Drug-addicted cocker spaniel

My brother sent me this link the other day and it was too funny for words. So I had to share it.


You can either read the story or listen to it. I would suggest listening though, as it is good for some laughs.

I hope our dogs never get high on something. Though I know Weasel does eat poo at times, and Buster used to get 'roid rage when he was on steroids for his third eyelid issue.

Knitting and returns

Remember that post of a pic of my impulse purchase. It was post dentist and it wasn't yarn. I took a pic of some beads that I was going to turn into jewelry. I had a vision for the jewelery too, and it was going to be cool and trendy.

Yesterday after carrying the beads and things around in my car for a few weeks I decided to return the items at Michaels. I looked all over the place for my receipt, my car, all the tables in our house, my purse, my knitting bag, etc., and looked in these places several times just in case I had overlooked it the first 3 times I was hunting. I could not find the receipt anywhere. I could find every other receipt for everything else I had bought, but not that one receipt. So I returned it all and got store credit. I really needed credit card credit- since I had already bought YARN the week before, while I planned to return the beads.

This morning, I was poking around through another of my bins of stuff for my traveling office, and there it was. A Michaels receipt folded in half the long way, with the Michaels logo facing outward- all the items were listed. Unbelievable. The only place I didn't look was the right place to find it. Since I hadn't had the receipt the previous day I had gotten less than full price for some of the items due to them being on sale. So, to Michaels I went. And I was pleased with the service as the sales lady kindly put up with me, and I have now been credited back to my account so I can keep the yarn I bought already.

The YARN.

I indulged in a trip to the Three Kittens Needle Arts, just barely a week after the Shop Hop. I went there originally for baby yarn for a boy baby sweater for an upcoming baby shower gift, and came out of there with more. I purchased the yarn for a wild and crazy sweater vest out of Berrocco Foliage yarn, the color named "Russian Sage" which is ironic because I have Russian Sage, or salvia, growing in my garden. The pattern is free online, and another knitting friend of mine made it, and I kind of thought it was over the top, too wild for me. I wear lots of wild colors, often at the same time, and for me to make this statement seems kind of uncharacteristic. But I thought this vest was too crazy. I bought the yarn for it now as it has grown on me.

When I was little I used to lament the evils of the color pink, socks with ruffles on them, and sweater vests. A few years ago after many years of shunning the color pink in any form, I gave in. It was popular that season, and there were some newer shades of vibrant pink. Now I have much more pink in my closet than ever before, except for the time I was really little and Mommy did my shopping. Along with pink, I thought ruffled socks were just plain wrong. Now I often wear patterned socks, with fall leaves, black cats, silver reindeer, and knitted patterns on them, but I do not own any ruffle-top socks.

This brings me to the sweater vests issue. I thought they were pretty awful when I was little, but old enough to have an opinion. I wore a red one with a school bus, and some of the alphabet on it for my first grade pictures. It was my jack o' lantern look, as I was without my two front teeth too. The night before picture day I remember my mom telling me "don't lose those two front teeth before picture day tomorrow, or you will have a funny picture." Gues what happened? I don't remember when but sometime between then and picture day I lost both of those front teeth. So I smiled toothlessly wearing my red sweater vest with a white collared shirt. And now, after some time, I am planning to knit one. Go figure.

Did you wonder too?

Remember the Yarn Shop Hop? How many of you where waiting and wondering if you were the winner? I was wondering. I was checking my phone and my e-mail address- but no luck. Who is the lucky winner? Does anyone know? I feel as though it should be posted for all to see - somewhere- possibly in the blogosphere, or on the TC Knit list for sure.

c'mon ya'll let's do the Happy Dance!

c'mon ya'll let's do the Happy Dance!
Originally uploaded by CorgiMom.

friendly yarn pirates

friendly yarn pirates
Originally uploaded by CorgiMom.

Check out her pin- it has all the charms on it!

my prize from the drawing at Three Kittens Needle Arts

my prize from the drawing at Three Kittens Needle Arts
Originally uploaded by CorgiMom.

Big long needles. I did not have this size or length.

two steps left

two steps left
Originally uploaded by CorgiMom.

Kitchener- which I really enjoy. I think it is easy and amazing how it

works. And weave in the tails- which I dread.

I have a plan for this

I have a plan for this
Originally uploaded by CorgiMom.

I dread going to the dentist. So when I went last week Thursday and

received a good report post teeth cleaning, I rewarded myself with a

trip to Michael's where I bought jewelry fix-ins. We will have to see

if my "vision" turns out the way I planned.

finally- done

finally- done
Originally uploaded by CorgiMom.

I used the free Knitpicks pattern that uses Sierra yarn with leftover

mohair from my vogue knitting mohair/Sierra v-neck chunky cable

sweater. I also used the same cable from the sweater rather than the

cable from the pattern for the main cable. The side cables are from the

pattern. It will be fun when it gets cold to wear both the sweater and

carry the matching purse.

the three little kittens have lost their mittens...

and gotten new ones from their friendly new owners! Yes- that is right- New ownership at the Three Kittens!!!!I took a pic of the sign because this news was nearly too good to be true. The challenge of this is that I will have to budget more carefully, as this store is WAY TOO CLOSE to my house for monetary safety- and with new owners comes some new policies. Knitter friendly policies to be exact. I can now go there freely and not have a credit card use spending limit. The previous store required a 20+ dollar purchase when using credit cards. Now don't worry, I am not about to flip and individually charge those little stitch holders one by one on my credit card, or make ridiculously small amounts of purchases just cause I can. But let's just say the store owners might get to know me on a first name basis.

the changeover came just in time for the crawl- in fact the switch happened at the start of this week. For those of you muggles (non-knitters what are you doing reading my blog? This is a knitting blog, for knitters! ) , The crawl is like a mini-olympic knitting event where groupies flock to participating yarn stores to get stamps on their treasure map, by answering clues, and get treasure treats along the way. Like prize drawings, and little silver knitting related charms for a funky un-screwable safety pin.

The fun times began this morning for me as I had the luxury of scheduling my day around the 7 yarn shops on the 'crawl. I began at 11:30 at Amazing Threads. There I was greeted by two female pirates.

Later in my day I drove past the Yarnery- to work- then back, to Grand Avenue. Along the way I picked up a paint chip at Restoration Hardware, bought new fabulous running shoes, and stopped at the Yarnery. Yay- another stamp and another drawing!

Then, off to Three Kittens Needle Arts. No longer the yarn shop with 2 p's and an e at the end. Coolness. I was really hungry and my brain was about to shut down to the point that I knew I could not make any decisions- shopping wise- but waited about 13 min as a drawing for prizes was about to happen. Good thing I waited, 'cause I won the drawing of the hour. Sweet!

I was mulling over a purchase that I have meant to do for awhile, buy 5 skeins of Berrocco's Foliage for a funky sweater vest, but could not make any color decisions on an empty stomach.
I was cognizant enough to read the good news sign and snap a pic of it though.

Tomorrow I have a long all morning work meeting- then I will visit the other stores on the map in the afternoon. I must say that the stores are sure spaced out away from each other. It's like a few mini road trips to make the map full.

Gandalf

Gandalf
Originally uploaded by CorgiMom.

Ok, so this really isn't going to become a habit, me (DH) posting all
the time, but I had to post a picture of Gandalf! Basically, Gandalf is
my work's way of recognizing outstanding achievement. He was first
given out last December at the office christmas party, and then this
week he was given to me. Cool! He also came with a little bit of moola
with which I can take Corgimom out to a nice place. And maybe a Segway
tour, she wants to do one of those.

Lost!

This is not a story about the show- sorry to dissappoint- but it is a real life experience, something that happened just the other day on DH's birthday outing.

It began Tuesday- we both took "half days" of work- I ended at 2, he ended about the same time. The event was DH's birthday. We had decided to take some time off work to visit the apple orchard (not the Emma Krumbees orchard, it was a different one) and Emma Krumbees in Belle Plaine, MN.

It was a bit of a drive, but a much nicer one than the last time we had driven to this orchard. That time took like an hour and a half to get there from Eden Prairie due to all the weekend-only Renaissance Festival traffic. That was crazy. But this time we went on a weekday, after all the kids were done with school- so no field trip kids to steal all our apples.

We drove to the Apple Orchard of my childhood memories, the first one I had visited and remembered, from my first grade field trip. I have visited this apple orchard many times, and always had a positive experience and a great time. I am sure you can sense that my memories are going to take a detour-

DH and I waited with a large group of people to board the apple wagon to visit the trees of our chosen apple varieties. There was a small sign with a holder for the "apple picking info" papers. We grabbed the instruction sheet, and eventually boarded the wagon.

The wagon was driven by a hispanic young man, with presumably his spanish name tatooed across the back of his neck (very modern Romeo and Juliet movie- the one with Claire Danes, and that Leonardo DiCaprio guy). Others aboard the wagon proceeded to ask him questions, none of which he responded to. The wagon bumped along, through the orchard, to arrive at our first stop. Honey gold apples. We wanted some of these, so we departed from the wagon and proceeded to search high and low for these apples. Nearly all the trees were picked over, and only the apples that were rotten or at the tops of the trees remained. So, I ventured over to where I could see more apples, and began picking them with DH. We picked about a half bag full, to save room in our bag, and because there were no more nice apples that we could find, for the 3rd and last stop apples, Cortland. We looked around, and wondered while wandering. Let's go find those apples, I thought. So we walked some more, and soon thought, there must be an easier way to find them in this great big orchard.

So I said, hey Dh, is there a phone number on our apple picking paper? He checked, and there was, so I dialed the number into my silver Razr cell phone from the Raspberry Road and Lone Oak Road crossing signs in the orchard. I proceeded to tell the woman on the phone our coordinates, so she could give us better directions. I heard her say, "YOU ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE DRIVING BACK THERE!!!" And I replied, "We are not driving, we're walking. We picked some Honeygold apples, and the driver left us." "He LEFT YOU-He WAS NOT SUPPOSED TO DO THAT! YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO WAIT FOR THE WAGON TO TAKE YOU IN THE ORCHARD! I CAN TAKE CARE OF THAT! And our call was done.

So now, we are getting yelled at for trying to speed up our s-l-o-w visit to the orchard, as the sun is starting to drop. We waited for what seemed like 30-45 min, and a smoking man in a minivan with an out of state license plate drove by us twice. Then, a group of horseback riders came by. We continued to wait, DH more patient than I. I knew we weren't lost, I had been to this big orchard before quite a few times.

We waited. Eventually the wagon came by, this time with a second wagon connected. By pointing the driver instructed us to get into the empty back section. It felt like we were in time out- for having wandered in the orchard. Our empty wagon bumped and shook along with every dip in the road, as it had only us two to weigh it down. We picked up the other batch of people who had been in the first wagon with us. The wagon continued to bump and shake along. We waited through the second stop, onto the third. The wagon passed by through the rest of the orchard, and took us all the way back to the start, without stopping at the Cortland apples. What a day. Time out, and skipping the third stop. There were only 3 total stops, you'd think it wasn't too hard to remember them.

Back at the main building, we wandered, wondering where to pay for our apples. We waited in line behind a guy who had purchased a brat at the cafe there- and had not received a bun. The other cashier was surprised as well that he didn't get a bun, and quickly remedied the situation. The cashier also offered to charge us for a full bag of apples and included a 5lb bag of the Cortland pre-picked apples. It was not our best time at the orchard- but at least he fixed the problem. It seemed like this guy's job was to do the clean up work for all the other employees who were not quite meeting the expectations. It was frustrating, but a little funny. What a day.

The Technorati

Warning! Warning! This is a DH posting! Which means, sadly, that there will likely be a lot less knitting content than your typical Corgimom post. And by that I mean zero. Unless you count the fact that I just used the word knitting. But I don't.

Anyway, the time has come for my DW (does it work that way?) to enter the next phase of technological assimilation: the PDA. We have determined that her schedule for her job is simply too crazy to handle without the assistance of electronic devices. However, she is unwilling to give up her Razr phone, so we are bypassing the Treos and the Crackberries and going for a straight-up PDA (which are getting harder and harder to find, I might add).

She's been able to play with a few - mainly a Palm Tungsten in an Office Max and an iPaq that my coworker has. So far I think she's favoring the latter, as the Windows Mobile versions have a better visual display for the day view in the calendar - it blocks it out with squares and colors, whereas the Palm OS version just gives you dots and times. However, she thought it would be wise to solicit opinions from the collective experience of the masses, and thus here we are. At this point, our two main choices would be between the Palm TX and the iPaq R1955, as they both have Wi-Fi capability, but we're open to new suggestions.

That's it for me. Back to your regularly scheduled Corgi Knitting.

- DH

DSCN0357.JPG

DSCN0357.JPG
Originally uploaded by CorgiMom.

Dh's birthday was yesterday- sorry for those of you who did not get to

eat the buttercream frosting and Funfetti guitar cake. It was/is quite

good though. I made this for him, and decorated it. You can tell when

Buster barked while I was decorating because it made me mess up on the

tops of the guitar strings.

Robin, her best friend, and me

Robin, her best friend, and me
Originally uploaded by CorgiMom.

Guess who saw Dr. Phil and Robin!

I did. Dh and I stayed at a hotel nearby the Northwestern Bookstore in Maple Grove, and woke up really early to go there. We were the 5th and 6th people in line, and got there about 7:15 on a Saturday morning.

We waited till the line grew, and the store opened at 9:30am while knitting on DH's sock and eating Krispy Kremes and Starbucks. MMM. I wore the same sweater I wore to meet the Harlot since it was toasty warm.

We got into the store and Dr. Phil introduced his wife Robin and her book, while threatening to go through the audience/crowd and "check us out" jokingly. It came to be my turn to meet Robin and get my copy of her book autographed, and my camera was swept from Dh's hand and given to a book signing staff person for them to take a pic. I was whisked along with DH, to keep the line moving, and told Robin how Dh and I had stayed in a hotel to be nearby. She reached out her hand and held mine while saying "isn't that sweet." I held hands with Robin McGraw!

Then we noticed that the camera girl had taken a pic of the person in line after me/us. She hadn't even taken my picture with Robin! How unfair. So we chatted and we begged, and the girl took a different picture. This one had Dr. Phil smiling, while Robin and her best friend at the signing table were looking down. I felt like my face had a "Don't you know how to take pictures?" look on it directed at the "photographer."

We went next door to Best Buy while I thought about whether that was an acceptable picture of not. Then I decided it wasn't, and we trotted back to the store, and had to discuss and nearly beg for another picture. It worked, and I got a better picture with Robin and myself smiling a real smile.

I took a little camera video too, and will have it up on the blog later this week.

The very scary bookshelf

To be read with all the lights on and loved ones nearby. So, it was a cool, fall Sunday afternoon, and DH and I were getting some thing accomplished for my Art Room. I was just about to start painting the second, or the third coat of paint on this giant bookshelf. Perhaps I should have measured it to share the full effect, but that is too tedious, so I will try to create an image for you. Think about the width of an Scion Xb, and the height of my chest, when the bookshelf is propped up on sideways lying fenceposts (leftovers from Project Corgi Containment). I was preparing my area, a dimly light downstairs with minimal natural light at the time.

I thought, hey, this just needs to move over a little, so the one lightbulb could shine into the deep recesses of its cubbyholes (it was a bookshelf with 2 levels of shelves, and 2 levels of cubbys). And, then I was yelling. I think. Dh asked if it had landed on my foot. I said no, but really it had. It wasn't as if the whole shelf were sitting atop my foot. Then suddenly I felt warm and flushed, and as if I was about to throw up. I told him I was feeling sick, as I felt a crazy head rush. I told my psychologically trained self, don't faint, breather slowly from the gut, concentrate, focus, breathe. Then I remember being in a seated position with minimal hearing, and I felt my eyes were fully open but in a very blurry squinty way. I was drinking a bottle of water, very slowly, and in a daze while Dh nonchalantly painted another shelf.

I felt like my toe had been removed from my foot, when in actuality I had scraped the top layer of skin off the big toe, and it hurt a lot. Dh asked, didn't you remember saying 'I need to get up off the floor?" And I said, good thing I didn't pass out because I felt really sick. He told me he had caught me from falling, but knew I wasn't going to die, so he kept on painting. It was a very scary painting time with a very scary bookshelf. A bookshelf that still needs another coat or two of paint.

anything but work, please!

I did a bunch of paperwork on Saturday so that I would have less for today. It took F-o-r-e-v-e-r. Ordinarily I would do it Monday morning, and try to get it all done before my first client of the day appt., but I wanted to complete it. I did finish it all then, but now, I still have some more other paperwork to do, before tomorrow morning.

I want to do anything but that. You will notice my procrastination skills in the form of adding many, many more blogs to my "blogs I read" list on the right sidebar of my blog. It was time. I was lying and fooling many of you into thinking I read a small handful of blogs on a regular basis. Well now my secret is into the light, and out of the dark. There are a lot of blogs I "tend" to.

Today- I worked and went to 2 Yarn shops. All About Yarn in Coon Rapids, and Borealis Yarns in St. Paul. At the first I was amazed by the prettiness of the store, the variety of examples that were knit up, and the selection. I only had about 10 minutes to spend there, but still did not make it out empty-handed. I purchased "Sherbet Socks" a Shelly Kang original sock pattern using Cascade Fixation yarn. I was so happy to see this pattern- as I have been stumped by what to do with the Fixation yarn I bought last winter for a pair of lace-ish socks for my best friend, Elzbieta. Wow- how did I go through the world so long without knowing about this pattern?!? And to think it was written by one of my blogging friends!

Later on in the day, I deliberated about visiting Borealis. Then, decided to take the leap, and was pleased to encounter harldly any rush-hour traffic, and 2 successful purchases. I was desperate for another size 6 circ needle- it seems like everything I am knitting aside from socks needs a size 6, and I bought some size 3 dpn's to use with my fixation yarn and my new sock pattern.

I was busy swatching again for my noro-gloria-whatever it will be- sweater with the 6's. The gauge is looking good, tighter and better.

I really should go do my work now- I am stalling while our Windows PC boots up, while using our Mac. It has been booted up for a few minutes now. Oops.

If I get time I will tell you about my very scary bookshelf story- that gives me a bad taste in my mouth just thinking about it- Shivers...

about the yarn harlot escapade...

Wow- everyone else has a well-developed narrative about the yarn harlot, but I. I just had a lot of pics. Perhaps I should offer my perspective as well, it is only fair as I am a blogger.

So on a cold, dreary fall day we gathered into Roxanne's Magic van. It is magic because she is a magical driver who can drive through darkness while all throughout her van the dome lights were on, to accomodate us insatiable knitters. We, who knit from our respective places in MN, all the way to Eau Claire, and then back again in the night.

The funny thing is that Shelly was trying to find her booklight to knit with by the light of her Sidekick, in the depths of her knitting bag. She found it just before Roxanne, our magic driver, proclaimed her permission granting us the use of all the van lights. Hooray for all day all night knitting. It was like an SnB that was a day long, with a comedy club about knitting show wrapped all into one, plus, a knitting celebrity- Stephanie Pearl McPhee- signing autographs.

The other funny thing was this- The Yarn Harlot asked "didn't I put a comment on your blog recently, I remember one on a blog of a person with two corgis." Not wanting to embarrass myself by not noticing the Yarn Harlot (though how could I miss a comment from her?!?) thinking she had commented on my blog (which would be big-time for any knitblogger) I did what I do when (a) either I don't understand someone, (b) am in a different country with a different language than my country of origin, (c) both. I smiled and nodded. I don't remember expressing any sincere gratitude from her assumption that she graced my blog with her comment, but I remember smiling and nodding.

Being the obsessive researcher that I am I had to google this elusive comment. This is what I found... I did not receive a comment from the Yarn Harlot. Alas, maybe some other day.

If you would like to read further on regarding the Eau Claire trip, please visit Tipper, Shelly, Stephania, Kelle, or Roxanne (who is blogless).

the pattern

the pattern
Originally uploaded by CorgiMom.

I call these style of bags "dauchschund" bags- "cause they are long,

like doxie's. I suppose when I knit one, it will have to called a corgi

bag- 'cause they are long too, and they are my hired hands. I outsource

to the 'dogs.