Queen of the Household

I hereby dub myself Queen of the Household for successfully replacing the fan on our vacuum. LOL!

Here's the fan that was broken (and incredibly loud!!!):

It was cracked in multiple places and made an incredible noise when I turned on the vacuum. It's also filthy but I guess that proves the vacuum was doing its job.

The new fan went in really easily and the vacuum is quieter than it's been for a while. It's an industrial Sanitaire vacuum that my grandfather bought for us as a wedding present, going on 14 years ago (gasp!!!). It's a fabulous vacuum and I'm very proud of myself for diagnosing the problem and fixing it myself.


On the knitting front, I started a new pair of socks. I'm trying these toe up, with a heel flap, and hopefully they'll fit.


I have a hard time getting the color balance right, but you can get the idea.


I also got a skin for my Sony Touch e-reader. I'm not thrilled with the quality of the picture (someone used the unsharp mask in Photoshop a few too many times) but I love the way it feels on the device. Next time I'll order one from DecalGirl instead, though.



I love my e-reader, although it's going to take me a while to duplicate my paperback collection in digital files. I have to remind myself that it's taken me years to build up my paperback collection, and I don't need to have all of them NOW. LOL! On the other hand, it's really nice to be getting rid of things and I need to move that to other areas of my life. I was good and got rid of a stack of knitting books that I'll never use, and I need to go through my quilt books next. I think my yarn collection might be getting purged next. We'll see.

I just might live

Last week I got hit with a really, really nasty sinus infection. I spent most of the last week sleeping 12 - 14 hours a day, which is not my norm. But, at last, I'm managing to say awake all day!

So now I have a bunch of stuff to get caught up on, but I did manage to finish Teresa's quilt. It's gorgeous and I'm thrilled that I got to participate in this project.





Gorgeous, isn't it?



This weekend Greg and the kids did a lot of work out in the garden, and got two beds ready to go.

Here's the bed from last year, all ready to go, with some onions left over form last year:


Here are some seed packets and tomatoes started:


The new big raised bed, plus a tilled-up area next to it:

Last year the kids talked Greg into building flower boxes, and on Saturday he put them up on the side of the shed and they put seeds in them. Hopefully they'll grow!


The fish tank is up and filled with water, now all we need are fish!

Ravelympics

It's been a busy week or so since my last post. (Why do I wait so long between posts?)

First up, Carmine is no longer with us. It turned out that he was older than a year old, and was FliV (I think that's right -- feline leukemia) positive. Very, very positive. I know we made the right decision but it was tough. On the other hand, we've seen a lot more of Lenny and Squiggy since they basically disappeared while Carmine was around.

Greg has been very busy with his new tools!

He sprayed some coats of polyurethane on the aquarium table:


And here's the finished table:

Isn't it gorgeous? It'll sit for a few more days to let the finish really harden, and then we'll get it set up in the living room with the fish tank.


Thursday night Greg and I went to see the opera Rigoletto at the Tulsa Opera. It was great! It was the final dress rehearsal, so our seats were really good. It's wonderful knowing people behind the scenes who got us tickets (thanks Lena and Somer!).


Friday was the school carnival at the kids' school, which was torture for the adults but the kids loved it.

They entered the Twinkie decorating contest, and here are their entries:


Those are Gillian's penguins, and Ryan did a car ("it's NOT a train, it's a CAR!"):

They both won ribbons so they were thrilled.

We won one of the class baskets! It was filled with all kinds of gardening stuff:


Now we're eager for the weather to warm up so we can get started on the garden.


During the Olympics, there's an event called the Ravelympics during which knitters (and other fiber crafters) attempt to finish certain projects. I managed to finish a pair of socks for the WIPs Dancing (Work In Progress) category, and I ripped out an almost-finished pair of socks for the Aerial Unwind category (no pic at the moment since they're just two balls of yarn again).

Here's the finished pair:


I really like the heel on this sock, and I'll probably use it from now on. There's no picking up of stitches!


I also got a quilt done for Calista, again using glow in the dark thread. Cute, huh?


That's it for the moment! Thankfully I don't have a lot going this week so I can concentrate on getting another two quilts finished. (I hope I haven't just doomed myself. LOL!)