Friday Photos

It's spring, so of course you should be expecting some pictures of the garden. I have my first tulip completely up. It's a very pretty pink. I have a variety of daffodils. They hyacinth are looking good and there's lots of other stuff making itself known. The peonies, some lilies, some coreopsis, lavender - good things. I'll get surprises too because I don't know what got moved when the fence guys moved dirt around - some stuff might not have made it, other stuff may show up in a new place! I've also added a picture of the stole I am knitting for myself. It's about 2/3 done. I'm really happy with the progress and how it looks.

Happiness is....

...my honey coming home! A has been out in Indy since Friday at a conference for Fire Department Instructors. I miss him. I'm looking forward to seeing him tonight.

I must say - happiness is also having that fence! Boomer gets it now. When I open the door, he waits for the okay, then he goes dashing out into the yard to do his business and play a bit. If it's raining - I can stay inside and dry.

The fence is in!!

YAYAY - from both me and Boomer! A has not seen the finished fence yet, but he'll be happy. Boomer didn't really know what to make of it at first. He didn't get that he could just roam around. He just picked a spot and sat in the sun. Then, Bentley came to visit. Bentley is our friend's dog. He's an 8 month old Bassett Hound. The 2 dogs had such fun chasing each other around the yard. Boomer is now exhausted, laying here asleep. See pics of the fence and the fun below.

Friday Photos

Some more flower pictures. It's been a busy week. The fence is about half done - should be done sometime Saturday. Then I'll be off to the nursery to buy some new flowers. They had to dig some up to get it in and with our schedules, neither of us have had a chance to try to replant them, so I don't think they'll make it. I'm wondering what happened to the stuff that hadn't started coming up yet! We may get some surprises!! I can't wait for it to be done - to see Boomer run around his yard for the first time off leash.

Onion Grass

I hate it. It's annoying. It grows faster than our regular grass. It grows in my flower gardens. For that I blame the previous owners who did not take care of the gardens. I decided to get back to my "learning new things" project and learn about onion grass. Pulling it up only eliminates it to a certain extent - if you don't get all the little bulbs and all of all of them - it will grow back. Roundup works, but can kill your regular grass. Weed B Gone appears to be better. Would you believe that people eat onion grass? EWWWW! Apparently it is in the chive family. What I've read is that you use the top like chives. You boil the little bulbs with salt and butter - Yum! You can even eat them raw? Oh yuck. It's a weed! Clearly you should not eat them if you have tried to kill them with Roundup or Weed B Gone. Or if, like me, you have a doggie who may have done his business on the onion grass. If only dog pee would kill onion grass, I would be in business!

Friday Photos

Some knitting, some flowers, some fencing. Yeah fencing. I'm excited. Our fence was delivered yesterday. It will be installed later this month. I think I'm going to particularly love the fence come winter when I can just open the door and say "go do your business Boomer" and not have to go out with him.

The knitting is booties that I will send up to my new nephew. They were very easy to make. The pattern is at http://www.lionbrand.com/patterns/60091A.html?noImages=. They aren't fancy - I figure they are knock-around booties. I did a better job sewing the 2nd one up. The hardest part was the stupid tassels.

It's a double-sided coin

I got some answers today as to why I didn't get the spot of president. On the one hand, it makes me feel better to know what it was. On the other, I feel down because maybe I could have done better. It was all about the interview - or almost all. The guy who got it was "outstanding". I was not. Apparently I was not even close enough to outstanding to make them choose me to have a more appropriate balance. This makes the 5th white male in a row and 8 out of the last 10. Females make up 49% of the membership. He represents a geographic region whose members make up less than 2% of our membership. So I'm reading into all this that I wasn't even close enough to make them say "hey - they're pretty close, it's time for a woman, go with her." I could have done a better job. I could have worked on responses to some of the questions I was sure they would ask. Woulda, coulda, shoulda. I probably shouldn't beat myself up over it. Who knows if I could have prepared more. I prepared more than I did the year before. And now - this really puts into question what happened the year before. Was I maybe good enough - but they felt last year the other guy was close enough to me that they should choose him for balance? I'll never know. I should stop all this - but it's hard to let go of a dream.
One of the women in the next class is really pissed off about them picking another guy. She raised some good points about the process - one being that laying it all on one interview is a pretty narrow process. She's right. What's really wrong about that is that your body of work while on the Executive Board means very little - so what's the point? I wouldn't have been able to not work hard, because that's not my nature, but it hits home when the guy who got it last year got it because he had a good interview. He had been pretty much a non-entity in his 3 years on the board, but one interview and he's going to be president. It sucks - just sucks.
I need to let it go and move on.

My feel good recipe

Jewelry is a great medicine.

I didn't get it

and the truth is, I don't even feel like going jewelry shopping this time.

Tomorrow is D-Day

Tomorrow I hear if I get the presidency of my professional association. I'm trying to prepare for a negative. No need to prepare for a positive - right? So, same kind of plan as last year - retail therapy. I've been researching jewelry. If I covet a Dooney & Bourke handbag again, I know to talk to A first, so that his buddy Pat, who works for Mr. B, can get it for me at his employee discount. So, I've been cruising some jewelry websites. I'm thinking a diamond journey necklace. Although part of me says I should take the peridot/diamond pendant my mom had made for me and get it made into a ring. I've wanted to do that for years. Is now the time? I'm leaning more towards something I wasn't going to have otherwise - to make it truly special. I do think my odds are decent. I think that in simple comparison to the other candidates, I match up well. If you add to it that with the guy who beat me out last year, it will be four men in a row - for an organization that is 49% female - I think being the only woman in contention plays in my favor. I'm not proud - I'll take the advantage. In the end though - it may all hinge on something else that is important to the committee that I know nothing about. So I move along with my plan to indulge myself if it doesn't go in my favor. My own personal silver lining - you know how it goes.

Friday Photos

As promised, here are pictures of my recently finished knitting project. It is a scarf - the name of the scarf is Bias Knit Scarf and it's a free pattern on http://www.lionbrand.com/. The pattern calls for mohair yarn and says to knit to 36 inches. I used Lion Brand Homespun - much softer - and made it a bit over 60 inches. I really liked this pattern. I knit it for my friend Deb. A few months back, my friend Patrick passed away after a golfing accident. Deb was his girlfriend. We had dinner last month and I was wearing a scarf I had knit. Deb loved it and the color and said "I want one" or something like that. So - I found a yarn with a color close to mine and decided to try a different pattern from mine. The first pattern I tried, I really didn't like. Then I thought I would try the Bias Knit Scarf -but using a smaller needle and cast on more stitches. I ripped that out too - or using knitting language I guess I frogged it. So - finally got going with a size I liked and it really moved pretty quickly. I gave it to Deb yesterday. I'm happy I could do something that made her happy. She's had a tough few months. So enough story - here are the pictures.

Happiness is... part 2

....learning to cable! Thank you "Stitch 'n Bitch"! It's also finally figuring out what knit the knits and purl the purls means. It was one of those "ah hah!" moments for me. I'm not planning to do any patterns with cables soon - but I plan to be practicing. For now, I'm working diligently on my stole. I finished the other project, will post pictures on Friday.

Happiness is....

....blooming daffodils! I love my daffys. I've got 5 that have popped so far. They are just so bright and happy and spring-ish. The weather is supposed to be good this weekend, so I see myself working out in the yard some. YAY!