Swap Goodies!!

First, and apology to Christine, my Swap partner from Grace's St Patrick's Day Swap.  Grace (her blog link is on my sidebar as loving comfort Knits) does a fun swap every St Patrick's Day.  The theme is obvious.  But what you do is you have to roll up the goodies inside a ball of yarn.  I am not so coordinated so my "balls"  look like weird rugby balls.  And for the second year in a row - yeah I'm lazy sometimes and I hate winding balls by hand.. . that's why god made winders right??  - so for the second year in a row - I  had lunch with Grace and SHE unrolled the ball for me... I iz spoiled!!

Anyway - here is the cool stuff Christine sent me.  ( I ate the chocolate one day before the gym - you can ask Grace - that's my new m.o. if I really want something with too much carbs or sugar - I eat it right before the gym... I'm pretty sure this is a weird form of bulimia or something - but as long as my blood glucose numbers are good, I'm sticking to it) I'm going to use the yarn and some of the shamrocks to make my "hopefully" soon to be born nephew a St Patty's Sweater Vest for next year.  (He will be getting many of these - I've never seen my brother in law without one - except for the wedding day when he wore a regular vest with his morning suit)



She also sent a cool ribbon ball ornament, a wrapped vase and shamrock, tissues and a rubber ducky!!  Love it all!  Thank you Christine!!!


I was also in another caffeine addicts swap.  My swap partner MADE ME A MUG!!!  Seriously!!  She made me a mug!!  My brain is so blown away by this!!



Also a very rich French Roast coffee roasted near her in St Louis, a Kermit pez dispenser - can not have too many pez dispensers,  and a bunch of owlie stuff.  I seem to be falling into the collection of owls!!  Totally blame the Angie!!

Actually Read Two Books!!

Haven't read any books this year yet.  Then my library sends me an e-mail that 3 of my requested (no recollection of requesting) books were ready for pickup.  One thing about Debbie Macomber and Nora Roberts - is I totally get sucked into their books, and end up shunning all other activities until I've finished.  So in 2 days, I've read 2 of the books!!!  Both were series books.  The Perfect Hope by Roberts was part Three in the Inn at Boonsboro trilogy (and 3 brothers, 3 best friends .,. you guess)  And the story line with the ghost worked out nicely!

The second Book was another of the Blossom street series - So yarn was in it!  AN overworked laid off lawyer and a grouchy Doctor,.... enough said.

Forget the chocolate and flowerz

I'm not a bouquet of flowers kind of girl. I mean the florets are already dead,  they just haven't turned black...yet.  Chocolate is good. I like really really dark chocolate. The kind most people think is too bitter. But with my sugar issues,  I can have chocolate, but it's a pain in the ass to balance out the day.  There is one way, fool proof actually to show me love.  Coffee, dark roast, rich, deep ... If it's brewed don't even think about cream or sugar... I like my coffee black. If it's good coffee you don't need to cover the flavor.

Daniel is my #2 guy at work. ( Carl is #1 - and I doubt anyone could bump him from his spot in my heart)  he recently ordered some DEATH WISH COFFEE.  Google it. The most highly caffeinated beans out there. And in a dark roast (caffeine is heat sensitive, so darker roasts actually have less caffeine) the beans are so potent, that even with the dark roasting process, there is still way more caffeine. Daniel brought me a whole tupperware container full! 

If that doesn't say love, I  don't know what does.

I wish this car were real

More on the auto show after I download pics.

Mom's Greenhouse

For Christmas I bought my mom a temporary, seasonal greenhouse that she can use in the spring to put her plants out when it isn't warm enough yet to have them outside, or to start her seeds whatever.  This is mostly because she and my father in law have this thing where they want to beat me to the first ripe tomato.  Never happens.  Maybe later this spring I'll let you in on my winning secret.  It's pretty simple really - and just requires knowing how to keep the plants happy.

They are dead set determined because, from a zonal point of view they SHOULD beat me by about 2 weeks at least.  I live at a higher altitude and it is usually 5-8 degrees cooler here than where they live.  My father in law SHOULD beat my mom by about a week. (that's about 50-50 at this point.)  Here is an example.  My father in law's daffodils are in full bloom right now.  My mom's daffs are just about to bloom the buds are just about right there.



Meanwhile at my house, the reticulated irises are blooming, but the crocuses are just coming out of their buds - bud stalks aren't even fully up on my daffs.





Back to the greenhouse.  I bought one for each  my mom and my father in law - telling them I was trying to help them out - it won't their issues are farther down than when they start their plants.  My mom just turned 80 last month, and was never mechanically inclined, so buying her a greenhouse meant putting it together every spring, but Curt is the good son-in-law so he doesn't mind.  So he spent his morning off building a greenhouse.





Of course this now puts some pressure on my father in law, because he feels "behind".  Hee hee hee. Yes, I'm kind of being mean, but you know "old people" need something to piss them off enough every morning to get out of bed and get moving!!!

Ambivalent Easter

Happy Easter to those who celebrate.  I'm having a slightly ambivalent holiday.  The Angie couldn't come home for the weekend, so a holiday without her just doesn't have the sparkle.

I did mail her a care package Easter Basket the end of last week, and on Friday Curt and I drove down to Philly.  We had lunch ((great tacos at Pure Tacos- even though they don't understand no raw onions means no raw onions on top of my tacos.. grrrr) with Min and Rachel.  We then did some center city shopping (including getting some Beck's Cajun to go and putting it in a cooler to bring back for yesterday) then the Angie met us and we did some more shopping.  We then had a really delicious dinner at Spice 28 - although I think Curt's dinner was spicier than he anticipated. (the Angie took his abundant leftovers home - she likes spicy and she said college kids love free food best.  We had picked up some things she requested before we went down - apparently she can't find some brands/foods down there, and tp and apparently the quick dry nail polish spray isn't readily available ( I picked up some spring polish colors for her as well)  And the one thing she really really wanted was my baked spiral cut ham - so I made one on Thursday and brought her a large chunk of it, along with some extra glaze.   Then we went back to Min's place because she had some things for me... and you know I need to visit with my catphew.  Fe must've been happy to see us - he was purring really really loud!!