I think I'm ready, are you?

Finished the Diamonds and Pearls shawl this week. I was able to add in six extra rows and still had a bit of the skein left. I tried iron blocking it, but think I'll try spraying it and pinning it to dry. My pictures are with me wearing a burnt orange sweater, not the best for showing off the shawl. I'll try to do better, oh and wear makeup. ;-)

Broke even on the number of books read this year. Using Shelfari (right side bar) it's been keeping track and telling me all year that I was ahead of my pace until this week. I was one short of last years reading of 108 books. Thankfully I had one book left to finish and I was able to get it wrapped up Thursday night. I tried to sneak one more in, but no time! Oh well!

I spent the morning playing on Ravelry. I have tabs organized for the four groups I'm playing with this year in my queue. Thankfully there can be overlap in goals with some of the groups. I couldn't do a tab in my stash for the handspun that I want to get spun this year, but I could number them and that helped bump them into order. The overall plan is to knit from stash. I do need to spend a bit for the spinning.

Okay, here's my wild goal with spinning to be able to enter skeins at Black Sheep Gathering (I actually have to make it to one, hopefully this is the year!), Washington County Fair (have done this but want to fill more categories than I have in the past), Oregon State Fair (new) and Oregon Flock and Fiber Festival (new).

I'm going to have to buy some small amounts of fiber to spin for the State Fair. I get to take advantage of a 20% off that Cindy is going to have in her shop for the Seattle to Portland Yarn Crawl coming in a couple weeks.

A new set of print cartridges were picked up so I can print out patterns. A number of gallon sized bags are available. I don't think it will be until Sunday that I'll be able to start getting them all kit up.

So I'll have a year long sock, shawl and fiber club. I'll be working on Christmas gifts with monthly goals, and also trying to knit a cardigan for myself finally.  I shall be flabbergasted if I manage to keep up with all of them and get them done. Fingers crossed!

The day turned out to be bright and sunny and thirty degrees, so we popped Leeloo into her hoody sweater and took the dogs for a walk around Rood Bridge Park. Only half of the park is currently accessible due to winter flooding of the Tualatin River. We get creative and still manage to get a full walk done by doing two loops around the different paths.

Leeloo had managed to squirm out of her harness earlier in the week and chewed on one of the straps. Little brat! So was in need of a new harness. Norbert's is at least eight years old and showed the time when he was younger and nibbled a bit on one of the straps also. A stop in at Petco and trying out different sizes showed that the XS really was the best fit for Leeloo and a S for Norbert. Leeloo also needed a new collar, so a matching one to her harness. She's sassy in red and Norbert with his manly blue. They're all set for the new year walks.

A bug must have gotten in my bonnet because I came home determined to start the new year with everything all cleaned up. So started laundry and then washed dishes. This made it easy to make the Key Lime Pie and get the eggs boiling. Brandon was busy making some cheesy bread, but once he was at a point I could pull him away, I got his help stripping and remaking the bed with fresh clean sheets. More dishes were washed as things were made. William was scooped up by his friends to go to other friends apartment for movies and games for the next couple of days. I'm almost finished with the laundry. It's amazing how you think you've found everything and turn around and there's a batch ready to go.

So Brandon and I are having our first child free New Year celebration. Someone had a Mary Poppins song stuck in his head so I got a copy from the library. There's also The Princess Bride in line. Snacky food for dinner and movie watching. Different from the last few years where we've had William and Luke and played games on the XBox.

The 11 Shawls in 2011 had the new year officially start at the CET time, which meant I could have started my Haruni shawl at 3:01pm (PST). As mentioned above, I was a bit busy. So I'm going to get a few rows started in a few minutes, then wait for midnight to cast on my Orion's socks.

Tomorrow is a drive down to Salem to visit my side of the family - Bridges, Tibbets and Silbernagels for a potluck, game playing and for some of the menfolk - football watching. Cheesy bread, deviled eggs and the key lime pie will go down with us. Monday we're going to take advantage of the kids going back to school and a day off to see a few matinee showings of Tron and Harry Potter.

Good bye 2010. You were a difficult year with losing my sweet Nessa girl. You brightened up with little Leeloo, but left me way behind on my knitting and sewing. Deep cleansing breath and here we come 2011!