It appears as though life is settling down a little. I have never had an October like that one! Usually October is one of my favorite times of the year but I am ready to be rid of this one.

Almost all my houseplants are inside for the winter. We got the upstairs room cleaned out. It has a large west window so it's the perfect place to keep my plants. Last year I had no trouble finding room downstairs for my plants but I had a windfall.

My interests go in spurts. I'm doing less with the plants now and more crocheting. I found patterns I like for a baby winter gear set. There are two babies showing up soon. One is a girl but the other is unknown. They thought it would be a nice suprise. But how am I supposed to know what color yarn to use?! Well I have an idea. I'm making the main color of the hat, mittens, and booties in cream, then once the kid is born I can make the embellishments in the appropriate color. The mitts and booties have ties that I can add afterwards and I figure I can just make a single crochet rim around the bottom of the hat. It has flaps and ties so I'll... well I can't really explain it well with words so I'll just post a picture when it is done. It looks good in my head so hopefully it'll work in real life.

I'm working on an adult beret/slouchy hat right now. I'm thinking about making hats for Christmas presents for my Dad's side of the family. I've made one hat from this pattern before but I don't know where it went so I'm doing this one. If I like it, and I don't find another pattern I like better, I'll make it for the women. However, I did find another pattern for a hat that isn't slouchy and has a cuffed brim thing. I can switch out yarn to an eyelash or something for the brim and it might be a nice hat too. It'll be an easier pattern and take less yarn. I don't know. And then there's the guys. Men are hard to make things for. I found a cool pattern but I'd have to pay for it. I'm not sure I want to pay for it.

Last night I took some fuzzy yarn and some silver shiny yarn and made a scarf. I was trying to make a stole but I decided a couple of rows in that it wasn't going to look right. So it became a scarf. But then I ran out of silver yarn about a foot from the end. I'm not sure if it's going to be a problem or not. I might just rip it out and make the scarf a little shorter so I'll have enough. It turned out a little curly which looks cool.

So I need to get some black yarn to make a stole. I have a fancy fundraiser thingy to go to this Friday and I don't have a nice over-thing. It will probably be too cool to have my shoulders bare.

I'm taking DH to work here in a few minutes (he has a trial to get ready for) and then I'll go to Michael's to find some yarn, and then to WalMart to find some evening makeup. I have everyday/Sunday type makeup but I want to do smokey eyes. I also need nail polish to go with my shoes. Red shoes are fun! Sometimes it's fun to dress up like a girl. I'm sure glad I don't have to do this very often. It would get real old real quick! I am such a tomboy but sometimes I like to be a girl.

Right now I have black nail polish on because I thought it would be fun for Haloween. I forget how much I hate nail polish! It makes my fingers feel heavy and the pigment scratches off onto paper at work so I can't grab things normally. Blech! I was complaining about it to Mark at work on Friday and he was laughing at me. He has a very girly wife and daughter so he's not used to those complaints I guess.

Today I need to get all the dead plant material out of the front beds, figure out a watering system for the upstairs plants, do a little repotting of things, and maybe plant some seeds. I have been gathering seeds for a few weeks. When we visited Froggi's parents a few weeks ago I got bitten by the bonsai bug. Her dad has been doing bonsai for about 15 years. He's got some really amazing specimins. Now I want to bonsai everything! LOL! I figure this winter I can start some of these ornamental plant seeds I got. During the winter I get really antsy and want to start things from seed waaay to early for planting outdoors. Maybe this way I can keep that urge in check. It may not work out too well for the plants but the seeds are free.

I need to make some banana muffins today and maybe something else. There's still a lot of candy at work though, so perhaps I'll wait. I'm really trying to watch what I eat so that when I do have to splurge during the holidays it won't be so bad. It is so difficult to maintain a decent weight during the normal times and holidays are so much worse! I am about 25-30 pounds heavier than I want to be. I'll lose about 10 pounds and then get tired of being hungry and gain it all back. So frustrating! When I was younger I told myself I'd never let my weight get out of control so I wouldn't have to go through the torture of dieting but then I got on Zoloft and it made me really hungry and I gained about 20 pounds in a year without realizing it. I had never been the type to overeat. I just eat when I get hungry, but the meds made me really hungry. Grr...

So anyway, I'm taking DH to work now.