36 months of Boo

Dear Boo Boo,

Well m'dear, here we are: yesterday you turned three years old. My overwhelming reaction to this milestone has been hunh? Followed closely by what the fuck? How did this happen?

It's been a big year for all of us, in so many ways. Our last few weeks in Houston were pretty hectic, but you dealt with things with your usual aplomb. As long as you had your a-ni-muls, you were happy. It's still true.

Upon first arriving in England, you were thrown off your game a bit - suddenly you'd gone from hanging with your buds all day to hanging with Mama. This resulted in a bit of an exaggeration in your tendency to separate the world into "Mama" and "not-Mama", otherwise known as "acceptable persons" and "unacceptable persons".

Thankfully, you've decided that other people are also acceptable, which had done a world of good for my sanity.

When you went back to nursery in September, it took you a while to get used to the idea again. Fair enough, but I'm happy to see that now that you've started going to the same school as your sister, most mornings you ask wistfully "Can I go back to Devil's school today?"

Unlike Devil, you are sticking to your Texas-accent guns with a vengeance. Some of your vocabulary has shifted (rubbish, toilet, trousers), but you still say "Mama, I ca-yaan't" with a lovely Southern drawl. The one word that has snuck through, however (your grand-paternal aunties will be thrilled to know), is to-mah-to. Which, given that up until a few months ago, those red things were te-ne-moes, is only fair.

You've become quite the amazing traveler over the past months, happily jaunting off to Scotland, France, Switzerland, the Peak District and North Africa. You've thankfully grown past the stage of not being able to sit still for longer then 25 minutes, which makes plane/train trips with you much more enjoyable.

Yesterday, we had a very low key party for you (poor second born!). T and M (our first friends in the UK) came over with their parents. You made animal masks and ran around the house screaming while we had tea and tried to carry on semi-normal, grown-up conversations. I fed the four of you sausages and to-mah-toes and carrots, and you happily blew out the candles on your (personally decorated) cupcakes. It was a lovely afternoon, and though you were a bit grey by bedtime, you were still your usual cuddly, snuggly self. And when we were putting you two to bed, you chattered blithely away through Daddy's and my's stories until suddenly you fell quiet. Sound asleep in mid-sentence. Well done kiddo.

Much love,

Mama

PS - Sorry about the blanket baby. One of these days I'll get it finished, I promise.

Do you hear that singing?

I think it's the fat lady. Sadly, that means that

there is no way in hell I'm going to be successful at this Knitting Olympics challenge (again*). I'm halfway through the second of three pattern repeats (~40 rows each), and it's just not going to happen by tomorrow at 7:30 pm. I'm going to finish at some point in the near future next week, but given that I ended Thursday behind where I'd started that morning**, I was pretty much doomed. Couple that with a stomach bug and collapsing unconscious at 10:00 for the last two nights, and that's all she wrote.

But what she's been writing is awful pretty.

Neck steek shaping up

Close up of front

I can't wait to finish this and actually wear it, although I'm hoping that a good blocking will take care of the massive amounts of stitch wonkiness. It's started to warm up quite a bit over hear in southeast England, so I'm hoping it doesn't become summer before I get to finish it up. Congratulations to all the Knitting Olympians who were successful!

* Winter 2006: Adamas, my first lace project, and I had only about 10 rows to go by the end. Closest finish yet.
Summer 2008: Veil of Isis, which, as we all know, finally got finished as a Christmas present in 2009.
Winter 2010: as you see it. Oh well!
** Those pesky armhole decreases got left out, so I got to rip back about six rows on the train on my way home on Thursday. Not.A.Happy.Camper.

So about those shorter rows...

Shorter rows are apparently not enough to make me knit any faster. That's the bad news. The good news is that I've started the armhole steeks, so things are moving along. I've got one color that is starting to run a little thin, but I think it will be ok. That's the good news. It's still quite likely that this is not going to be done by Sunday evening, but so be it. It will be done before the end of the Winter Paralympics on March 21st (thanks to aquaphilic for the heads up!). Maybe even before the end of the first week of March - there are secret projects lurking in the wings that must be done ASAP, and they will pounce at 12:01 am on Monday.

So how's everyone else's Olympic knitting going*? Any winners yet? Or are we all in the same boat?

* I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Magdalena Neuner's Olympic knitting has taken a back seat to kicking ass in biathlon. But that's just a guess!

Hold the phone!

Now, when I was blathering on yesterday about rows/day and such like, why did none of you point out to (math-challenged) me that (ehem) the Closing Ceremonies don't actually occur until Sunday? Here I was thinking that I only had five days to go and was going to have to forgo basic hygiene to get this vest done. But as of right now (bedtime on Tuesday), I am on row 68, have started the neck steek, and have only 104 rows to go on the body. However, it seems that I am unable to do more then around 15 rows a day: today I was home with Boo (who managed to barf all over me and herself within seconds of my getting dressed this morning) watching Dumbo and Angelina Ballerina all day, and I still only got 17 rows done. WTF?

104 rows/3 days = 32 rows per day. Fuck. However...the rows are going to get shorter with the neck shaping, right? Hmmmm...further updates tomorrow evening.

58 rows down, 121 to go, 5 days. Hunh.

I think it's time to declare sleep obsolete, meals that include anything other then cold cereal and nuked baked beans a luxury, and stock up on the coffee and chocolate. But definitely not the wine - after knitting row 19 for the fifth (!) time, I've come to the conclusion that I can not knit fair isle and pay even the slightest amount of attention to anything else. But,

I still like the colors, and it's moving along. I've finished the waist shaping, and am onto row 36 of the chart. Which has 70 rows, 48 of which need to be worked a total of three times. 121 rows/5 days means 22 rows per day. That doesn't include the neck and armhole edgings. Hunh.

Ok, 121 rows/3 days means 40 rows per day. Seeing as how I got from row 19 to row 35 last night in a couple of hours, it's not impossible. But, let's be honest, it's also probably not going to happen. Hmmm...I think I may be lugging six balls of yarn and a big bag on the train with me for the next few days. Stay tuned...