But sir, it's just wafer-thin...

I am pitiful: for the last hour, I watched the Nathan's Famous Hot Dog Eating Contest on ESPN. Why, you ask? I have no earthly idea. We watched the Tour de France this morning, then my husband turned the TV to ESPN (like he usually does when he gets a hold of the remote), and after SportsCenter was over, they showed the contest live. And I watched the whole thing. I even put my knitting down during the actual 12 minute contest! That's horrible.

On the Ironman front, I have this much time until the race starts:

Ironman Wisconsin Countdown

Yipes!!! I'm nervous, excited, tired, sore, happy ... you name an emotion, I'm probably it. This weekend was full of long training hours. Saturday morning my friends and I rode our bikes 103 miles, then Sunday morning I ran 15 miles with a friend. I'm very proud of myself for doing this. It's so amazing to think back to the person I was back in high school. I was an overweight, lazy, extremely non-active, nerdy cross-stitcher. Now I'm a fit, active, nerdy triathlete/knitter. What a transformation!

On the knitting front, I finished 1/2 of a project for my secret pal. I'm having a lot of fun spoiling her. Unfortunately, the person spoiling me has dropped off the face of the earth. She won't even respond to my "hey, are you still there?" email. I guess this happens during games like this, but it still sucks when it happens to you. Oh well. At least I'm making a new friend out of the girl I'm spoiling. But back to knitting: I've also finished felting a bag for the Autism Conference silent auction. It doesn't have a handle, so it's not totally done, but it will be by the end of the week. I'm still working on Lelah, and I've run into a problem. My gauge grew from the time I did my swatch to the time I started working on the stockinette stitch part of the top, so it's too big. But I've talked to Christine, the pattern's creator, and I've got a couple of things to try. I'm gonna keep on working on it and try her suggestion for binding off (BO over 2 sts for half of the top, then regular BO for the rest). If that doesn't work - or if it works but doesn't look good - then I'll turn the top into a skirt and get an underskirt to wear so that I'm not flashing the people behind me when I wear it in public! It'll make a cute skirt. I tried it on as a skirt the other night, and my husband loved it. But of course he did - he's a guy, and it's a low-rise short skirt that's mainly see-through lace!