Movie Day

Thank you to our friends at Die Schreiben von Scireiber for inviting our family for a meal and movie. The kids had a ball playing together and picnic-ing.



Then our ds sacked out and dd enjoyed watching the newest Narnia movie, The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe with our hosts. We had not seen it in the theaters, but we had heard it was well done. I certainly agree! It was well worth the wait.

Good News Bad News

Good News! Today will be a great day because my darling dear husband comes home from his trip to Connecticut (for work). The kiddos and I get to pick him up at the airport around 4 p.m.

Then he gets to set aside the frustrations of travel and pick up the performance jitters -- Running in Circles has a show tonight.

Yesterday the kids and I all caught some kind of cold. We had very little school yesterday as I had an appointment. I took the kids to a playground and when we came home we were all sniffling and sneezing. But, oh my! They had a good time! It looks like we will just be doing reading work today as well.

Bad news...As we were rather subdued yesterday afternoon I did get to do some knitting. I started with my baseball sock while I listened to my team on the radio. My sock and my team were both decidedly uninspiring. I found myself thinking, "I had better like wearing these when they are done!"

Although this work is tedious, I get the distinct impression it is preparing me to be a better knitter when I move on to other projects. I liken it to penmanship practice. All in all I added only about 16 rounds to the sock. It probably does not look much different from the last time I posted a picture of it.

I broke up the frustration (caused by the baseball team more than the sock) by making a swatch of an alpaca/wool/polyester blend I had bought on-line. I wanted to determine whether it would shrink felt at all. As it turns out, it does not.

Can someone more experienced tell me, it this because of the 7% polyester, or were the fibers treated to be a superwash?

Now I want to buy a red alpaca/wool blend that will be a nice contrast to this grey. And I now know I'll need to shop for a superwash. I hope to make a red & grey winter tunic sweater.

My daughter calls these socks my 'Slinky socks' because the colors remind her of our cat. One sock needs about three more inches to complete the toe. On the other, I have just begun the gussets. I have a big decision to make on these socks. When I try them on the ankle is still a bit tight. Even after I ripped out a few inches on the ankles and lessened the taper. It does go on my foot, but it is more difficult that it should be. I'm not sure how much of the difficulty I should attribute to the needles and how much is a property of a too-narrow sock. I have decided this pattern will go in the garbage when I am done. While I like the idea of the socks being fitted, these particular socks don't seem fitted *to me* as much as I'd hoped.

"Run Away!!!" and Some Knitting

Every Wednesday I drive past this church on the way to German School. Just reading the sign, "Worldview Community Church," sounds alarm bells in my head and I find myself quoting Monty Python in my mind "Run Away!!! Run Away!!!" You can't see the building from the road, and I'm glad. I think it would make me more sad.

During this week when Dh is out of town for work I had visions of completing this pair of socks and making great progress on my baseball sock. The time has not been there, and when it is, I'm ready to fall asleep. Last night I did get to work on them a little. The gusset is just completed on the one, and not yet begun on the other. There are still some mistakes in the gusset, but they will not affect the fit. I'm going to have to stick with using markers rather than counting stitches in the future. Here you can see Slinky has joined me on the couch. She likes to lie on the knitting pattern, so we get into a shoving match several times last night. Thursday afternoon there is a baseball game. Perhaps that blue sock can get some work then....

Go Vote

Today is the day-- vote in your primary!
The kids and I took the short walk to our polling place since it is a beautiful day in northeast Ohio. I'm not too enamored with the electronic voting machines. Maybe I had more of a problem with the way they were set up. I had no sense of privacy with the screen available for anyone standing behind me to view. I wonder how often they clean those touch screens (ick!). I suppose people who had trouble with the complexities of the punch card will have no problem reading the three paragraphs of instructions about how to use the touch screen. Yes, that is sarcasm. Perhaps they should bring back the literacy test I had to take when I registered to vote.A pleasant surprise on this beautiful day, the "gauntlet" of campaign workers was practically non-existent, here are only 5 people to walk past briskly on the way to the door. There is usually a large mob and scores of signs and banners. No one shoved any papers in my face (which I really hate when I'm holding the hand of a child in each of my hands).

On our walk back home, I noticed that my yard needs some attention. Hundreds of spent daffodil blooms and half the tulips need to be dead-headed. The purple, yellow and white tulips here are new this year. The previous owner had lots of red tulips in the front landscape. I added some other colors for variety.

Also clamoring for attention are some volunteer plants I'd like to relocate, some hosta to move, and I still have not worked any peat into the soil of the veggie plot.

Today we have a treat-- daytime baseball. But with the two toddlers I babysit for coming over today there will be no knitting for me.

Proof of Global Warming

Thank you, Ann, for adding this humor to my day.

Yesterday was a day of mixed emotions. Our family was invited to lunch with some friends. In accepting this gracious invitation we also got to enjoy the company of our friends who are waiting for information about their move to Togo, West Africa. We were enjoying a beautiful day, picnicking with fun conversation and watching all the children frolic...

Then the sound of crying and thrashing in the water caught my attention. My poor 4 year old ds had tumbled into the fishpond. He did manage to right himself, but when Dad lifted him from the water he was frightened, uncomfortable, soaked with water (algae etc.) from collar to shoes, and generally upset. Poor guy. Our kind hostess wrapped him in a big towel and got his soggy clothes off. He settled down and stopped crying when he felt the security of Dad's arms around him and solid ground under his swiftly unshod feet. Then we headed straight for the bathtub.

Of course I did not have spare clothes. Luckily I still had a couple of pull-ups that I had always kept in my car with a box of wipes. Our little one got to come home with us clean and dry and sporting a pull-up, a tee shirt several sizes too large and an equally large sweat jacket. But he had gotten over his fright. I told him that next time he visits our friends I do not want him to scare their fish.

So we were off towards home. For a little while anyway. Dh had to fly out of town for a week and his flight departed Sunday afternoon. After taking him to the airport the kiddos and I hung around home reading until bedtime. We all miss you already, Dear. It is going to be a long week.

Realizing a Dream

At long last my Sweetheart got to live a dream! He has not had a chance to play on stage in a band since college. He and the rest of Running in Circles did a great job on their first gig together tonight. He sings mostly backup and harmonies, but sings lead in four songs.
The crowd filled the dance floor several times.
See you next time.

In the Kitchen

Last night I made latkes to go along with dinner again. This time I remembered to take some pix. These potatoes have an onion, chives, parsley, celery (fine chopped) and carrots (shredded) mixed in with the egg and flour. I mixed with a fork, but use a spoon to put the mix into the hot oil so you don't end up with too much liquid for the last few cakes. They were so good and I'm glad I made a lot so the kids and I can eat them for lunch again today!

Good thing I'm not cooking a lunch today because a science experiment was on the schedule. Dd needed to determine whether or not air molecules float on carbon dioxide molecules. So my sink became a science lab.

We put about a cup and a half of baking soda around the bottom of the sink. Then we added two cups of vinegar. This fizzed beautifully and gave us a sink about half full of carbon dioxide.

Then she had to blow soap bubbles over the sink and notice whether they floated to the bottom, eschewed the sink, or hovered on that invisible layer on carbon dioxide. By the time I got the camera ready the carbon dioxide concentration was almost gone. It lasted a bit longer toward the back of the sink so you can see one lone bubble hovering there. At the front of the sink there was less baking soda. One large bubble in the front had come to rest on the bottom of the sink.
Next, the least exciting part. Writing up the findings and answering the discussion questions!

Chemistry has been quite fun this year with lots of great experiments. Next year physics should be a favorite subject of hers (and mine) too.