Let's Make Some Lists

Things that seemed far away and omigosh they are thisclose, or have already happened

my car being paid off (happened!)

Thanksgiving

the release of New Moon (I'm going to see it tonight!)

Things that seem far away

Summer 2010

finishing my AAS

Annabella (it occurs to me as I am typing this that I haven't really talked about this other than to say how cute doxies are, more to come)

Christmastime

3/5/10

Things that are on hold

my move south

Knitting

I've been working on Knitting Projects # 2 and 3. Project # 2 is a pair of fingerless gloves that are coming right along (see picture below). Project # 3 was going along with no problems until there were problems. And boy are there problems. I don't even know where to begin to fix the problem. It's looking like I'll have to rip it apart and start over, but considering that I was about 7 inches into the blanket I just can't do it. I know I have to, though. And I will. Eventually.
















{the beginning of fingerless gloves}

New Moon is Almost Here!

Hilarious.

Things I Should Own

With this going on it would've been nice to have these this morning:

















{source}





















{source}

Books

Can you believe I haven't written about what I'm reading since July 29th? I can't either. I've checked out and purchased many books but I haven't been very good with the follow through. So what have I been reading since July? Here's what:





Sad, I know. But here are some books I hope to read by year's end (or something like that):









p.s. - East of the Sun is a very good book and I haven't actually finished Friday Night Knitting Club (funnily enough because I've been busy knitting).

knitting, apples, a trip to the middle of nowhere, and lots of links

I finished knitting my first scarf. Yay! It only took a few years, but whatevs, I finished it and that is all that matters.

I have moved onto two more projects. Project # 2 is a pair of fingerless gloves I saw in One More Skein. I'm using a very pretty light grey wool. Project # 3 is a baby blanket for a friend that I'm kind of making up as I go along. It all started with a pretty pale pink wool that I found on the clearance shelf. I don't have enough of the pink to make the whole blanket so I am going to do a wide border in a dark grey. Both projects made possible because of gift cards my friends Caitlin and EB got me to The Yarn Lounge. I have discovered a few things about myself while knitting; let's make a list: 1) I love bamboo needles and hate metal needles; 2) I cannot knit and talk at the same time if there is more than one kind of stitch involved, apparently I cannot divide my attention; 3) I get no reading done when I am knitting because my hands can only do one thing at a time; 4) I knit longer when I am watching tv; and 5) I can think about absolutely nothing, my mind actually quiets down and it's quite lovely.

Now the part about apples! I went to Graves Mountain for their Apple Harvest Festival with my Buddy (my Buddy is my paternal grandmother whom I have never called "grandma" in my life), Aunt Paula, Aunt Linda, Cousin Emily and my cousin's daughter (is there a title for that? does that make her my second cousin? I don't know), Ashley. I had a great time and discovered that I had actually been there before. I've always had this memory of a creek and a bluegrass band playing by it and when we were walking around, I saw the creek and put it all together. I said to my Buddy, "Hey! I've been here before!" to which she replied, "Yeah, I brought you here when you were little." *That* would have been nice to know before.

I drank cups and cups of yummy hot cider, we looked at crafts and pumpkins, got some apples, listened to bluegrass, and hoped it didn't snow. Then we went up to the lodge on the mountain and had a very yummy lunch and the best dessert ever. It was some sort of apple cake with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Yum-o!

After finishing up with the fam, I headed over to Buckingham County where my grandfather has a little lego house. There is no cell phone reception at the house. There is one spot on the front porch, if you stand just so, you can pick up a signal. So there were some fun moments standing just so to make a couple of phone calls and send some text messages. I had two days alone and I made the most of them – I finished reading my October book club book, started knitting projects 2 and 3, ate a lot of apples, napped, did some very therapeutic writing, watched The Whole Nine Yards, and generally just stood still for a minute. It was so lovely and I am so glad I took the time to do it.

On the way back to Richmond, I stopped by my dad’s family’s homestead (the house is still standing, for the most part), stopped by the family church and saw the old folks that are buried there, from there I drove over to Scottsville for lunch/dinner at Lumpkin's.

And now, I give you pictures from my weekend in the sticks...

{Here is my Buddy rocking my first scarf}

{Emily and I in front of the creek I recognized}

{my hot cider and Buddy’s black coffee}

{pumpkins}

{apples}

{random}

{crafts}

{pretty}

{my bounty}

{the Buckingham house}

{the old house}

{Old Bryant Lane}

On Notice

UPDATE: I am told that "cancellors" is not a word. Whatevs, it totes is on this blog. Here at Irregardless: Two Negative Elements Together At Last, we are all about giving words that don't exist a home.

blogging fail

I was working on a post









And then I wasn't

And then I was, but I accidently deleted it

And then there was a piece of pumpkin cheesecake












Maybe I'll try again tomorrow.

Lose Some, Gain Some (Pounds)

I don't think I have ever talked about my weight loss journey on here so consider yourself warned that I'm talking about it now.

When I moved to Richmond I looked like this*:











Luckily my RVA employer participates in the Weight Watchers At Work program. So now I look like this:













In the past I went on diets and lost weight but it never stayed off for very long. My reasons for regaining the weight were: 1) I worked long hours and did not have time to pay attention to what I ate, 2) Taco Bell, and a lot of it, 3) eating late at night, 4) skipping breakfast, and sometimes lunch, because omigosh I'm so busy, and 5) maybe I'm just supposed to be fat. What I've come to find is that the reason was simple: I was in a bad relationship with food. There was a lot of miscommunication going on and the whole concept of eating balanced meals was a foreign concept. Thinking about the calories in what I was eating and drinking never even occurred to me. Joining WW was an eye opening experience. Food and I learned to talk to each and listen to what the other was saying.

I signed up for Weight Watchers and my first meeting was on June 3, 2008. In that 17-weeks, I lost 23.4 pounds. More importantly though I learned to be aware of the calories I consume and how to spread them out over the course of the day. After the 17-week session ended some co-workers and I decided to strike out on our own. We felt that now that we had this new found information that we could continue without the WW fee. We chipped in and bought a scale for the office and we weigh-in every Tuesday. We track our losses and our gains, we give each other pep talks and we talk each other down off the edge. Since going rogue, I've lost 19.4 pounds for a grand total of 42.8 pounds lost. One of my current mini-goals (because it's important to have mini-goals so that reaching the main goal doesn't seem so daunting) is to lose 10 pounds by the end of the year. September was a busy month and there were a lot of celebrations going on which means I ate a lot of cake and fancy dinners out and gained a bit more then I bargained for. All is well though, I am aware of the situation (and that's one-fourth of the battle) and am refocusing on my end of the year goal.

I'm happy with where I am (especially when I look at that first picture, it just makes me think of this) but I know I have a lot farther to go. I know I'll get there and I'm sure this past September will not be the only month when my feet hang off the back of the proverbial wagon. As long as my feet only dangle off the edge, I'm ok with whatever happens. Of course it would be preferable that they (my feet) put on a pair of sneakers and burn off some calories but that's a whole other battle.

*Sorry, I don't have full-body shots that document the loss; you'll just have to trust the cheekbones.

Throw on our bow-ties and we hit the town

All week everyone has been talking about this video but I'm just now getting around to watching it. It's hysterical! Watch it now. Don't wait.