Just a Quick Project

I’ve spent too many days with cold toes to let it go on any longer.

I bought some Wool-Ease Thick & Quick at the Arts and Crafts store, (although, they charge MSRP on the yarn there, a bit shocking for someone used to shopping sales in a multi-store-competition-based world) double-stranded it, and knit some of the ugliest slippers I have ever seen. You can find the pattern here, but I’m just gonna clue you in now that it’s a rectangle with cables on the sides and decreases in the last row. To be honest, double-stranding the Thick & Quick might have been overkill, but despite their thick and lumpy appearance, the slippers are cushy and warm.

So, yeah - I’m not too enamored of the pattern, but it’s fast and functional. Max saw that I made some slippers and told me that he needed some, too - because he had cold toes. “You make me some, Mama!” You bet, bud. I ended up using about a skein and a half in my gigantic slippers, so there was plenty left to make some little single-stranded ones. (Pictures to come later.) Charlie might want some, too! We’ll see.

(B)Lame Excuses

Wow, a week since my last blog, huh? Let’s see…I bought a ‘learn to spin’ kit on Etsy from a helpful seller with a lot of nifty things in her shop - she was very communicative and helpful with regards to my shipping concerns, and it got here safely and in a timely fashion. I even made yarn!

Spinning is both simpler and more difficult than I expected; all you do is twist the fiber and it’s yarn! The brown yarn (my first attempt) varies wildly from superbulky to laceweight and back and was so badly overtwisted that I had to untwist it a little before I could wind it on my little bobbin. (That was also in the kit. Too cute!) The blue you may recognize as fiber I squirreled from Kid ‘n Ewe handouts last fall - and I’m glad I did. Spinning with something colored was way more fun than the undyed fiber (pretty much all I have at the moment). I’m going to have to get on that.

I’m afraid that’s the only picture you’re going to get today. I’ve gotten back to the end of the first clue for my Laceweight Mystery Shawl (no picture of that yet), but I’ve put it to the side for the time being. I’m knitting something (that I can’t show you) to submit to Knitty! It’s turning out well and I am so excited. I haven’t done a huge amount of designing knitwear - or any clothes, for that matter - but I had an idea, and I’m working it up, and it seems to be working. It’s an adventure! Doesn’t make for great blog fodder, though.

In other news, Greg is going to be going TDY for a few months and we had what is for us quite short notice, so we’re scrambling to get everything sorted for while he’s gone. I haven’t really come to terms with the fact that he’s leaving (likely aided by the fact that I actively avoid thinking too much about it) and I’m sure we’ll get down to the wire and not have enough time to do things…

The prospect of him leaving has made it clear how far from home we really are. Usually I make a trip back to my parents’ sometime during an extended separation, and I’m almost sure that I can’t this time, even though it’s scheduled to be the longest separation in our marriage. (Look for us some time next year, though!) It seems like they just keep getting longer and longer, even though I have little right to complain when I compare my situation with people who have a spouse ship out for a year, or deploy for 15 months…it’s tough.

I also feel like I’m struggling just to keep in touch with my family back home. It’s not something I thought we’d have a problem with. After all, there’s email. IM. We have phone service through the internet so we actually have a phone line with a stateside number. We figured it wouldn’t be too different from Texas - we were already far enough that most of our interaction was online or over the phone, right? The time difference is staggering, though. It’s easy to miss the time window to make phone calls. It’s easy to miss special days when you think, “I should call about this,” and realize you need to wait eight hours to catch someone. It’s easy to forget over those hours. I’m sure we’ll step up and get it sorted out, it’s just going to take some extra effort - much like the extra effort required to keep my dishes clean now that we live in a house without a dishwasher. (I do miss my old kitchen. Yes, I do. So many things about it…)

A Big Day for Little Things

The boys and I went grocery shopping at the commissary today. (We tried to go yesterday, but we forgot that they recently changed the schedule so that the day they are closed is Monday instead of Sunday. The Japanese employees - meaning, almost all of them - are ticked off about it, too. If I understand correctly, they only take one day for weekends, and Sunday is it. I wasn’t too pleased to waste a trip to base, myself.) I was pleasantly surprised to see that they had more fruit than usual! We get strange gaps in stock and supply, and something they carry one day may never show up again. Today, though, they had strawberries (I haven’t seen those for a month or two) and green grapes for a reasonable price (last time they had grapes they were $4 a pound) and I was quick to snatch some up.

Unfortunately, we did not get out of the store without incident.

You know those little buttons under the counter by the cash register, that the cashier can push to call the police if they’re being robbed? Yeah, it’s a big red button about two and a half feet up from the floor - quite eye-catching if you’re three feet tall. We were checking out and no one was standing in the lane next to us, so Max wandered two steps away and pushed the bright red button.

The cashier said, “Oh, no, don’t push that -” (as he pushes the button) “…Police come now.”

We had to stand and wait about ten or fifteen minutes for the SP to show up to take the report. Wow, sure glad there wasn’t actually a gunman. Although, they may have told him that it was a false alarm, and if they did he surely took his time. He seemed annoyed, and pulled aside the store manager to discuss something that I’m not surprised to learn is a recurring problem.

SP: “Look, you’ve got to do something about this. This is the second time -”

Japanese Store Manager (politely interrupting): “Third time.”

SP: “Okay, the third time that this has happened. The kids just walk in there and push the button, you need to put something across there to cover it when no one’s using it, to keep people from going in there.”

Sounds like a plan. He came over and talked to me, took Max’s name, birth date, and social security number (baby’s got a rap sheet now!); then all of my information, a contact number, Greg’s squadron and info, and his work number. Apparently three-year-olds pushing the panic button is the sort of thing that they take very seriously. I mean come on. (I said that no one could possibly be getting in trouble over this, and he did tell me that most of the info was required solely for record keeping purposes. Sigh.) When he was done, we took our groceries and went home.

The rest of the day was better.

I cut up a few bananas, washed some (giant! but still sweet and red inside) strawberries, pulled off some small, succulent grapes, and we had fruit for lunch. I made a dip by mixing four ounces of cream cheese, about 1/2 tbsp honey, a dash of cinnamon, and a splash of milk in a bowl. I microwaved it until it stirred together fairly easily, and we were in decadent fruit heaven.

Here’s the culprit! Is this the face of a criminal? Nah. Max loves fruit, especially strawberries, although I think he was intimidated by the massive ones we bought today.

Charlie, on the other hand, detests fresh fruit. (I know, right? I think it’s a texture issue, since he will eat baby food fruit, or cooked fruit, but not fresh fruit or even applesauce.) He used one of the giant strawberries as an elaborate and messy scoop to get the honeyed cream cheese in his mouth. Mmmm, cream cheese.

A lot more is going on around here, but we’ll deal with that another day.

Progress going backwards

I finally did it!

Sooo….now I get to start over. With luck, I’ll catch up before the next clue is released. I’d have a better idea of whether that was possible if I knew when the clue was coming, but it’s a mystery.

Today is special for another reason, too: Knitty! That’s right, the summer issue has been released. It’s a little light - (you can’t blame them: summer!) but there are some lovely patterns. Seascape is quite beautiful, and I like Gigi although if I were to make it I’d alter the proportions a bit. And look! A hat with the most interesting bit crocheted. That’s actually pretty encouraging; I’ve been thinking about creating something to submit to Knitty, and one of my ideas has a crocheted element. So we’ll see.

I have one more thing to show off before I finish:

The other night I just wanted to knit something. I wanted something fast, something I could just cast on, follow the directions, and finish. These little booties fit the bill! The pattern is free: I may make the hat that goes with it, I haven’t decided. There are a lot of pregnant women around here this summer, and it wouldn’t hurt to be prepared.

A Pattern, FOs, and a WIP!

I’ve gotten a lot of work done this week on my projects. First of all, the pattern for the Mulberry Wristwarmers is now available!

Better late than never, right? I’m happy. I’m always excited to release a new pattern (and to be honest the free patterns are a lot of fun because they’re less work - I don’t have the free ones tested).

I also finished the project I was working on:

NOONAS! (Noona is a nonsense word Charlie uses, and I decided it was good for these.) Here’s a better view of the toys:

It’s a set of nine stuffed toys with soft, suggestive shapes instead of a lot of detail. The bright colors really attract the kids’ attention, and this kind of toy is great for encouraging creativity: instead of having an assigned function, the boys have to use their imagination to play with them. They’ve loved doing it, too. They’ve been steering wheels, cookies, cars, babies, flowers, hats, bracelets, guitars, pianos, chicken nuggets…you name it. I like toys of this kind a lot better than something with a single, proscribed function (can we say E-L-M-O Elmo?) I’m glad my kids agree. The pattern for the set will be available to buy as soon as I get it tested - sigh.

In mystery shawl news, I decided to split the cashmere back into two single strands. I know. Holy cow. I’ve already spent probably an hour and a half or two hours at it, and it’s going to take at least that much again to finish up. When I wound the two strands together last year, they got twisted around each other somewhat - it’s like I’m separating plies! (I hate doing that! They get all twisted around until you have to spin your ball to go any farther. )

I’d better hurry up, though. They’ve already released the second clue!

And now, for a political aside.

If you’re the kind of person who finds heated or controversial political discussions distasteful, please - come back next time, when I’ll have a quirky toy collection and and an update on the cashmere situation to present.

I’ve been doing a lot of research this week, and having many, many online discussions to try and decide which Presidential candidate will get my vote this fall. (Yes, I’m still deliberating.) I’ve been asking others what it is about their candidate of choice that earned their support. Some people are voting along party lines, some people are voting after careful consideration of issues most important to them, and some people’s vote was swayed by mudslinging. Out of everything, I was most disturbed by a single line I kept seeing over and over.

I could never support someone who was pro-life. Period.

Since when has being pro-life been an indefensible position? Since when has being pro-life been a symptom of radical religious misogyny, not to mention someone incredibly out of touch with the ‘realities’ of modern life? Since when has concern for the life of an unborn child been irrelevant?

Look. I don’t think abortion should be completely illegal. The decision to have an abortion is a huge and very personal one, and there are situations where I would feel that a mother was justified in terminating her pregnancy. I don’t believe laws should be changed to force women to carry a baby they do not want to term. That’s wrong. I’ve had children. Being pregnant was one of the most invasive, exhausting, overwhelming, and frightening experiences of my life - of course it wasn’t only that, but in a situation where I had no desire for the pregnancy or the child, in a situation with no support, it would have been Hell. I also don’t believe that women should have an abortion because they don’t feel like having kids, or getting stretch marks, or ‘I’m in school right now,’ or ‘he broke up with me when he found out,’ or the hundred other reasons that have nothing to do with the life of the mother, the life of the child, rape, incest, or other deeply damaging situations. (These combined account for less than 10% of abortions in the United States.) That is also wrong. Not because I say so, but because the decision to end a human life for any but the deepest and most desperate of reasons is wrong. I suppose that because I don’t want to completely ban abortions, and I don’t want to strictly limit them (I don’t think that’s possible in a way that is ethical) I can’t call myself ‘pro-life.’ I’m definitely not ‘pro-choice.’ It’s just never that simple.

So I’m not out to take away your “right” to abortions. But come on, people. There has to be a better way. I’m all for mass dispersal of contraceptives, if that would reduce abortion rates. Frankly, if you don’t want children I don’t want you reproducing. (Not in a Darwinian sense. But I like babies. Why would I want to force you to have one you don’t want? Not fair to anyone.) If you (as an adult) choose to have sex, you choose to accept an implicit risk of pregnancy resulting - even with contraception. Responsibility for the consequences of your actions is not optional. If even a .01% chance of pregnancy is unacceptable to you, quit having sex.

In the end, I am really, truly saddened by the unspoken attitude I have seen reflected by dozens of women this week, that anyone ‘against’ abortion only wants to cripple and control women, shackling them in their own bodies for the sake of some unwanted non-person (aka fetus) that someone will have to grudgingly provide and care for after it makes it out. It seems like the discussion has focused so much on “her body” that no one dares to mention “her baby” - and that is devastatingly tragic.

You’re welcome to tell me you disagree with me. I don’t mind. I do reserve the right to delete any comments from flamers.

We now return to your regularly scheduled content.

Whoops

Well, while I’m marginally closer to finishing the project I was working on, I did not manage to avoid starting something completely different. I’ve joined the Mystery Laceweight Shawl Crochet-Along! (The group is on Ravelry but the directions are not, so everyone can play. Although I believe the wait time for new Ravelry users is down to one day, so if you’ve been wanting to sign up but were intimidated by the wait list, wait no more! Also, if you want to play along and don’t want to see it, shoo! I’m going to post a picture that’s a bit ’spoilery.’) I’ve never made a shawl, something with laceweight, been in a crochet (or knit, for that matter) along, and I’ve certainly never done a mystery one before. I cheated a little: I didn’t join until after I’d seen a few people get through the first clue. It was pretty, and I already had a G hook out, and I realized that it would be perfect for this overdyed cashmere - although I had no idea how much yardage I had. (The shawl is supposed to need 700.) Although, looking at that blog post, it looks like I will NOT have that much. I wrote that I dyed 850 yds, and then I doubled it (so, about 425) because it was so thin and fragile. Hmm. That dampens my enthusiasm somewhat.

Oh, well. For picture,

S

c

r

o

l

l

d

o

w

n

!

Click the picture to see the first clue fully revealed! Intriguing, right? I guess I have a few options to deal with the yarn issue. One: Don’t make a full-blown shawl. Not a bad option, I’m not a huge fan of full sized shawls, anyway. The downside is that this is a Mystery pattern. I don’t know enough to make radical design alterations at this point. So, I could Two: unravel what I’ve done, separate the strands and work singly instead of doubled. This would have the benefit of making the finished project even thinner and lacier (possibly prettier?), give me sufficient yardage for the project, etc. Downside? Ack! Not only undo what I’ve already done, but unravel that whole spool and separate it onto two?? I’m almost sure that in some places I’ve spliced both strands together when mending breaks. That would mean cutting and re-splicing around them - not difficult, just adding a new layer of complexity to the process. Third option: I have a lot of that cashmere left, just not dyed. I could try to dye some more to finish with. I don’t feel that’s the best option.

I think that I’m going to swatch with a single strand of cashmere and see how it looks. Then I’ll know better whether option two is worth the hassle…