my soft spot

just a mom who plays hockey and knits

Saturday, January 02, 2010

Happy New Year!

I had a super busy New Year's Eve day, working on some deadlines at work. I did well, only 2 outstanding bugs plus one doozie of a conundrum that needs to be solved Monday. It was nice to blast through some totally doable bugs, including one I'd looked at before, not solved (but found the source of the problem), and then looked at with fresh eyes and was able to solve pretty quickly.

I left at 3 to pick G up from Winter Wonderland camp, as it didn't have aftercare that day. G really enjoyed the camp, including the field trip to Chabot Space & Science Center on Wednesday. He implored me to stop by home and we picked up his DS and let the dogs out to pee. He played DS while I finished up my bugs.

We went home to feed the dogs and let them out again, and then went to a drop-in NYE party I'd just been invited to on Tuesday. I grabbed a jar of peach jam for a hostess gift, didn't look for their address, and set out. I knew which street it was, but not sure which block, and was hoping I'd recognize it from our previous Freecycle exchanges. Turns out, big surprise, I didn't! G and I walked around for a bit and then saw some people chatting on a porch. I asked if it was S's house, and lo and behold!, it was.

What a great party! I met a really nice lesbian couple, one of whom is part of S's homeschooling group (with her 4 kids to match S's). The partner is one of Alameda's Finest and we had a really great conversation about policework, guns, and lots of other topics. I really enjoyed talking to each of them. It was a great group of people, quite varied, and the house was great for kid play, too. G got to play with his friend T, and they were upstairs, downstairs, and out front, playing with all sorts of things. S invited us to eat "a lot," and I definitely did my share. Thinking we'd leave at 8, we ended up leaving at 10, pretty dead tired.

When we got home, though, G wanted to watch a movie, with me thinking, "OK, part of a movie." At 12:08, Dodgeball was over, and I said "Happy New Year" and practically immediately went to sleep.

Had a lovely morning on New Year's Day, quite easy but productive, too. I cleared off half the dining room table and set out two knitting projects that needed some sewing to finish. I never did locate my sewing machine, though, so that didn't get done.

But the highlight of the day was going to a movie at our "new" movie theater. I decided to walk to more places, and had found that downtown is just 1 mile away, so I made plans for us to leave our house by 10:30 for an 11:35 movie. We left on time, walked down in about 35 minutes, and got matinee tickets to "The Blind Side," despite G's plaintive requests to see the latest Chipmunks movie ("the Squeakwel")--um, no way.

We went in to the theater and had our pick of seats. G with his book and me with my knitting, we settled in and waited patiently for the start.

I think we both enjoyed the movie, but I thought it would have more football in it. In retrospect: it's not about the football. It's about kids with potential who fall through the cracks, and the people who step up and save one. I got choked up about 4 times. Afterward, G asked why they called it "The Blind Side," so I went through a complex display on the sidewalk with the line of scrimmage, an invisible center, me as the guard (?), and he as quarterback, so he could see that when he turned to throw the ball, he was blind to my side. "But I can see you!" he says, pointing to the plate-glass windows. Agh!

That evening, we went to my friend Jean's Burning Bowl celebration. In it, we made 3 lists; what we're happy to say Good-bye to from 2009, what we look forward to in 2010, and what we are grateful for (the longest list, for most). We burned the "Good-bye" list and had some black-eyed peas and rice... and then G grew short on patience (tired, I think) and we left.

Saturday, we had a lovely sleep-in and then got ready pretty quickly, stuffing poppyseed muffins in our faces for a quick breakfast, to head out to a local school for blood donation. When we got there, a woman game blustering up to us, insisting that G stay in a specific corner that was already set up with crayons and coloring sheets. Points for the crayons and coloring sheets; but points off for being so weird about it... and for the guy who hovered at the snack bar/refreshment center who told people when they "could leave"... um, guy, I'm leaving when I damn well please. I did break my donating record, though--last time, I got it done in 6 minutes; this time, 5! Woo!

After that, we went to the library and had our usual lovely visit, with my getting out "The Hunchback of Notre Dame" in French and English, to give it another try. I also got "Tunnels," wanting to read over parts of it after we listened to it on our drive back from Thanksgiving and up and back at Christmas (unabridged, something like 13 hours). G had fallen asleep in parts, and wanted to read those parts, too. GREAT story.

On our way home, we just had to drop by Salvation Army, luckily on another 50%-off-everything day. I found some molds for juice pops, a pretty necklace, and a few books. I found a super-soft XL lambswool men's sweater that I almost bought, but then remembered I had 4 sweaters to unravel back at home. Came home to finish spinning the blue-faced Leicester a friend had given me, and plied it all up--more yarn than I've ever spun before, and it's SO soft!

It's a new year and I'm loving it already.

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