Good, Bad and the Geeky

I appreciate everyone's comment on my post yesterday.  I have to admit, I had a similar reaction when I walked in there.  After the initial shock of seeing cornstarch and powdery white kids, I fought the laughter myself.  Okay, like a good blogger, I did back out and close the door so I could get the camera.  You bet I'm going to print those pictures out and frame them.  They'll definitely be good blackmail pictures down the road.  I knew it could have been far worse than the never-ending vacuuming and you all provided the "worse".  There are still spots of "mesh" that I need to get back to as the twins keep wandering into those spots.   I bit the bullet and pulled the sides of the cribs off last night.  I installed Kathryn's toddler rail and used a regular bed-rail that collapses to half the length of the crib for Alex's bed.  While I knitted and listened to the baby monitor for them to go to sleep, a picture flashed by on my computer's screen saver mode.  It was this:

That was the day they came home from the hospital after a week in the NICU.  They shared that crib, side-by-side as above, for the first six months.  Now look at them:

I still can't get over the fact that they are going to be two years old soon.  TWO?!  They did very well in the bed last night.  Kat fell out once at around 10.  I walked in to find her standing next to the bed, crying.  She was more surprised than anything else and went back to bed pretty nicely.  Gasp, the next stage will be twin beds.  I'm in no rush, but will keep and eye on bed sales in the area.  This will do for a little while at least.

Now.. onto the knitting.  I have been doing some.  I need to clear some projects off the plate before the Shetland Lace Workshop starts over on the EZasPi list.  I ordered several skeins of the Jamieson & Smith 1ply Cobweb in Natural for the projects from a fellow lister Beth.  I can't wait to check out this cobweb and compare it to some of the very fine yarn I have hanging about the house thanks to the knitting machine days. 

I had a setback with Birchington this weekend.  Friday on the train home I started playing with the math for the next motif that I wanted to add to the border.  I was very close so I finished with the last repeat, did a few rows of solid stockinette and set about with the next.  Three rows into it I didn't like how it looked.  At all.  But when I changed patterns, I had 111 st each side, 444 per round and I needed to undo 3 rounds.  I don't have to know the final number there to know that I couldn't tink that much.  It was at this point that I regretted the decision to not use lifelines.  I've read how they've saved others but never got around to implementing them in my own knitting.  Now I wish I had.  I pulled the needle out, frogged the yarn and somehow managed to get all my stitches back on the needle.  An hour later.  Oy. 

Having the bad taste of Birchington and the frogpond, I decided to switch tracks.  I moved to the Girlfriend Swing Sweater for Kat in that lovely pink color of Jaeger Shetland Aran.  Having done a lot with fine gauge yarn recently, I'm tickled pink at how fast this is going.  I was an inch shy of the bind off at the bottom during my train ride this morning.  Going out on a limb, this should be definitely done in time for Rhinebeck.  But then again, I do have to add buttons and we all know how long that takes me to do.  At least there is no piecing to do.  That takes me almost as long as the buttons to accomplish.

Now for the geeky bits.  Get a gander at this:

That's my computer desk in the living room.  Nice flat panel monitor, very sleek and colorful Sony computer.  Ignore the clutter please, I might be a good knitter but I'm a lousy housekeeper.  Hmm that reminds me that my mom's friend wanted to know if she should check to see if her housekeeper had any available time.  Must make a note to call her.  Anyway... in between the computer and the pile of bags (yes knitting and roving if you must ask) you see a nice printer/copier/scanner combo that I'm very pleased with.  But the geeky bit (geekier than the second computer hiding in the lower right hand corner of the photo under all the bags) is the item sitting on top of the printer combo.  Want a closer look?  Now you might be asking what's so darn geeky about some seriously old technology as a turntable.  (If you've never had a turntable, please don't tell me, I don't need to feel older than I already am.)  The geeky bit is that this new, yes brand new, turntable is plugged into the line-in on my computer's sound card.  As these pictures were being snapped, my computer was busy converting the LP into a MP3 file. Yo how cool is that?  I still have old vinyl that I never converted to CD and as such, really can't listen to these days.   Yo yo.  Oh and yes, I'm still drinking TaB with no ill effects on the keppellah.  Yay me.

Nothing to report on the dating front.  I have a lunch date scheduled with (S) for Friday and probably dinner with (B) Friday night.  Rains but it pours right?  I haven't had a date since late June 1999 and now I have two on the same day to break the drought.  Figures.  (B) still shows signs of being a phone pest and as such is falling quickly from favor.   I take heart in all the comments you've left of how successful pairings have been made off the 'net.  Thank you!

Now to answer a bunch of emails...and get some work done ;)

Craft on!

Comments

[Lesley]

Hi,

I have a photo almost exactly like the one of your twins lying together in the crib. My babies were wearing pink and blue and turned away from each other in exactly the same way. Their heads were even sort of bony looking like yours!

I also wanted to comment on your recounting of finding the cornstarch covered room/toddlers. I could *SOOOOOO* relate to that! I can't even remember the number of times I came upon my kids having gotten into something awful, and having so much fun I didn't have the heart to stop them. Top of the list was the time I was visiting a friend about 10 hours drive away, and had put the kids down for a nap in the afternoon in her spare bedroom. THey were about 2 1/2 at the time. When I went upstairs to see how they were doing, they had discovered her cosmetics and had adorned themselves in as many colours, powders, shadows and lipsticks as they could - they looked like clowns! Second on the list was the time I woke up in the morning to find my sweet little daughter pouring white glue into my very nice wicker table - "It's sticky!" was all she said. Her brother was of course watching with much interest.

The best thing for me about having to release the twins from their cribs was that I would often find myself covered in babies when I awoke in the morning. What they would do is wake up early in the morning before I was awake, and come down to my room and crawl into bed with me for a cuddle. Nothing like a warm toddler to play with when you're half-awake :)

Cherish these moments with your babies - they grow up way too fast. Mine are 14 (!) now and hardly ever crawl into bed with me in the morning :) - just once in a while, and I hate to let them go when they do.

Thanks for the great memories - I love the stories.

[Carole]

I was just having a discussion about converting LPs to MP3s at my birthday party on Sunday. How ironic that you should be doing the very same thing!
I didn't get to comment on the twin/cornstarch explosion but I loved the pictures and had a good laugh over them.

[--Deb]

You can convert LPs to computer audio files?? How, how?? Some of my old LP collection I've already re-purchased on CD, but there are a few . . . hmmm!

[Juno]

You can do that with LPs? Oh my.

I may have to move the turntable down to the computer...of course I'd have to move the year's worth of undone filing and the 80 cds waiting to be ripped.

[Allison]

Your kids ar adorable. If my kids (wait, they don't exist yet...) did that- the first thing I would do is grab the camera too.

[Kim]

The geek part is too cool!! What a concept!!

It's scary how fast our babies grow up. Enjoy them while they are little.... ;-)

[Laurie]

I'll never forget the story of one our nurses who walked into a quiet living room to find her toddler rubbing Desitin on her hands, deliberately, carefully. And then turning around the rubbing it on the speaker foam. Over and over again.

Love the turntable set up. I still have mine, a really great AR. I don't know why I still have it. Other than the fact that I am a Packrat.

[Lisa]

Not to go overboard on IKEA, but my sister bought her daughter an extendable bed there last year. Starts out small and then you can make it longer. The mattress is even designed in pieces that you can add as the bed gets longer. Her daughter seems to like it.

Rebecca said she didn't like the big collar on the swing coat so right now I am making her a One Skein Wonder in pink handspun. She also picked out a cardigan that won't be quite as easy as the swing coat - maybe I'll just do the swing coat with a smaller collar...

[Janette]

I love coming back to catch up on your blog! The photos of the cornstarch and the monkey, priceless. Totally priceless. We're strugging with the same issue right now. Peanut doesn't have a convertible crib, so we're weighing whether or not to buy the toddler bed frame. She just seems too small for a twin bed. Oh..Peanut and the Monkeys have the same birthday. How strange is that?! (She's a 33wk preemie) We're doing a cake party after we're moved and settled just a few friends..nothing like last year.

[Jackie]

So exciting when they move into the big bed! The fun is just beginning. :)