I did it!

See the little bit of yarn left over? I call these "LUCKY Socks!"

The Japanese cable pattern was fun to work, the only issue is that these were supposed to fit my mom! I think she's an 8 or 9, and I'm only about a size 5 1/2, and they fit Loch too! I guess I'm a very tight knitter so I'll use bigger needles next time. Don't worry mom, you will get some cozy socks if it takes me from here to Christmas to get it right!

Now I may start a hat... I have never made a hat or anything in the round. Apparently I'm working backwards, most people start with those before attempting socks! I'm afraid of circular needles so I'll try with dp needles! There's always something to be afraid of...

Hot and Humid Again!

Due to wind and rain, like everyone else today it seems, no real projects or gardening going on today. The weather was made worse by the fact that temps soared to 88º today with high humidity - yuck!

I did manage to get a S@m's Club trip done today - please kick me in the head if you ever hear me mention that it's time to renew that membership! I actually did the math today since it was a leisurely trip without the kids, and most things are MORE expensive there than the commissary that is RIGHT BY my house LOL! I also am responsible for preparing a veggie tray for the current Master Gardener class for tomorrow morning. This was very dumb on my part, volunteering a veggie tray when nothing is in season anymore! I wasn't thinking straight back in August when I signed up for this. I priced bell peppers, the 1000 lb bag o'carrots at S@m's Club, broccoli, etc and almost fell over - I ended up buying one of those pre-made veggie trays and calling it a day. Two weeks ago I did pumpkin bread loaves for the class for FREE since I had all the ingredients, and even if I hadn't, it wouldn't have cost more than about $5.

I spent the first 2 hours of my morning driving around aimlessly, thanks to no stores being open until 10 a.m.! I can't stand this, since I am a morning person, and prefer to get all my errands out of the way early. Hancock Fabrics - closed, S@m's Club - closed, craft store - closed, library - closed! Really, I ended up wasting money at St@rbucks waiting for stores to open and wasting fuel, grrr....

On the bright side: the harvest today, I LOVE FALL!

Dinner Tonight (for me, anyways!)

And if you are wondering, YES - I eat the whole thing!

Other news: apparently there was one tip provided to police they are keeping to themselves, but they were out in full force again today behind the T@rget Store about a mile away, all walking in a line, this backs up to the freeway on ramp so I am assuming someone may have seen something tossed out of a window that they are looking for. I'm not sure of the significance of this, since the officer was off duty when the murder occurred, but the media made it a point of repeating several times that his body was found with his police badge around his neck, that's all the info we have now. Since we live so close to the crime scene, I had to have a talk with my kids this morning at breakfast about what they should do if they ever came across a weapon (gun) in the grass, etc... wow, there's a talk I didn't think I would have to have. What the perp might not have thought of... the police have just requested all the fenceline surveillance video from the Naval Air Station from that night - this took place in a treeless area immediately next to the airfield. Hope it shows something!

Lastly, I've been trying to clean up my computer desktop and came across this little video I meant to post about 2 months ago!

Tonight I will be listening to severe storms and finishing the SECOND sock in the pair, yay! I'm completely obsessed now and my hands are always on the verge of carpal tunnel syndrome!

I hope everyone in the path of this crazy weather system has fared okay! If any of you have snow, I want to see some photos!

A Sad Update...

The body found near our house this morning was ruled a homicide, and the victim was a police officer. Apparently the body was found behind a pickup truck that was on the side of the road which would explain why no one discovered the body until 7:15, that's just when the sun is up enough here to see everything. My kids were standing out at the bus stop at that time. Nothing further is known, but now I know why every unit in a massive radius was here - even a busload of police recruits showed up to help canvass the area. They say it was a fatal gunshot. I heard nothing here, although the dogs across the street were barking incessantly for a good hour last night.

Say a prayer for his family, 25 year old officer Victor Decker had a wife and a little baby girl. He also received a Medal of Valor last year after only 4 years on the force for stopping an armed robbery he came across alone while on bike patrol - sounds like he was exactly the kind of police officer we all hope to have in our local departments.

Forensic Crime Scene?

I just got back from an interesting adventure. I live on a dead end street and left an hour ago to go to the library. When I got to the end of my street to turn on to the main road, I was greeted with the scene of about 10-12 police cars and 2 forensic crime scene units! An extremely rude cop interrogates me about my address and then makes a big deal of verifying it on my license, finally lets me out of my street. Not sure what's going on yet but the news crews were there as I returned a few minutes ago, so I'm sure I'll find out soon. Yikes, I can't wait until hubby retires from the military and we can move somewhere they wouldn't be able to rustle up that many cops in the whole county LOL! I'll keep you updated!

Oh no.... it just started POURING! Not good for a crime scene I wouldn't think...

Never mind... just popped up on my news crawler.... (I'm thinking this might have been a medical emergency type thing since there is no way a body could be on this road undiscovered for longer than about a half a minute)

Man found dead by car on side of road in Va. Beach

13NEWS / WVEC.com

Posted on October 26, 2010 at 10:07 AM

Death investigation

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VIRGINIA BEACH – Police say a man was found dead alongside a vehicle that was stopped on the side of the road.

MPO Adam Bernstein says the victim was found around 7:15 a.m. Tuesday by a motorist driving in the 400 block of Oceana Blvd.

Detectives are on the scene and working to determine the circumstances of the man’s death.

The man’s name hasn’t been released.

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Scenes from our weekend

Lots of random unimportant things to cover from the past several days, so lets get started!

Thursday night was Math Carnival at the kids' school, here's some scenes from that...

The kids play math games and win tickets to be used for treats, moon bounce, and the teacher dunk tank!

Parking was scarce, luckily I was able to find Subaru Row fairly easily! Funny how us Subarubies always park as far away as possible and hike in - it must be that "Subaru Love"... we are afraid of people rubbing the dirt off our cars!

I couldn't pass this up.... check out the HAIR!! I was trying to get a better shot with iphone but couldn't do it without being obvious, although I don't think "obvious" bothers this woman LOL

Right on cue, less than 24 hours after mopping the floor, I get this...

I had my first ever parent-teacher conference! I was extremely nervous, as this school has a practice of only doing them if there is a problem. Loch is in the gifted resource class this year, where they evaluate him for further placement starting in the 3rd grade at a separate gifted school, so of course I figured since I had a conference they were going to tell me he wasn't suited to the program or something. I wouldn't be that concerned about him being "gifted" except the change in his peer group has done wonders for him this year. His being surrounded with kids that are more like him has cut the bullying issue WAY down so far this year. I didn't need to worry! Both his teachers told me he is doing so well that they have sent in recommendations not only to the local elementary school for the gifted, but also the math & science academy, to be our decision which. I wasn't aware we even had a separate math & science school so I will need to do some research in the coming months. Did they switch this kid at birth? Where's MY kid? LOL...

I drove home in tears I was so relieved! Of course I know he's my smart little guy, but I am always nervous when I have to have a "conference" LOL... must be flashbacks from when I was a kid! As a reward for me getting such a good report on his behavior and work in class, I told them we'd go out to dinner, his choice.... and he picks Golden Corral. What is it with that place and kids?

You can tell he's still just a regular kid by his choices for dinner (I also let him choose what he wanted to eat)!

"Cracker Soup"??

Below we have my plate vs. his plate, all the food is the same color! Do any of you struggle with your kids' dinner plate color palette?

Randomly moving on - girls knitting night at my house. No knitting ever really gets done, and come to think of it, it's not even truly a girls' night since we have all the boys and all we do is yell over them all night! Another friend J came over too and brought this...

Her grandmother passed away some time ago and she got "the stash" but she doesn't know how to knit so she's trying to get the hang of it. I had to take a photo, her grandma has needles in EVERY size, the flexible ones, in a cute case, too! There's a lot of money in that collection. She also inherited some pretty advanced "in-progress" projects that were neat to see.

Remember these? Haha, watch out for tacky potholders made by children for Christmas! What a great way to keep them out of my hair while I work on MY stuff!

This morning I actually had a few green tomatoes outside to come in and ripen

The next couple of photos are for Mama Pea!

She was interested in my high-tech double stranded knitting yarn feeder LOL

She also commented the other day that she spent so much time being afraid of knitting cables, and for what? After the past day, I have to say I agree, they're lots of fun!

I wonder if this means I'm an "intermediate knitter" yet? Probably not, there must be some law or test on that :)

See what else is in the basket? I got my first pair of "old lady knitting glasses"! That must fulfill one of the regulations to becoming an "intermediate" knitter, right?

Tonight I will definitely be "socking" again. Rainy and overcast outside so nothing going on garden-wise today.