Joy of Less

Today is my first day off from work since my husband I went on vacation.  And I feel accomplished.

1. Day started off with some good coffee and a good book: The Joy of Less
2. Two loads of laundry: washed, dried, AND put away!
3. Large trash bag of trash and junk out of my house!
4. Box of things to donate: a few text books and some winter gloves and hats
5. I've got cookies in the oven as I type.

I think it's time I sat down and knit :)

Have a great day!

A little Vacation

Yay! I'm updating my blog!! I feel like it been forever since my last post, but I know that I've gone longer between posts, so I'm trying not to feel guilty. Besides, I'm a busy girl! Last week my hubbiekins and I were house setting. The house we were at was about 2 min from my job. Awesome. My house is about 25-30 min depending on traffic, and that includes highway time. So I didn't spend a whole lot of time at my own house. Just enough time to pet/feed/love on the cat and do some laundry.

This week, Hubbiekins and I went on a little out of town vacation to celebrate our 7^th anniversary. We went to Kansas City and stayed in a beautiful bed and breakfast. Each room was named after a famous person who lived in Kansas City. Our room was the "Clara and Russell Stover" room. They were from New England originally so the room was decorated with pictures of light houses and things that reminded me of the ocean. The rest of the furniture was "dated" to look like it came from the time period that they lived (late 1800's to early 1900's). All except the jacuzzi tub for two. The next morning we enjoyed Carrot Cake Waffles with maple mascarpone cheese, raspberry coffee cake, and a cold watermelon soup. If you want to check this place out. . Here they are: Southmoreland bed and breakfast.

Rick trying to use the internet in our room.

For the remainder of the trip we rented a cabin at Lake Perry, between Lawrence and Topeka. It was cute! Makes me want one of the tiny houses from the Tiny House Blog and fill it up with yarn. The cabin came with air conditioning, full size bathroom, kitchenette with stove, oven, refrigerator, AND dishes/pots and pans. There was a sign asking patrons to clean up the cabin before they left, and sure enough in the bed room closet there was a broom and a bucket of cleaning supplies. The only thing that we needed that wasn't provided: towels. 

From the front door looking in. 

From the bed room looking out.

View of the lake from the front porch.

Rick enjoying his new pipe.

In addition to sea gulls and geese, we also saw wild turkeys.

If you looked up what Robert's Rules says about gifting for the 7^th anniversary, you'd know that it is the year of WOOL. OOOH YESS!!! Knitter's dream. Rick and I went to a yarn store while in Kansas City called The Studio. There he got me these lovelies:

The Knit your own Ninja kit did not come from The Studio, I have no idea where he got it.  I, in turn, got him a wool newsboy hat and some pipe supplies. ( he didn't want me to knit him anything?!. . The brown yarn, I had to twist his arm over, b/c I wanted to make him socks that weren't black)

But all this living away from home has me thinking about the things I own and whether or not I could live without them. So today I made a list of 100 items I didn't think I could live without. Car was the number one thing, so the list has some pretty obvious things on it, but after item 53, it started getting harder to come up with the things I had to have. This kind of thinking has helped me create a new goal for myself. Every Day I will throw out one garbage bag of trash. I did this yesterday and I did this today. Dear reader, you also have to understand that I'm talking a kitchen trash can sized garbage bag, not some heavy duty bag that would use on the show hoarders. I'm going to do this until I feel that my clutter and life are more simple. I also know that means that I have to learn to bring less into the house. No more buying stuff if there is a way around it. Today I linked up my kindle to the public library's ebook website. No more physical books! Well, unless they are knitting books. :)

July Socks

I haven't posted for a while, I'm feeling a bit "blah".  That last bit if knitting nasty really got me.  I went a week without knitting at all.  nothing at all.  crazy.  I did, however, make an espresso cheesecake and played a lot of Diablo.  Then July 1st came buy and I realized it was time to start another sock.  The yarn I chose is Stroll hand painted in watermelon colors by knitpicks:

I love how it looks in the ball but knitted up, not so much.  So I needed a pattern that would break up the colors.  I chose the Aquaphobia sock pattern by Crystal Flanagan.  I'm in the process of re-writing it to make a toe up sock using Judy's magic cast on and knitting them up using the magic loop method.  I should call these my magic socks. . .   I'm also going to use some leftover black yarn for the toes and cuffs.  Well, yesterday I knitted up the toe and started the pattern with the main color and it just doesn't look right.  

I don't think I started with enough stitches, the toe looks narrow and pointy.  And I know you can't really see it in the picture but the cables don't match, they twist in opposite directions but the right side looks more like a slip stitch and the left looks clean. . .  So today's goal is to undo and redo the toe and write out the pattern using the left cable on both sides.  I really want to get this going this week because the hubbiekins and I are taking some vacation days together for our anniversary.  We're going to drive up to Kansas City and I wanted some good progress on the sock before the trip.  

As far as Celebrating the 4th, I have some snakes and some throwy-snappy thingies.  Not really into fireworks (especially in 100 degree weather), but I hope everyone has a lot of fun and plays it safe!