Stuck in the snow

Almost forgot to post this video from our trip to Glacier...

Deep snow + short legs = a good laugh :)

Glacier National Park and Knitting Too...

I finished my second knitting project today-hizzah! As you can see, it's an ever-so bulky head warmer. I wanted to practice making something on circular needles and at the time, I couldn't find my hat, so a head warmer was the perfect solution! I was also practicing a stitch called a seed stitch, which is pretty cool, but it didn't turn out nearly as well as I wanted to because of the multi-colored yarn. I've already started my next project; a hat for Aaron. More circular knitting, but this time it actually needs to turn out well. 

This weekend, Aaron and I took a trip to Glacier National Park to check out the mountains and we couldn't have picked a better day to go! The skies were clear, the sun was shining, the snow glistened and I didn't freeze to death! :)  Here's some pictures from our adventure.

Nice pic by the mountain and stream (and I even got Elphie in this picture)

Picturesque enough to be painted by Bob Ross...

We had a wonderful day :)

The Big Sky State

Montana. The Big Sky State. I'm chilling in a hotel room in Montana. Cool.

It's really not too bad. It's just a really small town. Aaron and I arrived in this small town in the evening on Sunday and I've been relaxing, job hunting, exploring the town (did that in about an hour), and have been knitting to stay sane. Elphie and I have not been having good days here in the hotel until today because for some reason she enjoying peeing everywhere in the hotel while she's on her way out to go to the bathroom. Today, she's been really calm and has not piddled anywhere inside the hotel, so it's been a good day. Score!

Aaron and I hang out when he gets home from work and we've gone out to the local restaurants (which have very slow service), tried to go to the hotel hot tub but it was filled with 6 middle aged men. Awkward., and played Mario Brothers and Duck Hunt! It's been a pretty good time. We've also done some adventuring including going to explore a dam that was about 30 or 45 miles away to discover that it was completely frozen. Pretty lame, but it was good to get out of the hotel AND we got to see hundreds of antelope meandering in a field. Last night, we explored the next town over and went to Aaron's work to look at some turbines while the sun set. It was pretty rad. Here's a picture from the turbine field. The mountains in the background where the sun is setting are in Glacier National Park.

My first few days here I've been trying occupy my time while Aaron has been at work and came up with nothing. Then I remembered that I know how to knit and played around with different stitches and color changes and I'm pretty excited to make some knit up some pretty sweet stuff. I'm hoping to make a hat soon, but most of the patterns call for double sided needles, which I don't have and neither does any store in this town, so I'm gonna have to make an 80 mile trip to the big city to get to a JoAnn Fabrics this weekend so I can get started. I'm so excited to knit more and get good enough to give my knitting projects to friends and family, I had a dream about it last night. WEIRD. I've been having some wicked crazy dreams lately and last night's dream went as follows:

I came home to find my family murdered (not my actual family, but a family that my subconscious made up as my own). Shortly after, the cops arrived at my home along with the Joker (yeah, from the Batman comics...), and accused me of murdering my family so I up and ran because I wasn't guilty (it made sense at the time). The Joker followed me as I hopped on the Amtrak and headed in the opposite direction of everything I knew. After talking with the Joker, it was obvious that he had murdered my family and I did everything I could to turn him in. I stopped in some town and managed to ditch the Joker so I could talk with the local police department and set up a scheme to capture the Joker. I remember it involved an abandoned old house, a grand piano falling on the Joker and lots of police backup, but don't remember all the details. Once he was put behind bars and I was safe, the police escorted me back to my hometown and a new family, that was ridiculously similar to my old family, but I knew them from school, or something. And I thought, "Wow, now I can FINALLY get back to knitting and now I have people to knit for because I have a new family. I'll start looking up patterns as soon as I wake up from this dream! Golly gee!". This is the kind of dream my subconscious has been cooking up every night this week. 

On a lighter note, I cut bangs for myself! It's still pretty cold and I've always had a big forehead, so bangs seemed like a fashionable and logical decision. I don't want to brag, but I think they look rockin, especially with my long hair. And no, its not nearly as long as it used to be, but I really miss my long hair and I'm excited that I'm getting length back. Hooray!!  Happy Thursday Everyone! :)

Friday Night Update (Man, I am COOL)

This time tomorrow I will be on my to Montana to stay with Aaron for a while before I head back to Cali and then Keys! Aaron is actually riding the train back to here to Washington and he and I will be driving my awesome car to MT. I'm VERY excited to see Aaron, and as fate would have it, his train was delayed 4 hours. Hopefully it will make up some time tonight, but we'll just have to wait and see what happens tomorrow morning! 

I think my next knitting project will either be really awesome socks, a duckie hat, or a blanket. I haven't really decided yet. I guess I'll have to see what yarn I have left and how much there is (I have big feet!) If y'all have any ideas or suggestions, PLEASE send them my way! I'm still very new at this and would love any help I can get :)

You may have already noticed, but I revamped my blog page a bit. I found some pretty awesome art recently and decided to post it up. 

That's about all the news I've got for now. Happy trails and have a good weekend! 

The power of Christ compels you

If you once thought "I wonder how I look when I sleep", I assure you that you are not this hideous...

(yes, that's my dog. yes, she sleeps with her eyes open. yes, she needs an exorcism.)

Lucky Dog

I don't know if anyone has seen this yet. I posted it on myspace and somehow forgot to post it here. This is when Aaron and Lucky became real good friends and Lucky Dog learned to howl :)

EAT IT 2009!!

I finished my first knitting project! BOOO-YAH!! It is a ridiculously long scarf that I enjoy a lot (and Elphie seems to like it too)! AND it only took me about a week to do while watching tv at night! My next project is yet to be determined, but I'll let you know when I do.

The Flood is A-comin'!

I just wanted to give a quick update and let everyone know that I am not canoeing around town...

With 3.5 days of straight rain, which melted all of the snow left over from Christmas, there are parts of town that are very flooded because it's very, VERY hilly around here. But never fear! I live above the flood plain so I was not washed away nor do I use a canoe as my major source of transportation. 

In other news, I'm almost done knitting my first scarf! Hooray! I will post pictures when I am finished.

Also, 2009 is bringing a LOT of change already! I quit my job at Old Navy, because it SUCKED. I couldn't stand getting paid peanuts to fold clothing everyday. If you can, thats cool, but this girl was meant to fry some bigger fish. Literally. I'm heading back down south to where I'm closer to Cuba than a Wal-Mart for the Spring to make better money than I did at Old Navy (crazy, right?), and to get another wicked awesome tan. My start date is February 15th so hooray! And in the meantime I'm going to spend some QT with Aaron and then go visit CHRISTEN!!!!!  I'm pretty excited because I haven't seen her in over a year, which is absolutely ridiculous and I won't let it go on any longer! 

Another point to chalk up so-far to 2009 is keeping up being healthy & keeping off the weight I lost last year. I went running yesterday (something I haven't done in ages) and then did about 45 minutes of Wii fit to stretch out my muscles and whatnot. I'm definitely wicked sore today, but its that good and accomplished kind of sore. If I can keep this up, y'all wont be able to recognize me anymore!

On a completely unrelated note, I'd like to share an odd quirk my pup has developed. Elphie is now potty trained and goes to the door and whines a little when she needs out or is very frantic when pawing at the door to let me know that she's really got to go. But in the past couple of months she'll do those same actions but not because she has to go potty--no. Just because she wants to go outside (it was REALLY bad when it snowed). It was kind of cute at first, but now its just plain frustrating. To prevent this from happening, I monitor her potty habits and won't let her out if she was just outside in the past half hour or so. Her response has been to grunt, huff, whine and look at me with her sad puppy eyes. I don't know where she got it from, but she sure is good at it. Kudos Elphie! but better luck next time.

I hope 2009 has been treating you well so-far! Good luck with your resolutions. Until next time, friends...

Party like its 2009

I hate making New Years Resolutions. Most people, including myself, forget about the resolution by mid-February and find a new reason (spring break, Lent, a vacation) to follow up with their broken resolution. Because of this, I have never made a New Year's Resolution, until this year. And this year is the only exception! I have learned to knit and almost made an entire scarf until I messed the stitching up beyond belief and tore the whole thing apart. Now it is once again a lump of yarn sitting on my shelf. I enjoy knitting and would love to be able to knit things for my friends and family AND myself (I got a sweet book for Christmas with knitting tips and cool patterns. I have my eye on some wicked cool socks...) so I have come up with this resolution to get myself rolling. If I can finish at least ONE thing, it will surely provide the accomplishment and confidence that I need to become a knitting fiend! 

My New Year's Resolution: To start and finish knitting an entire something (sock, scarf, blanket, etc.).

Things I'm hoping to see in 2009:

-A "grown up" paycheck

-No sunburns

-Christen

-STL

-Myself volunteering more 

-Getting rid of stuff I don't use (clothes, books, etc.) and not buy more stuff I don't need

-Living simply so others can simply live

-Keeping off the 10 lbs. I lost in 2008

Good luck with you and your resolutions! I'm gonna go start on mine. Until next time...