hand eye crafts

When I took the dogs out this morning, this was waiting on the sidewalk: My very most favorite thing about Spring.  Maple seed helicopters.  That one little pod made me really happy.

Following the lead of my twinster  and knitting a Color Affection shawl.  I'm always late to the game on stuff like this Hot-Pattern-of-the-Moment.  But elann.com  is selling yarn packs for Color Affection, and I thought I'd dive in.  I went with Night Flower , if you're interested. Heading off to Stitches South tomorrow.  Can't leave until after 4, which will most likely put me 1) in Atlanta 5 o'clock traffic and 2) driving into some strong thunderstorms.  But once I'm there, I'm there, and Friday, Saturday and Sunday stretch out before me. It's possible I won't spend that much time at the actual Stitches events.  I couldn't sign up for any classes --- too expensive.  So the only place for me to go, really, is the marketplace.  Not that I'm complaining. Hopefully, these few days away will help me mentally.  My therapist called my trip to Folly Beach last year (last YEAR?) "as good as ElectroShock."  I am in desperate...

. . .is starting with a pulverizing headache. . . .is the week of Stitches South in Atlanta.  I'm going --- are any of you?  Is there anything any of you need me to pick up for you while I'm there? . . .while at Stitches, I may need to buy yarn in "my" color: . . .has me taking one new medicine and new dosages of two of my "regulars."  My doctor is seriously considering ElectroConvulsive Therapy.  I'm just stuck.  And still can't give you a good reason for me to go on. . . .will hopefully have Riley getting her feeding tube removed.  She is eating a good bit on her own.

When I was in middle school, high school and college, I was a fervent writer of poetry.  In high school, my best friend and I would compile our poems into compilations "books" and exchange them with one another.  She, being an excellent artist, illustrated a lot of her pages.  Mine were can't-draw-anything-but-a-balloon bare.  Those were some of the best days of my life --- the two of us encouraging each other, sharing these words that we wouldn't let anyone else see. As I said, I wrote all through college --- even making The National Poetry Review  at one point.  But somewhere along the way, I just sort of stopped writing. Last week, my therapist gave me a copy of The Artist's Way  by Julia Cameron to leaf through.  I had had a copy when I was going through my SARK /self-help book extravaganza after Dale died, but, like almost all those titles, I gave/threw it away. The book guides you through a 12-week "path" to opening, or re-opening...

I don't make New Year's Resolutions.  I've never had a life Plan, Five-Year or otherwise.  My life has always just sort of happened.  Not entirely, of course --- I did set my cap and my jaw for a few things along the way.  But mostly, I've just dealt with each day as best I could. Still, I find myself looking back over this month as it ends and being proud of keeping some promises I made to myself.  I continued with the Alphabetical Authors run, knocking out "R," "S," "T," and beginning "U." And, I took myself out of town.  For the last couple of years, I've been aching to travel.  Big, airplane-y, meet people I only know online travel.  But, still unemployed, Travel has to be smaller, smarter.  One place a month.  The bed and breakfast I began with was ideal, and a wondrous start that made me want to keep going all year.  In fact, my February destination may already be chosen. But that's for another month. ...

I never, ever buy the yarn that a pattern I like is made in.  It's usually too expensive, and there is already so much yarn in this house, odds are there will be something  that can be used to make just as lovely a garment. Seldom, though, do I ever have precise matches.  The pattern I like calls for more yarn than what I have on hand. or the pattern calls for considerably less, which leads to the problem of leftovers and what to do with them. A couple of days ago, I found Perfection.  Pattern I love, yarn I'd just bought with exactly the amount needed for the project.  I foresaw a garment in a new color, easily knit and put together, and I cast on with a smile.  A fancy rib back, just a rectangle, and two sleeves that are variations on feather-and-fan.  Couldn't be simpler. I have started that freakin' back THREE times.  And have always messed up the stitch count.  So I decided to try a sleeve first.   Yeah. So ...

Finn scared me deeply Thursday by first vomiting and retching, then literally collapsing against one of the bathroom cabinets.  It was the first time I'd ever seen him anything but jumpy-happy, and it was unnerving.  I laid on the bed with him, gave him ice to lick, and, within a couple of hours, he was back to normal.  Still pretty tired, though: Pretty sure I put something about this organization on my facebook wall.  Well, the bracelets I ordered from them arrived: The top one says "Dropped + Made in Laos."  Hard to realize I'm wearing parts of bombs or guns or ammunition around my wrist. Spent a good part of this morning updating my etsy page.   I didn't make a single sale over the holidays, so it isn't like I had to re-stock or anything.  There were just some pictures hanging around that needed to be posted. On THE other economic issue, I am still unemployed.   I told myself I was going to jump back into the hunt with renewed ...

When my parents were alive, my mother cooked black-eyed pears, hog jowl and collard greens every  New Year's Day.  Daddy was extraordinarily superstitious, and wouldn't have it any other way.  No one in my family now eats hog jowls or collards, though my daughter does love black-eyed peas, so we  just throw caution to the culinary winds and eat what we want at the beginning of the year.  This year, it was stir-fry at Genghis Grill for the two of us.  My son went to Atlanta to pick his girlfriend up at the airport;  she's been in Australia the last three weeks. Also, whatever you do on New Year's Day is supposed to be the template for what you are going to do the rest of the year.  If that's so, I'm going to drive in cold rain a lot, shop at Barnes & Noble, eat stir-fry often and cast on new knitting projects. You?

Wow --- a week later.  There was a time when I could/would post every other day.  Are blogs going out of style?  Is it tumblr or nothing these days? Not that I've had any earth-shattering news to report.  When you are clinically depressed and chronically unemployed, days pretty much run together as blurs of nothing getting done. We did buy our Christmas tree.  A beautiful, big, fat one.  But I haven't drug myself up the stairs to pull the decorations out of Hannah's closet.  Must get the lights on it tomorrow, though.  Simply must .

I like jigsaw puzzles.  Except when my life is one, and pieces seem to have been blown off the table after I was just getting going good on putting the damn thing together. Looking for the pieces would take energy and focus, and maybe even a hint of concern. It was beginning to look like a nice picture --- one with radiance and warmth and hope and even a little happiness.  But now the pieces are all over.  Everywhere.  Some may be gone for good.  Do I try, as best I can, to search out those wandering pieces, and put the puzzle together, saying the holes in it "give it 'character'?"  Or do I start an all-together different puzzle, fresh out of the box? Or do I abandon puzzles.

We are so very close to the Final Four!  In fact, we should have them in place by tomorrow.  You can spend part, if not all, of your weekend, deciding whom should wear the Knitters' Crown! Speaking of knitters --- as of right now, five people are still in the running for the Hunk grand prize, and four for the Chick prize.  You know who you are, because you know who you nominated.  I hope. As for yesterday, Emma Watson, Johnny Depp, Rachel McAdams and Benedict Cumberbatch all moved forward. And as for today, just to set everything up evenly: Pair Eighty-Five Pair Eighty-Six

Liam Neeson, Stephen Colbert and Alan Rickman won yesterday, and are, therefore, in the Quarterfinals.  The tie between Jeremy Irons and Tom Selleck was broken, and the victor there gets right back into the action today to fill out the Final Eight.   In other pairs: Pair Seventy-Seven Pair Seventy-Eight Pair Seventy-Nine Pair Eighty

Hello and How Are You?  Still trying to whittle the men's field down to sixteen.  Friday, Johnny Depp, Nathan Fillion and Robert Downey, Jr. moved there, as did Benedict Cumberbatch, who thrashed  reigning Hunk Sam Neill.  Thank you, Sam, for a first-rate year;  I'm sure we'll run into you again another time. Now --- whom do we have today? Pair Fifty-Four Pair Fifty-Five Pair Fifty-Six Pair Fifty-Seven

ROUND TWO Congratulations to the 16 women and 32 men, as well as their nominators, who have made it into the second go-round of the tournament. Sorry to say that Marin, Twinnie and Rashie have all been knocked out of the prize race, but thank every one of you for SO many things other than participating in this contest.  (You know what you've done.) Are you ready? No.  Really.  Are you ready?  Because if not, we can just stop the whole. . . OKAY, OKAY! Pair Forty-Six Pair Forty-Seven  Pair Forty-Eight Pair Forty-Nine

(ETA: I have no idea whatsoever why these links are popping up in my text.  I've tried to get rid of them, to no avail.  Pay them no mind.) So, I've been running the Knitters' Hunk contest for five years. My children have expressed little to no interest in it ever, usually only bringing it up in conversation when they couldn't think of anything else to say. It was Briton's idea, heartily seconded by Hannah, to include women in the competition.  And, boy, have their attitudes changed.  Briton checks in every day on the results, and always has possible explanations for who did and who didn't win.  As we rode to Atlanta yesterday, Hannah kept coming up with more contest ideas.  She and Briton were talking about how they hate that the tournament is going to be over soon, and that they don't want to wait another year.  So, don't be shocked if I come here with some, um, original ideas for more tilts. It will take us three days for us to get throug...

Pair One Pair Two Pair Three

Every year, this is the point of the Knitters' contest that makes me a wee bit jittery.  The brackets are all filled ("WHOA" is all I'll allow myself to say about some of the match-ups that the Fedora of Fate came up with), I've got at least the first day's photos ready to go. . .  The only thing left is putting the actual poll on the blog and opening it up.  However, significant  problems with polls in the past have stayed with me.  And this year, we're going to have to go with a weird split-screen-y-type thing. But I want it to start!  I want you to see who everyone else nominated, and I like watching people get all psyched about it.  This year, you've responded very, very nicely to Knitters' Chick, so I'm interested to see how that goes. And I'm starting to think about prize packages and maybe random fun giveaways, and what a tiebreaker could be if we need one. So, check back here either very late tonight or very early...

There are 8 seeds for the men, as there are so many more of them than the women.  Too, 4 were pre-set by virtue of having won KH before.  But just so you'll have a little tease, a few names to think about over the weekend, here are the seeds in full: 1.  Sam Neill 2.  Alan Rickman 3.  Johnny Depp 4.  Hugh Jackman 5.  Nathan Fillion 6.  Daniel Craig 7.  Ewan McGregor 8.  Liam Neeson How we doin' so far?

Whilst noodling around last night, trying to get the hang of creating the polls we need, and attempting to put pictures with those polls, I wiped out  yesterday's post.  Its three salient points were that the Knitters' Chick brackets are all done, voting starts  Monday, and the Top Four Chick seeds are Samantha Bee, Rashida Jones Meryl Streep and Sofia Vergara. I've been re-noodling this morning, and the  layout of the system is going to have to be different than in the past.  The photos of the    nominees will go here, and the places to  vote will be in the sidebar.           Done with the first half of the men's draw;                gotta get back to business!  Will tell you those seeds later today.