Labor Day in Chicago

My Aunt R and Cousin C are coming into town on Wednesday evening, and my mom is coming on Saturday morning. All the visitors are leaving on Monday. I have been asked to figure out what we should be doing.

Thursday:

• R and C are on their own
• I suggest a Wendella boat cruise
  

Friday:

• 10am, R , C, R's high school friend and I are going to see Tut at the Field Museum
• lunch at the Field?
• then what? The Field Museum isn't that exciting.
  

Saturday

• pick-up Mom at the airport ~9:15am
• IKEA w/ Mom? (if I've already driven to O'hare, Schaumburg isn't that much farther)
• Lunch at the Italian cafe across the street from the Bean
• Millenium Park
• Spinning Into Butter by Rebecca Gilman? I'll email around... it sounds like a good show
• maybe we'll try to get the $25 tickets to Wicked

Sunday

• Ann Sather for breakfast... but we'll have to go to a not-in-Andersonville one, as that one seems to be closed
  
• I'd like to take Mom to my church (All Saints Episcopal in Ravenswood)
• DaVinci at 1pm at the Museum of Science and Industry
• Sunday evening? collapse?
• maybe 7:30 TMLMTBGB

Monday

• Shedd Aquarium?
• Visit friends in Deerfield?
• wander Andersonville?
• Thai Pastry?
• Everyone goes home =(
• Life returns to normal =(
  

Baby Surprise Jacket

Baby Surprise Jacket
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

I am a smart person. Even generally a smart knitter. But somehow, I decided that a DK-weight yarn (Merino Style) would be a good choice to use for a pattern that called for a shetland wool that knit to 6 stitches/inch aka Sport weight. And I kept knitting all the way through the decreases, through the straight knitting and into the increases, almost through 2 balls of yarn.

This pattern is supposed to take 3 oz. of yarn I have used almost that much and I'm nowhere near completion. That was the tipoff for me, actually, that it used too much yarn. It wasn't the fact that it is GIGANTIC or that I'm getting no more than 5 stitches to the inch (I haven't actually measured it) that tipped me off, oh say, a week ago. Nope, it was that I was running low on yarn. I have plenty (2 balls of each color) of this yarn for the jacket, but I knew how much was supposed to be used, and this is too much.

I started the jacket with the intention that it would be either for the Long Range Planning Department or for the Windy City Knitting Guild Charities program, but in the end, the yarn will return to yarn format until something better comes along to knit with it.

OSSP August Package, with notes!

OSSP August Package, with notes!
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

My upstream secret pal this summer was Gina at Life in LaLaLumay Land and she was a great pal. All of the packages were timely, well thought out, had nice yarn, and this final one was stuffed full of extra goodies.

Click on over to the flickr! picture for a larger version, lots of notes and detail shots.

If anyone can assist me in wearing a beret without looking ridiculous, please let me know. I really like this yarn (its got angora in it!) and the colors are nice and neutral, but I look a bit ridiculous. It is very well-made and fits nicely.

Thanks Gina!

Show and Tell Thursdays

Current Toothbrush holder
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

I suggested the topic for S&T and then almost didn't get the post made. Lame-o! Last night, I was exhausted from shopping for work, and it was Wednesday. Tonight, I was watching Gray's Anatomy re-runs and knitting quite contentedly. Then, as I was thinking about going to bed early, I remembered that I needed to post about my awesome toothbrush holder. Here it is, in all its easy-to-clean glory.

And this is a note-filled narrative in a picture of where I *used* to keep my toothbrush:


If you click on either picture, you can see other views, with the captions, about why my toothbrush holder is great, and totally worth the $9.99 at Target.

Proofread, people!

Those who missed the 'L' at Belmont are not alone | Chicago Tribune

I have made mistakes with graphics before, and have sympathy for the person who got fired, because we all know that nothing goes all the way to install without 37 people looking at it, but still, if you are working on a graphic, and you notice that there is a potential mistake,

Say Something!

Just like the public safety messages on trains, buses and in airports say, "If you see something, say something." Its better to look attentive to detail, but be wrong, than to let something get all the way to the install because "that's what the designer wanted" even if the "desired" item is ridiculous or wrong or defies logic.

I challenge everyone to take responsibility for the world around them. If you see something that seems odd, find a way to inquire, politely and appropriately, if it is correct. At worst, you seem to be unknowledgeable (is that a word?). At best, you save the CTA $75,000.

That's 37,500 full-fare, cash-paid rides on a bus or train. Which is one commuter, for two rides per day (round trip), for over 51 years. And that commuter would probably have gotten a Chicago Card Plus before 51 years passes, so they will be paying a bit less than figured in these calculations.

Something to think about.

Progress and Fun

If you take a look on the right hand side, you will notice that I updated the sidebar a bit. Took out the outdated buttons, added a list of blogs-I-read (I'm just the last kid on the block to do that), and

Got a Flickr! Badge!

I have wanted one for a while, but there are a lot of steps (well, a few, surprisingly, freakishly easy ones). First, you have to have a Flickr! account with some pictures in it, then you have to pay attention to your blog, then you have to put the Flickr!-generated code into the sidebar. I picked Flash. If this messes anyone up, let me know. I can change it. Like I said, freakishly easy.

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I am in the process of uploading pictures from the camera to the computer and then the computer to both York Photo (for my mom) and Flickr! (because that's where people who aren't my mom actually look at pictures). I have knitting stuff, photos of the new Guthrie and the amazing, spectacular, awe-inspiring, incredible, why-don't-I-live-in-Minneapolis, how-did-they-ever-figure-this-out view of the Mississippi river, pictures of bridesmaids' bouquets, and wedding reception pictures. It will be fun. I want to upload the full-size images to Flickr! to save time on resizing. Is the Pro! account worth it? Is there a batch resizer program out there that even I can figure out?

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I found the source of the horrible smell in my kitchen, and cleaned a lot of other surfaces along the way. I still need to keep at that battle tomorrow. Now that isolated areas are clean, I see how dirty I've let the rest of that room go. A bigger dustpan and a mop bucket are on the shopping list.

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Arcadia Knitting had a yarn exchange party today. I went with oddballs and small bits, but the stuff I brought was kind of lame. I definitely came out ahead, mostly by hovering on the donation bin. You see, it was allowable to swap with the donation pile, as long as you didn't take more than you gave. I put in my weird random yarn to the yarn swap process, and came home with some good stuff. There will be a separate post for that fun.

I still need to work out the details, but I will, soon enough, have exciting news about my progress in the fiber arts world. But I don't want to jinx it. Though if you read the comments, well, there you go.

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I am up to 14.5" on the back of my Brioche Bodice. And I finished a hat with the annoying Cleckheaton Gusto yarn for Adopt-a-Native Elder. All that fat yarn is making my hands tired. (or is that the typing and web surfing?) I need to go back to my Baby Surprise Jacket and sock swatching.

Is it wasteful to use superwash, handpainted, merino yarn in a blanket? I want to do a modular blanket, a la Shelly "could I please have some scraps" Kang, with it, ever since I was sent over to Shelly's website by Ms. Stephanie "let's bury her house in yarn" Pearl-McPhee.

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Marcy will be teaching an Argyle Sock class this fall. I hope that it fits into my schedule, because I absolutely want to take it. Even if I have to buy expensive yarn and pay the expensive class fees (I am totally spoiled by the 24 person WCKG classes) to take it. How 1950s of me, knitting argyle socks. Maybe I'll find a boyfriend to put in them too? Ha! One shocker at a time, people.

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Why does Target keep the Archer Farms Sparkling Mineral Water hidden? The yucky flavors are featured, but the plain stuff is hidden away, out of sight, not where you expect to find it. Its a good deal too, 99 cents for a big bottle of it. The imported stuff is around $1.29 minimum for the same size bottle.

Keep Smiling! =)

Look, there's my butt

Franklin and Kathy
Originally uploaded by arcadiaknitting.

I went to the Arcadia knit blogger party in July, had fun, ate snacks, got a goody bag, and had NO IDEA who Franklin was or why we would want his drawings.

Now, due to Stitches Midwest, I know who he is, and I was looking at these pictures, and saw my butt, and now, well, I'm putting my flat butt and bulge-y legs out on my own freakin' blog. Crazy she is. But look at how pretty Kathy looks at her party.

In a room full of knitters...

you will find someone who knows the answer to most anything, especially related to knitting/yarn/fiber.

I went to Stitches Midwest today, after a bit of trauma trying to print the ticket, for the Market only. There was *so* much yarn. Something that I noticed, when talking to my friend Deirdre, was that if you are not on the internet as it relates to yarn, then all that yarn is really new and different, and the only time to get it is at the show. From my point of view, a lot of it was yarn that I had seen on-line, or read posts about, and had just never seen in person. And some of it, like the Koigu, is freakishly difficult to get from any source. But in general, the Stitches Market was a shopping experience, not really a buying experience. Its nice to touch the yarn, and there are some that I would definitely like to keep in mind, and now I know that there are some I have no interest in, but overall, I know where to get what I want/need. I'm kicking myself that I didn't buy more sock yarn, but I'm getting to the reason for that shortly.

I really want to knit socks. I've made two pairs of real adult socks, and many pairs of cute little baby booties. The problem with socks though, is that they need a tight gauge (7-10 stitches/inch) to be any good as socks. I want a firm fabric, with neat, tiny little stitches. And I don't want to use a 0000 steel needle to do it. In my previous experience, no matter what size needle I use, my stitches are always huge. As I said today,

I'm so loose, my mother is embarrassed by it.

I don't want to be a loose knitter. I'm don't usually mind it when I can be Elizabeth Zimmerman zen about how nice it is to be relaxed and calm and easy going with the knitting. But when I'm knitting a sock, I want firm tight, quick little stitches.

In a last ditch effort, I bought a 100g skein of sock yarn from Susan's Fiber Shop and a pair of Clover bamboo needles (my personal favorite) in both US1 and US2 sizes. When we were done shopping, D and I sat down on some chairs, pulled out our knitting, and I decided to try swatching for socks right there. I cast on 40 stitches over 2 of the US1 needles and then proceeded to knit a few rows using a fake-in-the-round swatching method. Drat, foiled by yarn again. My stitches were giant and baggy and loosely hanging off these pointy little toothpick needles.

I turned to D and asked her what I could be doing wrong, she's heard about my extraordinary looseness, but now she could see it in action. She watched how I knit and could find nothing wrong, so we decided to ask some passersby. A lady from the WCKG didn't have any ideas, but then another lady, from Champaign, IL, took one look at me knitting, looped the yarn around my pinky, and told me to try it.

That lady is a freakin' GENIUS. Suddenly, with no other change, no concentration on my tension, I was knitting, tiny, tight, cute little stitches. Its a bit awkward to learn how to keep the yarn over my pinky, but I think that with time, it will be natural. Now I just need to finish my other projects that are in loose-gauge land with the yarn only over my index finger before the over-the-pinky thing is too set in my habits.

Thank you, o lady who works in the yarn store in Champaign two days a week and on Saturdays (except for this one). You have changed my knitting for the better. My sock yarn need not languish any longer.

She made this!

My friend Lacey designed this shirt a long while ago. And I thought that I'd show it off for her. To all 3 people who look at this page. Leave a comment if you read the post (because I'm curious) and then go check out her website and flickr! pictures and all that.

"

Yep, they're Chicken!

If you click through to Flickr! you can see the comments and stuff. Blogger ate the titles and "uploaded by" bits, and I'm over it enough that I'm not trying to fix it now.


IKEA Pillow
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

A Blue Chicken from far away

Another chicken view
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

Getting closer to that Blue Chicken

Blue Bird close-up
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

And its a Blue Chicken! I caught it.

Not Chicken
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

Which one of these things doesn't belong?

The tofu! Its not-chicken!

Frozen Chicken
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

Frozen Chicken! Its pretty freakin' idiot proof. Open package, plop on grill, wait 9 minutes, eat. The most difficult part is cleaning the grill.

Thawed Chicken
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

Its down to 8 minutes-ish on the grill if you thaw the day before.

Tequila Chicken 1
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

Off the grill, into the bag and then the fridge, two more meals closer to completion.

Basil Chicken 02
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

Kao Pad Ka Praw aka Thai Basil Chicken leftovers, mixed with extra rice to tone down the spice that has been increasing for 4 days. yum! I love Thai Pastry.

Chicken Pincushion Front
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

Helllloooo chicken!

Chicken Pincushion Back
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

cluck! cluck!

Chicken Pincushion Side
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

Hello Chicken!

And that is my first attempt to play along with Show and Tell Thursdays. Now I'll go comment that "I'm up!"

she's a capital kay Knitter

she's a capital kay Knitter
Originally uploaded by tdgirl.

This is Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, who is Awesome! (say it in Patrick's voice) signing my books in a teensy-tiny little yarn store on the Southwest side of the city, in the Beverly neighborhood.

I had a great time with Jennifer and Erin. They were super to hang out with. We bought Tricoteuses Sans Frontieres/Knitters Without Borders pins, Erin gave me a chicken and we talked about ghosts in old homes. It was super fun, and there was yarn! too.

This is the first entry I've posted using Flickr! And I just figured out how to use Flickr! Notes on the photos, so clicky-clicky! I heart the exclamation points today, and no one reads this thing anyway.

Coming soon, a chicken!

Yarn, how I love thee

Most anyone who has been around me for about, oh, 23 seconds knows that I love yarn. At 3pm today I received an email from Loopy Yarns' newletter list, with two announcements. They are having a party next Friday night. Yarn parties are good. I went to one last night at Arcadia Knitting. But the second part was even better. There were having a sale. A buck-a-ball sale. Yes, you read that correctly.

Yarn, from a real yarn store, for ONE DOLLAR.

One, measly, American dollar. That is two cans of soda from the machine at work, but with yarn, which is way better than soda. They did mention that when they had some yarn for a dollar on Sunday it flew out of there, so we should get there soon. So I did. (I am good at following directions like that. I like yarn.)

I got there by 5pm, and one of my friends from the Knitting Guild, Nancy, was working there today. She could see the gleam in my eyes, hooked me up with a basket, and pointed me to the sale yarn. Well, I saw a few piles on the back table, and thought that's all there was. Oh, was I wrong. The owner, Vicky, showed me that there was a whole bookcase and a spinning rack full of yarn that was, yes, I'll say it again

ONE DOLLAR... for yarn...

I was in heaven, and shock, and air-conditioning, all at once. So what did I get?

Two full, big bags of yarn (I usually only buy less than one small bag when I go to a yarn shop), containing:

Elsebeth Lavold Chunky AL in the color Still Water, a lovely blue that calls out to be something for me. (11 balls) This is an alpaca-wool blend, 50g balls with 82 yards per ball

Elsebeth Lavold Chunky AL in the color Poppy, a bright orange, that I intend to send to a friend in Indiana who loves the color orange. (7 balls)

Linbel Tourage in the color 101, a multi-color blue, that will be sent to a friend in Texas. This is a cotton-linen-viscose blend. (7 balls)

Cleckheaton Gusto 10 in a nice blue, for charity knitting. This is a wool-mohair-acrylic blend and its super-duper-huge-chunky. (3 balls)

Cleckheaton Gusto 10 in a natural-cream-white color, also for charity knitting. (3 balls)

Its wonderful. My yarn cravings might have been satiated for a while. (but if you were thinking of sending yarn, you should anyway)

oh, and at the bottom of my receipt, it says, "Today you saved $198.77". I saved way more than 4 times what I spent on yarn. To paraphrase the Yarn Harlot, a knitter will not pass up on yarn she believes the store to be losing money on. And Nancy still wrapped up all my treasures in the tissue paper and into pretty red bags, even though they lost a bundle on my purchase. I like the products that Arcadia stocks better, but Loopy always feels like a deal.

P.S. There was still yarn on the shelf when I left, and in the rack that spins (filled with Cascade Sierra). They are closed on Wednesdays, so get thee to the yarn store on Thursday, but call first and see if there is anything left. Its yarn, people. For $1! That's better than any price on yarn anywhere.

Arcadia Knitting Online

Arcadia Knitting: Meet the Bloggers
Monday, July 31, 7:00 pm
Arcadia Knitting and Chicagoland's knit bloggers invite you to get face to face with the people you read in cyber space. Match faces to the stories of knitting, ripping and the rush of making it happen. Included are Corinne Neissner of LuckyPennyHandmade.com, Franklin Habit of The Panopticon and Lynette, Gail & Dee of The Island of Misfit Patterns and many more Chicagoland bloggers. Get a sneak peek of new yarns for this fall. Snacks and prizes too!

Something to think about

"A precious human life: Every day, think as you wake up today, today I am fortunate to have woken up, I am alive, I have a precious human life, I am not going to waste it, I am going to use all my energies to develop myself, to expand my heart out to others, to achieve enlightenment for the benefit of all beings, I am going to have kind thoughts toward others, I am not going to get angry, or think badly about others, I am going to benefit others as much as I can."

His Holiness Dalai-Lama

What I'm making

I found a new designer today whose work I like. Her name is Miriam Felton, she designed the Icarus shawl in the current (Summer 2006) issue of Interweave Knits and she has some free patterns available here. I bought some Lorna's Laces Fisherman yarn in the Irving Park colorway for my OSSP exchange, from my favorite yarn store in Michigan, to knit into a bag of some sort for the August finished object mailing. I've been looking for just the right bag pattern that would call for a total of no-more-than 500 yards of worsted weight yarn, and still be practical enough for a high school English teacher and Mom, and be interesting for me to knit. I am going to make the Retro Wedge Felted Bag (.pdf). It involves short rows (woohoo!), and I'll learn two new things, the provisional cast-on and the welt.

There is the yarn on the swift, waiting to be wound into a ball. It looks so pretty, so full of possibilities.

And here it is fresh off the ballwinder, even closer to its future baginess.
And a cool little graphic-y doodad of a photo:

Whoa that was slow...

I have a very conscientious One Skein Secret Pal, who sends the packages the first week of the month in which they are supposed to arrive, as opposed to me who tends to send them in the third week. This time, however, she sent it with a postmark of July 6, and I didn't receive it until yesterday, July 28th. It was not coming from Korea, or Iran or Denmark... this package was coming for New York state. I'm not sure where it went on its way here, but it must have gone via Alaska or something.

Here's what was in my package:That is the package laid out in my kitchen. She sent a lovely card and the envelope was a sturdy Tyvek one with a yarn-themed mailing label. There is also a pattern printed out in color from MagKnits and slipped into a sheet protector as an appetizer.

The main course:This is a skein of RY Classicyarns Cashsoft Aran in shade 004. The fiber content is 57% extrafine merino, 33% microfiber, 10% cashmere. It is a lovely light blue color with a bit of shine. There are 95 yards in the 50 gram ball.

Then, there was a tube of lip gloss that is supposed to freshen breath. I haven't tested whether it does that, but from the strong taste, I believe the claims. Here is a blurry picture:
Do you see that cute yarn and needles graphic on there? Yes, I think its darling and fun.

Thanks secret pal! I love getting packages, and I look forward to seeing what you come up with for a completed item in August.

Keep Smiling! =)

Yup, a dork

I finally found a picture of myself, courtesy of Anne, cropped out the other person and the bright lights in the mirror, and posted it as a userpic on LJ and Blogger. And now I've posted about it in both places. Maybe I'll even go and take care of MySpace too.

Next up... taking pictures of things and then posting them. I need to make better friends with my camera, maybe it'll happen someday.

First thing though, when I am done with the computer, will be a nap to get rid of this beer-headache. I don't know what I had at the Cubs game today (Bob dba Scott was buying), but I have a crappy-beer headache. Too much heat as well? eh, at least the home team won!

Mystery Love

The second weekend in June is Brandeis Used Book Sale time here in Chicago. This was the last year for it (until another charity decided to continue it in the future) because the ladies who ran it are getting old and dying. Most of the paperbacks are $2 each, and they have mountains of them. I have been meaning to try a few different authors, and got one each from a few. This week, I have read two mysteries by new-to-me, quite prolific mystery writers, and enjoyed them both.

The first, suggested by Deidre from Spinning Guild and Knitting Guild, was Dick Francis, who writes horse-racing stories. The second, who I think counts David as a fan, was Robert B. Parker who writes the Spenser novels. I am sorry that I only have the one from each to read because they were quite enjoyable, quick little things. Perhaps I should explore the Chicago Public Library beyond the knitting books and the meeting room.

I will write up more about these later, perhaps, but for now, I'm hungry and its time for some lunch and sugary caffeine.

Keep Smiling! =)

vacuum love

I need to get my camera up and working (i.e. buy some new rechargeable batteries for it, and charge them) so that I can show you one of the most amazing area rug upkeep things ever.

If you have an "oriental" area rug with the requisite fringe in your home, you know how messed up it gets, like a kindergartener's ponytail when she won't let her mom brush it. Ick. and so unsightly. But, when vacuuming said rug, stand on the wood floor side of the fringe and run the vacuum across the fringe, pulling back towards you. The fringe will get sucked up, and as you pull straight back, it will be laid out on the floor all nice and neat. You have to pick up the vacuum to put it back on the rug for the next section of fringe, but it looks so nice that its totally worth the 3 minutes it takes to not be down on the floor with a comb or something to smooth it all out.

Another cleaning lady secret from my childhood figured out. Vacuum the fringe. Go try it... your living room will look nicer for it.

A lazy meme

I haven't been posting much at all, but this one was taken from BabelBabe via a slew of folks. And I can do it during break. Enjoy


YOUR MOVIE STAR NAME
(grandfather/grandmother on your father's side, your favorite sweet/lolly):
Elva Dove Chocolate


YOUR FLY GIRL/GUY NAME
(first initial of first name followed by 'izzle', first two or three letters of your last name followed by 'dizzle'):
Kizzle Kedizzle


YOUR DETECTIVE NAME
(favorite color, favorite animal):
Blue Cat

YOUR STAR WARS NAME
(first 3 letters of your name- last 3 letters of mother's maiden name, first 3 letters of your pet's name repeated twice):
Katerr BaxBax


YOUR SUPERHERO NAME
('The', your favorite color, the automobile you drive):
The Blue Altima

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I have to write an Operation & Maintenance manual for a project at work, and some of the sections are downright silly. The "Theory of Operation" for scenery? It sits there, you look at it. Don't touch, its not your's, you are in a museum. Take that for your theory of operation.

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A lady that I spin and knit with recommended Dick Francis mysteries for some good brain candy reading. She was absolutely right. I got one at the Brandeis Used Book Sale to try it out, and I read it in about 3 evenings (not long sittings). It was very satisfying, quick, and I totally didn't figure it out before the protagonist.

Now its back to writing that manual.

Keep Smiling! =)

Favorite Summertime Recipes

I am not known for adventurous eating, or superb culinary skills, or even passable food prep kitchen capabilities, but I want to share two of my favorite recipes that I make quite willingly. These are written up as I make them, which cuts out as much food prep and grocery shopping savvy as possible, while still making it better for you than McDonalds. The frugal, kitchen-smart and gourmet-types can make it more complicated if you wish

First up is a fantastic salad-as-main-course that was originally inspired by a SuperTarget ad on the radio.

Katy's Yummy Target Salad for Dinner

Materials:

• Bag of lettuce*, 1/4 to 1/2 of a bag per person, I usually use 1/3 for myself as a meal
  
• grape tomatos** I use 8 per person
  
• mozzerella cheese, cut into bite-size chunks*** use lots if it is the only protein or about the same amount as you have chicken
  
• Italian dressing, I like Kraft Light done Right Zesty Italian
• Chicken, preferably rotisserie from the store, or breast cooked at home****, cut up or pulled off the carcass into bite size pieces, one breast per person
  

Tools:

• knife
• cutting board
• large bowl or plate
• smaller bowls if you are making this for more than one person
• George Foreman grill, if you are cooking the chicken yourself

Tasks:

1. Cook chicken, if you need to do this step, get it started, then prep everything else and your chicken will be done
2. Open bag of lettuce, check for freshness and fill tossing bowl or cover plate
   
3. Rinse tomatos, cut up if you like them smaller
4. Put tomatos in with the lettuce
5. Cut up cheese, put on top of the tomatos and lettuce
6. Cut up chicken, if you cooked it yourself, or pull the meat off the bone if it is a rotisserie chicken.
7. Put chicken on top of cheese, tomatos and lettuce.
8. Add salad dressing to taste.
9. Toss if you feel the need. Be warned that everything is heavier than lettuce, so I find it preferable to make this salad up directly on the serving plate (fairly spread out) and skip the tossing. I have tossed this salad, and it works, but all the good stuff falls to the bottom.
10. Eat!
    

*I like romaine-heavy mixes, preferably bought when they are buy-1-get-one-free at the store (which also means you have to eat a lot of salad quickly, since they don't put the freshest bags on sale)
**any tomatos will do, if you cut them up into bite size pieces. I discovered the yummy, bite-sized grape tomato on the original ad recipe, and I prefer them to all other tomatos I've tried in salads. If you cut them in half, they go farther and take up less fork space.
***original recipe calls for the mini balls of cheese, cut into half or quarters. I find that 8 oz balls of "fresh" mozz that are packed tight in thick plastic (so no cheese juice to spill) also bought b1g1free taste good, are less expensive and taste just as good
****I just got a George Foreman grill, and you guessed it, individually wrapped, frozen, prewashed, boneless, skinless chicken breasts are buy-1-get-1-free in gigantic boxes that will last me the rest of the summer.

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Its not the 4th of July without Lemonade Ice Cream Pie. My mom will only make it once a year, and she says that it is because we wouldn't appreciate it as much if she made it all the time. She might be right, but I appreciate her chocolate chip cookies, chicken with pasta, banana goop and scrambled eggs, and she makes those all more than once a year. (thank goodness!) Due to that whole growing up, being an adult thing, I have spent very few 4th's with my Mom, so I've learned to make my own pie. This recipe is written to fill two store-bought pie crusts, as that's how I have to make it. WIC must only pay for full-size cans of lemonade concentrate or something because I have yet to see a city grocery store that carries the small cans, which is what is called for in the original recipe. Last year, I tried to make one pie by using half of the can of concentrate, but that is tough (not to mention sticky) to measure, and it is easier to just make two pies. The single pie was not lemon-y enough, so I made two pies later on in the summer, to demonstrate to my roommate how it was supposed to taste.

Mom's Lemonade Ice Cream Pie

Materials:

• 2 graham cracker pie crusts (you could make your own, but that is not something that I'm inclined to do in the summer, and then you need to turn on the oven. On a hot day? I don't think so)
• 16 oz Cool Whip (Lite or Regular, it doesn't matter. A regular size container is 8 oz)
• 1 box (half gallon) vanilla ice cream
• 12 oz frozen Minute Maid lemonade concentrate (don't get the store brand. trust me on this one. All your flavor comes from the lemonade, so don't cheap out here)

Tools:

• Freezer
• Counter (for thawing and mixing)
• Rubber spatula (versus a metal spatula aka pancake turner if you are a home ec teacher) (don't use the spoon-spatula combos that they make in nice blue silicone these days. You want one that is flat and has a good combination of flexibility and strength. The spoons have too much scoop and not enough spread)
• electric mixer
• Your biggest mixing bowl. This gets sticky and has a lot of volume. Too big is not possible.
• Large spoon
  

Tasks:

1. Thaw the ice cream until it is soft. Thaw it some more. If you get impatient, and try to mix everything together when it isn't soft, you'll burn out your mixer. Ask my mom how I know this.
2. Put the Cool Whip in the fridge while the ice cream is thawing. Then put it on the counter.
3. Thaw the lemonade on the counter while you get everything else ready.
4. Find all the mixer parts, assemble them and clear off some counter space near the outlet.
5. Unwrap the pie crust, being sure to save the liner that becomes a lid.
6. Scoop out about half the ice cream and half the Cool Whip into the mixing bowl. Mix these together with the electric mixer.
7. Add the lemonade concentrate and the rest of the ice cream and Cool Whip. Mix everything together. Taste the filling. Isn't it divine?
8. Resist eating the filling plain.
9. Fill both pie crusts evenly, smooth the top with the spatula
10. Using the liners as lids, cover the pies and put them in the freezer for a few hours.
11. Lick all the bowls, beaters, spoons and spatulas. Enjoy the filling. Resist eating the very soft pie now.
12. When the pies are frozen, cut into pieces and eat!

Enjoy this tangy sweet summer treat! I intended to eat both of these things today, as a meal, but I realized that I don't have a mixer and I'm short a package of Cool Whip. So my pie will have to wait until later this week.

Happy Independence Day!

Knitting content

But first... where oh where is my roommate? I miss her...

I visited a new-to-me yarn shop this afternoon, Loopy Yarns in the South Loop area. In Chicago, my yarn store of choice is usually Arcadia Knitting owned by the Kelly Sisters, but Loopy is having a sale, and Judy Chan hangs out there on Friday nights, so I wanted to check it out.

I intended to get down to their location at 719 S. State Street via the CTA Red Line (get off at the Harrison stop), but could not find my CTA card anywhere in my apartment (I checked bags, pockets, shelves, drawers... nowhere was there a CTA card), so I decided to drive. Yes, I was that motivated to visit a yarn store. I really wanted to find something different-to-at-least-me for my One Skein Secret Pal, so I drove, totally forgetting that the Taste of Chicago was going on. I got myself a bit tangled up looking for a parking spot, discovered that there is a Target on Clark Street and eventually just parked in an automated $5 for 6 hours after 3pm ramp that was in the same block at the yarn store.

The shop was located between a "Got Pizza" and an Ace Hardware store, just like the website said. The front windows had yarn and projects on display and when I walked in, there was a table with some women sitting and knitting. I was given a moment to take the shop in before I was warmly greeted by a woman who worked there. She explained how the sale worked and then let me be to look around. In the back of the store was another employee (or the owner?) teaching a woman how to knit. I think that she was re-learning after a long hiatus.

Later on, while I was wandering aimlessly, the first woman asked if I needed help, and I told her that I was looking for something for my One Skein Secret Pal. I got her a skein of sock yarn (Mountian Colors Bearfoot from Coldwater in Excelsior) last time, and I wanted to go for something a bit thicker, but still with decent yardage, this time around. (oh, and it had to be unique... I'm not just going to send off a skein of Cascade 220) The saleswoman showed me a section of the yarn cubbies that fit the bill quite well. One of the yarns that was on sale had too much bumpy texture for me to want to send it, another wasn't very soft (apparently, it sells well on the east coast, but not as well in Chicago/the Midwest) and finally, the one I chose was a thick-and-thin, multi-color merino wood. It is very soft and came in a 200gram/215 yard hank. This skein of yarn could make a hat, a short or skinny scarf or be felted into a bag without any additions, and most importantly, it will look exciting and enticing in the package.

I looked at the needles and notions and got a 40" cord for my Denise set which should make Magic Loop easier (and thus hats), but the rest of the notions were uninspiring. The straight and double pointed needles were all stored in a card catalog-type cabinet, which is unusual, and definitely saves on the display space, but means that I have no idea what the carry in that area, since I didn't look in the drawers. The woman in front of me in line bought a pair of Pyrex needles, so there must be something interesting in those drawers.

The yarn selection was well displayed in "wooden" cubes (probably laminate on particleboard), which is a nice step up from the oh-so-popular wire mesh cubes (which have their advantages) and definitely more to my liking than the on-a-shelf methodology of Arcadia. There were some items in baskets, and the Manos de Uraguay was hung on hooks at the back wall of the display area. It was definitely not the yarn that I am used to seeing in the LYS (local yarn store)... there was a lot of acrylic content. Suss yarns, which looks very fancy and is priced as such, had a shocking amount of acrylic. There was Cascade 220 Superwash (a rarity) but no other Cascade yarns that I noticed. There was a fair bit of Norwegian yarn, both superwash and not, but no Dale of Norway that I noticed. There is some "Smart" yarn that is a superwash wool and is on sale. They seemed to be well-stocked with the Lorna's Laces, but it was not all displayed together, so I didn't realize it at first. There was a line of lace weight (or maybe even cobweb) yarns that were put up in wonderful centerpull balls. I tried to memorize the website on the label to take a look at the company further, but I forgot it by the time I got home, and it isn't listed on the shop's website. Overall, I never quite figured out the logic of the organization, but I'm sure that it was there.

I hear that the Friday night knitting is lots of fun at Loopy and that the girls there go out to the bar afterwards (much like the Toronto knitters), and the sale is going on through the end of the month, so I expect that I'll be back, if I can find my CTA card. The people were nice, they have yarn and the pattern selection (in binders and books) looked to be extensive. Oh, and they wrapped each of my purchases up in light blue tissue paper and then tucked them into lovely red shopping bags. That is almost better than getting something wrapped at Borders or Barnes & Noble for free, even when it is just for me.

Keep Smiling! =) I'm going back to my knitting

Its that time of year

I held out all through June, managing to get out of town for the two worst weekends, but today, on July 1, around 4pm, I gave in and installed an air conditioner. Last year, we had the a/c set up in the first or second week of June, and ran it through September. This summer in Chicago has been having major ups and downs in temperature, but its just so hot and muggy today that I did it. All by myself.

The curtain is up between the dining room and the hallway, and the cooling unit is chugging away. Last summer the a/c raised our electric bill by about $10 or less per person, and we had a unit in both bedrooms and in the living room. So far, I haven't put in the one in my room, but that is mostly because it is too messy to get to the window or deal with the cords.

I will be trying to post more often, I think of things all the time that would be neat to write up, but then I forget, or just don't get to it.

Stay cool!

Thanks pal!

My One Skein Secret Pal (OSSP) sent my June package and I received it yesterday! She sent me a skein (well, a center pull ball) of JaggerSpun Zephyr Silk/wool in the color Lilac. There was also a packet of Boye cabone rings, which I think are meant to be used as stitch markers. My pal said that she thought the yarn would be good for the tank from One Skein. Hmm... at first I was thinking about how I'd need to get another ball to do the whole thing, and there is that issue of getting two balls from the same dyelot, but now that I think about it, I could just get another ball and make a two-tone tank. I wonder if any of my local yarn shops carry this stuff, I'd like to see the colors together before I knit up a garment.

*****************************************************
Edited to Add:Here is a picture of my skein:I think that it is pretty, so I am particularly interested in finding someone who sells the Zephyr in the 2oz balls so that I can make the tank top and not end up with a GIANT cone of yarn in a color I will have then already used.
**************************************

Thanks again pal! I need to get the package out to my pal this week. I went shopping in Minnesota when I was home over Memorial Day weekend.

And I'm only going across the hall

My roommate is/has moved in with her boyfriend now, officially. They live in the apartment above me, and my new roommate will start bringing stuff over tomorrow night, after work. I am just moving into Anne's old room, because it is a bit bigger, has a west (aka morning) facing window and a better door-closet-radiator arrangement. Here are some ellipses:

My apartment is freakishly empty in large swaths... its gross to use a cobweb duster for the first time in an apartment with lots of mouldings... why don't the built-in drawers have any drawer glide hardware??? I definitely didn't take up a full half of this apartment, do you think that will change?... why do they individually wrap the silverware that I got at Target??? that bin wasn't full of kitchen stuff, I wonder where my pots and pans are... Healthy Choice meals are inferior to Lean Cuisine, even if HC comes with desserts... I'm pretty sure that I don't want these votive holders, but we'll see... I had no idea my living room was so, well, spacious... how do you attach things (like a bookcase from IKEA) to 100yo plaster walls?... maybe I should have packed my room, I don't know where to start... there sure are a lot of dust bunnies... why is the outlet in the closet?... I need a filing system, and "piles all over the place" don't count... where is that towel rack??? sounds like I need to explore the storage space... does Joanne have a step ladder??? I haven't knit in a few days, maybe that would take the edge off... the inferiority of the shower curtain rings I bought is shocking... the fridge is not self-filling, bummer

I've gotten really used to my roommate having the television on pretty much all the time. Its weird to be alone down here, totally by myself, which is reinforced by the lack of television. The internet still works, since the router just moved upstairs. Do they have wireless routers that amplify an existing wifi signal? It seems like they should. I'd buy one. The silence is deafening and the solitude is crushing, I think that I'll listen to my mother and go to bed.

Keep Smiling! =)

One Skein Secret Pal

I have signed up for the secret pal exchange based on the One Skein book, so I need to post my answers to the questions. Last summer I did Secret Pal 5 and it was lots of fun. I signed up for this exchange because it takes a lot of the "did I send enough?" "is it the right kind of stuff to send?" uncertainty out of it. A skein and a letter in June, a skein and a letter in July, a finished product (made from one skein) with a letter in August. Seems pretty simple.

And now, onto the questions: I realize that all of these aren't answered. 14 questions is a lot of question answering. But I'll keep coming back to this post until its complete.

1. Which yarn is most like your personality (you can be specific or general with your answer- brand, type, color, fiber, whatever)?



2. What is your favorite color yarn to knit with?

Definitely yarns on the red-purple-blue end of the spectrum.


3. Have you ever used variegated, or magic, yarns?

Yes, and I love them. Koigu, Lorna's Laces, self-striping sock yarn, I am easily entertained by changing yarn colors.

4. Do you tend to favor certain fibers when choosing yarns?

I tend towards some amount of wool content, and I find softness to be an important attribute (i.e. alpaca and angora). Surprisingly, I don't think that I've ever used yarn with silk in it.

5. Do you prefer to work with center-pull or traditionally wound balls of yarn?

Center-pull all the way baby. I have a swift from Dragonfly Turnings and a standard blue ballwinder and a nostepinne. I have no interest in traditionally wound balls of yarn.

6. Have you ever worked with organic yarns or are you interested in trying them?

I swatched the organic cotton from elann, but in general, I have very little interest in organic yarn. I like supporting small businesses, cottage industries and the like, but organiz seems unnecessary to be a good yarn, so I don't really look for it.

7. How many and what projects have you made in the last year?



8. Will you be knitting any gifts this year?

absolutely. I love knitting gifts, and people keep having babies, so I keep making the baby booties from Last Minute Knitted Gifts using Lorna's Laces Angel yarn. Other than that, its mostly Xmas gifts for my mom, dad and sister, thought I always have ideas for gifts that I don't get to.

9. What is your favorite one skein project?

From the book? Well, I've made the petal bib and I'm working on the bath mat, but what I really want to make in the future are the tank top, cabled footies and well, I like pretty much everything in the book. Other kinds of projects with one skein of yarn? Well, hats and mittens and socks are all fun to make, and if the skein is big enough, just about anything could be made with just one

10. How much yarn do you have in your stash and how do you store it?

It isn't polite to ask a lady her age, so why ask a knitter about her stash? Well, actually, I don't know how much yarn I have, but I am switching rooms in the next few weeks, so I will do a bit of stash-inventory then. I store it in baskety-bins on a shelf and ziplock bags and plastic shoebox size boxes and on those wire "crate"-type snap together shelves. Pretty much wherever it won't get in the way.

11. Do you have a yarn in your stash that you love so much you can never use it or part with it?

That would be a NO. Yarn is for knitting. Even if it won't be knit for a long time. Its a processing and reconciliation backlog. My imagination is a faster knitter than I am.

12. Do you knit less or differently in the summer?

Not currently. I try to have a balance between physical and mental stimulation. When I was in school (primarily brain work) I would knit lots, and then in the summer I would be actually working, so I would read more. I didn't need the physical stimulation before. Now, I work as a project manager, in an office, so I have more of a drive to knit year-round. And in the summer, I can knit on the porch, which is nice. Rambling enough for you?

13. Do you belong to any knitting groups (online or offline)?

I am a member of the Windy City Knitting Guild, knit with friends in the evenings (shoutout to Lacey and Anne) and I read Livejournal Knitting regularly (though I don't post)

If you happen to be in Michigan...

Go check out Nicole Broughton's design at the Boarshead Theater's play, "If the Shoe Fits". It is their educational play, which apparently means that everyone at the theater takes on a new role. It features the interns in the cast, the managing director as the playwright, the PM/TD as designer and the SM as the director.

Bonus for the audience: There is a talkback with the actors after every single performance.

The review is linked in the title of this post.

Congrats Nicole!

Backstage Knitting

I'm not exactly sure who Christine Levin is, but apparently she is a folk singer, who has a song called Cold Pizza for Breakfast, has a knitting circle backstage before all her shows, and she is coming to Chicago on September 25. I might have to listen to her music, because the idea of combining music and knitting is wonderful. Mostly, I am blogging this so that I remember about it later. Thanks Mason-Dixon Knitting for tipping me off.

Knitters Please Print Me For Show Day

P.S. I'll add all the appropriate links later

request

does anyone have any pictures of me? I don't have user pics for blogger, livejournal or myspace and its pretty much because I don't have any pictures of myself. If you have something, even if its outdated, please leave a comment. thanks!

He's got fans

I was hanging out with my future roommate, Joanne, this evening with her friend Mike. J and M both like to go see musicals, and M lived in NYC for a while and is really into noting *who* is in them, something that totally eludes me even when I know the people (i.e. school plays).

We had discussed that I went to drama school, and worked for a commercial scene shop, and so yes, I know people who are in musicals and plays. Well, M is a big fan of Telly Leung and wanted to know all about him. I was really unhelpful there, as the most vivid memory I have of him is a certain friend who had a crush of sorts on him. and that he was a good dancer. Anyone out there have anything more exciting to share?

**************blatantly stolen device******************

I am wearing a pedometer and trying to work my way up to walking 10,000 steps per day. This week's goal is to break 7000 steps/day on average. I keep track on a pad of paper in my room, near where the cell phones are charged. Today I took the train to work, and then walked the rest of the way to the shop, and then walked around with J to Thai Pastry and then over to Sweet Occasions for ice cream in Andersonville. So far, I have walked 10,778 steps, a personal one-day record.

************this is me ripping off BabelBabe*********

I think that I am going to sign up for Cheetah Gym tomorrow. They have a special that ends tomorrow. I think that I would like going to the gym, and J goes for classes on the weekends and Lacey goes for regular workouts and Anne and Dan are members now, so it seems like I'll have enough motivation around me to stick with it. Besides, I don't want to be the fat cow of my friends. That would be no fun at all.

Just like I used to do on the Diaryland page,

Keep Smiling! =)

Oregon Trail

This is not a post about playing childhood computer games at Anne's birthday party.

Its about all the freaky diseases that seem to still exist. I started discussing this with my sister because of the Mumps outbreak in the Midwest, starting in Iowa and seeming to mostly be hitting college kids. Hitting college kids makes sense since they all live together and none of them have ever had the Mumps since they've been vaccinating all the kiddos for the last 30 years. And if a disease starts with college kids, starting in Iowa makes sense considering how many colleges they have. If I had to think of a non-agricultural image of Iowa, it would be cute little liberal arts colleges.

My sister knows someone who got Whooping Cough, and her roommate has had Scarlet Fever TWICE. Have you had, or do you know someone who has had, any of the following diseases? I'm just morbidly curious about these old school diseases that really, truly should not be an issue anymore.

• Polio
• diphtheria
• Cholera
• Rubella (German Measles)
• measles

Note: the spellchecker didn't even *know* the word mumps. That's how much of a non-issue it generally is.

10,000 what?

Does anyone do the 10,000 steps thing? Or use a pedometer? Its springtime, so my thoughts are turning to weight loss. And wondering how much walking I do because my boss doesn't want to get things himself. Unfortunately, pedometers (aka step counters) come in way more than 31 flavors and I'm not sure where to start. There are websites giving reviews of them, but its all just kind of gibberish and I'm looking for the opinion of a real person.

Google Romance

Google Romance: "When you do a Soulmate Search, your deeply personal and potentially life-altering search results are produced solely by computer algorithm, without human intervention of any kind.

Note: depending on your personality, you may or may not find this reassuring."

I, personally, find this reassuring, which is why I have used OkCupid, though it hasn't worked out super-well in the romance department. The only human intervention that I want is friends, no weird people at dating companies.

But it makes such fun fire!

Iran Says It Won't Use Oil As a Weapon: "Iran Says It Won't Use Oil As a Weapon"

Now, I went to read the article and was disappointed but not surprised that they were talking about an *economic* weapon. But my first thought was something more along the lines of promising not to make oil balls and throwing them into the campfire. I have no idea exactly how it would work, but somehow I was imagining a cross between a Pre-Hispanic ball game I saw in Mexico and paintball. The ball game had 3 players per team, a goalie +2 and they had field hockey sticks. The ball was actually a flaming coconut that was rolled down the sloped side wall of the ball game arena, and when it broke apart or stopped being firey, a new one was put into play.

Now put that into a slightly larger scale, coconut sized balls of oil/fire being blasted out of some sort of big gun thing. And promising not to do that (which seems like an inherently bad idea) makes me laugh.

Its Roommate Season!

go here on Craigslist. To see my ad. That is also the link to forward to anyone you know who is looking for a roommate in Chicago.

For those who don't feel like clicking, here's the text below:

2BR 1Bath, original built in cabinets (with mirrors and glass door cabinets), front balcony, easy parking, amazingly beautiful hardwood floors, bay window, plenty of storage space, close to the Red Line. Available, officially, for June 1, 2006-April 30, 2007 move-in possible starting mid-May.

My roommate is moving in with her boyfriend, so I need a new roommate--there is no way I want to leave this apartment. It is so great to live here that my current roommate is just moving to the upstairs apartment. I am an easy-going 24yo female, and have been living in Chicago for more than a year now. I like to knit, read, spin yarn, listen to Chicago Public Radio, go to the Foster Avenue Beach in the summer (its just so convenient!), and travel.

I hope that you are someone nice who has lived with other people before, pay the rent and utilities on-time and want a friend, not just someone who happens to also live in the apartment.

There is lots more that I would like to tell you about this awesome apartment, so you should send me an email if you are interested. Tell me a little bit about yourself and we'll set up a time to meet and show you the apartment.

Blogthings - What Year Were You Born Under?

Blogthings - What Year Were You Born Under?: "

You Were Actually Born Under:

You are totally loyal, faithful, and honest. However, you don't trust others to be as ethical as you are! Straight forward and direct, you really aren't one for small talk. You are a great listener - and an agreeable companion when you're in a good mood! You are most compatible with a Tiger or Horse.

You Should Have Been Born Under:

No worries, you're not really pig-like in your personality. (Though you have been known to have a healthy appetite!) You are highly intelligent - forever studying and gaining knowledge. You have a heart of gold and you are appreciated by many. You are most compatible with a Rabbit or Goat.

What Year Were You Born "

For all you scenery nerds...

How many nails are in a flat?

Post your response in the comments.... I'll post what I believe to be the correct answer tomorrow.

Happy Ayyam-i-Ha! Yesterday my Baha'i study group (Ruhi Book 1) visited the House of Worship in Wilmette in the morning. Then, in the afternoon, my friend Lacey had an Ayyam-i-Ha yarn exchange party. It was lots of fun. We had a much-too-cooperative yarn exchange (which happens when you put Baha'is and their friends together in a game that is supposed to have stealing from others) with 19 lots of yarn to swap and trade amongst 9 people.

I put in a skein of handspun and rainbow (Kool-Aid) dyed yarn and a lot of two skeins of handspun-by-me and handdyed-by-Lacey celery colored yarn. I went home with two skeins of shetland yarn, one red (called Laquer) and one brown (called Moss, I think), a skein of thin novelty-ish yarn that is red and brown and pretty and a ball of Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Aran in a deep brown color.

My birthday is coming up in about a month, and I think that it is not-so-cool to throw myself a birthday party, but at the same time, I think that it would be lots of fun to have a party with a yarn exchange component. I would like to do it with two swaps, one would be for everyone to bring one lot of 1-3 skeins of good yarns that they would like to get or give as a real gift, and the other would be a white elephant yarn exchange, when you bring your acrylics, fun fur and other abominations of yarn purchases. Can you tell that I'm a bit of a yarn snob?

Break's over. Back to work.

Keep Smiling! =)

I passed 8th Grade Math

You Passed 8th Grade Math

Congratulations, you got 10/10 correct!

Could You Pass 8th Grade Math?

Thanks to Peg for pointing me there.

Yay!

The Steelers are going to the Super Bowl!

I know that I'm late on the blogging front for this, but it just occurred to me to show my happiness in a form other than saying, in my living room, to my roommate and her boyfriend (who are both Broncos fans), "Yay! The Steelers are going to the Super Bowl!"

My little sister goes to school at the University of Denver, so she watched the game and cheered for the Broncos, because, in her words, "I don't want to die." She did promise to cheer for the Steelers as well, even if it was to herself. I appreciated that.

I would have enjoyed a Bears v. Steelers Super Bowl, but this way I have no conflict in my cheering. Steelers all the way, baby!

Yay! The Steelers are going to the Super Bowl!

Good Night.

Valerie Rae Light

I found her again! Thank you to the anonymous commenter who left her email address. That is the one that I tried about a year ago with no response, but I figured that since it was a fresh tip, I'd try again.

Now, I need to finish the never-ending Robots Carts so that I can leave work for the weekend and go to the yarn store with my fantastic roommate, but I wanted Val to always have something pop up when she Googles her own name.

Something I'm looking into

My friend Lacey who knits and knew Anne first is a Baha'i. I am fascinated by other religions so I am looking into it. I think that I like the Episcopalians enough to not switch, though I'm not much for religious practice anyway. (note that I don't exactly attend church regularly)

I give my mother credit for my religious curiousity. When I was in the depths of insanity that is preteen puberty I was very angry about going to church/Sunday School. My mom thought that it was important to be reminded that there is a god and that you need to be a good person. In elementary school she told me that I could be Jewish if I wanted, but I had to go to Sunday school and Hebrew school and services, or I could go to church and sunday school with her. From my point of view, 2 hours on Sunday morning was more than enough religion in a week, so I stuck with her, since I couldn't find a lower-commitment religion anyway.

When we moved to Minnesota, Eckankar's Temple of ECK was right there in Chanhassen, and if you want a weird religion, that's it. I'm not super familiar with it, but the ECKs that I've met are definitely a little different.

My father is from Salt Lake City, Utah, but as far as I know, he is not and was not raised in the Mormon Church. But he doesn't talk about it. Which makes me curious about Mormons, especially because Mormon Fundamentalists are nutty and sometimes violent.

Which brings me to my curiousity about the Baha'i faith. I will be asking Lacey lots more questions, and reading, but I think in the end I won't switch because it is a non-ritualistic religion. I like pomp and circumstance and stained glass and ritualized cannibalism and fancy vestments. What can I say, I was raised in a fairly High Church Episcopal congregation.

Do you have any further reading reccommendations? Your own story of religious curiosity or nuttiness? Leave comments.

Spinning Yarn - Knitting - Meditation - New York Times

I may be a blog slacker, but look at this cool article about spinning yarn.
Spinning Yarn - Knitting - Meditation - New York Times

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I'm not just a blog slacker, but I'm also a knitting and spinning slacker. I finished Andrea's Mom's yarn, its a pretty green color with lots of depth from the color blending. That's about all I've finished though.
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I'm going to go to bed and try to sleep off the exhaustion.

Christmas Cards

I get almost all of my graphics at work from Eugene at Colorimage. He is nearby, does good work, tolerates my complicated projects with a smile, delivers proofs right away and is speedy when I need him to be.

Today, I got my first business Christmas card ever today, from Eugene. It was an exciting work world first. Definitely cooler than the Thank You card I got from the lubricant company, though that was funnier. Its nice to work with nice people. That's all.

Thanks!

Andrea has given me one of these, or maybe she meant all of the ones on the page, for nonspecific winter holiday.

In response, my friend Charlie gave me these. I love this game.

Thanks Babelbabe!

BB posted her Virtual Christmas Gifts to the blogosphere friends today.

She got me this swift and ball winder. I'm in love with it as a gift, even without ever getting a real one. I promised to explain how it all works in a thank you comment that isn't appearing just yet.

A swift is an item that holds your yarn skein while you wind it into a ball. The kind that BB got me is an umbrella swift that clamps to a table. There are other kinds of swifts, as well as ways to hold your yarn during ball winding. A frequent pseudo-swift is another person's arms (preferably someone who will get so sick of it that they buy you a swift) or a chair back.

The umbrella swift looks like a broken umbrella because it has a very similar mechanism that is essentially infinitely adjustable with in range of circumferences, depending on how far up you push the center. The skein is untwisted so that it is one big loop, and then put onto the swift around the Xes. The skein is then expanded so that the skein is held taut. The swift is a wonderful invention not only when considering how tired a human pseudo-swift's arms can become, but also because it spins.

The broken umbrella part of the swift is attached to a center post, around which it rotates. Good swifts have a bearing of some sort in there. This is an important part of being a swift because otherwise the person winding the ball must walk around and around the tightly held loop.

The center post goes into some sort of base. Most swifts clamp to a table or countertop, others have a weightier base that lets it sit wherever there is a surface.

Dragonfly Turnings makes some really super, simple, no-clamp swifts. You can check them out here. If I ever get a swift, instead of using my feet, I will probably get one of theirs. It is simple, attractive and I don't really have a dedicated work table to clamp it onto. I also think that it is more likely that I will get around to getting a swift long before I find a man willing to hold my yarn.

On to the ball winder. The one shown is a very standard issue, plastic ball winder. You hook the yarn onto the center core and turn the handle. The core moves in a strange pattern that creates a cylindrical, center-pull yarn ball. They are neat to have, but I hear that they wear out over time and sometimes can't handle the fussier yarns.

My preference, due to their relative cheapness and portability, is a nostepinde. It is pretty much a thick, tapered stick. Before my aunt bought me one for Christmas (but I got to take it home after Thanksgiving), I used the wisk handle and then one of the center posts for my niddy noddy (the one to make it one yard). I find that the balls made are very good both for knitting from and plying (instead of an Andean plying bracelet).

I hope that this all helps with the "what the heck is that?" reaction to seeing a swift. Post any questions in the comments and I'll edit the post.

How to Fluff

a Christmas tree. This is intended to be a primer for those who are unfamiliar with the concept of fluffing an artificial tree. Apparently, there are many people out there who don't know how to do it.

1. Make sure that all of the branches are in their slots on the center post. There should be no big gaping spaces. This is a sign of missing or twisted branches.
   
2. Untangle and straighten branches as needed.
3. Start at the top row of branches on the tree. Each branch is made up of many tips.
4. Grasp the branch close to the center post, and lift the tips off of the branch's core wire. This is essentially un-braiding.
   
5. Working from center out, lift all of the tips off of the branch. They should form a radial sort of pattern, coming off in all directions. This should be quick moving and result in the branch taking up as much volume as possible on the tree.
6. Repeat steps 3 and 4 for all branches on the tree. You should move quickly and touch every tip on the tree, not just the ones at the end of the branch.
   
7. Step back from the tree and see if there are any major problems. This is the time to fuss with the tree, not when it is still crushed from storage.
8. Decorate and light tree as desired.

Congratulations! Your artificial tree has been fluffed. There really should be a video that can be shown to low-wage, unskilled labor to save supervisors from repeatedly explaining how to do it.

Its been a really long time

since I posted a blog entry. I have so much fun reading everyone else's blogs, I don't know why I'm such a slacker with my own. It does go in cycles, but so much has been going on in the last month or so, I don't know why I'm not keeping the world up-to-date.

Quick facts, in no particular order:

1. I have too many people with conflicting interests who could be considered my boss.
2. The spinning is going very well.
3. I have a mountain of wool in my apartment, waiting to be spun. Probably more than a whole sheep.
4. The new Knitty is up, and full of cool patterns.
5. I have very little patience for people who can't imagine things being different from how they are presented.
6. CMU got a CNC router. Check out David's blog for some entries. I love CNC routers, they have totally changed the way that designers and production folks look at scenery construction.
7. Nicole, who needs to take up blogging, is coming to Chicago this weekend. I'm very excited, even if she has decided that Mike&Jackie are who she wants to stay with. *tear*
8. It is really really really cold here right now. But it is a bit warmer by the lake, which I appreciate greatly. And the weekend is supposed to be back up into the high twenties, thirties and maybe even the forties.
9. Things officially ended with the most recent boy on Friday. It has been dwindling for quite a while.
10. I think that I would be well-suited to a fun-loving accountant who cooks. Does anyone know any single, 23-31 year-old, male accountants who cook? I'm a nice girl.
11. I think that I might start going to church. I did a Christmas Basket through the local Episcopal Church and Cathedral Shelter Chicago. When I dropped it off, the woman who runs it was really nice. Young, single and friendly. She was very welcoming and encouraged me to try out the 11am service, which even I should be able to get to on time, if I make an effort.
12. I don't have any idea what I'm going to wear to the Winter Wonder Fest preview party gala thing on Thursday night. Which is in two (2) days. Eeek.
13. I read Under the Banner of Heaven over Thanksgiving weekend and into last week. It was really good, and made me curious about my father's family and childhood and why he dislikes Mormons/Mormonism with such passion. I wonder why I've always thought of Mormonism as just another sect of Christianity, when really its a whole other branch of the monotheistic Judeo-Christian-Muslim religion, the most recent prophet, if you can accept that it isn't just a crackpot religion. Ok, time to move on, this isn't a quick statement.
14. My roommate and her boyfriend are getting on very well. I hope that she doesn't move out at the end of this lease though. Maybe at the end of his lease they could move in together.
15. You can buy a 36" whisk at the restaurant supply store. I want a whole kitchen full of oversized utensils. Its not like I cook anyway.

Does anyone know where Valerie Light is or what she's up to? I miss her. She was one of my best friends in college and somehow I lost her.

Yarn Quiz

You are 100% wool hand-dyed MERINO.
You like all things natural and would prefer to do
it yourself. You are socially conscious and
aware of your surroundings. You are kind to all
living things.


What kind of yarn are you really??
brought to you by Quizilla

200th Post!

I am setting up my etsy shop, which may someday be used solely to direct people to items that I may list in Jen's shop, but for now is my one and only internet selling presence (with no items to sell). To make it complete, I am looking to hire/barter/trade with someone to design a logo and then produce the graphics for a banner and an avatar.

The avatar needs to be 75 x 75 pixels in size.

The banner needs to be 536 pixels wide x 77 pixels tall.

Did I ever mention before that I have no graphic design skills?

Last night, I started to spin up the cream alpaca that I bought at the Windy City Spinning Guild in November. It was prepared as true roving, with all the fibers parallel for a worsted spinning technique. This stuff has the longest staple length, it must be 7+ inches, and its incredibly, unbelievably smooth and soft. I tried to spin up a medium-fine single to ply. The bag of roving is really heavy for its size, like a good cantalope.

Does mail really not get delivered on Veteran's Day? I was hoping for my locker hooking kit to arrive from Marr Haven today, and it didn't. If I'm lucky, tomorrow will be the day.

Yay Post Number 200! I will try to update more regularly now, so that it doesn't take another year to reach #300.

Last Call

I'm putting in my fiber order in the morning. I would love to have reason to buy some more of the multi-color merino, the best photos of which are at the Texas Fiber site that I linked to above. Leave a comment if you are interested. Tonight I was spinning and I went faster than the ounce/hour estimations that I made before. After spinning merino for so many nights, the Corriedale that I tried out tonight was very short stapled. The alpaca though... man-o-man was that stuff silky and smooth, like butter. And such long, long, long fibers. Incredible stuff.

Well, its getting cold in here, time for sleeping.

A firm offer

Ok, oh few readers, I have a proposition for you. I want to set up Bee-Ewe-Tee-Full Creations as an etsy shop to sell off the yarn addiction as I spin it up. I'm thinking of running all transactions through there, though they also take a percentage. =( But if I ever get business-serious about this, it will give me a web presence. However, I am not a designer. At all. And my graphic design application skills are rudimentary at best.

If someone speaks up by Friday morning, I will spin up a pound of any Ashland Bay wool into yarn in exchange for logo/shop design work. If you think that your skills, talent and time are worth more than that, I am open to negotiation. Send me the same information I asked for here.

Are you a pretty-picture-designer who knits and has a friend who is a kick-ass web designer who crochets? I'm open to teams as well. A pound per person seems fair, but payout will take longer, since it will be more to spin. I seem to be averaging an ounce an hour of singles and then another hour for plying. It definitely goes faster if I sit down to do it for a longer while, and if Anne is on the TiVo duty. So 2 pounds per month seems like it might be a reasonable pace to get the commissions/trades completed. The well-prepared roving spins like a dream on the wheel.

Let me know in the comments or email or AIM if you want to play, otherwise I'm buying my $200 of wholesale fiber as whatever I want, with no consideration for what someone else might want.

To David: I have not gone off the deep end, but I am addicted.

yarn!

I just got my first handspun yarn comission! Thanks Andrea, and Andrea's mom for being a knitter who of course always needs yarn. I will be spinning up a pound of merino in the multi-color of English Garden. It should be very pretty. Now all I need to do is figure out the rest of my fiber order by Friday. Anyone else need a very special gift for the very special knitter/crocheter/weaver/yarn-petter in their life?

Jen has posted about her cool finds from the Trunk Show on Saturday. My yarn is the third picture down. I love making yarn, I can't believe that I didn't know how to do this just six weeks ago.

New Craft Alert: To deal with the very soft, but filled with little bits of vegetable matter, wool (Finn-Merino cross) that came with my wheel, I am thinking about learning to do locker hooking and making a rug. The trouble is, that then I will be adding yet another craft to my to-do list. Does anyone remember way back when I wanted to try cross-stitch? Yeah, I haven't touched that shit in ages. All of my crafts are pretty much focused on fiber arts. I like them the best because they tend to involve the least amount of water. I really dislike having wet and/or sticky hands. Painting, dyeing, wet felting, most paper crafts and a lot of glass-type stuff all involve water-based clean-up and/or glue at the very least. ick.

I went to see Wallace & Gromit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit tonight. It was very amusing, totally worth the $5 ticket that included a free small popcorn and parking at the theater. Discount Tuesday at AMC City North is a great deal, I should go more often. Has anyone seen Chicken Little? The previews make it look very funny and well-done, but I'm a little unsure about a Disney movie.

It is way past my bedtime. Over and out.

Fiber Overload

Over in the land of LiveJournal, there is a community called Spinning Fiber. It is full of very nice people. One of them is making an initial order to a fiber wholesaler (click the title link) that makes freaking amazing fibers. I'm quite certain that they are the source of some of the best stuff I have used (not like the yucky vegetable matter (vm) filled stuff I have in the bag o' sheep) that was purchased from stores. The only trouble now is deciding if I have $200 to spend on fiber. Its quite an investment in a stash, but I'm also spinning the stuff up pretty fast. The trouble is that in a range of $9-20/pound, on average, of the wools that I would purchase, that is 10-20 pounds of wool to ship to Chicago and also to find a place to store and to spin up.

I think that if I didn't already have the bag-o-sheep, I would be more easily swayed towards all this new wool. Maybe I should just save my money and buy a set of wool combs, then I could prep the bag of Finn-Merino cross wool and spin it. Or I could use that stuff to play around with woolen spinning and buy $200 of fiber and just try my darndest to find a place to put it all in the crammed-with-crafting-supplies apartment. If I got rid of the yarn that I have, there might be room, but I have plans for that yarn. Gah! I am addicted.

Maybe I could use this as an opportunity for extended experiments with different types of wool. There are lots of different types, Merino, Colonial, English, Blue-Faced Leicester, Jacob, Shetland, Corriedale, Wensleydale, and then all the different colors and blends and regular versus superwash. Don't forget about alpaca and angora and all the different kinds of silk. I'm in heaven, but my bank account is groaning loudly at the idea of all this excess.

We definitely need a yahoo-group for the Windy City Spinning Guild, so that I could ask the other spinners if they would be interested without waiting until December's meeting. I'm sure that some of the people there would be game for wool purchasing, co-op style.

This entry is rambling, but I'm just not sure what to do. If anyone reading this is interested in buying even just a few pounds of wool, let me know in the comments. Or, if you want to buy the wool and have me spin it in to yarn for you, that could be arranged as well.

To bed with me.

Katy needs

Top 10 results from putting in my name with the word "needs" after it. Most recently seen at Jennifer's blog, Piddleloop.

1. Katy needs to get home, and get home soon
2. Katy needs will be taken care of
3. Katy needs every ounce of her courage
4. Katy needs fish money
5. Katy needs dental assistant with dental experience
6. Katy needs to know
7. Katy needs to know that her outlook could negatively affect the...
8. Katy needs checkups less frequently
9. Katy needs to be part of the overall planning
10. Katy needs to eat some sweets

This was strangely repetitive (I counted the top 10 unique answers to the search) and seems to be adversely affected by the existence of the town Katy, TX. Thinking of Texas though, got me thinking of Ms. Valerie Light (whose complete name I have put in with the hope that someday she will Google her own name, find this blog and write to me with her current contact information!) and how much I miss her now that she is far, far away in the Republic of Texas.

Good thing that I like yellow and blue

You Should Learn Swedish

Fantastisk! You're laid back about learning a language - and about life in general.Peaceful, beautiful Sweden is ideal for you... And you won't even have to speak perfect Swedish to get around!

href="What Language Should You Learn?