New Shoes

I got new shoes! I saw these at Belk in Anderson with Daddy at Christmas. They were $50. He was going to buy them for me. They didn't have my size. I checked online and found them for $30 WITH a free tote bag! SCORE! They're cute. They're comfy. SCORE! I like my new shoes.

2000

My car turned over to 2,000 miles tonight on the way to knitting. We had a huge crowd tonight: Counting me, 18 knitters, crocheters, and/or spinners. I had my usual coffee and cookie.

Things that make you go, "Hmmm."

It's a good question. I think mine is paying all the bills on what I make. And finally finishing my dad's vest. What's your biggest challenge for the year? An interesting topic for the comments.

PS: Garterlac Dishcloth in Lily's Sugar & Cream in Baby Stripes.

Saturday in Pine Mountain

I went to Pine Mountain today to hang out with Seth. After lunch at San Marcos (the best Mexican food in West Central Georgia), we visited his neighbors. We only go there to see the animals. This is their horse, Apollo. He's normally not very friendly, but he was following me along the fence today. I think he posed for this picture. It turned out really great.

This is BarnCat. She is exceptionally sweet. Purrs all the time. Very lovable. Adorable, too, but you can see that for yourself.

We went over to Callaway Gardens and visited the Day Butterfly Center.

And the Discovery Center, where I tried using the self-timer on my camera to take a self-portrait. Honest. Seth didn't want his picture taken and he was hiding.

I like going to Callaway. It's a really nice place that has a special quality to it. It's only about a thirty minute drive, but when you go there, you feel like you're far away from real life.

This is the scarf I made Seth for Christmas. Bernat Denim in Faded Khaki. Knit double stranded in a 1 x 1 rib on size 13 needles. It matches the hat I made him last year.

Work is a four letter word

It was a full day at work today. I made a lot of tv today. I did get to take my lunch break with (New Year's dinner leftovers) and eat and have some knitting time in the break room. It makes the day way more bearable. I'm looking forward to the weekend.

As for the Gator Bowl, I don't want to talk about it.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year. It was quiet here. I called Daddy to make sure he was awake for it. I walked over in front of the tv to watch Carson Daly count down. Then I called Seth and told him Happy New Year. And that was it.

Look! Actual knitting content:

That's Toto the Extremely Useful and Cute Potholder from Mason-Dixon Knitting Outside the Lines. It was a fun little portable project. That's Sugar & Cream yarn by Lily. It's knitted double stranded fair isle style to make it thick and heat resistant. It uses an i-cord bind-off to create the lovely green ridge around the bottom. It also features a three needle bind-off to attach the two pockets to each other. This baby packs a skill building punch into one tiny (but extremely useful and cute) package.

I had a big plate of Turnip Greens, Cornbread, Ham, and Black Eye Pea Salad for lunch today. Yum. Yum. I have to go watch the ballgame now. It's getting too close for comfort.

Not Profound

I wanted to post something profound about the end of the year or something, but I just don't have it in me tonight. Instead here's some more pictures from my Christmas time in South Carolina:

This is the "new" Anderson County Courthouse that was built nearly twenty years ago. Here's a link to a daytime photo in case anyone's curious. The city does a big holiday display at a park on the lake - Hartwell, that is - or what's left of it - every year. I've never been up there and got Daddy interested in the idea this year. So we went. The gate donations go to several worthwhile local charities.
Yeah, that's the speedometer from my new car in the bottom of the shot! This is one of the displays. Cute!
We got out at the refreshment area and got some hot chocolate. There was a costumed Polar Bear, so I took Daddy's picture. There was a line for Santa visits, so we opted out of that.
After Christmas Day dinner, Daddy and I went to Belton, my Mom's hometown, and visited with the family. That's Daddy with my cousins Portia, Debbie, Aunt Sara, and cousin Sandra. Sandra had made some rocking coconut cake!

Debbie's daughter is a fantastic photographer. She's not a "professional", though she has made money at it - she has another job. Go look at her stuff on flickr. If you comment, tell her you found her on the Yarn to Knit blog!

I went back to work Monday after a week off. I didn't want to go. It's been relatively quiet. The only commercial client that's come in has been someone I enjoy working with, so it was no biggy. Today I directed three half-hour shows with a way-out-of-practice audio & graphics person. Whew!

Tomorrow Clemson plays in the Gator Bowl.

GOOOOOOOO, TIGERS!

Happy New Year, y'all. Make it a good one. Be safe. Don't make a resolution you can't keep. Keep the resolutions you make. God bless.

Christmas in South Carolina

Greetings from South Carolina where Internet access is only occasionally hackable. I hope you are all having a lovely holiday. The picture above is downtown Anderson decked out in her holiday finest. The picture below is from a house whose picture was in the Sunday paper. Daddy and I drove over there last night to see it. Very cool. The article is here with better pictures than I took.
Merry Christmas and remember the reason for the season. God bless your family this holiday.

Christmas Time is Here

Last Saturday I went to Pine Mountain to have Mexican food with Seth. The Pine Mountain Christmas Parade was that afternoon. I got a big coffee from the Circle K and we watched the parade. Enjoy it with us:

I was a flag girl in my high school band. I marched in many a parade like this.

This is the Jolly Trolly from Callaway Gardens. You can ride this through Fantasy in Lights. It's so much fun.

And here's Santa!

I mentioned in my last post that I was doing stage makeup for the Christmas Program at church. Here are some examples of my handy work: First we have a little donkey.
Then we have a little lamb. They were animals in the manger when Mary and Joseph went there to have baby Jesus.

I also sparkled up three angels. I don't know if you can tell in the photo, but their faces and hair are all covered in glitter.

This is the finale part of the program. Most of the drama is done with the children down in front of the choir, but at the end the curtain on the stage above the choir opens and the adults are up there doing the scene, too. See the angels on top of the manger? The little animals are down front on the right. There's also a "camel" on the very right.

At the very end, everyone comes down and the angels are on the stairs. I told them to move their heads a little so the glitter would catch the light. It was so pretty.

It was a very nice program. The choir sounded wonderful. The musical was so sweet.

I've got to go get some knitting done now. Y'all have a good weekend.

How I Spent My Thanksgiving Weekend

As I said in my last post, I got my new car and took off to Augusta (a four hour drive) the next day to have Thanksgiving Dinner with my family at my cousin David's house. Clockwise around the table beginning top left: My dad (Robert), cousin Randall, David's next-door neighbor (I've forgotten his name), cousin David, cousin Perry. Randall, David, and Perry are brothers. Their dad, Ralph, was my dad's oldest brother. He died a few years ago. I went around the table so we could see a little better. Randall and David are joined by our cousin Steve. Steve's dad was the middle brother, James. He died a few months after Uncle Ralph. Steve has a sister, Rhonda (the oldest among us - I'm the baby), who is the only other cousin. She spent the holiday with her daughter and two grandchildren.
Clockwise from bottom left: Cathy (Perry's wife), Katie (David's younger daughter), Garrett (Perry's younger son), Vickie (Randall's wife), and Aunt Eunice (Perry, David, and Randall's mom).
As you can tell from the pictures, David and Shari have a beautiful home. Here is a picture from the back porch looking out towards the pond.

I walked down to the pond and took this picture looking back towards the house. Just beautiful.

We all ended up in the driveway. Here are all of Aunt Eunice's grandchildren: Lindsey (David's older daughter), Katie, Bradley (Perry's older son), and Garrett in the background.

Aunt Eunice tried on some cool Coach sunglasses Cathy had. David's wife Shari (who was in the kitchen cooking and cleaning while I took the other pictures - she's a great hostess) is standing behind her with Cathy.

Steve had driven Daddy the two hours from Anderson. After we ate, I drove Daddy home to Anderson in my new car. We followed Steve. Things Daddy said on the way home:

"I don't know why Steve is going so fast."

"Why's he going this way."

"It would have been quicker to go through Abbeville."

"Are you okay, Hon?"

"What town is this?"
"Can you see Steve up there?"
"Don't talk on that phone while you're driving."
"Are we in Calhoun Falls yet?"

"Are you okay, Hon?"

We made it safe and sound, despite his worries. We went out on Friday and went to the mall. Katie had reminded me about the big bonus sale they were having at Bath & Body Works. We went straight there when we got to the mall. Daddy was going to wait outside, but the lines were out to almost the front of the store, so I went and got him and made him stand in the line for me while I shopped. He was pretty close to the register when I finished and I went and handed him a coupon. "What's this?" "That's your coupon." "For what?" "For these," as I hand him two can of room fragrance. "I don't want these." "I do and I can only use one coupon. I'm using this one. I need you to use that one." "Oh, Hon." Anyway, I ended up with $196 worth of products for $65. Woo-Hoo!

On Saturday we watched my Clemson Tigers beat the Carolina Gamecocks! Go, Tigers!!

Eventually, I'd driven 378 miles and was down to a quarter of a tank - gotta love a Honda - and needed some gas. I realized this was my first fill-up in this car and documented the event:

That's Daddy in the car. Eat your heart out SUV drivers: (Remember, this is 378 miles worth of gas.)

The Sunday after Thanksgiving in Anderson always means the Toys for Tots Motorcycle Parade. One year Daddy and I happened upon it by accident. Now we make plans to be there every year. The weather this year was horrible. The crowd was down, but there were still die-hard bikers who made sure those kids will get presents. I did a video with my digital camera:

Anderson had some autumnal decorations lining the streets near city hall.

Daddy has two neighborhood cats he feeds when they come for a visit. They occasionally announce themselves by perching in the kitchen window. This one came by Monday morning while I was packing to leave.

I came back to more stress at work and a Christmas musical at church. I'll have to take some pictures to share at tomorrow's performance.