I went to see Mama Mia today and I thought it was good. And I have to say that thank god Pierce Brosnan is still so attractive, because, man, he can't sing at all. I just love how everyone threw themselves into the roles, which was necessary. I will definitely see it again. I think if you're going and you've seen the show on the stage, you've got to divorce yourself from that and go in cold turkey.

Other than that, I got a lot of knitting done today. First I went the other way to my brothers house, which happens to be the way that is the entrance to Redskins Training camp. Big Mistake. Needless to say, my car sock got quite a bit of knitting done on it. Good lord. Then I babysat my sleeping nephew and knitting on the Log Cabin Baby blanket. I think just a couple more panels and we might be ready for the edging. Yeah!

It's definitely a Dark Knight...

I saw The Dark Knight this evening and my god was it dark! I walked out of the movie feeling very tense. I almost went and bought a ticket to see Mama Mia so that I could have some happy ABBA music. Whew. I loved it though. It was good...or what I saw of it through my fingers...the guy next to me was laughing. All I can say is wow. It was almost 3 hours worth of on the edge with some shockers. BTW, you don't need to stay til the end of the credits there's nothing. And Heath Ledger. OMG Unbelievable. If I hadn't known it was him, I wouldn't have believed it. Amazing, Just amazing. Also, hat to say this, but I wish Katie Holmes had come back as Rachel Dawes. She played the cool aloof better. Maggie Gyllenhall, whom I like so much better than Mrs. Cruise, played to young on the screen and too warm for what I thought the character should be.

I'm so going to have nightmares tonight.

back to work...

Well, have to go back to work tomorrow. Glad I took today off, even though I didn't do a whole lot. Got up late, lazed around in bed. Went to Target and the grocery store and then spent most of the rest of the afternoon trying to figure out how to install printer drivers for my new printer (Thanks for pushing me to actually go buy one Beth!). What a pain, but I've just been procrastinating buying one.

I also made myself a good dinner. I had the Trader Joe's Chipotle Chicken Skewers with Yellow Rice and Corn-on-the-cob. Yummy. And for dessert, I'm going to make myself a Chocolate Malt, thanks to the fact that I picked up some Malt powder in Cincy. Yeah! It's unbelievable that you can't find that anywhere in the DC area and I've checked 4 grocery stores. I'll just have to import it.

Hello! I'm back from vacation!!! Hurrah!!! Had a fantastic time with Beth and her Cincy crew. We were all over the place and the consensus is we may be too old to continue at that pace, but a good time was had by all I think.

First off, the Jimmy Buffett concert was awesome this year. First off, NO RAIN. Hurrah!!! We got there earlier and were down by the "real fans." I must have been having a good evening because I got kissed by two weirdo old guys and I kept getting pulled into pictures by people I didn't know...and I wasn't even dressed up... It was a great evening and Jimmy was great, as always.

The next day, we spent recovering...or...umm shopping a bit..., time spent at the GAP Clearance outlet (the outlets outlet) and the candy outlet, Lunch at Penn Station (YUMMMY!!!!!) and then we hung out knitting and then had a girls night in to watch movies, knit and eat Beth's yummy dip.

Saturday we went on a yarn crawl and then to the Reds game for Stich'n'Pitch and all I can say is that it was HOT! Let me say that again IT WAS HOT!! Whew! But, it was a day spent with friends and meeting, quite possibly, the fatest cat I have ever seen in my life.

So, the total score was 3 yarn store, no purchase, Restaurants not in the DC Metro eaten at 4 (Penn Station, Graeters Ice Cream, O'Charley's, & Sonic), purchases (1 pair of shoes, 3 pairs capri pants, gifts for neices and nephew & chocolates). In total a fantastic time was had.

For those of you who know me, I turned off my Blackberry and did not turn it back on until this morning. Really! I swear! Beth will tell you. Honest. I did go through withdrawl symptoms at stoplights that were long, but managed to work through it. I also, didn't watch tv other than the movies at girls night and didn't look at a computer until this afternoon. It was a true vacation. Now, I still have off tomorrow to recover from my vacation. Yeah!!!

The bags are mostly packed. The knitting has been selected. Hopefully I remembered to pack the pattern, but I can't find it around, so it must be already packed. Just need to clean a few last things up at the old apartment so everything when I get home.

Sadly, tomorrow, I have back to back meetings until I have to leave the office and then I'm taking a conference call from the airport while waiting for the plane. Ugghhh! I should be able to get 3 full days off after that.

This is it from me until Sunday or Monday. Yeah!

Man, it's amazing what weekends can be when you're not working or exhausted from working. I think I'm slowly coming out of that work coma. I should be even better after next weekend after spending the weekend in Cincinnati with Beth. I'm so looking forward to seeing her, meeting the adorable Sadie and hanging out. I've even told everyone at work that I won't be accessible by Blackberry. Yes, I really did that... I'm washing my clothes and starting to collect things to take to Cincy with me. As usual, the hardest decision is always what knitting to pack...

I took a remarkable step this weekend towards embracing living in DC...I got my hair cut here. Yes, I went to a salon and tried out a stylist. Before now, I've been getting it cut/highlightedevery time I go home to St. Louis. Even better, because my stylist was running late, I got a free manicure. Whoo Hoo!! Now, the only thing between me and feeling like a true resident of NoVa (Northern Virginia) is to get an EZ pass for the toll road. Then I could stop saving all my quarters...

Because I wasn't working and I only worked 50 hours last week, I wasn't exhausted and I actually had time to knit this weekend, so here's some progress on my Nashua Surplice top.

This is the top back section. I have about 3.5 inches left to go before doing the neckline. I've been alteratining between the Stockinette of this project and the garter stitch of the log cabin baby blanket shown below.
I'm at 20 inches now, and I want to go to about 32 inches accross, so still got a ways to go. Still like this a lot.

Now, you can see my issue in selecting travel knitting. The baby blanket is at a point where it's too bulky to travel. The Surplice is getting to the finish line. Hmmmm...What to do...What to do...

The end of the long weekend...Sniff!

So, tomorrow is Monday and I have to go to work. It's hard to believe that a 4 day weekend passed so fast. I never did accomplish everything I wanted to get done. I certainly didn't buy a car. I did go see a movie, spend time with my nephew, clean my kitchen, sleep and knit, which will have to be enough I guess. So, one full week of work and then I'm going to Cincinnati to visit Beth. Yeah!!!

So, I did finish a project this weekend. It's the Saturday Market bag by Jodie with modifications from disdressed.
I made it out of a skein of Cotton-Ease I had in the stash.

I'm also working on the log cabin baby blanket, but no new pictures yet. It's made out of Mission Falls 1824 Cotton, which I love, love, love. Every time I see it on sale, I buy a ton of it and then just keep it in the stash for moments like this.

It's amazing what a full day off and some sleep will do for you. No, I haven't yet cleaned my house, but I did get up at 7:30 and go walking. Then I knitted and watched USA JAG Marathon before going over to my brothers house to spend the afternoon with the two of them and the wee one, who really isn't all that wee anymore. But, man is he a cutie.

I started a new project, but I'll have pictures tomorrow. I'm too lazy to go take pictures tonight and it will look better once it's farther along. It's a last minute birthday gift for a friend.

Tomorrow is cleaning day, but hopefully it's not raining and I can take another walk tomorrow morning. I think it was good for me.

Hope everyone had a great 4th of July.

Back from the dead...

Yes, I'm amazingly still alive. I could probably use about 24 more hours of sleep before I'm fit to hold intelligent conversations, but I am done with the crazy hours. Yeah!!! Our office closed for the long weekend yesterday at 3pm. I left at 2pm and came home and took a 2 hour nap. Then I went to the local knitting meet-up. I hadn't been in a month. It's amazing what happends in a month... This morning I got up about 8:30. Knitted a little. Went to lunch with my nephew and SIL and then to Trader Joe's. Got yummy chocolate covered bananas suggested by my SIL. Came home, napped for 3 hours and then actually cooked my self a real dinner... I haven't done that in a month either. Baked marinated chicken breast , potatoes (home grown by one of my co-workers) in a butter parsley sauce, and peas. Yum!!!

There has been knitting. I'd like to say that I've been knitting something that was already on the needles, but I'd be lying.
Instead, I started a new baby blanket for a co-worker who's having a baby shower in a few weeks. Tomorrow my plan is to get up, clean a little (now there's a concept), knit some more, watch a few movies. Just a very relaxing weekend. No working.