Reality Check

Yesterday was a planning meeting on our foster care case. The birth family is working very hard and desperate to have their son back. I don't blame them at all! They have a lot of work to do with classes, parenting trainings, and visitations. Best case scenario, it will be January when the little guy goes home.

Pat and I are working to adapt our mindset to the temporary nature of this placement. There is still a chance that the case may go to adoption, but in my opinion, it is unlikely. We will just enjoy the time we have with the baby and keep working with him so that he reaches the milestones and gains the skills that he needs to be a healthy toddler.

I appreciate SO MUCH all the support we are getting from family and friends. This is a hard, hard process but we believe we are safe, healthy, bright spot in this child's life (and for future placements too). We go back and forth on whether we will try again to have a family via foster care. Its a gamble.

No words needed

Mmmmmm......Harlot

Yesterday was the long-awaited day when Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, AKA the Yarn Harlot, came to Wichita. OMG...she was awesome! What a hoot. It was so great to have a good laugh! Jessica Mounts and I met before the program and worked on our respective sock projects. Once we got to the presentation (held at East High), you would not have believed the crowd. There were close to 300 knitters in the building, all wielding their needles and projects!

She is touching my sock!!!!!!!! I am not worthy......he, he, he.

A New Journey

It has been a long sleepy week! A week ago today, Pat and I received our first foster child. We are busy trying to adapt to him and the requirements of the foster care program. I may be away from my extracurricular activities for awhile until we figure out all of the little guy's needs.

Knitterly updates

My knitting is slowing down now that homework is ramping up. Also around the corner is the rush of school field trips at the WATER Center once Labor Day is over. I do have one project 50% complete - an RPM sock using J. Knits "Kansas" colorway and Lang Yarns' Jawoll superwash for the cuff, toe and heel. You can purchase these awsome yarns at Wichita's newest yarn shop, Twist.

Personally, I am unhappy with the way the gusset connects with the foot so I think I'll stray from the pattern a little on the next foot. I dislike the row of purls that it called for between the ktog/ssk and the main body of the foot.

I still have a ton of "Kansas" left...even with one sock to go... and am toying with Eunny Jang's entrelac pattern for my next project with this colorway (along with some solid colors of Jawoll).

Also...exciting news. My friend Jess dropped of our tickets for the Yarn Harlot! Wahoo!

Back to School

I think my knitting is going to suffer for the next nine months. Darn education.

School starts up again tonight and the courses I'm enrolled for look to keep me busy. As it stands, I am nine hours into my Masters in Resource Interpretation from Stephen F. Austin State University. This is an on-line only program that was developed for the National Park Service Park Rangers. Since the National Parks are spread out all over the States, it is logical to have classes in a virtual classroom.

This semester I'm taking two courses again (in the Spring I can only handle one....work is too hectic during those months). Curriculum Based Interpretation should be familiar enough - I have been customizing my programs to school standards for a number of years. However, Interpretive Planning will be a huge jump for me. This is a concept that I have been struggling with while trying to operate the WATER Center's education program.

Nine hours down, enrolled in six, fifteen and a thesis to go. I'm thinking 2010. Sheesh.

Finished Objects

I finished up the Lacy-edged Tee (knitpicks) and whipped out some booties and the Unbiased bag (kintty). I also lined the Unbiased with a cool piece of fabric that my sis wove some years ago. If feel so strange to actually FINISH something. I need to keep going on this trend.

Busy Busy

I haven't decided why my life is so busy. Do I take on things I shouldn't? Do I get assigned things that I can't get out of? Do I have too many hobbies? Do I have poor time management? Who knows. All I know is that:

• four grants due
• need to complete trail grant project - meet with Eagle Scout this week
• spinning class in Lawrence
• grad school starts back up next week - need to buy books
• Christmas knitting
• finish posters and displays for WATER Center exhibit hall
• RFP for 2007-2008 WRAPS position
• Develop position description for 2008-2009 WRAPS grant

Sigh...it is too depressing to type it all out. It all due on or before 8/31.

Back to work.

Kitty Loooooves Finished Projects

I finished a Mason Dixon Baby Kimono knit in Paton's Paradiso (discontinued...boo hoo). It turned out so cute! I adapted it and made it a little more outdoorsy. The way I knit it, it will probably fit a 12 month old. I'm working on a pair of booties to match.

The funny part happened when I tried to take a picture of the finished project. Kitties love yarn.

Shot #1:


Shot #2:

Shot #3

Ugh.

Babysittin'

Last week we had the opportunity to babysit for Kris and Jess' baby boy, Finn. He, he, he...ya think we are ready for a kid?

Don't eat Spicy Food Before Bed

Sorry for the lack of postings this week - everytime I think I'll have a moment to sit down at the computer, something else happens.

I do want to use this time to pass on some sage advice - don't eat pizza before bed. I realized this long ago but had sorta forgotten what spicy food does to my dreams. I end up having the worst nightmares and Tuesday night was no different. That night I had gone out with the Wichita Paddlers for a Tuesday Night Pizza Meeting at Godfather's. Mmmmm.....pizza.

After a very restless night (I won't go into the horrifying nightmares and freaking out that there HAD to be somebody breaking into the house) and being woken up at 4:30 am by the brat-cat (Typhoon) dropping a wooden toy down the wooden stairs (how did she manage that????), there came a hilarious dream:

Pat and I had just received two little girls in foster care - one was two years old and the other was a baby. We were playing with them in the living room and trying to get acquainted. I asked the toddler their names....her name was "Aloe Vera" and the baby's name was "Crochet."

No pizza before bed. Period.

Room Ready

Although I do not feel ready to have a child...I guess the room is. Over the past couple of months, i sold some of my backpacking gear on eBay to fund our new hobby - parenting. We moved the guest bed out on to the landing and moved the hide-a-bed into the guest room. It means that the guest area is less than private but I have already gotten used to the bed being at the top of the stairs. It does provide guest with access to the TV, though.

I refused to repaint the walls so I had to rip out the wallpaper that I LOVED to put up something less Victorian and more kid-friendly. We are borrowing the bed from Lecia and were given the changing table by her friend Angie. I think we have everything but a car seat, diapers and formula. I figure it is best to see what age we get before buying that stuff. The other side of the room (not shown in the picture) is where the couch is. Above the couch are two big Ikea Lova Leaves - so cool!

Our temporary license came in the mail on Friday - so I guess we are official. Hopefully our Foster Care Worker will call us soon so that we can meet her and start learning the process.

Guess I better start knitting kid stuff!

"P" is for Procrastination

I know I put things off. Most of the time it is not deliberate. Okay...it is deliberate. But, sometimes I'm just busy. Since last Friday, I have prepped materials and supplies for yesterday's Senior Wednesday Program - "Edible Wetlands." The Interns dug the cattails last Friday, I soaked the roots all weekend, peeled the tubers on Monday, ground and dehydrated the tubers all day Monday (my day off) and cooked late into the night Tuesday night. I finally finished my PowerPoint on Wednesday at 10 am.

The program went off without a hitch - it was great. Then I came to the realization that I had a whole NEW program the next day (at 1 pm) about mussels. Luckily it will be with kiddos. I was naive enough to think that maybe these kids would be able to carve their own shell button or something. Last night (when trying the idea out), I realized that shells are crazy-hard. Plan B - scrimshaw. We'll see how it turns out.

15 Minutes of Fame and Over-work-ed-ness

After a long weekend (of painting, moving a friend, seeing old friends, cleaning, knitting, and doing work-work), I am back at work. I have decided a need a clone. I need someone to organize and work with the volunteers, someone to plan and prepare the programs and supplies, someone to answer the phone, someone to write and maintain the grants, and someone to work on the operation and maintenance of the Center. So that gets to what...five clones...which leaves me time to knit and garden and do fun stuff.

Anywho, to add a little more...I mean...to give myself additional OPPORTUNITIES, I have been nominated to the KCKA board (we'll see if I get on) and my friend Jan Brock and I had a spread in the Wichita Eagle on our women's hiking business, Cottonwood Adventures. It looks like I best get back in shape. The last bit of my chocolate bar is still dissolving in my mouth...and now...wait for it....I am on a diet. Damn.

So...if you are chicky looking for a Kansas backpacking trip in October...give me a shout.

Also - here is the link to the Wichita Eagle story (the pictures don't come through, but they also convinced me of a diet in my near future).

Muckin' Around

Friday was crazy busy - at work I had lots of great volunteers helping out with some of the stream maintenance. Vaughn Weaver's interns (Erin and Ashley) worked on one of the water falls for close to eight hours trying to repair the places where the water had undercut the rocks. It definitely looks like some of the big limestone slabs have slipped and shifted over the since they were installed four years ago. If they finally slip off their base, I'm not sure how will get them back up. Anyway - the girls and I hit wal-mart and picked up more rock, gravel and sand for the repairs.

When we got back to the WATER Center, Chris Collins showed up to return the kayaks that he borrowed for the float last Wednesday. It was great to have the interns there to help carry all the boats back upstairs. Chris and I agreed that we need to come up with a new storage systems now that the boats are getting used more.

At 1 pm by teen volunteers (Michelle, Anthony and Sebastian) came in. Michelle and Anthony worked on preparing supplies for one of the kids groups coming next week. Sebastian got in the stream and started gathering up all the aquatic planting baskets for the youth volunteers that would be coming in.

The goal for "Youth Volunteer Day" was to work on the aquatic habitat structures in the creek/stream. Eight kids, ages four through twelve came in and got on their rubber boots. We jumped in the stream and started transplanting watercress into the fountains, helping with the waterfall repair and moving logs around to create better fish homes.

3:00...little kids gone
4:00...teens gone
5:00...interns gone

Whew...no wonder I don't get my office work done!

Twist!

I ventured over to Twist, the new yarn shop, yesterday over my lunch break. (www.twistyarnshop.com) Wait...backup. I went to the bank and withdrew some cash, then I ventured over to the new yarn shop. Oooooooo.....so many temptations! I picked up a Twist logo bag and a prezzie for a friend. I was totally amazed by the awesome "yarn hammocks" that owner Shelley had designed - she so should patent them! After work I went back to knit and chat with some of the KIPpers. He, he, he...its so great to see other people as giddy about yarn as I am. I had forgotten how fun it was to talk gear with knitters.

Rejuvination

Thanks to everyone who has harassed me about my blog post being a year old...it is shameful.

Here is a start of a new round of posts:
Float of the Flying Fish
Chris Collins (http://www.wichitapaddler.org/) and I put together an evening float on the Little Arkansas River. Last night, a dozen of us met at the fire station at 21st and Coolidge to put in. The heat of the day was already dissipating and the shaded banks made the float even more refreshing.
Immediately after putting in, our flotilla saw the strangest sight - one that repeated itself throughout the float. Jumping Shad! The water was like popcorn in a popper - fish jumping out of the water and scattering in every direction. Some even jumped over the bow of our boats. The resident herons and egrets were thrilled as we "herded" the fish in their directions.
Lia Keller took some gorgeous pictures of the trip...see them on http://baskinginbliss.blogspot.com/ and http://knitandfit.blogspot.com/

We Met Alton Brown!!!!

Jessica, Pat, Kris and I went to the small town of Florence last Saturday (20
miles east of Newton) for a fund-raiser a brisket feed where Alton Brown of "Good
Eats" was filming an episode of his new show,"Feasting on Asphalt". He was
there for some bbq joint. I guess the premise of the show is he and some
french chef travel across america on motorcyles stopping off at "good eats"!
Well Saturday he and his crew stopped in Florence. That night the town was
having their anual town brisket dinner at the high school gym. Alton and his
crew decided to stick around and help with the event........so needless to
say....WE MET ALTON BROWN!!! and got our picture taken with him. He is
genuinely a very nice guy. the personality that he portrays on his show is
how he was!!! Along with getting our picture taken with him Jessica had him sign
his autograph on her marriage license! (It was the only paper she had in her
purse. ) His comment was, " This is a first. I've never signed a marriage
license before!" He was so friendly and cute too!!!

Oh yeah and the food was awesome. What a great time!!!!

The Rest of the Office Update

OK, so we got the desk delivered and the office set up (minus all of the junk that will eventually need to go in it somewhere, and we haven't finished the closet yet--though you'll have to come here to see that because it will be too cramped to take pictures). I tried to update this last night but it wasn't uploading pictures correctly so we'll try it again now with the last few pictures I have.

Here is the new closet door we put in.
















This is the pass through that goes from the right hand cabinet into the closet behind it. Practically, this will allow us to store long items and still be able to get at them since the back of the closet will probably be blocked with clothes. Impractically, we thought, someday, a child might like it for a "secret room" type place. Now if we could only successfully breed we might make use of it. Our nephew Tanner loves it, though. Also, that is a monkey hiding in there now. The Puma (Newton's own superhero, who likes to visit people and leave surprise presents when they are on vacation) left this for us a few years ago while we were in Canada. He looks good in here.









Here is the new desk. It is mighty. You can sort of see the carpet in here too. We also go the pictures hung. Yea for us being productve!











Last one. This is just the outside wall with drapes and pictures up. Libby puts alot of stock in things like drapes, so I figured I would share them with everyone.











OK, that's that. Lots of pictures, but considering how long this project has taken I suppose that makes sense. Thanks for taking the time to look it over.

Office Update

So I thought I would post some pictures continuing the process of our construction (oh, and this is Pat, in case anyone cares). This way we have an easy way to show everyone what's been done.
this could be rather long, since we haven't updated this in several weeks, but bare with me.

This is the only process picture we have of the "overhang" that we built to cover up the heat duct that goes through the room. Libby also wired a light into it. My desk goes underneath it in the finished project.















And here is the finished project.













This is the system we used to create the bookshelves. These boxes we built and stained then attached to a 2x4 that we attached to the wall along a stud. Each end box was 1x8 size to accommodate the dining room door and the closet door. The four middle boxes were 1x12 depth.














And here is what they looked like with both boxes up and the shelves put in. There's still plenty of "froo froo" crap that has to go on each of these, though, before it's all said and done.















Here is the row of shelves up. We still needed to finish cutting a few of the shelves themselves--we had to cut each to individual measurements since concepts of "square" and "accurate" were foreign to us.















And here is the finished project with all of the decorative touches added (we may elaborate on them in the future, but this is what they're going to look like for the time being). As you can see, all of this work created JUST enough bookshelf space for the books that I already had. Guess I'm going to have to sort through them and get rid of enough to make room for future purchases. Which is fine. I have some books I stole from Newman's library as a college student that I really don't need anymore. I mean, The Prague Spring? Who cares. And you wouldn't believe the Hemmingway collection I have. You'd almost think I liked the guy.

And our desk is just arriving so I better close this and continue later!