Random Friday

Today at work, I had to pack up my office because our department is switching floors. The last time I moved offices was 3-4 years ago (and I had a lot of stuff then), so I have several boxes of stuff that's making the move. I finally opened one of the boxes that moved with me the last time -- and has acted as a trust-worthy footrest on a daily basis -- today. In the entire box, I found one file folder of information that needed to be kept.

The most annoying thing I discovered was 3 mugs and 1 ziploc bag full of loose change. I hate carrying around loose change and never even try to have exact change when paying in cash, so it accumulates like crazy. I think the 3 mugs were moved into my current office during the last move, so they're moving once again. Some time next week, I need to go to a CoinStar machine and redeem the change for a gift card.

I know that I have an issue with loose change, but I really didn't think I'd find more of it today because I took ~$75 worth of change to the CoinStar just a few months ago! I truly thought all of it was out of my life. Ugh.

At home, I'm working on my first knitted afghan. It's an Aran Twist tree design and the picture looks wonderful. My afghan is going to be winter white. I'm not sure if I like the green one (called sage). It's getting a little tricky keeping track of where I am in each of the design features because all of the designs are repeats at different lines. (Does that make sense?) Right now, I've mapped out how the lines correspond to each other on a piece of paper and have that, along with the design instructions, laid out beside me when knitting. For a split second, I thought about typing up a table in Excel, but then I caught myself. I can't let Excel creep into my personal life at this stage in the game!

I'm alternating knitting with embroidering a set of tea towels for a swap. They are turning out so nicely. It's going to be incredibly difficult to ship these guys away because they would be so sweet in my kitchen.

This weekend in Chicago, it's a mad St. Patrick's Day celebration. The river gets dyed green, there's the South Side parade in Beverly, and I think there's probably a tamer parade downtown. I'm going to skip the festivities and work away at all of the projects that I keep starting around the house. I'd also love to go for a long walk if the weather cooperates.