Just Motorin'

Sorry for the blog silence. That usually happens when a lot is going on all at once.

I cut the warp off Big Beka tonight, and I think the project(s) turned out pretty good. Not too short this time, and funky. Hmm. Very funky.

Anyway, I'm debating whether to attempt one more project this week before heading off to Indiana next weekend. I think I'm getting a little too ambitious...but we'll see.

We spent the start of Hanukkah last weekend with the cousins in NYC, but (BAD BLOGGER) I forgot the camera. The kids had an awesome time, we had an amazing Hanukkah party, and best of all: I got to see the Bauhaus show at MOMA.

WOW.

The whole show is phenomenal in its comprehensiveness. I truly felt I was living alongside all these teachers and students and developing along with them. Everything in there was gorgeous, but when I turned the corner and saw the first large woven wall hanging, I started crying.

If you are anywhere near NYC, do not miss this show.

And I even got to bring home a souvenir.

Endurance...We've Got It

The secret Hanukkah and Christmas weaving is going slowly, but to pass the time, the Cap'n sat with me last night and read from the book we're going through together, Endurance by Alfred Lansing.

If you have any chance to read this book or listen to it, DO IT. It is an amazing book, detailed in its descriptions and beautifully written. The Cap'n and I were wondering last night why it has not been made into a movie yet, but I guess they did do a TV version. (Usually I like Kenneth Branaugh, so it might be good...)

The book fits in with my thinking after the trauma of the accident this summer: Things could always be worse. Right now, when little anxieties or worries start itching me, I think back to slogging through all the crap that we went through, how horrible everything was, and I get some perspective back.

I've not been good with perspective in my life. Going through the Academy, the rough years at college, overwhelmed postpartum, I got so easily swamped with worry and sucked into dark places where I couldn't see any light.

I wonder if your anxiety reaches such a high level, like it did for me this summer, you burn out the brain receptors that make it easy for worry to kick in? Or if there is a one-way mirror in my brain to a room where all the scenes from the hospital and this summer reside, so that if I start getting anxious, I can peek through there and realize: It's not that bad.

I hope so. I hope this perspective endures.

Meanwhile, chilruns:

Nothing Like a Feeling...

A couple of feelings actually:

...Relaxation with happy parents and kids laughing on a sunny Sunday morning. Kids SHARING and playing together with their blocks and trains. Dad with his apron on and cooking duck a'la'orange. Mom still sitting at the breakfast table, relaxing.

...Recuperation with two wonderful, much-needed, extra hours of sleep. Upon being woken up at 7 this morning, the Cap'n went downstairs with the boys and I drifted right off to sleep again.

...Production as I got a 5.5 yard warp on the Beka upstairs last night. It's a secret holiday knitting project, but I was so pleased that it went on so quickly and I was able to get 10 inches woven last night while the Cap'n went to a retirement party for a colleague.

...Inspiration at the open house Bonnie Inouye held in her Hyattsville home. Her work on a 24-shaft compu-dobby AVL loom is light years beyond the weaving I'm doing (to the point where my friends and I could barely speak the same weaving language) but it's fascinating to see all the different directions that weaving can go. I came home last night and listened to her interview again on Weavezine, which is a good substitute if you can't make her open house today.

Now, off the computer and back to the good feelings in the real world!

November Color

I've become as much a weaving blog junkie as I was a knitting blog junkie.

So when Sue at Life Looms Large put out a call for November color, I opened my eyes to the world around me.

When the boys and I went for a walk at the National Arboretum for Thanksgiving, this is what the Cap'n and I saw.


(He was just as inspired as I was, and wants to put some of the color into his pottery. Half of these photos are his.)

I hope everyone out there is having as inspiring and creative fall as I am. I am looking forward to a productive winter.

I am thankful that the Cap'n and I made it through what has been our worst year yet together, and we and the boys are happy, healthy and all in one piece. Hope y'all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

P.S. Check this link out on their website: The Science of Color in Autumn Leaves. Includes an amazing Fall Foliage gallery.

Back in Action

This was the very first picture taken when my new camera came out of the box last month! Thank you, Mom and Mikey!!

Of course, it came with strings, and not the knitting or weaving kind. More like the kind demanding little boy pictures. So to satisfy the onlookers:

Goofballs on Parade.

I keep thinking of blog posts in my head and then not sitting down to the computer with them. Lately, it's been my craftsman's statement that I'm drafting, pictures of the three (yes, 3!) scarves I've finished weaving, and my very FIRST sweater for MEEEEEEE!!!

But I'll get to all that.

Meanwhile, the boys are ready to eat, and dinner calls!

A New Start

I got emotional today saying goodbye to the Cap'n as he headed off to his first day back at work after the accident.

This has been a really long, hard road. Almost 5 months of times I wasn't sure I knew how to get through, when they were happening.

The accident definitely changed me. It rubbed off some of the blurriness about what's important and what I want to do and have in my life. In some ways, I feel strangely mellow, as if the high anxiety of the past few months has made my usual anxiety seem like that not that big a deal.

We were off on vacation last week in NC, and at the time I started feeling sad. Getting the first bit of literal distance from DC and the accident gave me a better perspective on all I could have lost. I'll probably start talking to a therapist about it.

In some ways, I know I haven't dealt with all of the accident fallout yet, but in other ways I feel better about myself and my relationship with the Cap'n, knowing we can handle something that big.

I know I just want to keep moving forward. I've made a list of things I want to work on and accomplish this year, and that's what I am going to focus on. Sometimes there is no way through but through.

On that note: I signed up for a weaving class, but unfortunately had to miss the first one this weekend with an awful cold. First time I've ever lost my voice! But I should be back in the saddle to start next weekend...I can't wait.

And oh, all the other projects I have to show you....

We're Animaniacs!

Finally introduced the family to The Animaniacs.

Even the Cap'n agreed it's pure genius.

There's lots planned to do around the house today, but hopefully will blog more tonight about my frowny-face weaving. :(

Hey Y'all! Watch This!!

So I started to write a post last night, but was interrupted by:

Slim: "Ewwww!! Mom, Mom! L pooped in the bathtub!!"

Ahem.

Anyway, as I was about to say:

International Weaving Woman of Mystery

Sorry for the crappy webcam quality (the digital camera seems to have given up the ghost), but LOOK -----> We Have A Weaving!!

I am more than pleased to announce the start of a new hobby. Can't say the same for The Cap'n, but he's been incredibly supportive of it.

It's been a long, interesting year. Last year around this time, I had just helped close down a fiber arts workshop that unfortunately couldn't be saved. I wish that I would have had about $50,000 of my own to turn it around. But I did what I could, and before I helped sweep up the last dust bunnies and box up the last yarn, I was encouraged to buy a donated Beka 32" rigid heddle loom.

They were really good fiber pushers around there.

I was a little shell-shocked after the store closed though, and felt very guilty that I couldn't do more to save it. So the Beka sat in a box under the bed for the last year. Around the time that I was working at the store, I also tried biking again and the tendenitis in my left thumb started acting up too.

So other than a couple of knitted hats over the last year, I was off fiber. I got a little stopped up with out my daily dose. (So to speak...)

But I missed it. Terribly. I just didn't know it.

Then on May 6, the Cap'n was involved in a bad motorcycle accident on his way to work. A woman pulling out from a stop sign didn't see him, and hit him. He shattered his right wrist and elbow, and broke 4 vertebrae in his back.

Talk about a game changer. He's doing better now, but it's been a long, hot, miserable summer. I had to return to fiber just to hang on to the last drips of my sanity that were seeping out of my ears.

So about a month ago, my KnittinSis came to visit, and I got her to help me dust off the loom and figure out what screws I needed to put the floor stand together.

It's a monster. 32" is not a shy and retiring size. Luckily the Cap'n doesn't mind it taking up one big corner of the dining room. I haven't named it yet, but maybe one will come to me.

For a first project, I decided to wind up some Louet Opal superwash yarn that I had purchased from Springwater in its first, healthier incarnation. It seemed karmically correct. I had navy blue and spring green, and I wanted to make a table runner.

Bear in mind, I saw people work on the rigid heddles at the store, and I saw warping being done, but I was way too busy to learn any of it. But I guess some of it came through osmosis, and a lot came through the innerwebs. I found this and this to be helpful.

Turns out I should have used a 10-dent heddle instead of an 8-dent, and superwash actually doesn't full (or felt) that much in the wash. And even selvedges? HA! I say.

Whatevs.

Any disappointments I may have had with my first weaving project were washed away as soon as Slim saw it and said, "Mommy, is that for me? Can I have it?"

So instead of a fuzzy crooked table runner (just what we need on our frequently crumb-y table), we have a warm, soft scarf for a very special little boy who is starting Pre-K next Monday.

Yay!

Life: The Original Ninja Duck

(Sung to the theme of "Spiderman")

Ninja Duck,
Ninja Duck,
He's a little, tiny Ninja Duck.

WATCH OUT!
Here comes the Ninja Duck.

Maybe if I knew how the Ninja Duck had infiltrated my bathroom, the rest of my life would make sense.

Maybe.

But I doubt it.

This blog went a little dark right around the time my old computer died. A lot has happened since then. Sad things and happy things. I'll try to catch you up on all of it, and I'll try to move on.

RIP Mia, my sweetest, the best dog ever

If I gave you the Girl Scout promise that I would try to blog more frequently, I would probably be lying, and then I wouldn't be a very good Girl Scout, would I?

(Insert obligatory child photo here)

Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm blogging from the front room of our friends' house in Raleigh. We're celebrating Turkey Day with our other "family" here in NC.

As my astute readers will notice, I did not post any of the blog ramblings that I promised the other day. I am still battling this cold, and it's only slowly going away. But this week, I promise...more pictures and more posts.

Besides I have to tell you about my awesome husband's plans for the stash room...I love the Cap'n.

There are lots of things to be thankful for this Thanksgiving: Good kids, good friends, good family and one great Cap'n. (Oh, and yarn.) ((But maybe not sweater patterns. Grr.)

More later...

Kvetch First, Knit Later

Let's just get the kvetching out of the way, shall we?

1. I am in a Pretty Miserable Situation. PMS, get it?

2. Both kids have spent the last week sick with a fever and sniffly noses. But, you know, on alternating days. Cuz that's how they roll.

3. Another person who also lives in our house is sick and waiting for the Big Ole Boat O' Sympathy to dock at his harbor. But it's not gonna. It crashed into the Iceberg O' Apathy and sank to the bottom of Couldn't Care Less Bay. Because....

4. I am sick. Wah.

5. And today the boys are feeling a bit better. So much so that they decided to take alternating naps and keep me up ALL. DAY. LONG.

6. Did I mention I only got about 4 hours of sleep last night?

Okay, kvetch over. Let's see why these children make it through to see each new day.


Grampy and Grammy pimped our park ride. Swwwwweeeet.

So I like finished a baby sweater? In like a week? And it's like totally awesome? But like, I have no pictures? Because it's like, way too dark? And apparently I've like, been possessed by a Valley Girl?

Yeah.

Tell ya what I'll do. Because I'm in a listing mood, I'll tell you what posts you can expect in the week coming up, and you can tune in if something interests you. Or just to place bets on whether I actually blog when I say I'm going to. (I would not take that one if I were you.)

Here:

1. The Harlot's Hat, or Happy Belated Birthday to Me
2. In Which I'm Liable to Kvetch More About Being Sick (gotta save room for this one)
3. Super Secret Knitting, or Why Knit for Warm People?
4. Baby Sweater Uno
5. Baby Sweater Dos
6. Travel Knitting That Answers the Question of Whether I Cast On Madly for Two Fingering Weight Hats Tomorrow to Finish in a Week
7. Happy Thanksgiving!

See you at the races...

Cute Photo Post

Just call me Ms. Obvious re: headline. I can't think of anything else to say, except that it's been a while since little boy pictures have been posted and we've had a proper update on the fam.

Back in the summer, while it was still hot, we had a great visit with Auntie. She really saved our butts again with helping us unpack and with free babysitting. The boys enjoyed having her here.


The Little Lion has started eating solid food, and this is a photo of his first day with rice cereal. This week, his first tooth (bottom right) popped out. It's strange how the time has passed more quickly with Number 2 vs. Number 1.

Slim is talking like crazy and loves to paint. I think he's going to be a performance artist, as he feels like finger paints are more body paints. He's getting to be a real character.

This is Slim's very first self-portrait with his camera. My mini auteur.

I've been knitting, and I have more posts to share with you now that the photos are downloaded. But it's late, and the noisy dishwasher is getting on my nerves, so I've got to get upstairs.

Saved by the SD Card Drive

Yay, Grampy!

We have boy pictures...

On Vacay

Malcolm, Oren, Leo, Ginny, originally uploaded by billandamir.

I just wanted to post quickly to the blog to test the Flickr posting function and show off one of the pictures our friends took of us while on vacation in South Carolina.

Little Baby and I are off on the bus to meet the rest of the crew at the Arboretum after they pick up our Safta.

I have much to tell: baby handknits in the wild (and more on the way!), clicking while I walk, etc.

More soon!

Time Flies...

...when you're sleepless with a sick toddler and baby with day/night confusion.

I am sorry it's been two weeks since I blogged. I have been writing blog entries in my head at 3:30 in the morning while little baby and I have been up together. But it's so hard to type one-handed, I haven't sat down at the computer to even check email.

There's all sorts of news to blog, but we'll have to give the bulleted version:

• Baby is a charming little thing, growing like a weed and eating through the night. At two weeks he was already at 9 lbs, 3 oz., a pound up from birthweight.
• Slim has run a high fever over 103 for two days, but we think it's just a sore throat and not strep. We hope.
• We put an offer in on a house, got countered, came up and countered again, and were rejected. The home owner thinks she is sitting on a gold mine. One that happens to be eaten up with termite damage and in need of a complete renovation. It's one of those things that makes me hate living in D.C. But we can't give up. If we add one more toy, onesie or Cheerio to this tiny little apartment, us 'rents are going to go nuts.
• Grandpa DiDa and Grammy had good visits with the D-boys. Hopefully we'll get more visits with the fam, maybe in a house with more room.
• Knitting has been happening...slowly. But it sure does help with the sanity-keeping.
• We made our first out of town trip with both boys, taking a wonderful break outside of Philly on the farm. Little Baby got to go to his first play, an interesting production about a hostage-taking situation.
• I have seen the movie "Cars" four times in a week. Thank goodness the soundtrack is good.

There are cute, new pics waiting to be downloaded from the cameras, but I'm back to cuddling a sick kiddo and typing one-handed, so it'll have to wait. It'll give me a good reason to take new pics of the knitting project, too.

Things I Like

I am going to borrow Maryse's idea and make this a Things I Like Monday. But on a Tuesday. Because feeling negative isn't good for anyone.

1. Orchids at the National Botanic Garden. It doesn't matter how many times I've seen them, the roomful of orchids is awe-inspiring. Also, a great place to take an active kid on a cold day.

2. Cadbury Creme Eggs.

3. Scrubs. Hilarious show. Even if I am in a crappy mood, it makes me laugh out loud.

4. Wearing the felted mittens I made. They are so warm and comfy, though too long. If I make another pair, I would increase the rate of decreases at the fingertips.

5. When Slim and I are in the same moment at the same time just enjoying each other's company. And developing new wells of patience for those times when we aren't.

6. Total Eclipse of the Heart. And the fact that I can remember most of the words from singing them at the top of my lungs so many times during my angsty years in high school.

7. Tattoos. Following Scout's Craft-Tat Meme, I'm showing mine. I have two, a butterfly on my left shoulder and the Chinese character for Dragon (my Chinese zodiac sign) on my right ankle.

Both of the tattoos are very meaningful for me. For one, there are quite a few members on my dad's side of the family with tattoos, starting with my grandfather. He was a professional wrestler (Tinker Todd), and he has a man wrestling a snake on his forearm. My dad got a butterfly on his right shoulder in the Navy. I went with my aunt (my dad's sister) to get my first tattoo -- the butterfly on my left shoulder. My sister and two cousins (my aunt's sons) also have tattoos.
The second tattoo is this dragon character. I was born in the year of the Fire Dragon, and I wanted to have more of the qualities of the Fire Dragon. So I got the character tattooed on my ankle where I could easily see it. (It's the only one I can photograph right now, so it's the only one I'll post.)

I have been wanting to get a third tattoo for a while now. Probably something that incorporates the kids in some way. A Rooster and a Pig? Maybe we'll go with their names...

There. I am as cheery as I'm going to get. Yet it's better than yesterday.

An appointment with the midwife today yielded no progress...no dilation, but a healthy baby still. I'll go for another appointment next Thursday with the midwife and a sonogram to make sure baby has enough fluid and is moving well, unless there's action between now and then.

A friend reminded me that once the baby gets here (two kids on two totally different schedules), I'll probably wonder why I was anxious to get past the pregnancy part and into the sleepless nights of breastfeeding and sleeplesss days of toddler chasing.

Meanwhile...send some good labor vibes Alison's way today.

No knit progress to report, other than an inch or two on the scarf. Beautiful colors, great needles...I'm hoping it'll zip by. Though I'll probably put in some time tonight on the socks so I can see how the yarn cooperates. I'm trying to avoid pooling this time...

Still Here

It's been a while since my last post, and we're off to another family gathering soon, so I just wanted to leave an update that we're still hanging in here.

We had a little excitement in NYC with one of the SILs taking me to the hospital on Sunday for some light contractions. Luckily it was just the onset of a stomach bug that caused the contractions, so they eased off the next day. We haven't made a baby yet here.

Slim and I had so much fun in NYC. Slim playing with his cousins, and me hitting the art openings and museums with my SILs. It was so good to hang out with family. And all the art was inspiring.

But things are on a high stress level here...I won't lie. We're off to NC with NCGrandpa so we can meet up with all the family for my aunt's wedding. I'm looking forward to it, but I don't feel like I have everything together yet. Plus we're planning on traveling through the day, and Slim can be, well, "challenging" in the car for too long. We'll see how it goes.

Pics when we return...and a review of the MofAD knitting show and hopefully, actual knitting content.

I think that is part of the reason why I'm stressed...I haven't picked up the needles in almost a week. EEK!!