Please help me -- I can't stop!

Greetings, and Dear Cynthia,

One of the items on my "Mission Possible" list was "one" cotton dishrag. So, I made the "one" dishrag using the Ball Band Dishrag Pattern...(except I cast on only 33 stitches) and had a **lot** of yarn leftover, so no real dent in my cotton yarn stash. I decided to keep going, incorporating all of my cotton yarn leftovers from the past few years, and sometimes starting with 33 stitches, sometimes 39 (depending on how far I thought the particular leftover yarn would take me). I couldn't stop knitting dishrags. Today is a new day, however, and I'm going to call this Mission Possible item "done" (three items done, nine to go), and move on.

Years ago, I made DH a fleece bathrobe for his Christmas gift. I've grown accustomed to his very calm approach to opening my gifts -- he sort of nods and smiles and says "thank you", and uses the gift and seems to like it, but he is not "exuberant"...EXCEPT the day I gave him the bathrobe, he told me that he never had received anything like it, and it was warm and cuddly, and he obviously **loved it**. (Very much a surprise for me, and not bad for about four hours of effort on my part...) Anyway, DH and our boys were discussing the merits of bathrobes a couple of weeks ago, and both boys decided they wanted one, and DH said, "Maybe if you ask Mommy, she'll make one for you." So, I decided I'd sew them robes for Valentines' Day, and then I got the flu, so it didn't work out. However, this past week, I bought some fleece and went to work. The pattern worked out great -- each robe took me only about three hours to cut out and sew. The boys love them so much that they wear them in the house over their **clothes**. (We had visitors this past weekend, and I felt compelled to tell them that my kids were wearing clothes under the bathrobes -- didn't want our visitors to think that we just sit around in our jammies all day, everyday!) They've never gone this ape over any sweaters I've knit them... Perhaps fleece is the way to go instead of yarn -- several advantages including much less time to create the finished item, and they really LOVE the finished item.

Anyway, my Attention Deficit has returned, and I'm trying to get several things done at once. Returning my attention to the bathroom cabinet, I removed all of the cabinet door hinges and put them in numbered little cups so that I can put everything back together with all of the parts in all of the same places. (I don't know how much it will matter, but I didn't want to take any chances.) Here are the doors, also numbered. Recall that the **lovely** handles were mounted in the very center of the doors. I know there are wood fillers available, though I had spackling compound on hand and used that to fill the holes from where the old hardware was mounted. I also put primer on the doors and cabinet last week. This week, I hope to drill the holes for the new hardware, paint the whole thing, and reassemble. It shouldn't take long -- I just have to find a couple of hours.

Finally, I want to say, "Thank you," for the suggestions regarding the buttonhole band on my Tangled Yoke Cardigan. I bought some grossgrain ribbon, and I'm going to try to sew some buttonholes on it with my sewing machine (which generally does a nice job with buttonholes), just to determine if it is feasible without too much frustration. If it is, I'll go ahead and knit the buttonhole band with the holes in it. If it isn't, I'll knit the buttonhole band without the buttonholes, sew the ribbon to the wrong side of the front bands, and then take the sweater to a tailor to have professional buttonholes sewn in. Your ideas were awesome!!!!

Time for me to get some other things done around here this morning while both of my kids are at school. After spending hours this past weekend chipping away at the ice on our walkways (gotta love living on a corner lot!) which is up to three inches thick in some places, we're expecting up to eight inches of snow today! I think I mentioned, it's beautiful and tiring all at the same time...

Oh, I almost forgot -- I found out last Monday that I've been accepted into the Physical Therapy program at UW-Madison. They start a new class of 40 every June. Now that I know I'll be going back to school this summer, I find myself preparing for it the same way I prepared for the birth of my kids -- stocking up on things (clean underwear for everybody so I don't have to do laundry so much), taking care of things around the house (putting better organizing systems in place so that there is a "place for everything" and others can be more helpful keeping things tidy around here), getting projects out of the way (painting the eyesore of a cabinet in our main bathroom, putting up a valence in our little "office", taking clothes/toys we've outgrown to Good Will), etc.

Have a great Monday!

Warm regards,
Laura (YarnThrower)