*sigh* It's true...
The new issue of
The AntiCraft is up and I have a new pumpkin carving pattern, along with a couple of other surprises in there as well. Enjoy!
image courtesy of someecards.comLabels: carving, holidays, projects, the anticraft
Toad Hall all decked out
Here are some photos of the house all decorated for the winter holidays.
Labels: holidays
How I spent my New Year's Eve
It was New Years Eve's and myself, Bug, and my parents are getting ready to go out and run a few errands before the big night.
Mom gets the idea to clean out the fridge before we run errands. (like she needs to add more chores to her never-ending list) She keeps asking us which things need to be thrown out, and I keep telling her anything she finds is fair game because I am so tired of the leftovers. Next thing I know, she starts the garbage disposal up and starts putting everything from the past couple of weeks down it. The next thing I heard is her yelling for me to come help. I run into the kitchen and see water pouring across the floor, so I yell for Bug to come up and help me mop it up, while I run and grab towels to dry it.
The pipe under the sink had broken and spewed shredded chicken, rice noodles, and water, (a lot of it) all over the kitchen floor. The pipe had been leaking for a little while. It was the last original pieces of pipe from when the house was built, making it over 50 years old. While were we trying to get the water out from underneath the sink the pipes finally fell off. There was a huge hole (about 1x2 inches) in the underside of the trap. No wonder it was leaking.
Off to the Home Depot we went with the broken pieces in hand, to find some replacement parts of the PVC variety, that we could replicate the old setup. Dad started by looking at the thicker walled PVC, but was directed by a wonderful employee to the more appropriate thinner walled pipe.
Then, on the boxed up toilets across the aisle, Bug and Dad carefully reconstructed the pipes to show him what we wanted to create. Bug thought it was like creating a sculpture. The employee was very nice and helped us get all the pieces that we needed.
Back to Toad Hall we went with the new and old piping, to try to fix the sink. Again on the kitchen floor the old rusty pipes were laid out, and Dad and Bug started the careful reconstruction with the new PVC pipe. All the while, Mom and I were trying to get dinner fixed, stepping over around, and sometimes on our two "plumbers" laying in the middle of the kitchen floor.
After about 4 hours of measuring and cutting and measuring some more and cutting again, they finally got down to putting the trap in, but ran into problems when the parts of the trap would not join up with the pipe running down through the floor. Dad and Bug quit for the night and would have to run back to Home Depot in the morning.
Finally after 2 trips to Home Depot and many hours of labor the sink is fixed. I am glad that I don't have to do the dishes in the bathroom sink anymore. What a challenging New Year's it was for us. I hope this doesn't mean that we'll be fixing things throughout 2007. I don't have enough stamina for all that.
How was your New Year?
Labels: holidays
Fun with parents at the holidays...
On Friday, we got up and ran errands, did some minor shopping, and then went home to meet Harland at Toad Hall so we could start trimming the holly tree at the side of the house. After we finished, Mom wasn't feeling well and went inside to lay down. She was shivery and had a fever and we were all hoping it wasn't the flu. She took some tylenol and covered up to sleep and wait out her fever. She repeated this until the next afternoon, when about 2 pm, she declared that she couldn't take any more of this and we had to take her to an urgent treatment center.
We waited patiently for them to examine her, and found out that they were stumped as to what was giving her a fever and abdominal pain, but no nausea, vomiting, or diarrhea. They then suggested that we take her on to the emergency room.
We arrive at the emergency room at 4:30 pm and she was admitted pretty quickly, where they took blood and urine samples and did a CT scan of her abdomen to find out that she had a serious case of
Diverticulitis. They recommended that she be admitted and stay until they could get the infection under control with antibiotics. We agreed and she was in a room upstairs at the hospital by 11 pm.
She is doing much better after several rounds of antibiotics and morphine for the abdominal pain. They have cut back her IV fluids and are hoping to wean her onto the oral antibiotics tomorrow morning. As soon as they can do that she will be able to come home. We are hoping that she will be able leave the hospital by Tuesday evening or Wednesday morning.
Labels: holidays
Busy Weekend and more!
Mom and Dad came down for the UK football game early last week and it seems like we just haven't stopped all weekend. Mom had several "projects" to do, and of course, she enlisted her best helper. 8^O
Tuesday was spent getting ready for the trick-or-treaters to come. I set out several candles on the front porch and had a huge bowl of candy to give away. The weather was quite warm, so Bug and I just sat outside on the porch to greet all the kids. We saw some really cute costumes! I think my favorite had to be the little girl dressed as a pink poodle. She even brought a pink doggie dish that said FOOD on the front to collect her candy. (Her parents carried a bag to put all the candy in...) She was just too cute!
Wednesday I was making beaded stitch markers all day and then delivered them to ReBelle. I did 12 sets! That's a whole lot of beading... I hope they sell well and Robyn and Sarah want me to create more for them. I even did some creative packaging by hand stamping my own cards to hold the stitch markers. They looked pretty good, but I delivered them before I thought to get a photo for the blog. Darn it!
Thursday Mom and Dad arrived early and we went to get groceries and stuff to fix for the tailgate on Saturday. That evening Dad and I spent scanning old photographs and looking up genealogy stuff on the internet. That took hours of looking and searching...
Friday we ran errands while Bug was gone to work and then fixed some of the food for the tailgate the next day. Mom and I ran around and cleaned the house and did a huge amount of laundry.
Saturday was the tailgate and the UK game. The Wildcats beat the Georgia Bulldogs and the fans were so excited they tore down a goalpost! The Cats had not beaten the Bulldogs in 18 years I think.
Mom and Jenny Lynn went shopping afterward, and I made chili for everyone for supper because it was really cold out that day. I was supposed to meet Liz that evening for knitting, but when it was time to go, I was so tired, I called and canceled. It was okay though, because Liz had been cleaning the house all day and was tired, so we gave each other rain checks and decided to meet up again another day.
Sunday, Melissa and I got up early and went to get doughnuts from Spalding's Bakery. Mom and Dad were planning on leaving early that morning, and we wanted to fix breakfast for them before they left. We fixed bacon, eggs, sausage and had doughnuts. Then Melissa and I went out and started raking leaves. Mom and Dad came out and helped us. We started about 11 am, and did not stop until 5:30 pm. By that time, we had filled about 35 yard bags full of leaves. We were so sore and tired. Mom and Dad decided not to leave that might and we all got cleaned up and went out to eat.
Monday, Mom and I got up and ran down to the dollar store to get some items for one of her projects that she had forgotten to do over the weekend. She is doing shoeboxes for the Samaritan's Purse charity, like we did with the Girl Scouts last year. She went out and got all the stuff to fill four boxes, and then got Dad ready and went home, leaving me to finish wrapping and stuffing the boxes.
It's been a busy month already and it hasn't even gotten started yet!
Labels: holidays
One week later...
The knee is much better. I can walk for short distances without getting too tired, but if I'm up on it for more than an hour and a half, it really starts to feel tired and sore and I have to rest it. It still looks slightly swollen, but isn't hot, so I think it's just going to take some time to go down.
Socktoberfest is almost at a close, and what do I have to show for it? Two cuffs for entirely different sets of socks. Somehow I just could not get myself into the sock knitting mojo that I usually have. Hopefully I will get these done within the next couple of weeks. I will probably start a couple of other pairs heading into winter so I will have something to do while sitting by the fireplace when it gets cold.
I'm trying to get my mind set for the Holiday season fast approaching. Time to rev up the creative juices for card design, ornament design (I'm thinking about joining the swap over at
cake + pie), and gift design. Lots of design, not much time...
Tomorrow is Halloween and I can't wait to see what pops up at our door looking for treats! I plan on knitting my socks with a cup of hot tea on the couch, and handing out lots of candy to the little ghouls in our neighborhood.
Hope everyone has a Happy Halloween!
Labels: holidays, knitting, oops
