…you know the rest. Things are progressing with the co-op sale, but the house contract negotiation is dragging a bit. No one’s being difficult. It is just apparently a bit more complicated to buy a house than an apartment, in terms of what needs to be in the contract. I hope to have good news on this front soon.

In a fit of optimism I went to my friendly neighborhood hardware store to grab every single Benjamin Moore colorcard from the display. It took a good 15 minutes, and I walked out with an 8-inch tall stack of ’em. So now I’m choosing hypothetical wall colors for the hypothetical house. My hypothetical office/studio/fiber room will be a deep red. Hypothetically.

Now that the work crunch is past (phrase book files turned in on Tuesday, thank you very much) I’m determined to get the toddler sweater finished this weekend. And not a moment too soon because A)The kid’s birthday is tomorrow and B)I’m starting to get bored with the project and anxious to move on to the next.

Immediately after the toddler sweater is done, I need to make that ChicKami for my brother’s fiancee. That should be pretty quick. Then there are two baby gifts that need to be done pretty soon, as well as my mom’s sweater and my brother’s sweater. Oh…and my mom’s boyfriend’s sweater and Billy’s socks… I think I’ve planned too many gifts. I love to knit for my family and friends because it means so much more than simply buying them something. I feel like the real gift is the time I dedicate to making the project for them, the time spent thinking about them and what they might like… But there are so many things I want to make for myself too! I have such a list.

The ChicKami has to be done in time for our shared birthday on the 20th, but after that I’m going to make something for myself. Maybe the monster sweater that I started back in the early spring. It’s only half a sleeve and a few sketches at this point. I call it the monster sweater (it’s based on EPS but I added extra-long slightly belled sleeves and some waist shaping to the plans) because the colors I have planned are Muppet monster colors. I always loved the monsters best of all. Especially Sweetums.