Pause for Reflection

2001. What a year. It was the year that Everything went down. My brother broke his arm. My dad had gall bladder surgery for gall stones like a bag of marbles. Mom...I forget what happened with her, but my sister got married. And I? I got a new kidney to take over for the other one that was beat down by immune suppressant medication. Double edged sword, no?

And I was still in school, though in September, I was still recovering so my plate wasn't as loaded as usual. I had afternoon classes. I was checking my email in a groggy fog that accompanied just waking up rather than the consistent one I had before my transplant. That's when it all went down.

And just like WWII stories/movies/books can tear me to pieces, any thought of what happened in New York still makes me tear up. A lot of Wrong happened that day...so glad this isn't a vlog because I'd turn off the camera right now. Anyways, it took a while to sink in what was happening. Mom and I had every television on, tuned into the news. Dad was shooed home in case They decided to bomb the federal building where he worked in Kansas City. Class was cancelled. It didn't matter. There was nothing but death and dying happening.

But someone once said that experience is an arrow. You have to be drawn back, put under extreme duress and pressure, but then you are released into freedom and joy. I saw heroes that day. I saw heroes for weeks, for months, for years. Even now, there are people still rescuing others from that devastating day and the events after.

And my heart goes out to those who lost. And my love goes out to those who helped.

But I never thought I was Crazy

You know you have a yarn problem when Dad sees all of the bits and bobs strewn about in a massive carpeting of his office/spare room for photographing and accuses you of being a hoarder when you had to shove out of the way HIS electronics he's been saving since the 70's and 80's.
I tried organizing it a little...by color, weight, what box it was living in, handspun vs. not, that sort of thing.
 Fiber on the bed, yarn on the floor...
 

 The hardest part after photographing each skein to organize (not done there by half) was to pack it all away. But then I go onto Ravelry. I see other people's stashes. I think about how much I've learned from my own projects, how much I've connected with others, how much empty time I have filled in doctors' offices, grocery stores, work when everyone is in bed and all the pills are put away, the reports are all written and there's nothing to do but wait for the shift change (it's a rare thing to happen in a nursing career but prominent enough when working in a nursing home)--I think of all of that while looking at my stash and I realize that this is not hoarding. This is a hobby. The yarn does eventually get rotated. I am never in need of handknit socks. I always have something to drape around my shoulders if I'm cold.

And so, am I hoarding? I'm going to protest and say, "No, I'm *preparing*."

~*~

As for WHAT I'm knitting, well, socks. It's still good sock weather and then Sock Madness started up as well and for those who have read back on this blog know that though I passed last year, the siren call was too much to ignore this time. Now, my goal has been to use UP some of the stash, but how can I possibly say 'no' to people like Laura Harmon, owner of the newest LYS on the block - Harmony. She has luscious yarns that are mostly picked by other knitters as she has seriously surveyed us all on what she ought to stock and she's not gone too far wrong!  Like these Jane Bennet socks that I made of Malabrigo sock Arco Iris on the left. How can you say 'no' to such gorgeous yarn?




But I did say there was Sock Madness, no? And when the first specs came out, I was a bit dismayed as it asked for wildly variegated yarn. I had nothing of the sort so after grabbing some KnitPics Stroll in Bare (undyed), I went to create a bit of a disaster of the microwave with water streaming onto the stove below (don't worry, what I didn't catch in used drinking glasses got sopped up by dishrags). But in the end, I created a colorway I have finally decided a name for: Leprechaun In A Blender. The name is appropriate because that green is really kind of unnaturally bright and then those deep berry reds and the dark purple that looks more like brown or black...okay, a touch morbid but it does make me giggle just a bit. Next time I'll be a little more selective of my Kool-Aid dyes. And now I'm tempted to use the green on my hair, y'know, for St. Patrick's. Not that it would be considered all that professional in my line of work. Pity.

I have a few more things on the needles at the moment including Janalee's Traveling Socks. I promised to knit 2" of lace on each sock since her hands do not appreciate being put to work on such teensy needles (Size #00s, which is about as big as the needles are for drawing up blood). But the LiaB socks are top priority for now.

~*~
Some of you may wonder, why does Kit knit so very much (and others wonder how I knit so very much which is a secret). Well, it's a little like why I prefer to knit in theaters. At a movie there is always a degree of stress related to the movie on the screen. It's how movies like that are and there is always something there to relieve that stress, primarily food. I've been to movies without knitting and when THAT happens, I eat popcorn a lot. It's a bit pathetic, but hey, it's there for my enjoyment, right? But if I do bring knitting with me, the stress is relieved through the stitches, I can enjoy the movie without making an utter pig of myself. Now, consider the stress of the movies and halve that but make it constant. Mom has been ill and on her good days, I'm relaxed, we go out, we do things together, my knitting production takes a dive. On her bad days, she's on the couch most of the time and I'm making sure she doesn't get lonely or go without anything and that's when I either eat or I knit. Of course, I'm not comfortable knitting upstairs what with the beagles running rampant but I hope you understand the point I'm getting to; I'm managing stress.

Which is also why my clothes are getting tighter every day...oh dear.

~*~
And that's about it. For those of you curious, I've got a few recommendations.

What I'm listening to:
Warning: These robots really move like robots and it can be a little spooky. But the music is magic and CLEAN. :)

What I'm reading:
Mrs. Brooke recommended Emperor Of All Maladies and I got it for $5 on Kindle and it's been utterly fascinated. As the subtitle proclaims, it is a biography of cancer and it involves so very much. I'm still repeatedly surprised at how ignorant we as a medical community are about cancer. And it makes me so grateful that mom survived her bout of breast cancer and it's been over 5 years since she finished treatment. That's termed a great success in the field of oncology.

I'm also reading Doctrine & Covenants Made Easier since I'm teaching that to my wee Primary kiddles.

And Sheri Dew's No Doubt About It that my sister got me for Christmas.

It's a lot of reading but it's all worth it.

And finally; What I'm watching

I'm catching up on Season 2 of Grimm since Season 3 is about to come out.
I'm still hooked on The Walking Dead but I can't recommend that to anyone who isn't a total weenie bit sensitive to graphic violence.
And I've been introduced to the Lizzie Bennet Diaries on YouTube since Janalee was talking about it. It's hilarious but I can only take in small doses (which is good since each 'episode' is under 5 minutes).

So what's up wichoo?

Works in Passion

If you've known me for a while, you know that when I was a kid, I loved to draw. I would draw a LOT, I even had a doodle journal for a bit that I cringe to look through. SO MANY EMOTIONS! Prednisone is bad, kids. Don't be on it for 17 years, then have a transplant and have to come off it, your body will be VERY UNHAPPY.

Anyways, now I knit. It alleviates the nerves, it creates things that I don't have to cringe at, I don't see all the raw emotions, though I can still feel them when I stroke the fabric. Here I cried into the blanket. There, I was watching an intense movie and knit so fast my needles almost caught fire. But no one can see those things but me.

Last week was kind of dramatic. No, wait, it WAS dramatic, no 'kind of' or 'maybe', it just was. And I had to admit, I was so glad I was knitting and spinning, it took a lot of my anxiety and pain away. And funny enough, well, the worst of it was taken while working on my Serenity Blanket. Of course, I was also watching a whole lot of video game playthroughs (it's fun to watch GhostRobo play scary stuff because he's as big a wimp as I am, though a little more squeaky).

But it's not just to knit, I get bored, my wrists get sore, I need something else. So, my dear friend Janalee caught me at a spin out near Park City and handed me a small bundle. "I'm sorry it doesn't have any black in it, but it's as close to goth as I could find," she said as I opened it up. Uhhh, are you kidding? It's named MARCELINE! If you don't know who that is, watch Adventure Time with your kids, you might spot a little vampire girl with a bass ax guitar who sings like Anna Nalick and sucks the red out of things (not blood, just the color red). It is PERFECT.


So here I am, spinning a worsted weight (or as close as I can manage once it's all double-plyed up) and chilling out when I'm not knitting or dodging drama. Just thought I'd update all of you.

So if you're feeling a little in the dumps (or a lot in the dumps), what do you do? Do you draw? I don't much anymore but I love looking at other people's artwork. Show me!

So I went to fight a War.

I won't apologize. This is my blog, I will post what I want when I want but...I do need to catch up on what I've been doing lately. See, I went and joined Nerd Wars, the latest Tournament (#4) starting in February and I've been knitting. Like a fiend. Nevermind castonitis, that got sated very early on. And now I've got a lovely finished object gallery just to show off!

Now, I'm on Team Tardis and if there's any reason for the silence here, it's because I exploded with posts there and quickly rose to the top of the chattiest chart. I've met so many friends, including Maggie (who works at Kamille's and has angora bunnies!). But I don't have pictures of them (or if I do, I don't wish to show them since I'm in them). Let's move on to the knitting.



It begins with the Gothic Tam, available in the Interweave Knits Holiday Accessories 2011 issue. I was disappointed that the tweed yarn caused the intricate pattern to get terribly lost but I still liked the swirling vortex of space look.



The second was my attempt at the 2-color brioche stitch using a couple of Malabrigo Worsted colors. It came out lovely, warm, and soft as a sigh.



These were the prize of my February, cashmere fingerless mitts. I had some laceweight cashmere but not enough for anything actually lace and so I had to search the Ravelry pattern search and came up with this. It's actually even softer than a sigh, it's luxury and it only could be moments away from my fingers when I wore them rather than a hat or a scarf so I could pet them while I wore them.



Any baby that calls himself Stormageddon: Dark Lord of All (Doctor Who reference, Netflix it now on Instant) is deserving of a hat that looks set to keep his ears, head, and part of his chin warm against the chills of war. The pattern was lovely, once I got over a severe case of derp and figured out what I was doing.

And at last:


A Tardis cover for the device that holds more books than I could plausibly carry. It brings me a smile every time I see it, keeps the random drops of bathwater off my device and also chases off any random dust.

Five projects in a month? I did it and I'm quite chuffed, I "melted the cube" or managed to meet all 5 challenges (well, 6 challenges but one was a donation to a charity) and I'm that much closer to being prepared for winter, babies, and watery doom to my books.

And I'll have 5 more to feature next post but in the meantime:



Enjoy the weather while you can.

How I spent the last two hours at work.

Now, I'm not a lazy nurse, I'd prefer to call myself an efficient nurse. Which means that by 10pm at the nursing home, meds are done which includes all the signing off of meds and narcotics that I've passed, all the treatments are done, all the tube feedings, all the nurses' notes, the call lights are answered, everything is...quiet. Or mostly quiet, depending on how well those narcotics worked.

And I am left to my own devices. Now, I'm not sure what Teri or Patty do when it's quiet for them, but for me, I grab my knitting and now that I have it, my Kindle. I used to scoff at those who had one. I know, I'm a guilty one, but you just can't beat the feel of the paper, the inexhaustible battery life, the reliability of a good old fashioned book. But a Kindle is light, portable, doesn't need to be held open, and always opens to where you last left off. Convenient!

And then there's my knitting project. I had a case of startitis but most of those projects landed in the frog pond as soon as I cast on and checked gauge. Sometimes that happens. But one that endured is the Spectra scarf.

I had no idea how much straight knitting it includes. It's a garter scarf, pretty much, with panels of stockinette and a little bit of short row action just to keep the knitter from going utterly comatose. The yarn is from Studio June, called Star Struck due to the sparkly bits of silver woven throughout (antibacterial!) in the color Bright Copper Kettle. The panels are Jojoland's Melody, cleverly named MS08. Clearly these people don't work for Crayola.

The nice bit about both Kindle and Spectra is that I can put both aside immediately in the case of a call light or bed alarm going off. The joys of being a nurse in a rehab facility, eh?

WIP Wednesday: January 4

Before I go into the featured Work In Progress, there is something that needs mentioning.

Sometimes life happens. Sometimes someone's mother has a brain tumor and the only thing that springs to mind is the thought that her last days would be spent in comfort if she had a little something from her own mother to keep her. Except that the only thing she got to keep from her mother is a sweater's worth of old, scratchy mohair. And the only one that someone knows who could turn that mohair into something worth enjoying is that someone's niece.

Enter the Scarf.


I knew just what to do with this yarn as soon as I got it. Three skeins of Bernat mohair plus and it would be a Simple Lace Scarf (Ravelry Link) on US#13 needles.

Now most people ought to know that I am an 85% selfish knitter. Sure, I'll knit for others if I know them and I like them and can be assured that my knits will be well received, which is why this scarf is a bit of a hit-or-miss. I don't know my Aunt Lea's mom. I don't know Aunt Lea's grandmom. But here I am, knitting up scratchy mohair that, to be honest, is just a shade softer than twine. I wondered why. Why would I do this for a total stranger?


Because I love Aunt Lea. Sure, my other aunts are great but when I had flubbed my clinicals for RN school, she was the one who was able to get my mind off of things by talking with me until the wee hours of the morning. She is the only one that I've honestly been able to connect with. I've seen her home and the incredible amount of books everywhere, books that I have read, books that I plan to read, books that sounded like I would love if I could remember the title and author. She has opened up to me and I to her and I realized that if she is this cool, her mother could only be just as awesome, if not more.

And to be honest, if my mom had a brain tumor and wanted, maybe, a hot tub installed in her bathroom or something else that I couldn't do and I knew someone who could do it, absolutely I would ask them to do it for me. Well, for compensation but hey, hopefully at a discount because it's family and they love me.

Either way, that picture was taken at 11am and right now I've finished up the second skein, the scarf is about 3 feet, and I'm about done. One more day.

You could call this your obligatory New Year's post

...and you'd be right.

My NYE wasn't much to really hoot about. Old people don't party and frown upon loud noises and wild celebrating after 8pm. But that's okay, because I got my long-awaited Chinese food and even longer awaited fortune cookie.

The cookie itself was, well, an ordinary cookie but the fortune inside, it sure was something else.



How's that for exciting? And just earlier that day, I had found that a local university was offering an LPN to RN transition program starting fall 2012. If I could get in, I might just start school again. I just hope I can find a way to pay for it all somehow.

So, much like almost every other knitter, I started a project for good luck. I had two skeins of Manos del Uruguay Wool Clasica that came home with me at the Three Wishes moving sale:



And yesterday I put two ends together, made a slipknot and did a long-tail cast on with both ends, casting on 200 stitches with a #10.5 US size set of circulars. I'm pretty pleased with the results so far, I did a bit of good work on it during church, which was handy because we start at 9am now and I was up till 1:30am the night before, showering so I didn't have to battle for it in the morning.



It's a really nice stitch, the linen stitch and the two yarns really are working nicely together for now, though we had to sit and discuss whether they would be a brioche scarf (never done brioche before!) or the linen stitch scarf or something else altogether. I think I made a good decision, though. This looks nice.

As I didn't get to do very much partying on NYE, we had a little party tonight instead. Sis brought Ticket To Ride and we had a pretty hilarious time trying to beat each other out.



I came in a close third, my sister in second and my brother in law wiping the floors with us way in front. I can't wait to do it again! I'll cream them all next time, bwahaha!

I will leave you all with a picture of pooped puppies. Because who doesn't love a pair of pooped pups?



Dad took them on an 8 mile walk so they're all tuckered. :D I hope you all had a great New Year's Day and I hope that you manage to fulfill all of your resolutions!

You can come out of the corner now.

There are many things I tend to put in "time-out" just to ruminate on them a bit.

Schooling, for one. I'm doing okay as an LPN but would like to become and RN if I can only just find some way to do it that would be free or at least cheaper than what I bring in on a monthly basis. This does not exist so right now, that dream is in time out.

My sketchbooks are another, a pasttime that used to bring me much relaxation and a zen-like state that I can't really reach any other way, not even by knitting. I pick it up every season or so, draw a little something and then set it aside again, promising that I will be more faithful. And then...I don't.

But of all the things in time out, this blog has been the second longest in such a place (schooling being #1). And so I am bringing it out, dusting it off, challenging my laconic tendencies and making an attempt to share with you a little bit more of myself.

Though the blog has been idle, these hands have not. Allow me to feature some things from the past year that I have knit:

In January I joined the Harry Potter Knit and Crochet...group. Forgive me, I can't remember the whole name. But in an effort to keep up with the 'classes', I knit a pair of fingerless gloves in honor of a book series I had just finished: Hunger Games.


In February, I made a pair of eye-shades for someone who needed them at the time.


Then came March and Sock Madness. Here are my "Support Hos":


April showed a few Dangerous Curves:


May brought me one of my favorite pair of socks:


June was when I went to visit my BFF in Northern California and I brought my Rock Island to work on. It's finished but I don't have a picture of it! I need to do that, pronto!


July gave me Francie, my other favorite pair of socks.


I think I slept through August. Or maybe I just didn't finish this guy then, though heaven knew I was working hard enough on him:


I finished this one in September for my sister's Christmas present...then realized that the colors were inverted. Well, she got my hat, I kept hers, I'm the odder one out anyways. ;)


Aaand I can't find what I knit on during October and November besides the Everlasting LinenScarfstopper.

But this past month, I rolled out a few things. My favorite goes out to Briana, a pair of Swirling Gauntlets made out of handspun, just for her:



That's love, y'all. Hours and hours went into the yarn alone.

So I resolve from now on to post a bit more often. Weekly, at least. I hope those of you left to read this will support this resolution. I'll try to be funny or at least interesting and I will definitely post more pictures.

Unlikely hero

This is what happens when I leave my camera behind at my sister's.

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You should thank me, Christina, I did not decide to save and upload the picture of the very intimate aspect of your sinuses. Lucky you!

So, hey, it was Christmas! Who doesn't love Christmas? Shut it, Scrooge! I love Christmas. Well, except when Mom is in Holland and the rest of us are here in Utah, coughing up snow balls and desperately trying to find whether we're driving on government mandated roads or just someone else's roof.



Okay, perhaps I'm overreacting. Just a touch. Or you would THINK until we lost the dog.


(Goodbye, Daisy. Goodbye forever.)

Well, even without Mom, I did my best to make Christmas warm and welcoming. I made Almond Chocolate Toffee Crunch, chocolate chip cookies, and for breakfast, there was coffee cake that was just divine.


And look, no mess! Well, okay, nothing I have to actually scrub with soap and water.

Everything looked so nice, so pretty, it was almost like Mom was there with us anyways.

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Christmas morning, my brother, dad and I went to Christina's to watch the kids open presents while we Skyped with mom. She is out in Holland being with my Oma so that she doesn't have to be alone for Christmas. My Opa is in a nursing home on comfort measures and he is having good and bad days. I don't know how long to expect him to live but he has been on the mend since mom has been there. Anyways, the kids really tore into their presents. I don't think that Kade was really thrilled with the crocheted hat I made him (he ripped it off when it was put on his head and threw it on the floor) but I gave everyone plush puppies with their hats to sweeten the deal a bit. Some kids aren't going to adore handmade lovelies when there is Star Wars action figures to play with instead. Weirdos!

After that, the boys and I headed back home where we had our coffee cake breakfast with lavender rooibos tea and then opened presents.


BOOKS! Lots of books. And an Ott light so I don't go blind while knitting, and some awesome movies (Don got me Prince of Smexia after some heavy prompting and Dad got me Excalibur). My Oma gave me some tea-pot shaped dirty spoon-holders (well, I think that's what they are) and they're so lovely, very Dutch.



In the news of knitting, I'm nearly done with sock 1 of Cookie A's Vilai.

I also joined Ravelry's Harry Potter Knitting and Crochet group. I was not intending to actually join it but then I realized that there was so much more to it than just being a fan of Harry Potter. It has groups and projects, challenges and homework. And the interaction just seems so intense, I will be looking forward to what the group brings and what I can bring to the group.

Pictures to come, the ones I took did not come out very well.

By the way, Daisy made it back, annoyed that I expected her to make her way successfully in chest high snow. Hmmph, how could I think she'd want to go anywhere without her comfy bed, her lovely mattress and her twice daily glucophage and aspirin? The nerve.

Stage Tour

I love Utah. I really do. I have so many more friends here, I love the weather better, and I'm closer to my beloved family here.

On that note, I have to say that I resent that there seem to be fewer nearby yarn stores. But hey, if you can't get yarn, you make yarn!

Roving

Back during the great Yarn Quest of 2010 where Briana came to visit, I bought some roving in Gothic Punk. I've gotten so sick of knitting and crocheting that I picked up spinning again. And it's really a nice relaxing hobby until my back protests from sitting up so much.


That's about a third of it right there.

It's Merino & Tussah Silk and it really is as soft as it sounds. In fact, it's almost as fun prepping the roving as it is spinning it up.

But I just couldn't stop with that stuff. So Etsy had a few sellers offering Blue-Faced Leicester for cheap and since I had never worked with that before but it seemed so very soft, I bought a couple 4ozers of the stuff.


Plum Dandy by Blue Mountain Handcrafts


Wooly Cupcakes by Stefknits

Gorgeous, huh? I don't think I'll go through it too fast but that's fine, I just like the pretties.

Knitting

I finished my third Edith The Hat (Ravelry Link). And I have to say, they have been so fun to knit and quite popular as well.


It's so easy to spot my Mom in a crowd with that hat.

Of course, the third has gone off to Mrs. Brooke.


Cute colors, no? I love them! :D

And finally, a little secret project for our hosts over at Jaxies:



Roger and Dee have been so kind to us and so gracious to let us come and use their establishment for our knitting group that I thought to make up a few ornaments for their all-year tree. :D I have a mitten and a pair of socks already. And they're so cute and made out of leftover sock yarn and patterns are just off the top of my wee head.

Then Marudesigns needed test knitters for her socks so I volunteered. Her pattern is lovely and I finished the socks on Saturday before work and photographed them yesterday.


She's named them Galaxy Socks and you can search for them on Ravelry soon.







I used leftover KnitPicks Gloss and needle size US#1.

And that's about it. So much for being a selfish knitter, eh? I guess that's why I bought the buttons. ;)