Fantastic Friday Morning Commute

I worked 2 hours late last night because I knew I was going to have over 300 bills today, which is a lot and it required that much prep time to make today go smoothly. When I woke up I knew I was well prepared for the day so I woke up and went to work stress free and felt fantastic. I first stopped at my favorite bagel shop to get my favorite bagel sandwich which I always get to go. When I was driving to work there was such a beautiful sunrise and great music coming on in my shuffle.

Anyone who knows me knows I love taking pictures of my commute which is mostly country roads. I was stopped when I took these pictures. Some are a little blurry, but that is because my cell phone camera likes to do that, not because I was speeding by. Sometimes I like that effect even though I wasn't trying for it. Onto the pictures:

On Wasaukee Rd just south of Mequon Rd:


Wasaukee Rd and Donges Bay Rd:


Wasaukee Rd and Brown Deer Rd:


Park Place Rd just off of Bradley Rd:


At my parking spot at work:


And finally, my favorite bagel sandwich:


Now some of the music I was listening to:
The The "Uncertain Smile"


So it seems like I can only get "One Minute" by The Album Leaf as background music to something else and why not the surfer guy. I LOVE watching surfers and I love the sun sand and beach and track is a great background to this clip.


Of course my girl Bek-Jean Stewart, here as lead singer of Eva Trout, these days she is skinny sporting blond hair and is drummer for a band called The Leisure Suit which contains band members of Eva Trout. They all seem to be a close bunch. I really just love Bek-Jean Stewart. All her music, Eva Trout and her solo music, has so much heart. There are the pop songs, but there is some very deep stuff as well. Anyways, LOVE this song:


This song didn't come up in my shuffle, but should have. It was hard to find a decent version with an embed code, but this isn't too bad, performed live by Aimee Mann. "Coming Up Close" by Til Tuesday:


One other picture taken over a week ago that I like:


Hopefully more pictures by Sunday night, I have a great busy weekend ahead.

Fiber Fest!!!

My friend Nicole has my number alright!!! Such amazing gorgeous yarn!!!! Nice and sparkly. Also some soap to try out as I am looking for good soaps to shower with (though the UNSCENTED Dove is working good, but the SCENTED Dove made me near sick). I would eventually like all vegan handmade unscented soap (unless it is a nice natural lavender scent). Anyways, onto fiber goodness to make yarn with. Yay!!!

The group shot:


Individual shots:





Whenever I get around to spinning them I'll post pictures. Will be a while yet.

I never mentioned that I have also entered the realm of dying roving:


I will be spinning up some of this one this week:


Yay!!!

A fantastic walk

Well the plan was to stay at home and do nothing but knit all day, but then I noticed it was getting over 60 degrees and it was sunny out. I HAD to go for a walk. First I opened almost every window in my apartment. mmmm....Fresh air. I went to Garrison's Glen in Ozaukee County on Pioneer Road about 1/2 mile west of Hwy 43. It is pretty much a prairie with some trees around the edge and a few trees on the inside. It looks deceptively small, but it isn't huge either. Really cool meandering trails, almost like a maze. I highly recommend going, it is quite pleasant. All the pictures are here.

Onto the pictures:





I think this milkweed would make great yarn. I should look up to see if it has been done. (yay, someone has done it.)

An Amazing Commute

I really had the most amazing commute tonight!!! A fiery sunset, country roads, and fantastic music!!!! Oh wow!!! So I couldn't really get a picture of the fiery sky because I was driving and a car was riding my tail, so I couldn't slow down or stop a second to get a picture. Anyways, I have a couple pictures I took when I went to the grocery store. After the pictures is a video of the song I was listening to on my way home. It is "Moon Dream" by Desolation Wilderness. The video shows them performing it live, but I listened to the studio version which is a little better. It really was a great soundtrack to the drive.





Video:


Enjoy!!!

Breast Cancer Awareness hat

First off, I'm not really proud of this hat, but the idea was there. I really just used the wrong chart for something the size of a hat. The idea was that I would wear this hat on "wear Pink to work day" for breast cancer awareness. I HATE the color pink, so this was my contribution, but the hat turned out a little too large. When we had our bake sale to raise money for breast cancer I contributed this hat. Someone donated $5 to get it, so I am happy for that. Next year I plan on doing more knitting and NO baking. I will need to create my own hat friendly chart for the ribbon. Not sure yet if I'll do all hats, all dishcloths, or a mix. Right now I am thinking a mix. Anyways, here is the hat (not the best picture).

What is going on

I think I need to rethink my idea of a blog post. Instead of writing a book on everything since I last wrote, just simply write a few things every couple of days or so and offer a couple of pictures (I love pictures).

Today is busiest day of month at work today, so it means I will be working late today. This month I will attempt NaNoWriMo (that would be National Novel Writing Month). Really, I am most comfortable writing poetry and non fiction, so this is a real challenge for me. I'm going to try it. I won't lose too much sleep if I don't succeed, but my plan is still to succeed. I am already way behind because I was trying to do research for things I don't know much about, but a friend suggested putting in "place markers" and then go back in December and do the research for the details. The idea this month is to get as much written down as possible.

Work has been insane, but we won't talk about that. I feel like there is tons more to speak of, but I am drawing a blank this morning. Oh well, later.

Some pictures:
If you listen to NPR you may have heard This American Life hosted by Ira Glass. I got to see him speak and then I met him in person afterwords. What an amazing man.


As I was driving home from work one day:


As I was driving to work one day:


On my last camping trip at Harrington Beach State Park, I am amazed I got this picture, I love it:


Have a good day all.

Plastic, food, and other projects

The plastic thing is a bust for me for now. Sounds like my aunt is doing fantastic. Not really something to do on the spur of the moment for me. This will be an eventual gradual goal to reduce the amount of plastic. I was at Whole Foods on Friday and they even had a ton of plastic packaging including cheese. What a bummer. So how can you get cheese not in plastic? I think some are wrapped in foil if I remember correctly. I may have to explore that. I still did make some changes listed in my last post.

As many of you know I have gone vegetarian, though I am changing that to pescatarian (where the only meat you eat is fish and seafood). I am still for the most part not missing meat, though burgers do smell good. This is part a health decision, but it also more environmentally friendly to stop eating meat, though some would debate that, but it is where I stand. My other issue with meat is not knowing how it was raised. If I absolutely knew the animals were raised in humane conditions it wouldn't be such a problem, but still, I have other reasons for going meat free. I still haven't bought organic cage free eggs. It is so much more expensive, but I do believe this is a change I need to make.

Another food goal is cutting out high fructose corn syrup. I think this will do more for my health than cutting out meat. There is soooo much stuff with the junk in it, even some spaghetti sauces. Thankfully my tomatoes are finally starting to turn color so hopefully soon I'll have enough to make my own spaghetti sauce, sugar free. What is with people putting sugar in spaghetti sauce? It tastes fanstastic without it.

Speaking of tomatoes, look at my beauties:


mmmmmmmmmmmmmm......................

When I was in door county, Gretchen at Whitefish Bay Farm taught me how to spin better on my drop spindle. Here is the result (sorry the picture is really bad, but when I am done with the project I'll get better pictures):

Believe me, it is sooo much better than what I was doing. Even my mom noticed how incredibly much better it is. There is still room for improvement. The yellow/red one is done spinning and I am working on the blue/orange one. Gretchen also told me how to ply using a drop spindle, so I will eventually ply those two different colorways together. I think it will turn out really cool.

I still haven't edited all my July pictures from our family get togethers and camping trip. Who knows, maybe some time before 2010 I'll get to it.