Send a postcard!

I saw a news story on FoxNews this afternoon about this website. The link is http://letssaythanks.com/Home.aspx

When you go to that website you can choose from several different postcard designs and then you can personalize the card with a short note to a serviceman/woman (you cant specify who you want it sent to) Then the postcard is printed out with your message on it, and are placed in care packages that are sent to the soldiers. It's free to do.

I thought it was a cool idea, and have already sent one off. (I put my email address on it too, maybe they'll write me back?)

****

My parents have to find a new maid service. (mom always wanted a cleaning service when I was growing up, so dad finally got her one for Xmas a few years ago) Anyways, We got a phone call yesterday from the cleaning service that we've used for the past 3yrs. Seems the owner has been forced to shut down. Her husband used to have a franchise with a nationally known maid service (not naming names) and last winter, he decided he wanted to concentrate more on his carpet cleaning business and so he cancelled his contract with that nationally known maid service franchise and started a new cleaning service, with a new name. (the nationally known franchise was about to start raising the franchise fees, so they'd have either had to raise the rates, or give their cleaning crews a paycut)

When he started the new cleaning business he gave ownership of the business to his wife, who up until that point had been just an employee.

They consulted a lawyer to make sure starting the new business wouldnt be stepping on anyones toes, and they contacted their customers and asked if they wanted to continue on with the nationally known company or stick with their new company.

So now, 6 months later, the nationally known company is now suing them, and they've got some sort of injunction keeping them from running their cleaning business for at least the next year. (her husband's carpet cleaning company is not affected) They had to lay off ALL of their employees too. Which is horrible because a lot of their employees have been with them for years and now they'll have to start all over again with a new job.

This really sucks. They're such nice people, and I know the cleaning company was probably where they got most of their income from. Hopefully they can get things straightened out and can get back to cleaning for my mom. I'll probably start pricing some of the other cleaning companies in town soon. But I'm actually hoping they'll get things straightened out quick and will be back soon. I'd kind of like to stay loyal to these people since they've done such a good job for my parents.

Finally!

Finally, I've managed to complete a Seraphina shawl. I'm not so sure I'll ever do another one of these again. It was such a pain in the ass to start, took me a year and many a ruined skein of yarn to get past the fourth row.

I used worsted weight yarn, and it's very possible that there's a mistake in it (since the text of the pattern was full of mistakes) but it's now finished, and it will probably be years before I ever attempt another one of these things again.

I used Red Heart Giant "Candy Print", and Red Heart Super Saver "Amethyst". When I first started this shawl, I thought the Candy Print color was pretty and that it would look good in this shawl. Last night, as I was finishing up the shawl, and was checking it for mistakes and rogue yarn tails, it started to dawn on me that the Candy Print is a really really really busy yarn.

I'm not all that thrilled with how it turned out. I'm going to keep it for myself since I think that if I gave it to a family member, I'd be disowned. So far the only person who's said they like the color was my dad, but I dont think he's going to wear it unless he's got a disguise over his face.

Here's a picture of my ugly Seraphina shawl.

I'm starting a scrap-a-ghan tonight. I bought a couple of skeins of Red Heart SS Mexicana and I'm going to mix that with the scrap yarn. I'm using my giant rectangle granny square pattern. I'm doing one round of Mexicana to three rounds of scrap yarn. (started the center with Mexicana) Just started it, only have 4 rounds done so far, but I like how the Mexicana looks with my first color. I've been wanting to do a scrap-a-ghan for a long time, but have been too busy finishing up a couple of other projects to start it before now.

Went to Hobby Lobby tonight to buy the RH Mexicana yarn, and found myself four skeins of Bernat Velour for $1.51/skein. Not at all sure what I'm going do with it...not sure if 4 skeins is enough to do anything exciting, like a shawl.

How freaking scary is this?

I've been watching the news about North Korea's impending missile test. FoxNews just reported that this missle is potentially capable of reaching as far as Chicago, IL.

This scares me. I live in Omaha, Nebraska...which I'm pretty sure is just a few hundred miles closer to North Korea than Chicago is. Plus the fact that Offutt AFB is right "next door" in Bellevue and has long been considered a potential target for the U.S.S.R during the Cold War.

If North Korea launches it's test missle, let's hope that it doesnt end up in a cornfield somewhere in the American Midwest. (the last time N. Korea launched a missle, it flew OVER Japan, and the Japanese were mightily pissed off by that)

Argh!!!

Ever frog an entire two rows of a project, re-crochet those frogged rows, only to find that you made the same damn mistake again...way back at the point that you frogged it to?? TWICE!!!

*grumble*

My dad had a pretty decent Father's Day

This year we remembered my dad (my mom and I were bad last year) and got my dad some actual presents for Father's Day. This year he got a nice oak filing cabinet for his office in the basement. It's so nice that we didnt have to put it together with an Allen wrench. It came already assembled. I labeled all of his file folders in alphabetical order (ran out of folders and the plastic tabs at the letter "Z" tho. (never understand why they dont sell the folders and tabs pre-alphabetized)

I also crocheted an afghan for my dad. It's nothing too fancy. It's done all in hdc, and I used Red Heart Giant (the ginormous skeins that WalMart gets occasionally) to make it. I think I already posted a picture of it on my blog back before I knew it was going to be a gift for dad. Here's a picture

It's my dad's favorite crochet stitch that I do. He likes his afghans to be warm and functional, not pretty and decorative.

We took him to Upstream Brewing Company for dinner. http://www.upstreambrewing.com/ The food there is pretty good, and they brew their own beers there. I think Dad enjoyed his beer he got, and the sample beer I bought for him to taste (they sell 4 oz. samples of beer for .95 cents) I got him the sample so he could taste it without having to blow $3something on an actual glass.

I'm almost done with my SoDarnedFrustrating...err....ummm...Seraphina shawl. I've still got a bunch of yarn left in the skein I was using, so I'm going to make it a little bigger than I was planning. I'll post a picture when I'm finished.

Hello World!!

Was just looking at the Google Analytics page for my site...I love this thing. It doesnt tell me who has been to my site, but it tells me where (country/town) that they're in. I got a non-American hit tonight...someone in Australia (Bankstown) visited today (hi!). Got a LOT of hits from people on the East Coast (Lititz, PA; Brooklyn; Falls Church, VA;...) and lots of other cool places.

I was telling my aunt Jan about it, and told her that someone from Lititz, PA visited my blog. She got all excited (she's from PA), said she knew some people there.

I even got a visit from someone in Hawaii.

I really like looking at the map on Google Analytics, seeing where everyone is from, and then Googling their towns to see if there's anything neat or interesting about the place. I guess I'll be learning more and more geography now. (my high school geography teacher would have loved this)

and on to some crochet related stuff. I saw a strange crochet sculpture the other day. It was a crocheted urinal (yes...you read that right) http://www.geocities.com/nathanvincentart/urinal.html and that got me wondering what other strange crocheted sculptures are out there...so I Googled some more, and found this http://www.patriciawaller.com/images.html

I have to say that on one hand, I love Patricia Waller's work, but I'm also a bit worried that I might be just as disturbed as she is because I actually want to try and make some of these things. Ok, I'll pass on the pink crocheted bondage tools that she made...(eeek!) but I really like the crocodile with the kid in it's mouth for some reason. Not sure why, but her work just impresses me.

I see you! (sorta)

I just discovered Google Analytics. It's a Google site you can use to monitor traffic on your websites. It's so cool. I can now see on a map all the different places in the world people who've visited my blog are from. I've only had it monitoring my blog for a couple of days, but I've already have 40something hits (about 6 or 7 of those are actually me, checking my blog)

I signed up for it on Google, they gave me the html code to put into the body of my blog template, and a day later, I could see a couple of dots on the map showing the geographical area people visiting my blog are from. So far I havent had any hits from outside the U.S....most of the hits are from the East coast, a couple of places in the Midwest...and a few from the SouthWest and California.

I knew people actually read my blog occasionally, it's just kind of neat to see actual proof of it.

Grandma's doily, all clean and pretty again

Several weeks ago, I posted a picture of a doily that my Grandma O'Neil (dad's mom) had made for me when I was younger. The poor doily was filthy. Well, my aunt Jan saw it the other day, and offered to wash it and block it for me. (she doesnt crochet, but she's great at blocking doilies!)

A couple of days later she gave it back to me, and I'm even more impressed with what a good crocheter my grandmother was. Here's the newly washed and blocked doily.

I think I freaked out my parents tonight.

Parents and I went out to the Upstream Brewing Company for dinner. What I think freaked out my parents was the fact that I willingly ate asparagus tonight (never had it before).

I'm one of those people who usually does not touch vegetables unless it's corn, potatoes, or the occasional raw carrot. The asparagus wasnt bad, but then again, there was so much spice in the gravy on top of my lamb shank that I was eating that it probably covered up whatever asparagus actually tastes like. (my mouth is still burning!)

I think my parents are starting to worry about me, because the other day I ate all the green beans in the Marie Callendar's TV dinner I had the other night. (I half expected my dad to check me for a fever)

I'm a little further along on the Seraphina (SoDarnedFrustrating) shawl...it's starting to look more like the pictures of shawls that I've seen others make with this pattern, so I guess I must finally be doing it right. I might not even have to worry about running out of yarn for this shawl (I only have two skeins of this color) I added a contrasting solid color to break up the busy-ness of the varigaited yarn that I'm using.

Once I find some decent batteries for my digital camera I'll take a picture of the shawl.

I'm trying to decide if I want to put any fringe on the shawl (fringe is usually a waste of good yarn)

I think I'll do another one of these shawls in red, white, and blue.

Made some progress on the SoDarnedFrustrating shawl.

I might have mentioned earlier that I've been having trouble crocheting on the Seraphina shawl (enough that I've renamed it the SoDarnedFrustrating shawl)

I've finally been able to get past the 4th row. Something that I hadnt been able to do since I started attempting this shawl....so now I'm stuck somewhere on the 12th row and am about to take the entire thing out to the backyard so I can set fire to it and the pattern in the BBQ grill.

At least I'm a little further along with it now. There could be hope for this yet. I've noticed that there are several errors in the text of the pattern on just about every row. Wish the designer had either proofread the pattern before posting it, or have a pattern tester check the pattern.

The other projects I've been working on lately are a doll for my cousin's daughter, and I've also been working on a purse for myself with crochet cotton. Planning on lining that with some fabric.

Cool!

My dad is rearranging the house a bit...moving his home office from the upstairs front room down into the basement. (it's cooler in the basement and he thinks his computer will run better if it's cooler)

My dad found a box of stuff that belonged to my grandmother. One of my aunts had brought it over about a year ago and the box sat in the garage for several months until dad brought it inside recently.

I had just mentioned the other day that I was wondering what had happened to my grandmother's crochet hooks...so I was kind of surprised when my dad came into my room 5 minutes ago and handed me 6 crochet hooks. Three Susan Bates hooks and three Boye's. One of the hooks looks like it's been thru a war, the enamel is coming off. So I'm guessing that's the one she must have used the most. It's a Boye "I" hook.

It's kind of weird that two days after I'd said something to my dad about wondering what happened to grandma's crochet hooks they turn up. I'm almost positive she had more, but it's cool that my dad found these. I think I'll get out my sewing machine and make a small case to keep them in. That means a trip to the fabric store! Yay!

It's been two years already...

It's kind of strange...that it's been two years since my grandmother passed away. It feels like it was just yesterday. I've been cleaning out my computer desk and found a cd of digital pictures. Found a neat picture of my grandma showing off an afghan that I made for her.

I also found a couple of pictures of TinyMonsters...thought this one was cute. He had apparently been chasing (and catching) snowballs a few moments before this picture was taken. I'm guessing the picture was taken the winter of 2001.

Look what I found!!

I was looking for some pieces of jewelry of mine that I couldnt find and hadnt seen for several years...I looked inside one of the ceramic boxes that my grandmother had made for me when I was little (she was crafty), I found a doily that she'd crocheted for me. I had asked her to make me one, and I told her I wanted it to have green in it.

I was excited when a few weeks later she presented me with this

I hadnt seen this doily in several years. It's in serious need of washing, and needs to be reblocked, but I was really thrilled to find it again. (oh, and by the way, I found the jewelry I had been looking for...along with several other pieces of jewelry I'd been missing...found it right after I found the doily)

Now I'm thinking of trying to either copy the doily by sight, or I'm going to look around and see if I can find the pattern for it.

This is horrible.

For the past 6 months, a 12yr old girl named Amber Harris has been missing from her home here in Omaha. She disappeared just before Thanksgiving. The week she disappeared was probably the coldest week we had all winter, and one of the snowiest.

There are several other women missing here in Omaha/Council Bluffs...during a search for one of the other missing women, a body was found in Hummel Park last thursday.

It took a week for DNA test results to come in, but they just confirmed that the body found was Amber Harris.

http://www.ketv.com/news/9208830/detail.html

It's really quite sad. She was a beautiful little girl (and no, I didnt know her) Amber's story was covered nationwide, and the show Without A Trace even aired a blurb about her at the end of one of their episodes.

The news just broke, so I havent seen any news about how Amber died yet. If she was murdered, hopefully whoever did it gets a nice fair trial and a speedy execution. (edited to add: The Omaha PD is ruling Amber's death as a homicide)

And also today the body of a woman was found in the Missouri River. I wont be surprised if it turns out to be one of the other two missing women. (Tracy Tribble or Jessica O'Grady)

The fact that there are several women missing from the Omaha/Council Bluffs area is starting to scare me that there could be a serial killer in the area.

Yay! It finally worked!

Whoohoo!! Just as I was about to give up and start a new blog, I tried again. I dont know what was wrong...because I'd tried everything using the password that I got in with and it wouldnt work until just now. I tried the caps lock on, caps off...number lock on, numbers off.

Finally I changed my cookie settings, rebooted my computer and tried again. This time it worked. I guess it just didnt like me, or it didnt like the browser I was using.

This is weird...

I've been trying to log into my blog from my desktop computer for about a day. Cant do it. It doesnt recognize my password. My laptop is still allowing me to post to the blog (as long as I dont log out) but it wont let me change my password.

I've been trying to get Blogger to email me a reminder of my password just to make sure it's still what I think it is, but after requesting the reminder from Blogger for a total of about 9 times, I have yet to receive anything in my email.

Totally weird.

Hopefully I wont have to start over with a new blog. I was just starting to like this one. If I do, I'll post a comment to this blog entry saying where the new one is (that's if I lose my ability to log into this blog's account for some reason)

On a crochet note...I've been again attempting the Seraphina shawl...and again I'm cussing up a storm because whoever wrote the pattern seems to have left out some vital information.

I've seen on other blogs that I'm not the only one who's had problems starting the shawl, and others have mentioned that there are NUMEROUS errors in the pattern and they have to twiddle with it to get it to work. I really wish someone would rewrite the pattern to make it usable. It's a neat looking shawl if you can figure it out.

I wanna crochet!!!

I've been on a (so far) two week vacation from crocheting. I injured my hip a little over two weeks ago, and it's been quite painful to sit, stand, walk, or lay down. So, it's been hard to get in a position comfortable enough to allow me to crochet. Hopefully things start healing quickly because I'm going nuts not being able to crochet, and I've got one cousin who is about to have a baby in the next few weeks (probably the week of my birthday) and I have nothing made for the little guy yet. Hope my cousin doesnt mind if the baby present is a few weeks late.

I'm going to attempt to do some crocheting tonight. Maybe if I stick to short crochet sessions I can get something small made.

Happy May Day!

I just got back from watching the Mayday immigration protest that was just down the street from my house. Very interesting. I drove down 120th st towards Blondo, before the protesters made it to Blondo street. Saw a few counter-protesters, probably less than 20, holding signs up.

Talked to a few people standing along the sidewalk while we were waiting for the protesters to walk by. Most of the people I talked to seemed be more annoyed by the way the protesters were acting than the fact that traffic was all fubar along 120th st.

On the news, I'd been reading and hearing that the protesters were being encouraged to carry American flags. That's not what I saw as the protest walked past. Sure, there were a lot of American flags, but there was a lot of Mexican flags and flags from other countries. If they wanted to become American so badly, why did I hear so many yells of "viva Mexico"? I saw an American flag and a Mexican flag that had been sewed together.

If there's another protest (and there probably will be) I think someone should suggest that they have Port-a-Potty's set up along the way, since as soon as a lot of the protesters saw the gas station that's on the corner of 120th and Maple, they pretty much overwhelmed the station wanting to use the bathrooms. The gas station attendents actually set up a monitor at the door and they were only letting 3 or 4 people in the station at a time after that.

I was a little grossed out to see a few dozen people go BEHIND the gas station to take care of their business (ewww!! and no, I didnt take pictures of THAT!)

The thing that disturbed me the most, that actually pissed me off, would be the sight of someone, after having publically defecated behind the gas station, proceeded to use a minature American flag as toilet paper. That sight alone will probably compel me to join the counter protesters the next time there's a demonstration.

That was the point where I decided to walk back to my car and leave.

Walking back to my car I saw Father Damien (a well known Omaha Catholic priest who is very outspoken on immigration rights) I said hi to him. He made some joke about people going out for a "little" stroll. He walked into the crowd and joined them over in Tranquility Park soccer field. (Fr. Damien is the man in black walking away from me)

As far as I know, everything was peaceful. I didnt see any violence, just a lot of people, dumping their trash and baby diapers along the road. Hopefully next time, they'll have people out there with trash cans, encouraging people to use the trashcans and not the side of the road.

If you havent seen it yet...

I can really recommend the movie "Elizabeth I" on HBO. I've just finished watching the first half. They've taken a little license with history (I dont think Elizabeth I and Mary Queen of Scots ever met in real life), but if you can ignore a few historical inaccuracies, it's actually so far been a pretty good movie. The sets and the costumes looked excellent. I cant wait to watch the second half.

I've hurt my back somehow. Not exactly sure what I did, but my right hip is numb. Feels like it's burning at times, and it hurts my back to bend forward. I'll probably end up having to go to a doctor for this. The pain isnt all that bad, but the numbness is a bit disturbing.

My laptop, a 3yr old Compaq Presario, suddenly went bad this week...really bad...like wont even boot up and give me a Blue Screen of Death bad. You know it's totally fubar if you cant even get it to give you a Blue Screen of Death. Luckily, my 3yr warranty from Best Buy hadnt expired yet (expires in June) so my laptop is at the 'puter ER (also known as "it's been shipped off to the manufacturer...dont expect it back anytime soon...") Shocks the heck out of me that it crapped out BEFORE the warranty expired. Someone at Compaq must have set the fubar timer wrong when it left the factory...it crapped out about 2 months too early. It's been my experience that computers always kill themselves once the warranty has expired. This is the first time I've ever been lucky enough to have one do it beforehand.

So, while I was at Best Buy, saying goodbye to my Compaq laptop as it left for it's long journey, my dad told me that I could get my birthday present early. (yep, you guessed it) so we went and looked at new laptops. There was some lady in the computer department that would not let me look at any of the laptops. Everytime I walked over to look at one, she'd push her way in front of me and "hog" the computer. I finally got to look at the one I wanted. I noticed this woman kept pulling the info cards out of the holders in front of the computers. I didnt think anything of it at the time, and I picked out a nice Toshiba. It was late, and the computer Geeks had to install some software, update stuff on it and make sure it would actually work (10% of all computers come out of the box DOA) so I left it at the store over night.

Went back this morning with my dad to pick it up. Got it, came home...opened the box and discovered that the computer they gave me was NOT the computer I picked out the night before. Wasnt even close. (wrong processor, wrong hard drive) Only thing the computer had in common with the one I thought I was getting was the monitor size and the brand name.

So, I repacked the computer and went back down to the store. Walked in, told them it was the wrong computer. They said the receipt and the computer matched. (duh) I told them this was not the computer I picked out. Apparently the computer hogging woman, when she kept pulling the info cards out, either accidentally or purposefully switched ALL of the info cards for most of the laptops.

This would be why when Mohammed the sales guy sold us the computer, he had the wrong info.

This did work out in the end. The wrong computer was on sale for $999....the computer I had actually picked out was on sale for $1099. Since today is sunday and the prices changed the one I wanted was now $1249.

The manager of the computer department, Corey, was so nice and understanding that he gave me the computer that I had originally picked out for $999 (yay!!!). Unfortunately I now have to wait till friday to get it since they didnt have any available in the store. (oh well)

I'm probably giving my old laptop to my dad, since his Sony laptop is ancient (it's 6yrs old!!!) I'm surprised it still works!

I'm going shopping...on Monday

Apparently there's going to be a boycott on monday (May 1st) being sponsored by a bunch of groups that support legalizing illegal immigrants. http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/04/28/boycott/index.html

What they're asking people (mostly illegal immigrants) to do, is to not spend any money (or make any money) on May 1st. They're planning another series of marches in several American cities (I dont know which ones...my eyes glaze over everytime I read about stuff like this)

I guess their aim is to see how much of a financial impact they can make on American businesses. I have nothing against legal immigration. Several of my ancestors were immigrants. I do have a problem with people who break the law, and then expect to be rewarded for it.

There's nothing wrong with the boycott in and of itself, but the reasons behind it. Illegal immigration is just that. It's illegal.

If people come to America to become Americans, I dont care what country they're from, Mexico, England, Upper Mongolia...I dont care, come thru the front door...dont sneak over the border and then jump in the front of the line at the immigration office and expect to become a full fledged American long before the ones who did things the right way that you just cut in front of.

The illegals need to take a number...and probably bring a magazine with them to the immigration offices, because there's a long line of people wanting to become Americans. (which actually surprises me, because if one was to believe the news, the whole world hates America.)

So, instead of going yarn shopping tomorrow or sunday, I'm going to wait till monday and spend some money to help the economy. I cant afford to spend much, but I'll stock up on yarn to help the economy. Hopefully the yarn I'm planning on buying is made in America