babies abound!

Ok, so I haven't blogged in two weeks. I didn't have all that much to say!

In the meantime, the list is up to FOUR duckies to make! Congratulations to:

  • Viveka and Brian Ryn on the birth of their son Gabriel (Feb 20th, which also happens to be Auntie M's birthday! Easy to remember!)
  • Brian and Stacey Krapf, on the birth of their son William "Max" (March 17th)
  • Dan and Tracy Lader on the birth of their son Ian (April 2nd), and
  • Kevin and Amanda Book, on the birth of their daughter Claire, on April 5th.

(and thank you to all of them for choosing NORMAL names, unlike Gwyneth Paltrow who chose Moses for her newborn son... Moses? What, in honor of Passover? Please. That's worse than naming your kid after a piece of fruit or something. Oh wait... )

Clearly, my friends have been busy! (well, they were busy 9 months ago... ha ha ha) Fortunately, duckies are quick and easy to make. Maybe I should have brought the yarn and stuffing here to Richmond with me... but then again, I'm not sure my boss would be pleased if I were crocheting during the conference. Oh well.

I've started working again on the Olympic scarf again. I'd really like to get it finished one of these days. It's almost long enough to wear... maybe two or three more triangles and I'll stop. I've also continued putting together the squares for my "Friendship Stars" afghan blanket. It's 3x3 blocks (each block is nearly 3 feet wide) now, so I only have 3 more to add, and then the border, and it'll be done!

So, I'm in Richmond, at the Jefferson Hotel. It's beautiful. The art and antiques in the hallways are gorgeous. The only complaint I have so far is that there's no electrical outlet near the desk. Wireless access, excellent. Electricity? Not so much. I don't mind sitting on the bed with my computer, but it would be nice if I could leave it plugged in and sit at the desk for at least a little while. But no. Bad planning on their part. Maybe I'll call down and ask for an extension cord. :) [I used to think it was funny when people I knew travelled with extension cords - now I get it!]

Last night Betty (Boop) came to visit us at mom & dad's house. Betty is the lovely woman I stayed with on my last night in London... she was here visiting friends for a few days before heading to an Oracle conference in Vegas. We had takeout from Moby's... YUM! But of course I was so busy with Betty and the stuff that dad was unpacking from his London trip, I forgot that West Wing was on! Thank goodness for my DVR. [spoiler alert!!] The election is over, Leo McGarry died (had to happen, since John Spencer died in December), and Santos won! It was very emotional. I cried a lot. I know I'll be a basket case next Sunday when they show Leo's funeral. And, Josh and Donna finally got together (last week), which only took... seven years?!

(I just heard on CNN that some Dems in Ohio actually asked Martin Sheen to run for Congress for real... he turned them down. bummer. ) ;)

Comments

Just Me said…
Hmmm, maybe you should mix up the menagerie. A ducky here, a penguin there. I saw someone had made the cutest little dinosaur while I was trapped in a blog spiral yesterday.
8:05 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ciao, Italia!

Image
Eating our homemade pasta at the Villa Third time's the charm, right? After two failed attempts to get to Italy (IXPUG Meeting in 2018, foiled by a Nor'easter, and May 2020 foiled by COVID) , we finally made it!  Friday, May 20: We were not the only ones in the airport with masks, but definitely in the minority. The flight to Dulles was uneventful, but the C and D gates at IAD were *packed*. Lots of school kids going to Europe.  We had the middle and window seats in the middle of the plane, but not in Premium Economy (which apparently didn't hold over from our tickets purchased 2 years ago). Ugh. The guy on the aisle was a fidgeter. And there were so many little kids on the plane! I felt bad - one of them cried for his mommy for about three straight hours. But I was also super grateful for my earplugs and eyeshades. The gluten-free food on the plane was HORRIBLE, btw. Do not recommend.  Saturday, May 21 I will say, when we arrived, it was the fastest passport check ever - E
Read more

I see London, I see France...

Image
Saturday, June 3: Landed in London on Saturday with only 2 hrs of sleep on the plane... which is what happens when you're seated right next to the restroom. Sigh. We dropped our stuff in the apartment and went to lunch with the parents, and then we went off to find the Polish museum - only open the first Saturday of the month. Of course, we went to the wrong tube stop and had to hike a million miles... The Polish gentleman who was the tour guide was a survivor of WWII, I think. He knew everything - and assumed that we knew nothing, especially about WWII, which is not a good assumption to make with our family. Anyway, John and I were totally exhausted after the museum, so we went back to the flat for a while. The 'rents had theater tickets, so John and I stumbled out to find dinner in the rain and ended up having burgers at GBK  in Earl's Court. I think the maitre'd was American. This was the start of my string of bunless burgers (gluten-free was hard to find) on this
Read more

Sixteen Days in the UK - Part 4

Image
Part 4: A little hiccup in our plans  On Wednesday , we slept late. We were exhausted from all of the travel and moving around and driving, so we took a lazy day. After breakfast, we did a little bit of shopping (Boots, Oxfam, and even a yarn shop) and took more photos. In retrospect, we probably shouldn't have started talking about how we couldn't wait to go home.  We had one thing on our calendar that had been scheduled since April - a tour of Castle Stalker , which was the castle out in the lake at the very end of " Monty Python and the Holy Grail ." The castle is a private residence, so they only do one tour a day, for 12 people. We had reservations for Wednesday afternoon. We decided to go see Dunstaffnage Castle on the way to Stalker, since both are near Oban.  Remember when we pissed off the faeries? Well, they were still mad.  We were finally motivated enough to leave at 2:30pm, at which point we discovered a flat tire - the front driver's
Read more