Fancy Swag for the Crafty Witch

Trips with yarn are always good trips. Even if you have to dash home before you head out so you can feed the hamsters which you forgot to ask your husband to do because you forgot to do. Even if you realize that the rumbling sound is coming from your car and the guy at the dealership tells you that your muffler has rusted right through. Even if you spend one of the nights driving around for half an hour looking for a place to eat dinner. Even if all of these things happen AND the locals put you through the dunk test and burn you at the stake for knowing how to swim... but you got yarn, it's a good trip.

Once again, Door County provided us with an absolutely fantastic weekend of relaxation. And really, the muffler thing turned out okay because it became a conversation starter.

"VROOOM!"

"Okay, we are totally the most manly Toyota Corolla in town right now."

"...Hey, when we're going uphill, it kinda sounds like our car is constantly farting."

"We are here, Sturgeon Bay! Cower in fear at the nasty rumblings of my awesome Toyota from Hell, bitches!"

We stayed at the Chanticlear Bed & Breakfast for the second year in a row in the same cabin. No noise (except the occasional rumblings of our car). No kids. A private jacuzzi. A king sized bed. And a fireplace. Not to mention Saturday morning cartoons. Hooray for pajamas until noon and a morning marathon of the Fairly Odd Parents. We traipsed up and down the peninsula where we found the only kite store open in winter that had a good selection of sport kites which will no doubt pull me through a field one day as I wrestle with the Guardians of the Watchtowers of the East ("Powers of air!Spirits of the East! Stop showing off!"). Plus, we found Spin - a yarn store without a website, but with all the more reason to visit and splurge.

I grabbed these two books the first day with grandiose plans of finally crocheting a potholder and adding a border, or crocheting an entire bouquet of flowers because I could. Well, turns out the books are not for amateurs in the world of crochet. I've found that my head may have to wrap itself around actually reading the directions before I start. Ugh. I've never been one for rule reading. But if you're not afraid of a challenge, I would say go for it. Both of these books have beautiful designs that make me want to crochet a potholder or a flower bouquet! And... wait...

This week will be severely busy, as bellydance practices are going back-to-back. However, I will have a recipe coming up tomorrow, and another giveaway coming up on Thursday. What is it? As I said to a 7th grader today when he asked me "What's for snack?": "What's for snack!? Who is it coming from? Where is it? How many can fit inside my mouth at a time? Can my fist fit inside my mouth? Who are you? What day is it? Who am I!? I'm confused!!!!" "...." "....It's food." :) 

Oh, and the yarn from top to bottom: 

1). Recycled Silk Sari Yarn, 

2). Silk Sari Ribbon 

3). Kettle Dyed Pure Merino Wool

It's Cold, So I'm Going Further North

 

Oh yes. After a very long stint in the city, I'm heading up to another city! Where it is, I will say when I get back on Sunday. In the time being, behold the heavenly yarn store that I will be spending most of my vacation money at. If I could, I would secretly live in that vault in the background and make my own witch-dragon nest-hoard of yarn and gold. And my vault-cave would also be impervious to hobbits.

In the meantime, don't forget that I've still got a  giveaway going! I'll be choosing the winner of hot chocolate bling, chocolate and a beautiful gift tag on Valentine's Day. See everyone Sunday! ...ish! :)

Winding Down and Gearing Up

I love the day after coming home from vacation. If you time it just right, you can shove several hundred activities into your travels, completely wear yourself out, and get home in time to have a good day or two's rest. Granted, I'm a little spoiled by the fact that I work in a school, so I'm still enjoying the perks of the two week winter break. Hey. Don't look at me like that! I had a very busy weekend that included several batches of cookie eating, present-opening, friend-hanging-out-with, and kitty-photographing (that's Zoe on the right), not to mention a mountain of late-night-board-game-playing. And that stuff is hard when you have Midwestern friends and relatives:"Let's get food." "Aren't you hungry?" "For the love of GOD take some cookies! And who wants wine? Twelve bottles! Here! Get tipsy!" (This last one was my friend, Sara, who made the mistake/best decision ever of ordering fifteen bottles of wine for $90 through Barnes & Noble. She and Jake were swimming in wine and were trying to slowly pawn it off on the rest of us. As you may suspect, none of us were really reluctant to take some off her hands.)

Christmas was good this year, but also strange. Half of it was me holding in the urge to tell my mom that I'm thinking that maybe I don't want to celebrate Christmas while at the same time thanking her for a most excellent hand pureeing device. That one really is making it hard for me to break my love of stuff - especially cooking stuff. But Christmas was also strange because for the first time it was missing my grandma. I went to her house with my folks, went through every room in the house and came back with boxes of her jewelery, scarves, dishes, and bags and bags of yarn. And I hardly felt anything. I guessed my time for crying and missing her was over. But opening gifts with the rest of the family my brother and I got $50 checks from her. She had set it up with my mom as last Christmas gifts before she died. That was really hard. My brother and I had to try not to look at each other to keep from losing it. That was an awkwardness and a sadness that I think hung over me the rest of the evening.

But thank goodness for friends and their ability to distract. I went over to Jake's house with my husband the day after Christmas. He and Jocelyn had told me to bring an appetizer, main dish, and dessert. Well, that was what Jake told me. Jocelyn had relayed that I should bring a meat, vegetable and appetizer. This mix-up, the relaying of this information to me two days before, and the fact that my friends are total pranksters, gave me the vague suspicion that I would show up with all this food and they'd say, "Yay! Thanks for feeding us!" and proceed to mooch with grins. It turns out we all mooched off each other with grins because everyone did bring food. We spent most of the time cooking and watching YouTube videos on Jake's iPad (Still something I find to be not extremely useful for the price, but entertaining nonetheless.).The other bit of the time we spent trying to convince Jocelyn and her fiance to elope. They're the only couple in the group left to get married. They'll be tying the knot in traditional Catholic fashion in May- even though Jocelyn is agnostic ,and I think finds the whole Catholic set-up slightly amusing.

And so, with yet another wedding on my mind, I'm back in the comfort of my Madison abode getting set up for the new year. I returned to find that the hamsters have hit middle age and, instead of deciding to hold roaring parties while I'm not watching, have opted to take the time to rest...sumo wrestler style apparently.

Christmas Break

See ya, everyone! I'm off for a few days celebrating Christmas with the Minnesota relatives. Meanwhile, I'll be leaving my little guys in charge of the guarding the apartment. Let's just hope I come home to find the place in one piece this time .*

*Last trip we returned to find empty beer bottles all over the place. Zeke was passed out on his back inside a toilet paper tube. Elroy was still running in the wheel with a lamp shade on his head. It was chaos. I had to nurse them back to sobriety, chase away the stoned chipmunks and get the little mini saddles off several squirrels. At least they know how to party.