New Year’s Eve spins

Not what you think. No alcohol is involved.

I spun a “starter ball” of this 90/10 wool and mohair fiber that I bought at Rhinebeck this year. Just to see how it would turn out, and also to check on my burgeoning spinning skills.

Which clearly are still in the burgeoning phase, but baby steps, dearest. Baby steps.

The spindle was also acquired at Rhinebeck, but I am sorry to say I don’t remember the vendor, and I don’t seem to have the tag.

I ended up frustrated by the variations in twist, and so took this batch off the spindle and balled it up.

And discovered it wasn’t half as bad as I thought. Maybe I’ll ply it later and make a teeny-tiny, little skein of yarn.

In the meantime, I’m spinning the rest, but really working on my drafting. I have found that when I draft so that just the merest amount of fibers are left, and it looks like a cloud of fluff, it spins the best. Meaning the spindle does what it should, and it spins, rather than quickly reversing direction and undoing all the twist. Which I suspect is a result of spinning to thick a “cloud” of fiber, and getting too much twist.

It’s a rough balancing act, this spinning is. And I don’t know what I’m talking about, so take all of this with a grain of salt.

Ravelry has some good spinning forums that I’m learning a lot from.

Here’s to 2008, and the pleasure found in clean slates, new beginnings, and all that jazz…

Starting to own up to the stash

In an effort to clean up my space for a new year, I have emptied the spare closet of it’s huge tub o’yarn. It had been sitting there, untouched, since arriving back here from S. Florida a year ago.

Inside were many treasures. Most of which I forgot I had.

Here’s a thought for the new year.

YARN. DIET.

Check out this handpainted mohair. When the hell did I buy this???? And what for???? Finally, is it gorgeous, or what?

And look! Here’s some alpaca from Rhinebeck 2005 that was working it’s way into my first piece of lumpy lace. I remember putting it away, because who wears alpaca lace in Fort Lauderdale?

My fingers itch…just blister, I tell you…to get back at it. Except, where the hell is the pattern?

I’ve got some Schaeffer cotton.

And some orange mohair that I strung some purple/black seed beads onto…thinking of knitting…what???? I don’t remember now.

My house is a mess. Piles of crap (mostly yarn) everywhere.

The stuff I have no clue what to do with, that doesn’t particularly ring my chimes anymore, is going on eBay.

The rest is going into ziplock bags (don’t they make all different sizes now, some really big?) and onto shelves in the bright light of day, so I can see what I have. This should stave off the urge to visit the LYS (sorry, guys.)

Harrison is outside this evening, and offers nothing to his viewing audience, because he is way too busy enjoying the warmer temperatures.

Looking ahead

So the craziness that is Xmas is behind me for another year. I swear. Next year will be different. Less last minute emphasis on buying. (I tried this year. I really did. But at the eleventh hour, I collapsed under pressure.) I think I need to figure out what Christmas means to me, if anything. And if it means nothing but going through the motions of buying/planning/receiving, then part of me wants to stage a coup d’etat against the whole thing.

The other part of me, the part that got some really nice presents, wants a repeat performance next year. Somehow I have to combine the fun stuff with a sense of purpose, some sort of meaning.

I have 362 days to do that in.

Looking ahead to the new year is fun. I’m a note taking sort of gal. I like colored pens and flow charts and index cards vs. notebook vs. computer program for my planning endeavors. I like to plot out hoped-for vacations against on call weeks, tack in the birthdays to remember, and set up goals for myself for the year.

New Year’s Eve I like a little time alone to sit in the light of the Christmas tree and reflect on the year gone by. Some years I get to do this. Some years I don’t. Some years I can’t quiet my mind long enough to string two consecutive thoughts together.

The busy-ness of living gets in the way of the business of living.

Okaaaaay….

Clearly this is a post that needs to end before it becomes even more of a cliche.

One of the things that goes directly on the 2008 calendar is the palliative care conference in Scottsdale, AZ in March. Can’t wait for this. It’s been a long time since I’ve been on a work conference.

Wish there was exciting news on the knitting front. However, I’m doing little more than slogging away on row after row of 2×2 rib and cable on

the waves scarf.

I ripped out the Silk Garden Lite that was trialing as a Clapotis. The Clap is going to be my Brooks Farms Four Play that I got at Rhinebeck, as originally planned.

I just really need to finish one project before I start another.

I’m considering making 2008, or at least part of it, the year to buy nothing but necessities, like I’ve read in those articles. Think of the money I’d save. Maybe I should try it for just a month, at first. Nothing but necessities. Food, gas, etc. No clothes, books, magazines, (gasp!) or yarn.

No shoes, bags, jewelry, or makeup. No notebooks or pens unless there’s a dire need. And the word ‘need’ needs to be explicitly defined, as well.

Taking it one step further, maybe I could sell all my extraneous stuff on eBay and commit to a simpler lifestyle. Who really needs all this crap, anyway?

Ah…the pleasure of the new year, and new possibilities.

Must. Go. To. Bed.

Harrison wiggles his sweet pink toes at you.

A picture intensive holiday

It’s noon on Christmas Day, and I am happily sitting here posting to you, and listening to Bare Naked Ladies on the present from my brother. As he could probably tell by my over-the-top gushing of glee on the phone, I really, really, really like it.

(If it isn’t obvious, it’s a Bose iPod SoundDock!)

The boyfriend, dear one that he is, thinks I get hives – not from stress – but from sterling silver. He thinks gold is a better metal choice.

But, being an observant sort of man, he made sure he got me gold that I would like…as in white gold. And a few sweet diamonds for sparkle, too.

And, to add to my already abundant watch collection –

He knows me well. I think he believes, as I do, that I was a crow in a previous life. I love shiny, sparkly things.

My kids, bless their hearts, also know me well. My daughter gave me a Beehouse teapot! Green, my favorite color. I’m going to brew my first pot in it in just a couple of minutes.

And my son gave me…YARN! (and some other stuff). The sock yarn is washable merino from Fleece Artist. The booklet is on Magic Loop with a long circular (included!), and for good measure, the wrist bag to hold yarn while knitting standing up (which I am quickly graduating to, as I hate just standing around, and itch to knit when I do). Hairspray is such a cool movie — I already have the soundtrack on my iPod — now I can watch it again.

I always love my mother’s gifts. She knows me well, too. She knows I love stones. This year it’s amber. Amber is warm and used to be part of a living thing, and it has a whole lot of history locked within it’s confines. I love this pendant because it reminds me of an arrow head, further pleasing my sense of history. Inside the amber is all sorts of occlusions and stuff.

This pin is very organic, and therefore very beautiful. And…it has a loop on the back so it can be worn as a pendant, too.

Update: There’s a mosquito in the pin — wings, legs, stinger and all. Holy crap!

She also sent me some warm fingerless gloves, a little Bearington Bear that I’m sure is intended as a Christmas tree ornament, but I’ll have out all year round, a new wall calendar, and what I can only guess is a potato masher?????

My kids were here for Christmas Eve. These are the greatest two kids ever created, if I do say so myself…

My son, who is one of the most handsome, brave, and sensitive men I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing…and who is, by the way…also one of the very few (holy crap!) 4.0 students I’ve ever known –

And my beautiful daughter, who is extra gorgeous because from somewhere deep within, she’s found all this self-confidence that makes her shine — my wild woman-child — half rough and tumble hockey player, half femme-fatale –

**********

My mother sent DBF a sort of hat to keep his ears warm –

Here’s hoping everyone has as wonderful a day as I’m having. And from my house to yours…MERRY CHRISTMAS!

(and thank you all very much!)

Mulligan

Size 9’s and sort of sloppy vs. size 5’s and…better?

Things have quieted down at work just a little (insert knock on wood here). At least today I got a chance to take a breath and catch up.

I might be going to a conference in Scottsdale in March. The desert in March is not a bad thing.

Warm.

Dry.

Yep. I’ll go.

I’m renouncing traditional Christmas. Sure, I will do the Christmas Eve thing with my kids so as not to trounce yet another of their traditions. But Christmas day is mine, all mine. I will knit and watch movies and nap. I think my mother and her boyfriend (the word ‘boyfriend’ over the age of 24 is absurd, but ‘lover’ is way too much information and ‘partner’ is just weird, so ‘boyfriend’ it is) have the right idea in driving up north on Christmas day and draping pine trees with stringed popcorn and cranberries for the wildlife. I think a feast for the birds and squirrels out back, and maybe some apples in the woods for the deer is a good idea. Can’t forget the little beasties who share the earth with us.

Then my ‘boyfriend’ (see above) and I might go see a movie, and call it a day.

If I can remember to take a few minutes between now and then to just sit still and breathe, it might be all right, after all.

*****

Look what I found in the bookcase last night. The LCPL in Afghanistan, back in…what…2003? No…2004.

Hard to remember. Look at that gun. Just the picture scares me. I can’t imagine my child actually using it. But. He still loves guns, and he loves firing. My daughter tells a story how this summer he was target shooting with his father, got down on the ground, assumed the “position” (whatever that is) and fired straight into the bullseye. Causing his father to frown and say, “hmmmmm.”

Sort of like, “ruh roh! Baby boy’s done gone and grown up. Now what.”

*****

Tonight’s cat activity shot is…Harrison at his post, between the slats of the blinds, keeping watch on the backyard. Because you never know what might be going on back there…

*****

The two sides of Harrison P. Cat. Or…

…how can a creature this sweet…

…look this damned evil?

Startitis?

If startitis is the disease that is manifested by the uncontrollable urge to start a new project while current projects hang limp on the needles…then I have a roaring case of startitis.

Clapotis in Silk Garden Lite.

Those are not enormous dropped stitches up there. Those are the yo’s that are supposed to stop the ripping when I drop a stitches on purpose later on. Or so the story goes….

Green is my favorite color.

At least it is today.

I’m knitting on size 9’s, and hoping my stitches aren’t too loose. I don’t think so. I’m aiming for an easy rip of the dropped stitch portion of the scarf, later on. And I want a nice drape. (Well. Maybe it is too loose. Crap.)

So I’ll soldier on and hope for the best.

In the good news department — Christmas boxes were mailed today. Phew. Cross that off my list.

Wouldn’t it be nice if it was okay to be happy with just a string of pretty lights, and maybe a candle to illuminate the dark at Christmas? But every year I succumb to the power of the Xmas machine and the demand to do more more MORE.

Buy more, spend more, wrap more, give more, clean more, cook more, plan more, drive more. Only to end up looking forward to next Wednesday, because then I can rest.

Next year I’ll do better.

But I tried. I kept decorations simple. Just some (okay, they’re fake) candles to light the way.

Someone at work said something today that stuck with me.

“My ghosts come out at Christmastime.”

That’s exactly what I would have said, if I’d known it was what I wanted to say at all.

“My ghosts come out at Christmastime.” Indeed. They do.

*****

But there’s tons to be happy about, too. My kids are home safely from college. There’s still money in the bank, even after the shopping is done. I have next Tuesday off. Tomorrow is hump day. Tomorrow morning I get to bend the ear of my medical director about some of these nightmare discharge plans I’ve been dealing with, confident that she’ll listen and hear only the important stuff in the midst of all my chatter, and give some really decent advice like she always does.

And…

Harrison says, “Mom may not like the Christmas season very much, but I sure do loves me my tree!”

Can’t get it up this year

Made you look, huh?

It’s not what you think. I can’t seem to stir up much enthusiasm for the holidays. Working through them doesn’t help much, I’m sure. Just being overwhelmed contributes, too, I suppose.

Guess maybe it’s time to set some limits.

Anyway….I have a lot of wrapping to do. Would it be okay if I just shmushed everything into gift bags and shook up some tissue paper oh-so-artfully, crammed it in, and presented everything that way?

(“Oh my GOODNESS! Would you look at this! She’s so clever! She blurred the picture so we can’t see what she got us!”)

My Malabrigo waves scarf is coming along. I see myself burying my nose in it. It’s warm and comforting, and brings to mind a small child self-soothing with a blankie.

(Yes, that’s right. I’m into self soothing again. So what?)

Harrison wishes his mom would pay more attention to him and quit dicking around with the damned scarf.

PLEASE?

Several months ago I picked up some Reynolds Whiskey on sale.

I have been sitting on it ever since. (Another yarn purchase with no clue.) However, I found this on Ravelry. I think that might be my next project. I want to line the bag, though. And change out that goofy looking handle they have on the pattern. The one they have is kind of busy.

I should be baking fruitcakes. But like every other year in the 20 year history of fruitcake baking for my dad…it’s not the mixing that I dread. It’s the lining of all those pans with greased brown paper.

I have no motivation today. None. I’m sort of hoping for a massive amount of snow so I can work at least the morning from home tomorrow. I have a ton of documentation to finish from Friday.

If I don’t get moving, Christmas is going to bite me in the ass.

Blech. This picture of the cat grasps what I feel like today. I only want to watch the snow fall….

Mood elevator

Going up….

My brother is a person who has a themed tree every year. One year it was an elf, complete with elf feet near the base, and hands somewhere in the middle. This year I think it’s blue and silver? Maybe apple green and white. Me…I’m a traditionalist. I have ornaments from when I was a baby. I love to get them out each year, dust them off, and drift back, for just a nanosecond, to the time and place the ornament represents.

This one reminds me of my Grandpa, for instance. He was a watchmaker.

My grandmother gave me an engraved brass ornament from Lillian Vernon every year for a while. All these years later, I still miss her terribly.

One year when I was little, I told her I liked this one, and she let me take it off her tree, and take it home to mine. It’s barely holding together.

I took this one off my tree at home when I left to start my own life. I remember it being hung every year when I was a kid.

My great aunt Jessie, I think, made this one when I was tiny.

One of the most special ornaments of all is the one I got one day in the mail a couple of years ago. It was a surprise. One of the other moms of a deployed Marine sent them out to our frightened little group of Marine moms with kids overseas. I wish I remembered her name now, but I’ll never forget what she did. The Christmas my son was deployed in Afghanistan was a rough one. This helped a little. At least we were in it together, us Marine moms.

Not really an ornament…but…my grandmother gave me her creche. One year I had it on a shelf, walked by, caught my sleeve on the corner, and the whole thing hit the hardwood floor. Nativity figures flew into pieces, and decades-old bits of straw and wood flew everywhere. It looked like a modern day bombing in Jerusalem.

This is all that’s left.

And here’s the finished tree. Done!

Oh, and by the way. My day off was absolutely splendid. The boyfriend took us to Dinosaur Barbecue, where the ribs taste like a campfire and the cornbread is to die for….

And tomorrow is Friday and payday. Any day that starts with an ‘F’ and ends in cash is a good day for me.

Oh, and Harrison says, “I really wish Mom would go back to work. She’s driving me nuts.”

A good day to stay home

Since my usually keen sense of humor went belly up on Tuesday, and my coping skills hid under the bed on Wednesday, I made the choice to give up a few bucks and take a comp day.

Judging from this view out the front window, I picked a good day to do it.

So, at 1:15 in the afternoon, this is my perspective.

You know I knit backwards, don’t you? When someone asks me to teach them how to knit, I wince. I can’t teach you. I do it backwards. I’m left handed, if that helps explain it.

You might move your stitches from the left needle onto the right. I move from the right needle onto the left. If I put my needle into the stitch like you do to knit, I end up with a twisted stitch. I have no idea why. So I enter the stitch backwards, too.

(By the way, I had no idea how difficult it is to photograph myself knitting.)

Julie from My 45th Year posted a picture of her messenger bag. It made me remember this really cool scarf that I forgot I made. I bought the Manos from her shop several years ago, and the wooly bits interspersed throughout are from the shop, too. I really love this scarf. Thanks, Julie…for reminding me.

Good grief. That godawful, sappy, melodramatic, BS song about the little boy and his dying mother and the shoes is on the radio again.

CLICK. I hate that damned song.

I should do something productive today and put up the Christmas tree, but the Christmas spirit, if there is such a beast, has yet to visit this house.

Besides, I told myself yesterday that today was all about knitting, spinning, and staying in my pajamas all day.

I wonder if I could get away without having a tree this year?

My mother asked me if I wanted a jewelry box for Christmas this year. I think I said ‘no’, but maybe I should have said ‘yes’. There seems to be an organizational problem happening on my bureau. Some of it is caused by my relentless zeal for acquiring things, like some sort of demented squirrel, packing away the goodies for the coming famine.

We won’t even talk about my yarn stash, which really is shameful. However, judging from my reading on Ravelry, it’s not nearly as “bad” as others.

It’s not like I grew up impoverished. Though when I was in high school, I remember telling myself (on yet another day when my clothes were about as fashionable as ski pants on a lizard) that when I grew up, I would have enough money so that if I saw something I liked, I would just be able to get it, without having to choose between that item and say…heat, or food. I may have taken that self-promise just a bit too far, however.

So when I die, my children will inherit yarn and sterling silver. And books. And knitting needles.

Sorry, kids.

Sometimes it adds up to too much, y’know?

Warning. No cute cat pictures tonight.

No knitting pictures, either.

All I have to offer is this.

Sometimes I have to let them go, and I don’t know how.

Of course I blame my employer. Who else but a modern health care organization would expect 8-12 hour days, twelve of them in a row, devoted to death and dying, without so much as an acknowledgment of the human suffering just witnessed?

In the normal course of human existence, death is dealt with on occasion. But unless you are living in a war zone, or during a famine or other natural disaster, it’s not something to deal with every day.

Hospice work is a choice I make every day, however. So I really have no business blaming anyone, do I?

But I am human. And one death after another after another, sometimes two and three a day, is too much for even the most hardened of souls. These are people whose lives I’ve had a glimpse of, and who have sometimes whispered to me the fear they don’t dare share with anyone else. Many times they astound me with their strength and, well, I wish I had a nickel for every time one of them had me collapsed in giggles. Not everything is about hanging crepe, you see.

If I think I will not see one of them again as a living person, and if the family is okay with it, I will kiss them softly on their head and say goodbye. It’s funny, but I never feel like I’m saying goodbye forever. Just for a little while.

I wish I could tell you the stories of my patients, and their families. But you understand I can’t.

I hope they’re all in a good place now, whatever “a good place” means to them. Whether it’s reunited with long lost family and friends, or free from pain, or being able to walk again…whatever trite idealization comes to my mind…hell…I hope they’re there.

I wish them well, and thank each and every one of them for drifting in and out of my life. Those kisses, and hugs, the old Air Force guy with the ‘thumbs up’ sign, all of them, touch me more deeply than they will ever know.

Sometimes I have to let them go.

I just wish I knew how.