Happy New Year-hope everone's Christmas was full of family, friends and hope.
Since it is soon to be 2007 and I found a few extra dollars after Christmas I decided to donate to Doctors Without Borders through Stephanie Pearl- McPhee'a blog.
So far, since Dec. 15th, over 120,000 Dollars has been donated by knitters to this worthy cause. Be careful world, we are a huge group and we carry pointy sticks!!
All my company has gone home. sigh I miss Caitlin already, but am ready to have my house back and some time to knit, shop, listen to the new books on CD I got for Christmas and watch the knitting videos Santa(well, actually,me) left in my stocking. I also have cash burning a hole in my pocket from Hubby to buy yarn with!!! What to buy first???? I can't just go off whilly,nilly now can I? Yes, I can!! It is found money to spend as I see fit!! It is enough to seriously add to my already multipying in the dark stash. It makes me smile. So, to feel even better, I donated a little to Doctors Without Borders.
No snow in Michigan yet-no white Christmas, but I am looking forward to the blizzard which I know will come (it is only a matter of time-this is Michigan) and force me to stay home and just knit!!

Merry Christmas to all and to all Zen knitting!! Talk to you after Christmas.
Santa Comes tonight!! Miss Caitlin is very excited and so are we as it is so much fun to have Santa come to our house again.

Good Morning,
My kitchen is open again-all is wrapped!! I have finished my "absolutly must be done for Christmas" knitting. The necklace with the Maggie clasp looks nice and the Newfoundland Dog hair/wool socks for my son-in-law are wrapped. My index finger is killing me!!! My daughter's shrug is so cute and soft-I hope it fits-Phoenix Bess must have anorexic arms. I may continue to knit on "possible" presents.

On a "it only happens to me" note-our 10ft. prelit tree is slowly dying. When we put it up one string of light at eye level were out and changing fuses and bulbs did nothing so I put my peek a boo Santa (his head peeks out from behind the tree and his arms wrap around it) that the Grandkids love in that spot. Problem solved? For a few days. Then I noticed the lights at the very top level were out. Damn. Again, no fuse or bulb replacement helped. I am afraid by Christmas the whole tree will have died. And now, it is all decorated and impossible to reach because it it surrounded with presents that stick out past the tree for 6 ft. NO, I am not taking it down and buying a new tree at this point. I no longer care- and my husband had fear in his eyes at the very thought that I might consider doing this. His little"2 monkeys and a yoyo"brain was spinning as he calculated the time factor of taking away the presents, undecorating,taking down the tree, shopping for a new tree,..well, you get the idea. Since my Marine daughter and Granddaughter are flying in Monday(God willing and the creek don't rise) I will let her deal with it. I'm tough(I did RAISE a Marine afterall) but she IS the Marine and if it positively has to be destroyed and rebuilt overnight she is the one to do it!!!!!!
Merry Christmas to all-may your knitting be finished and your family/friends delighted with it!!!!!!

There will be no cooking in my kitchen until further notice. My island is covered in presents, wrapping paper, bags, ribbon and tags. I am trying to get some things wrapped and organized so that I can figure out what I have for everyone and what I still to need to buy-hopefully not much because my husband is going to have a coronary when the Visa Bill arrives as it is.
My shrug for Amanda is almost finished-doing the ruffle on the collar (about 800 stitches I swear) and then just a quick sewing up. I have started the dog hair/yarn socks for my son-in-law's birthday(dec. 23) and am starting my Mom's fuzzy slipper socks today. Someone please make me stop beginning new Christmas projects!!
My tree is not up yet because I need 2 strong men to carry it up from the basement storage room so decorating is at a standstill. I suggested the small tree that goes in the foyer-my "grown" children threw hissy fits -I suggested they put up their own trees in their own homes to compensate for the smaller Grandma tree-they threw hissy fits. TRADITION-Apparently they are really 3 Russian Jewish men on a roof top.
On a lucky note... my husband ordered a Guardian Generator that hooks up to our propane tank and kicks on automatically when we lose power-which is more often than you would think in the 21st century. I was kind of against it-I hate spending that much money on anything except jewelry or yarn but I kept my mouth shup(made my teeth hurt to do so) and low and behold on Friday(dec 1st I think) we lost power!! That baby kicked right in and we had heat, toilets(wells need electricity),showers, freezer,fridge, stove, t.v., and lights!!!!! No one around us had any of these things.Is my husband smart or what???!!! But don't tell him I said so-he thinks I think his brain contains only 2 monkeys and a yoyo. It is better that way.