Birthdays and other exciting and harrowing events.

Well, today is Michael's birthday , and as you can see, he is back in Germany- or we are in the Congo! I have on a hat too ,but I took the picture. We had big plans for he weekend. Michael was supposed to get to Germany on Friday Morning to begin his 4 week vacation, but then this happened http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/africa/03/22/Congo.reut/index.html
and he was unable to get to the airport and was confined to quarters. Our plans to go to friends in the Netherlands and our tickets for a function went right out the window.

Thursday evening I pretty much had decided to go anyway . Friday morning , Patrick woke up with a stomach ache and I decided not to go. Friday midday, Alexander came home from school and asked "Are we going?" As Patrick was feeling better - we jammed some stuff into the car, grabbed the dog and went. The between the lines here is a lot of telephone calls with Anja- tears and stomping about, on my part, a trip to the Dr. for Patrick and Michael not knowing exactly when he would be able to get on a plane.

Friday evening , I went with my friends to our "event" . It is a big charity function- I have been most years for about the last 12. Years ago ,I was on the committee that organizes this event and it is always a highlight in my year. It is a fun evening with food and drink from different countries, a casino, music and dancing and a huge tombola . But.. I prefer to go with my husband. I still had a nice time and Saturday Morning, Anja and Ciara and I went to Aachen to do a little stashing ,that is the other picture , and to hit Starbucks.
Buy the time we got home, Michael had called and said that it looked pretty good to get to the airport that evening and we could pick him up from the airport in Dusseldorf, on Sunday - that's today- his birthday. We manged to greet him at the airport with the dog, a candle in a Starbuck's muffin , paper hats etc... The main thing is he is home , safe and sound. Right now he is asleep on the sofa- OUR sofa in OUR house. You understand.

For those that come for knitting /stitching content- my new stash came from Junghans Wolle in Aachen. The greenish yarn is Opal cotton- I might actually have this already, the other yarn is Regia bamboo, there are some 2mm Addi circs , some beads to try beaded knitting, a book about knitting mittens and gloves- I may branch out, some very short knitting needles- for knitting the fingers, some blank memory cards- to make your own, and the blue box thing is a stretcher stitching frame thingy for stitching projects. I have no idea if the stretcher thingy will work ,but the box was torn and they were selling it for 2.50 , so into the basket it went. You can hardly go wrong for 2.50.
I also managed to get a great massage yesterday- so , although it started out badly , the weekend has turned out pretty well!

More socks

Not only did I finish Su's RR yesterday - I finished these socks , late last night. They are the embossed leaves socks again , but this time in a pale green Regia.

I am up early this morning- for a Sunday ,as it is the first Formula One Sunday of the year and the race is in Australia . I did not get up at 4 am like we used to do. When the kids were smaller and Michael was home , the kids would crawl in bed with us and we would all watch together. This morning I am watching the repeat- by myself. I got up at 8 for the pre-race show and ironed shirts while watching it, and am now watching the race, but it's just not the same by myself. I think I'll go cast on a new pair of socks!

If you missed the "Help" post, please do go read it. Thanks.

Su's RR - done and in the mail

Well, Here is a picture of Su's RR . I stitched the square in the bottom , left hand corner. The picture is totally crooked ,but it is raining and gray and I was trying to get as much natural sunlight on the thing as possible. Then as it was already 11 and our post closes at 12 , I packed it up and hurried over there to make sure it got in the mail today, and only looked at the pix afterwards. But I did get it mailed :-)
Now I am waiting to receive Veronica's from Barbara and hoping for inspiration. Barbara did a fab job extending a square that Veronica had stitched. I am not sure I have enough imagination for this! I will do my best.

Help!! There is a prize involved here!

The book cases are exploding- it's time to buy more books!
Seriously folks- We are going on vacation over Easter - Center Park in The Netherlands. We will be spending lot of time swimming and saunaing ( don't think this is actually a word ,but you know what I mean) bowling and playing ping pong etc.. but I also hope to visit Amsterdam , knit , see Barbara and just relax and read. So here's the thing- I need some book suggestions. I want to make a largish order from Amazon in the next couple of days ,but I don't know what to get.
Many of my favorite authors have new books coming out in June or July , but I need something now! So please let me know what you think I would like.
Please include your shoe size if you would like a to try and win a pair of hand knit socks. The person who recommends the book I like the best will receive a pair of socks knit buy my own two hands.
If you don't want socks but just want to recommend a book - just leave out your shoe size. I know there are a lot of people out there who think hand knit socks are eeeeeee :-)

Edited- Barbara wants a hint about what I like- is will be easier to say what I don't like . I am pretty opinionated . I will never again read Danielle Steel or Stephan King. So no really cheapy Romance, and Horror is pretty much out. Scary and Romantic are both good- just not that kind. Also I won't read L. Ron Hubbard , even though the one sci fi that I read from him was pretty good. I just refuse to support that kind of thing. I think the last book that I just loved was "The time Travelers Wife" and before that it was "The Red Tent". That's all your going to get ,as I want to know what YOU think I would like.

I 'm alive!!

Here is a picture of Su's neighborhood in progress.
Alexander has learned "which" one is the wash machine but not how to use it. He has however learned to change the bag in the vaccume cleaner.
I got a massage last Friday!!!
My husband might be coming home on the 23rd and staying for a month!!! He can celebrate his birthday at home.
My chest no longer feels like someone is sitting on it all the time.
Here are also two picture's of recently completed socks.
And a picture of my feet- not to show you my good taste in sandals, but to demonstrate how nice the weather has been.