Are you a sickie too?

Wow, so I am sick. So sick I took a day and a half off work. I'm never sick, and even if I do get sick it's normally so mild that it barely fazes me. This one took me out hard. I mean I can physically see my weakness when I walk too much, you know when your vision starts to get sorta white and brighter? Kinda like when you work out too hard but then I feel like I need to puke instead. Anywho, it's just a head cold but for some reason today whenever I really breathe in it aches. I also have a terrible sore throat (I don't sound like myself at all, kinda freaky) and it's totally wiped me out. Lots of progress on the shawl though. Still need to find my camera to post pictures. I've had two colds almost successively before this and I think that my immune system had finally had enough and caved. Drinking a lot of xxx vitamin water as it makes my throat feel better, go figure.

Really in love with Brett Dennen - So Long Sweet Misery today.

Forbidden

I think I always feel like I have to have something pressing or profound to say when I write this blog but I'm coming to understand that it just needs to be my frame of mind at the moment. So with that I am going to work on posting more often and writing about my days.

Lots happening lately. Twilight is finally really dropping off, and I'm knitting again. I've started a shawl and I am finally finishing my second sock of my first pair. Yay! I've really been into movies lately. Instead of watching television in the evenings I've been watching movies. Currently I'm watching the Underworld trilogy and I recently finished Feast of Love. I was not expecting all the nudity that it contained but the Oscar and Chloe story line I found really enthralling. Yes I know Underworld is all about vampires and werewolves (lycans) but Michael Sheen is very compelling and apparently I am not over vampire and werewolf story lines. Also The Cake Eaters is a great movie.

I've had a real urge to listen to Ray LaMontagne lately. I swear I could listen to him sing anything and be in love with it. I'm extremely partial to his song Jolene so I've been listening to that a lot today. I've also recently found out about something called Forbidden Rice. Isaac says that they used to make it a lot at the CIA so I'm really interested in trying it. Once you cook it it turns purple which is also a reason I want to try it as purple is one of my favorite colors.

 

 And this is rather disjointed but it's something I started to write the other day, never finished and never posted.

I strive for humility. I don't know how well I always do though, maybe at times I'm too humble as I don't really know how to sell myself and I can come across as too earnest. I've had a lot of people tell me I'm really intense and take charge but I don't know if I see it. I always feel like I'm in the backseat giving directions but no one hears. I'm working on less but my life seems so filled with stuff. I've been watching a lot of movies lately that center on being happy with little and that you are only limited by your mind and the limitations you put on yourself. I think I'm finally stepping into the concept, it was something I've always understood but I think lately I have been figuring out how to embody it. It's making me feel lighter and it's like all my stuff is a second weighty skin yet I can slide around underneath it.

Music

Perhaps one of my favorite things are solo Sunday morning drives with really good music, even if it's just running errands. It's one of the times that I can be contemplative and just let my mind wander and really be at peace. So yesterday I was listening to 103.7 The Mountain and they were playing some artists I haven't listened to in a while but really love. Every Sunday they do something they call Sunday brunch from 8-12 in the morning. I specifically tuned in because they were showcasing Bruce Cockburn who is probably one of my all time favorite artists. He's coming into town at the end of April and I really want to go see him. It's one of my life long goals to see him perform and I entered to win tickets but I might probably buy tickets anyway because I'm so keen on it. Probably my favorite song by him is "Pacing the Cage" but everything by him is fantastic I don't think he has a single song I don't like.

Two more songs that really caught my attention while I was running errands were Alexi Murdoch's Orange Sky and Brett Dennen's She's Mine. I finally broke down and bought Alexi Murdoch's album which I have been contemplating since it came out but I wasn't sold on it until yesterday. I also love Brett Dennen but ever since someone pointed out to me the androgyny of his voice I've been holding off on buying any of his albums as I'm not totally sold yet though I love his music. I think for me it's that I now listen to his voice instead of the song deciding (yes, even though I know) on if it's being sung by a man or woman and it's distracting to me. I don't know why this puts me off.  Maybe I'll break down this week. :)

Lord help me I think it's almost over...

So I've been an obsessed person as of late. I don't normally think of myself as someone who obsesses. I would agree with that I give myself over to irrational fears now and then (whether tired and therefore wrought overemotional or because of issues I have from my childhood) but I prefer to think of myself as pretty even keel.

I fell into the life sucking hole that Twilight is with such naivete that I was a somewhat shocked (but made profoundly happy by it) by the force that it took me with. I am a person who only ever gives a book one read through (there are a few rare exceptions) but I found that I was not able to put it down. I am currently on my third read through (back to back) and the feelings are starting to ebb a little. Not only am I reading it but I listen to it on my iPod on my way to and from work and at work while I work. As a sane person I realize this is kinda nutty (okay totally nutty but I can't stop myself, see the obsessed admission above) and I have tried to sparingly talk to people about my feelings for Twilight.

On the premise of Twilight I would like to say that before reading it I never thought I would read it. Some of my reasons were: I don't much like vampires. I'm smarter than that. I had been told by friends that they were unable to even get through the first book. The writing is just so so (I do have to say that while this series has my heart it's not the most cerebral writing I've read). I didn't know too much about it and was able to generalize very easily that it was something that wouldn't hold my interest.

Enter my friend Heather who so generously offered to lend me her copies saying that she thought it would be right up my alley. That was in October. So I put the books in my car and kind of forgot about them (again not knowing much I was easily able to resist) It wasn't until Thanksgiving weekend when I was out of town and needed something to read and remembered that I had the whole series in my car.

At this point my life kinda altered (by which I mean totally altered). I started reading the first one and I wasn't able to put it down. I read the first one in a day and a half and each subsequent one in two days (I did have to work). I resented all the time that I wasn't able to read them, I would stay up until midnight or one in the morning unable to stop reading and go to work the next morning very tired but extremely happy. I didn't watch t.v., t.v. was an annoyance, I would talk to Isaac when it was necessary (I love him deeply but I was enthralled) and holed up with my books the rest of the time. My feelings towards this series are bittersweet. I wanted to read the stories as fast as I could but at the same time I wanted to make it last. Hence the third read through. (Crazily I am contemplating creating my own audio reading of the books as I don't really care for how Ilyana Kadushin reads the novels as it sounds different in my head). I know, I said it was crazy.

I know why I like it and I know the sane, smart, independent, and supposedly feminist reasons why not to like it, so that makes me kind of embarrassed for how much I DO like it. I haven't even been able to knit and I would really like to but I have been unable to put the books down. I have a shawl I want to make and I have sock commitments I need to fill (fingerless gloves too).

In the past two or three days the fierce feelings I've had for this series has started to ebb ever so slightly. I don't resent other activities taking my time away from it. I've been able to go to bed at the same time as Isaac. And I'm starting to watch t.v. again although I'm still kind of resisting that.


I will never consider myself a Twihard  but the Twitarded website is pretty funny but also over the top, I'm not that crazy. I really feel for Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner. I know that they all chose to be actors but they have next to zero lives and a lot of people cannot associate the fact that they might actually be people and not Bella, Edward and Jacob in real life.


And if you want to know what I really want for any special occasion that calls for a present, here are a few ideas that I will only wear inside my house or underneath another shirt. :)
Team Charlie
Team Edward James Olmos

This is just Hi-larious

Score

So through my lovely friend Jilian I was able to score this Mod Green Pod fabric (the one to the left) for, get this, 3 dollars a yard. Corey, ideas? It's upholstery weight. Isn't it pretty?

A few things I forgot.

Let me just say that reading over yesterday's post I kind of feel like I sound a little conceited. If you didn't get this feeling then disregard this part. I was trying to convey how floored I was at what a good knitter people seemed to think I am as I am just learning what I can really do. I am humbled and it gives me a warm feeling inside to know that people like the knitting I am doing.

Okay with that said there are a few things that I forgot to talk about yesterday. This past weekend happened so fast I know I am forgetting to detail a lot of fun and interesting interactions that I had. There are a few that I do remember and here they are. With complete remiss I left out Morgaine. Morgaine owns Carolina Homespun  which is another really fantastic yarn/fiber store as she sells all things weaving, spinning, and knitting. She is one of the sweetest, most patient and kind people you will ever meet. She helped me learn how to spin on my final night there before dinner and she was very patient with my extremely rudimentary ability to spin. I may one day pick up spinning but right now it's not going to be a focus of mine. One of Tina and Stephanie's ulterior motives of this weekend was to at least have us all learn to spin. We didn't have to become spinners but learning the ability helps in the long run with knitting. You learn how fiber works when you learn how to spin and therefore it helps you choose better yarn. I am no longer afraid of silk.

Below are pictures of the yarns I dyed.
The first one is sock yarn. This is how most of ours in my class looked. I think we were so excited to finally lay our hands on the dye that we all went crazy.

This second one is called Geisha in Blue Moon Fiber Arts lineup. I was thinking of dragonflies and I love how it turned out. I diluted the black to gray and combined green and turquoise and diluted that, it's one of my favorites that I dyed.

My third one is called Icelandic in BMFA's lineup. I was thinking of the royal blue cardigan (you're lucky you got it back) that Corey has and I wanted to replicate the color. But I thought it was a little boring so I added some purple and magenta. It's okay but I think it's going to knit up lovely.

My fourth one has no picture. I was looking to add it and it just wasn't there. I don't really like it that much. Do you think my unintentional omission of the picture is my subconscious telling me that I don't like it? I will however describe it. It is a light violet purple and black mixture. I was trying to get pastel purple (I really don't like pastels) and Tina wanted us all to choose a color or hue that we didn't like and try and work on it. Well long story short my purple wasn't pastel so I mentally got stuck and added the black. I'm sure I'll find someone who will like it.

My fifth was silk. Silk is one of the warmest, and most durable fibers out there. For some reason the picture makes the yellow look really bright but it's actually really washed out. I think the floor picked up and made it more yellow. I used green in the center and then I was unsure what to do so I added a diluted brown and undiluted yellow. I didn't really like the yellow so I pushed to brown to cover it. After I dyed this skein I didn't really like it but after they rinsed it and I got it back I'm really in love with it. I just don't think the picture does it justice. It reminds me of a lakeside.

The last one I don't really care for based on that it's novelty yarn. It's eyelash and it looks a lot like the first one. I think I was running out of steam and original ideas.

The Best Weekend Ever

So this past weekend was amazing fun. The Inn at Port Ludlow is so small that the only people there that were non-knitters were hotel staff and people that came in to eat at the restaurant. Never have I been in a place with so many knitters, it was awesome. I have a couple of friends that knit as I haven't been able to convert the rest even with my best intentions. Okay, so I don't try that hard. Although I have been able to convert Lori and that's been really cool to see her fall as in love with knitting as I am. :) But I digress. It was cool to see all the different styles of knitting, spinning, and see what people had brought to wear that they had knit. It's probably the only time in my life that if someone was wearing knitwear you could assume they made and not be presumptive in asking them if they had. Stephanie and Tina were awesome. They are some of the nicest people in the world and both an amazing amount of fun. I found out that Tina is also left handed which I thought was really cool and there were actually quite a few left handed people there, more that I thought there would be. I ended up in group 2 which I think was the best way to work the weekend. This resulted in me being able to dye the first day with Tina (and 20 other knitters, I don't want to make it sound as though it was just Tina and I) and she let us dye 6 skeins of her yarn of all different kinds. Group 1 got gypped when it came to dyeing because it was the last day of the retreat and due to time constraints they were only able to dye 5 skeins. Also whereas we had the first three hours of class to talk about color and dyeing group 1 had to just jump right in.
My second day was with Stephanie who taught us the history of knitting and lever knitting which I really want to figure out and do well at as it's more accessible to left handers. It's going to make me faster I just need to keep practicing it. :) I was the first one to ask Stephanie about Joe's gansey to which she replied "Stop it, that's not nice" which was really funny. One other person asked later as they weren't in the room when I brought it up (in my defense Stephaine brought up gansey's first). I was able to hold and look at her Bohus sweater, wedding shawl and one other shawl I don't remember the name of. She does really incredible work and it was really nice to be able to see in person the stuff she knits on her blog.
I took my first sock along which I am (completely by coincidence) knitting with Tina's yarn and with Stephanie's pattern (really, I started before I even knew they were doing this weekend). I showed it to Tina first in the evening after the first day of class. I figured my sock was okay, I mean it's my first sock how good can it be? I was floored when I first moved Tina with how the color pattern was moving across the sock because apparently how it's moving doesn't look like it comes from the same ball of yarn (I made Tina speechless!). She called Deborah over who works at Tina's company Blue Moon Fiber Arts and she was floored too. Then I told her that it was my first sock, and she was amazed and didn't quite believe me. We had show and tell the last night which I was unable to stay for and Tina said I should show it then and that it was a really well knit sock. Stephen Houghton who was there helping Tina and Stephanie (Tina called him over too) told me he was jealous of my sock (very cool as he is a very accomplished knitter). I was bowled over (and very flattered) by their estimations of my sock. I thought it was okay and they thought it was amazing (apparently sometimes I dumb down to myself how good something is, also if I have nothing to really compare it to I have a harder time knowing the value). I was excited to show it to Stephanie the next day even before all this happened as I kind of consider her the queen of first socks. So the next day I was stupid happy to show it to her. I asked her over to where I was the next day during a break and I was so excited the whole interaction was kind of a blur. I think she said something to the effect of "oh yeah, all first socks look like that" (sarcastically :) ) but I'm not really sure as I was still nervous of what she would think and I had my adrenaline going. All I for sure remember is asking her over to where I was, some kind of conversation happening and then we were both laughing really hard. No matter what it was it was awesome. It makes me want to do more of these types of conferences in the future but I think it will be a little ways out before I'm able to do another one. Everyone was lovely and very nice. I was finally able to turn my first heel on my sock with the help of another knitter by the name of Melinda as the directions were confusing me. I wish all my weekends were like this last one and it makes me realize I should join my local S&B. Knitters are a lot of fun. :)