Crocheting again and vanilla beans

A couple of projects that I'm working on:
Everyone's Christmas presents
A different Christmas present
Butters' coat
Two baby presents
...and food related projects that I've already started (I really hope the starter will be ready before I leave for SF)

I finally bought the fabric for Butters' coats. I found some quilting material at JoAnn's. They are reversible as well. Initially, I was going to buy a flannel/fleece middle piece, and two cotton squares at Wal-Mart and make a quilting material myself. However, this saves me a bit of work. Plus, they were on sale too! Now I just need to find matching colored ribbons and threads and Butters can go walking at night. Maybe, I'll add a raincoat in the future. It'll have to be red to match mine.

At the checkout, the price turned out to be not the sale price. The guy at the counter was really cool though, he just used a 50% off coupon. I mentioned that it was for my little dog, and he said that I probably treat the dog better than I treat L, who was with me at the time. And L agreed. What a butt. I just don't have the skills to make him clothes. If I can buy sheets and modify them a little bit and throw it over him and call them shirts, I would, but I can't.

Anyway, my vanilla beans from Beanilla Trading Company came today. Very exciting. I bet they smell delicious. I was surprised how fast that was. I must have ordered them, at most, three days ago.

I have been having the hardest time finding appropriate bottles for the extract. A small part of that is my horrible conception of volume, i.e., I have no idea how much 8 fl. oz. is. I don't know if that's good for what I need or not. I'm trying to decide between 8 and 10. Normally, I would just get 9 oz. However, these bottles are even rarer. Go figure.

I'm taking up crocheting again because I have some awesome ideas revolving around that. However, I can only find one of my six crochet hooks. I have no idea where the others are. I'm going to use my Michael's 40% off coupon to get them. Anyway, look what I made today!

According to the crochet book from the library, it's called an Irish Lace Flower. I can see an art project out of this. Imagine me, creative! Ha!

(I've noticed posts are always more interesting with pictures. Sometimes I have this fantasy of talking in pictures, where half of my post is illustrations, sprinkled in among the words.)