Crochet for a Cause

You may have read in my last post that I have decided to whip up some scarves for the Special Olympics as a part of their Scarf Project. I mentioned how I had not been able to find any Red Heart Super Saver Blue (#886) yarn in stock at any of my local stores (I tried 4 different ones). Well, I finally broke down and ordered the yarn online through Joann last week.

Naturally, I couldn't buy one skein of $2.50 yarn and be expected to pay $7 in shipping... So, I bought 2 skeins of the blue (I have high hopes) and managed to add a few other items that I didn't really need. This included two different pink yarns, just in case I really get in the groove and decide to make some items to sell to raise money for my Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure that's coming up in May. (Join my team here, if you want to walk with us, run without us, or stay home and sleep but still raise money for the cause. -More on this campaign in a future post.)

Since I've been itching to begin my scarves, I was really hoping that my yarns would have arrived today. And I think they did...only the post office didn't deliver because I wasn't home. Argh! I was stuck with that little pink slip they stick in your mailbox, saying the item will be available for pickup tomorrow after 10am. Sorry, I have a job! I'm going to go to the website to see if they'll redeliver (and leave it at my door or at the apartment complex offices). Wish me luck!

I also checked the Scarf Project website to see how many scarves have been provided for the Northern CA event, and out of the 1,150 scarves they requested, they have only received 45! Please consider contributing your own creation to this worthy cause. See the project guidelines here.

The deadline to receive scarves for the your scarves in for the Northern CA event is 3/1/2011. There are different deadlines for the games in different locations, as well as a different number of scarves requested for each event. If I have leftover yarn after the Northern CA deadline (a surety), then I will just keep making more scarves and send them to another state's event. Everybody wins!

Long Weekend

Hello everyone,

I hope you all had a nice relaxing, or eventful (depending on what floats your boat) weekend. Mine was kind of relaxing, rather uneventful, and rather boring. I came down with a cold last weekend, and have been trying to kick it ever since. The congestion is mostly gone, my ears are nearly clear, but I'm still coughing a bit and my voice is decidedly lower. Urgh. So, I didn't go to my youngest step-brother's high school graduation party that was yesterday, and I didn't go visit Kristin and the baby (just in case I am still contagious).

But, since I am feeling a bit better (even though the energy lags, and there's occasional coughing), I wandered over to Kohl's for their Memorial Day Sale. Mainly because all luggage is on sale for at least 50% off, and I've been using old (and ugly) hand me down luggage for the last decade. I've been thinking about buying a new set of luggage for years, but it's expensive, and I'm cheap... You know, the luggage I have been using has wheels, but it's the old-fashioned, attach the strap and pull kind. If I bother trying to wheel it around with the strap, it just ends up falling over.

So, I bought a brand-spanking new 4-piece set of luggage (in royal purple - that should make it easier to spot on the luggage carousel), for $59! I am rather proud of myself. I hope it's of good quality - but I didn't want to pay the ridiculously high amounts for a single piece of a more well-known brand (the American Tourister and Dockers were double and triple the prices for just one item). Anyway, here's what I got (the online photo makes the purple look like navy, but trust me, it's not).

I'm so easily satisfied, aren't I? I also got a mini-coffee maker (4-cup), a beach towel (realized last summer that I didn't have one!) and 2 cute casual t-shirts. In total, I ended up spending just $10 over the original price of the luggage set. I love me a good sale!

The Happy Happy Snowman

Merry late Christmas to everyone!

In the spirit of Christmas, I headed out to Target today at lunch to see what was on clearance (well, really I just needed catfood, but since I had to go anyway...). All holiday stuff is 50% off, so I picked up some wrapping paper and ornaments, and while browsing the stock, my friend Christyn and I came upon what may be the world's happiest snowman.

Now, we are cracking up in the aisle at this little beverage dispenser, which could have been very cute, but the design was poorly executed. What do you think?

The little snowbank is substantial enough that the dispenser could have been placed lower on the figure. But instead, the spigot is located in a rather unfortunate spot. Odd that it says "love" right above it... (I call this the spigot of love!)

Yeah, I'm perverse, but this just looks too wrong. Oh Target, you never disappoint me. First Easter, now this...

Weekend Rants and Raves

This past weekend I drove up to Sacramento to visit my friend Kerri. We decided to do something a little different, and hit a comedy club on Saturday night. We ended up at The Punchline. The headliner was Jamie Kaler, whom neither of us had heard of. Apparently he's been in a few things, including the TBS series My Boys (which I've never watched). Well, Kerri and I have decided we might have to start watching now. This guy was hilarious! We laughed so hard, I expected to go down a pant size (ab workout and all that). Anyway, if you can catch his stand up, I would recommend it.

On Sunday, we decided it time for some shopping, so we hit the mall that's near her house. Before leaving for the weekend, I had set a spending limit of $100 for myself (I knew we were shopping, and had decided to replace certain undergarments that have been known to attack - and have since been eliminated from my wardrobe). We cruise through Macy's and see some very cute and overpriced shoes alongside some very skanky and overpriced shoes (a pair of which I picked up and showed to Kerri, stating "Wow, these will totally match my new pole!" Um, then I realized I made the joking exclamation perhaps a wee bit loudly...) But that is neither here nor there.

We came upon the NY & Co store (which I am still in the habit of referring to as Lerner's), and saw major sale signs plastered in and around their display windows. Almost Everything in the Store - Buy One Get One 1/2 Off! So, of course, we had to go in. I actually found 2 items that I liked and decided to buy. After waiting about 4 hours in line (a slight exaggeration, but really not that far off the mark), I get up to the counter and the frazzled associate rings me up. My 2 items come to over $80 (WAY more than I expected to spend, and hadn't even gotten what I'd come to the mall for)!! I questioned the sales girl, since I picked both items up off of the racks/tables with the sales signs prominently displayed. I was told that one of the items wasn't included in the sale, and I assumed it was the satin shirt I had nabbed...I was kind of at a loss, and at that point accepted it and signed the receipt.

Then, as soon as Kerri was done with her purchases, I grumbled to her that I got no discount, and that I was annoyed that the sales girl didn't mention to me prior to completing the transaction that one of my items was bogo 1/2 off and the other wasn't - usually they will at least ask if you wanted to pick up a 2nd item covered under the sale. I stewed a while and as we left I had pretty much decided to come back and either return both items or simply return the shirt that I assumed was the non-sale item and pick up a 2nd sweater, which I assumed was the sale item.

Kerri could tell I was p.o.ed, since I was totally quiet all the way to the elevator (anyone who knows me knows that isn't regular behavior for me), and was no doubt visibly seething. We decided to hit NY & Co on our way back out the mall, allowing me more time to figure out what to do. So, we did some (necessary for me) damage in Victoria's Secret, sniffed around the Body Shop, and found antibacterial hand soaps at B&BW for $3 (good deal!).

Now, Kerri and I are starving - mind you it was the first day of the time change and we'd barely eaten all day. So, on our way back out we decided that I'd stop in at NY & Co and exchange the shirt that wasn't on sale for the 2nd sweater that was, and Kerri would go on to Macy's to pick up a sweater she was drooling over after our first walk through. I was planning to just meet her there when I finished.

Well...the best laid plans and all that... I guess I wasn't the only unhappy customer, because aside from the 2 or 3 purchases ahead of me in line, there were also 2 returns and a huge problematic return in process. People were muttering and whining in line, and a few of them left instead of sticking around to buy. Kerri called me when she was done, and I was still 2 people back from the front! When I finally got up there, with the 2nd sweater I decided to get for the bogo deal, I was told that the sweaters were the items that were NOT on sale, rather, the pants that were folded on the bottom shelf of that display were. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?? The sweaters are folded on the top of the table, flanked by two giant signs advertising the sale. The pants are barely even visible. I was disgusted and did a straight exchange for a refund. Saved me over $80!

I left pretty peeved, and don't think I'll be shopping there again for a while. Slight grudge, perhaps, but I consider that to be total false advertising. And then, come to find out, the headband that Kerri had purchased wasn't on sale, though it was on a rack that had a 40% off sign. I also got an email today from Kerri that explained the reason she set off every alarm in all of the stores we entered and exited yesterday. NY & Co didn't remove the security tag from the shirt she bought. So, she has to go back AGAIN, to have the tag removed.

OY!

Shoes, Songs and Stuff

I haven't done a whole lot of shopping for myself in a while, and apparently was trying to make up for it last Friday. I found some cute shorts and a brown full skirt + 2 discounted tees at Old Navy, where I went in search of cheap-ish summer-type sandals...which I did not find. So, after my mini-spending spree, I still wanted shoes. And headed over to Shoe Pavillion to keep looking.

Success! Too much of it... I found these cute little tennis shoes (by Punkrose, that I'd never heard of) that were marked down to affordable, and I couldn't resist them. So, I bought them, and wore them to the Day in the Zone on Saturday, that I went to with Kerri and her friend Kathy. (The shoe shot is for Jill...)

I'll come back to the concert in a minute. First, I need to share the other pair of shoes (below photo is also for Jill - please ignore the large ankles.) I love these and took the last size 7 in the store. I wore them all day at work today and they didn't pinch across the toes at all. Thank you Steve Madden.
On to the concert - it was an all day concert in the park, with a number of bands and food and booths. Kerri had asked me about a month or so if I wanted to go, so we picked up tickets early. The lineup was Emerson Hart of Tonic, Matt Kearney, Everclear, Augustana, Five for Fighting and Smashmouth. The high points were Five for Fighting and Smashmouth, who were by far the best performances, and obviously enjoy themselves on stage.

Smashmouth

The low point was Everclear. I like their songs that made it to the radio, but they were terrible live. I think the lead singer was lit, and the words were slurry...just not good.

And luckily, it was less than 100 degrees that day. And we were totally prepared for that possibility, so none of us ended up burning. And all three of us are pretty pale...

After the concert, I headed out to my Dad's house to celebrate Father's Day. What should have taken only 1hr 15 min ended up taking over 2 hours, due to an unexpected road closure and a bizarre detour...but I got there safely. At 9:30pm. And my 3yr old little brother was still awake. My stepmother was about to put him down, but he got all excited when I came in, and ended up having a 2nd wind (though he was tired...).

On Sunday morning, I watched Gino for a bit while Dad was working, and let him run around in the backyard. That boy loves the hose...if he had his way, the backyard would be a mud pit. Dad came back from work and started making our traditional Sunday meal (from when I was growing up) - Pasta and meatballs. My father makes the best meatballs! (Though they are also known as bread balls, garlic balls, and my personal favorite, meat triangles.) My two other brothers showed up and we all had a nice dinner/lunch and a nice afternoon.

I hope everyone else had as good a weekend.