Month: February 2012

holiday cheer · Knitting · random

Totally Random Leap Day

Jen1 Comment

1. This morning I woke from a dream where I was frantically trying to knit a sharktopus for a boy in a wheelchair who desperately wanted one, but no matter how many stitches I knitted, I was never any closer to finishing it.

2. I have a cardiac stress test today. I’m a little stressed that I have to drive over to the testing place in the snow. I wonder if that will affect my test? Also, I did not know we were supposed to have a snow storm today and so did not get to do any PANIC shopping. Even though we have plenty of food in the house, I am stressed about it. I would call to reschedule my test, but I’ve already rescheduled it once and I just want to get it over with.

3. I’ve been working on some orange socks to use up the last of the 2nd hank of STR from Catkin.

4. Speaking of which, check out the nifty thingamabob my husband got for us to use on our iPhones:

Essentially, it’s a rubber band with a phone-sized lens in the middle. You put it around your iPhone, line up the lens with your camera and it makes it so you can take cool macro photos with your iPhone! Check it out:

4. Hubs and I finally got through all of Downton Abbey. OMG YOU GUYS HAVE YOU SEEN THIS SHOW? I know, I’m a little late to the party. If you are even later to the party than I was, you can check out the whole first season on Netflix streaming. PBS has some (but not all) second season episodes available as well. I’m not sure how long they will be legally available online, though, so you better clear your schedule and make plans to not sleep for a couple of days to get through them all. Or become a pirate. I suppose that’s an option as well. Arr!

5. Leap Day 2008: Finished Object Friday

Knitting · Meh.

Just Stuff

Jen3 Comments

I’m always really bummed when I realize that it’s been more than a week since I made a blog post because I know it means I haven’t been up to much. This month has been pretty shitty like that actually and I can’t even say there has been much knitting. I’ve been laid up with asthma since the end of January which has pretty much sucked. There’ve been so many doctor’s visits (once a week, at least) and 2 ER trips and, quite frankly, I am just so over it. I just want to breathe again, you know?

I did finally get around to blocking my sister’s shawl, which is something I suppose.

[ravelry]

Isn’t it pretty? Can you believe I was actually considering skipping blocking it all together? I’m so glad I didn’t, because it really does look nicer with the lace all stretched out and open, even if that does mean you can see all the mistakes I made that much better. Apologies for the poor lighting, but I didn’t get around to taking nicer pictures of it because asthma.

So yep, the asthma saga continues, but I do have another appointment with my pulmonologist on Monday. Here’s hopin’.

food

Sunday Night Noms

Jen

2 perfect gluten and dairy free cupcakes. Brought to you by How Sweet It Is.

1 egg white

2 Tablespoons sugar

2 Tablespoons Grape Seed Oil

1 teaspoon vanilla

1/4 cup flour (I used Bob’s Red Mill GF mix)

1/4 heaping teaspoon of baking powder

pinch of salt

1 1/2 tablespoons milk (I used TJ’s coconut milk)

a nip (or two) of guar gum

Preheat oven to 350°. In a bowl, add egg white and sugar and whisk until combined. Add in vanilla and oil and stir until mixed. Add flour, baking powder and salt and stir until smooth. Stir in milk. Divide batter equally between 2 cupcake liners.

Bake at 350 for 15-20 minutes, or until cake is set (mine took exactly 19 minutes). Let cool completely, then frost as desired. I may have skipped part of this step and ate my cupcake while it was still warm. So good.

Knitting

Socks: A Story Of Not Getting Gauge

Jen2 Comments

[ravelry]

I’ve blown out the heels in 4 pairs of socks since the weather turned colder this season, and so I have been very determined to make myself some socks this year. Sadly, those feet in that picture are not mine. You see, I knitted up the toes of these socks and measured them for gauge, deciding at once that I would dig out my copy of “New Pathways for Sock Knitters” and make another pair of the Simple Coriolis socks. (The pair I made back in ’08 had been my favorites until the heels blew out.) I measured, I thought, carefully, and knitted away, faithfully following the charts which Cat provides in the book. When the socks were looking rather a bit large, I told myself that it was because Cat likes her socks to be roomy and comfortable and so didn’t build any negative ease into her calculations. I told myself that this was no big deal because, after all, the old pair fit me fine and I loved them. I knitted through the increases and made the heels and about a half an inch of the leg before I decided that they were looking “a little” long and that I should probably try them on.

They were a good 4 inches longer than my feet.

At first I couldn’t figure out what had gone wrong. I mean, I followed all the directions! But then a thought occurred to me and I took out my measuring tape. Sure enough, my gauge was off by half a stitch. HALF! But that half stitch meant the difference between my size and ginormo size.

I was disappointed, yes, but luckily socks are like hats: if they don’t fit me, they will fit someone somewhere. Even better, when I had my husband try them on, they fit him as though I had him in mind when I cast them on. Which was good, because I didn’t want to frog all of that knitting. And there was a lot of knitting. Did I tell you his feet are size 13?

holiday cheer

Say It With Meat

Jen2 Comments

20120214-191054.jpg

Happy Valentine’s Day!!

Adventures

The Big Announcement Post

Jen7 Comments

Last year the small software company for which Mr. Interrupted has worked for 13 years was purchased by a large corporate conglomerate. He survived 2 rounds of firings, thank god, and in November they closed the Connecticut office. He has worked from home pretty much all the time, so the closing didn’t affect him much, but when all was said and done, the new company announced that the kind of job he is doing from home (high-level software technical support) would be going away at some point in the future, but that there will be a job for him in the office near Ft. Lauderdale if he wanted to take it. Let that sink in. The job is moving to Florida and that means that we will be too.

I’ll be honest, I didn’t want to go at first. My Totally Awesome Sister is here in Connecticut, and besides, I really like it here. I like the cooler weather and the trees in the fall. I tolerate the winters thanks to all my woolies, and the summers are blessedly short. But, keeping the job is more important than living in a specific place and so we decided that when the time comes, we will go to Florida. And the more I think about it, the more the idea grows on me. Besides, luckily, thankfully, they have air conditioning down there.

Up until a couple of weeks ago, we didn’t know when the move would take place, assuming it would be sometime in the next few months, or maybe even next year. But then word came down that they want him there by June at the earliest, and definitely this summer. Did you hear that, y’all? We’re moving to Florida this summer, and we may be leaving as early as May!

So that’s the big news, big life-changes headed our way. I can’t believe it, and I can’t believe how much there is to do. I am excited and happy and sad and overwhelmed all at the same time. And part of me still can’t believe that this is actually going to happen. You should see how many to-do lists I have going right now. Now if we could just get my airways straightened out, I’d be all set.

Adventures · Knitting

i’m not dead yet

Jen2 Comments

So just a quick post to say that this has pretty much been a crappy week, asthma-wise. I am still alive, but there has been a visit to the ER and also the pulmonologist. I was feeling relatively better until today when my asthma flared up again while I was out shopping. I am hoping not to have to see the ER again. As a side note: PEOPLE, YOU’RE SHOPPING FOR SNACKS FOR THE SUPER BOWL, NOT FUCKING JUDGEMENT DAY. CALM YOUR SHIT DOWN.

Lastly, here is my sock in progress: