has lived with dogs will tell you. Molly and Murphy both recognize toy words – “ball”, “bone”, “dolly” – and can follow simple requests to get a particular type of toy. They know the difference between “deck” and “outside”, and will go to the appropriate door when you say one word or the other (in a phrase or not). We spell all kinds of words, especially “dog”, “cat”, “food” and “out”, to avoid crazy doggie behavior. They actually picked up on “f.o.o.d.”, so we now spell it “f.u.d.”. I would estimate that they know about 100 words and phrases. I actually suspect they know a whole lot more than that, but they aren’t letting on!

Potential Problems…

Sarah General

In preparation for switching hosting providers, I’m transferring my domain name registration to another service. Supposedly, nothing should change. If you don’t see this, though, you’ll know why! (It’s like those test emails I love, “Let me know if you don’t get this message.”)

I Really Do Knit!

Sarah Crafts

At least, occasionally… I’m actually done with the body of Rosebud. I finished the three needle bind-off on the shoulders Sunday. It only lacks sleeves. So, why am I not working on it? After all, it’s a maternity top, right? I need to finish it if I plan to wear it for this pregnancy, don’t I?

I measured. Not only once or twice, but about a dozen times. I did complicated math to make my off-by-a-fraction-of-an-inch gauge match up with a good stitch count. I planned extra length in the torso and a smidge (like 1/2″) extra room in the bust. And I’m swimming in it. Except in the torso, where it doesn’t cover the maternity panel on my jeans. What happened?!? My gauge, measured in random spots, still matches my original gauge, so it’s not that. Did I measure myself wrong? All twelve times?

I don’t know whether to finish it, wear it despite its flaws, hope that being cotton it will stretch lengthwise (or force it to stretch with a bit of judicious blocking) and just be done with it, or if I should toss it in the corner and glare at it for the rest of its natural life. I’m afraid to frog it, since the yarn sheds quite a bit, and it might just look awful when I go to re-knit it.

Well, I guess I’ll toss it in the corner for the rest of the week, anyway, since it’s just too hot to knit right now.

Suspense

Sarah General

Is it killing you yet?!? There’s a clue in this dream I had over the weekend:

I was at a Mommy and Me group even though the baby wasn’t born yet. One Mommy came in with her two-year-old, dressed from head to toe in every color of the rainbow. I couldn’t tell whether it was a girl or a boy, so I said, “Oh, what a cute kid!”. The mom said, “Well, don’t you want to know what it is?”, and I replied, “Sure, why not?” Then she said, “Actually, we don’t know. We haven’t looked yet!”

Remember my warning about having a modest child? The baby was not in the mood to have pictures taken. He or she was folded at the waist, with his/her legs crossed at the ankles above his/her head. Thankfully, they couldn’t get all the pictures they needed to anyway, so they told me to come back in two weeks! So, everyone, including me, can keep right on guessing!

In non-baby news… Jenny’s wedding was lovely, but I’ll let her blog about it when she gets home! The bed and breakfast we stayed in was very comfortable and was in a great location. If it hadn’t been raining Saturday afternoon…well, we probably still would have been lazy and hung out in the parlor knitting and reading! It’s nice to be home, though, and not in the car anymore.

Edit: for all you funny people who predicted twins or triplets…sorry, there is definitely only one baby in there. (Not that twins or triplets wouldn’t have been fun and all, but I’d like to start with one, thanks!)

Exciting Weekend!

Sarah General

With any luck, we’ll be finding out whether we’re having a son or a daughter this afternoon…but I won’t be around to blog about it until late Sunday or Monday. We’re leaving straight from the appointment to go to Jenny & Aaron’s wedding. I’m not looking forward to the 6-7 hour car ride, but we’re staying in an old victorian mansion-turned-bed and breakfast which will more than make up for it. Besides, it will give us ample time to reopen the baby name debate…whether we find out or not.

Get your guesses in now! For the record, I can’t tell yet if I’m carrying the baby high or low, the heartbeat has consistently been over 140, I did have morning (well, all-day) sickness (although I never actually got sick, I just felt sick all the time), my dreams have pretty consistently been girl – although I’ve dreamt boy a couple of times too, I’ve had more food aversions than food cravings, and my hair seems to be about the same as it always has been – thick and unruly. Have I missed any old wives’ tale indicators?

Have a great weekend!

Just Breathe

Sarah General

I went to a prenatal yoga session at Breathe Yoga yesterday afternoon. I’ve never done any sort of yoga before, but it really was relaxing. I just had to keep reminding myself to breathe…otherwise, I’d forget while I tried to figure out what else I was supposed to be doing. It’s not a miracle cure, but I think if I keep going it will help with some of the new and exciting back problems I’ve started to experience.

According to the instructor, there are some poses where the baby will be really active. I haven’t been able to feel anything that’s definitely the baby since those three nights I blogged about last week. There are things I think might be, but nothing I can really be sure about. (I’m not too worried yet about the lack of distinct motion, since you’re really not supposed to be able to keep track until about 28 weeks.) I certainly didn’t feel the baby during yoga yesterday, but I think it was because I was concentrating so much on keeping my balance and breathing. Maybe next time…

June Already?!?

Sarah General

Boy, it just seems like the days and weeks are flying by lately! We had a good long weekend. We did a bit of outdoor work, like getting some annuals planted (not quite done with that), getting the pool open (although it may be a while before it’s ready to swim in), and getting our outdoor swing assembled (don’t ask the pregnant lady to read the directions). I learned a bit about php in preparation for updating this site, and I managed to get in quite a bit of stitching and knitting time, too!

Of course, now it’s Tuesday, but it feels like a Monday, and we’re going out-of-town for the weekend, so it’s going to end up being a short, hectic week. I do hope it’s a very short week, though, because my ultrasound is on Friday and I really just can’t wait!

I’m Not Crazy, I’m Just Pregnant

Sarah General

Ever have one of those days where little things just seem to stack up until you can’t take it anymore? Well, I’ve noticed the height of that stack has a much lower limit for me than it used to. I was actually having a decent day yesterday, until – all in the space of maybe 20 minutes – I managed to splash soy sauce all over my shirt at dinner (ok, that one was definitely my fault, unless you can somehow blame the sushi chef for not wrapping the roll well enough), I was called a “f***ing wh***” by someone who apparently thought he deserved to be able to take up more than his fair share of roadway (I actually did have the right-of-way), and I was treated very rudely by a coffee shop employee (for asking for an extra cup since the drink she made me was leaking all over). That third incident was the last straw, and I ended up bursting into tears in the middle of the coffee shop. (Hey, I did get a free drink out of it…I guess there’s one good thing that happened.)

I hate feeling like I have no control over my emotions, and I really hate publicly losing control. I feel like such a blithering idiot, especially because it’s not really that obvious yet that I’m pregnant, so I’m sure people are looking at me like I’m a crazy lady who needs her head examined. I feel like I should make up a t-shirt that says “I’m not crazy, I’m just pregnant!” so people might understand that I’m basically just a ticking, emotional time bomb.

Of course, then you get to the real root of all of this, which is, why exactly do people feel that they have the right to be rude or hurtful to others, especially to someone who hasn’t wronged them in any way?