Life's a Stitch

"Bushtits are seldom parasitized by Brown-headed Cowbirds." That sentence from the bird book sent us into peals of laughter this evening. I love when summer visitors start arriving and we eat on the deck and our silliness can be heard for miles. Takes my mind off the ten stitches in my shoulder where the "it’s probably nothing to worry about" bump was. I’m not worried about it at all, but it’s still on the sore side.

Here’s the landscape scarf finished and blocking. It does remind me of a landscape scene as viewed from a plane at 35,000 feet. This was fun and quick once you get into the rhythm. But don’t you just hate it when the project requires 1 and 1/10th skein?

Have you ever seen something that is so foreign to you, so incomprehensible you look twice to check its existance? And then you look again just in case it was the MSG or maybe the wrong kind of mushrooms in dinner’s chop suey. Consider these. Excuse me, butt pads? In my family we are afflicted with what we call "Hernandez ass," from my maternal side. It is undoubtedly genetic. Just ask look at my mother, sister, cousins and daughters. Never, I repeat never, would the concept of butt pads ever enter into our realm of reality.

Purse knitting, continued:

I believe in God. And I’m certain that "He" has very little control over a world that we mortals have influenced to the point of tragedy, illness and misfortune. I’m not going to get into the details of my kind of faith, but I know this to be true. Why? Because, as we have heard in some form or another, no God would have had scheduled kids’ teen years to coincide with mom’s menopause. I’m not talking about the classic clash of teen rebel without a cause vs raging hormonally challenged mothers. I’m talking about the series of events that happen between the ages of 13 and 19 that bring moms to tears in an instant.

Generally, I am not a cryer, but I am a bowlful of mush when watching my kid in the school play, three out of four performances, eyes welling with tears even before he comes on stage, when some other menopausal mom’s kid sings Somewhere Over the Rainbow. My child is so used to my situational emotional upheaval that he text messages me from back stage, "R U crying yet?"

I might appear strong and tearless on the outside, but I am a soggy mess inside while holding down my drunken child’s leg while he receives 30 stitches in three layers.

Smiling, the tears would have a shorter distance to travel before I taste them. I’m watching through the glass gym door and see my six feet tall little boy in his high school ballroom dance class effortlessly salsa-ing with a redhead he’s known since Kindergarten. Call me sentimental, as echoes and images of them Ring-Around-the-Roseying turn me into menopausal meatloaf.

No wonder he wouldn’t permit me to take pre-prom photos last weekend. I feel like a walking breathing Kodak commercial. You know the one if you’re old enough. The one with the "Turn Around" song.

1. A clump of Iris I bought on clearance at the grocery store a few years back. This year there were at least five dozen blossoms.

2. My favourite Gingher embroidery scissors in the Leah colourway.

3. My current purse knitting project, a Fibertrends Landscape scarf in Koigu KPPM P527.

4. No photo, but enroute is a skein of the limited run of Cherry Tree Hill Possum Lace in the Peacock colourway from the Yarn and Fiber Company. Check them out – reasonable prices and free shipping to the US and Canada with no minimum purchase, and so far, good customer service.

After much anguish and paper signing (I don’t do debt very easily), I now own a Kia Rondo, affectionately dubbed "the Runto" by Chuck. The good news is that it’s not technically a minivan but still holds seven if necessary, just right for all our visitors. It’s fun living in a tourist attraction; when we lived in Omaha, hardly anyone visited.

In celebration, my 17-year-old offered to buy me a license plate holder embellished with chrome flames. I politely declined, using the offer as a teachable moment – the difference between a gift for me and one that’s really for himself. The women in his life will thank me.

I’ve had to put the knitting aside to file my overdue taxes in order to get the refund needed for the down payment, which will appear on my next Mastercard bill. Follow that?

Even if you've never had a migraine, please read this post, but read it to its end. You might have them in the future or know of someone who can benefit from this. I'll try to summarize so it isn't migraine inducing post due to its length. It's basically a series of clues that led to an effective  a not so effective treatment:

• I've had migraines for over 15 years.
• Recently I had 22 headaches in 6 weeks; all needing Imitrex and/or Tylenol 3.
• In preparation for a visit to a neurologist I kept a headache diary and found that only six were classic migraines. The others started with pain on both sides of my temples before zeroing in on the typical one sided migraine.
• No foods seemed to trigger the headaches, and although dr's kept telling me they were hormone related, it didn't seem cyclical in any way.
• The two sided pain was similar to headaches I experienced after being treated with traction for a neck injury.
• When given a guard for teeth grinding, it made the headaches worse.
• It is different and more complex than TMJ, it's a disorder of the trigeminal nerve.
• I happened to be at the dentist with an active headache and he had recently taken a course about this FDA approved treatment. I was very doubtful since the night guard was such a disaster, but in desperation, I agreed to try it.
• I've had one migraine in ten days and I'm cautiously optimistic.
• The only side effect is that my bite is rather wonky, but my dentist assures me he will address this.

Update: Not such a good update,actually. Fit of the device is crucial. I lost mine and my dentist made a new one. It fits slightly differently and the headaches are back. Unfortunately it can't be adjusted until he returns from vacation.

Another update after a year: It didn't work out well at all. The device changed my bite severely to a point where I had difficulty chewing and even my speech was affected. My jaw felt crooked and the headaches returned. Now, a couple of months after no device at all, things are feeling a little better. I've been to a neurologist, who feels my headaches are related to an old neck injury, and he will be trying Botox for migraines, which apparently has a very successful outcome. Good luck to all you who have arrived here after Googling for a migraine cure.

October 2008 Update – the Botox for migraines is working relatively well, with about a 75% reduction in the number of headaches. My Imitrex works for the remaining few. The Botox lasts about three months and there were no side effects. If you'd like further information, please leave a comment.

Knitting content: take a look at Darlene's version of my Herringbone Rib scarf, knit of Arte-new from Needful Yarns. The pattern is always available right here for the price of a comment.

Research demonstrates that given names can cause lifelong personal issues. Some kids get by with easy names and others, such as myself, have spent our entire lives spelling our names. I grew up with the name Lilice (sounds like Denise) Lesinski (doesn’t rhyme with anything, but my dad with his Polish sense of humour, in trying to explain the spelling, used to say "think of sin, think of me").

But what about the nicknames we acquired on the playground or those that stuck with us when an older sibling couldn’t pronounce our given moniker? Jayne, another Vancouver blogger recently posted about her playground nickname, Fishy Wishy in a Dishy, a second generation nickname derived from her family members dubbing her "Minnow." My cousin Elena grew up as Nana and my daughter, Elina, is Nonnie. For me it happened in eighth grade, Revlon came out with a lipstick called LeLips. It didn’t take long for the boys, conscious of my chatty ways, to change Lilice to LeLips. Anybody want to top that?

Signs that spring may turn into summer:

Sometimes a meme is just what you need for an easy post. Did I say easy? When Blogland was busy with 100 Things a About Me lists, I could only manage 59. Now I need to come up with 7 or 8 things, depending on where the tag originated, that aren’t on that list? OK, I’ll give it a shot. Thanks to Liberty, Suzanne, Sonya and "Criquette". Anyone else who wants to give it a go – consider yourself tagged.

1. At work I’d rather write in pencil than ink.

2. In high school and college I took Latin, French, Spanish and German. Can’t speak any one well enough and get Spanish and French hopelessly mixed up.

3. I live in a big ugly white dog of a house, but it’s interesting on the inside.

4. I appear to have figured out the cause of the 22 headaches/migraines I’ve had in six weeks. I’ve had migraines for over 15 years, but I was starting to consider them life ruining. More on the drugless cure later, but it’s not without side effects.

5. I have recently developed a positive relationship with a treadmill and I’m hoping it’s for keeps.

6. My nails are manicure resistant. Paying for one is a waste of money for me as they chip within 24 hours.

7. We are trying to live with one car and are finding it very difficult.

8. My latest knitting project combines a Barbara Walker book and some more of that beautifully coloured, but easily wrinkling cotton:

We’ve all survived, hopefully all a little wiser. Three things I’ve learned this week:

1. You can’t beat the support you get in blogland. Thank you to all for your reassurance and good advice. My favourite explanation for teen boys’ behaviour is that testosterone is a neurotoxin and that their brains are swimming in it.

2. I use extreme stress as an opportunity to eat things that normally never pass my lips – popcorn, chocolate, tuxedo cake, and the best? Cobbs lemon tarts. You Aussies and Vancouverites know what I’m talking about.

3. You know what they say about having a child later in life will keep you young? They lie.

I’m looking forward to a promising Saturday with Blogless Marsha in Edgemont Village. What’s on the agenda? A half spa day and visits to Urban Yarns and Cobbs. I’m not done with those lemon tarts.

Here’s the FO photo I didn’t get to post, the narrow version of Midwest Moonlight. I need advice – how do you get cotton to stay flat post bocking? I’ve even ironed it. Starch, maybe? I’m wondering if it’s because I tried to block it with straight edges when it’s supposed to have points along the way.

My Mother’s Day started at 1:30 a.m. Take two boys, ages 16 and 17, uncharacteristically exceeding their curfew; add a twelve pack of beer. While you’re at it throw in some poor judgment, a little mischief, and a romp through the woods in rugged terrain after dark, and what do you get? An ambulance ride and 30 plus internal and external leg stitches. Yes I’m talking about the same cowardly lion from a couple of posts back. His smile is not quite so big.

When you get a call like that in the middle of the night, the last thing you think about taking along is your knitting. We are thankful parents, it could have been way worse.