So, I finished the baby sampler. I have no idea why I have spent so much time after work doing this sampler, but I did and it's finished and I'm thrilled:



Yey!

Sadly, my sister's dog Molly passed away late Sunday night/early Monday morning. She was diagnosed with lymphosarcoma in March 2011, and was given about a year to live. She received chemotherapy, holistic treatments, and basically every option under the sun from 3 different veterinarian practices. At one point, she was in remission, then was out of remission. We think she was basically in remission at the time of her death, but also had a pinched nerve.

On Sunday, she was affected by the pinched nerve and it subsequently hurt her paw. As a result, she was a bit quiet on Sunday, but by no means did we think it was her last day (she had other days like this and recovered just fine!)

In the end, we don't know if the cancer, the pinched nerve, or a heart attack is what took away sweet Molly. She never knew anything but lots of love and kisses, and had a great puppy dog life - it was just far too short.

One of the first pictures I took of Alyson with Molly, March 2004:


Molly in a pink bow!


The first time I held Molly (March 23, 2004)


On vacation, sleeping in hotel with Molly (June 2004)


September 2004 - LBI backyard with Molly and Tuffy


Le Petit Monstre, 2004


Molly supporting me at an MSU football game, October 2004


April 8, 2005 - Baby Rory with Molly


She was such a good girl!

The rivers around NJ are still rising and there are more and more flooding problems. I heard that if you basement was filled with 4 feet of water, it will cost approximately $50,000 to fix it - and a lot of these homes don't have flood insurance cause these parts of NJ don't normally flood.

Ok - Dave's brother's wife's sister (Rosalie) had over 6 feet of water in her basement in Scotch Plains, NJ and everything is ruined. Her basement had been really nice - I have been there for a party. It had a tv, couch, bar, toy area - all gone. Dave's cousin and her family in Wyckoff, NJ have been out of power for 4 days. Kelly from roxydoll ubb days (remember her?) is in Wallington, NJ and posted pictures of her backyard - it's about 5 feet of water - you can't see any fences - just the posts.

Dave just sent me this picture of Fair Lawn, NJ (where he works) near River Road and Rt 20 - the middle school is in the background:



This is the mall closest to my house (there are about 10 malls all within a 10 mile radius, but this is technically one of the closest - Willowbrook in Wayne, NJ)



Really no word as of yet about our shore house in LBI. Either it's there and fine or very wet. Ya know that restaurant Daddy O that Dave and I like?

This is Daddy O now:



I don't know where on LBI this was taken, but my house is on a street that looks like this - very close to the bay and very close to the ocean:



And about 3 miles from my LBI house in Holgate, also on the island, this old 1960s car washed up on the beach after Irene:



We will probably go down this weekend and see if we have water damage. I'm feeling either way about it - awesome if we don't, if we do, we have flood insurance and I'm just glad none of us were hurt. I'm also super thankful that our primary home is fine and we are all safe. I'm back at work, and my commute is fine (no alternate routes) and everything is good. Yey!

Knitting news! I finished the hat for Hayden last night:



Two other people also finished my hat pattern recently, so I thought I would share:






Completely random, but you all know how I love interesting dishes and china patterns? I love these two from Echo Design. Want!





That's all for now - back to work!

Weather.com said it was going to rain every day over the weekend in LBI. And, sorta last minute, Dave and I decided to chance it, thinking we could always come home early if the weather was awful. And it was beautiful! His mom and my mom were telling us how there were really bad thunderstorms at home, but we had clear skies and sun. Crazy! I'm glad we did actually go, and even happier that the weather was good!

On Friday afternoon, we went to the beach and just walked around. We then went back to the house and got ready to go out to dinner. We tried a place called Bistro 14, a restaurant and raw bar. I've actually never been to it, but have walked by it so many times. I have no idea why I hadn't tried it sooner - so good! We brought along a pinot grigio.




We got a table on the balcony, so it overlooked all of bay village, which was cool. I picked up the pottery that my mom and I had painted last week, and it's pretty neat as well. Hers is the cupcake, mine is the flower:



We then spent Friday night at the amusement park, and went on the big pirate ship and the scrambler. We also got ice cream and just walked around. Really nice night.

On Saturday morning, we got breakfast at the deli by my house and ate it out front. We then rented a kayak, and went kayaking in the bay. I had expected that the rental place would sort of drop us off in the bay, but it turns out they didn't have waterfront property, and basically just strapped a kayak to your roof and said "Have fun!" We ended up finding a street that had a little mini-bay beach to walk on (no pier) and we launched from there. It was a perfect spot. Once in the bay, we kayaked to an island in the middle of the bay, and landed there and then explored the island. There were wild hermit crabs, lots of fish, regular crabs, many different types of birds - it was really pretty.





After our kayak trip, we got lunch at the deli again, and then went to the beach. Gorgeous weather, gorgeous waves. We went swimming and napped on the sand.




On Saturday night, we went out to eat at a restaurant called Bisque. Bisque had been by my house, and then moved further down the island. This was the first time we went to their new location (we didn't go last year) and it was nice. While there, we ran into a woman that Dave works with, which was nice.

We ordered an amazing baked brie appetizer, and both of our dinners were really good as well. We drank cabernet savignon and had a really nice night talking and eating the good food!



After our dinner, I bought fudge at a place called "Oh Fudge!" (Dave likes Country Kettle Fudge better - Oh Fudge! is nearer to the exit of the island, so we sometimes stop there when driving home. Since we passed it coming back from Bisque, it was easy to just stop in and buy it then) Then, we went back to the beach at night (after I took a long walk with Turbo) and started watching the Exorcist. We then made a trip out to get ice cream, and then finished watching the movie.

Sunday, we woke up and basically lounged around, got breakfast, packed, and drove home. Nothing exciting. Once home, I found out that Dave's cousin Kristen and her two sons were going to come over swimming at our pool with Andrew and Alyson. I told Dave, and he said he was planning on coming over anyway to do something on the pool with my father and to swim. So, we had a little party!

Dave's cannonball:



Dave was teaching Jack how to jump in the pool and not do a bellyflop. It was really cute! Dave is a lifeguard and taught kid swim lessons, so it's good having him around with all the children, cause he gives them all little tips and helps them learn how to swim. Luke and Andrew are both a bit young, but it's still cute.

Jack on Dave's shoulders, me with Luke:


Me with Andrew. He loves the hose and likes spraying people with it and filling up the watering can. He wouldn't drop it!


Fun pool day!

I'm still working on the knit turtle, but progress is a bit slow. I didn't do any knitting while in LBI - I didn't have a lot of down time! Here he is so far - shell top, body, and one leg. I have since finished the bottom portion of the shell, and a second leg. (This picture was taken while in LBI. We also got new flooring in the living room since I was there last weekend - it was rug, and now it's a pergo.)



This picture is kind of odd, but shows off the new floor. We finished the kitchen last year, so it is now new Kraftmaid cabinets, green/blue granite countertops, mosaic backsplash and a tile floor. Now the living room is pergo instead of the carpet, so it looks cleaner and bigger.



We try to do some kind of update each year - we are also going to look into putting in a real heating system so we can go down during the winter because it is now currently baseboard heating only in the living room and kitchen, so it's not an all-seasons house. But, maybe it will be soon!

I'm back at work now, and last Friday was my last summer-Friday-off for the summer. So sad - I'm now back to working 5 days a week. Obviously, that's normal, but one or two more weeks of summer Fridays would have been really nice.

I'm worried about our trip for this weekend - the weather looks as if it is going to be pretty crappy, and if that is the case, there really is no point in going. I'll just have to play it by ear and keep checking weather.com.

Last night, Dave went to eat dinner at his sister's house - he invited me, but I had just finished cooking at my house. He then sent me a picture of the mobile my mother made set up in the baby's room, and I thought it was cute:




Gina picked me up on my lunch break and we went out to eat together, which was nice. It's always fun to catch up and made the day that much more exciting. Some fun to look forward to, and something to break up the monotony of the work day. (And she liked my feather hair extension, too! Yey!)

Not much else happening. Just hangin' in there. Last work day of the week, too. But, it is also my last Friday off for the rest of the summer. Next week I go back to working 5 days, instead of 4 for summer hours. Sucks.

I finished the asymmetrical cabled cardigan:





I'm really happy with the finished sweater.

We were going to leave Thursday night, the 14th, but when I got home from work, there was just a ton of stuff that needed to be done. I ended up running errands and doing things for Aunt Betty. Also, there were a lot of events the following week (2nd birthday party, 50th birthday party, Michelle's shower) and I needed to get gifts for some of them, and wrapping paper. I bought wine for the 50th birthday party, and then bought wine for me and Dave in LBI since it is cheaper here.

Going into our trip, this was the projected weather:


And it was just that...absolutely perfect!

Friday morning, I got Dave by 7 am. He wanted to leave by 6, but it just didn't happen. We arrived at the LBI house (with Turbo!) by about 9 am, which is a pretty quick trip. There was no traffic, no issues - smooth sailing.

When we got to the house, we noticed that the shower head/pipe in the outdoor shower had come off the house, so we went to the local hardware store for a 29 cent bracket to fix it. (Dave fixed it. I bought the bracket.) Then we went to Wawa to buy food for the weekend, and lunch. After that, we went to the beach! It was a perfect beach day. We both went in the water and just relaxed.

Back at the house, we rested and I did some knitting. We then went to go out to dinner at Sweet Vidalia, a tapas place, but it had closed and a restaurant called Carmen's was there. So, we tried it. It was yummy!

My dinner at Carmen's, chicken and shrimp in a sundried tomato cream sauce:


In the late evening, we walked around Bay Village for shopping, ice cream and just enjoyed the island life.



In front of the house with Turbo


The next day, Dave wanted to try crabbing. I thought it was best to do that down by the lighthouse on the north-most point of the island. Dave talked to some fishermen there, and gave us a better location (but I thought this picture was cool)



We ended up on a pier in Harvey Cedars, which is also more north than where my house is (but the entire island is 18 miles, and a good portion of that is a nature preserve, so it takes a while to get there with traffic lights, but is a straight drive)

Crab bait - frozen fish. Yum!





But, we didn't catch any crabs. Neither did the other people around us who were crabbing. Boo.

After crabbing, we went to the beach:



And then dinner at the Boathouse, one of our favorites.

After dinner, we watched the sunset on the bay:


Then played mini golf:


Par for the course was 90. Dave got 92. I got 97. Not bad. We both actually got a lot of holes in one - and I didn't think that I would get any!





On Sunday, we didn't do a whole lot, but got ready to go home. Really nice mini-vacation!

Here is my knitting progress!

I finished sewing on the snaps for the blue cabled vest last night. I have yet to take pictures of me wearing it since it is the wrong season, but here are two of the vest on my mannequin. The first is from the front, with a belt since I want to wear a belt with it when I wear it. The second is from the back.





I also took a picture of some of my progress on the baby giraffe sweater. I did more after this picture was taken, but you can still see how the colors go together. (The blue yarn for the giraffe sweater is leftover from the vest! I love it when projects use leftover yarn - they are then cheap, and it uses up my stash of yarn!)

I finished the top I was sewing! It was finished within 36 hours (and the 9 months of having the fabric sit in my fabric stash, untouched!)





Anthropologie inspiration: (Originally sold for $68)

I posted a knit cowl on Etsy, just to see what happens.

Here is the link: Etsy store!



(I'm aware my banner says "custom web graphics." I'll fix that in a bit)