Yes, I'm still alive!

Everything's fine here, just taking a little break from several things for the past month. I'm in the midst of reading The Happiness Project and have been working to focus on what's right in front of me (as in, playing a board game with Sydney when she asks me to rather than blowing her off because I'm busy surfing the Ravelry forums).

It's an interesting book, BTW. I'm trying really hard not to be too annoyed by the author, because I think anyone would be mildly annoying when laying all their faults bare for the world to see. When I get past that, she really has lots of great suggestions about how to improve your satisfaction with life. After a fall and spring of really struggling with fatigue and general grumpiness, this is something I really need. I'm hoping that not only will I put some joy back into my family life but also my work as well. It needs a little joy! Still trying to put burnout behind me here.

So what have I been up to in the past month? The quick run-down:

• Drove to California for spring break and had a blast at Legoland/Disneyland with the kiddos.


• Cut off all my hair (seriously - it's Winona-Ryder-in-Reality-Bites short).


• Started Sydney in T-ball, which she LOVES (and is quite good at, unlike her mother). With 2 games per week, we have lots of chances to cheer her on. Her team sponsor is Voodoo Donuts, which is the icing on the cake, considering the number of donut fanatics in this house.


• Taught Sydney how to ski (she's a natural - just like her mother). Still trying to get Owen up on the mountain.


• Hired a house cleaning service to come in every other week. Realized that it's worth every penny, because if it didn't get spent on cleaning, I'd have to start spending it on therapy!


• Took Sydney and my mother-in-law to see the Cirque du Soleil show in town. It was absolutely fantastic and so fun to see it through Sydney's 7-year-old eyes. She couldn't believe what she was seeing!


• Celebrated Owen's 5th birthday. I can't believe he's so old - it seems like just yesterday we brought him home from the hospital.


• Welcomed our first niece, Anna, into the world. I got to spend several hours with her and her mom at the hospital helping them through their slightly rocky start in the nursing department. Parents are now sleep-deprived but doing as well as any first-time parents do in their first month home!

I also got a few work-related things done, including a couple different pairs of socks for a couple different publications (which you'll see sometime in the next year or two). For Gardiner Yarn Works, I finally got my new summer sweater design released:







Three months after I first showed her to you, Valencia is finally finished! Click the button above to get your own pdf copy (this version includes the XS-XL sizes - the plus version is still a few months away due to my extreme procrastination issues and current inability to get excited about doing any more grading of anything right now...).

My latest goal? Not to let 6 weeks pass before posting again. I need to stop letting perfect be the enemy of good and realize that I don't have to have a bunch of pictures or something seriously enlightening to say in order to post. Photos have been an issue - I bought a great new pocket camera that gets me to take more photos, but it's having issues talking to my laptop. Sort of hard to post photos when they refuse to upload to my computer! I'll tackle that issue next week - right now, I'm off to tackle some deadline knitting and nurse my cold by watching The Celebrity Apprentice in bed. Good times!