Erica’s Blog

Got an email last night that our friend Nicole (the one whose daughter-to-be is named Mahalia) had been admitted to the hospital with possible preeclampsia.  If she has it, and they let her leave the hospital, she’ll be on bed rest. 

Please pray:

1. That the docs make an accurate diagnosis and take her condition seriously.
2. That they make her stay in the hospital if she’s got preeclampsia b/c she’s not going to get good rest if she goes home b/c of the steep stairs to her apartment and b/c she’s already been fretting a lot.  Just the fretting she’d do, even in bed, would raise her blood pressure.
3. That her husband, Quentin, would use his…um…strong personality to get up in the doctors’ faces and advocate for her.
4. That she’ll be OK and that baby Mahalia will be OK.
5. For me b/c this is bringing back all the feelings about when I was admitted to the hospital at nearly 30 weeks with severe preeclampsia.  Last night, I was starting to have a panic attack about it.  It’s freaking me out pretty badly.

Thanks for the prayers/kind thoughts.  I know Q and Nicole would appreciate it a lot.

So, Kelli on  does a listener poll every episode and plays some of the responses on the podcast.  Each time, she puts all the names in a hat or something and pulls one winner who gets to choose any book from her “library” list (or one of her “fiber finds”).  Well, yesterday, yours truly was the winner!!

One guess what book I chose.  I immediately searched the list for it, and it was there, so I’m incredibly excited for it to arrive on Thursday.  Got your guess?  OK, click now to see if you guessed correctly.

More of the leftovers from Thing One’s sweater.  I bought a ball of each of the contrasting colors for the yoke, so there was a lot left.  This is the Elizabeth Zimmermann square baby shawl, with some texture added for interest.  Not saying right now who it’s for, but I think it will be appreciated.  It still needs to be a lot bigger, though, so I may actually have to purchase some yarn.  Oh, well.

Thing Two:  Cabo Hoodie in KnitPicks Swish Superwash, baby blue and deep ocean colors, US 6’s & 7’s.

The ratzenfratzen thing SHRANK when I washed it!!!  HellOOOOO - If it’s superwash and specifically says “machine washable” on it, should this happen?  I think not!  Those sleeves were originally 3/4 length sleeves, and the sweater came down a couple of inches farther.  The way it is now, it won’t fit her for long at all.  I’m VERY disappointed in this yarn.  It’s really too bad b/c the yarn is REALLY soft.

Thing One:  Drive-Thru in Plymouth Encore (don’t remember the color numbers - four different pinks), US 7’s & 8’s, I think.

The pattern is great, and I’d happily make it again.  I, however, made the mistake of finishing the yoke and the neck ribbing while Thing One was asleep and couldn’t try it on till the next afternoon.  Remember that “nearly done” picture?  Well, it took three more tries after that to get a neck that would fit her head.  Welcome to The Land Of The Big-Headed People!  I ended up having to frog back past the short-row shaping and just past the last decrease.  When I re-knit it, I didn’t bother w/the short-row stuff b/c I was just too fried.   I also didn’t drop down a needle size for the ribbing.  I probably could have, but by that point, I was determined not to have to do the neck a fifth time, so I didn’t want to risk it.

They both love their sweaters and wore them to church yesterday.

Baby gift for Ginger A.  I had to miss her shower b/c it was at the same time as Thing Two’s party, so I gave it to her at church yesterday.  She loved them!  (Yes, the little one is made from leftovers from Thing One’s sweater).

How could I not be intrigued when I saw this on Dani’s blog?  After all, Hubby’s employer’s NYSE stock symbol is “DNA”…

I’m waiting for you guys to tuck me in, and while I’m waiting, I’m doing my knitting.

Who says parents don’t influence their children? 

Phoenix, Cassidy, Jaeda, Ainsley, Thing Two, Becky, Karizma, Thing One

MEOW!  Any time you have to cut pieces of cake and “glue” the whole together w/frosting, it never works quite right.  The ears were kind of falling off, especially the one on the right, but it tasted good.  Thing Two and the other girls loved it.

Animal masks?  I’ll wear the kitty one, of course!

Strawberries, cream puffs, and cake all at once???  Sweeeet!

Thing Two is six years old today!  Hard to believe.  At this time on St. Patty’s Day in 2001, I had been at the hospital for 3 1/2 hours for my scheduled induction.  Labor was progressing along, but I was handling it much better than the first time around.  I was determined not to freak out like I did when I was in labor with Thing One.  Hubby was watching March Madness on the hospital room TV.  Things were going well — her heart hadn’t stopped yet, my blood pressure hadn’t gone through the floor, and she hadn’t bonked me so many times the wrong way that my dilation went backwards instead of progressing.  In other words, it was still about 10 hours till we realized we were going to have to do a c-section.

Anyhow, she woke up at 7:00 this morning, dying to open her presents from us and Grandma & Grandpa.  We put her off till Thing One woke up and a little past that.  At 7:45, we bit the bullet and got up (but we went back to bed afterwards).  Here she is with her favorite gift:

Birthday breakfast of champions:

At 2:00, all her peeps are coming over for a party.  At 5:30, the family’s coming over for a laid-back dinner of a bunch of her favorite things (ribs, shrimp, bread, cake).  I’ll just post the highlights here.  The full set of pictures are going here.

Juuuuuust in case, I didn’t cut the yarn after I bound off the neck.  I’ll have Thing One try it on when she gets home from school.  I’m only about 80% happy with it, but at this point, I’ll settle for that. 

First off, parent/teacher conferences and report cards were this week.  We’re SOOO proud of the Things!  Thing One brought her math up from a B to a B+.  Her spelling slipped from an A to an A-, but she’ll get it back up.  She still needs to work on staying on task and finishing her work quicker, but she’s really doing a lot better.  Thing Two doesn’t get real grades, but in many areas, she’s already progressed to where they expect the kids to be at the end of the school year.  Pretty cool.  We had to laugh when we saw a page where the teacher tested her understanding of rhymes.  The teacher would say a word, and Thing Two had to come up with something that rhymed.  For the word fin, her rhyme was sin. Hee, hee!  I’m sure the teacher got a nice giggle out of that one.

It never ceases to amaze me how different the Things are from each other.  They both love Barbies, Polly Pockets, the same computer games, etc., but they still have different strengths.  Thing One’s never been that into learning how to ride a bike.  Honestly, the kid is eight and a half years old, and she still uses training wheels and is a bit nervous.  Today, Thing Two asked if she could try it out, and Thing One told her she could have it.  I spent 10 minutes or so with her, helping her try for a bit.  Half an hour ago, I made the girls go outside to clean up their toys.  A few minutes later, Thing One came running in, Mom, [Thing Two] is riding the bike ALL BY HERSELF!!  Uh, yeah.  They’re different.  Perhaps we’ll buy the Things bikes this spring instead of getting a new futon….