Funny Magic

Getting Ready

This year, on the day after Thanksgiving:

• I avoided any shopping and instead the kids and I went out and bought our Christmas tree.
• Juliet decorated the entire tree all by herself, after I strung it up with lights. (I only had to move a few ornaments higher up in the branches because Flossie is a bonafide Ornament Snatcher/Destroyer.)
• By weekend's end the house was decorated, which makes me feel really, really happy.
• I started wondering if I might be able to knit a sweater for my son by Christmas morning. Am I nuts??? 
• I'm nearly done Christmas shopping, and I did most of it online.
• Tomorrow I'll stuff the Advent Stockings with goodies (chocolate and candy) and fun activities (baking cookies, a drive to look at Christmas lights around town, etc.).

December...bring it on. I'm ready!

I Knit a Pumpkin.

When I finished knitting, it looked like this:

Then I tossed it all in the wash yesterday, ran it through two cycles on hot, stuffed 'er up with polyfill and attached the felted leaf and curlicue this a.m.:

Cute, huh? I could get used to this felting thing...which is good, because I've got some more of Marie's patterns to work through, like this one and this one. Oh, and this one, too. (Have I ever mentioned that I love to collect patterns? Thank goodness for Ravelry and the fact that I can just fave and queue to my heart's content, rather than purchase everything I come across that I might someday wanna knit/crochet/felt.)

(Pumpkin pattern can be found here, with further deets on my Ravelry page.)

Today I wound some yarn so that I could start knitting monsters:

I'm planning to knit each of these as Christmas gifts for my kids this year; I feel some marathon-style knitting working it's way into in my fingers...

Turn the Page :: Tuesday

Last month I read a fantastic book by one of my favorite non-fiction writers:

(From the book description:)

Karr's longing for a solid family seems secure when her marriage to a handsome, Shakespeare-quoting blueblood poet produces a son they adore. But she can't outrun her apocalyptic past. She drinks herself into the same numbness that nearly devoured her charismatic but troubled mother, reaching the brink of suicide. A hair-raising stint in "The Mental Marriott," with an oddball tribe of gurus and saviors, awakens her to the possibility of joy and leads her to an unlikely faith.

Lit is about getting drunk and getting sober; becoming a mother by letting go of a mother; learning to write by learning to live. Written with Karr's relentless honesty, unflinching self-scrutiny, and irreverent, lacerating humor, it is a truly electrifying story of how to grow up--as only Mary Karr can tell it.

I've read both of Karr's previous books, The Liar's Club, and Cherry, and loved them, as well. I really am a big fan of nonfiction, and her writing is honest and harrowing, sharp and gritty; she's up there with the best of the best, in my humble opinion. Not only that, but she's very funny in an ascerbic/irreverant type of way, and not at all self-pitying...plus she writes poetry, too! (I'm looking forward to reading some of her work in that genre as well.) Can you tell I like Mary Karr yet?

Oh, and I found this on youtube - Mary in her own words:

Be sure to stop by and visit Adrienne for more TTPT this week, okay? Okay!

Skellybones Jones

Last week I received something in the mail from my friend and fellow blogger Natalie that totally made my day:

Name: Skellybones Jones. I'm in love.

He keeps me company in the car when I'm driving around town.

Thanks so much Natalie - I know we'll be very happy together!

 

Anyhoo...hello! My presence has been rather "ghostly" around here as of late, but I'll be back tomorrow for some TTPT and hopefully later in the week with a report on what I've been making. At the moment, though, I've gotta make some lunches and wake the kiddos for shcool. Bye for now!