Didn't Mean To Be Away So Long

It amazes me how quickly time is passing.  It is mid-February already.  I guess part of the reason time is passing by is that I've seem to have done nothing but work.  It has been absolutely crazy lately and it is making my very cranky.  The company I work for hired a new CIO in December.  This woman is completely restructuring my department.  Two managers were 'encouraged to pursue other opportunities'.  She has totally flattened the organization and now there are literally dozens of teams focused on the type of system they support.  My team is crazy busy trying to fix the issues with the new ERP system we released (prematurely) last fall.  We have been told that we have to work 11 hour days.   We have to choose one of the following shifts:  7am-6pm, 8am-7pm, or 9am-8pm.  I'm a morning person, and since I have a family at home, I prefer the earliest shift.  However, I also go to a trainer at 6am two days a week, which I refuse to give up.  That means on Tuesdays and Thursdays I work until at least 8pm and then I'm back in the office at 7am on Wednesdays and Fridays.  It is exhausting.  No one will tell us how long this schedule is going to be required.  I know I won't be able to keep it up much longer.  I'm finding it very hard to keep a civil tongue by the end of the week.  The filter disappears when I'm exhausted.

All this means that there has been no progress on anything knitting related.  That really bums me out.  I did fall prey to the enticement of the silk hankies that the Yarn Harlot had on her blog a while ago.  I ordered a couple.  I'm still waiting for them to arrive.

Today is a beautiful day outside.  It has been a very long time since I've taken a walk outside, so I'm going to do that.  I also plan to make my family a nice meal tonight.  I'm trying some new recipes.  Tonight's menu has a Greek theme:  pastitsio, pita bread, hummus, and Greek salad.  (Guess what my 'go to' website is for recipes.  ;)  )  Enjoy your day! 

This Week's Progress

I'm up to the armhole shaping on the right front of the Go Live Minimalist Cardi.  It is moving along at a nice pace.  Others might think my progress is slow, but at the rate I finish sweaters, this is light-speed.

My goal is to get this piece finished by tomorrow night.

All of yesterday was spent at a wrestling tournament for Blake.  I took several magazines, a book and the cardi to occupy me.  ADD seems to be a bit of an issue for me at those things.  They are too noise and the bleachers too uncomfortable to do any one thing for a stretch of time.    Blake wrestled 4 times throughout the day.  Unfortunately, he isn't doing very well.  It is a major accomplishment if he can make it all 3 rounds without getting pinned.  After the tournament, I made a pot of chili for him, Ed and me since the girls weren't home.  Later we turned on a movie to relax.  This is how Blake was 10 minutes into the movie.

As I mentioned, the girls weren't home.  The Winter Formal was last night.  Trisha went with her friends, but Kristin opted to skip it this year.  Kristin just hung out at one of her friend's house.  Here's Trisha and one of her best friends.  Two very pretty girls.

Moving Along

Last weekend I finished the back of the Go Live cardi and started the right front panel.  Since the panel is narrow it is flying along.  When I work on it, that is.    Here's how it looks now.  I'm getting rather excited about wearing it, motivating me to get it done.

After I'm done with this, I think I'm going to move on to a crochet project.  I like this.  Yes, it is frilly, but I have some olive lace weight left over from one of my tag team projects.  I think it will be a nice summer item. 

Conversations have started in our house about college for Kristin.  She having trouble trying to decide what to do as a career.  I've suggested several for her.  It isn't critical now that she decides, but it would help if she could get a general idea to help us with looking at colleges.  We'll start college visits in the fall.

1-1-11

Happy New Year everyone!!!  Like millions of other people, I make resolutions.  In the past few years, I've targeted my resolutions around things that were on my 'driving me crazy' list.  I moved my sewing area from the dining room to the basement.  A slow decluttering has been going on for several years.  This year I want to get several rooms painted.  First will be the living room and then the dining room.  Neither of these rooms have been painted since we moved in 13 years ago.  After those are painted, I want to repaint the family room and kitchen.  Eleven years ago I painted those rooms one color since their isn't a physical separation between the rooms except where the flooring changes.  Now I plan to delineate the area by painting several walls in the kitchen color and the remaining walls in the family room color.  Coordinating the colors is key, but I think I have found shades that will work.  Here is a photo of 3 of the colors.

The yellow is for the living room which is where this photo was taken.  The orange is for the dining room, which is the room in the background.  The green is for the kitchen walls.  The family room walls will be a tannish taupe (a bit hard for me to describe).  Stay tuned for the progress.

Speaking of progress, a bit of knitting happened last night.  It was an exciting New Years Eve.  After the girls left for their parties, Ed, Blake and I went to dinner at a chinese restaurant and then came home.  We played Sequence and then watched football.  I knit for a while but then got tired.  Since I had to stay up until 1:30 to pick Trisha and a friend up from their party, I didn't want to make myself too sleepy.  After midnight, Ed went to bed while Blake and I channel surfed.    Here's how far I got on the back of the sweater.  There's more football today, so I expect to get the back done.