It's Like A Zoo in Here!

   The Monkey Blanket

     A few months ago my best friend, S.B (for the sake of privacy I will not use the real names of anyone in this blog) told me that her and her husband were expecting their first child; a boy! I was excited to hear the news and decided to make something for the little boy. At first I had a difficult time thinking of what to do. During a Skype conversation, my friend told me that they were going to have a "Monkey" theme for the nursery. Using the theme as a starting point, I had some ideas of making little stuffed monkeys for the little one, since my stuffed animals have always been a hit. But one day I was on Google looking up some crochet patterns and came across this.

   I knew at that moment that that was what I was going to make for S.B's baby boy. I went out the next day to buy the yarn, and was barely home a minute before I started making the first squares. This is going to be a long project (since I work full-time and have other priorities after work that I must see to) but I am so excited to work on it and even more excited to complete it and send it off. For those who are interested here is the link to the free pattern. http://www.caron.com/projects/ss/ss_monkey_blanket.html

Here is my progress so far. (Please excuse the excess yarn ends, I plan on weaving them in once I complete all the required parts. I know it looks a bit messy)

All 20 little squares are complete!

Now working on the 31 rectangles.

I've been having a lot of fun working on this project and I'm crossing my fingers that I will get it done in time for the arrival of her baby.


What Kind of Poker Player Are You?

   One of the main things I focus on in poker is knowing my opponents. However, since I normally play internet poker, "reading" your opponents can sometimes be difficult, but not entirely impossible. The first thing I do when I start  a tournament, is start taking notes of the playing styles of my opponents. But I started noticing that I spent too much time writing those notes and it would severely affect my game. Then I came across Phil Hellmuth's ( 11 time Texas Hold-em Champion and writer of the book Play Poker Like the Pros )  poker animals. He categorizes poker players by animals, which helped me tremendously in knowing who I'm playing against, because all I needed to do was figure out what animal that player was. There are 5 different kinds of poker animals. Six if you include The Donkey, which is just a really bad poker player who shouldn't be on the tables.

The Mouse
  This is me as a poker player. The Mouse is a player who plays careful and pretty tight. Which means that they only call or bet if they have a pretty good hand. They rarely bluff, or raise, unless they are almost 100% sure of winning the pot. The Mouse tends to stay longer in tournaments by playing safe and sure. However, if you notice a Mouse make an aggressive play, get out of the way, because they normally have a good hand.

The Jackal
 The Jackal is a player that everyone hates. They are the players that go all-in, all-in, all-in, consecutively. They are the bluffers, and they think that every hand has a chance of winning and will rarely fold. It is really easy to make money off of The Jackal once you can identify that this particular player is one. The Jackal can be found on almost every table, and can frustrate the other players to no end with his crazy and wild plays.

The Elephant
    The Elephant is a "caller," meaning that he will rarely fold and call almost every raise. It's like his fingers are glued to the call button. The Elephant is really easy to make money off of.  Since he will pretty much call all your raises, even if he doesn't necessarily have a good hand.

The Lion
    The Lion is an aggressive player who plays tight. They will play their good hands aggressively and bluff occasionally The Lion is a really good poker player who is normally highly respected and makes his money from The Mouse, The Jackal and The Elephant.

The Eagle
  The Eagle is the rarest of poker players. Most poker players never get a chance in their life  to play against an Eagle. The Eagle is one of the top 100 players of the world. They are the ones that have been studying poker all their lives and who we normally see playing in televised events.

So what poker player are you?

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Thanks for Reading!