Martha Sheds Electronic Ankle Bracelet

The irritant that allowed authorities to track Stewart's every move is now gone

Martha Stewart can kick up her heels at last.

At 12:05 a.m. Thursday morning, she finally shed her irritating electronic ankle bracelet. With a smile on her face Wednesday, she said the prospect of losing the device filled her with “nervous excitement,” the Associated Press reports.

The monitoring device, allowing authorities to track her every move, had been Stewart’s cross to bear throughout more than five months of home confinement, including a three-week extension for violating an unspecified probation rule. (The New York Post reported that one purported violation was her attending a yoga class.)

In one Internet chat with fans, the domestic diva said: “I hope none of you ever has to wear one.”

Stewart, 64, was sentenced last year to five months behind bars and five months of house arrest after she was convicted of lying to authorities about her 2001 sale of about 4,000 shares of ImClone Systems Inc. stock.

She will remain on probation for a year and a half, meaning among other things that she is not allowed to get drunk, own a gun or leave the federal court district (for her other homes in Connecticut, Maine and the Hamptons on Long Island, for example) without permission. She must meet with her probation officer whenever requested and submit monthly reports on her activities.