Saffinity: A world of odds and sods

Just sick!

I caught a tremendously bad cold last Tuesday and foolishly decided to still go into work on Wednesday (that’s what happens when I get paid hourly). So for the last week I’ve been pretty dead to the computer when not at work, and even when at work I’ve not felt like really doing anything more than staring at space.

My coworkers who have even a slight knowledge of who I am are already commenting “Wow… we know you’re really sick… you’re not talking”…. yeah…. I’m a bit of a chatterbox, but it’s ok, it means there’s always something interesting going on around me… if only I could turn all that chatting into typing… then this blog would be more fun.

I’ve not even really been knitting recently. Lynn, my fabulous knitting friend, lent me a long circular needle for a moebius shawl and unfortunately when I started it, I don’t think I cast on enough stitches (even though I’m pretty sure I cast on around 200) so now I’m going to have to rip it out… if I can figure out how to get it off the needle.

I’ve got my Granpa’s socks to do, I’m at the cuff of the first one… I’ve been so lazy with my knitting lately.

Hmm… let’s see… oh! My roommate happened to bring his eliptical up from his Mom’s house so I’ve been working on that a bit, and I was given a Balance/Swiss ball from a friend who doesn’t use it (Yay for tight abs coming up!!)

I have about 3.5 months to be bikini ready AGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!

Wish me luck!

So, one of my “want to”s of 2010 was to get fit… and over this weekend I’ve worked towards that. My eating hasn’t really changed, I’m naturally a pretty healthy eater, but I have been adding more exercize. I spent a good 1.5 hours on the WiiFit this weekend, not to mention my walking around and up and down stairs at work everyday (I never take the elevator if I can help it. Also, being the lunch float is awesome because I walk a good 5 km in intervals over the day).

Currently, my lower ribs ache (mainly because I was doing plank exercizes and crunches so my obliques kill) and my lower abdominals still feel like they’re on fire!!! But that’s a good thing. That means they’re working.

In knitting news I have a couple of stashbuster done. Two lovely fun fur scarves that were both snatched up by a couple of women at my church.

These are awesome, quick and actually quite fun to make! The red and black one took 1.5 balls of yarn out of my stash, and the orange one took 2. So yay!!

Yup, so beyond that I’m working on 3 pairs of socks… I have my wedding shawl to finish, and I have a moebius that I want done by Feb 13 which Lynn the wonderful lent me a needle for (Lynn you’re AWESOME!!!)

In other news, I’m still loving my new job, I’m working on my self esteem (because emotional eating is detrimental to me wearing a bikini) and… yeah I think that’s it.

Now the title says “not a cop out” because continuing with the health stuff, I’ve joined Sparkpeople which I am really enjoying. It’s a nutrition/exercize/health/accountablilty site that allows you to track what you eat, it gives you daily exercize programs (that you can switch exercizes out for if you don’t feel comfortable with what they give you (so take out push ups on an incline and just do modified pushups, which is much easier), and the best part is it’s completely free. I’m really excited about this site and it’s encouragement value (I also absolutely love Bodies in Motivation so much so that I think I’ll do a full post about it later in the week). Sparkpeople has a book out (that you have to pay for that part) and you can read a free chapter that they have up. However the best way I found to give you the link is through a computerized blog, and I didn’t want you guys to think I was copping out again by posting this. So if you want more info or whatever read on, and if not.. take care and I’ll catch you next time.

Oh and the talk about a contest below… don’t worry about that, I don’t think I have a chance in winning so I really don’t care about that. I just wanted to let people know about this.

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As you may know, I am an active member of the popular healthy-living website, SparkPeople.com.  In an effort to help SparkPeople live out their mission of helping millions of people reach their goals and live healthier lives, I have joined a contest they’re holding called “The Spark Free Chapter Challenge.”  If you have one minute to spare, I could use your help, because I REALLY want to win!

So here’s the deal with the challenge…

Chris Downie, SparkPeople’s CEO and founder, recently published a book called “The Spark” that offers a proven new approach to improving your health, transforming your life and reaching your goals (for example, real people have lost over 10 million pounds using their free online program)!

People like me who are helping them “Spread The Spark” through The Spark Free Chapter Challenge are encouraging our friends and family to download a FREE chapter of “The Spark” book.  And for every person I can encourage to download the chapter, I will get an additional chance to win a $500 weekend getaway and other prizes, as well as something they offer called “SparkPoints,” which also help motivate me to reach my goals.

All you have to do to help is download a free chapter from The Spark book. Nothing else.  To do so, simply go to http://book.sparkpeople.com/book.asp?u=saffity  and click the button to download your free chapter.

If you would be willing to help me with this, I would truly appreciate it, and I also think you will enjoy reading this free chapter from “The Spark”.  I know I did!

Thank you for your time.  I really appreciate it.

SAFFITY

Yes, I know… I’ve already ‘failed’ at getting 3 posts per week, but give me a break, last week was rough.

So to make up for it, this week will have a number of picture posts (it could have been one big picture dump but I’m dragging it out..).

Today I start off with the sweater I made for my Mother-in-law

This is the Counterpane sweater from Interweave knits.

The story behind this sweater is interesting. My Mother-in-law took knitting lessons from a friend for a while and enjoyed knitting to a point but never got really into it. She’s knit herself a stocking stitch sweater and loves it, but she decided she wanted a “cool” sweater.

So, she came to me with her bag of yarn, it was Bernat Chunky I believe (I’ll have to see if I can find a ball band) it’s a 50/50 wool/acrylic blend, and she asked me to make it into a Cool sweater. So I went upstairs and grabbed all my pattern books, magazines and such and we took an afternoon going through them. Every sweater that I pointed out as interesting, wasn’t right for her, she definitely did not want something knit in a traditional way, no basic texture stitches allowed for her Cool Sweater.

Then flipping through Interweave, she saw this one she said she really liked it but it wasn’t right, and passed it by. She kept going back to it over the afternoon and finally I asked her what wasn’t right about the pattern… turns out, she HATES turtlenecks and this sweater was designed as a turtleneck (which shows that while she’s knit, she doesn’t understand the concept of knitting). I explained that of all the alterations that would possibly be needed, that was the simplest. I just stop knitting when it’s long enough.

So I grabbed my needles and started going round and round on the front pane. This pattern is SO much fun. When I was getting close to full size I decided to double check my gauge and realized that it was OFF!!! Luckily I hadn’t gone too big yet so I didn’t need to rip out, I just needed to know where I had to stop… enter C, my math genius, and he helped me get it all straightened out. I caught it just in time, if I’d gone even 3 more rows, it would have had to be ripped.

It’s simple, but pretty…

Anyway, I was still worried that I had made the length too long but I was almost finished the back panel, so I just stitched the shoulders together and threw it over MIL like a tunic, I thought it still might be too long, but she liked it. Then it was the sleeves that started to give me issues because MIL is VERY particular about where her sleeves stop, so I measured her arms about 50 million times over the course of knitting the sleeves, and they worked out (luckily)

The neckline was easy peasy, all I had to do was pick up the stitches as told and stop where she wanted it.

So that worked out well.

MIL had to go buy a special shirt for this sweater because the lace is a wee bit revealing, but it worked out nicely. I just need to get a picture of her wearing it.

Really, I am ok, I know things sounded really really bad in the last post, but I do have a lot of support around me. Not only C, but also my church, and my friends (and my knitters!!!). It’s just when I get hit like I did on Sunday I need to vent and that’s just what I did.

Right now I’m trying to keep myself going by diving into work (which I love) and spending time with my friends. Sunday is going to be very rough… I am going to tell my Mom something I’ve been keeping from her for 2 years and it may destroy any relationship we could have (which is why I’ve kept it secret). I’m going to make a list of everything I still need help on with the wedding to let her know that I haven’t cut her out completely and give it to her (folded) before I tell her. After she’s heard, she can decide if she wants to help me still or have anything to do with me.

We’ll see what happens.

For tonight, I am going out to a knitting guild meeting and I’m fully intending on enjoying myself and laughing a lot and surrounding myself with the company of supportive wonderful people who are amazing friends.

I’m so glad that I don’t have to go this alone anymore.

So yesterday was… interesting.

I had a great morning! I was baptized in my church yesterday and it was an incredible experience. My friends and I went out to lunch afterwards and I was on an emotional high! That’s where I’ve been trying to stay all day today because after lunch, everything went bonkers.

See, Mom called me on Saturday wanting to have me come talk to her… I wasn’t available Saturday but said I could come over Sunday after church, which we did. The weird thing was, she said she needed to talk to both C and me, and she never really talks to C. Already I was worried and I told her that on the phone, to which she replied “Don’t be”.

When we got to her place, she sat C and me down at the table with my brother, my Mom and my Mom’s boyfriend on the other side. She had a lovely list on a pad of paper which she read from, and she proceeded to tell me all the ways that I have hurt and insulted her in the last little while. I listened and didn’t interrupt (though C had to stop me a couple of times from saying anything) and then I took her list and tried to go through it to address the areas that she was concerned about.

As I was trying to address them I was told that what I was saying was a bunch of lame excuses and that I was full of it (the last comment coming from my brother). So after two hours of this, I asked where we went from here, what was the plan for resolution, I was told there wasn’t one. They just wanted to get it all out on the table and let me know how they were feeling.

So, C and I asked when we could see them next and we’re going back there next Sunday after church. We’ve been told to process what we’ve been told and come back with anything we feel we need to say, which, if I let myself go, would be a LOT. However, (and I know I don’t talk about religion very much but I think this is very important as a part of me) I’m trying to keep my baptism in mind and to truly do things right. I said in my testimony that I wanted to step away from the pain and anger in my past and move forward as a baptized follower of Christ, and to do that, I can’t throw mud at my Mom… which is REALLY hard as that’s exactly what she did to me.

So going into this meeting on Sunday, I’m trying to bring solutions, not blame, not anger, but ways to move forward to fix our relationship and maybe have things happier in my family. It’s just very hard as one of the issues is my religion. I just know I need to be the bigger person and not have this spiral down into the muck heap where we’re just flinging blame and hurt at each other.

It’s just really hard to get to that point right now when I feel like I’ve been shredded up and spit out.

That’s why I decided to write this here… few enough people read it that I don’t have to worri about the whole Internet knowing my personal stuff.

With any luck things will get better, that’s what I’m praying for anyway.

ok, ok… so… this is not what I planned when I said one picture post per week, but I have an explanation!!

I was all set to give a lovely picture post with a few pics of new projects that I’ve done. I took the pics, took my camera up to the computer, plugged it in and….. nothing happened.

I wiggled the cords, blew on them, wiggled them some more.. changed ports, everything my little IT brain could think of and… nothing.

The USB cord or the port on the camera was not reading.. there was no communication between camera and computer…

So, luckily, my camera still works… but how to get the pictures off in time. I bought an SD card reader tonight and while going through the pictures on the card I realized that I have way more pictures than I can put into this one post right now (especially since it’s 10:30 at night and I still would have to move the pics over, edit them, upload them, and THEN make this post).

So, tonight you guys are getting a cop out (and I say guys because I noticed I had 16 people view my blog on Tuesday… or something) and you get to see this picture (which I don’t think I’ve shown).

This is my Grandparents on Oct 16, 1953 on their wedding day. This is also the dress I will be walking down the aisle in on May 22, 2010.  Imagine it is ice blue though, because you don’t get the full effect in gray scale.

I have another dress to wear for the reception as this dress is velvet, and it’s also very old and I don’t want to destroy it by wearing it too long.

I’ve wanted to wear this dress since I was about7. There are pictures from my Grandparent’s wedding day all over their house and I always have thought my Gramma looked gorgeous in this dress.

Also, I’m named after her, so I though.. you know… it was a dress made for Jessie, and I’m Jessie so I’m going to wear the dress.

There was some resistance from my Mom and my Aunts at first… to start they were trying to tell me I was too much taller than my Gramma (there’s about an inch and a half difference, but it’s because I have a longer neck and bigger head than Gramma… our shoulders are at the same height). Then they tried to tell me I was too skinny and that the dress would swim on me… which, they forgot that I’d been steadily gaining curves, getting to a healthy weight, and that dress sizes had changed. The dress was about a size 14-16 pattern size when my Great-Grandma made it for Gramma and I’m only a size 10 dress size… showing how much sizes have changed in 50 years.

I stood my ground though and tried on the dress at Christmas a couple of years ago… however my Mom swears up and down that my arms are too “fat” and I don’t fit the dress… Gramma and I say that the dress fits me perfectly, even better than my Gramma, who it was made for.

Mom currently has the dress hostage at her house, waiting to be “washed” and hasn’t let me try it on since the summer  (where she declared I had to go on a salad diet to lose weight in my arms at least), and I’m trying desperately to be patient and bide my time until I can try it on again.

Luckily… I have Gramma on my side and I don’t think she’s as patient as me… she really wants me to be able to try the dress on again to prove that I actually do fit it.

It’s nice having someone batting for me.

I will post a better picture post over the weekend.. I just have to go through my pictures.

You may even get to see a bad video of me and my cousins playing Rock Band… complete with C showing how graceful he is….

So, I’m already making it to the second step. Second post this week, 2 boa scarves knit from stash, pulled out the WiiFit and played a bit yesterday.

It’s continuing that’s the problem.

However, Ravelry has a lovely aid to this, it’s a group called “Monthly Adventures” and it’s right up my alley.

It’s a group of people on Ravelry who just wanna have fun! There’s swaps, Knit/Crochet a longs, blanket square of the month, stashbuster assistance… it’s great!

I’ve already maintained on this blog that swaps are NO GO for me, sadly I didn’t follow this rule and I joined in a sock yarn swap for my blankie of doom. Once again, I was really great at the adding stuff in, just not so great at sending it out. Not because I didn’t want to mind you, it just so happened that when the loverly box of goodness arrived we were having money issues what with C losing hours and my job being not so good, then add onto it that I was in Canada, having to send a box to the US, unlike the US, shipping up here doesn’t have a one box fee, it was going to cost in the area of $40 which was no good (at that point in time, it was $40 to ship something, or $40 for groceries, I think you know what won).

So once again I have sent myself to the naughty swapper corner and I’m not allowed to come out until I’ve got decent stable income and a bunch of debts down, not to mention a lot more time on my hands and a mandate that my swap partner is in Canada.

This Monthly Adventures group is going to make that difficult because they already have a Divinely Dottie doll swap going that I’d love to take part in… I can see that temptation beign a difficult one to master.

However, the current KAL is a moebius (which I have great difficulty spelling since it took me 3 times and I’m not even sure that’s right), and I’m doing this one (Ravelry Link but I don’t think enough people read this to worry about it). I’m going to be doing it in a black sparkly yarn that’s been in my stash (STASHBUSTER!!!) to go with my pretty red sparkly dress (do you see a theme here… I’m all about the “ooo sparkly”… and apparently brackets). So that’s helping.

Then there’s the blanket square of the month, which luckily they’re doing the same blanket squares they did last year so all the patterns are up and I can move ahead if need be, which may be a good possibility since I have 2 baby blankets to do in the next 6 months AHHH! (luckily… I MAY have a bit of sit back and knit time in Oahu which is where we’re going on our honeymoon in May, so the second of the blankets may be able to wait… we’ll see…).

Thirdly in the Stashbusters section they have a wicked cool hat to play with and I’ve already got 2 yarns picked out for it, though I’m worried if I’ll have enough… oh well, that’s why it’s call stashbuster, I’m sure I can find something co-ordinating.

The great thing about this group is that I’m sure it’s going to help me keep blogging, if only because they have the greatest thing ever… PRIZES!! but in order to get these, you must post pictures, and pictures are where I become and insanely lazy person/blogger, so with that temptation it should assist me in completing the last part of this whole blogging thing and that’s to have at least 1 picture post a week.

Now, if only I can find the $30 USD to get a full fledged Flickr account I would be a happy woman… hmmm… how to bribe C when I’ve already given him what he wanted for Christmas.

As 2009 comes to a close I figured I would post my “would likes” for 2010. I am one of those people who doesn’t believe in resolutions because I find they always end in failure. So instead of saying I will do something I say that I would like to do something, that way there isn’t as much pressure, and I have a better chance of succeeding.

So firstly, I would like to post on here 3 times per week with at least one post containing pictures. I was going to say daily, but I decided not to get too ambitious. I mean, I’m very good at starting blogs and setting up blogs and putting first posts on blogs but then… I lose interest. So by having this put out, I’m going to try. I’m not going to limit myself to anything (I know this was originally a knitting blog, but the title is “odds and sods” so that’s what’s going to happen).

Secondly, I would like to actually start exercizing and sticking to it. This is for a number of reasons, first: I used to do 4 hours of dance per week and since I had the motivation to do that, there’s no reason why I shouldn’t have the motivation to make myself exercize a few times a week (stop laughing…), second, I have plenty of things in my posession to help me, things like a WiiFit, a DDR dance game, and 3 videos (a yoga video, a pilates video and Jillian Michael’s 30 Day Shred). Not only do I have the tools I have variety so I can’t even claim boredom. Thirdly, my abs have decided to go on strike since I stopped dancing… this is unacceptable, especially since I have a wedding dress to fit into and I would like to be able to breathe in said dress… which will not be possible if my abs do not move back into their normal position… I’ve tried explaining this to them but they aren’t listening, so now I need to crack the whip and it will be done in less than 5 months (stop laughing!!)

Thirdly, I would like to knit up a good portion of my stash, or get rid of it. This year I was very good and got rid of some of my icky yarns that were in my stash. I would like to continue in this vein and either actually knit a bunch of it up or get rid of a bunch of it. Or both. I just would like to get more yarn gone (so that I can get new pretty stuff in… shh don’t tell C).

Fourthly, I would like to go to a spinning class at Shall We Knit or some other store that has a class for spinning. I still only have drop spindles but I need to learn how to properly spin so that I can use up my fibre.

Fifthly, I would like to make one costume this year. I used to make 3 or 4 and I know I’m busier now but I would like to have something new for Hallowe’en at least. I’m not sure what I’m going to make but I do have options as I have a ton of fabric in my craft stuff for various costumes. We’ll see what I cook up but it’s something I definitely want to get back into.

That sounds good for now. I’m hoping I can get this done, we’ll see how well I do.

So I had knit morning today. It was wonderful, when I get a job again I’m really going to miss this.

As of right now though, it looks like the Knit Mornings may be held at my house. Our group has kind of out grown the corner of Starbucks and we’re starting to have to sit on the little side tables. I offered up my living room in passing because it’s big, we’ve got 2 futons and a comfy chair plus other padded chairs, it’s very open with lots of daylight… and a fire place. Plus, it’ll help me keep the place clean!

So that could be fun, it may be starting next Friday, but I have to keep an eye on Ravelry for that. We also may be taking a field trip up to Spinrite for their sale… heee!!! Bags of Regia, and other yarns for CHEAP! Now if only I had money… hmmm…

Anyway, I figured I would tie up some loose ends I have laying around, like that lovely list of Christmas Gifts I have to the side.

I don’t have all the pictures of stuff yet but here’s the end result.

I got everything except Alistair’s blanket done… so I didn’t give Jude’s blanket either, instead I made 3 baby hats with the initials of my 3 pseudo-nephews engraved on them.

The blankets I’m giving to my Mom on Saturday to give to the moms of the boys.

So I have a couple of pictures right now ( I do have more, but I haven’t got them on the computer…) of some recent projects, I just want to say that this year is probably going to end up being a year of socks for me… I’ve decided to work through my sock stash if only to get to have more yarn for my blankie (which I’ll talk about in another post).

Here we go…

First up are my Dad’s slipper socks (Karin’s look almost identical only they’re green-gray and smaller).

Pattern: Slipper Socks from Paton’s Website (Free Pattern)

Yarn: Classic Merino Wool

Size: Small

Needles: 4.5 mm dpns

Started: September 17 2008

Finished: October 2008

I’ll just put this bluntly, I HATE this pattern. These socks were originally supposed to be for Karin, my Dad’s wife, I made the “small” size and it came out big enough for C’s feet. I may have had an issue with gauge but I don’t think so.

Now I did learn a new style of heel for these socks which was really quite interesting. However, there are two little 2×2 cables that go down the side of each foot. Up on the cuff/leg the pattern tells you to twist them one direction, but after the heel, it tells you to twist them another.

Then the amount of stitches you are supposed to kitchener from the top of the foot to the sole isn’t even so you either have to instinctively know to decrease at a certain point, or do what I did and fudge it by moving stitches around.

It makes a nice sock, I will say that, but if you don’t know what you’re doing, find a different pattern because this one will give you a headache.

Pattern: Selbu Modern by Kate Gagnon from Ravlery  (Free Pattern)

Yarn: Black: Paton’s Kroy and Variegated: Artsygal Yarns in Phoenix

Size: Small

Needles: 2.5 mm dpns

Started: December 10 2008

Finished: December 17 2008

Granted, I had a lot of time on my hands to make this, but it was truly a really fast knit. This pattern is written for 2 solid colours, but I had some left over Artsygal yarns from my monkey socks and decided to try it out.

This actually had a very simple chart to follow and it turned out beautifully. However mine doesn’t really look like the beret style it’s supposed to be, and I think this is because I used slightly thinner yarn than called for in the pattern.

Still this has become my daily hat, and is totally a favourite… it’s going to take something major to bump this off my first grab list.

So that’s a quick catch up, hopefully I can get some new pics on the computer soon… because heck knows I’m going to have a ton of socks to show you in the near future.

So with that, I’ll leave you with a picture of my demented Hydrangeas who don’t want to grow properly.

Till next time.