My Winnie-the-Pooh quiz results

Your Score: Kanga

You scored 13 Ego, 14 Anxiety, and 14 Agency!

"I am not Roo," said Piglet loudly. "I am Piglet!"

"Yes, dear, yes," said Kanga soothingly. "And imitating Piglet's voice too! So clever of him," she went on, as she took a large bar of yellow soap out of the cupboard. "What will he be doing next"

"Can't you see?" shouted Piglet "Haven't you got eyes? Look at me!"

"I am looking, Roo, dear," said Kanga rather severely. "And you know what I told you yesterday about making faces. If you go on making faces like Piglet's, you will grow up to look like Piglet -- and then think how sorry you will be. Now then, into the bath, and don't let me have to speak to you about it again."

You scored as Kanga!

ABOUT KANGA: Kanga is Roo's mother and Tigger's foster mother. While she is a kind and motherly sort of person, the other inhabitants of the Hundred Acre Wood suspect that underneath, she is a Fierce Animal. Her hobbies involve talking about Roo's health and development, watching Roo while he practices jumping, and making Roo and Tigger take their strengthening medicine.

WHAT THIS SAYS ABOUT YOU: You are the kind of person who takes on other people's worries. You are efficient and a person of action - the type of person who Gets Things Done. Your friends tend to rely on you to get them moving and keep things running.

The problem is that you tend to forget about yourself in all of this. You need to remember that you are an important and worthwhile person, and sometimes it is okay to say "no" to people's constant requests and demands. Give yourself some time off.

Link: The Deep and Meaningful Winnie-The-Pooh Character Test written by wolfcaroling on OkCupid, home of the The Dating Persona Test View My Profile(wolfcaroling)

Peanut's blanket

We've taken to calling the little one on the way "Peanut." We haven't found out the sex of the baby and we don't want to know until the birth. We did it that way with Rose and it was a lot a fun to hear the doctor say, "It's a girl!" So even though we have a name chosen for a boy and for a girl, since we don't know who's coming, its name is Peanut. Rose loves this, and talks to my belly all the time.

The other day the conversation went something like this.
Rose: "Peanut, when you come out, we'll go to the park and swing on the swings."
Me: "Peanut will love that, but at first he [note: I choose a pronoun at random when talking about the baby to Rose. I hope it doesn't mess her up.] won't be big enough to ride the swing.
Rose: "Oh."
Me: "But I know Peanut would love to watch while you ride the swing."
Rose: "Okay. Peanut, you can sit on the bench and watch me swing."
Me (trying not to laugh): "Well, he might not be able to sit on the bench, either. Maybe Peanut can sit in your stroller and watch you."
Rose: "My stroller?"
Me (thinking "uh-oh"): "Yes, you're so big you almost never need to ride in the stroller anymore. So maybe Peanut can use it when we go to the park."
Rose (thinking for a moment): "Okay, Peanut, I guess I can share my stroller with you."
Whew!

So I've started this Moderne Baby Blanket from Mason-Dixon Knitting and it's going pretty well.

I decided to use a heavy worsted weight yarn to help all that garter stitch go faster, and bought some cotton from Blue Sky Alpacas in these great warm shades. I did a little math to figure out what number of stitches would give me color blocks in the same dimensions as the original DK weight blanket. Well, my math was just a teensy bit off, because I'm only halfway through this blanket and it already measures 30" by 34" -- the pattern says the finished blanket should measure 28" by 38"! Whoops!

I don't care; I like big blankets, and this one will last Peanut for a while. But I did need to get more yarn.

Rose's Lullaby

Rose has lately become very fond of tucking me in at bedtime. I lie in my bed and she "reads" me a story then sings me a song or two. She loves to pull the chain on my bedside lamp to turn it off and tells me "Have a good sleep, Mommy." Then she goes to her room and Daddy reads her a story and sings a song while I sneak out of my bed and go do whatever I was going to do that evening.

Here is a sample of one of her lullabyes:
Rock-a-bye, Mommy,
Don't go away.
(unintelligible)
And Rocket flies away.

Alrighty then...

I'm going to give it a go, and we'll see what happens. I thought to myself, it's 12 1/2 weeks until my due date; I may not be able to do much for a few weeks after that, but I'll try to get back into the swing of blogging until then.

My knitting mojo is definitely back. For a few months there, I didn't even want to see my knitting bag, let alone get anything out of it. But now, let's see...

I've finished this,

in which the zipper is not great, but not absolutely horrible, either;

and this, too:

The Tilted Duster from Interweave Knits, fall 2007. I made it to my pre-pregnancy bust size, so it gapes a bit in front, but I hope it will look nicer after the baby is weaned. Otherwise, I'm very pleased with it.

Then, just for fun (and perhaps for a warmer second cup of tea):

A quick little knit -- a tea cozy in trinity stitch.

There, now. I guess that wasn't so bad. :)

I'm thinking that since I've got Ravelry, more of this blog will end up being daily life and random thoughts. Be warned!

Is anyone still out there?

Dear friends,

I'm guessing that the answer to the above is "probably not." But, just in case, if you are reading this, would you please leave a comment and let me know? I'm feeling much better and have even finished two projects in the last month, but blogging has fallen very far down the list of priorities.

So I'm trying to figure out if I want to resume blogging or just use Ravelry to post progress notes and log finished projects (which is why I started this blog in the first place). What will help me decide is if anyone answers my plea. :) Just a little comment, please.

Thanks,

Kim

Here I Am

Oh my gosh, two months? I'm so very sorry. I do have a good excuse, however: constant nausea and fatigue. Yes, Andrew and I are expecting again.

We are very excited, and as I move into my second trimester, I really, really hope (please God!) that I will start feeling better. It's not so much that I've been throwing up, because, thankfully, I haven't been. It's just that with a two-year-old (oh my gosh, she's three now!) -- a three-year-old in the house, my little remaining energy goes toward her, and not toward knitting, web-surfing, or blogging. When she's asleep, or when Andy gets home, I'm much more likely to assume a horizontal position somewhere than to knit.

I just haven't wanted to knit. At all. And I know that will change soon -- at least it did when I was expecting Rose. I didn't even want to touch yarn until I was around 5 months along. So I'm hopeful. In the meantime, this is how I've been and what I've been doing, and when knitting resumes, so will more regular blogging.

I hope everyone had a great Christmas and New Year!

Real Life

There has been a lot going on around here. Sometimes real life gets in the way of internet life, but you know, that's how it's supposed to be. And I know the four of you who check in to my blog understand that. :)

Our parish has been celebrating its 150th Anniversary this year.

The big culmination of the year was over the weekend of the 27th and 28th. We had a big dinner dance on Saturday night.
The next day, we had a big Mass at noon, with the cardinal celebrating.

The choir did very well; I was very proud of how all their hard work turned out.

Then I had jury duty the next day. Thankfully, I was dismissed shortly after noon.

Hallowe'en was also this week. Rose wanted to be "a black kitty." My mom recycled a skunk costume that her cousin (Rose's, not my mom's) had worn a couple of years earlier. She looked a little like a Monchichi. :)

I have also been knitting -- I decided to start the Tilted Duster. After a lot of swatching and many false starts, I finally started the back on the 31st. I just finished the first sleeve last night, and hope to have the second sleeve done soon. I'm washing and blocking each piece as I finish it, and so far it looks like it's going to work out.

See, I'm using Cascade 220, and it's my first time using it. Now, since the Tilted Duster should not be overly baggy, I wanted to make sure I was getting gauge (I've learned my lesson). I knit my first swatch on size 9 needles, and got 17 st./in., as the pattern calls for. Perfect, right? Well, no. I washed and blocked that swatch. I did not stretch it in any way, shape, or form, and it measured 15 st./in. after washing. Ah HA! See, I would have knit another baggy, unflattering sweater, and there would have been much wailing and gnashing of teeth. Unfortunately, it didn't bloom as much on size 8s, and I was having a really hard time getting stitch gauge before or after washing, and row gauge was way off. So I ended up sticking with the 9s, but knitting the 36" size. The fronts and backs blocked out perfectly to fit my 38" bust with just about 1" of ease. Which is exactly what I was looking for, yay swatching!