What a Headache!

After the initial bouts of nausea, light-headedness and falling down, I am happy to report that it is mostly gone.

I am unhappy to report that Clay yelled at me. (I say "yell"; he says "spoke to firmly." I say, yelling is in the ear of the hearer.)

This time, it was after I had a little collapse onto the family room floor the night before Thanksgiving.

"You have got to slow down," he yelled/spoke firmly. "Things don't have to be perfect. You do a great job. Thanksgiving will be great no matter how clean the house is."

When I told him that all this yelling was making my head hurt worse, he added this kicker:

"I need you to take care of yourself."

And as usual, (which really ticks me off) he was right: we had a nice dinner and a good time together, even though the steps weren't swept and I saw a couple of places I missed dusting.

So, I am happy to report, I took his advice, and slowed down the day after Thanksgiving. We sat on the couch, ate leftovers and watched movies.

And I got a chance to knit a little. Here are the results:

I got the back of Tommy's Accordion sweater done -- 18" of 4x4 ribbing. The width is supposed to block out to 17", but this yarn is really springy -- I am hoping for the best. I have about 5" done on the right front.

This is a feather and fan scarf, using the yarn I got from Anno in the Halloween secret pal swap -- Freedom Spirit. I think I will call this my "24" scarf, because we watched about 5 episodes of season 4 of 24 while I worked on this. (I don't know how anyone can watch that show during the regular season, and wait a whole week to see what happens. Will got up extra early yesterday morning so we could watch an episode before he went to school. Yes, we are addicted, and we have Clay's boss to thank -- she couldn't believe we didn't watch 24, and has loaned us all her DVD sets.) 24 is the Lays Potato Chips of TV shows.

Also, I love the stitch pattern so much, I couldn't stop knitting. One skein didn't make the scarf quite long enough, so I started in on skein #2 but couldn't quit (I blame Jack Bauer) -- the scarf is about 24" too long. I think I will rip back some.

My lovely model agreed to try on Andrew's hat and fun fur scarf. The hat is made from Paton's SWS. I just sort of made up the pattern: I cast on 88 and knit in the 4x4 rib pattern like the sweater, but then I got a little bored and added the cable. Here it is a little closer up:

I really love this yarn. I don't know if it's the soy or the silk or the combination, but it just feels great in your hands and knits up beautifully.

On the other hand, I'm not so crazy about fun fur. I did a lot of scarves, ponchos and purses when it first came out, but I'm a little tired of it. But I was asked to make another one for a little girl at school, so here's what I hope will be my last fun fur scarf in St. Ambrose colors. (Yesterday, I did find some sparkly blue and gold yarn at Hobby Lobby, marked down to $1.99 from $8.99 -- I'm thinking about scarves and hats for my two favorite piano students for Christmas. Novelty yarn is a little more tolerable when it is on big sale.)

Saturday morning, Clay and I went to Indianapolis for the funeral of the mom of our good friend, Kevin. Elinor was 90 years old, mother of 6, grandmother, great-grandmother and great-great-grandmother. The Mass (at Little Flower) was a loving tribute to her.

On the way home, we stopped for a sandwich at a drive-through, but called Will (who had wrestling practice that morning) and told him we went to Shapiro's, just to hear what he would say. We are evil parents.

And finally, a wrestling update: the team wrestled last week at Bloomington North. Will did better, but lost. He was disappointed in himself, but is determined to get the first freshman varsity win this year. He has another chance tonight, when they wrestle Hanover here at home. Then, conference matches this Friday and Saturday. With all these meets, I just might get that sweater done by Christmas.

peace