CeliaAnne Knits

FINALLY

2011-04-25T16:20:00.000-05:00

I have finally gotten access to my blog again! Let the fast and furious blogging begin!

As The Aughra Turns

2010-10-07T13:21:00.000-05:00

Aughra has had a busy summer and fall. Lots of stuff going on since our last update. Aughra spent most of the summer across the state with her Sunshine and his family. I think it was an enlighten time for all of them. Sunshine and Aughra realized that they really don't know each other. At one time I intercepted a phone call from him to Mama-san . I don't really remember what he was calling about. What I do remember is that my very stoic uncle said to me "She's a lot of work, isn't she?" Yes, Dear uncle. Yes, she is. Aughra was in and out of the hospital a couple of times. She has trouble remembering that she needs her oxygen all the time.

Mama-san spent her summer getting Aughra affairs in order. Having a bit of a life. (Something she hasn't had for 9 years give or take.) Generally having a quiet summer. Then Aughra came back. She is different than when she left. More of her memories are gone. She is missing words. Which pisses her off and makes her mean. She cries more. She is almost childlike sometimes. If she thinks you are late coming to see her she panics and believes you aren't coming. She really isn't who I grew-up with at all. Mama-san believes that the real Aughra still shows up from time to time but I haven't seen it. She has lost a lot of weight. Basically she has become a tiny little old lady.

She had a really serious trip to the hospital for emergency surgery. Aughra had to have 6 ft of bowel removed. The Dr Feel-good prepared us for the fact that she might not make it. She did. Much to her annoyance. So this is where we sit. All of us watching her slowly die. Depressing.

Sexism is alive and well and living in my town.

2010-09-13T21:23:00.000-05:00

Periodically I forget that people really do judge others based solely on skin color, religion or gender. Then I smack head long into it and I am stunned.

For example, I recently got new tires put on my car at NTB, here in my fair metropolis. They, as courtesy , checked out my whole car. Isn't that nice of them? They came back to me with $5,000 worth of stuff that was wrong with my poor car. That is 3 zeros there people. 3. I was stunned. They wanted me to give them permission to do the work right there. I said I would have to talk to my husband about. Using the old "Gee. I need to clear all of these with my husband . I was only allowed to get tires, mister" thing. All of a sudden my became a death trap. That's right if I drove off in my car with doing this work, I would cause and accident. People might DIE!! Are you scared? Well, I did drive off without getting the oh so important life saving work done and guess what? My car passed inspection to get my tags renewed.

Death trap? Not so much.

This whole thing remind me of when I was in high school. Oh so many moons ago. The men in my family were big supporters of women being able to take care of themselves. So before I could drive a car. I had to learn basic car maintenance. How to change a tire. Check the fluids. What type of fluids to put back in the car. Familiar enough to the engine to know when something is disconnected. That kind of stuff.

This 'cause no end of problems in my rural hometown. It was my first experience with being completely disregarded because I was a girl. See if you are female you can't possible know anything about the engine in your car. Nothing! And after battling it for a couple of years, I started hiring guys to take my car to the shop when it needed to go. Fun Celia fact.

Anyway I wanted to let all my friends know that NTB hires sexist mechanics who will try to take advantage if you let them. Thus ends Celia's Story time. Tomorrow episode "As the Aughra turns"

If you can't say anything nice...

2010-08-01T16:27:00.003-05:00

HI. Remember me? Yeah. Well I have been keeping a low profile for last last 3 months. Everything I have wanted to say I haven't wanted put into print. More accurately I haven't wanted to have it out on the Internet for all eternity.

However, I think I can share again without overly offending anyone. I am a bit out of practice so I will leave this post as is and will think of something wonderful to talk about anon.

Death & Dying

2010-04-19T12:56:00.005-05:00

So I think it is time for another Aughra update. This one will be a little different than others. See Aughra's body has decided not to wait for her anymore. When I went to see her on Sunday, I was shocked. I see her every week and in one week she had noticeably lost mass. The skin around her eyes was red and sunk in. Her forearms were smaller than my 9 yr olds. At the end of last week, they called mama-san and told her they were concerned with Aughra's kidneys. They seem to be leeching more water from her body than she is taking in. Also Necrosis specifically Coagulative Necrosis has begun in her legs.

Let's see if I can organize my thoughts into something you can follow. Aughra's mind still works, at least as well as it can with her low O2 levels. So She knows her body is crumbling around her and it scares the hell out of her. She never expected to live to be old. She had her 1st major stoke in her 40's. That is when they found the brain tumor. Which seems to be benign since it hasn't changed in 30 years. She has 4 major strokes and a ton of mini ones that she barely notices. Those, a heart murmur and 2 bouts of cancer have done nothing to make her believe she was ever going to live to be old. So she never thought about a lingering death. She thought it would be more of a bolt out of the sky thing. Now she is scared and small. I hope you understand what I mean by small. She seems to have drawn in on herself. She used to but this force of nature and now she is just a little old lady.

I got to thinking about death and dying. I remember me and my friends discussing our deaths. Do we want to grow old and dying in our sleep or go fast in some dramatic way? I know all of you, my dear readers, will shocked to find out that none of us picked and a slow wasting illness as the ideal way to shuffle off this mortal coil.

In this day and age we seem to have more compassion for our pets than for our human loved ones. If our dog/cat has something fatal and is in pain, we do something about it. We can't stand to see the poor thing suffering. If our great Aunt Sue is dying of incurable cancer and is in pain, society says we need to 'just be there' for her. Which means there isn't a damn thing you can do for her but wait like a vulture for her to go. the whole time quietly praying for an end to her suffering while feeling guilty about wishing for her death.

Why? Why do we do this? Is the last few months with this person, who isn't really the person you loved because the pain and drugs had changed them, that important? Is my sadness more important than Aunt Sue's pain? Well, I will tell you the sudden death of my paternal grandfather was a lot easier than this. I even found him all cold and stuff. The lingering decline of my great grandfather who had dementia.He didn't know where he was half the time and other half of the time he thought my Mama-san was his wife. Nothing to it. There was pain but the pain was short lived.

One of the hardest things I do is going to see how much of my grandmother, my Aughra, has disappeared in the last week and knowing that she knows how much she has lost too.

Lacey Lace.

2010-04-14T14:36:00.004-05:00

I have 2 goals this year. To make a bunch of lovely lace and color working projects. For my first project I made Haruni outta some yummy new stuff my favorite Yarn pusher sent me to try out. WOW! I love this pattern. I love this yarn! I LOVE THIS PROJECT! LOVE! I really want to make it again out of the same type of yarn but bigger and OH JOY! the designer tells you how to upsize.

So Haruni is a pretty simple lace shawlette. A field of Fern stitch with a crazy beautiful edge. The designer made it fairly clear all the way. I think I might have had the duhs going while trying to make this. There were a couple of spots I was cornfused at. The first spot is "Continue Chart A as established until you have 12 stems in each half". She goes on to explains what she means by stems. However, I couldn't decide whether she meant total for the half or across the row. After looking at my 12 stem field, I decided she meant across the row. I told you. duh!

My next 'huh?' moment came while reading the directions for the edging. Basically you work the chart across, ending with just the leaves not the triangle decrease bit. If you look at the first picture in this post, it shows the center of the shawlette. Two sets of leaves separated by a single stitch. So you begin and end each half of the shawlette with leaves. Which the designer says. Which I didn't get until I did it. I know I was being dense. This shawl does need blocking. I chose to block my with scallops. I have seen it done with a straight edge. I think It is equally beautiful either way.

Now about this yarn. LittleFreak is opening a new online shop called Shameless Twist. Which she hopes to have open by the 1st of May. In this shop of wonders she will offer Murmur. That is what my shawlette is made out of. Crazy soft 100% baby alpaca fingering weight. Yummy. 1 skein is enough for this project. Just enough but still enough (I think I have 5 or 6 yards left)

I will let you in on a little secret. She will be keeping LittleFreak open as a testing ground for new colorways and guess what she has in her shop right now? Murmur! It is incognito as babykisses but I saw it there. And....It is on sale! I don't know how long she is running the sale. So hurry if you want some!

Cliff Jumping.

2010-04-09T17:16:00.005-05:00

Most knitters/crocheters have go-to patterns that they pull out for gift giving opportunities. Something that they end up making over and over again because the pattern is easy and turns out great. I have a dear friend who found her go-to pattern for yarn. If she has a skein or so of yarn that she wants to work with but it hasn't told her what it wants to be it become the Storm Cloud Shawlette. She has made this pattern 4 times. FOUR! She would come to Saturday knit group and tell us all how easy this pattern was. Show us how pretty it was all worked up. We would all oh and ah over them.

One day Chelle decided to try it. [She has made at least 2. maybe 3]. She came back with this lovely green thing. Then Lorenia tried it [She has made 4]. The Storm Cloud Shawlette took over. Everybody was making them. So I caved. I admit it. I had this great handspun I didn't know what to make with and I just caved. So if mama-san asked me today "Would I jump off a cliff if all my friend were doing it?" The answer would have to be "Yes. Yes, I would."

Enough about my weak will power and the fact that my friends peer pressured me into this project. Peer Pressure? I'll be 35 this year. It never goes away.

This pattern is all that they,my peer pressuring bad influence friends, said. It is quick, easy and beautiful. It shows the loveliness of yarn off. It can go from Shawlette to half-moon blanket. And...drum roll please.. its free! So everybody go make your own. 'Cuz you know...All the cool kids are doing it.

Yummmy !

2010-03-30T18:12:00.003-05:00

The Jones Clan is settling into our new digs nicely. Although the boxes seem to be multiplying when I am now looking. Anyway. We are starting to explore our new environment. So we decided to go out for Chinese food. As we pulled into the parking lot we saw a sign for the Bombay Palace Authentic Indian Cuisine.

Oh no. Now we couldn't decide which to go to. So we flipped a coin and Bombay Palace won. I must say I must say I am glad it did. The food was so good.

Since we had never been before we let the proprietor decide what we wanted. He asked us to try some different relishes and tell him what we thought. I could for the life of me tell you what they were. All but one of them was fairly mild. When he came back Mini-me and I went for middle of the road medium. The 'Bum decide to test the fates and go for hot. Hehe.

While we waited we got Paneer Pakora (a home-made cheese, dipped in gram flour with Indian Spices) which was so tasty. Then our food came. All served family style but really elegantly. The basmati rice came in a raise covered dish. Each of the main dishes came in a smaller covered dish. All of them covered with Indian motifs. So I got Lamb Korma. There are not words in the English language to describe how good it was. Melt in you mouth. Seriously. Here is how they describe it: Tender lamb cooked in creamy tomato sauce with coconut, raisins and plump cashews. That really doesn't describe it.

Mini-Me got Butter Chicken (Rich Delicious sauce smothers boneless white chicken chunks). She didn't really care for it. She likes her food with a little more spice to it.

The 'Bum got Lamb Vindaloo(A spicy hot dish of tender, de-boned lamb. Which was so spicy, he almost choked. snort I shouldn't laugh. Poor Guy. But I warned him and the proprietor warned him. He was so sure he could take it. See Indian cuisine has a special kind of hot or so I have been told (by people who eat habaneros whole.)

Anybody who has eaten out with me will tell you I like to share bites with everybody. So everybody knows what everybody else dish tastes like. So we kind of did a fire drill for the 'bum. He took Mini-me's dish and Mini-me ordered another order of what I had. By the time we left we were full and mellow. You know the kind of mellow you get when you have eaten some really well balanced meal as far as textures and tastes?

So the whole bill came to $60. whew! But let me tell you everytime the wallet allows we will be back. Oh yes. We will be back.

The Odyssey by Me

2010-03-01T20:27:00.003-06:00

Gather around all as I tell the tale of the month the CeliaAnne Clan tried to move.

Once upon a time, this lovely man that Clan CeliaAnne knew offered to help them get into one of the lands he manages. These were nice lands in a good part of the city. He even offered to give it to them at a lower rent. The Clan was excited and started making plans to move.

Landlord man came back to Clan Chief a few days after and said that he really need them to move in before the first of the month not 2 weeks away. Their leader pondered a moment and decided it was still do-able if they all buckled down. Then the lands the clan was living in said that they were fine with them moving but they would need to give them 30 days notice and pay the last 3 months on their lease. Still CeliaAnne's Clan persevered.

Then all of a sudden they had a clan member break ranks and not help with the move. Then another did the same. OOOH! What was their fearless leader to do? She struggled and she packed. She pleaded and she yelled.

Meanwhile the clan leader also tried to prepared the new homeland for the clan. She made sure the water was there and fuel for their fires. She made sure that they had lights to see by during the long dark evenings. Finally clan leader tried to make sure that Clan CeliaAnne would be able to communicate with other clans. Lo! She ran into yet another trap set out to ensnare our intrepid clan.

The Keepers of the mystical Internet/phone/cable decided to be difficult. So the clan leader went to the seers to confer with them regarding the Keepers. The 1st seer gave the clan leader high hopes that this would be resolved easliy but no. She told the leader to talk to The Keepers directly. So the leader did. After much discussion Keeper 1 sent the clan leader back to the house of the seers. At the House of the Seers, the clan chief was told to speak to a different seer than she saw the 1st time. So our heroine talked to 2nd seer. 2nd Seer looked at the message 1st seer sent to the keepers and discovered that 1st seer didn't follow the proper rituals required to get a favorable response. So 2nd seer resent the message supposedly with all the proper rituals observed. Alas! This message too was not properly worded to suit the Keepers. The Clan leader repeated this scene with different seers and keepers 7 times. Then she broke down and had a teeny tiny panic attack. Clan CeliaAnne's fearless leader was reduced a gibbering fool.

Finally The Amazon from a neighboring clan stepped in and told Clan CeliaAnne to back their leader and help her out. Her second in command stepped-up to help with The Keepers of the mystical Internet/phone/cable and also with Those who dispose. After 2 abort attempts by her second, The Keepers of the mystical Internet/phone/cable finally bestowed the wonders of Internet/phone/cable. So a month after our intrepid clan moved to this new homeland, they once more could trade with neighboring clans and it was good.

So did you like the story? It way more entertaining to read about then to live it. The truth of the matter is this: At&t U-verse is crazy good. I really like having it. However, they have a major problem with their information flow. If they tell you they will call you back, they won't. You never get to talk to the same person twice. Every time you talk to a new person they close out the old ticket and open a new work order ticket (that is how I ended up with 9 separate tickets). Also every time they open a new ticket, they hit your credit report. I now have 9 new credit inquiries. So on the whole I would not recommend U-verse to anyone based on my experience. They got a solid F- from me.

Mothers & Daughters

2009-12-13T15:45:00.005-06:00

I went to visit Aughra today. We had quite the conversation about Mama-san.
It seems that since Aughra got back from visiting the Eastside family over Thanksgiving (she feels) Mama-san has washed her hands of Aughra. Here is the thing. Mama-san talks to Aughra daily and goes to see her a couple of times a week. Aughra is just slipping enough these days that she doesn't remember those visits. Today she cried telling me how she hadn't seen her daughter all week. She just didn't understand. She thought Mama-san and her were finally building a relationship. Now Mama-san had been there not 2 days before to pick-up Aughra's laundry for me to do and take back today.Which I did. But Aughra just doesn't remember that visit.

The whole conversation got me to thinking what is it about mothers & daughters? Why are we so hard on each other? Why is we can't give each other a break? It isn't like we don't know what it is like to live inside a girls head. How a small comment can grow into a huge slight with a little time and brooding. We say something in passing and it becomes a insult. So I wonder why? Why is it when Aughra says my cousin the Capt. of Business "makes a good meatloaf and she can really do anything she sets her mind to ". I hear but you can't. Aughra didn't say that so why do I put it in there? Or when Mama-san talks about the Steps. I feel like she is slighting me or Mini-me in some way.

It is a strange thing that the person who gave us life can make us so miserable. That they can push their issues on to us. Make us worry over our weight. Or repeatedly say we are a certain way until we believe them. I believe that most mothers are trying to help. They are trying to protect us from ourselves. When does this protection become harmful? When does the mothering become something to cause anxiety and be avoided?

I never want Mini-me feel about me the way Mama-san feels about Aughra. So here is what I will try to do to stop the insanity. I will tell Mini-me I love her. I will be pretty obnoxious about. Anytime anywhere. Even when I am mad. I will tell her, "Mommy loves you dearly, but if you don't get outta her sight she may have to beat you." I will not pester her about wieght, boys or her personality.

For Mama-san, I will try to cut her a break. I will try to listen to what is actually said and not read other things into to it. For Aughra, I will try not to judge her. I will remind her that Mama-san has other things she must take care of and when she saw Mama-san last. I will try to remind Mama-san that her mama is a scared little old lady and needs to be reassured all that time that she won't be left to rot in the home alone. I will remind both of them at they love each other even when they can't to look at each other.

And my dears, Stalkers, I urge you to make sure with words, out loud and everything, that your mother and/or daughter knows you love them even when they make you crazy. Tell them often. Tell them Loudly. Keeping telling them until they never question it.

I am such Magpie.

2009-11-05T17:00:00.007-06:00

“I've never tried to block out the memories of the past, even though some are painful. I don't understand people who hide from their past. Everything you live through helps to make you the person you are now.” ~ Sophia Loren

As we are going through Aughra's house to get it ready to sell. We are sorting thorough everybody's inheritance. Mine is dishes. I love dishes. I have ever since I was a small child. They always seemed like beautiful bits of our lives. Each thing holding a shining memory of an event or time.
The crystal Irish Coffee mugs with clovers etched on them hold the memory of the first time I felt elegant. I was drinking hot coco out of them. I remember feeling so grown up. The porcelain dolls I loved so much. They hold the memory of the time I tried to steal them when I was 4 or 5. I had them carefully wrapped up in some blankets and clothes when I got busted. They are also the things that taught me you can't take something just because you want it. The dainty star shaped dishes Aughra brought with her first ever paycheck. They always reminded her that she didn't need anybody to do for her. She can manage 'very well on her own, thank you!'
The memory of My great-grandmother's cookie jar all the way up on the top of her refrigerator. So very high up. I received it complete with pre-historic cookie crumbs.

The personal tea set that Aughra used to bring tea to my poor sick Mama-san when she was a little girl.

The teapots. All of the wonderful teapots. 20 in all. They used to resided the china cabinet they are in here. Then they lived on the top of Aughra's kitchen cabinets. About 10 years ago, Aughra decided it was time to put my teapots away. It had been ten years since I saw them last but as we unpacked them I knew which one was in each newspaper wrapped bundle. I told little stories about them as we unwrapped them.

So many memories. I brought each memory to my house. I pulled them out and polished them so they would gleamed brightly in their cabinets. I told Mini-me the story behind each item. As I put my families memories away, I tell her that someday these will be her memories to keep. And whether the story showed the person it was about in a good light or bad it made them real to Mini-me. Which is so important to me.

Thelma & Louise

2009-10-15T19:41:00.007-05:00

So Aughra and her roommate were exciting last week. Auhgra hasn't been feeling well lately. Not really able to do much of anything. Her COPD is getting worse. Anyway, she was in the bathroom had a dizzy spell and fell off the toilet. (Stop laughing! That is my poor elderly grandmother!) Those of you who have ever used a hospital bathroom have seen there is a call string? Did Aughra use this nifty little device put there to call for help? Nope.

So the Centurian decided to help my grandmother. Did she help her by pushing the call button beside her? Nope. She decided that her 4'4" 95 lbs frame could pick my 5'5" 140 lbs grandmother up. Care to guess what happen next? That's right they both ended up on the floor.

Now of one of them will pull the call string right? Right? Nope. The Centurian crawled out into the hallway to get help. Nether of them were seriously hurt. The Centurian has a nice bruise. Aughra won't admit to anything. In fact, both of them refuse to admit that it even happened. Sigh. I think they may be be bad influences on each other.

Happy Birthday,Mama-san!

2009-10-11T16:28:00.006-05:00

Something wonderful happened 55 years ago tomorrow. My Mama-san was born! She was a funny little kid who was desperately wanted by her family. She and her family lived through the Ruskin Heights tornado.She had what I am starting to think is a normal mid-western upbringing. Her parents weren't Ozzie & Harriet but they did the best they were able to. The daughter of a metal worker, she is staunchly pro-union. She was a rainbow girl. As High School honor roll student, she studied 2 languages (French and Spanish). She was a part of the drama club working on costumes for school plays. She grew-up during the Vietnam war. She married a military man right out of High school.

And though that starry eyed girl has been tripped up repeatedly since then, she has managed to hold on to something I lost in childhood. Optimism. She trusts people. She looks at something and assumes it will all work out. Isn't that amazing? I can only see the half empty glass and immediately start planning for the glass to become completely empty. Mama-san believes that someone will come along and help her fill that glass. This outlook on life is why people always under estimate her. It is what I love about her. I hope that she never loses it.

Happy Birthday, Mama.

Oh JOY - an Aughra saga update

2009-10-07T12:12:00.005-05:00

I was just thinking today is an excellent day to do an Aughra update.
So let's see when we last left herself, she was being transferred to a nursing home. We got her into what is considered the best facility in my home town by health care providers. Which was no small feat. Anybody want to know what to look for when choosing a nursing home? I knew you did.

First you want to talk to nurses and doctors about the facilities. How often do they get people in the emergency room for fall/wounds from these places? People mistakenly think that bed sores are a sign of neglect. The truth is that bed sores come to anybody who stays still for long periods of time. They come for the skin breaking down from constant pressure. Now the size of the sore or if it wasn't treated properly are things to watch for.

Secondly go for a visit. Look in the corners of the rooms. Is there dirt or dust? Look at the lights. Are there dead bugs? Both of these will let you know how clean the place is.

Third. Look at the people living there. Is their hair brushed? Do they have food on their clothes? Do they smell? I emphasize the 'they' because with that many people with varying degrees of incontinence in one place it is going to smell. You want to make sure they are being well cared for. Thus ends my choosing a nursing house tutorial.

Back to Aughra. Her 1st roommate, Wheels, was a woman who has late stag MS. Sadly her family doesn't visit often and as such she tried to horn in on other people's visits. She had made herself such a pest that the nurses were slow to answer her when she used her call button. So she would make my grandmother call for her. She would wake my grandmother up at 3 am to call for her. sigh

Aughra can be a touch of a hard ass. I have even heard her referred to as 'meaner than a black snake(whip).' She was told that if she wanted to stay in this nice home she had to play nice with the other kids. I must say I am really proud of her. She stayed in that room the second longest of anyone who had Wheels as a roommate. Yep. 3 weeks. Poor Wheels.

Her next room was on the long term care wing. So much posher than the skilled care wing. Anyhoo. Her new roommate is the pet of the floor. Centurian is 102 years old. That is right 102. She is a sweet little thing. Blind as a bat and deaf. Centurian might be 4'4". Maybe. She daughter comes in everyday to see her. Which is nice to know since she also kind of looks out for Aughra.

So now Aughra is settled and will let us put pictures up and decorate her room. We are being to clean out her house. I have concerns. My Mama-san and I are fundamentally different people. I am systematic kind of gal. I line projects up and go right down the line doing them. Mama-san is really more of a free spirit. I am concerned that I am going to annoy the hell out of her before this is all said and done. Yes. People who know me in 3D land know I kind of relish annoying people, but only if I do it on purpose. I don't like it to be accident.

Also I have taken on the project of scanning the family photos in to the computer and adding who the picture is of to the summary. Damn we are are picture takin' people. I have 20 photos of Aughra's nose that is out of focus cause she was playing with her new camera. I have 2 rolls of photos her retirement party from a place that doesn't even exist anymore. Tons of pictures of butts from different members of the family. Seriously it doesn't matter how bad the photo turn out, we still have it. So that is going to be great fun. I will be tied to the computer when ever I am home. My knitting is going to suffer.

Brooke & Dover

2009-10-04T22:11:00.010-05:00

"Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in your joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."~ Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams

Even as small child stuffed toys are magical things, aren't they? They seems to speak to you. They listen when you talk to them even before you can talk clearly. My favorite stuffed toy is the teddy bear. I love how place of the features can completely change the personality of a bear. For example Missy Brooke [Pictured Right] looks
quizzically at you. She seems to saying Huh? Where as Dover [Pictured below] looks very concerned about the whole matter.

In my quest for great knitted toys. I found a lovely book called The Knitted Teddy Bear. This book is full of knitted bears made in the classic bear fashion. They have gusseted heads and jointed arms/legs.I love it and plan to make a few of the bears.

My 1st foray into this book was to make the pattern Elizabeth & Heidi out of some Knit Picks yarns I recieved as a RAK. On the whole it went pretty well. I had trouble with the arms had to remake them a couple of times. But in the end me and Brooke worked it out. Made some alterations to the little dress by adding a Chevon lace edging to the bottom which gave it a nice scalloped edge. While I was making my little 6 in. bear, Mini-me exclaimed her love for Brooke and her wish for a mini-bear of her very own so Brooke's companion, Dover, came into the world. Master Dover is dress in a snappy grey vest of my own design. The notes for said vest are missing and have be stolen by my house brownies no doubt. I will add the notes later if they decide to bring them back.

Everybody Loves A Good Bodice Ripper.

2009-10-03T17:01:00.007-05:00

At the being of this year, some females of my acquaintance and myself where having beau problems. I was inspired to make these socks by the tales of woe. They started out based on a lyric from the Gordan Lightfoot song If you could read my mind .

"...With chains upon my feet
You know that ghost is me
And I will never be set free
As long as I'm a ghost that you can't see..."

It really spoke to me. So I designed a sock based on chains and faded love for my friend who strictly crochets.( Though we maybe turning her to the dark side.) After I send them to her she posted on Rav, pictures of them and how much she liked them. Guess what happen then? People wanted to know when I was publishing it! I, of course, took minimal notes as I made them. Just enough to be able to make a second sock. So in order to publish the pattern I had to sit down and recreate them. Which went really well.

During that process, I thought about what I would name them. Relationships really have and ebb and flow about them. Sometimes you wake up in the morning and look over at your love and think "How did I survive with out this person?" other times you look over and think "Dear Lord in Heaven, what the hell was I thinking?" Which this is a normal part of being with someone. As I discussed this with my favorite sounding board, she told me it was just like this story she reading. The two main characters wanted each other, then they hated each other, then they discover what the reader knew all along that they actually loved each other. You got it. She was reading a Bodice Ripper. Voila! They were named! And so after being vetted my test knitters, I give you the pattern.

Bodice Rippers are a toe-up pattern suitable for the begining sock knitter. I have the pattern of chains and hearts both written out and charted. I hope you like them.

download now

Socks! Sock-ty Socks!

2009-09-27T17:47:00.010-05:00

“His socks compelled one's attention without losing one's respect”~ H. H. Munro

So I appear to have a major sock problem. Some would even call it an addiction. 6 pairs of socks and 3 toys over the summer. Whew.

I started with a pair on the plane to Canada. Slalom. So pretty. The yarn (Little Freak yarns) worked loverly with the pattern. The very cool part of this pattern is that all the heel shaping is hidden in the cables that run to the bottom of your heel. I did make a small change to the pattern. My toes are in stockinette instead of reverse stockinette. My only complaint with these socks is that I must have been tense on the plane cause they are a little snug in places. As soon as Mama-san laid eyes on them, she wanted a pair. She is waiting for a skein of yarn to speak to her.

The next pair was Send a Little Cable socks. I saw my good friend, Knitty, making them at the kitchen one day and felt and over whelming need to make my own. They are a heavy sock made from Little snugs a Little Freaks worsted weight yarn. These were super quick and easy to make. I love how they turned out and I am all around happy with them. Can't waited for boot weather!

I also made Pablo over the summer. Okay. So I made a little joke whiling naming this project on Ravelry. Pablo is a classic Hispanic name and my yarn colorway is 'Can't we all just get along'. So I named these socks after the Paul Simon song Adios Hermanos. snort. I had some major knitting issues with this sock. It was all me. I just plain couldn't get it with the first sock. My 2nd sock was done in 3 days. My one thing is the cuffs want to roll. I have worn these a few times. They fit really well.

Then I revisited Bettie’s Lace Stockings for my hostess with the mostest. She saw mine when I went to the great white north and asked me pretty please. How I say no? After she let me have a sneak preview of her shop update. These were way easier the second time around. Miss Thing has a 12” calf. So after working 3 rpts of the Wide Lace I went up a needle size. I also worked another 3 rpts to the end for height. Which was kind of guess work due the the fact that the calf in question lives in Canada. They fit her and she loves them. So total win for long distance sock knitting.

Of my other three socks. One pair isn't finished. I haven't get picture for the other and I am going to post separately for the third.

I also made some toys this summer. One Woe cake for a swap. And some lovely little bears from The Knitted Teddy Bear book.
I made some notes on them but don't have them in front of me. So I will blog about these again.

Where'd She Go?

2009-09-10T10:34:00.008-05:00

Yesterday, we took Aughra from the Loony Tunes Ranch to the Nursing Home. She was raring to go until we got outside the locked doors of her unit. The closer we got to the front doors of the hospital the more anxious she became.

Sitting outside waiting for Mama-san to bring up the van. She commented how different everything seemed. I think she is being to understand how bad off she is. She asked Mama-san how long she had been in the hospital. 10 days. It seemed so much longer to her.

Aughra said something, during the transfer process, that struck me. She was looking in the mirror at herself and said, "It looks like whoever was there has left." I replied that maybe she had. Her next question was, "Why?" I told her "Maybe it just got too hard." And Aughra being Aughra said, "Coward." [Picture: Aughra at age 18, pregnant with her 1st child]

I got to thinking about that conversation. I believe we all have that moment when we look in the mirror and wonder where we went to. You know that moment when you remember your teenage plans. Stardom. World Domination. White picket fences. Whatever your particular plans were. Why did those idealists leave? Did we all grow-up? Or did life just wear us down? When did we change our goals from the sky? To a easily attainable goal a little closer to the ground?

Boxing by Ben Folds

2009-09-08T18:29:00.006-05:00

Howard, the strangest things
have happened lately when I
take a good swing at all my dreams
they pivot and slip
I drop my fists and they're back
laughing
Howard,

my intention's become
not to lose what I've won
Ambition has given way to
desperation and I
lost the fight for my eyes

Well sometimes I punch myself
hard as I can, yelling
"Nobody cares"
hoping some one will tell me
how wrong I am
Howard,

Boxing's been good to me, Howard
now I'm told, "you're growing old"
the whole time we knew
a couple of years I'd be through
Has boxing been good to you?

Howard, now I confess
I'm scared and lonely and tired
They seem to think I'm made of clay
another day
I'm not cut out for this
I just know what to say
I say

Well sometimes I punch myself
hard as I can, yelling
"Nobody cares"
hoping some one will tell me
how wrong I am
Howard,

Boxing's been good to me Howard
now I'm told
"you're growing old"
the whole time you knew
a couple of years
I'd be through
has boxing been good. . .
has boxing been good. . .
has boxing been good?

YAY ME! (okay not really)

2009-09-08T18:02:00.006-05:00

Today I got the wondrous joy of breaking an old lady's heart. Yep. I am a horrible thoughtless child who is too selfish to take her poor little grandmother in to keep her from a nursing home.

Never mind the fact that she would go from being her own person to the chaos that is my household. Never mind that her and I would fight like cats and dogs. (Man, can her and I fight.) Never mind that she is confused and weak and needs a nurse to take care of her. The point is she doesn't want to go into a home and I should take care of her.

Snort. Isn't it funny how people throw aside all common sense when faced with something they don't want to happen? She knows(knew?) that me and her living together is an incredibly bad idea. But still she had to try. I told her no and she cried. YAY. I made Aughra cry.

Then she started in on Mama-san. Apparently Mama-san just sits there with a 'stupid grin' on her face all the time. I then jumped in and pointed out that this wasn't a piece of cake for Mama-san either. Aughra is no longer the woman Mama-san knows and it is hard not to cry. So Mama-san fakes it. Aughra cried.

By the time we left the Loony Tunes Ranch today, I had made Aughra cry 4 times. Yep. I am evil. sigh.

Untitled

2009-09-02T19:59:00.004-05:00

No; Remorse, Jack of course;
Regret is a spiteful old maid;
but her brother,
Remorse, though widower certainly,yet
Has been wed to young Pleasure.
Dear, Jack, hang Regret!
~ excerpt from Lucile by Owen Meredith

Heartbroken

2009-08-30T19:56:00.003-05:00

To Sorrow I bade good-morrow, And thought to leave her far away behind; But cheerly, cheerly, She loves me dearly: She is so constant to me, and so kind.
- John Keats

As I type I am heartbroken. My chest is aching and tears are rolling down my face. No, Aughra is not dead. It is worst than that. She is well and truly defeated. I know the suicide should have been a clue by four. But I honestly thought she just couldn't handle the pain anymore. I was wrong. After all the tragedy and sorrow she survived in her time on this planet. Life finally beat her. She is done. I ache for her.

Maybe sometime in the future I will commit what I know of Aughra's life here. Maybe not. There are a lot of episodes that people will judge. Where I stop and say look what they did in order to survive. Others will say how could they have possibly done that?

Tomorrow Mama-san and myself start the process of cleaning out her house to sell. Her 'Sunshine' and his lil' rays of light have not really expressed and interest in helping or real concern for her. So sad. We will be trying to guess what they will want. Trying not to give away the things that mean something to us.

The Aughra Saga continued.

2009-08-29T21:14:00.005-05:00

Isn't funny how during high stress events things change by the second? Yesterday when we took Aughra to the hospital, we were told that though she made it through the night of a thousand pills, she may have killed her liver. Therefore would still be dying and considered a successful suicide. 3 very long hours later the test came back that her liver was fine.

They then admitted her under a psychiatric hold and we left her there. Mama-san went in to see her this morning. All was well. She missed the doctor's rounds but the nurses were very reassuring. A few hours later at Mini-me's soccer game we get a call they are transferring her to an actual Psych hospital. The nurse is thinking Two Rivers. Then we get the call that Aughra needs clothes by 5 pm so she can be transferred to Research. Don't let the lovely web page fool you if there was a place that still uses electroshock therapy this is it.

So Mom gets there to find out that they let Aughra release herself over to Research. Aughra? The same lady who took 10 percocet with 30 vicodin chasers 2 nights ago? We are letting her make decisions now? And then we are going to tell the person with her power of attorney she can't talk to her. UNBELIEVABLE!!!

So finally My Grandmother and the nurse at that fine establishment had a set to. And now Mama-san can come and see her. In fact they insist.

What new and wonderous thing will this event spawn tomorrow?

Suicide Watch

2009-08-28T21:49:00.006-05:00

“God, I don’t know why you want me to carry this load. I can see no good in it and it’s awfully heavy. But, if you want me to carry it, I will.”

We placed Aughra in the hospital on suicide watch today. She will not be returning to her home. If and when they release her from the hospital she will be going into a care facility.

UPDATE: The Hospital wants to release Aughra to a physic hospital today. sigh. Not really what we were hoping for.

Where Did You Come From Baby Dear?

2009-07-10T10:21:00.000-05:00

'Where did you come from baby, dear?
Out of the everywhere and into here
Where did you get those eyes so blue?
Out of the sky as I came through

What makes the light in them sparkle and spin?
Some of the starry spikes got left in
Where did you get that little tear?
I found it waiting when I got here

What makes your forehead so smooth and so high?
A soft hand stroked it as I went by
What makes your cheek like a warm pink rose?
I saw something better than anyone knows

Whence the three-cornered smile of bliss?
The Angels as one gave me a kiss
Where did you get this pearly ear
God spoke, and it came out to hear

Where did you get those hands and arms?
Love made itself into hooks and bands
Feet whence you come from, darling things?
From the very same box as the cherub's wings

How did they all just come to be you?
God thought about me, and so I grew
But how did you come to us, baby dear?
God thought about you

So I am here' ~ George MacDonald - 1871

Good Bye, Lil'soul.- Auntie Celia

CeliaAnne's Canukistan Odyssey

2009-07-01T17:06:00.011-05:00

Our story begins with my lovely friend inviting me in February to Canada for the Olds Fiber Festival in June. I talk to the the mister about going and he agrees to send me north. YAY! Then I realized that this will be after the whole you need a passport card/passport to go to Canada or Mexico thing goes into effect. Thank you, Homeland Security. I feel so much safer.

Still no big whoop. I need a copy of my birth certificate that is embossed to renew my drivers license in October. Seriously, Homeland Security, you shouldn't have. So I go online cause the world is online anymore right? Well, not really. I found the county and state was born in no problem. I even was able to look my birth record online. I was not able to order a copy. So I tried calling the county seat they had a recording tell you to download a form and send them money for the copy but I couldn't leave a message and talk to a person. I have a problem with blindly sending money away with no proof I did. I dug around on the internet some more and found VitalChek Express. This site not only helps you order you records they get to you really fast. They are an expensive service. I feel they are worth it and give them two thumbs way up!

Next thing I did was price tickets. Yowouzer! I talked to my World Travel Papa-san about how to find cheaper tickets. He said Expedia, Priceline, Orbitz, and Travelocity. So I tried each of them and got the cheapest tickets though Priceline. I was really happy at this point. Yay Priceline!(Please continue to read as my opinion of Priceline changes dramatically later.)

Having got my tickets and my birth certificate, I can now work on my passport form. Which is honestly pretty easy to fill out. Then I went to the post office to get my picture taken and order the passport.Voila! I am feeling Pretty froggy about this whole thing.

I started to research what could and could not be taken on a plane cuz sitting for three hours and not knitting? That would make me nuts. Hey guess what? YOU CAN TAKE KNITTING NEEDLES ON A PLANE and your IPOD. I was very pleased to find this out. I printed a copy of the page to take with me in case the security tried to make me toss them.

Oops! 1st Hiccup. My out bound flights were canceled. Eek! I called Priceline they assured me that I was booked on new flights. I would be getting into Calgary later though. I update my Friend. Whew! Crisis averted, Right? Right?

2nd Hiccup. My Friend has the opportunity to buy a house. Yay, her! She will be moving in around the 1st of June. So I will get to stay at her new house. SO Exciting. Seller of said house starts being flaky. Grr. The tenants of said house tear things up on their way out the door. So there will be a little remodeling. Still things are good.

The day of my flight comes. I go to my online itinerary and confirm my flights. I also printed off a copy. This was a very smart move on my part. I tell my 'bum that I would like to be there 2 hours early for check in and random craziness that always occurs. He tells me that we don't need to be there that early. We bicker bit. I let him win. So we get there and hour before my flight and try to check in. Remember up there when I asked you if the crisis had be averted? Yeah. No. I go to the check in counter of the airline I am suppose to be flying out on. They have no record of me and tell me I need to go to the original airline I was booked on before the those flights were canceled. Which is in a different terminal.

The KCI airport is set up in Hubs that are far enough apart you need to drive between them. So we go out and get into our car and go to the other Hub. We get to that airline counter. Wait in line for 10 min for them to tell me that they can't help me I will need to call priceline. So I go to a pay phone to call priceline and can get confirmation that I have tickets on the flight with the 1st airport. I couldn't get a human being to answer. This was still during normal business hours. So we go get in our car and drive back to that 1st airline counter. I get a different lady than the 1st time. I relate this entire thing to her. The very nice Delta Lady gets on the phone with priceline and gets a human. I was shocked. The over the intercom comes the boarding calls for my flight. So she calls the flight and asks them to wait. She trying to deal with priceline. She tells them that we are working under a time constraint. They are still spouting the company lines. And long drawn out story very short I missed that flight. So it comes to pass that they never booked me on replacement flights. After much begging and pleading She gets them to release my tickets to her. The next flight she can get my on is 4 hours later. Sigh. I call my friend to tell her I won't be there until 11:30.

Eventually I get on my flight to St Paul. Nothing exciting happens. Thanks the powers that be! When I get to my connecting flight from St Paul to Calgary, I find that the plane has been delayed. Apparently someone got airsick from turbulence in New York and they had to pull a seat. So I called my friend again. It will be more like 12:30. By the time I get there my eyes are so bloodshot I can't focus but my friend is there waiting.

Meanwhile my poor friend. My hostess with the mostest is having problems of her own. Things did not go as planned with the move. The house was in worst shape than she thought. But her'bum came through. The super hero that he is. He told her that he would finish the moving while she played with me. YAY, Mr. FREAK!

The next morning we went to breakfast and then on to Olds! I loved olds. It was great fun all kinds of fiber people to talk to. I got to meet the Owner of Twist of Fate yarns. She gave us a Ravelry Button to wear around. We ran into a couple of other Ravelers. I went buck wild with the yarn. A great time! Upon seeing Canada in daylight one thing struck me. They still have Lilacs. I love lilacs but they fade so fast in Missouri. Also the Poplars were pollinating. So there were tuffs of fuzzy stuff floating every where.

When we got home that night we exchanged goodies with each other. I had made her a pair of socks(those are them in the picture), a CD and a crochet hook holder thingy. I brought her girls some books. She gave a bazillion ton of goodies I got a Project Bag from Lingering Springs that I have been coveting, a rubberhoar bag, some needles, a thread cutter and some yarn. WHOOT!!

In all my trip to Canada was wonderful. Red Deer is beautiful. My Friend and her family are delightful. I can't wait to go back.

Tantric Diamonds

2009-06-19T11:03:00.004-05:00

I like patterns that are different. Something unique that not everybody has made. I just found one of the greatest. There is under a 100 projects on Ravelry for the Tantric Tank.

This free pattern is really more of formula than a pattern but that is what makes it great. You can use any type of yarn and any gauge. There is no shaping. So it is also a great beginner pattern. Just 2 straight panels and 2 thin ties. Some creative semming. Voila! You are done. I made a couple of small adjustments for my ample-ness (47.5" bust). One adjustment is I made the panels a couple of inches longer. The other is I made it an inch wider. Even with adjustment I only needed about 900 yards of aran cotton yarn. Worked one panel in an Irish Moss Diamond stich and the other in a Seed Diamond stitch.

Monchichi 's Socks

2009-06-17T13:41:00.004-05:00

While I was working on socks for My friend, Miss Freak, Mini-me expressed a desire for some knitted socks of her very own. As I mulled over the merits of knitting socks for feet that might very likely grow before I finished them. I found a partial skien of Lisa Souza's Sock! yarn in the Violet's Pink Ribbon colorway that someone had given me.So away we went. This is one of those good news bad news project stories.

Good News - This yarn is lovely to work with. I love the simple stripes it made when worked up. Can't wait to use it a again.

Bad News - This were the socks of doom for me. Just simple socks right? Boring ordinary anklets. NOT! I had to frog and recast on at least 4 times.

Anyhoo they got done and she loves them. So Whoot! Here's hoping her feet don't grow.

Her Red-headedness is MARRIED!!!!

2009-06-16T20:38:00.003-05:00

My girlfriend ran away and got married to her long time beau.

To them I say:

May your mornings bring joy and your evenings bring peace.
May your troubles grow few as your blessings increase.
May the saddest day of your future be no worse than the happiest day of your past.
May your hands be forever clasped in friendship and your hearts joined forever in love.

Love ~C.

Carrot, Egg or Coffee?

2009-05-20T11:55:00.006-05:00

A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how things were so hard for her. She did not know how she was going to make it and wanted to give up. She was tired of fighting and struggling. It seemed as one problem was solved a new one arose.

Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water. In the first, she placed carrots, in the second she placed eggs and the last she placed ground coffee beans. She let them sit and boil without saying a word.

In about twenty minutes she turned off the burners. She fished the carrots and eggs out and placed them on a plate. Then she ladled the coffee out into 2 mugs. Turning to her daughter, she asked, "So which are you? Carrots, eggs, or coffee?"

She brought her closer and asked her to feel the carrots. "A carrot is normally strong, hard and unrelenting. See? When you place a carrot in hot water. They go soft and weak."

Then her mother asked her to take an egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, she observed this aboutthe hard-boiled egg. "Eggs are normally fragile with a thin outter shell. When you put them in hot water they become hard."

Finally, she asked her to sip the coffee. The daughter smiled, as she tasted its rich aroma. The daughter then asked. "What's the point, mother?"

Her mother explained that each of these objects had faced the same adversity--boiling water--but each reacted differently. The ground coffee beans were unique, however. After they were in the boiling water they had changed the water.

"Which are you?" she asked her daughter. "When adversity knocks on your door, how do you respond? Are you a carrot, an egg, or a coffee bean?"~ Unknown Source

Bad Blogger! No Cookie For you!

2009-05-15T11:54:00.013-05:00

I have slacked off on the blogging of knitting projects. so I am going to do a huge one right here. I have a serious thing for socks and sock yarn right now. I blame all the great sock designer and indy dyers for this affliction. Seriously I can't seem to make anything else.

So the 1st project you haven't heard about is a Swappy Project. I was in the Bebeh Freak's designs 1st ever swap. It was called the Hot Stuff CAL/KAL. We just stated whether we wanted mitts, socks or hats. My swappy buddy wanted sockies. I made her Rainy Day socks out of Crystal Palace Panda Cotton. She has promised me pictures of her sock clad feet but as of yet hasn't delivered. This was my 1st time using Panda Cotton. I liked it. It was not a love-at-first-sight thing, but I will use it in the future.

The 2nd Project, done but not reported, is my friend Jodi's Paper Back Novel socks. I designed this pattern based on a song by Gordan Lightfoot. Once I successfully recreate them, I will share the pattern. promise. I made these out of Little Freak yarn's littlesock. I love this yarn. LOVE!

The 3rd project is The Gardner made out of Zitron Trekking Handart. This was my 2nd pair of socks for the Spider along. These are beautiful socks with a flowery vine pattern up the front and a big spider on the back. Also had a really cool lace trim along the top. I did fiddle with the pattern a bit. I had to make the heel gusset a little bigger and I ended all the vines with buds. once again love the yarn.

4th project( I told you busy, busy), I made My Missouri Autumn Mitts for the Moma-san out of some discontinued Knitpicks sock yarn. I am selling this pattern for $5,if you are interested in it.

My 5th project is a hostess gift for Missy Jodi. She is letting me stay at her home while I feed my yarn addiction at a fiber festival in Canada. It however is a secret. So I am not tell you about it.

My 6th project is Bettie's Lace Stockings in Littlefreaks Yarns. Did I mention I love this yarn? Anyhoo. This pattern was in Interweave Knits, Spring 2009. I like the finished product a lot. I had problems with the pattern through. My calves are apparently shapelier than the designer's. Once I got up to the larger lace pattern and worked 3 repeats I had to go up another needle size and then again after 3 more repeats. Still I like them and will make another pair for a friend.

My 7th unreported project was my 1st ever Cookie A. Sock, Monkey published in this really cool online mag, Knitty. I made Monkey out of Pagewood Farms yarn. Again had to fiddle a bit. This it was because my friend Rosemary is very statuesque and needs more to stand on than us under 6 ft. However the pattern was easy to memorize and was fun. This gives me hope for some of Cookies more challenging patterns.

Currently I have sock for Mini-me and a tank on the needles. Whew! Finally caught up. I will try to post projects as I finish them in the future.

Pandemic Shmandemic

2009-05-15T11:17:00.004-05:00

"OMG THE PANDEMIC IS COMING!!! RUN! HIDE! DON'T LET ANOTHER SOUL WITHIN 10 FEET of YOU!!"

Please. It's the flu, people. Breathe. Use the internet for more than playing games and updating you myspace page. K? Educate yourselves. The H1N1 flu is just a flu. Granted a new flu but still just a flu. So let us go over how to prevent getting sick. Hygiene People! Wash your hands a lot. Go outside. Breathe the fresh air. Eat healthy. Get Plenty of sleep. If you start feeling sick or your loved ones do take them to the doctor right away for treatment. Easy, huh? Yes, people are dying from H1N1. People with compromised immune systems, the elderly, and small child are at risk of death. Not any more risk than they are under every single flu season. But there is a risk.

I know people are going to be annoyed with me. 'You are minimizing the risk' Not really. I am cutting through all the drama. Over the years our news station have started sensationalizing what they report. Trying to stir us up to get ratings and now they are creating a panic. But that is a whole nother rant.

Now order to show our Swine Flu prepared-ness, I made my Moma-san and myself Swine Flu Masks. These are supper easy and fun to make. I made them out of Dark Horse Fantasy yarn. My grandmother is one of the 'compromised immune system people'. She has trouble breathing in the winter with the cold air. I think if I leave the snout off, this would be perfect for her when she has to go out and about.
There is my mini rant about SWINE FLU ::insert scarey music here::

Only a Go-Go Girl in Love

2009-04-20T15:31:00.004-05:00

'But as she walks,
she waits for him the pavement is a shoulder for her tears
But in her heart she knows there is no way
She can hope to change him.'

'Only a go-go girl in love
with someone who didn't care'
~ excerpt from Go-Go Round by Gordan Lightfoot

'Bum. sigh. One year ago I told him I was done. I told him what had to happen in order to keep our life together. As of today, He has done none of it. So I give myself a stern talking to I say "Celia Anne you deserve better than this. There is someone out there who will pull their own weight in the house. Who will actually hear what you are saying. Who won't make you feel bad about yourself. Why are you still here?"

To which I reply,"12 years is a long time to throw away. As a couple we still have heat. I can't keep my hands off. I still want him. But I want the him I married; not the him who walks through the door every night."

SO now what? I am clearly not ready to walk away. Even if my head keeps telling me that is where we are headed. Ugh! Libra, make up your damn mind and stick with it! You are doing more harm than good going back and forth and he isn't going to change 'cause you have already proven you won't leave if he doesn't.

What Was I Thinking?

2009-04-15T19:22:00.003-05:00

Dear Lord! I just did a search on a couple of my exes. One I broke up with 'cuz I was becoming a drunk and he would not have approved. And the other I married god help me while I was still being a drunk and when I sobered up I did not approve.

Anyway, I found them. Scared the crap outta me. Do I really wanna look these people up? If I made a connection, then what? Ugh. I have such a problem with relationships in general the whole thought of this boggles the mind. Back to the "What the hell Celia Anne?"

Did I just poke-the crazy? Are they gonna find me now? I'll be hiding under my bed if you need me.

Spider Socks!

2009-03-10T19:58:00.005-05:00

I started a Spider-a-long on Ravelry. We are all working on spider themed projects. In the process of talking about the different spider patterns I found 2 sock patterns I wanted to make. The 1st of these is done! I give you Spider Socks! I love them. I made these outta Trekking Hand Art. They are a super fun. The pattern is a cuff down one. It seem to take forever then all of a sudden the big spider starts to take shape and Whoosh you are done!

I seem to stuck on socks lately. I just finished a pair of Sidewinders for Mama-san. She loves them. I use Knit Picks Imagination in the frog prince colorway. This pattern really show the yarn well. In traditional knitted socks, Imagination intends to pool a lot. Which not everybody loves. I am still having problems with the back to back decreases. I think the next time I make these pattern I will add I middle stitch to see if that fixes my laddering problem.
I have also got socks on my needles for a swap that I am in. Another spider sock that I will cast on as soon as I have finished the swapies ones. That pattern is called The Gardener. I also have 2 sock ideas rattling around in my head based on Gordan Lightfoot songs. One of which I must have done before my trip in June. Which should be too big of a deal the swatching is going great.

So my friends, I hope you like looking at sock pictures.

Real or Memorex?

2009-03-06T16:26:00.004-06:00

So everybody has heard me refer to my loin fruit as Mini-me. Here is why:

One of those is me. One is Mini-me. Scary, huh?

Something evil this way comes

2009-02-26T20:57:00.006-06:00

I can see the evil coming. I can see where this will end. Why can't I fix it? Why can't I stop her from doing these things to herself?

I am seriously distraught right now. I thought it was over and yet tonight I caught her biting herself. I am going to back up a moment. Last year we found out Mini-me was hitting herself whenever things got too much for her. I tried to find her help. I asked her school to recommend a counselor. They counselor treated her like she was acting out in class. THAT IS NOT WHAT SHE IS DOING! She is inflicting pain on herself to make her feel better. This is so wrong. Why can't a find help? I can't find any info on children her age even doing this.

And my support system? They all think that there is something each of them can say that will magically makes this go away. Like I haven't? I am heart sick and so very worried about her. I am here. I am engaged. I see her as her own person not as my chance to rewrite history. Why can't I fix this? Why can't I make it stop?

UPDATE: Morning has dawned and after coffee, it seems I may have been over reacting just a little bit. I know I was just as shocked as the rest of you. Me over react? never. Oh! and that bit up there where I said...

"I see her as her own person not as my chance to rewrite history."

Yeah, I was full of shit. After advise from a couple of sources, I realize that my addictive crap makes me worry about her having her own addiction start up. Not really seeing her for herself there. Instead of tell her that biting herself seems really goofy and painful, I tell her that she really shouldn't do that and it is so wrong. snort Parenting is hard. I am so worried about screwing this kid up. That I may do it by over thinking. Anyhoo. I am going to breathe for a while. I am going to try to lighten the hell up. I am going to watch. Thus ends the drama freak out.

Note to Self: Self- Blogging maybe not such a good idea. People are going to learn about all the crazy you wade through in your head. This may be too much info.

Handmade Heritage-Maternal

2009-02-09T18:44:00.011-06:00

It is late afternoon here, slowly creeping in to night and I am musing about my heritage. I grew-up in a very crafty family. Both sides of my family are really into handwork. From Crewl embroidery to crochet/knitting to Quill work. So I decided to share my thoughts on the two sides of my family. I will start with Mama-san's side. Recently, Aughra has decided that congestive heart failure really does mean she may not survive it and has started clean out her house. I received two precious objects from her recently. One is the first ever piece of knitting she ever did.

Aughra made this little cream (white?) sweater for my uncle when he was born. We are talking 1949 or so. It has been a little moth-eaten since the time it was worn by her little boy and is an awkward little thing. 60 some-odd years ago someone (her mother-in-law so the story goes) told Aughra that she couldn't knit and she would never be able to keep a house. The knitter in question is a very stubborn woman. Nobody tells her what she can or can't do. So she taught herself to knit. This sweater has a wrap type closure with crocheted trim around the neck. There is some dissension as to whether or not it is worked in acrylic yarn. Mama-san believes that it is acrylic based on Aughra's social class at the time. I don't know of any moths that eat acrylic.

The 2nd item is also made for my uncle when he was a toddler. This navy sweater has color work on it. She worked the nursery rhyme 'Hey diddle diddle' on it. There is a little grey cat playing the fiddle, a dog with his tongue lolling out in a happy smile and a cow jumping over a red moon. You can see on the cow where it has been stained by baby food. This sweater has no moth holes in it. So I am certain this one is made of acrylic.

I love handmade things. They represent time to me. When we make something for someone specific, we think about them during the time we spend on it. If it's for our soon-to-be child, our hope and dreams are work in to the object as we go. These little sweaters were made by a young mother deeply in love with the man of her dreams and are full of love for her 'Sunshine'.

As I was growing up, my hands always had to be busy. It was a rule in Aughra's house. Idle hands and what not. Mama-san and Aughra have always had something crafty going on. When I was very little, we were always working on something for the Church bazaar. Then Aughra decided to build a miniature town in her basement. Mama-san and her had an interior decorating business once. Always busy there. And as we go through her house all these ventures surface. Such good memories.

Freaky Socks!

2009-02-09T18:23:00.005-06:00

I got some wondrous yarn from LittleFreak yarns named Celia. Yep! you heard right. Celia! cackles Let me introduce you to my Twisted Freak socks. I had the best time makes these socks. The pattern is Twisted Hourglass by Robin Griffiths At first the charts were eye-crossing but after about an inch or so I got my groove on. These are my favorite socks right now. I love the yarn so much that I now have 3 more skeins in my stash. LOVE!
Note: I have updated my Mitts pattern. It is published and up for sale. I am selling it at an introductory price for the month of February

PTB Bless This Man

2009-01-20T12:30:00.003-06:00

My fellow citizens:
I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors. I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and cooperation he has shown throughout this transition.
Forty-four Americans have now taken the Presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, Americahas carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents.
So it has been. So it must be with this generation of Americans.
That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.

These are the indicators of crisis, subject to data and statistics. Less measurable but no less profound is a sapping of confidence across our land - a nagging fear that America's decline is inevitable, and that the next generation must lower its sights.
Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real. They are serious and they are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this, America- they will be met.
On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.
On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics.
We remain a young nation, but in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things. The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation: the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.
In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of short-cuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted - for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things - some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom.
For us, they packed up their few worldly possessions and traveled across oceans in search of a new life.
For us, they toiled in sweatshops and settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and plowed the hard earth.
For us, they fought and died, in places like Concordand Gettysburg; Normandyand Khe Sahn.
Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.
This is the journey we continue today. We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on Earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year. Our capacity remains undiminished. But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions - that time has surely passed. Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.
For everywhere we look, there is work to be done. The state of the economy calls for action, bold and swift, and we will act - not only to create new jobs, but to lay a new foundation for growth. We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology's wonders to raise health care's quality and lower its cost. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age. All this we can do. And all this we will do.
Now, there are some who question the scale of our ambitions - who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans. Their memories are short. For they have forgotten what this country has already done; what free men and women can achieve when imagination is joined to common purpose, and necessity to courage.
What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them - that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply. The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works - whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified. Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward. Where the answer is no, programs will end. And those of us who manage the public's dollars will be held to account - to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day - because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.
Nor is the question before us whether the market is a force for good or ill. Its power to generate wealth and expand freedom is unmatched, but this crisis has reminded us that without a watchful eye, the market can spin out of control - and that a nation cannot prosper long when it favors only the prosperous. The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our Gross Domestic Product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on our ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart - not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.
As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience's sake. And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: know that Americais a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.
Recall that earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring convictions. They understood that our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please. Instead, they knew that our power grows through its prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint.
We are the keepers of this legacy. Guided by these principles once more, we can meet those new threats that demand even greater effort - even greater cooperation and understanding between nations. We will begin to responsibly leave Iraqto its people, and forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan. With old friends and former foes, we will work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat, and roll back the specter of a warming planet. We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense, and for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you.
For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus - and non-believers. We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this Earth; and because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace.
To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society's ills on the West - know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.
To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds. And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to suffering outside our borders; nor can we consume the world's resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change with it.
As we consider the road that unfolds before us, we remember with humble gratitude those brave Americans who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains. They have something to tell us today, just as the fallen heroes who lie in Arlington whisper through the ages. We honor them not only because they are guardians of our liberty, but because they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find meaning in something greater than themselves. And yet, at this moment - a moment that will define a generation - it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all.
For as much as government can do and must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies. It is the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees us through our darkest hours. It is the firefighter's courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent's willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate.
Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends - hard work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism - these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility - a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.
This is the price and the promise of citizenship.
This is the source of our confidence - the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny.
This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed - why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent mall, and why a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.
So let us mark this day with remembrance, of who we are and how far we have traveled. In the year of America's birth, in the coldest of months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying campfires on the shores of an icy river. The capital was abandoned. The enemy was advancing. The snow was stained with blood. At a moment when the outcome of our revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation ordered these words be read to the people:
"Let it be told to the future world...that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive...that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet [it]."
America. In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children's children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.
Thank you. God bless you, and God bless the United States of America

The Rocks

2009-01-15T15:53:00.011-06:00

One day a tribe of beings were given a gift. A gift of rocks. Little rocks. Big rocks. Precious rocks. Worthless rocks. Some so beautiful you would have wondered how the givers could part with it. Some so horrible you would wonder why someone would give it to another. So, so many rocks. The tribe was also given a yoke and a couple of buckets to carry their newly acquired rocks.

The givers told the tribe that they knew of a place for the tribe to live. It was quite a trek from here to there. Up a hill. across a wide river. It was a beautiful place. Lush and happy. The tribe decided it was worth the walk. So off they went.

Shortly they came to the hill the givers had told them about. It wasn't a very big hill. It certainly wasn't a very steep hill. The tribe started up the hill. Some of the tribe trotted right up the hill. Some of the tribe quit part way up. Some of the tribe struggled with their rocks.

Eventually one of the tribe set down his yoke. He looked in his buckets. He decided he could drop one of the rocks. Which he did and pick up his yoke but his burden was uneven now. Once more he set down his rocks and picked another rock to drop. This time his yoke was balanced! It was still heavy but manageable. His pace quicken up the hill. Those of the tribe behind him saw what he had done. Some thought,"Why did he drop those rocks? Those were his rocks. I will never drop my rocks! They are my rock and important to me." Still other saw the wisdom of the first's actions and did the same.

In due time, most of the tribe had made it up the hill leaving behind those who decided it was just too hard. The those left behind stayed at the bottom of the hill. Those who had made it up the hill, the ones who had struggled and those who had not, moved on.

They walked and walked. Ever so often some would set down their burdens and drop some rocks. All of a sudden they where at the shore of the river. The river was very wide and not very deep, only about knee high on the average tribe member.

Those of the tribe who had charged up the hill plunged right in to the slow moving water. Crossing the river was a lot harder than climbing the hill. Some of these beings had to stop and lighten their load. When it was time for the being, who had 1st drop his rocks, to enter the water he paused. He considered what the givers had said when they had given the tribe their rocks. They said, "Here these are yours. Here is a yoke to carry them with." They had never told the tribe to take the rocks. They had never said the tribe needed to keep the rocks. They had just said these are yours.

He ponder this for a moment. He knew he wouldn't make it across the river with all of those rocks. So he decided. He went through his rocks. He held them up to the light. He looked at each and every one of them. Some he kept. A lot he dropped. When he reached the bottom of his buckets. He only had a handful or so of rocks to keep. This time he didn't pick up the yoke. He just walked right in and crossed the river passed all the others.

When he got to the other side, it was just a beautiful as the givers said it would be. He was happy. He still had a few of his rocks with him. Little rocks. Big rocks. Precious rocks. Worthless rocks. Some so beautiful you knew why he kept them. Some so horrible you would wonder how he could look at them. But all of the rocks could be carried and all of them were his.

My Recent Obsession.

2008-12-29T14:49:00.012-06:00

I bought myself this yarn mostly cause I liked the name of the colorway. Shallow? Me? Never. When the yarn arrived at my doorstep, I innocently opened it and what to my wondrous eyes did appear?(see what I did there?) This! Isn't it just lovely. Woe Cake is by Dizzy Blonde Designs and is part of her signature collection. Her regular line of yarn is all named after famous blondes. But I digress.

So I laid eyes upon this yarn. Then I touched it. I thought about how it reminded me of how KCMO looks towards the end of fall. You know the leaves are mostly shades from red to pink and the grass is kind of tan color? Just breezy and cold. Almost immediately a pattern came to mind of fingerless mitts with a open work leaves running down them. I was swamped under with obligations at the time. So I had to set it aside.

It was all well and good until it got cold...Then it wouldn't leave me alone. I dreamed about the pattern. I searched the web to see if anybody had made them. This yarn and the pattern were always on my mind. The obsession was not as bad as it was going to get.

Finally I was able to work up a swatch! From working the swatch to weaving the end~2 days. That's right. 2 days! I couldn't think about anything else. I barely fed Mini-me and the Dogglet. Sad, huh? Anyhoo! Here is the finished product. What do you think? Pretty? I think so. The best part is it used less than half of the skein. So I can have some footies from it! Hopefully, I will fall equally in love with the next colorway I get from her. 'Cuz there will be more. Oh yes, there will be more. I am going to get it test knitted by someone else. then I will publish!
UPDATE: The test knitting went really well! My Testers loved it and there was just a few things to adjust. So it is up for sale at $5.00 USD.

YAY...Cookie Time!

2008-12-21T19:56:00.011-06:00

Today we did my favorite family tradition, the women of my family get together and bake cookies. The oldest woman present is always head chef. Ever since I can remember we have done this. For the longest time it was Aughra as Head Baker, Mama-san and me. Before that my Great-Grandma was the Head of the Bakers. Mama-san, myself and Mini-me got together to bake today.

When I was little, we would spend 2 or 3 weekends baking. Starting before Thanksgiving to be able to get 10-12 dozen of 20 or so different types of cookies. Some were super simple and fast. Some where labor intensive and slow. We would have Aughra's spare bed covered with cookies. This was our big family gift. We would make gingerbread men for me to take to school for my class. We would have tins of cookies for every person we came in regular contact with during a month. The mail person, school bus driver, my Teacher, the neighbors , everyone. For the big gift, it would be a large tray of cookies to Aughra's work, Mama-san's work and for me to take to Papa-san's family.

As I got older we scaled back a bit. Finally Aughra got too sick to bake and now needs so much of Mama-san's time. We now just bake for ourselves. However, both Mama-san and Me speak wistfully of a time in the near future when we will bake like mad people again.

Usually we start earlier in the holiday season, so that we can bake for the One Good Meal,a local charity, bake sale also. This year it has been hard to get together. I was sick for about 2 months. During that time Aughra decided to announce that God had told her she could die now. Which understandably upset Mama-san. Sigh. SO we got a very late start this year.

What I love about this particular tradition is the sense of female companionship. This is our No-Boys-Allowed time. The chance to discuss life. The undivided female attention. (Mini-me was so excited this year to read a story to Mama-san. Showing off her newly acquired reading skills. Big words and everything.Very Cool.) The teaching of where this or that cookie recipe came from. The showing of how to fill the cookie divot with just enough jam. Or how tell if the cookies are done. The picking on each other when we mess up the cookie recipe we know by heart and have made a bazillion times. The laughter and joy we bring each other. The annoyance and pain. In all an exhausting wonderful time. YAY! Cookie time!

Updates!

2008-12-10T13:39:00.004-06:00

I just updated some stuff on my blog. There is some new stuff to behold. One Of my Favorite people just opened her OLYS Little Freaks Yarn. Check out the link down in my yarn candy. Also I have added a link to my new ArtFire Shop. The shelves are a little sparse. I am still adding stuff to it. And have I mentioned how much Ravelry rocks recently? No? Well let me tell you Casey And Frecklegirl are awesome. They gave me linkys to my patterns. So now there are cool links to PDFs of my stuff.

December is super busy as you all know so that is all for now!

Sup?

2008-11-28T14:03:00.006-06:00

Thanksgiving is over and Christmas is fast approaching. My needles are smoking from the effort to get my Christmas knitting done. I am really making pretty good progress. We had a lovely Craft sale last weekend. I meet some really great people. And got a job offer. Yep! You heard right I have been offer a teaching position with Metro Community College here in the KC area. I am So excited! I loved teaching knitting before and am ready to get back to it. So for the spring class schedule 'Beginner's Knitting I - Felted bag' will be taught by myself. The classes will be held out on the old military base in Belton.

Let's see any things else worth mentioning. I am still sick(?). I have this cough that will not go away. I am on almost a full month of it now. So sometimes I have a voice sometimes I don't, but I am not sick enough to justify a doctor's visit. So I just keep trying to wait it out. Blegh!

Oooo! I receive something of great value to me. I am the proud owner of a baby sweater Aughra knitted for my uncle. this sweater is srsly close to 60 years old. After I get it cleaned up and reblocked I will share. I also got to copy a pattern for the Most wonderful handmade stocking. I grew-up wanting this stocking for my own. I will probably not get it done this year but next year I will have it. After Christmas I will post pics of all my Christmas projects. I can't post them as they are finished because their soon to be owners frequent this blog. 'k. That is all for now.

How Long?

2008-11-12T15:29:00.006-06:00

How long?
How long am I to be understanding?
How long am I to be the only one worried about the future?
How long am I to be the only one parenting?
How long am I to be the only one deal with the bad?

How long should I put me behind them?
How long should I stay in a house that is not good for my daughter or me?
How long should I ignore that the XBox is more important than me?
How long should I believe that my child & myself are wanted?

How long do I keep my promises when they don't keep theirs?
How long do I hold on while the other person seems to let go?
How long do I believe them when they say thing will get better?
How long do I keep pretending?

How long is too long?
How long is too soon?

To my peeps ~just so you know we all have these questions sometimes.

Double Standards

2008-10-30T16:08:00.004-05:00

I has some. Meet Aughra. This is how I see her, hence the name. She is the Matriarch on my mother's side. She started a charity in her hometown. She can be the most charming person in the world unless you are a female related to her, then she picks you part constantly. Today I yelled at Aughra. She started in on Mini-me... 'How I should beat her more often'; 'How she has no manners'; 'How she doesn't even know the difference between a tomato and a potato'. ( note Mini-me does know the difference. She was really sick as a baby and has a speech prob. The names sound the same to her, so she uses then interchangeably) As I sat there listening to her tear apart my Mama-san, myself and my daughter, I realized that I have a complete double standard when it comes to her. She says things that I would jump down someone else's throat about. I wonder why? Is it because my Mama-san asked me not to start something with Aughra? Maybe. Little. Is it cause I still get a little scared of what will happen if I yell at her? I think that is a lot of it. She likes to withhold affection if you don't toe the line. Aughra likes to dangle something in front of you. 'Here. See this? This is how much I love you. When I die you will get it. I have hung on to it your whole life just for you.' Then when your opinion is different than hers, she snatches it away. When I was 8-9, she gave me this dress to wear. I hated it. wouldn't wear it. We had a big fight. Didn't talk to each other for probably 10 years.

Aughra is tough woman. She's had a hard life. Very hard. It has made her a hard woman. She assumes anyone she loves is out to screw her. This is what her life experiences have taught her. She is in the process of dying now. It is a painful ugly death. Slowly drowning. So my conundrum is this... I know she loves us all of us. I know she cannot express it the way most people do. Do I ignore her behavior and do clean up with my daughter afterward? Is this the way I want my daughter to remember the woman that most of Aughra's hometown thinks is a saint? 'Cuz bucking the system means fighting with my Mama-san too. Do I want to go there? I know that my Mama-san will side with Aughra she has to. Aughra will hurt her in ways that can't be forgiven, if she sides with me. So then what? I have heard that I am just as hard as Aughra. Am I really that ugly and hard to people? See, Opening this can of worms means hearing that over and over again. This is depressing. I think I'll pull a Scarlet and think about it tomorrow.

THE GREATEST SOCCER PLAYER in my Life

2008-10-27T17:24:00.004-05:00

I promised pictures of my Soccer Star. Here they are. This photos are mainly from the game when she was in the goalie position. She really seems to enjoy soccer. I admire her so for being athletic. I am so not. I can't run across a flat paved surface without falling down and really messing up my arm but this is about her. Last spring she played indoor soccer and was thrilled with goalie. This time her team was too good and the goalie never had much to do. So it was super boring. Even with all that talent and skill, her team didn't have a winning season. The other teams were just too good. but that's fine she had great fun and they gave her a throphy at the end. As I think all females will agree, a lot of bad can be erased with something shiny. So Ends soccer until spring? Maybe? Sigh. Girl Scout Cookies anyone?

Gibberish

2008-10-20T01:56:00.008-05:00

First I would like to say... DOG BUTT!

Isn't that a cute dog butt? The rest of the dog is cute too. But the getting on the couch and then leaning down to look out the window cracks me up! To those of you who may not have met Mr. Samson. He says 'Oh, Hi.' snort! I just woke him up in this picture. He is really more Samson after meeting Delilah. He is a rescue pup and has the scars to prove it. When we got him he was bald. Seriously. And they had him on all kinds of meds. As you can see he has been to CeliaAnne's hair club for dogs.

So updates...Let's see. Oh! the really important one my Mama-san is fine. Apparently her pieces parts are shaped really weird, but they all work fine and have no ickiness. YAY! Mini-me had her last soccer game this week. She got a trophy and everything. So I am no longer a soccer mom(a least until next season). I will post homage to my favorite soccer player soon. Also She had decided the she really needs some earrings. So next weekend I am taking my 8 yr old to get holes put in her head. I have finished my Rainyday Socks. I must say I am not a big fan of the bamboo yarn for socks. It is not as comfy as wool ones. However, I love the colors of them. I am trying to get the last of the three Hallowigs done for my Mama-san to take up to the cancer unit. I also can hear the clock ticking on my promised special olympic scarves for Yogini and Christmas time, she is a comin'. sigh. And a much ancipated Xbox game drops this week. Fable II. I loved Fable soo much. I must have started it over 6 or 7 times. Love! I say. But financial outlooks are low. So I will have to be a growed-up and wait. Being a growed-up sucks.

The 'Bum and I are holding even after the nuclear explosion earlier in the week. We are kind of in a armed-standoff until we talk to Dr. Feelgood this week. He is pretending everything is coming up roses. I am trying really hard to stay put. I am really am cut and run kind of person. If things get to hard, I feel the need to run away. I've had exactly 4 boyfriends, in my entire life, that lasted over 2 weeks. I married 2 of them. Staying power? I ain't got some. That's not really right. I didn't use to have some. I have been married 11 years to this one.

My Birthday was last week. 33 years on the planet. My Mama-san celebrated the whole week long. I got something from her everyday last week! I got all kind of wondrous goodies from everybody. On my actual birthday, My Papa-san and the Italian Goddess took me and Mini-me out to dinner. All in all a winner of a B-day.

My Etsy shop is up and running. I have add a link to my blog. I will be adding some of my Mama-san's designs also. So check it out. Oh. I have to take down the free Knitted wire bracelet pattern. Someone has been looking on my Etsy Shop a duplicating my designs. Which is pretty hard to do 'cuz I can't even make the same one twice. This is my 'I CAN SEE YOU!' to the big thief. Now I know this probably won't stop this person, but I did clearly state that it was for personal use only and if the items remain on the Internet, then I will be looking into further options. Is there anything else? Nope. I think I'm done for now. I have always heard you should leave on a high note, so here is the best toy ever or so he tells me.

PISSED! (warning not for everyone)

2008-10-14T22:08:00.015-05:00

I'm Pissed! Not the euro pissed as in drunk. The US pissed as in postal. Today I come home from putting in extra hours to pay bills. Zombie Boy and Mini-me are watching cartoons. Neither say HI. Neither acknowledge that I have even entered the house. So I ask Mini-me if she had done her homework.(assuming she had 'cuz it is over an hour since she had gotten out of school. 'No, Daddy said she could watch cartoons and eat cookies first.' sigh. I told Mini-me to quit playin' her dad, get in her room and do her homework. I told both of them that they knew better, homework before TV. Mini-me starts the 'its too hard', 'I don't understand' whine which for her translates into 'I don't wanna do my homework. You come do it for me.' Well Angry Guy shows-up. He starts telling Mini-me to quit acting stupid. And as she gets more upset he gets louder. Then is like 'Fine! Cry!' The whole time I have been trying to be calm and calm down Angry Guy. SO not working. Then he made her cry. MY HER!

That was it! Gloves are off! I told him he is doing exactly the same shit to Mini-me that was done to him and I AM NOT HAVING IT! I will be GOD DAMMED if he is going to damage my child. So we had an ugly conversation. I was not kind.

Backround:
Lately, if I try to talk to him about my feelings on what is going on...'Bum is all 'I am only doing this to keep you' implying that if I leave him, he will stop counseling. So ever so gently I point out that he needs to stop worrying about what I am doing and start worrying about getting well for his daughter. HE then tells me I am trying to control him by threatening divorce. First of all I would like to point out I never threaten anyone. I state my position on a situation so that everyone knows where they stand. Today, during the Angry Guy triad, I had an epiphany! The Son of A Bitch was controlling me by saying I was behaving like his mother.

Back to the fight:
After I slapped him down(figuratively speaking), he stomped off to our room to pout. Such the wrong move. 'Cuz I stew. My Papa-san says it is the German in me, but what ever the reason the longer I think about something the madder I get. So when pouty boy reemerged we had us a little pow-wow. I told him that I am sick in tired of him trying to make me think I am the crazy one. I am done with the way he behaves toward my daughter. And he had better start doing what the fucking Counselor says. He cannot hinge his mental health on me. I can barely keep myself sober and a good parent I cannot carry his ass around also. I know my limits.

He counters with Dr. Feelgood wants him to cry and to get angry. And he doesn't want to. My response? TOO FUCKING BAD. Man up, Damn it! If not feeling those feeling is what broke you in the first place, than continuing to ignore them will not help you heal. So now he is tearing up 'cuz I iz a unfeeling bitch. I asked him who are we going to listen to the diagnosed crazy guy who barely finished high school or the Dr. who is working on her master degree in this? mmm... Gosh I don't know. Which should we choose? Bah! Just typing it out is making me mad again. What right has He got to decide not to follow through with treatment? Damn it!!!! I chose good this time. He had a good job. He paid his bills. He thought I was a princess. Everything was pretty good. We fought but everybody fights. Then I became a mommy and he lost his fool mind. WHY ME!?!?!

Felting...How to?

2008-10-07T15:23:00.003-05:00

So I mentioned that I was going to felt myself a tea cozy using my 1 Fish, 2 fish charts. Right? I know very little about designing felted projects but I am willing to learn..off a researching I will go! I googled 'designing felted projects'. WOW! there is a wealth of people selling their felted projects. But what I was really after was how big you should knit something before you felt it down. That info was a little harder to find. But I found it! Knitted to felted pieces generally shrink 20-25% width wise and between 40-50% lengthwise Depending on the type of wool used. Everybody strongly suggests swatching. Man. I hate swatching. But I guess I will do so. I think I have decided to use worsted weight Wool of the Andes Now I have to ponder the amount of yarn to order for this project...

My 1st for sale pattern!

2008-10-06T17:48:00.011-05:00

See this beautiful sweater? Well, I didn't design it. Someone else did. The lovely color working? that is all me. I originally designed these charts for my red-headed friend, currently trying to get her bath remodeled wink, she adores the poem Winkin', Blinkin', & Nod. However, The Amazon beat her to the punch and wanted it really bad for her soon to be little baby Amazon. Since I let her pick what she wanted, I made it for her. The Amazon & I have a difference of opinion on the colors babies should be dressed in. Sigh. The pale bits are all her. The lime green sail and red fishes, that would be my design. As soon as Her Red-headedness gets around to spawning, I will make another in the colors I originally pictured. Until such a time as we are all graced with the presence of mini-redheads, I will sell these charts. In fact for a measly $1.00 USD you to can own them! They are available in my Ravelry store. If you would like these charts and have no wish to be apart of Ravelry, then you nuts! Kidding. Just leave me a note. Here is the lovely poem of inspiration...

Winkin, Blinkin, and Nod

Winken, Blinken, and Nod one night
Sailed off in a wooden shoe --
Sailed off on a river of crystal light,
Into a sea of dew.

"Where are you going, and what do you wish?"
The old moon asked the three.
"We have come to fish for the herring fish
That live in the beautiful sea;
Nets of silver and gold have we!"
Said Winken, Blinken, and Nod.

The old moon laughed and sang a song,
As they rocked in the wooden shoe,
And the wind that sped them all night long
Ruffled the waves of dew.

The little stars were the herring fish
That lived in the beautiful sea --
"Now cast your nets wherever you wish --
Never afeard are we";
So cried the stars to the fisherman three:
Winken, Blinken, and Nod.

All night long their nets they threw
To the stars in the twinkling foam --
Then down from the skies came the wooden shoe
Bringing the fisherman home;

'Twas all so pretty a sail it seemed
As if it could not be,
And some folks thought 'twas a dream they'd dreamed
Of sailing that beautiful sea --
But I shall name you the fishermen three:
Winken, Blinken, and Nod.

Winken and Blinken are two little eyes,
And Nod is a little head,
And the wooden shoes that sailed the skies
Is the wee one's trundle-bed.

So shut your eyes while mother sings
Of wonderful sights that be,
And you shall see the beautiful things
As you rock in the misty sea,
Where the old shoe rocked the fisherman three:
Winken, Blinken, and Nod.

poem by Eugene Field

Something Fishy

2008-10-05T14:24:00.010-05:00

I am the new proud proprietor of an Ravelry Store. YAY! I have spent the past few days pouring through my three-ring binder of many ideas and projects. I have posted some for FREE. Mostly just color work charts. Digging amongst all of my favorites I found one of my 1st charts. Strangely enough it is still a really good chart, to my thinking. You would think you could really improve on one of you 1st efforts, won't you? Simple yet fun. The picture of the finished product has long since disappeared or I would post it to share.

So, I ponder. I would really like to share these charts with others. How? I could make up samples of them? I hate working on something and having nothing usable at the end. OOO! I could make a purse! A 1 Fish, 2 fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish Purse. Hmm... I can see problems with that. I could felt it. But my felting skills are still at the neophyte level. I know I will make a tea cozy! I need one and it is a fairly small project to felt . We have a winner! Look forward to seeing a marvy felted fishy teapot! The charts are published! I just added a Download Link.
DOWNLOAD NOW!

Weezy Doll Revisited.

2008-10-04T22:08:00.005-05:00

I promised a couple of knitters to work up the pattern for Weezy. So I revised my notes on this delightful labor of Love for Mini-me. Guess what? I will totally have to rework her. I cannot make heads or tails of my notes. Sigh. Well, that's okay I have some new ideas regarding construction. Can you hear my maniacal laughter? It is there I promise. I must but off to finish my 2nd sock of the Rain Day socks I am working on. I am in danger of catching 2nd sock syndrome. Every day that passes makes it just that much harder to pick the needles up.

Mama-san is having some health 'troubles' these days. They concern me. Not in the freak-out 'Oh Noes! my mommy sick! How will I survive?!?!?!' way. But in the 'What is the next step?' way. I am a planner. I like to know what is going on pretty far out so that I can plan. I get a little twitchy when things are up in the air. Down right mean sometimes. My Mama-san is a go with the flow type of person. very in the now.

She doesn't want to discuss the 'troubles'. She will wait until she is forced to confront them. I, however, want to know what is going on right now!!!!!! I need time to look it up on the internet, to plan just exactly what I need to do to help her get through all of it. Pushing the issue is not helping though. So I sit and twitch and try not to push her around about it. So there it is in a nutshell. Blah!

Miser's Purse

2008-10-04T14:58:00.010-05:00

Well, Party people, I have completed the miser's purse. I even completed it before the Ravelympics began. I haven't had a chance to post it before. I decided to share my charts for the Miser's Purse aka Partial Worm Poo Purse. However, I am only going to post them on Ravelry. If you are not on Ravelry, GET THERE! Just kidding. Contact me and I'll send the PDF of the color working. I am not including the pattern 'cuz there is a bazillion of them and I based mine off of other person's pattern. Really just picture's the gauge are completely different. But Whatev' That's all for now! DOWNLOAD NOW!

The 3 faces of 'Bum

2008-09-29T17:10:00.010-05:00

So many people know something has been up in the CeliaAnne Knits household and himself has finally given me permission to discuss this with MY family and friends.(We will get back to the reason for the 'MY' in the last sentence.) In the Spring of this year, I told my 'bum I was out. Done. After 10 years I was ready to leave. Which completely blindsided him and that fact flabbergasted me.

How could he have missed how unhappy his wife-y and daughter were? Was he just not seeing it? We talked it over and over and over. I decided that, if he was willing go to marriage counseling, I was willing to try to work it out. So we go and we talk to the very nice Dr. Feelgood. The following takes place over 3-4 visits.

Dr. Feelgood asks I what is going on. I tell my side of our issues. I tell her feel like the only grown-up. That I have to be aware of what mini-me is doing and what my 30+ 'son' is up to. I have to play referee between the two of them all the time. The dog even ignores him. I am the only person concerned about paying bills and cleaning the house. That's not true. Mini-me is always offering her piggy bank to help me pay a bill and always trying to help me clean the house. And then I admit to being a difficult person to live with. I am not patient with adults as a rule. 'Bum? he sits there. Says nothing. Acts like he doesn't even realize he is in the room with us.

Dr. Feelgood gets his attention after a couple of tries and asks him what he was thinking. He says he doesn't know. She asks him why he does these things he says he doesn't know. She asks him why he is so angry all the time. He says he thinks It is because he has a chemical imbalance. She sniffs. Dr.Feelgood asks 'Bum to talk about his childhood. So he talks. During this time, I mostly listen. Sometimes I interject something that the in-laws had shared with me. Hearing his childhood from his point of view made me really sad for lil'Bum. Kids don't see things the same way adults do. If adults don't explain things to children, children come-up with their own explanations and they hold them close as solid truths.

After about 2 sessions of this is 'Bum's life, Dr. Feelgood drops the bomb. 'Bum has a physiological disorder, Dissociative Identity. Think Sybil, but not that bad. Mini-me and I had actually come up with names (pre-diagnosis) for the different faces 'bum has. Which I thought was interesting when I looked up info on this disorder. This info understandably scared 'Bum. I am going to take a moment to describe each facet of 'Bum. Those have meet him in real life may recognized them.

There is Angry Guy. He is mad at the world. If you won't just give it to him he will take it. Don't look at him the wrong way or it is on. You don't actually have to do anything to Angry Guy. Angry Guy is the reason my family thinks that 'Bum might become abusive. He has never been physically abusive. Mentally? Guess so. I am not sure. Dr. Feelgood says 'yes'. CeliaAnne says 'neh, could go either way. Nobody is perfect.' Mini-me didn't get a vote, but she had been have nightmares about her daddy when I decided enough was enough.

The next side of 'Bum is Zombie Boy. Zombie Boy cannot walk past the TV without being caught under its spell. Zombie Boy is the one who puts the XBox before his daughter and wife. Zombie Boy is the one who checks out when you are talking to 'Bum.

And then there's Daddy. Daddy is the one who plays with Mini-me. Daddy takes Mini-me sledding. Daddy volunteers at Mini-me's school library. We like Daddy man. He is a great human being.

Back to Dr. Feelgood. She said that there was no point in working on our marriage when we never really knew who we were talking to. In fact when 'Bum said he didn't know why he did something, really didn't. He probably wasn't the one that did it. Dr. Feelgood said something happened to lil'Bum that was so bad, he couldn't deal. His lil'mind broke instead. Dr. Feelgood said that I didn't need to come anymore. 'Bum asked me to continue to come. He didn't want to do this alone.

WOW! All I can say about this next couple of sessions is Angry Guy has a lot of RAGE toward his parents. A LOT. Dr. Feelgood and 'Bum finally started to get to the meat of his problems. Then 'Bum asked me to stop coming. He was afraid for me to know about whatever it was that broke him. I still don't know what that was. Frankly, judging by what he did share with me and what I know from the in-laws, I am almost 100% sure I don't wanna know.

Dr. Feelgood and himself decided to cut all contact with his parents. I personally think this is wrong. However, 'Bum and Dr. Feelgood both believe that him talking about this to his parent would end really badly. (yes, bossy nosey me called Dr. Feelgood and made her explain herself. OK, 'Bum told her to talk to me about this.) 'Bum actually told me to call the police if either of them showed up at the house. He gave me the impression that he expected violence. My question is what the hell happened to him? And then I remind myself that if he ever starts talking to his parents again, I would probably not be able to be nice to them if it was their fault. It is a Pandora's box, once I hear it I won't be able to forget it. As it sits now...No contact with his family, his choice I know but I still think they deserve to at least know where this is coming from. And now he has decided to stop going. He tells me he just needs to make an appointment and has needed to for about a month. Things are slowly shifting back to the way the were in the Spring of this year. So here I sit trying to keep it all together. And convince my broken 'Bum to get help. 'Cuz if he doesn't .. I don't don't like to things threaten. I just do what I say I'm going to do. I told him that I will protect our daughter even from him if I have to.

Scarey Attack Celia

2008-09-18T13:17:00.004-05:00

I was just reading a thread on Ravelry today. And In they were discussing one of those name generator scripts for Sarah Palin . I went on typed in my full name and Learned that if Sarah had been my mom, my name would've been Seam Marauder Palin. I think 'funny. Then a few posts later someone post a pirate name quiz. So I took the quiz. Yea! Fun! Silly Names! My pirate name? Bloody Bess Bonney.

eep. Bloody? Marauder?

What are the mystic power of the universe trying to tell me?
Am I that violent?
Should People be afraid?
Very Afraid?
Mwaaaahahah!

Woe Sheet Cake Recipe

2008-09-16T16:56:00.014-05:00

The top example is Snarky cake with Flaming Hypocrisy Icing. To make your own tasty cake, you will need worsted weight & bulky weight yarn in flavors of your choice; You will need foam in a cube shape for stuffing. This one is 3 in. square. All the numbers given in the pattern are for this size but this pattern is easily adaptable to any size.

Needles: US 4

Gauge: 5 sts / 1”

Bottom:make 1
Finished Size X gauge = CO
3” X 5 sts = 15 sts

With main cake color CO 15 sts. Work in st st until piece measures 3”
square. BO

Side:make 1
Finished size X 4 = Length
3” X 4 = 12”

With main cake color CO 15 sts. Work first 6 sts in st sts, work next 3 sts in
moss st, and finish the row in st sts. Continue in this manner until piece
measures 12 in. BO

Icing:Make 1
Use the same number of Sts Cast on as the bottom. Due the nature of the yarn
this will actually make a slightly bigger side. Work until the measures
square. BO

Block all pieces. Add face and that rosey glow from too many tears. With right-sides facing, seam the long side of the Side to bottom along the edge; making a box. Seam the CO edge and the BO edge together. Turn right side out. Stuff with foam. Sew on the Icing. And serve! Would you like it as a PDF? Ok! DOWNLOAD NOW!

The pattern is provided for personal use only. Designer does not give permission to use this pattern for profit.

Knitted Wire Bracelet

2008-09-16T16:51:00.014-05:00

UNFORTUNATELY SOMEONE HAS DECIDED TO START SELLING THESE. SO I AM TAKING DOWN THE FREE PATTERN. However, I will sell this pattern for $2.00 USD. You can find the link at the bottom of this post.

Most Wire knitted uses a smaller gauge wire than I do. I don't not feel that the smaller gauges gives enough stitch definition. So I use the heavier gauge wire. I recommend using metal needles and beads that are 1/2 inch or smaller. Any larger and you need up with a cuff more than a bracelet. This pattern is uber-simple. The only catch is... it is hard on you needle and hands. But the end result is worth it. Should you decide that it is not worth it, You can find them for sale on my Esty shop. To those of you who play fair about other people's designs. Thank you for your patience while I decided how to proceed.

Fight or Flight?

2008-09-10T12:35:00.007-05:00

Last night, himself scared me and I decked him. Now he thinks this is a serious overreaction to being spooked. Rrrriiight. So The 'Bum and I had a discussion about the fight or flight instinct.

Once in high school, which has been cougha bitcough, I went to one of the big haunted houses here in KCMO. I don't really remember which but I believe it was one of these. Anyhoo. I went with my big, strong, current boy-toy and some friends.

I was asked to leave. Actually I was kicked out. The very first time someone jumped out at me and surprised me...I hit them. I felt really bad about, but it was something I really couldn't control. When I realized what I was doing I tried to pull it. So I am pretty sure in most situations I would be a fight person. A least as sure as I can be with actually being in a bad situation.

Now, 'Bum, he has neither fight nor flight. In fact he doesn't really spook. He just stands there. No reaction whatsoever. I tease him that when Godzilla attacks Missouri, he is dead meat. Everybody else will run away, while he just stands there waiting to be squished. Being the kind and loving wifey that I am, I have promised to defend him should this ever occur. Snicker.

The Last Knit

2008-09-01T17:51:00.002-05:00

Alright all you yarn-olics out there. Here is your public service announcment. The YouTube film on the top could be you! Beware! Seriously the funniest G-rated thing I have seen in awhile.

Meanwhile back at the Ponderosa...Everthing around here is reasonably okay. Something are much better. 'Bum is more comfortable in his skin. His is better with the decisions he has made recently. In all he is good. Mini-me is doing great at school and is really interested in reading this year! Yippee!

I am continuing to try to curb the rampant cussing coming out of my mouth. I am still sober. Which some of you may know was alittle touch and go last month. I have a new exciting tick from all the stress in the house. Get this. Everytime I leave the house...I get a migraine. Which I then have for the rest of the day. What fun, huh? I am not sure what is the problem. Maybe it is 'cause 'bum poked the crazy and I am just waiting for the retaliation? Expecting WWIII? MMMM...That is a thought. Anyway the current keep-Celia-from-the-Hug-me-tight-coat meds are not working. So it is back to the Doctor's for me. Sigh. So that's the latest and greatest. Feel free to voice opinion on this subject.

Ravelympics 2008-Final!

2008-08-31T13:01:00.007-05:00

I did it! I finished all 3 events! Rubbernecker Gold for me! I enjoyed the whole Ravelery event! I can't wait until the 2010 Winter Ravelympics!
The 1st event was the Hat Dash. My submission was the Hannah Hat. I made it out of Patons Shetland Chunky yarn in the blue jean colorway. I loved the pattern. It worked up super fast. The whole hat took my less than one evening. I love the yarn. I will work with it a again. Mini-me loved the finished project. In fact the Knit group I go to on Saturdays loved the hat. It fits a wide range of heads. In all a great project! Two thumbs way up!
Next Ravelympic event Homestuff Hammerthrow. This one did not go so well. I made knitted dish scrubbies out of tulle and Sugar & Cream yarn in the breeze coloway. I had thought these would be a fairly simple project. Quick and easy. My needles constantly were getting caught in the tulle. It was a mess. The only good thing I can say about this project is that me hands were really soft and smooth when I finished. These 4 lil' things took my 3 days. UGH! So my review is 2 thumbs way down.
Last but not least is my Sock Put entry. I made ZigZag Lace Pedi Socks out of Berroco Comfort DK yarn. I broadened my knitting mojo with this event. I had never done a long tail cast on. I have now. I do not like the heel flap for turning heels. but I did that too. This pattern is a really well written easy pattern to follow. I was not happy with the yarn. It kept splitting on me. It is however machine washable and super soft to the touch. But I doubt that I buy any more. So this project has mixed reviews. 1 thumb up (for the pattern) and 1 thumb down (for the yarn).

It'll be a cold day in hell...

2008-08-13T22:39:00.005-05:00

I had a bad day this week. A really bad day. I am an addict. See... I keep thinking it’s was an addict. And then the NEED rears its head and the desire comes back. And I am a mess. The same mess I was when I decided to sober up. Here is the exciting part. I was an addict my junior-senior year in high school. It will be 14 years this year since I stopped. I forget between the times I have an attack (?) how bad they are. I forget that they even happen. My daughter’s god-mother tells me they happen about once or twice a year.I thought I would share my experience of alcohol with you. First you should know my family has a long history of drinking. Though none of them ever have called themselves an alcoholic. And in fact some of them still believe I am over dramatic about it. I was never that bad. Here is how bad it didn’t get. I was a fairly good student in high school. Pretty high marks. I was going to go to an art college. I lettered in speech and debate. Then I started drinking. At first it was very casual. Just a beer (or 5) at a party. People were always so admiring of the amount of liquor I could put away. So I started drinking more and harder alcohol. One of the nights I can remember I had drunk; 12 Jack Daniels’ Down Punch thingies, 4 big 32 oz glasses of rum w/ a little coca cola for color, and one of the big bottles of Mad Dog 20/20. After all that I could still walk. I was about 140 lbs. My school tried to intervene, I quit going. My boyfriend, who I was 'promised' to at that time started to catch on, I broke up with him out of the blue. My family tried, but I moved out. I refused to be helped. I was having fun.People say you spiral like water down a bath tub drain. But I never knew I was. I was partying and having sex. People liked me. It was a great time. I started blacking out waking up next to guys I wouldn’t even talk to sober. But some greater power was guarding me ‘cause I managed to only get a knocked up and a case of crabs. Yes, one of these great winners got me knocked up. However, the little pink line on the pee stick probably saved my life. Screw up myself? Sure. Why not? It’s my life. Screw up someone else? Not gonna do it. So I sobered up. I didn’t go to meetings. I didn’t go to rehab. I read everything I could find about addiction. This is NOT the way I would advise anyone to go about this. I made it way too hard on myself I should have gotten someone to help me. Please DO NOT THINK THIS IS A GOOD IDEA!.So becoming sober sounds fairly cut and dry. You stop putting the poison in your body. You go through detox and find your triggers so you don’t slip. The thing I could never find anyone saying was how loud everything becomes. How bright. How hard and sharp all the edges of the world are. See the numbness is soft and seductive. It makes everything funny and easy. This week I was in pain, I wanted a drink so bad. It hurt to be sober. I ached for the numbness and the time way from reality. I wept I wanted it so bad. It was the 1st time in 14 years that it was that bad. I felt like such a loser for not being able to put this behind me. I know I am not a loser I am a strong person. But the addiction was thinking not me. One drink would take the edge off the pain. One drink won’t get me going again. This time I reached out. Told people what was happening. And while I struggled, I had people telling me I could beat it. And then another attack faded away.And I began to remember that it is like being allergic to something you crave. You know you shouldn't eat it. You know it will make you very sick and maybe this time even kill you. But it tastes so good.

Ravelympics 2008-Update

2008-08-10T00:59:00.006-05:00

Well, My Stats for the Ravelympics are mixed. My Hannah Hat is done! Yippee! It took me just a few hours. I love the results. All in all completely enjoyable. Hat Dash '08 Gold!And then I moved on to my next event the Homestuff Hammer Throw. Not going well. It was supposedly an easy project. It looked easy. Little square scrubbies made of tulle and worsted weight cotton on Size US 10. I thought I could get 4 in before I moved on to the sock put. Ever try to knit tulle? It's hard. Really hard. You needles get stuck in the tulle. The tulle scrapes your hands enough that your hands start to hurt. I however was determined. I will get these made. This project will not break me. Now I have run out of the (insert really bad words that I am trying to stop saying here)tulle that I loathe working with!!! Sigh. So today I am off to buy more tulle. Ever have a cursed project?

Hermit?

2008-07-23T15:25:00.004-05:00

I have come to the conclusion that I am slowly turning in to a hermit. It is very slowly mind you. But still it is happening. I don't like people as a whole. One at a time or even in small groups, they are ok. The entire population of the world not so much. Also my circle of friends seems to be getting smaller. There are alot of people I talk to but not very many I am 'friends' with. My world is shinking to the computer, Xbox and TV. So very not good.I have been recently inspired by the "Raverly Rubbernecker Quitsters". They are supporting each other as they try to quit smoking. Which numerous study have liken to a heroin addiction. Heavy stuff right? So I decided if they can get rid of their collective monkeys, I can totally try to be more social. That doesn't really sound like they are on the same level, but for me they are. I would rather do just about anything than open myself up to another person.I feel (and I think a lot of people feel this way) that if I open myself up people won't like me for who I am. That I'll be shunned. Or even worse ridiculed. What I have trouble understanding is the need to tear each other a part. Why do we assume other person is out to get us? Or even meant what they said harshly? Some where on this road trip somebody forgot to put the benefit-of-the-doubt bag in the car. Now we are out here with out it and all the stores seem to be sold out.So here are my goals:~ I will clean up my nasty sailor's mouth. I will do this by popping a rubberband on my wrist everytime I catch myself cursing. BTW I already have a welt. Grr!~ I will also try to strike the fine line between open and TMI.~ I will endevor to be more cheerful. Less the world is going to hell(pop! OW!) in a hand basket and more What a wonderful world! Here's hoping!

Ravelympics 2008

2008-07-21T19:12:00.007-05:00

Ok. I may have lost my mind. I have agreed to finish not 1, not 2 but 3 projects during the 2008 Ravelympics. I am excited and a little nervous this is the first time I have done something on such a short time frame. So this could be fun.As to what is going on in my life. As always it is very hectic. Things are very random. So nothing new.I have just about finished my mama-san's vest It has turned out beautiful. I am hoping to get my miser's purse done before the opening of the ravelympics. So cross your fingers.

What a Day!

2008-06-26T19:12:00.000-05:00

Ever have one of those days that can't end soon enough? Today is one of those. My type-A, little amazon decided to stage a coup and The Crazy came for a visit.

Now the amazon princess has spent the whole day trying to take over. Just pushing. 'I know you said this mom but do you still mean it? YES I still mean it quit asking! Why are you yelling at me?' bah...she makes me crazy. The mother's curse comes home to roost. But I remained in power. Mwahhha!

Then The Crazy starts in.

When people are trying to help you out of a situation, maybe you should tell them the truth. My family started a charity. We let people work of their court-order community service hours with us, all we ask is that you tell the truth. We had this person working up there that lied to use about why they were there.

When we made a report the their PO, we mentioned some things that while not good were not big deals. Except that this person didn't tell us that they had a DUI and no driver's license. So it became a big deal.

Now they are harassing my mama-san. 20 some odd calls in less than 3 hrs. I finally answered their call.

(I should take a moment to tell you, dear readers, that I have a pretty bitchy streak. I call it the crazy hillbilly. I try to keep her locked-up. She is just not good to be out around people.)

So Crazy and me 'talked'. (I use talked loosely here, because the conversation went downhill fast.) How upset can you be if you have made some pretty stupid moves and then you get busted for them? I mean honestly. It isn't mine or mama-san's fault you are in this position. You did it all by youself.

SO this day was not one of my most shinning moments. And I just can't wait for it to be over...

NEW Day

2008-06-23T16:07:00.000-05:00

Yipee! I am a blogging woman now. Watch out! I plan on using this blog to share patterns that I've have created. I also plan to free up so valuable brain space by unloading some musing on daily events.