Interview me!!!!

I have been hooked on Dogs Steal Yarn for a long time, see sidebar to visit this rockin' blog. So when its creator invited brave bloggers to be interviewed I thought...hmmm...dare I? Well, I dared. I figured it would be a fun, mind boggling experience, and indeed, it did not dissapoint:)

Here ya go...all you blog readers dangling in the suspense of the moment. And might I add this is a welcome respite from the "regurgitate your learning sessions" aka writing papers for class to get a degree that will be ALL MINE soon!

So here are my five questions... with answers

1. Congratulations! You’ve won that $100 drawing on KnitPicks. What do you buy with it?

Wow. I've won a scrapbooking 30 second shopping spree, but I've never visited KnitPicks. I just visited KnitPicks. Where is the Colinette yarn? Hmm. Can I get the cute and saucy llamas from the front page? I would select Merino Style in asparagus, cornflower and harvest, get the book that tells me how to make gloves with sock yarn, Elegance in wild rose, Knitter's Little Helper Hand Cream- I've tried it, it's cool and it works, Interweave's and Wiseman's two books on finishing techniques, circular needles, and more dpn's. Hmm. I think I went over budget!


2. Can you think of anything funnier than a herd of corgis running? (I can’t...okay...so maybe a herd of dachshunds...) What’s the funniest dog story you’ve got?

I was in bed "sleeping", and my husband had left for work. I heard the front door open and someone barrel up the stairs towards the bed room. I got out of bed to see what was up, and I noticed that the front door was just about to close. My husband had came back for his cell phone. I asked him where Buster went. He didn't know. We both searched all over the house for him, under the bed, in each room, and called his name. I stood on our front steps in a Victoria Secret tank top and capri pants while calling his name. I looked around and was convinced that he had run outside while the door was still open. We couldn't find him anywhere and he wasn't responded to his name being called. Then I went to my walk-in closet and opened the door, and out burst Buster with his ears back, his eyes wide as saucers, and his delirious I'm so happy to see you! face on. He ran at us, and I could not stop laughing with joy and at his crazy antics. You'd think he would have been narking or scratching at the door, but I must have had a nice comfy pile of clothes on the floor for him to enjoy (Mom- don't read that part. Really my closet is always organized!).

It's also cute when he howls, and when he is po-go dog when his little head pops up above the windowsill as I leave our house.

3. Fill in the blank. “If someone told me ten years ago that I’d be doing ...... today, I would have laughed my ass off.”
Well, 10 years ago I would have been 15. I never in my wildest dreams thought I could belong to a two dog household. Genevieve is coming in a week! I didn't think I'd cook gourmet meals or have a zester, either. I especially didn't think I'd almost have a Master's degree! Oh, wait. I didn't expect to have my own blog or to have knit nearly 2 sweaters. That last one is probably the craziest to me.

4. You can have one room of a house entirely for yourself. It doesn’t have to be your house, or a house that actually exists. What does the room look like, what do you put in it, and what will you do there?

It'd be a spacious sun room in a sunny place (not MN!) . It would be filled with flowering ginger, hibiscus, frangipani, orchids, everything luscious. It would be my own arboretum and I'd have a big koi pond, a japanese garden, and original sculptures by Loet VanderVeen. It would have comfy seating and I would knit, have parties, and do whatever I wanted there!


5. What does the smell of fresh-cut grass remind you of? How about the smell of frying eggs?
Fresh cut grass reminds me of the days that I wore grass perfume purchased at Nordstrom by Smell This! and when I used to take English riding lessons. Ohh, to ride a horse again. When I smell frying eggs I think of Rachel Ray and her Green Ranch Hand Eggs, and how my husband and I cook together and for each other.

Now that you see how fun this is it's your turn!

Here are the rules:

1. Leave me a comment saying “interview me.”
2. I will respond by asking you five questions here. They will be different questions than the ones below.
3. You will update YOUR blog with the answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions

In the interest of school work

I am blogging now to get all the brainiac juices flowing so I can continue writing my papers that are due Monday. I cannot comprehend what it will feel like to not write papers...like once I graduate from Grad school. If anyone told me I'd have to write this many papers albeit papers of varying lengths I would say no way! But here I am knitting through more schooling. The thing that inspires me or actually motivates me to keep writing is knowing that I can earn knitting time- from myself. I can be pretty rigid with my school work schedule- work for 45min to 1 hour, then knit 2 rows, or however many I can get done in an episode of Rebecca's Garden. Wait! What's up- I can't link to her site now? There are two icons present on my blog bar instead of the usual many. I can upload files, or do the fradulent spell check. I call it fradulent since the one time I tried it my posting dissappeared completely. When the post goes away like that, just where does it go? Hmm...I think I'd better go write my paper now...

OH- I had a great time as always with the EP Dunn Bros SnBers. Plus the cold rain was enough to inspire me to work on the re-knitting of my purple wool sweater collar. I think it will be more turtley this time, instead of like the wide giant collar that is was. Plus, I am so distracted by my Noro/Cascade 220 Gloria sweater. The striping action or switching colors every two rows is so addictive! Especially since the Noro changes colors quite dramatically. Pics on that later- like on my next study break!

Genevieve is growing up. 

Soon we will have our new puppy! 

Happy Easter!

I just finished dining with my family for Easter. We had tons of food, and I made chocolate souffle for our dessert. Yum. I hope everyone else has a good Easter and is able to hang out with friends and family today. Our weather is really nice with sunshine and a temperature around 55.

My Noro sweater back piece is slowly progressing. I finally got to a more fun part where I get to switch my yarn every two rows.

These two pics below are Eastery pics I took while in California.

Bunny topiary 

Easter at Knitting Arts yarn store  

Morning wake up call

Our dog is VERY successful at waking me up as my husband is leaving for work. Granted, I don't really need to sleep in that much, but I had been rationalizing a good sleep till about 9-10 as a cure for jet lag. I think I am sufficently un-jet lag-ed now, so I no longer have that excuse. Plus- I may as well get some of my work done before I "play" knit in public today.

Our corgi chases his tail while spinning profusely andbarking maniacally. That is how he expresses himself when someone close to him leaves. He does it for me, DH, Elizabethan, my parents, the works. If he knows them well enough and they start to get ready to leave he will turn into a little tornado (to use my in-laws term of endearment for him).

I have been thinking about it and taking everyone's opinions into consideration with my purple sweater. The consensus is that my purple turtleneck is more of a tortoise-neck, and again I must manipulate the pattern to my ideal. I already re-altered the sleeves a lot, to make them more fitted, so no big (to use Kim Possible's phrase) regarding the need to turtleifye the neck. Well that was what I thought. After an evening of ripping out the seven inches of stitches and a late bedtime when the wool began to enmesh itself I had gotten back to my starting point. I'm thinking if my collar is half as wide, 72/2= 36 it might be a whole lot better. Since my wacky corgi woke me I think it is about time to start the redo.

Elephant seal pups 

My first "real" sock 

Cascade 220 and Noro Kujaku sweater 

Collar is done!  

Last meal in San Francisco- dungeness crab 

Rainy irises 

Pretty kitty in Moroccan store 

passionfruit milk tea with green apple jelly, and caramel bubble tea (w/o tapioca pearls), Noro kujaku and Cascade 220 Gloria cardigan on the needles 

Arbor 

Hiding duck 

Mercado, Sunnyvale 

Japanese garden 

Hakone Garden, Saratoga, CA 

Alice in Wonderland 

Here in Silicon Valley

I am here, at this moment using the Intel lounge computers with my husband standing next to me. Earlier, I drove a rental car for the first time, a Buick LeSabre, to Saratoga, CA to Knitting Arts to buy needles that were long enough for cardigan knitting and reinforcing sock thread for the heel of my sock in progress.
This morning I had a waffle at the hotel's breakfast place, then sat outside poolside alternating between knitting a swatch of Noro Kujaku and napping. OH, I also located a J Crew outlet store. Sweet Dog!!

And thus I am ecstatic at my trip to Knitting Arts and then to WestGate Mall's Hancock Fabrics for the sock reinforcing stuff that a kind yarn store girl hunted down for me.
CA, well specifically the Silicon Valley is very beautiful now with flowers and trees in bloom. Later I will post some pics of the views so you can enjoy them vicariously.

OH, for lunch we ate at Thai Thai, a place that Troy thought was a hole in the wall from the outside. It was pretty good though and I had green curry with chicken and bamboo shoots.

Now Troy is done for the day, and we can have the whole night together to explore.

My driving experiences here have proved to be kinder than those in MN. It seems like the drivers are better here but the roads are marked oddly.

A is for...

Apple, aardvark, anteater, abacadabra, excellent, wonderful? Well, I am at my grad school at this very moment, sitting in the office, I just received my research paper. You know the one I was toiling and tormented over, well, yes, that one. The one that about ruined me...well, that same paper is the source of all kinds of goodness today, because...I got an A!!!!!!

I am more in shock than anything. I know that I worked as hard as hard could be, and stressed and sweated, and burned candles, and stayed up till 2 and 2:30am and then 2 again to edit the wretched thing. And now the wretched thing is a twisted element of happiness. As I have survived it and thrived it. YIPPEEE!

Are you all going to celebrate with me now? Have a cocktail, or a coke, or whatever floats your boat! I know that I will indulge in all things indulgent. OH, what a way to preface my California vacation, sweet doggity!

The Yarn Cafe Cometh, and is here

I haven't been there yet- I was in class all weekend long in Golden Valley, but there is a new store, "The Yarn Cafe" in Maple Grove. It has created quite a stir in the SnB circle- and I thought I better lay out my comments about it, as it seems that everyone else already has done just that. So I say, "yay! New store!!" The more stores the merrier. Plus, I enjoyed the Yarn Cafe's kiosk at the Mpls Women's Expo- and I have coupons for yarn discounts. I will drive across the world for a discount on yarn! So- yes, I will go there, but I just might check out the other store, Amazing Threads while I'm there. For more thoughts on this visit here and here.

Well I just had to type those links in all the way by hand since my hotkeys on the mac mini + windows system didn't work. Hmm.. more for dh to figure out before my blog returns to normal.

Jerusalem and Pericles

This past Thursday night we seized an opportunity for a date night in the midst of all my busyness and classes. With the research paper turned in I breathed a sigh of relief on Wednesday morning at the EP SnB. Quite a nice time, as usual. Thursday I indulged in KIP (knitting in public) with my friend Leslie at Anodyne. I was very impressed with their hip, modern interior design as well as my fave drink Cafe miel, and some tasty curry soup. Yum. Then it was off to Golden Valley for an appointment, then time to select a random Uptown street on which to leave my car so my husband and I could share one car for our dinner date of Jerusalem Cafe in Mpls, and then to continue our season's ticket-holding status at the Guthrie Lab. The dinner was really good, I'd suggest a trip there for middle eastern food. Pericles at the Lab was great too. We were not familiar with this Shakespeare play so I don't know if it really was intended to have middle eastern influences, but the set and costumes were fabulous. I was impressed that it began as a tragedy but the resolution led to comedy/happy play. I'm not used to Shakespeare plays being uplifting, but this one was. Lastly, we visited Zeno in Uptown to buy a tremendous piece of chocolate cake. We have eaten from it since Thursday, yet there is at least half the piece left!!

Well, I guess I survived my weekend class. It was exhausting yet amazing. I learned so much about myself and others, and the experience was a once in a lifetime thing. The instructor/therapist was phenomenal, encouraging, supportive, extremely well-read, yet he has a gentleness to his approach that led us all to take risks and to push ourselves to do things that we never dreamed possible.

My husband is resting now. It seems like he has a cold. He took very good care of me this weekend and put up with all my exhaustion and exhilaration quite well. He cooked me a fontina, onion, and bell pepper omelette with corn cakes for my Sunday breakfast, and made mexican meatza pizza for dinner (both were Rachel Ray meals).

I am getting curious about our little pup Genevieve. We should be getting her soon, like in a few weeks.

OH- I finished watching the "Wickedly Perfect" finale this afternoon from my parents' TIVO. I was very happy with the choice of the winner. I was going to be mad if the other person won.

I intended to put some links in here, but I'm not familiar with the process with our new Mac Mini. So far I have handled the PC to Mac shift quite well. I like the little icons on the bottom as I am a visual person.