It's been a while.

So much to say, so little time these days. Work continues to be just plain nuts. There may (or may not) be a recession on, but thankfully no one has informed my clients. I actually had to fudge some May hours into June for one client so as not to overrun the budget... I've never had that dubious pleasure before!

Short updates: My brother evidently has an angel sitting on his shoulder and has made a remarkable recovery. He seems to be okay for now, though I think he still drinks. Still living in his own crazy world he chose Friday May 13th to finally wed his long-time girlfriend in a civil ceremony at the county courthouse.

Some more belated posts: On the very night I found out about my brother being hospitalized, the adorable teen daughter went to her first prom. I do believe I spent more on her dress/hair/makeup/manicure/pedicure than I did on my own wedding finery! In a stunning (and oh so typical) act of grace I managed to drop my DH's 35 mm digital camera square on the lens (yep, broke it) so the pictures from my little purse camera are pretty ehhh.... I'll eventually get more from my friend (whose lovely 35mm I abscoded for a time, but these will do for now. This is Rachel and designated date-boy, Mark.






One of the other parents was very gracious in hosting a dinner party for eighteen or twenty prom couples, with parents filling in as wait-staff - a truly great idea - safe, sober and fun.





All the pretty girls --- and all the handsome boys.

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In mid-July the girl and I will begin the College Tour, but for right now it appears she has her heart set on Cal Poly, with a business major (and throwing a bone to her parents) a minor in music.


And while spring is pretty much done I managed to snap a couple of photos of the view from my upstairs window - critters raiding the qumquat tree.
I do love spring - except for the lunatic mockingbird living in the tree near our bedroom who invariably begins his search for his lady love at, oh, one a.m. Perhaps two a.m. if he isn't feeling so energetic. DH is ready to blow the dust off his pellet gun... Earplugs can only drown out so much. Mockingbirds are loud!

Knitting continues here, often into the wee hours of the morning, since my sleep issues don't seem to be letting up, mockingbirds notwithstanding.

I finished a shrug of K1C2's Second Time Cotton - this will be a shop sample if I can ever get around to writing up the pattern. Easy-peasy, except for the writing-it-up part. It does defy photos, so I'll have to get one of Ms. Adorable modeling it since I sized it to be small/medium and I, well, am not a small/medium.












I"m also working on another shop sample but ultimately it will go to Ms. Adorable.

It is so her.














Oooooh! A couple of my SnB friends went to the Blue Moon Sock Camp earlier this year - which made me wildly jealous - so I joined the Socks That Rock Club in the hopes that this might just secure my spot in next year's camp. I was sort of shocked that Blue Moon was still accepting memberships for 2008 but delighted to have gotten in. It was sort of like Christmas in May to get my first shipment. Wow. Love the colorways I received. I think that these will be my vacation projects since we're supposed to pack very very lightly and (howls the queen of over-packing) I'm just not wired that way!

Reality is beginning to set in regarding our upcoming vacation plans, and my stomach is doing a bit of a lurch just typing this up. One of our oldest friends is turning fifty and to celebrate she and her husband have chosen to go on a river rafting trip. Six days through the Grand Canyon on the Colorado River. Mind you, my idea of camping is to ensconce myself at Camp Hilton where "making do" involves little tiny bottles of shampoo and perhaps forgetting my razor. This is six days of no showers, no bathrooms, no mattresses. In August.

I've realized that this leaves me with five or six weeks to lose twenty or thirty pounds, get a tan and pack. This should be do-able, right? I can do at least one of these. How much does sock yarn weigh, exactly?

Honestly I think the hardest part will be missing my kid's birthdays. Rhonda, who's birthday we're celebrating, turns 50 on August 19th. This is also our son Matthew's birthday. Daughter Rachel's birthday is the next day, August 20th. And Rachel begins her senior year of high school on the 22nd so we'll miss arena check-in as well. Actually I won't miss arena check-in at all (think three hundred kids plus checkbook-toting parents crowded into a blistering hot gym moving from the get-your-ID-picture-station to get-your-gym-clothes-station to get-your-athletic-league-card station...) We have to decide in the next week or two whether it'd be easier to get Ray her own checking account or just hand her four or five signed checks.

I shall continue to knit, if only to save my sanity.