I completely forgot that today was Valentine's Day. J. and I went down into Vancouver for a few hours today, mostly as long as my ankle could handle, and on the trip home, somewhere on the bus or the Skytrain, I suddenly remembered that it was the day I used to call "Singles' Awareness Day" (acronym, SAD). It had slipped my mind before that.
This is a day which I liked when I was a child, because my grandparents would give us candy on pretty much any holiday. One winter when they were in Arizona (back in the days when they were snowbirds), they sent me and my brothers candy for Groundhog Day. So I liked that part. I liked making valentines with construction paper and giving them to my friends. I didn't really dislike the holiday until high school. Suddenly, I was head over heels in "love" with a guy who thought I was okay, but wasn't interested at all in me (he was head over heels for a friend of mine, instead). I was miserable. Valentine's Day sucked, because all the happy couples around me were giving each other flowers and candy and going on dates and going to the Sweethearts' Banquet our school hosted. That year, my dad gave me some really great socks for Valentine's Day and took me to the bookstore to cheer me up (where I bought Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility). I have great parents. I'm still amazed they put up with me in some of my moodier moments in my teens.
So, I made it through high school, tending towards grumpy every Valentine's Day because it would remind me even more that whoever I happened to like at the time didn't like me. Then I went off to university and met J. Our first Valentine's Day together happened about three weeks after we started (officially) dating. I told him I didn't want to make a big deal out of it, and being a guy who was still learning to read me, he took me at my word. I wrote him a poem and got my best friend to write it out for me in calligraphy. He said, "Oh yeah, happy Valentine's day" right before a class we had together. It wasn't the greatest day, since I had hoped he would do something in spite of what I'd said, but even so, I didn't exactly hate it anymore.
These days, we might go out for dinner, or stay in and make dinner together. The year he decided to make me Indian food was interesting. We had homemade palak paneer and some flatbread with grated horseradish in it. And that was it. Although, palak paneer is very filling. We went out for dinner tonight, but more because we didn't want to cook and Valentine's Day was as good an excuse as any. If he gives me red roses, it's never on Valentine's Day, it's because he thought it would be nice to bring me flowers.
I'm far less romantic than I used to be. I used to daydream about a guy who would do the grand gestures, but it turned out that what I really wanted was someone like J. He's not usually terribly romantic (although the occasional bouquet is really sweet of him), but I never doubt that he loves me, and I know that I love him. We don't play games with each other, and while it's not perfect (I doubt I could live with perfect--it'd drive me crazy), it's good. And we're happy.
Plus, wandering around Vancouver today was much more fun than an expensive candlelit dinner with roses. We had burritos and got to see a snowboarder jumping on a trampoline.
14 February 2010
09 February 2010
half-way down the stairs
There's something about being cautious on stairs that I should have learned when I was a child. I mean, really, I remember vividly falling down the stairs at my grandfather's retirement party when I was about two. I've slipped down a couple sets of staircases since. And each time, I've survived with, at most, a couple bruises. I usually instinctively fall the right way, ever since I took a self-defense class (usually being the important word there).
Yesterday afternoon, I was walking down the stairs in the linguistics building, going to class. I was chatting with a classmate about the options of thesis vs. comprehensive exams, and then, at the bottom of the stairs, I saw a friend I haven't seen since before Christmas. So I shouted hi, and as I was asking him how he was (with about two steps to go to the bottom), I placed my foot wrong. Down those last two steps I went, viciously twisting my ankle along the way. I managed to turn the word that almost came out of my mouth into "shoot!" and sat there at the bottom of the stairs, breathing carefully so as to keep from crying.
I've twisted my ankle before. Many times. It'll hurt, I rotate it a bit, and it might ache for a half hour, at most. Then it's fine. The stabbing pain of this suggested that this injury might be more serious. So, I sat through my class for an hour and a half, trying not cry or move my ankle, and then got a ride home with someone so I didn't have to face the walk to the bus stop, the bus ride, and the walk home from the bus stop.
It still hurts this morning. Badly. I think I will be stopping by the doctor's on the way home. In the meantime, it's been wrapped up and I believe ibuprofen and walking carefully are my friends.
Edit: Yes, the doctor says it's sprained. I spent close to two hours at the clinic waiting for him to tell me that I was already doing all the right stuff. Then I managed to strain my thumb a bit (either because I was a bit tense while knitting at the clinic, or because I managed to sleep on top of my hand, or both), so I have to take a day or two off of knitting. It's easier than it was this summer, but it's still annoying. I want to work on those socks.
Yesterday afternoon, I was walking down the stairs in the linguistics building, going to class. I was chatting with a classmate about the options of thesis vs. comprehensive exams, and then, at the bottom of the stairs, I saw a friend I haven't seen since before Christmas. So I shouted hi, and as I was asking him how he was (with about two steps to go to the bottom), I placed my foot wrong. Down those last two steps I went, viciously twisting my ankle along the way. I managed to turn the word that almost came out of my mouth into "shoot!" and sat there at the bottom of the stairs, breathing carefully so as to keep from crying.
I've twisted my ankle before. Many times. It'll hurt, I rotate it a bit, and it might ache for a half hour, at most. Then it's fine. The stabbing pain of this suggested that this injury might be more serious. So, I sat through my class for an hour and a half, trying not cry or move my ankle, and then got a ride home with someone so I didn't have to face the walk to the bus stop, the bus ride, and the walk home from the bus stop.
It still hurts this morning. Badly. I think I will be stopping by the doctor's on the way home. In the meantime, it's been wrapped up and I believe ibuprofen and walking carefully are my friends.
Edit: Yes, the doctor says it's sprained. I spent close to two hours at the clinic waiting for him to tell me that I was already doing all the right stuff. Then I managed to strain my thumb a bit (either because I was a bit tense while knitting at the clinic, or because I managed to sleep on top of my hand, or both), so I have to take a day or two off of knitting. It's easier than it was this summer, but it's still annoying. I want to work on those socks.
07 February 2010
pre-Olympics
We took a trip down to Vancouver yesterday and spent the day wandering around Commerical and Granville Island with some friends. Commercial is a really fun, quirky place with interesting stores and some great restaurants, and that's where we spent most of our day. Then we took Skytrain and the new "Olympic Line" streetcar over to Granville Island. The streetcar on loan from Brussells is very nice, and very similar to the MAX trains in Portland, Oregon, except the ones from Brussells have leather seats and signs that are in French and what I think was Dutch (since the signs are only a few words long, I wasn't sure if it was Dutch or German, since those can look a tad similar, and both are official languages in Belgium). And the drivers for these were driving much more slowly than the MAX drivers do.
I wasn't terribly enthusiastic about the Olympics until this weekend. We've been hearing about it for years, and so far, it's just seemed to result in lots of construction and road repair. And now, all of a sudden, this is something really, really neat. There were banners everywhere, people wearing maple leaves, and we actually saw the Slovakian Olympic team while we were waiting in line for the streetcar. This is real. It's no longer something we talk about, not something that's happening next year. It's happening now.
We're going back to Vancouver next weekend, the day after the opening ceremonies. We can't afford to go to any of the events, but there's free concerts and cultural stuff happening, and I want to be able to say that I was there when the Olympics were in Vancouver.
I wasn't terribly enthusiastic about the Olympics until this weekend. We've been hearing about it for years, and so far, it's just seemed to result in lots of construction and road repair. And now, all of a sudden, this is something really, really neat. There were banners everywhere, people wearing maple leaves, and we actually saw the Slovakian Olympic team while we were waiting in line for the streetcar. This is real. It's no longer something we talk about, not something that's happening next year. It's happening now.
We're going back to Vancouver next weekend, the day after the opening ceremonies. We can't afford to go to any of the events, but there's free concerts and cultural stuff happening, and I want to be able to say that I was there when the Olympics were in Vancouver.
27 January 2010
cracking the crochet code
When I learned how to sew, I did pretty well. I could sew by hand or by machine, and as long as I took my time with it and didn't take shortcuts, whatever I made would turn out fairly well. With practice, my stitches grew smaller and more even, and my skill using the machine got better.
When I learned how to knit, I'd been struggling with crochet and knitting was so much easier (I can think of at least two people who had tried to teach me to crochet and I had failed to learn). I was invited to my very first knit and crochet night. The evening I picked up those needles, my friend Sherie showed me how to cast on, and then how to make my first stitch, and all of sudden, I was sitting there on the floor of Emma's living room, knitting. Everyone around me was either knitting or crocheting and doing it much better than I, but I will always remember that moment. It was like magic.
I finished the scarf I was crocheting as a Christmas gift, tried to figure out how to crochet a hat, and then just gave up and concentrated on knitting. Periodically, I would pick up the hook and try it, but the most I could manage was a chain and what I now know was slip stitch (not single crochet, like I thought it was). I tried reading instructions and I tried watching videos. Nothing seemed to help.
Since I wasn't particularly interested in crochet for its own sake, it didn't seem important to learn. Then I got Wrap Style from the library. I loved most of the patterns for their quirkyness, their beauty, and the challenge they would pose for knitting. Then I turned a page and saw it. Chanson en Crochet is a crocheted capelet that made me forget my dislike of the look of crochet. I wanted to make it. So I filed it in the back of my mind ("I will learn to crochet enough to make that") and let it go for the moment. I was working on a lace shawl and some socks and a few other things.
A few weeks ago, I tried to learn again (New Year's goal!) and felt like pulling my hair out. It was so frustrating. Why had someone invented this blasted craft and why did so many people crochet like there was no tomorrow? So I set it aside once more, figuring that I could ask a friend at knit night sometime to give me a hand. Maybe what I needed was a real live teacher, not a video where a right-handed person did it so fast I couldn't see what was happening.
Three days ago, something happened. I had gotten Wrap Style out of the library again, and was looking at the instructions for the crochet project. I turned to the basic crochet instructions in the back, and read through them. And it clicked. Something, somewhere in my mind made the connection I'd been waiting for. Later that evening, I picked up a crochet hook, and I picked up a ball of dishcloth cotton. I made a chain. Then I made a few rows of single crochet. A few rows of double crochet. A few rows of half-double crochet. Some slip-stitch. To use up the last of the yarn, I single-crocheted around the edge.
It's not pretty. I skipped a few edge stitches by accident, so one end is wider than the other. It's reminiscent of the blob I made last November that turned out to be slip stitch, not single crochet (the blob is now a rice pillow). But it is, unmistakeably, crochet.
Obviously, I need a little more practice before I can get going on the actual project, but I will do it. Crochet is no longer my Waterloo. I'm positive it will never replace knitting for me, since I prefer the look of knitting to crochet, but I will no longer fear the projects with the crocheted edging.
When I learned how to knit, I'd been struggling with crochet and knitting was so much easier (I can think of at least two people who had tried to teach me to crochet and I had failed to learn). I was invited to my very first knit and crochet night. The evening I picked up those needles, my friend Sherie showed me how to cast on, and then how to make my first stitch, and all of sudden, I was sitting there on the floor of Emma's living room, knitting. Everyone around me was either knitting or crocheting and doing it much better than I, but I will always remember that moment. It was like magic.
I finished the scarf I was crocheting as a Christmas gift, tried to figure out how to crochet a hat, and then just gave up and concentrated on knitting. Periodically, I would pick up the hook and try it, but the most I could manage was a chain and what I now know was slip stitch (not single crochet, like I thought it was). I tried reading instructions and I tried watching videos. Nothing seemed to help.
Since I wasn't particularly interested in crochet for its own sake, it didn't seem important to learn. Then I got Wrap Style from the library. I loved most of the patterns for their quirkyness, their beauty, and the challenge they would pose for knitting. Then I turned a page and saw it. Chanson en Crochet is a crocheted capelet that made me forget my dislike of the look of crochet. I wanted to make it. So I filed it in the back of my mind ("I will learn to crochet enough to make that") and let it go for the moment. I was working on a lace shawl and some socks and a few other things.
A few weeks ago, I tried to learn again (New Year's goal!) and felt like pulling my hair out. It was so frustrating. Why had someone invented this blasted craft and why did so many people crochet like there was no tomorrow? So I set it aside once more, figuring that I could ask a friend at knit night sometime to give me a hand. Maybe what I needed was a real live teacher, not a video where a right-handed person did it so fast I couldn't see what was happening.
Three days ago, something happened. I had gotten Wrap Style out of the library again, and was looking at the instructions for the crochet project. I turned to the basic crochet instructions in the back, and read through them. And it clicked. Something, somewhere in my mind made the connection I'd been waiting for. Later that evening, I picked up a crochet hook, and I picked up a ball of dishcloth cotton. I made a chain. Then I made a few rows of single crochet. A few rows of double crochet. A few rows of half-double crochet. Some slip-stitch. To use up the last of the yarn, I single-crocheted around the edge.
It's not pretty. I skipped a few edge stitches by accident, so one end is wider than the other. It's reminiscent of the blob I made last November that turned out to be slip stitch, not single crochet (the blob is now a rice pillow). But it is, unmistakeably, crochet.
Obviously, I need a little more practice before I can get going on the actual project, but I will do it. Crochet is no longer my Waterloo. I'm positive it will never replace knitting for me, since I prefer the look of knitting to crochet, but I will no longer fear the projects with the crocheted edging.
22 January 2010
I haven't had as much time for knitting in the last couple weeks as I did during the holidays. It's been back to work and school. I do spend more time on campus now, which reminds me, oddly, of the hours spent on campus when I went to community college. Back then, I spent a lot of time in the ceramics lab or in the language department (which was in the same building as the machine programming department where my dad works--never quite understood why). Now I spend most of my time at the linguistics building, of course. Today, for example, I have class at 9, I'm done at 10, but since I also work the closing shift at the university library on Fridays, I have this enormous gap of time until 3. It's good for doing homework in. I have some writing to do today, some reading, and some math (acoustic phonetics is forcing me to remember algebra and trig, and making me wish I had taken stats when I had the chance). And, of course, I always bring my knitting.
Right now my project of choice is a pair of entrelac socks. My sweater is too large to bring with me and the mittens are too complicated, since I spend most of the time working on them staring at the chart (past the thumb gusset and working on palm, but not to the decreases yet, and still on first mitten). Entrelac mostly doesn't take a lot of concentration. I don't have a picture yet, but I'll try to take one when I get to the heel. The yarn I'm using slowly changes colour, and the colour change usually hits about when I start the next entrelac row, which is what I was hoping for.
And that's about all for now.
Right now my project of choice is a pair of entrelac socks. My sweater is too large to bring with me and the mittens are too complicated, since I spend most of the time working on them staring at the chart (past the thumb gusset and working on palm, but not to the decreases yet, and still on first mitten). Entrelac mostly doesn't take a lot of concentration. I don't have a picture yet, but I'll try to take one when I get to the heel. The yarn I'm using slowly changes colour, and the colour change usually hits about when I start the next entrelac row, which is what I was hoping for.
And that's about all for now.
09 January 2010
day trip
J. and I spent most of Friday and Saturday with his family. We went down into Vancouver today, and we made several stops, mostly along Broadway. Mine was supposed to be at "Three Bags Full," which was having a sale. It must have been an awesome sale because we got there and the line was out the door and down the street a ways (I've gotta wonder if they were selling Malabrigo half-price or something crazy like that). A guy half-way down the line said he'd been waiting for about an hour, and since none of the family really wanted to wait two hours for me to get in, we left. If it had just been J. and me, I would've done it, but it wasn't really fair to ask them to wait. I'll have to check out the store another time, when they aren't having a sale. Or, the next time they have a sale, I'll get there early.
So we left and got lunch instead. Then we went to a tea place, as my SIL wanted to stop there. That was fun. I got a couple new teas to try, and J. and I shared a pot of their Earl Grey. It was beautifully understated. There was enough bergamot flavouring to make it a proper Earl Grey, but not so much that it obscured the taste of the tea leaves (one of my biggest complaints about cheap Earl Greys).
We went to a music store so my MIL could look at harps, and I ran across a book I've been keeping an eye out for. Rise Up Singing is a collection of lyrics and chords for over a thousand songs. I know quite a few of them, but I often forget the lyrics. With this, I can have a reference for the lyrics, and I can work on learning to play chords properly on my mandolin. I kept trying to follow J. around the store with my head buried in this book, humming along with different songs. I ran into a couple of people doing that.
And I fell asleep in the car on the way home.
So we left and got lunch instead. Then we went to a tea place, as my SIL wanted to stop there. That was fun. I got a couple new teas to try, and J. and I shared a pot of their Earl Grey. It was beautifully understated. There was enough bergamot flavouring to make it a proper Earl Grey, but not so much that it obscured the taste of the tea leaves (one of my biggest complaints about cheap Earl Greys).
We went to a music store so my MIL could look at harps, and I ran across a book I've been keeping an eye out for. Rise Up Singing is a collection of lyrics and chords for over a thousand songs. I know quite a few of them, but I often forget the lyrics. With this, I can have a reference for the lyrics, and I can work on learning to play chords properly on my mandolin. I kept trying to follow J. around the store with my head buried in this book, humming along with different songs. I ran into a couple of people doing that.
And I fell asleep in the car on the way home.
31 December 2009
knitting resolutions
I've never been terribly good with New Year's resolutions. I resolve to exercise more, be tidier, read more classics, etc, and this rarely happens. I did end up getting more exercise than planned this year, but that was partly because the car died and I had to switch to walking or taking the bus (which often involves walking, too). And I'm not tidier or more organized than I used to be. I still wish I was, but the closest I've come is getting rid of old school papers from my undergrad that I have no use for (goodbye, chapter summaries from IDIS 400!) and organizing my yarn stash a bit. And I did read Wuthering Heights. And Emma, and I've never made it through that one before. Middlemarch and The Brothers Karamazov are still on the list.
However, I do plan to make some resolutions for knitting/other fibre arts this year. Since I already do a lot of knitting anyway, it doesn't seem like such a bad idea to plan some of it. In between school, work, and trying to remember to take out the recycling, I plan to:
1. Finish Sedum (as I'm almost 1/4 of the way through the pattern already, this shouldn't be difficult).
2. Get to the point with fair isle where I can do it competently (I'm working on a pair of mittens right now: slow going but it doesn't look bad).
3. Finish the Leaf in a Leaf shawl and knit at least one more lace shawl this year (probably Percy, since I have the yarn for it already).
4. Make something larger than mitts with my handspun yarn (how about a hat? or can I spin enough to make something lacy?). Also, get better at spinning.
5. Knit a rug for the Knitting Olympics using wool rags (rags need to be wound up into balls and I need to choose a pattern).
6. Knit something out of Knitted Lace of Estonia (the Raha Scarf is the one in my ravelry queue right now).
7. Knit another sweater (maybe Spoke?).
8. Learn to crochet enough to make Chanson En Crochet (crochet has been my Waterloo--my spinning is fairly decent for a beginner, and when I learned to knit, everything clicked and it worked, but crochet drives me batty. And I still want to beat it, and actually be a little competent with it).
9. Learn to do intarsia and double-knitting (I promised my dad argyle socks sometime, and double-knitting looks like fun, too).
10. Knit the Maple Swirl Socks by Debbie New (you should see the chart for these: it's insane! there's arrows and swirly sections and she even includes fair-isle).
11. Finish my wedding ring quilt (it's been a goal for a while, and I just need to take some time, sit down, and sew for a couple days, and then I will be at the fun part. I like the quilting better than the piecing).
12. AND finish those Christmas knitting projects. I've knit something fast for those people for this Christmas, but I'd like to get the projects I started this year done for next Christmas.
And I think that's about it. I'd like to work my way through more of the items in my queue, but some of those will take longer than others. And working my way through some of the stash would be good, too (no, it's not a huge stash, but if I don't buy yarn unless it's for a specific project, and knit mostly from stash, I can get through lots of it this year).
However, I do plan to make some resolutions for knitting/other fibre arts this year. Since I already do a lot of knitting anyway, it doesn't seem like such a bad idea to plan some of it. In between school, work, and trying to remember to take out the recycling, I plan to:
1. Finish Sedum (as I'm almost 1/4 of the way through the pattern already, this shouldn't be difficult).
2. Get to the point with fair isle where I can do it competently (I'm working on a pair of mittens right now: slow going but it doesn't look bad).
3. Finish the Leaf in a Leaf shawl and knit at least one more lace shawl this year (probably Percy, since I have the yarn for it already).
4. Make something larger than mitts with my handspun yarn (how about a hat? or can I spin enough to make something lacy?). Also, get better at spinning.
5. Knit a rug for the Knitting Olympics using wool rags (rags need to be wound up into balls and I need to choose a pattern).
6. Knit something out of Knitted Lace of Estonia (the Raha Scarf is the one in my ravelry queue right now).
7. Knit another sweater (maybe Spoke?).
8. Learn to crochet enough to make Chanson En Crochet (crochet has been my Waterloo--my spinning is fairly decent for a beginner, and when I learned to knit, everything clicked and it worked, but crochet drives me batty. And I still want to beat it, and actually be a little competent with it).
9. Learn to do intarsia and double-knitting (I promised my dad argyle socks sometime, and double-knitting looks like fun, too).
10. Knit the Maple Swirl Socks by Debbie New (you should see the chart for these: it's insane! there's arrows and swirly sections and she even includes fair-isle).
11. Finish my wedding ring quilt (it's been a goal for a while, and I just need to take some time, sit down, and sew for a couple days, and then I will be at the fun part. I like the quilting better than the piecing).
12. AND finish those Christmas knitting projects. I've knit something fast for those people for this Christmas, but I'd like to get the projects I started this year done for next Christmas.
And I think that's about it. I'd like to work my way through more of the items in my queue, but some of those will take longer than others. And working my way through some of the stash would be good, too (no, it's not a huge stash, but if I don't buy yarn unless it's for a specific project, and knit mostly from stash, I can get through lots of it this year).
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