How much fabric DO I have here?

Why, for the love of all things holy, can I not find a stupid tape measure around here? I know for a fact I own at least half a dozen.

Tearing apart my craft room looking for one, I found quite a bit of fabric and yarn I don't remember buying (that's an issue to deal with in another post). I found four pair of scissors and the sharpener. I found elastic, nylon webbing, velcro and several sorts of ribbon, as well as shipping supplies. But I don't need any of those things right now.

GAH!

I want to make a didymos for the trip this weekend. I just wanna see if I have enough of this fabric that's been sitting around waiting to become something beautiful and useful.

#$*%!

Anyone have suggestions as to how to measure my fabric with no tape measure?

Yay for fresh patterns!

I really have wonderful blessings for friends. It's true. Today, my friend Katie stopped by for lunch and came bearing a book she'd found for $0.50 at Half Price Books.
Does she know me or what? Not only did I have adult conversation and company for lunch today, I have a new book full of fabulous patterns! I adore the colorwork in this book!!! It's a great friend that cruises the book store and steals a great deal on a wonderful British knitting book!

Then. . . I go out and bring in the mail.

Life is good, people. Life is good.

The summer I became a runner

Remember how surprised hubby was when I came home one day and told him I wanted to run a marathon? It was a huge freaking deal that there was a sport I was suddenly interested in. There were skeptics. The usual "I only run if there's something chasing me" comments and "I don't get why anyone would want to do that." There were those who were still convinced I'm too big of a klutz to be a runner. But I managed to ignore the naysayers (shame on you, naysayers- you know who you are) and stick with the folks who cheered me on (have I ever mentioned what an awesome cheering section my hubby's folks are? Not to mention my friends Mel, Miriam and Emily who deserve major props for encouragement!).

July 25th, I ran my first real 5K (the first one I ever actually trained for) in 30:08. On Mt. Washington.

September 27th, I ran the 10k in Pittsburgh's Great Race in 57:12.

Yesterday, I had what it took. I'm so stinking proud of myself and I'm officially excited about, looking forward to and confident about my ability to run the 2010 Pittsburgh Marathon. Yesterday, I ran the Spirit of Pittsburgh Half Marathon in 2:14:15. A full FIVE SECONDS faster than my husband. Hey, every second counts when it comes to bragging rights. Yeah, yeah. He was injured. Whatever. I still ran faster. I ran THIRTEEN POINT ONE miles, people. When six months ago, 3.1 miles (a 5K) seemed like a huge distance.

I'm still wearing my medal today.

Call me George Costanza

So part of the reason I've not been around the blog as much lately is because of the running training. I'm still knitting alot. I just don't have time to tell you all about every cast on and heel turn. Next weekend, Tim and I will be running the Spirit of Pittsburgh Half Marathon. I'm very excited about this. Saturday, we ran our last long training run before the race. 13 miles. Yeah. It's as brutal as it sounds. We started out on the south side, ran a bit on the northside, followed the Eliza Furnace ("jail trail") for a ways and crossed back over to the south side trail for a few miles.

We didn't time things super well and we managed to cross over to the northside by Heinz Field right as a Pitt football game let out. So we were bobbing and weaving through oblivious walkers for a while, which was just oodles of fun. We were right around mile six of our run and passing the parking lots at the stadium when Tim needed to make a pit stop. So while waiting for him, I downed a Clif Shot (totally nasty under normal circumstances- AWESOME in the middle of a long long run) and hydrated myself a bit.

Some chubby, beer-battered college kid (sporting a scruffy, ridiculous beard in an attempt to look grown up) calls out to me, "Working out, huh?" I'm still not sure if I was being hit on or made fun of. It's such a hard distinction to make when dealing with college boys. Here's the killer. I was so fried, my wit and sarcasm TOTALLY failed me. It's a sad day when you can't come up with a snarky come back to such a set up. So, what DID I manage to come up with? I gave him stern look of annoyance and said, "yeah." I know. You have every right to be utterly disappointed with me.

By the time Tim came back, I had thought of at least 3 FAR superior comebacks. Figures. So, on the off chance that the rotund, tipsy young puppy from amidst the Pitt fans is reading this, I'm going to post my comebacks. If nothing else, I'll have them off my chest. And if you know anyone who might have been that beered-up football fan Saturday, please refer them to this blog post. And if you have any comeback suggestions for the guy lame enough to say "Working out, huh?" to a woman at least 10 years his senior (do mothers not teach their sons manners anymore?) who'd clearly just run 6 times farther than they ever could without passing out, please share in the comments. Just keep the language clean. We're going for snark and sarcasm, with perhaps a touch of irony, but keep it classy.

I could have said. . .

• No. I just wear hydration fanny packs because they're sexy.
• Yeah. Some people prefer to actually DO exercise rather than sit around with a beer getting fat while watching other people do the sports. (This is mostly just bitchy, but I feel it's appropriate for the situation.)
  
• What are you, 12? (OK, this might not be the cleverest, but it's a classic. A nice variation might be, "Are you even old enough to legally drink?")
• (With a look of utter confusion) No. Library convention. (Tim's suggestion. Very subtle and terribly eccentric.)
• Tell you what, hot stuff. If you can keep up with me for the last 7 miles of my run, I'll give you my phone number.

Thanks for listening. I feel better now. And I look forward to hearing what you all come up with.

Queen of Hearts and Alice in Wonderland Costume Set GIVEAWAY!!!!

These costumes are simply stunning!!!!

Queen of Hearts and Alice in Wonderland Costume Set GIVEAWAY!!!!

Crisp fall air

Dude. It's freezing. We wait until the last possible moment to turn our furnace on in the fall and I think I'm caving in today. I'm sitting here in wool socks over another pair of socks and alpaca mitts IN THE HOUSE. These are the owl cable/lace mitts the FABULOUS CarlaK knit for me.
I just sweatered the poor dog because I caught her shivering.
The great thing about when the weather snaps to cold like this is I start preparing for Christmas projects. I just have to finish the prayer shawl and I can start knitting Christmas gifts. Well. . . I may take a diversion and do a squid hat first for Halloween.

We do have a piano now though! I've wanted one for a long time but am not accomplished enough to warrant the time, money and effort to get one. Pookie and I recently started lessons together though and needed something to practice on. We borrowed a keyboard from my father in law to start, but that just isn't the same. So we started cruising craigslist for something cheap and in good shape and scored big. We only paid $100 for it. It's not the prettiest instrument in the world, but we can refinish it at some point. It has a couple broken keys and the pedals aren't working real well, but they are minor issues that hubby & his dad should be able to fix pretty easily. Sooooooo. . . I cleared out a space in the dining room.
We got a bunch of big friends to help.
And YAY! PIANO!
That's Globug up there walking past it. I told her when she woke up from her nap, we'd have a piano. When she woke up. . . she couldn't find it. I've no idea how one could miss it! Once we pointed it out to her, she tested it.
The real prodigy, however. . .
I think he plans on showing up everyone who said playing the piano will be hard for him.

Where HAS she been?

I know. Long time, no blog. Sorry. I've been really really really busy. On top of directing the first ever Pittsburgh Race for Fetal Hope slated to happen in 2011 and things starting to pick up a bit for the S.H.O.R.E. Project and still teaching at Natural Stitches and The Father Ryan Arts Center and taking care of the kids and house and husband and dog and cats and frog and snail. . .

• I ran the Pittsburgh Great Race 10K!!! Not only did I finish it in good form, feeling great, I finished it THREE MINUTES faster than my best 10K training run!!! My official time was 57:17. Not shabby at all for a 30 year old mom of three who's been running for all of 5 months! Next stop, Spirit of Pittsburgh Half Marathon in November and the 5K Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving (Hey, YMCA- you still have up last year's info).
  
• I finished the Sterling shawl, but until I have it blocking, it's pointless to take pictures. It's just a large, sparkly mush of red yarn. I also finished the afghan I was working on, but same deal with that.
• Right now, I'm mostly working on a prayer shawl for a friend who lost her job. I'm pretty sure she doesn't read my blog and I'm safe from her seeing this and figuring out it's her. And if she does see this and figure out it's her, she's the sort of person who will act surprised anyway, so I'll go ahead and letcha see a picture.
• Globug started dance classes.
• My little pal, M has been hanging out here a bit, playing with Scooter. They are about the best friends babies can be.
• Pookie started fourth grade and I did the dorky Mom-note thing and stuck it in her lunch box.
• The G-20 came to Pittsburgh. Everyone expected mayhem. There was anything but. Although, one night we had protesters show up on out front porch!! They were too cute to set the dog out on and they were protesting some things I could get behind.
• Globug has been busy giving Sparkle fashion makeovers.
• 
• Globug also gave herself a makeover.
• I got a cat at Build A Bear. (Don't LOL him, please.)
• I did a teacher art showing at The Father Ryan Arts Center. It was really neat to have a gallery show off my stuff!
• Scooter turned into a fish.