Vests for CIC

We visited my mom over the long weekend and picked up some vests and sweaters she knitted for CIC. They will go to orphanages in Russia. A while back I was gifted by a freecycler a nice stash of beanie babies, so I asked my mom to knit some vests with big pockets. The kids will love the toys.

Henry's Check up

Henry had his 7 year old check up today. He's 7 years and 3 months old. Height 50.2 inches, which is 80-85 percentile. Weight 53 lbs, 50 percentile. Doctor said he's tall and thin, just like his Dad. Now does that mean I'm fat? Henry has perfect vision, something like 20/15 or 20/13. I've been a bit stressed over the years that my child would inherit the far sightedness and lazy eye that runs in my family, though since he hasn't had any issue with vision it's becoming less of a concern. Still nice to know my child is perfect. My mom and I both have extremely low vision in the right eye, and the family theory is that the problem only runs in and through girls. My aunt has the problem but her son is ok; my uncle is ok and his daughter has the problem. If I have a little girl she'd have double the chance under that theory. The doctor pointed out that Henry has dead skin behind his ears and on his knees, which means he's not getting the scrubbing he needs. Did he just say that my son is dirty? Isn't that what little boys supposed to be made of? dirt, rocks, and puppy dog tails .... Better send that boy to the shower now.

Life is a box of chocolate

and every piece is good. Actually I never liked that movie (Forest Gump) and I don't like See's Candy's. Yeah, add those to the "don't like" list. But chocolate is always good. My tenure at Netflix ends in two weeks, whatever was promised, anticipated, is not panning out. I'm relieved that I no longer have to lose sleep over a project that I was supposed to implement, and in reality, never existed. Being a job search addict, here is my chance to hook up with all of my recruiter friends again. One thing I've learned from being called to the last two jobs, there is a good reason a company is willing to pay recruiters the big bucks to fill a job. Don't let that call flatter you. Now I'll have time to write, read my book club books (Hi Lesley), hang out with Henry, cook, take long walks, I might even scrub the toilet if I'm really really bored.

Childhood Memories

Visiting Hidden Villa Farm, Henry poses with a baby goat. Hanging out with Grandpa in the back yard, looking like a real guy. But the legs barely made it off the bench. Henry was about 2. One of those "school pictures" from the day care. Henry refused to be part of the "picture day" but was happy to be the only kid from his class in the make up session, then posed like a "Calvin Klein model" -- in his teacher's words.

Nina Wesson

I knew Nina from the Santa Clara 99 Las Madres playgroup, the year before I went back to work. My husband's cousin was in that playgroup, and I also knew couple others from the Kaiser Mommy and Me class that we were in when the babies were new borns. At that time Nina only had the older two kids, but they were very close in age, less than 15 months I believe. In those days I was having great deal of trouble dealing with just one child, all his separation issues, social issues, potty training, allergies, etc. Nina went around carrying an infant and tending her toddler, made it look like literarily a walk in the park. She always had a great laugh.

Nina Wesson passed away on May 2 at 35 years old, left her husband with 3 young children.

Somethings are beyond comprehension. Why is it always the most loving caring person to leave first? Is it because they give so much to others there is nothing left in the self? Is the world punishing the ones being cared for, that it's time to be on their own? It's not fair.

Belated Happy Mothers Day!

Hope all the moms enjoyed a day just for you! Mothers Day is one of my favorite days -- it usually signifies the beginning of the summer, watermelons, fresh veggies from the farmers market, and day trips to the beach.

We had great plans to visit Davenport on Sunday, but Henry got car sick along the way, so we took a detour and went to Santa Cruz instead. Since we were there, my loving husband let me stop by the Golden Fleece and bought me 12 balls of Brown Sheep Nature Spun sports weight in different colors. That calls for a fair isle sweater for me.

Then we hit the Seabright Beach, it was nice and cool. I took couple of walks up and down the beach, and the guys played badminton and football. Henry loves it when the waves run over his legs, at one point he actually fell down and was being carried by a big wave right into the ocean. He was walking one minute, next thing you know he was in the water sliding away. Luckily dad was right next to him and fished him right up, and the brave child wanted to chase after the wave for his badminton racket that he dropped when he went down. Well, other than that little scare, it was all very very nice.

Pointing Fingers

First there was the Chilli Fingers, woman bought a broken finger from her husband's co-worker and claimed she found it in a bowl of chilli at Wendy's. Got more than her 15 minutes share of fame and good amount of jail time to make everyone happy. Last week the power went out at work and they sent us home for the afternoon. Rare time for me to be home alone so I popped in a DVD and knitted till the guys made their way home. If you have never seen it before, Piano is worth every minute of the quiet time you can find. Beautiful movie, beautiful scenery in New Zealand, the powerful ocean, the depth of the mountain, the feelings are painful and unexplainable. Holly Hunter won an Oscar without speaking a word. Then there was the scene the finger was chopped off. Sunday night in Desperate Housewives the wicked Felicia chopped of TWO fingers to frame Paul Young. Now, that's getting too much.

The Trinket T

This is Trinket, aka, the other dog, the guru, the baby dog, knuckle head, gazilla, mouse, dear, silly goose. He's my sweet baboo, our first born, our practice child before the real one, the reluctant big brother to the pug. Trinket is part Chihuahua and part fox terrier, more precisely, a mutt, and a runt of the litter. He also has unmentionable names related to his heritage. Here is what dad says about Trinket: http://billkeys.blogspot.com/2006/04/guru.html Trinket was born under the care of a dog rescue lady named Cathy Thomas. As a family tradition, our dogs carry their original last name, so we have Trinket Thomas and Bucky Butters. Love the rhyme. Trinket is neurotic. He's often scared, anxious, or simply weired. Fourth of July and New Years Eve are his worst nightmare, when all the firecrackers go off our little pup wishes he's moving to the North Pole. Trinket is our home grown security system, my cuddle bunny, the neutral third party in an arguement. He gives dad "the look" when he's being questioned, before slinking away with his tail tucked between the legs. If a dog has unconditioning love for his human, our love for Trinket is to infinity and beyond.

Not my day to write

Jennifer started a great discussion on her blog about a mother and a wife's role in a family, and I have a burning desire to write about my own experience. But my head is burning from allergies that refuse to go away for two weeks. My eyes are still carrying the hang over from Monday night. Tomorrow, there is always tomorrow.

Curious

How thrill it is to have real writers reading my blog! I'm curious though, how did you all find me? I can't remember if I left a comment on the Blue Ridge Gazette blog. Having worked in software companies in some years, I know I can be tagged in various ways, the non-techie in me still wants to know. Please indulge me :-) Now I need a US map on my wall so I can figure out where everything is. At the moment my cube walls are covered with ad print outs from those flix mailers -- read all about those Pizza Hut ads on the Hacking Netflix site, link to your right. I'm literarily living on those ads, not complaining, the new movie ads are pretty cool and informative for a non-movie-buff.

Blue Ridge Gazette

I found this blog the other day: http://blueridgegazette.blogspot.com/ I've been to the east coast only once -- southern portion of the east coast to be exact, and am terrible at US geography, so I haven't figured out if Blue Ridge Mountains is in the south or as it says on the blog "from Maine to Georgia". But wherever it is, I want to be there. Love the writings on this blog. Wish there is something like that for the California coast, not serious literature which we have plenty, just every day layman enjoying the place we live. Some other places I want to visit: - Vancouver Island, British Columbia - Pug Wash, Nova Scotia (not just for the name, but the name did get my attention right away) - Woolly places in Scottland and Ireland - south of France - Switzerland

Noro Projects Planned

Over Easter weekend I had a coupon from Micheal's for 30% off entire purchase. I went to the Saratoga store and dug out all their Paton's Classic Wool all 9 balls of black left on the shelf. They will go with a bag of Noro Silk Garden I got earlier this year at Stitches. They'll become this sweater from Module Magic. It's called De Colores Jacket, worked in strips and joined together using 3-needle bind-off. There are four strips for the back, two for each front and two short ones for each side. I won't need all 9 balls of black of course, so will have to come up with another project to use them up. Here is my copy of the Module Magic signed by the author Ginger Luters. Another sweater planned with Noro yarn. This one is also from the same book, the pattern is Nevada City Windows and here is what it says in the book: "The squares in this jacket are joined as you work this fun to knit slip stitch pattern. The beautiful colors in the handdyed yarn appear to peek through little windows outlined in black." The yarn is Noro Kureyon and the black is some 100% wool from Newton Yarn Country. It's pretty thin so I might have to doubt it up to get the worsted weight gauge. All packed and ready to go in my African basket.

Some Nice Things to Look forward to

The husband, who has been "borrowing" my Prius so he can drive in the commuter lane to his job in Redwood City, is moving to Milpitas today, which means -- I'll have my car back!!! I'll have my little green engine for the 2.5 mile drive to pick up Henry every evening, and on days when I don't need to drive, I'll be looking at MY car sitting idle in the garage. ahhhh, life is a bliss..... On Friday the husband and I are taking the day off and trek to San Francisco to say farewell to Pixar Animation Studios. We've been going to the share holder meeting every year since we first bought the stock in 1998, which coincides with the conception of Henry. With the upcoming buyout from Disney, the future for Pixar is unknown to say the best. But we will join the last share holder meeting nonetheless and put in our vote for the merger -- me against it emotionally and for the sake of the employees. Coming from my six months stunt in the midst of Veritas/Symantec merger, I don't wish that upon anyone, and I don't have high confidence for Disney to begin with. Back to some happier thoughts. On Saturday I will be in a purse class, Silver Lining taught by the talented Lorna Miser, of the original Lorna's Lace's fame. There is a lot of homework for this class, including a 6x12 swatch. I decided to do two 6x6 mitered squares in a very firm gauge with scrap yarn. Just finished the second one last night and they look pretty cute. Now all I need to do is to find a "fat quarter" for the right size. I'll have to drive to a fabric store, darn it. Our book club is meeting next Monday night and I haven't read the book, The Maltese Falcon. Thanks to Lesley's great idea, I found the movie on Netflix. It's on "short wait", but hopefully I can get it within a week. Next Friday I have a free lunch offer from an advisor at Ameriprise and I can bring up to 10 people. It's at the Todai Restaurant in Cupertino (in Valco Mall, next to Sears). I love the place and going for free is even better, and having my friends going with me will make my day. Anyone that reads my blog is invited :-) Mothers Day is coming. I'm thinking a nice day trip for my small family to somewhere nice and quaint. uncrowded beach, shade trees, small local restaurant ......