Weekend update (without Tina Fey & SNL)

Shabbos was quiet. My friend that sometimes walks over for Rummikub on Saturday afternoons is in grad school and taking finals so our weekly game was off this week. I got a lot of reading done and thought about cleaning, so pretty much the usual minus the rummikub.

Saturday night was the family Chanukah party. As I was getting ready, something very strange happened to me: my mom asked if she could borrow some jewelry. To my knowledge, she's only ever worn "real" jewelry, whereas I go for beads and crystals. So this was definitely a first. Unfortunately I couldn't come through for her, she was wearing a purple sweater and the only purple necklace I have is a lavender one (that I made) that she thought was too light-colored. Luckily when I got to work today, T had brought in most of her collection. I bought this necklace (in purple) for my mom, it'll go perfectly with the sweater and it has too many different kinds of beads for me to try and make one myself. The best part is, I can borrow it from her :)

Anyways, back to the Chanukah party. My maternal grandmother used to host it every year at her house in Queens, and invite everyone: all her kids and grandkids, her nieces & their families, even her kids-in-laws' families. A couple of years ago when Grandma did something weird to her foot (like spraining it) so she couldn't host the Chanukah party my aunt stepped up
and had it at her house. She was slow on the invites this year, so her and my mom's cousin said she'd host it at her house. This cousin has never had the family over before for a party, so it was nice to be there.

The party itself went well, everyone chatted, looked at picture proofs from my cousin's wedding last October, and the kids played together well. My aunt & uncle said they missed me - last year when they had the party at their house Saturday night they invited everyone to spend shabbos, and my grandparents and I took them up on it. I haven't seen this aunt & uncle & their family as much, because we used to see each other on weekends in the Catskills over the summer but this year they weren't there when I was, so we've been missing each other in general. We made up to have a weekend at their place in January, and then it looks like 3-4 of my cousins are coming too which they are quite happy about. I know their kids are going to be thrilled :)

Then my cousin (the one that just got married) wanted to know why I hadn't visited them for shabbos yet. Hello? You're newlyweds, plus you haven't invited me! Well now I am invited, so I'm going there sometime in January or February.

I love visiting family. Once I finally get my own place I'm going to have a lot of return visitors.

Of course we had a gift exchange at the Chanukah party. I was covered for all but 2 cousins since I took everyone to HSM the Ice Tour. The other 2 got IOUs for unspecified handmade items. I owe one a scarf, and the other is the one getting the wedding sampler. Both are projects that will take forever, and they're not picky about it being on time since I'm the only one in my generation who gets gifts for people, it's mostly just the aunts & uncles & grandparents who get for the *kids*. I just think that at 24, I'm not such a kid anymore. Plus I love to shop :-)

C got me the coolest flip flops, and another aunt, the one with little kids, brought Webkinz. Cute stuffed animals are always good gifts. I made a necklace for C but forgot it home. Typical. I also forgot to bring the gift I got for UD - 2 little moisturizers to leave in his office and car, since he's too much of a guy to think to buy some of his own. Even though his hands are chapped to the point of bleeding. Sigh. Lucky for me he works near Penn Station so I'm going to drop them off on my way home tonight.

My newlywed cousin's new wife, Erica-3, and I made tentative plans to go to Woodbury Commons Sunday morning. We had to be there when it opened, so that the crowds would be manageable and so I could drive her back to NJ for her family's Chanukah party. So I woke up at 7:30, called her cell to make sure she'd be ready, left a message, and went back to sleep. She called at 4 but I missed it. I think we were both too tired to go shopping so early in the morning.

When I finally really woke up Sunday, I spent some time stitching and catching up on my DVRed TV shows, including the scuba episode of Bones. I did laundry, caught up with some chores, and spent a very quiet day in anticipation of a busy week.

I think I'm going to bail on my needlepoint meetup this week since that's the last night of Chanukah. I'll get my stitching fix though, wednesday is another Sit & Stitch at Lazy Daisy Stitchery. If you're in the neighborhood stop by.

I started my Fair & Square exchange over the weekend. It's a fun stitch. I'd like to finish it this week, but we'll see how that goes. I'm bringing the BC snappers Wednesday night to show Diana my progress, and I'm not sure how much stitching time I'll have the other nights.

Thanks for all the great suggestions about the BC Snappers! I'm going with SweetPea's excellent idea of February Knows, using this BC freebie pattern for the groundhog and tweaking it to fit the 50x50 block. T suggested a good idea for December, so keep an eye out for a pic when I've finished it - until then it's a surprise. I'm about 40% done with the November block, so I have to get cracking charting December. Oy.

Beatrice - I've only ever seen bowling with 10 pins and a large bowling ball.

Have a non-rainy Monday!