So, today was that day of the year, and it was a particularly frightening one. See, my parents had their thirtieth wedding anniversary this past March. And considering that I was already on the way when they got married, that might tell you just how old I am now. And that's kinda scary.

Not so scary is the fact that Mom and I went on a bus trip down to Schaumburg, IL with a local yarn shop today... to go to Stitches Midwest, a super huge knitting/crochet/fiber arts convention. We spent half the day yarn shopping. It was really, really awesome.

I don't have nice quality pics just yet (it's completely dark outside, and I have pretty lousy lighting in my room), but this is my haul.


Central would be my Japanese amigurumi book - the patterns are absolutely adorable! Clockwise starting with the kinda shiny purpleish one to the right of the book, we have a variegated laceweight tencel, a free brown New Zealand wool/possum blend, brown crochet thread with a sparkly blue thread running through it, two skeins of Noro Sekku (laceweight), laceweight wool (inside), pink, gray, and white sock yarn (outside), a purple, white, and bright lime green sock yarn, and a rainbow Zauberball (long color repeat German sock yarn wound into a ball).

Mom got some recycled sari silk, a bag of heavily discounted brown silk balls, a super fine lighter-than-laceweight flax/something blend, and a free wool/possum blend like my brown one, only gray (there wasn't much left to choose from when we got there).

So yeah, that was how I spent this rather significant day. Oh, and the entire bus sang to me on the way home. *blush*

I just realized haven't posted much of anything crochet wise since my last block a day update. I'll probably miss something, but I'm about to share most of the stuff I've done since then. ^_^;; Which went from scarves (just a couple), to hats (mostly slouchy beret type ones), to doilies and doilies worked in heavier yarn that can be used as lap blankets. Seriously, doilies. They're actually kinda fun, especially in brightly colored sock yarn! ^_^;

So, without further ado, hit the cut for lots and lots of pictures.

( cut for way too many pictures )

So, as I just mentioned in my latest Hanafurirou post, translation helps me get my mind off sucky real life stuff. And it's true. Writing and crochet do, too. And podcasts, and anime, and drama cds... and anything that keeps my mind from wandering to its own thoughts.

I'm not going to go into details, since I've managed to keep myself from tears for several whole days now, and I'd like to keep it that way. The short version is... we had to give Kia, the new doggy, back to the shelter on Monday. There was a nasty fight Sunday night. Mom and I just couldn't take more of it (especially the thought of either Kia or Zora getting seriously hurt one of these times). Dad, the idiotic asshole with no fucking brains that he is, just made it all worse, and there was no way we could get him to stop. So we took her back, even though she was an absolute sweetheart. It wasn't fair to her, or Zora.

I blame Dad, not the dogs, and at the moment I never plan on forgiving him. Ever. (As if I didn't have enough reasons to hate him these days...)

The end. >_<

Been a while since I last posted any Hanafurirou. Sorry about that. So here's more! (Translating helps me get my mind off sucky real life stuff. ^_^; )

This is just a little scene that is the next part of chapter 2. The next scenes are pretty short, but I have this one done, so here it is. It's been some years since the last scene, and Kichou is now 18... and having his debut. And, well, Kagerou is not terribly fond of this idea. ^_^;

( cut for Kagerou getting seriously cold feet... even though it's not even his debut ^_^; )

So, it's been some number of days since we adopted Kia. Things are going well, but it's just a little stressful.

( doggy-type story time: some stress, some blood, and lots of lying down and snuggling! )

So yeah, that's my update on life with a new doggy. Just a bit bloody, but worth it anyway. And I really do think it's all going to work out in the end. ^_^;

As for the rest of life, it's July... and time for Camp NaNoWriMo. I'm 13,000 words in already, and my main character is just starting to find out what happened while he was asleep. Well, some of it. And he's also learned that he's now mated to an alien. I don't think he's very happy about that part. ^_^; I'll probably post some of it soon. (I have three finished chapters.) It's still pretty rough, though. (Hell, I haven't even looked over it yet.)

And maybe one of these days I'll post some crochet pictures. I've been doing hats lately. Mostly slouchy beret/tam type ones. Oh, and a couple of doilies. One from sock yarn, and one from worsted that will be more like a lap blanket when I'm done with it! ^_^;

Okay, so... we adopted Kia. They were a little tense meeting at the shelter today, but there was no growling or biting, and that was good. So we took her home. She tried to lie in my lap most of the ride home.



That's her in the backyard. Not the best picture in the world, but oh well. We haven't had an easy time getting her to stay still for a picture, so this is one of the best we have yet. ^_^;

In terms of how things are going... it's a little tense. Zora's feeling just a little nervous that Kia might take over and all, and she's being just a bit of a bully. But Kia's not trying to fight back, and they already seem to be getting on a little better. We got Kia a crate, and we're going to have her eat and sleep in there until Zora feels better about everything. It has Mom just a little tense, but I think it's going well considering that Zora's nine and not really used to being around other dogs.

So, Mom and I have been going to shelters and looking at dogs recently, just to see if there were any dogs we were interested in. Today we hit the Green Bay humane society, and we fell in love.

( cut for picture and stuff )