On Friday, I managed to finish off the second sleeve for Thea. I was left with two whole skeins/balls and 5 partials. The partial from the back was about a third of a ball (I should have weighed them and then I'd have known!), the two partials from the sleeves are about a quarter of a ball each, and the two partials from the fronts are about a yard or two each.

I looked at the instructions for the collar (the last piece!!!) and decided that I could do it with the partials and not have to break into a complete ball (hadn't thought about what would use for seaming), just a little spit-splicing and I could have very few useless left overs from making this sweater.

I bet you can guess where this is going based on what I told you so far and the title. Well, hahahaha... fooled you!! I haven't run out of partials yet and I'll probably be fine in terms of finishing the collar with what I have left.

The stupid super don't that I did was much more dumb. In gathering my partials, I also somehow had a bunch of needles in the area. To be exact, there were two 7 circs (one good, one bad), one 6 circ, and one evil 8 circ. I set aside the bad 7 circ (too long and curly in the cord). I was careful to set aside the 6 circ. Somehow, I didn't notice the 8 circ and thought it was the good 7 (who was hiding). I swear I checked three times to make sure I didn't have the 6 circ, and then somehow magically the 7 turned into an 8, and I knit and knit and knit Saturday. I happily had half of the collar complete and looked forward to knitting the other half during the Super Bowl. I thought the gauge seemed a little off, but I ignored it. As I packed up my knitting for the Super Bowl party, I glanced at the needles and thought they looked wrong. And yep, it was an 8. So I had to rip out all of that work and start over.

So during the Super Bowl, I managed to get only a few rows beyond where I had been. Sigh. Fingers crossed that I can finish it tonight and have a new sweater by later this week!!!

I'm addicted to watching the pandas. I just can't stop. The two pandas at the National Zoo are quite active in the morning. Right now, one is playing with some kind of tube. As I was watching, the pandas were initially outside, and then one went up to a door, made a sound, and then the door opened and the panda was allowed to go into the indoor portion of the habitat. Very cool!!!

When I first started watching this morning, the two National Zoo pandas (the top two screens) were both at the mutual door sniffing each other and trying to communicate. The one on the right (I think the male) started marking the territory around the area when the one of the left (I think the female) left to rest on that log you see in the picture. The male then paced back and forth in the same area along the fence trying to get the female's attention.

The screen at the bottom is the Atlanta Zoo's sleeping baby panda. I watched the baby yesterday torturing its mom as she tried to eat. Very fun!!!! I love how relaxed he is laying on that branch.

Oh my gosh!!! The one panda (female I think) was just standing on her hind legs at a door (she went over to the door right after the other panda went to a different area... they seem to be separated but in adjacent enclosures so they can hear/see/smell each other) and started dancing. Oh oh!! She was dancing because she knew that door could open to let her back outside, but the keepers weren't paying attention and opening it.

I know it is blurry... it's a picture of the computer screen of a streaming video... but you can see her standing at the door.

Here's a little video of her getting them to open the door (again it is blurry, but still cute!!)

(Good thing I muted the TV, so you can't hear that I'm watching Maury in the background!!!)

Ok, one last panda thing... so the two pandas were sent (sorry, Fex-ex-ed) back to China yesterday. (Yes, I was watching the live feed of the Fed-Ex plan at Dulles Airport until I had to go to class... the truck carrying Tai Shan arrived right before I had to go to class). I was reading about them and came across this story. China is looking for a Chinese tutor for the pandas. Because the pandas were born in America and only know English, they will need Chinese tutors to teach them Chinese. Hahaha!! How cool is that?? That's something I would have never thought about in the pandas returning to China. Of course there will be food differences (apparently there are plans for slowly transitioning them to Chinese diets), but I had never thought about the language issue.

Ok, must stop watching pandas and do some work today!!!!

I just can't get enough pandas.

Have you seen this site: Panda Cams? It is all the panda cams in the US!! There's two from the National Zoo, one from Atlanta, my favorite from San Diego, and there's one from Memphis (although that isn't working right now).

From what I've seen today, the pandas at the National Zoo just eat and eat and eat. The pandas at the Atlanta zoo (there's a mama and 1.5 year old) are soooo entertaining. The mama keeps trying to eat and the baby just wants to play!!!!

I'm not a breakfast person. I mean, I like bacon and eggs and pancakes and waffles, but not first thing in the morning. For brunch, lunch, or dinner... all good. But what to eat when I wake up in the morning?

For some time, I've basically just skipped breakfast and eaten nothing until lunchtime. I still do this sometimes on weekends. I realized, however, it was becoming more difficult to get through the day without breakfast, especially when my stomach would start growling during class and then I'd be so ravenous after class that I'd just raid the vending machine. Not good.

Even worse, about two weeks ago, I got up in the morning and decided to work out. I had picked up Jillian Michael's 30 Day Shred on the cheap at Target. I put the DVD in, and started on level 1, which is a 20 minute workout involving strength training, cardio, and ab work. I made it through about 7 minutes at which point I had to lay down on the ground and not move until the DVD finished. And even then, when I sat up I still felt sick to my stomach. Apparently, my body was revolting against exercising with no food.

I like to exercise in the morning before work, but I don't like to eat breakfast, but I need food before working out. What to do?

On a website, I followed a link to Alton Brown talking about smoothies. He talked about how he has a smoothie for breakfast, which keeps him fulll and full of vitamins and other healthy stuff. His formula for smoothies is purple juice (pomegranate, acai, or grape), dairy product (he uses soy milk), and various frozen fruits (he combined 3 berries and a banana). I thought to myself, maybe smoothies would be a good choice. Since I had been forcing myself to eat a piece of toast, I hoped that smoothies would be more enjoyable.

The key to smoothie making for breakfast (from Alton) is to assemble the smoothie components the night before. Let them mingle in the blender jar over night in the fridge. Blend in the morning and enjoy.

Two mornings and two smoothies later... yum yum yum!!! Monday morning I had a pomegranate juice, vanilla yogurt, strawberry, raspberry smoothie. Tuesday morning I had a pomegranate juice, vanilla yogurt, peach, blackberry, lime smoothie. The smoothies are tasty and I actually enjoy drinking them in the morning. The only downside is the sudden wake up that is forced by the horrible noise of the blender.

What else should I try in my smoothies?

When I got my own office, I thought it would be nice to have a little basket of knitting for any down time (ha!), stressful time, or just to sneak in a few rows. I didn't want it to be a project that I was dying to finish or even working on constantly. Just a little something to do a row here or there.

I randomly tied together the loose bits from the Circle of Friends baby blanket that I made back in 2007, and started on a scarf. The yarn is KnitPicks Crayon so very soft and squishy. Quite nice for a scarf.

But alas, crayon scarf sits in her basket untouched. Because while there is stress, there are rarely free moments (that aren't taken up by web surfing). Maybe this post will remind me to "waste some time" knitting at work instead of reading (or writing) about knitting at work!

On Friday, I decided on the short-sleeves. Which are not short-short sleeves, they are elbow length sleeves. I think that those length sleeves will be most comfortable and will look cute. Looking on Ravelry, only one other person (one out of about 7) who made Thea went with the shorter sleeves and it looks really cute.

I started the sleeve on Friday afternoon (instead of doing work... this is why I don't like Fridays off... so hard to do work!!!!). If I had knit more this weekend, I probably could have finished off both sleeves, but there was important napping, cooking, and baking to be done this weekend (did I mention the napping?!).

So I'm 15 rows from completing the first sleeve. The second shouldn't take very long. Then it is on to the seaming and collar. Wee!!!

I'm 31 rows from the should shaping (which is about 5 rows of knitting) from finishing the front pieces. And in 6 rows, I get to cast off a huge portion of each front, so I'm hoping that I'll be able to finish the fronts later tonight. I've been getting about an hour of knitting time each night, so I think it is doable.

The question now is whether to knit the long sleeves or the short sleeves. I purchased the kit for the long sleeves so that I'd have the option of doing either. Here's a link to the pattern: Thea.

I'm currently leaning toward the short (elbow length) sleeves because I'm a little concerned that the sweater might be a bit itchy. Not intolerably itchy, but I often find that my forearms can be more sensitive to that and I don't often wear or have long-sleeve shirts to wear under this sweater. On the other hand, long-sleeved would be warmer. But would take longer to knit...

Thoughts??

*Remember on Arrested Development when George Michael found out what "fronts piece" meant. Heehee!!

I don't like slips. I find them uncomfortable and bothersome. To me, a slip has always been a small white skirt that pinches at the waist with some stupid, pointless and extremely itchy lace. The few I've owned have always been too tight in the waist (but the bigger size is too big) and the tightness of the skirt restricts your movement even if your real skirt is nice and flowie.

Sometime in late middle school, I convinced my mom that all the girls were wearing spandex shorts under their skirts instead of slips. And since that time that is mostly what I did through high school and college. (In high school in particular, I was terrified of falling down and my skirt flying up and everyone seeing my underwear, so spandex shorts seemed a good idea, though still not entirely comfortable.) By the time I got to graduate school, I was mostly in a jeans uniform and not wearing many skirts or dresses. If I wore a skirt or dress, I made sure it was one that wasn't see-through enough to warrant a slip. (Hence, a lot of denim skirts and black skirts.)

As much as I'm loving my clothes from Athleta, they run on the sheer side of things. One dress that I wore to work several times last semester, I was worried about, but lessened my worry a bit by wearing tights (still not the most comfortable option... I really hate anything that's tight around my stomach/waist... I would have never survived the days of girdles). For x-mas, my mom ordered me this dress (in the purple). It is cute, fits well, and I love it. But you can guess the problem...

I didn't want to return the dress and I didn't want to just hide it in the back of the closet. I decided that it was time to be a grown-up woman and get a new slip and just suck it up. Two weekends ago, Kevin and I went to Kohl's to spend some gift cards during a 30% off coupon weekend. I got several new tops and a new pair of jeans. Then before I went to find Kevin, I walked over to the underwear section to find a slip.

There weren't many options, but I found something similar to this. I guess to get technical with the terms. I though slips were pettiskirts or half slips; I never thought about chemise or full slips. I got a black one that it reversible depending on if you need a deeper neckline in the front or back. Obviously, the chemise works best for dresses, but my see-through problem is with dresses, not skirts, so this is fine with me.

I was so excited when I bought it (I know, silly to be excited about paying a chemise slip) that when I got home I immediately tried it on with the dress. I wore it yesterday under the dress (since even though it was rainy yesterday, it was quite warm), and it functioned perfectly. I hardly even knew I was wearing it. I may just have to get another one!!