One last birthday photo, because I can’t not share the super awesome cake one of my coworkers made. It was a chocolate cake covered in shiny purple glaze!! It was gorgeous.

Okay, wait, one more. Because a couple of other awesome coworkers gave me some beautiful knitting needles that look like magic wands!! (Again, purple.)

They gave me yarn too (Madelinetosh! HELLO!), but it hasn’t come yet. Seriously, do I have the best coworkers or what?? Another one gave me delicious chocolates, but those didn’t last long enough for a photo!

I’ve also had some good knitting time this week and I’ve cast on two new shawls. I was finally able to get yarn to make the Wonder Woman wrap, hooray!

I chose Malabrigo Sock yarn in Ravelry Red and Ochre. I’ve cast on and done the easy first section, and am loving it so far. Now I need to move on to the scary part, which has wrap & turn short rows, which I’ve never done before. It’ll be fine, though. Fine. Just fine.

Did you notice? I’m using Wonder Woman stitch markers too! Love them!

And this morning, I cast on for the Rainbow Warrior by Casapinka. I’ve been wanting to make this shawl for ages, but I wanted to do it with the Miss Babs yarn, just like the original, and I could never bring myself to order the yarn. Thanks to birthday money, I was finally able to place the order. And along with an adorable little mini-skein and three stitch markers, I got two skeins of Yummy 2-play, one in Perfectly Wreckless and one in Thunderstorm.

I’m pretty sure this will be a quick, fun knit. I’m already loving it and can’t wait to go back! How do I choose which awesome shawl to work on??

Plus I want to cast on more things. Really I just want to cast on ALL the things right now. But hopefully I can contain myself to two shawls at a time. More might be overwhelming!

Duncan is settling in nicely. He’s feeling more comfortable, which is mostly good. He’s not quite as mellow and easy-going as he was the first couple of days. In fact, he can be rather ornery and mischievous, both with us and the other dogs. His appetite also grew noticeably, and he’s much more playful and spunky that I thought at first. He’s making the other two play much more than they’re used to, so at least they’re getting worn out. I’m having a marvelous time watching them all interact, and I’m so glad I was able to convince the husband to add just one more dog to the pack.

Happy weekend, friends!