scary closeup

I should know better.

I’m itching to cast on something new. I want to work on my Girasole blanket or the Coraline cardigan. I must, however, avoid the urge. I have so many other things to finish! Sigh. And more yarn’s coming tomorrow. I have visions of tiny flowers on a greeting card…

My brain’s a busy place.

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payin' bills, and loving it

Tomorrow’s the first day back to school after a 10-day spring break. As usual, the mom and dad are glad to be getting back to some semblance of routine, but the kids? Not so much… BoyZilla just had a twelfth-degree meltdown, figuring that if he didn’t go to bed, then maybe tomorrow wouldn’t come. I know kid, ends of vacations bite. Suck it up.

I’m teleworking tomorrow, and I’m glad, because I really hate Mondays. Don’t tell the BoyZilla, but I have a colossal meltdown EVERY Sunday night, only a telework Monday seems to soften the blow. At least a little.

Spring seems to be making an earnest attempt at hanging around now, which makes me happy. And the pool is opening in about a month already, and I’m kinda kicking myself. This year has flown by! (My mother told me it happens when you get older… it sucks, doesn’t it?)

The thing is that this was the year I kept telling myself that there were a lot of things I was going to fix. So far, none have really happened. Get organized. Exercise. Eat well. Lose weight. (A LOT of weight.) Sleep more than three or four hours at a time. Be nicer to people. Sounds like quite a list, doesn’t it?

That’s the problem. My list is so long, I don’t even know where to start. I feel pretty alone and overwhelmed by my goals most of the time. So it’s like I have them on a shelf, right next to me. I can see the goals nearby, staring at me and taunting me. I know, I should tackle them one by one, and in little bits at a time. And then I think that they’re ALL so pressing, each one needs to come first. They’re all important. I’d probably feel better if I just somehow did all of the things on my list, and then so much more would be possible because I did. And yet, it’s all too overwhelming.

So what do I do? I blog. And I knit. And I generally spend too much time on the computer, pushing all of the things I really need to do out of my mind, and out of the way.

It’s not what I’m supposed to be doing and it’s not really working. Someday, I’ll sort it all out. But for now, I gotta pay bills. Argh! See you later.

And now, I leave you with a smile:

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Consequently the knitting I had planned to do today went right out the window.

I hope your New Year’s Day has been more exciting than mine! I’m yawning again so I think I’m going to bed for the night. I’ve got a new Episode of Cast On to keep me company if for some reason sleep eludes me again. Then, if all goes well, I’ll get up tomorrow morning and put on a pot of stew in my new crock pot that my mom gave me for Christmas. And I’ll knit. I have a hat to finish for an anxious little girl — the one who’s really not so little anymore and for whom teenagehood will arrive in 2009.

Yikes.

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It’s 1:00 a.m. on December 24. I’m as ready for Christmas as I am going to get. The presents are wrapped, the living room has been made ready for Santa’s visit. The Christmas cards are done and mailed, and except for the fact that my house is its usual cluttered self, yep, I’m about as ready as can be.

Except that I’m not. Not at all. I’m not feeling it this year. I haven’t even watched “It’s a Wonderful Life” yet. Or The Grinch. So it can’t be Christmas. Not yet.

A few years ago, my daughter unearthed a dusty yellow binder from a pile of old books in our dining room nook, and asked me with great curiosity what it was. “It’s my diary,” I replied, “and no, you can’t read it. Not ’til I’m dead.” I did write a lot in my teens and twenties. Not so much now, if the mere fact of having a blog doesn’t call me a liar. The diary does contain my first heartaches and other stories that I’d probably shudder if my mother or my daughter read them. But it also contains a collection of stories and poems I wrote as a young teen, back in the days when being in a wheelchair pretty much meant I didn’t leave my house except for school. One of those stories was a Christmas story I wrote as a Christmas present to my father in 1979, at 14. Given that it is December 24 after all, I thought I would share it here. Please don’t laugh. I copied it as was, from my teenage perspective. Perhaps I will read it to my kids tomorrow. Maybe you can read it to yours.

The Christmas Spirit

If you’re celebrating something over the next couple of days, make the most of it, whatever it is. Life’s too short not to try. And now, I’m off, to do just that. I’m going to give this Christmas Spirit thing a good try. Wish me luck.

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Magnatune Compilation: Christmas

I tried embedding it on my site but its CSS and mine aren’t playing well together and I don’t have time to mess with it. But, if you head over to that site you can hear the album in its entirety right on your PC. Then, you can buy, and YOU get to decide how much you want to pay! Magnatune is a great way for independent artists to get their music out to the public and I do try to support them as much as possible.

Not much knitting going on this weekend. But hey! The Christmas cards are done. At least a few folks will be getting them before Christmas, and that’s a good thing! All of my wrapping is done too. Now the only major thing I have to do this week is prepare our Christmas Eve dinner. I’ve decided on a roast chicken, cornbread stuffing, and green beans with red bell peppers and sesame seeds (red and green with snow!). I don’t usually care too much about plate presentation but on Christmas it’s different. It has to be yummy AND pretty. Wish me luck, I’m trying new recipes this year.

I swear, I’ve got to get back to the knitting. It’s making me crazy not to. Maybe tomorrow we’ll have a knitting post. K??

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I’m thankful that even though so many in my country are facing hard times, we’ve still got our heads at least a bit above water.

I’m thankful for our incoming president, and pray that his hopes for our Nation come true.

I’m thankful that my husband’s family will all be together this year for dinner, and wish we could do it more often. I find it sad that one sibling had not yet met the other sibling’s two-and-a-half-year-old son until this week, and hope we never allow so much time to pass among us again.

I’m thankful that I have a job, even though I hate it sometimes, because I know so many people who don’t have a job that they’re lucky enough to hate.

I’m grateful for discovering my son’s ADHD now, so early, so I still have plenty of time to learn to be a better parent to him.

I’m also thankful for my daughter, whose generally patient, cool-headed nature coupled with scary-smartness just might make her a true leader someday.

I’m thankful for my husband, who can always find something to laugh about.

I’m thankful for our kids’ grandparents, who are all healthy now and such an integral part of our lives.

I’m thankful that I have a small circle of true friends. That there are enough of them to actually form a circle around me means that much more.

I’m thankful for my knitting, which brings me peace on a daily basis.

I’m thankful for the friends I’ve met through knitting, so that I can spread and share the peace. I wonder at times what would happen in the world if everyone could knit, instead of fight. Somehow, knitting makes my head calmer and my thoughts more clear. If I could spread the knitting throughout the world, would there ever be a reason for fighting? There must be a knitters for peace movement out there. I will find it. And when I do, for that I shall be thankful also.

I’m thankful for the daily din of giggles and squeals I hear throughout my house each day, which is the music of my children.

I shall be thankful for a snowstorm, if we have one. It’s been a while, and I have a secret fear that I may never see a big one ever again.

I’m thankful for hot chocolate on a cold day, and fudgecicles on a hot one. Chocolate is good in any weather.

I’m thankful for another Thanksgiving, a day that I can pause to remember what I am thankful for. Sometimes I need that reminder.

What about you? What are you thankful for? I’d love to hear your answers, and I wish you a great day.

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Way to go, America!

I went first thing this morning to vote. They said on the news that the lines were terrible and many people were already waiting for hours by 7 a.m. when the polls actually opened in Maryland. The parking lot at our polling place was more crowded than I have ever seen it and the line actually snaked around the entire inside of the school building. I had never seen that before, either.

I had my knitting, and I was ready. Mindless garter stitch is good for stuff like this, waiting in lines. It was going to be a long haul, I thought. But then, a poll worker came up to me and told me I could go to the front. I guess being in a wheelchair does have some perks sometimes, but really, waiting in lines does not bother me. I told them it would not matter to me if I went through the line if my DH could not, since we came together. But they let him come up, too.

Turns out they have provisional wheelchair accessible parking on Election Day and they wanted to keep turning it over. So, in the end, while I was a bit disappointed to be deprived of being able to tell my “I waited in line for two hours” story, we spent the time by going to Starbucks afterward. So, it’s all good. Only 20 stitches were knit today. But there’s something much bigger unfolding in front of us. I am so looking forward to the ride.

halloween light fixture in the rain

Today was one of those days where the sun just refused to shine. It’s that time of year where the sun doesn’t come up until about 7:30 in the morning, which is bad enough by itself. But today, it seemed like daylight just never came. The sky was heavy and gray with the beginnings of autumn colors in the foreground. And it was cold. I waited, certain that the sun would come streaming in my window by mid morning, but there I sat, cold and dejected as if I’d been stood up on a blind date.

It was cold and dark, a perfect match for my rapidly worsening mood. We went from summer to winter in the space of one day. Perfect knitting weather, but I have to get out of my slump first. I’m still working on the simple hat I started last week and the garter stitch mitered square. Alas new photos of either one at this stage would be too boring to show. But I do think that the mindless knitting required for each is just what I need right now.

The sun will come out…. tomorrow… bet your bottom dollar that tomorrow…. there’ll be sun….

Harumph.