Things are strange.
T leaves tomorrow for his grandma's funeral. They are having a viewing, which is... surprising. It's not something I would have imagined she would ever want. He doesn't even have any black or gray pants and that detail is stressing him out. Poor guy.

Also, my sister and her family had a sad day. On Saturday, they got the news that their much-beloved Norwegian Elkhound had cancer of the spleen. He wasn't in pain, but was very lethargic and showing signs that he was very ill, so they made the very difficult decision to put him down today. She sent this out.

He was gorgeous and dear dog, with tons of energy. He was my sweet, one and only nephew's childhood best friend, so I know his heart is heavy tonight. If you've got it to spare, again I'm asking for some positive energy on my loved ones' behalves.

thanks everyone.

Soon this blog will return to the usual: knitting, kids, new house, blah blah blah.

oh, shit, the phone just rang and Todd's grandma died today. Please think good thoughts for him, ok?

We just had ridiculous amounts of fun grocery shopping!! Trader Joes was insane!! We had a blast, and I think every five seconds I pulled something off the shelf and exclaimed either that it was the best (fill in the blank) EVAH! or how freaking cheap is THAT??!!.
We lost track of each other at one point and were calling each other on our cell phones and it went like this:
Scout: "Where ARE you??!!"
Me: "I'm in the beer & wine aisle, where are YOU?"
Scout: "I'm in the beer & wine aisel!"
Me: "No, you aren't!!"
Scout: "Yes, I am, where are you?"
Me: "I'm right next to the cheese girl in the beer and wine aisle!"
Both of suddenly turn and see that we are literally three feet apart! Bwaaahahaha. Ok, it was funnier if you were there.
And if you had a roadie on the way.

It was actually really fun-- we were bonding with random strangers over our purchases and our joy over the fact that we actually have TJs in Albuquerque.

Oh, and I truly felt like a New Mexican when I pulled in at home and I had to kick a tumbleweed out of the way before parking the car.

opens tomorrow!!!

Scouty just posted about our big date tomorrow night-- yes, my friends, that's what happens when you're 35. A new store opens and you plot your big trip there with a best girlfriend, making certain to go in the evening when you won't have to drag the tots along.
On a Friday night.

However, I'm embracing my fading youth this time by thinking up a list of all my old TJ staples.. Let me know if you think I have missed anything; it's been a long six months since I've been able to shop there.
Hummus (oh, tj's hummus, how I have missed thee)
Reduced-fat gouda. Soooo good.
Milk and soy milk at insane prices.
Bombay curry sauce.
Organic mac & cheese for the aforementioned tots. (hellooooo, 89 cents!)
Naan.
Organic yogurt. (again, 89 cents!)
Organic canned beans. (all 89 cents! Sense a theme?)
PB joe-joes, although I don't know if I even trust myself around them and I generally hate all packaged cookies!

What am I forgetting? That's not enough to fill a cart!

Me, as my own Project Spectrum palette~~

I'm doing that book meme, even though no one has specifically tagged me. I'm hoping it will spark some book recommendations from you, my intelligent and witty readers. I have nothing to read at the moment and the last book I read was... meh.

Meme instructions: Look at the list of books below. Bold the ones you've read, italicize the ones you might read, cross out the ones you won't, underline the ones on your book shelf (or in my case, in boxes in storage), and place parentheses around the ones you've never even heard of.

The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger
The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy - Douglas Adams
The Great Gatsby - F.Scott Fitzgerald
To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
(His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman)
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - J. K. Rowling
Life of Pi - Yann Martel
Animal Farm: A Fairy Story - George Orwell
Catch-22 - Joseph Heller
The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
Lord of the Flies - William Golding
Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
1984 - George Orwell
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - J. K. Rowling
One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
Slaughterhouse 5 - Kurt Vonnegut
(The Secret History - Donna Tartt)
Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - C. S. Lewis
Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenides
(Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell)
Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
(Atonement - Ian McEwan)
(The Shadow Of The Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon)
The Old Man and the Sea - Ernest Hemingway
The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
Dune - Frank Herbert

So, the best books I have read this past year would be The Kite Runner, A Million Little Pieces (controversy or no), and The Lovely Bones. Some of my favorite authors ever include Paul Bowles and Barbara Kingsolver. My favorite non-fiction author is Oliver Sacks, and my most obscure favorite book is Lives of the Monster Dogs.
Okay! So what should I read next? And after that? And then what?

Dana Reeve has died of lung cancer.
Shit, only 44. After everything they went through, and oh, their poor son. He is 13. Imagine being 13 and having lost both your parents.
So sad.

If you have a moment, please give a little hello to my best girl, Scout today. It's a rough day for her & a little extra love never hurts.

Also, Ina asked for July and August Project Spectrum buttons, and so she shall receive!
July:

August:


If you missed March, April, May, or June, they are all here.

Just in time before rushing off to work, I present my first completed project of March.




I wanted to make a custom memory board for Viv, and I wanted it to be cute & girly, yet hip. Hence the funky ribbons, buttons, and the overall asymmetry! It was a fun project & I'll probably make something similar for S, but obviously more of a duuuuuuude one!
(as always, click for big & detailed.)

What, no one likes my PS March button? Huh, too bad, then 'cause I made pretty April, May & June ones too, but perhaps they'll just be mine!!! Ok, I'm kidding, I'm not really all dejected.
I haven't been blogging because I have been busy as hell and I haven't been knitting much at all; however I reminded myself today that this is not just a knitting blog!
On Friday evening, we had friends over for dinner. There's a couple here in the apartments we kept meaning to get together with and finally, I convinced Todd to invite the husband (who is a real-life Dr McDreamy, by the way) snowboarding, so since they planned to go Saturday, I figured that some carb-loading the evening before was the perfect excuse. Of course, up until Monday night, I forgot that I had invited them, which meant I had also planned to go visit Bev for a sewing lesson, so I had to change that again.
Anyway, we had such a blast! Whenever we hang out with people for the first time, I'm always nervous that they will be wildly different, say politically or as parents or whatever, and that we'll be left with lots of awkward silence. Well, we drank like fish and they didn't leave here until 2:15 am, so in my mind, that means it went swimmingly. (heh. get it? drank like fish? swimmingly?)
So yeah, I slept in a bit yesterday, which I never ever get to do. T & Dr McD were off to the mountains early and the kids and I hung out all day. We went out for coffee & hot chocolate and then went to Hobby Lobby for some PINK. Then we went to Read to the Dogs, which was just so cool. And little Miss Vivienne is just on the cusp of starting to read, so she "read"
Todd Parr's -- one of our all-time favorite books. If you have kids and you don't have this book, rush right out & buy it!!

Anyway, when we came home, I worked on a pink project! It's not quite done, but here's a sneak preview:

It's going to be very cool when it's complete, which should be later today.

I can't really participate in the backyard picture meme, since my backyard is currently a pile of dirt onto which I am officially trespassing until March 31, so instead I give you the vista from my aprtment balcony.

And this is the view from our front porch, and is the kids' current playspace:


Kinda pretty, huh?
And now, just to make you feel badly:

Two humble contributions to the kickoff of Project Spectrum:

The very beginning of a sock...


And a button just for March. Help yourself, but no bandwidth thievery, please!


I've had a busy and stressful couple days, and at least one more busy one ahead, so I may not post for a couple days. Saturday, T is going snowboarding and I'll be off, so hopefully I will get some blogging and some knitting time!