Random Meanderings at Middle Age

pretty pictures,boring text

It's autumn, the hot air balloons are being spotted in the neighborhood, we've made our first scarecrow, the Halloween decorations are up and I am getting my butt kicked by the shawl and have only made it to row 8 today.  No matter, the garden is still enchanting me.

And we're off...

Well, Secret of Chrysopolis has started and the first clue (90 rows worth, 94 if you count the 4 rows of garter set up.  it's only 139 stitches though) is up.  I cast on and knit 7 and a half rows of the pattern and then sat on the needle and pulled off and ripped back about 20 stitches or so.  Needless to say I ripped it all and started over again tonight.  My original goal was to try and get 20 rows a night, but I'll be happy is i get to row 10 tonight, or even just row 6!  Row 7 is a little tricky (mostly because I am a novice lace knitter and new to chart reading).  The wrong side rows are purled so that will help too.  I think this will be a stunning shawl, but it's very definitely going to be a challenge for me.  I'm using KnitPicks Shadow in the Vineyard colorway and I'm now knitting on circular Addi Turbo's US2 (originally it was straight Fiddle Sticks in US2, but I was having trouble K2Tog with them).

We all went on a walk at Tower Hill today and brought our sketch books.  John sketched Noah sketching.  I attempt to sketch the pond and gazebo and Noah walked down to the pond and sketched a little frog peeking out from under a leaf.  Em did a few great drawings as well, but they wouldn't scan well.   John was able to catch a baby garter snake that Noah spotted and it was adorable-sadly my camera batteries were charging and my cell phone was dead too.  It was a lovely afternoon for walking. 

I'm knitting, I'm knitting!

Haven't stopped to take any pictures, but knitting has been happening.  I'm zipping through Dream in Color's Baby Tulip Cardigan.  All those bloggers were right, this is a fun sweater to knit and I can't put it down.  The yarn is scrumptious, the colors stunning ( and thank you boys at  Threadbear Fiber Arts for the always spot on color choices and kits) and the pattern simple but fun.  I'm not knitting this for any specific baby, but I like to have a few nice baby gifts ready to go!  In that vein, I am finally putting the finishing touches on the little baby kimono from Mason Dixon Knitting.

I am also (or was before picking up the Tulip Cardigan) making good time on the great cabled footies from One Skein, this pair is for me, but I plan to make some as gifts this year.  Handknit, quilted or sewn gifts have a slight handicapped this year as Channukah is starting on December 4.  I suppose I'd better pick up a certain Icelandic and finish it soon.

Oh and I have to do my swatch for Secret of the Stole which starts soon and also pick up beads (I think I found some I like at a new local bead shop that opened just down from where I work.  I also joined Sock Wars which appeals to my sense of fun (a game of assasination by sock knitting? I'm all in!).

I'm spinning as well. I finished spinning my Cukoo Batt from Artclub (on etsy) and plan to start spinning the Confetti batts from Loop (also etsy), the latter is lots of recycled silk mixed with black alpaca and I think the mostly white and mostly black with silk and other embellishments will ply together to make a fun yarn and I am hoping a nice warm and funky winter cloche.

I'm planning a few other special projects.  Currently I am working on ideas to make a Tallit for my daughter.  Her Bat Mitzva is early next year and I am thinking of making it from Chinese silk.  I plan to have both em and I tie the knots ourselves and am basically stuck with whether or not to include and Atarah . It would be really great if I could get a hold of silk made in the province of China where she was born, but that may not be possible. 

In other non crafty news, I had plateaued with my weight loss for the latter part of the summer, but with more intense exercise and diet starting up again I've resumed losing weight (though not as quickly as I did in the Spring, which makes sense).  The current health issues are being dealt with a little more slowly than I'd like but then again I'm pretty busy so it's just as well I'm not scheduled to do anything time consuming in the near future!

Heroes resumed with Season Two last night and I had every intention of watching but was asleep almost as soon as I got home.  I am reading Michael Chabon's newest novel, The Yiddish Policemen's Union and think I like it, a little too soon to tell.

OK, that's enough of all that. I'll try and be more entertaining next update.

lint...or atonement.

At Tashlich last week the rabbi mentioned that even the lint in ones pocket could be used to symbolize the sins being tossed away (at least I think that's what he said, it was a little noisy).  My family and I tossed bread along with everyone else, but a few nights later I was taking my walk and thinking about repentance and teshuvah and felt some lint in my pocket and shredded and tossed that as I walked.  It felt good.  In fact, I found myself trying to recall what it was the good feeling reminded me of and then I had it!  It felt a lot like how I feel when we've rented a dumpster and rid the house of clutter, or when I clean out the closets and take the bags of unused clothes to Goodwill.  It's a feeling of freedom, of being unburdened of being cleaner somehow and renewed.

In these last hours before Kol Nidre and the start of Yom Kippur I have been thinking less about the personal acts of teshuvah I've been making or needed to make and more about why it is that so much of our lives (my life anyway) are taken up with clutter, both physical and psychological.  On the material level, I recognize that the best way that I can honor my planet and make some kind of teshuvah for the harm I cause it daily is to be more aware of consumption, and to reduce,reuse and recycle more frequently and more efficiently.  And I've addressed in other blog entries my efforts to reduce the clutter of my life that inteferes with actually enjoying and living my life-less meetings, less running around, more time at home.  It's not always possible but it's something to strive for.

"Why do you spend money on that which is not bread, and your labor on things which do not satisfy?"
Isaiah 2a

"...but the important thing about me is that I'm me."

"The important thing about me is that I'm me.  It's true that I'm kind of tall.  Sometimes I can be stubborn.  I'm a Jewish Cambodian American which is unique but the important thing about me is that I'm me."

But the afternoon walk was lovely...

Work was hectic and long and my day started at 6am (yikes!), which is sinful for a Sunday but during the school year I work most Sundays so there it is.  It was so lovely when I finally finished sometime after 2:30 that I went for a walk near a local pond.  There are trails and when I came to the pond itself the beauty of it was so amazing that I kicked myself for not bringing a camera.  I remembered the cell phone camera and after 2 years with this phone figured out how to actually acess the pictures I took!

The sky reflected in the pond was just breathtaking and I'm somewhat surprised and pleased to see the picture came out fine.

Dinner tonight is grilled veggies, chicken wings (mango) and teriyaki flank steak with rice.  I'm trying to make the most out my late summer visits to the local farmstand.  Soon it wil be closed for the season and I'll miss all the wonderful fresh produce.

There will be knitting, but not too much tonight. I plan to work on the second cabled footie,watchan episode of Torchwood, read a little and get to sleep early.

My universe...of which I am..of course..the center.

Saturday was interesting.  I made it to Torah study an hour early which gave me some peaceful time to knit (No, I do not consider knitting to be 'work").  There was a visitor. I'd knit her something but I strongly suspect that her grandma has that covered.
I then drove to an undisclosed location and helped a friend unpack from a recent move.  By help I mean, I made him go to Ikea.  I will say that seeing the stacks of boxes waiting to be unpacked (except for the 26 boxes of books that apparently belong to me I remain convinced that I will never again, if i can help it, move.  That said we did turn the master bedroom from  chaos, to semi-order and then with a quick trip to Target it became a place where one could actually sleep.

It was established that if I am entrusted with the job of tightening bolts with a wrench it may be advisable to check the bolts before putting the mattress back on the bed.  I'm just saying...

It was also established that I am capable of annoying the heck out of some of the house cats.  Earl was especially annoyed to find me stalking him with my camera. 
It's possible he and Grey were merely stressed because their house mate, Crunchy,  is very ill at the animal hospital , but I'm thinking he just wants to be left alone.

Today I worked a little over 7 hours and when returned home was almost blocked from getting to my house because a huge (and as it turns out brandy new) fire truck was a few houses down, ladder extended to the roof and there were scores of firefighters and other folks (an they're vehicles) everywhere.  I was alarmed to say the least, but it turned out that all was well and it was the town's new fire truck on a training run. 

When I got back home I found the boys next door were holding some very small, newly hatched baby birds (the feathers weren't even in yet).  Apparently they had fallen out of the tree early in the morning, but the younger boys weren't aware they needed to go back and took them a distance away to try and help them out.  Three birds were still alive when I saw them, although one appeared to have a broken leg/wing.  John out them back in the nest (in a tree) and they promptly flung themselves out of it.  I decided that because of the length of time, the unusual timing of the births (rather late in the season) and the fact that the birds were just gonna keep flinging themselves to the ground  I'd be best off bringing them, nest and all to the Wildlife Clinic at Tufts.  Sadly, it will be a tough job to rehab them.  The best thing to do is put them back and hope a parent bird returns, in this case I think too much time passed and in any event the birds were determined to get out of the nest.  I didn't take any pics because the poor little guys were stressed enough.

And so, another week end is finished.  I'm for bed.  Oh wait!  I started the Cabled Footies from One Skein, fun, quick and very gratifying.  I'm nearly done with the first one.  I think Cascade 220 is one of my favorite go to yarns for worsted weight projects.

Poor George.

The real reason he was smothered under a rug (Edward Gorey House).

Random Fiber

I finally finished the Three-Striped Flopsy Hat from Pick Up Sticks.  I started this at least two years ago, using Cascade 220.  Then, as with so many projects it fell into a black hole of UFOs.  Em is modeling the unfelted hat as it awaits the arrival of the felting house elf.  This is my favorite part, looking at this impossibly large knitted object and then, after some time in the washing machine it becomes......

..a very sweet hat, here modeled by a very sleepy and mortified Noah.  It will get tucked away and is yet another finished UFO and holiday gift. 

I also spent a pleasant hour with my swift and ball winder winding some skeins for future projects.  You see here the many little balls of Dream In Color, waiting to become a Tulip Jacket.  I wound one of my unmarked Flash skeins from my recent Classic Elite trip, it's supposed to become a Star Sweater for my nephew.  I also wound two of four skeins of Caravan and am thinking of making another Hermoine Hat with it.  The Shadow laceweight in Campfire is destined to be used for The Secret of the Stole.  Finally, the peachy cake of Cascade 220 is going to become another pair of Shadowbox Socks.  Oh and you can see my reskeined and rewound BMFA STR Summer of Love-the socks were completely frogged and I will start again in a smaller size.

"The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together"-William Shakspeare

May your joys be as deep as the ocean...

...your sorrows as light as it's foam.

We spent a couple of days back on Cape Cod.  We walked to Wing Island (the osprey have fledged) and the tide was out, out, out.  And then, it came in, in, in!!  We got a little wet.

I just love this place.