It's a Gemini thing...

I think it's a Gemini thing to have a million interests at one time. At least, that's what's normal to me. It seems like, once I feel like I've mastered (or semi-mastered) a hobby, craft or activity, it's time to move on to something else. I think that's why I loved school so much growing up. Every year, every month, every day was something new to learn. I don't think I'll ever go back to college to get my Master's degree (I've got a B.S. in Mathematics), but I love learning and I think of my life now as my own, personal college.

In life, I've not only had experience with being a daughter, friend, sister, girlfriend, wife, lover and mother, but also learned how to read, sew, crochet, knit, quilt, cross stitch, paint, cook, canning, making soaps, candles and dolls. I've taken up yoga, Reiki, reading tarot cards, bellydance and now, my favorite, hooping and hoopdancing. These are only a partial list of the interests in my life of learning so far. Is it because I can't sit still? (very possibly - you can ask my husband) Is it because I'm flighty and can't stick to anything? (possibly) Or is it because I just can't stop my love of learning and absorbing new information as much as possible? (that's MY answer - lol)

This year has been a challenge. I've had an incredible number of changes and events in the past year and I sometimes feel like I'm not quite caught up yet. In some people's eyes, these changes and events may seem trivial and unworthy of so much contemplation and time. But, to me, the accumulation of these things has been overwhelming - both good and bad. I've tried to organize these experiences in my mind and heart and, hopefully, at some point I can say that everything is in it's place - and can sigh in relief. In order to keep some perspective, I've made sure to write down all the things I'm grateful for each day and it truly makes a difference.

Having such a large number of hobbies and interests helps to calm my mind and dampen my feelings of being overwhelmed. For the most part, knitting is my activity of choice when it comes to calming my emotions and balancing any feeling of anxiety. It's amazing how two needles and yarn can be so relaxing!

The past few months, sewing has taken over - more as an obsession than a relaxation. I find that, as soon as I get my sewing machine out, I'm frantically tracing, cutting, looking over patterns and dimensions and then, exhausted, sitting at the sewing machine to crank out my project. Of course, sewing is so much fun and very rewarding - I love creating practical items for myself, my home and my family. But, man, is it frantic! It's go-go-go the whole time. Whereas with knitting, I can sit there, knit one stitch as slowly as I feel like, daydreaming about whatever I want and the knitting still happens and I'm still calm. of course, sometimes there are outbreaks of craziness - like yarn that breaks, splits, knots, pukes up the middle or a pattern that is just SO wrong that you feel like strangling the designer (that sometimes includes myself!). But, on the whole, knitting is wonderful.

I'm happy that I've gotten my knitting mojo back in time for the end of spring/beginning of summer. That time, of course, is known (to me at least) as the Summer of Lace Knitting.

In New Hampshire, it doesn't get overly warm but, to us, it's damn hot. When it's humid outside and the temps are in the high 80s, I don't feel like touching the fiber on my spinning wheel, doing any exercise (unless fully air conditioned) or cooking on my stove. The last two are inevitable, but the first I can substitute with some nice, lightweight, super fine yarn and an interesting lace pattern.

Here are some of the lace projects that I've finished so far this spring/summer:

1. Pleidades Shawl



-Knit using Mad Color's (formerly Sereknity Yarn and Fiber) Perfect yarn in Purple People Eater colorway

2. Weekend Shawl



-Knit using Swoon Fiber's sock yarn in Pinkish Red/Maroon colorway and Cascade Heritage sock yarn in brown colorway.

3. Echo Flower Shawl



-Knit using Jaggerspun Zephyr merino/silk in white colorway

and, the shawl I'm working on now is this,

4. Spring Things Shawl



-Knit using Karabella Lace Mohair in a neon green colorway

(All of my projects are also on Ravelry with more detail and more photos. Click HERE for my Ravelry notebook page.)

Along with knitting lace, I'm finding a lot of joy in hooping and hoopdancing. As I've mentioned before, I'm taking a teacher training course with Hoopnotica in September - in the meantime, I'm teaching free hoopdance classes in my neighborhood for experience. So far, they're going amazingly well and I'm having a lot of fun. (I hope my students are, too!) I'm still working on shoulder hooping, leg hooping and angled hooping. I look forward to my 30+ minutes each day that I practice ; )



If you're ever in the southern NH area, I'd love to see you at a class. The free classes are ending at the end of August, so take advantage while you can! If you'd like more information about Hoop Glow hoopdance and my classes, click on these links.

Thank you for still being loyal to my blog and for listening to my babble. It's so nice to know that you're still out there...

*HUG* :D

A Loaf of Bread, a Robot and a Crazy Lady

What do all of these have in common? Very little. Nothing in fact. Except that I was involved in all three.

Here is a pic of my successful (finally!) attempt at making homemade bread:



I used the simple bread recipe from the fabulous book, "Home Cooking: A Writer in the Kitchen" by Laurie Colwin. You can get it here. It's not only recipes, but great, short stories on cooking and being in the kitchen. I loved it and want to buy her second book as well. My first attempt at making this bread was a dud owing to the fact that I am "yeast ignorant". I had no idea that you had to add the yeast to very warm (100 degrees or so) water with a tiny bit of sugar and wait 10 minutes before adding to the bread. Last time, there was no rising, but this time, I happily had the opportunity to punch down the dough....Ben liked putting his hand prints in it, too!

Jackie gave me the tip for the water, sugar and waiting. Boy, did it work! Thanks, J!

Not only did the bread come out wonderfully, smell good and taste yummy, but it has such a golden look and crunch to the crust. I changed Laurie's recipe slightly...

-added 3 cups white unbleached bread flour and 3/4 cup whole wheat flour (instead of half and half)
-used 3/4 cup of organic, lowfat milk and 3/4 cup of water/yeast
-let the bread cook for a bit less time at 450 degrees.....22 minutes instead of 30. (I think my stove cooks quickly)

YUMMY!

Now, onto the Robot! I used the Wee Wonderfuls Second Put Together book, "SpaceBoy and Robot" again to make, what Ben calls, DADDY ROBOT!!!

Here he is with Roger....who you can find out more about here:



Again, this Robot was all hand sewn and the fabric picked out by Ben himself. I now have a request for another Robot to be made for Tim. I really love making toys.

I had more fun making Daddy Robot, although I think Roger is cuter. The Robot has less pieces to cut out and sew and, now that I know how to flip the legs and arms around, I didn't make any of the mistakes I'd made last time. I enjoyed making the front panel on the Robot with all his "buttons and knobs"...sounds kinda kinky, doesn't it?....and this panel makes the Robot sparkly and very special. I'm addicted to making these dolls. I want to make the others now, too....I have two more of the Wee Wonderfuls books and also the MakeAlong Dolls, which I'll probably make next. Those are for ME!!

A pic of my little sweetheart, just off the potty (Good job, Benji!) and still quite sleepy...holding his new doll:



Finally, we have the story about the crazy lady at B&N. Huh. Where do I begin? I can barely get over the shock of it. The whole episode happened so fast, so no one had time to take a picture of her, but here is what she may have looked like as a baby:



We were all at B&N knitting at our usual table in the cafe.....talking, laughing, being loud, etc. And, just as Lora was bringing another small table to our group and Amanda was coming back to the table with a cupcake, this late 30ish lady with dark hair (and her mouth full of cupcake...pieces spewing as she talked) came up to our table screaming at us.....

(this is just what I remember...)

"What the f*uck are YOU laughing at??? [looking at Amanda, then Mike] F*ck you! Do you think it's funny, you f*ggot? F*ck you! F*ggot!"

So GiGi says very politely and calmly, "Excuse me, but have we offended you somehow?" and the lady screams at her, "Why don't you shove your hook up your *ss!" And then again, as she is walking away, keeps screaming, "F*ck you! F*ck you!"

We were all looking at each other like, "What the HELL was that????" and saying to each other, "Do you KNOW her?"

After 10 minutes of shock and bewilderment (poor Blogless Amanda missed the whole thing by only a minute or two), we finally came to the conclusion that it was some crazy lady who had mental problems (SERIOUS mental problems) and didn't realize what she was doing or saying. At least, that can be the only explanation. At least she brought some new stuff to talk about the entire night. But, I was a bit spooked...we kept saying, "If only Laurin or Ericka were here!!!!

I guess knitting really IS a dangerous hobby. Who knew??

ROGER

Introducing Roger, the Spaceboy!



DETAILS:

*Created in 6 hours....Friday evening at 6 pm to Saturday morning at 1 am.
*Uses the Spaceboy pattern from Book 2 of Hillary Lang's SpaceBoy and Robot pattern book from her website/blog, Wee Wonderfuls
*Completely hand stitched (no machine...I am SO uncoordinated when using a sewing machine!)
*Fabric picked out entirely by my little guy, Ben...(on our trip to JoAnn Fabrics with Jackie and Lora and their kids...FUN!)

The Good

*After using Lora's tip of substituting freezer paper for tracing paper for cutting out the pattern pieces (BRILLIANT!), things were very quick. LOVE this tip!
*The fabrics were so cute and fun to work with and the instructions pretty clear and easy to understand.
*LOVED, LOVED, LOVED the outcome....I almost want a Spaceboy for myself!

The Bad

*For those of us who aren't experienced with sewing (aka dunces or dummies), I was confused by one thing. I came to the part where I was tracing and cutting out the feet and hands for the spaceboy. There was one shape for the foot and said to cut out 4. So, naturally, I cut out 4 pieces of this shape. When I went to sew the feet and hands on, I noticed that Roger had two left (or right) hands and feet.

Uh, oh.

I realized (after I'd sewn the foot on wrong), that I was supposed to cut two feet (and hands) out in one direction and then flip the fabric over and cut out two more of each in the OTHER direction.

It made sense afterwards, but I wish the pattern instructions had been a little more detailed here for people with sewing "disabilities".

The Adorable

*Here is Ben feeding Roger some fries....



*Here he is with my sister, Kim...and Roger's still very popular....



I totally recommend buying Hillary's pattern and also making the Robot toy, which is in the book as well. This was the cutest and most enjoyable sewn toy I've ever made....this is not counting Kimberly's Mr. SockFish Bag...that was AWESOME! On to make both Ben (and Tim!) a Robot toy....well, and also work on my Myrtle Leaf Shawl...whew!

'Night! : )

P.S. Did I mention that I'm also making Roger his own handstitched, 9 block quilt and pillow? Eh-hem....I think I'm a bit obsessed....maybe.