Life's a Stitch

That’s daughter #2’s word for the flawed thinking that comes out of our mouths at times. Come to think of it, even she has spewed some flawgic in the recent past:

We own three cars. Gasp! We register two during the year when the girls are away at school. The PLAN was that if they wanted a car during the summer they would register and insure the now almost 17 year old Grand Am with only 60,000 miles, and use that for work. The REALITY is that they pay for the insurance and we drive it while they drive one of the other vehicles. "Oh, I can’t drive standard," whines one, "Oh the minivan is too wide," moans the other. So, the Grand Am is relegated to the parents.

This plan had become so very comfortable for the girls that  I was lectured by daughter #2 that since she is paying for the insurance on the Grand Am, the Jetta was hers to use as she pleases this summer starting with a trip to the boyfriend’s place, three and a half hours away, on her first night home from school. I maintained my parental cool and used it as a teachable moment. She now knows that insurance is half the cost of a car, not counting maintenance and car payments, something her sister will discover really soon with her first vehicle. I admit, she was gracious in her reception of this information. This is the same girl who used to swear she would never carry a purse full of coupons and shop the sales like her mom, that is, until the realities of university life set in.

I can think of examples of knitting flawgic regarding things like gauge and blocking.

In the spirit of flawed knitting blog logic (say that three times fast) here’s a photo of Gracee enjoying  a last drop of Bailey’s:

I’m the last person in the world to be talking about balance in life. I’m sure that in the end it will all balance out, but for now full speed ahead! I did, however, bring some balance to my knitting life while in Edmonton.  I have Marina going very well on teensy weensy needles, and to compensate I am knitting Sirdar denim ultra on huge fat drumsticks. It takes about the same amount of time to knit the entire back of the Sirdar cardigan as it does for eight rows of Marina (the colours look pretty accurate):

As for balance, my dream was to work half time. I figured by the time you were tired of home life it was time to go to work and vice versa. I’m feeling balanced right about now in that I’ve had a week of vacation and I’m ready for work. That will probably change once I hit the office.

And finally, the graduate:

Still in Edmonton, we drove out to Stoney Plain to Pam’s Wooley Shop in their new location. I was surprised when they didn’t have a ball winder in house, but the nice clerk offered to wind with me by hand. She explained that when she was a kid, many years ago, her mom would ask for her assistance in winding yarn and use that time for "sex talks" as they wouldn’t necessarily have eye contact and she had a captive audience. I always thought riding in the car was a good time to talk about stuff for the same reasons. I was very good at Pam’s, only exchanging some leftover yarn from my last trip for some circular needles.

I was not so good at the Aveda shop. I have very sensitive skin and eczema. The hotel had Aveda samples in the bathroom and the mint cleanser was so soothing… It didn’t end there, I mistakenly bought some eye cream that was far more expensive that I thought I had read on the sign. Can I rationalize it by the fact that there is no provincial sales tax in Alberta? Nice try.

The convocation ceremony was beautiful, but I can’t post photos here as Elina’s computer won’t accept my camera. I fly back home on Sunday and hope the turbulence is better than on the way out. All I could think of is that our wills are incomplete and my house is a mess. Speaking of which, while Chuck and I came out here for graduation, leaving two kids in charge of the house, my mother arrived from back East. That’s right up there as one of my worst nightmares along with the time my boss came to cook at my house.

Have a wonderful weekend.

Thanks to all of you for your kind words for our family. There will be a memorial service next month and that’s a relief because I was afraid we wouldn’t be able to attend. Rosie was right in her comment that even when expected, death is a shock. My Dad died young at 47 and I always thought that when someone lives to be 91 like my MIL that the impact would be less. I’ve found, over the years, that I was wrong. It’s difficult no matter when.

Here we are in Edmonton, having a much needed quiet time together. It’s been nice to just hang out and spend the time relaxing and reminiscing. Yesterday we toured the building where Elina and her roommate have bought an apartment.Here we are, Elina, me and Jeanie (the recipient of the shawl I made last month) in our hardhats:

Elina has her RN exam today and the graduation ceremony is tomorrow. I’ve had some time to work away at Marina, it’s coming, slowly but surely:

It’s off to Edmonton we go this morning, to the graduation. I’m still figuring out how to travel with Marina. This project needs its own luggage:

Call me quirky, but I know I’m awake in the morning because I have a song in my head that wakes me up. It’s not always the same song; it’s my morning soundtrack. I also brush my teeth with warm water. I didn’t think that was so strange, but the dental hygienist, last week, was incredulous.

This weekend I collected on my Mother’s Day gift. On the day itself, my daughters pointed out that the reminder was going off on my PDA. I was surprised since it was a Sunday. I picked it up to be informed that on June 4th I had a mystery date scheduled for a performance of Miss Saigon. My daughters had schemed with my friend Lynn’s daughters, and Saturday was the day. It was a smaller travelling production, but very good. The first half didn’t grab me but the second was an emotional roller coaster. I wouldn’t mind trying some of the drugs vitamins "the engineer" was on, his performance was spectacular. Musicals are my thing and I’ve hardly ever seen such an inspired performance.

Update:

We’ve had sad news regarding my MIL, who I wrote about on the18th. She had taken a turn for the worse this weekend and passed away last night. It was so fast I can’t believe it. We’re very sad.

When my kids were little they ate ants on logs – peanut butter on celery with a parade of raisins on top. Gracee eats ants, not on anything. She stalks the ant, pounces, shakes it up in her mouth and then spits it out. Lovely. This time, however, the ant fought back. No matter how hard she tried to get rid of it, a part of the ant appeared embedded in her tongue. Poor girl, with a little coaxing we managed to free her of her burden:

Next week I will be in Edmonton for my daughter’s graduation from the university. It seems like a dream. As one of my co-workers put it – one off the payroll! I need a break, having over extended myself in a variety of ways. You should be around my house right about now. Maybe you shouldn’t. There seems to be a fair bit of ranting going on. When the kids were little I used to yell "Calgon, take me away" after the commercial from a long time ago. Once, my two-year-old said, "If you’re going with Calgon, I’m going, too." That was enough to break the tension. We need one of those tension breakers right now. Oh boy, a trip to Pam’s Wooley Shop seems like a good diversion. I’ll try to post from there, have a good weekend.

I never pictured myself as a knitter of Fair Isle, especially on size three needles. My first Fair Isle was accomplished at a class featuring a  Philosopher’s Wool pattern with12 beautiful colours. I went in with trepidation, but was relieved when I discovered the following:

1. Although a Fair Isle pattern may have many colours, you are generally only knitting with two in any given row.
2. Many patterns can be knit in the round eliminating the need to purl to achieve stockinette.
3. The strands of yarn don’t tangle because you knit with both hands, one colour in each.
4. Since you are adding new colours at the extra stitches in the middle of the front, a.k.a. the steek, you don’t need to weave in the ends since you will cut the steek anyway.
5. You usually don’t have to read the chart stitch by stitch. More often than not, a repetitive rhythmic pattern emerges and after a series of stitches you no longer have to refer to the chart for that row.
6. Forget the analogy to a knitting episiotomy, cutting up the steek is not traumatic.

Seriously, you can do it! So, here is Marina with a pattern emerging:

A pasta problem. Given:

1. One family member is allergic to wheat.
2. One is on a chronic variation of Atkins and doesn’t eat anything white (OK, you purists, I know there is no such thing as a variation to Atkins).
3. Two won’t eat white clam sauce and one likes his pasta hot and naked (with olive oil and herbs).
4. Two won’t touch whole wheat pasta.
5. We are trying a sample of brown rice pasta.

Problem: How many pots were cooking on my stove tonight?

Answer: Six – one each for the rice, the rice pasta sample, the whole wheat pasta, the angel hair pasta, the red meat sauce and the white clam sauce. And then there were four different salad dressings and two kinds of Parmesan.

I must be crazy. Most people cook spaghetti for an easy meal.

But you know I like a challenge, so here is my progress on Marina’s ribbing, front and back:

After a career in the world of non-profit social services, I often wonder what it would be like to work in the real world. Today I got a taste of another world, but I’m not sure it’s the real one. On my last day off I accompanied Bryant to "wardrobe" to get his clothes picked out for his role as "date boy" in a milk commercial. I was able put up my feet and knit away on Marina while Bryant was suited up in clothes he’d normally see in his dreams. As he wears a uniform to high school he doesn’t need much more, other than a pair or two of jeans and some khakis. It amazed me that in the world of commercials, the wardrobe person can pay anything to anyone for something she wants. They can literally rent the shirt off your back if they like it. So I did. Not a shirt, but a scarf I had in my stash. They sent a driver to pick it up at my house. If they use it I will be paid rent. If not they will pay me a restocking fee to put it back on the floor of my closet. Such a deal. You can tell I’m not in the business.

It was very relaxing until I discovered that I was knitting an Alice Starmore mobius. I can’t figure out how it happened, but somewhere in my 360 stitches I twisted things around. With no intentions of tearing back ten rows of corrugated rib knit on teensy needles, I did a premature snip of the steek to get things turned around. Thanks to Thomas, in Denmark, for featuring this solution on his blog. Here is my straightened out rib. I’m thrilled with the colours except for the very bottom where the pink shows through underneath the blue. I think this is due to the type of cast on I used. Again, there’s no way I’m ripping out ten rows to fix this. It will have to become a design feature or I can stitch over them afterwards with the blue yarn. Am I the only one bothered by things like that? I know I had a couple of unplanned "design features" in my Philosopher’s Wool Fair Isle, and I can’t remember what they are, although at the time I fretted about them.

I’m just back from our extended holiday weekend away. For those who aren’t in Canada it was Victoria Day, a celebration of Queen Victoria’s b-day. I think it’s Canada’s excuse for a May holiday. There was a lot of good knitting happening. I finished my flower basket bag and successfully swatched (finally) for Marina. I’ve spent more time swatching for that project than I have knitting some scarves. 

Here’s the view from our deck this weekend. My kids have grown up visiting this place from time to time. Notice it’s on a golf course. We are not golfers, but we are good golf critics, and being situated above a tee, it’s how my children learned foul language. Right. Knitters never swear; only golfers: