‘Cause you gotta have friends! Come on, sing along!*

Sorry ’bout that.  I got a little excited.  Look what I got:

Chocolate!  A handmade oh so soft cotton soap sack (MrsQuimby is still looking for a better name that item) full of wonderful smelling soap!  A big ol’ skein/cake of Socks that Rock medium weight in Titania!  Now that is the kind of birthday cake I can get behind!  Boo Rah.  All this was in honour of the fact that I’m staring down the gun barrel of 40 in about 10 days.  Eep.  I don’t feel forty though so I don’t think I should be forced to be forty.  Right?  No?  Shoot.  Oh well, Mrs. Quimby surely did make me feel special and all kinds of squishy with such a thoughtful gift.    Thank you so much girl!  You rock!

Not much else going on.  Still chugging along on my last two papers of the semester.  Oh!  Wait, I almost forgot.  This Friday and Saturday is the Fibreswest Festival in Abbotsford, BC.  I plan to be there on Saturday.  Is anyone else out there coming along?  Mrs. Quimby?  Yarnpiggy?  Anyone, anyone?  Bueller?  We need to meet up and maybe pet some alpacas together.  That would be cool.

*Sorry for putting that in your head.  Please enjoy the rest of your evening. 

I’m a big fat enabler,

oh yes I am. To that end, hey Leah! The Kauni came from Astrid’s Dutch Obsessions. She was fantastic and helpful and the shipping was about $20.00. With that rate of shipping though, you could go all the way up to 1800 grams which is A LOT of yarn! My Kauni was only 580 grams so technically I could have ordered enough for 3 sweaters and maybe a pair of socks. Not that I would do that of course. Who am I kidding, of course I would.

Who will be next to succumb to the siren call of this yarn?

Yarn safari

Kauni is not seen often seen in the wild, which is why this was such a lucky incident.  We spotted it from afar, and began to work our way closer in hopes of learning more about his rare and beautiful creature.

We believe that it was drawn out of hiding for a little sunbathing.  Here is our first glance:

We slowly work our way closer.  Carefully trying not to alarm it:

The warmth of the sun must have caused it to doze off.  This last closeup shot is inprecedented:

Okay, that’s enough Wild Kingdom for the day.    I’ve made a deal with myself, this is as much as I’m allowed to touch it until the Sockapalooza socks are finished.  I’m not even going to put it on the swift and wind it up until those socks are washed and blocking.  I plan on finishing them this weekend, there is no way I can keep my hands off this yarn for any longer than that.  But hey, want to get some Kauni for yourself?  Astrid was fabulous to work with and the shipping was amazingly fast.  I think you will have to wait until the end of July for some colours as they are on back order.

In other news, I had 3 interviews and testing sessions last week for various jobs and on Friday I got calls from 4 more for next week.  One of them is with the RCMP civilian staff.  Dress uniforms!  Swoon.  Don’t even get me started about the musical ride.  Uniforms and horses?  I’m almost unconscious here.

I’m getting a feeling that I will have to make a job choice in the next week or two.  That’s going to be the hard part.

I’m wicked I tell you! Wicked!

I ordered the yarn to make this today.  Someone take away the Visa, please, for the love of Pete.    I went with the rainbow colourway.  If all goes well I might do a more sombre/monochrome on for the fall.

On a more positive note:

1.    I have been called for testing for not one or two but three federal jobs.  Huzzah!

2.    I have an interview  tomorrow and next Friday for a couple of very fine provincial and federal jobs.

3.    I had an interview/testing session at SFU yesterday.

4.    My contract got extended again.  This time to July 20.

So it’s not all gloom and doom.  As long as I keep working the yarn will flow like wine!  Sorry, got a bit odd there.

And, I joined this exchange.  Sounds kind of fun eh?  This is who I’m spoiling.  And this is who’s sending to me.  How cool is that?  I’m going tea cup shopping this weekend. 

Hmmm, I wonder what this does?

My first non-Blogger blog post. Weird. I gotta tell ya though, the font, MUCH bigger over here on wordpress. Does that mean all the old blind chicks blog here? If so, I’ll fit right in.  It would seem that the import of the old blog worked well, got all the posts and the comments so that’s a good thing.

I haven’t a clue how to do anything here though so a little reading may be in order.  LIke how to put up a pici or something.  Hmmmm…

Hey!  I did it.  That’s the Manos I bought a couple of weeks ago.  It makes me think of grapefruits.  I have no idea why.  I’m going to cast on My So Called Scarf .  Very pretty stuff.  I made one a couple of years ago but hey, you can never have enough scarves.  I’m going to go do some more reading up on this here WordPress thing.  Have a good Sunday and happy father’s day to all the daddies.  Mine included!

I have a stalker…

and I kind of like it! My sock pal, sorry, Sockimus Palimus, has been sending me little missives through the mail. First there was this one:

Then there was this one:

This was the most wonderful thing to come home to after a 12 hour shift. I laughed so hard that snorting was heard. It was brilliant! I love my Sockimus Palimus.

The other thing I came how to was this:

A puffy from the Sweet Sheep. So nicely packaged and there is this awesome little pin with the sheepy logo. Very cute! So yeah, yarn diet, that was sooooo yesterday.

Here you see some Fleece Artist Sea Wool (squishability factor of 13), Shelridge Farms Handpaint (squishability factor of 12), and Mama C*EYE*BER Fiber (colour factor 1,000,000 – it’s called blood orange, swoon).

Okay, shower and back to work. Thanks for coming out kids!

Still alive, by the skin of my teeth

Here’s some advice, it’s free and I’m most definitely not using it. Once you reach the age of 38 (or so) you have no business going out to a stagette and drinking with the 19 – 26 crowd. Just so you know.

Before we get to that though, ‘Nessa and I went to the production centre tour of Bard on the Beach on Saturday afternoon. It was great. Got to see the teeny tiny little mockups of what the stages will look like, checked out the costuming department (beyond cool!), and then…wait for it…we got to sit in on part of the rehearsal for Taming of the Shrew. FABULOUS! My three favourite actors were all there, Haig Sutherland, Rob Frazer, and Kyle Rideout. It was wonderful. They are doing it in the concept of spaghetti western and it really worked. It’s going to be hilarious.

From there, I’m afraid things went downhill. A bunch of us were going to celebrate a friends impending (hmmm, that sounds sort of ominous) marriage and away we went. To the strippers. I’m proud to say, I had never been to the strippers before. I can no longer say that. Sigh. Before we went Vanessa and I were having a few drinks at home. Which led to a few shooters. Which led to this:

This one has some Stella in it. The dogs were having a gas with us running around like idiots.

Why yes, we are cool! It’s like Simon in the Land of Chalk Drawings threw up. You can tell how this is going to end, can’t you? Off to the bar, more drinks, falling, having to leave the bar. Yep, I am way too old for these sorts of activities. Anyway…needless to say ‘Nessa and I were just a scoach hung over on Sunday. So hung over in fact that I did not make it to my mom’s house and take her for dinner. I might actually be the worst daughter in the world. I’m sorry mom! I’ll totally make it up to you this weekend.

Also, because of the production centre tour I didn’t make it to the Fibre Festival. Lavender says it was lovely. Go see the linen she’s spinning, very cool!

After my interview with the RCMP yesterday (which went okay I think,) I popped over to a yarn store in the area that I had never been to, Three Bags Full. Nice, lots of stuff I hadn’t seen in person before, Blue Sky Alpaca, Kidsilk Haze, Louet Gems, etc. I did pick up a few things, you know to make me feel better about missing the fibre festival. Okay that’s what I’m telling myself. Some Lorna’s Laces shepherd sport in purple and orange, a couple skeins of Malabrigo, and I think what might be the last two skeins of Sweet Georgia sock yarn in Vancouver. Oh, and a Noro book.

On the Sockapalooza front, I’ve started my pal’s socks. I did end up changing my mind about the pattern about 76 times. I’m just getting to the patterning so I’ll take a pici tomorrow when it looks like more. Version 76.a.1 are the Tidal Wave socks. I think the greens will look nice. Okay, that’s it, I’m outta here. I got a tonne o’ stuff to get done before work tonight. This working afternoons is starting to grind a bit. Have a good day everyone, I’m going to go sit in my yard in the sunshine and knit a bit before I go to work.

Soooooo, wanna play golf?

My beloved Canucks lost 2 – 1 in second overtime last night. If we could all have a moment of quiet…..right, that’s enough of that.

Okay, here it comes. Are you ready for it? There’s always next season! Man, I am some kind of tired of saying that!

Anyway, nothing I can do about that. Look at this neato thingy I found in a thrift store for $1.00.

How cool is that? Just built for multicolour projects. What was that bleak future movie that kept showing tv commercials and one had the guy who just kept saying “I’d buy that for a dollar!” Robocop? Running Man? Anyway, I would and and I did buy that for a dollar!

Then, just now, when I went and opened the front door for a bit o’ natural light to take the above pici I found my Scout’s Swag club package on my front porch! Sweet.

Mmmmmmmmmmm, lavender and mint. Love it. There is gorgeous sock yarn, lip balm, Heal My Hands for hands and sample for heals, and a facial scrub. Yummers.

Don’t tell hubby, I sort of joined the club in a moment of weakness. I never thought I’d be picked in the lottery. ‘Course I was picked and ‘course I was secretly delighted! Duh, who wouldn’t be. But, shhhh, he doesn’t need to know. I’m pretty sure he doesn’t stop by here. Vanessa, don’t you say a word!

I’m so weak…

But, I don’t think it’s all my fault. I went to Birkeland Brothers today. Oh my. I was just going to get a bit of fibre for spinning for when my Spindolyn arrives. Um yeah, let’s just say that my yarn diet was seriously if not mortally wounded. First there was the Pima Cotton/silk blend, and the Drops Alpaca, and then the Mellenweit sock yarn. I’m so weak. But I did get a lovely little back of fibre for spinning. 100 grams worth, in addition to the 800 grams of lovely lovely yarn I bought.

Worthless and weak I tell you! Worthless and weak. Phe, whatever. Live hard, buy yarn.

Next month Rabbitch is going to be doing up one of the display windows at Birkeland Bros in style. Make sure you stop by and have a look at her goodies. She loves it when folks do that. Snort.

Tomorrow is the Vancouver Sun Run. Think of me out there forcing my rather largesh frame along the 10km course. The weather is supposed to be very good though, which is nice. I’ll try to get some good picis for y’all. Vancouver is a beautiful city so the scenery along the course is good for distracting you from thinking about your aching feet & calves.

Tomorrow is also the last day to send me in your entries for the Dulaan contest. Cutoff is midnight tomorrow night. So far, not as many entries as in last fall’s contest so those of you already in there, much better odds of winning! Those of you who have been waiting until the last minute, time is almost up.

My beloved Canucks lost last night too. I was most sad. They just didn’t seem to have it together, I think that super long game on Wednesday must have ground them up a bit. Plus, they were missing three players due to injury. Not good, not good at all. Have to make sure I’m wearing my lucking underwear tomorrow night. Whatever works baby, whatever works.