HGTV - update

Our epsiode of "My House is Worth What?" will be on HGTV this week! June 10 at 11pm and June 11 at 3am. There's another showing in August at 7pm, but I don't remember the date. Try not to laugh at us too much - I'm sure we look like total dorks!

Knitting pt 2

Here are other knitting projects.



This is my 3rd project - a baby blanket made with a "pound of love" yard in denim for Joshua. I thought I was being smooth by making it bigger, but I didn't do it correctly and now there's a large border on one end. :) The edges are all knit rows and the checker board is alternating knit and perl.



Another blanket for Joshua - it's made with denim "pound of love" yarn. It was knit on the diagonal (all knits no perl) with a yard over around the edge to create a bit of a border (that you can't see in this photo).



A snake for Kaitlyn's 3rd birthday. It was surprisingly easy to make. The stripes are all 10 rows of stockingnet stitch. The head used increases I had never tried, and the tail used regular K2tog decreases. The tongue and eyes are stiff felt.



I had a lot of yarn left over so I made a snake for Sydney (Gary's sister's daughter). It's a little different than the one I made for Kaitlyn since the multicolored yarn was used in between each color.

Goodbye Seattle

It's official, and things are moving faster than we thought possible! Gary & I had been thinking of moving back to the South to be closer to family, so we spent the past few months packing, staging the house, and getting a bit organized. We thought it would take several months to sell the house b/c, well, who hasn't heard about the horrible housing market?! We were even excited to be on HGTV's "My House is Worth What?" because they were going to have a stager come by and give us lots of helpful hints (which we barely used, btw).

Well, all that worry - for nothing!! We listed the house on Friday, and 3 freakin' days later we have an offer..... for $5,000 more than our asking price!!! Today is the inspection and if everything goes well, closing will be at the end of February. I have to work a few days into March, but after that, we'll be driving back across the country to Durham, NC. Hopefully we don't hit snow storms like we did moving here.

I'm seriously bummed to be leaving such a wonderful, beautiful city, but after the past 2 craptastic years, and 4 neices & nephews later, I really just want to be able to see my family more than once a year. I'll miss all of my wonderful Seattle friends, and maybe one day you'll be interested in visiting us on the other side of the country (Eastern Bal Champs, anyone?!). Please keep in touch.

HGTV

A few months ago, I was randomly looking on the HGTV site to see if they were filming any shows in Seattle. We applied for the only show available, and found out yesterday that we've been accepted!!

The crew will be at our house mid-January taping a segment for My House is Worth What?, but I'll have to let you guys know later when it will actually air.

Knitting

About 10 years ago, I started cross-stitching so I could do something productive while watching TV. It also helped me keep my hands busy instead of snacking while sitting in front of the boob tube. Over the years, I have made some rather elaborate gifts, which mostly ended up on my mom's walls. I ran out of projects to give away, so I started cross-stitching baby items (blankets, bibs, etc).

Recently, I decided that cross-stitched gifts were too cheesy, so I'm learning to knit instead. My first class, at Pacific Fabrics, was disappointing. It was 6 hours long (3 nights, 2 hours each) and by the end I didn't feel I could make anything by looking at a pattern. The only thing I had to show for my time was a sample knit that I used to practice.

My second class was at Jo Ann Fabrics and we worked on a simple purse. I didn't have any idea what I was doing, so I ended up using all the yarn. What I didn't realize was that I needed to save some at the beginning and end to "sew" the purse together. The teacher found yard that was the closest to my color she could find, which was brown instead of grey. Overall, I think it looks pretty good since it's my first project!



For my second project, I wanted to make something easy, but incorporate something I haven't tried yet. I decided to make a Gryffindor scarf for my niece's christmas present. She's only 2-1/2 and prolly won't "get it", but Tony & Lisa will think it's hilarious!



I didn't do a *great* job on the scarf. I started out with 22 stitches on the row, and ended up with 25! About 3/4 thru the scarf, I thought I had dropped several stitches, so I tried to pick them back up. Apparently, I didn't drop them since I added to the original number, but I have *no* idea what happened. I should've just pulled the whole thing out since it was just one color block instead of making the rest of the scarf fatter. Oh well. It's only my second project, so I'm living & learning.

Here's a close-up of my mistakes.



Now I'm working on a baby blanket for Tony & Lisa's new one (Joshua is due in December). It's alternating knit and purl stitches so that it makes a checkerboard pattern. In November, I'll be taking another class - this one is making socks!

Good thoughts for Mr. B

Please send Bingham (our dog) good thoughts! We're not sure what's wrong with him, but he's been in "Doggie ICU" since Friday. Apparently, his body is destroying his red blood cells and he's already had 2 blood transfusions. Hopefully, they'll be able to figure out what's wrong. :(

conservative assholes!

Court Uphold Nationwide Ban of Partial-Birth Abortions
Abortion-Rights Advocates Worry Decision Could Signal Shift in Court's Support of Roe

only 1.5% of abortions are done after 20 weeks. i'm guessing a large majority of those are due to medical reasons, and not just that the life of the mother is in danger. what's sad is that the new law really seems to be targeting the group of women that are in the position gary & i found ourselves in last summer. :(