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I'm back in Atlanta - arrived home safely this afternoon. The trip was fun, but exhausting. I always enjoy seeing everyone but all of the running around is not very relaxing. I now need a vacation to recover. :-)

Thanks again to DF Teresa for putting a roof over my head and a place to come home to sleep for those 6 hours every night. I had a lot of fun staying with her and catching up. It has been too long and I know that I will see her several times over the fall and we won't go 7 months again!

Thursday I drove to Middleburg, FL. That was uneventful - which is the way that I like my drives to be - except that I had an awful allergy attack and spent most of the drive sneezing and irritated. This continued after I arrived until I went to sleep. Fortunately the rest of the weekend was not like that. Friday T and I met my parents who had driven up for lunch and a quick exchange of 4 tiny chairs for my nephew, Nicholas. It was good to see them. Then T and I did a little shopping and T had her makeup session for a wedding she's in this coming weekend. We stopped by Knitwitz for a short visit before meeting a bunch of longtime friends for dinner. It was fun catching up but the mariachi band was competing with our volume. I think that we finally won.

Saturday we started early with a trip to the crack book store. I'm a collector of books as much as anything else. I love to read and I guess that I'm just uncomfortable if I don't have 100 books waiting here for me to read. This had to be the cheapest trip to Chamblin's ever for me, so maybe I'm not as sick as I thought. We went to Riverside to meet some of T's stitching friends - Melody and Carrie. I'm in such a stitching slump that I didn't even take stitching on my trip. I have to do something about that slump quickly. I knit while they stitched. It was hot, hot, hot (yes, Africa hot) that day - I even told T that my eyelids were sweating at 9:30am when we left her house. The "house" that we went to in Riverside is gorgeous and right on the river. Here's a few quick pics:

It was too hot to sit on the porch, but I would very much enjoy that!

The St Johns is very wide here, so the straight on view doesn't show much except water. This is the view to the left.
And this is to the right. You can probably tell that a storm was coming.

A side note for those of you who haven't known me for 10+ years - I grew up on the water in Florida and it is one of the things that I really miss being in Atlanta. So looking out at this view reminded me a lot of home.

We packed up in the early afternoon and headed to Knitwitz for Midnight Knit-Insanity. There are so many parts that could be considered insane - the length of time knitting (9+ hours, longer for me if you count the 2.5 hours at Melody's), the getting home at 1:00am, the amount of makeup that had run into my eyes (re: Africa hot) blurring my vision, the laughter and stories told over knitting, the fact that Jennifer produced a miniature accordion right after Tricia complained about being told she couldn't have one, or the # of projects that I thought I would get to during this long knitting day!

I did manage to accomplish some knitting and here's what I have to show for it.

I finished my 3rd medallion. Let the blocking begin!

I turned the heel on the Jill-Walkers.
Sorry about the turned pics, Blogger is not happy tonight.

I completed one more block on the Herringbone Block Shawl

T got to ring the bell for finishing her bauble socks

I had a fun, fun time Sat night - thanks Knitwitz and Co!!

Sunday (after church), I headed over to the beach area and sat on the wonderful sand and put my feet in the wonderful Atlantic for a couple of hours. I wasn't allowed to go further than the shallow part due to my ankle recovery and it was pure torture to be that close and not swim in the ocean - but at least I got what I did. Sorry Heather - no pics...I forgot my camera! Doh. I visited with my cousins and my aunt, had a nice dinner and got home late again.

Now...when is my next vacation? I'm ready....

Gone Knitting

I'm on vacation! Well, technically it starts tomorrow but I know that I won't have time to post anything as I'll be running around (carefully in ankle brace) gathering up last minute items that I was supposed to gather tonight.

I'm heading to Florida - Middleburg, Jacksonville, Jacksonville Beach. Yes, that's right...I said BEACH! I've been looking forward to getting out of town and relaxing and also seeing lots of old longtime friends and some family. My DF Teresa is hosting me (again). I haven't seen T since late October, so I'm really looking forward to spending some quality time with her.

I'll also be attending Midnight Knit Insanity at Knitwitz. That's Saturday evening. So my expectations are high for all of the knitting that I'll be able to accomplish. I promise to have something to show for it! OK, now the pressure's really on.

Keep it real while I'm away.

Jill-Walker Progress

I've made some good progress on my Jill-Walker socks. The pattern is very easy and going much faster now. I did end up doing some additional decreases with the help of DF Heather. I'm excited about turning the heel.
The ruffle is great, but the 224 stitch cast on was painful.

A significant amount of the progress was made while watching FSU baseball over the weekend. Two of the three games played were on TV here in Atlanta, thankfully! It helped calm my nerves to keep my hands busy. The Seminoles are on their way to Omaha for the College World Series. Go 'Noles!!

On Sunday I went to the Fox Theater to see Horton Hears a Who. It was Riley and Melia's first trip to the Fox and they were mesmerized by it, and who wouldn't be? They had a lot of curious questions - how does the man play the organ with his hands and his feet? How are the keys moving on the piano when the man is playing the organ (way over there)? Why is everything gold? They especially enjoyed the "Jasmine" themed surroundings and attempted to count all 96 stars. I can't wait until they are older to take them to a live show. Riley was having difficulty picturing the orchestra pit - why would the musicians sit down there where no one could see them? We all enjoyed the movie as well. Thank goodness we don't have to go to the movies to get news - although that would make the media more discriminating in what they present.

Gratuitous Baby Pictures

My office manager, Marsha, sent this pics to me. I thought that they were cute enough to share - and they show off my handwork.