Blizzard!!

Well, today I was planning on going to the Harvard Ceramics Program Holiday Show and Sale opening night, but, the weather predictions turned out to be true and traffic was worse than I thought so I walked home. Except that by 4 pm there was a foot of snow on the ground and nothing had been shoveled or plowed and the snow was still falling like crazy!! And me being me I didnt believe the weather prediction so I left all my perfectly good snow gear at home. At least I was wearing ankle boots or the 1.5 miles home would have been even worse. Really quite amazing how much snow fell in just a few hours.


These pictures are from my balcony around 5 pm tonight.





























But I did get some secret holiday knitting done. Yay! And since its another pattern from my head I'm crossing my fingers and praying that it turns out alright and not like the hat I tried to make for my brother's girlfriend last Christmas. We shall see.

update and thanks

Just wanted to say thanks again to everyone for offering their condolences. (realized of course after the last post that ive been spelling it as granpa and everyone else in the fam spells it grampa. ah well). i'm back from Chicago now. and i've caught a cold of course. been working on lots of snowflakes and about to start some holiday knitting (i swore i had size 8 needles but could not for the life of me find them before i left for my trip). ive been avoiding the endpapers as ive been sick and didnt want to cover them in whatever i'm coughing out, but they are sooo close to done.
i have lots and lots of ceramics fo's to post but with it being so dreary out i havent been able to get some good pictures, so hopefully soon!

Death, it always comes too soon

The first fish I ever caught, with Grampa's help of course.














Well since I've spent most of the day crying anyway, I may as well write the post that's going to make me cry. Today my sister called me, and I could tell she had been crying. My first thought was that something happened between her and her fiance. But then she said "Grampa died this morning." I will forever remember this day as the first time I truly knew loss and grief.
I have counted myself lucky that though they are not always in the best of health, and though there have been some close calls, every family member that I have been close to was still with me except for my great gramma. But when she passed in 2004 she was 101, and we were prepared for her passing as she had been ill for some time. We had time to make peace and say goodbye. I couldnt make the funeral because it was in the middle of finals at college but my family told me it was a more happy occasion, a celebration of her life, for she had lived a long and full life, one worthy of celebration. This time its not such a happy occasion. This was too sudden. Even though his health had been declining for a couple of years he wasnt that ill, just old. I know that everyone must die but that doesnt make it any easier when its your own granpa. He was a wonderful man and I will miss him terribly. He liked to tell jokes and make people smile. He liked to buy everyone gag gifts at Christmas. Or silly games that we could all play. He was a fisherman. He was a war veteran. He was "Chuck the Windspinner Man."

When I called him to wish him a happy birthday last year he asked me how the rats were (I work with mice), how the research was going, and if I got along with my roommates. He told me that he thought my sister was too young to be thinking about marriage and how happy he was that I'd chosen to live a life on my own before I settled down. He told me to see the world, have a career and "sow my wild oates" before I got married. When I laughed that that was strange advice for a grandfather to give a granddaughter he brushed it off and said it was true, I would live a longer life than I ever expected and I didnt want to get to an age where I regretted not doing all the exciting things when I was young. The fact that he not only supported my decisions but encouraged them at a time when most of my relatives were asking me when I was going to "find a nice guy and settle down" meant everything to me.

This Christmas is going to be so hard without him. I didnt go home for thanksgiving and I had looked forward to seeing him at Christmas. I am so incredibly sad. I know in time it will get easier... But right now this pain in my gut, this knot in my throat, reminding me that something I loved has been lost forever, is horrible. Right now I hate that I am alone in Boston. I'll be taking a red-eye flight to Chicago on weds and back to Boston saturday, but before then I have to present my research at our yearly Gates Foundation meeting and I just hope I can muster enough concentration to get through the day on tuesday.
This week will be rough but I know I'll get through it somehow. Also, thanks to everyone who has already sent me good wishes of love and support - it means a lot.


Grampa, me, my sister, and my dad at Six Flags.

When you are stressed

You get this (on the right):

instead of the five pointed one on the left. I worked on that "lace triangle" this past week, which was a particularly stressful one at work and i just had to laugh tonight when i finally bound it off and realized what it was. its even more funny since i tried so hard to make it right. i kept miscounting stitches and ripping back and starting over. oh well.

at least i had the arrival of some yarny goodness to help. (yes the stash has grown!! gah!)

Here we have some Socks That Rock from Blue Moon Fiber Arts in the new Raven series.
This is Grawk. isn't she beautiful?













And this is Tlingit.
I'm sad to say that I'm a little disappointed in Tlingit, she seems just like a muted Grawk. I had contemplated getting Rook-y instead, but its so hard to guess true color from the computer. So I didnt. And I wish I had. Ariel got a skein of Rook-y and I was very jealous. Ah well.





I love Grawk though so that makes me happy.
(:{

only 54%??

Man I have a long ways to go in seeing all these states. and there are a couple (Colorado, Nebraska) that I was in when I was 2, so I dont remember and I'd like to return. Totally stole this idea from Amanda via Ariel! Now its back to work for me!




create your own personalized map of the USA
or check out ourCalifornia travel guide

(mostly) FO's

I've been in a little bit of a knitting rut lately. Don't tell the secret spook endpaper's but it's all their fault. So I decided to stop stressing about the mitts and to devote some time learning to spindle. I stumbled upon this wonderful website while at work which answered a lot of questions I had. After the spindle began to wobble with all the spun alpaca goodness on it I wound up my first ball. Then onto the next. I used the same fiber - more alpaca cream colored. This time, after the first couple inches, I did a much better job of keeping the fiber the same thickness. Though, I still do better with the park and draft method, mostly cuz I cant keep the darned thing from spinning in the opposite direction and undoing all I've done. I also think I'm still spinning thicker than the spindle can handle b/c it wasnt long before it was wobbling again. So I wound up my second single ball.



Here I am winding up the second single. Using a little ceramic cup I made this past summer works perfect to hold the spindle while I wind. Notice the even thickness!!















Here are my first two singles. The one on the left is the very first - you can see all the varying thicknesses. The one on the right is much better except for that first couple inches when I started it - thats on the top right of the ball.
I think I'll have to get a heavier spindle to ply the yarn. I'm considering using a suggestion I saw on the Ravelry boards and plying it w/ colored thread so that it doesnt get super thick. But that's for later, first I'll do some more spindling practice.




Onto (nearly) FO 2!
Finally started some holiday knitting. Here is the beginning of my lace snowflake star ornament. The Emily Oaker cast on took several tries and I'm still not comfortable with it, so I may eventually switch to another method.










It knit up super quick though, so that's good.
This is what it looked like when I went to bed last night after 1 hour of work.













And here we are tonight after only 2 hours work. It's almost all done! It just needs to be starched. Despite the icky beginning - its not even easy to knit off of the EO cast-on, I like the pattern and am hoping to make roughly 40 of them by x-mas to give away as ornaments to my family. Wish me luck! (thankfully (or not!) I'll have quite a bit of boredom time to knit once I get to the parents house on dec 20th).

stash

if i were a lol-cat i would be saying "i can has a stash?"

i'm in the process of uploading all the pics i took today of stash bin #1 (since its so rare i see the sun - it was out today!) and then i'll get them into Ravelry. its funny b/c as i was pulling out the yarn from the bin i was thinking: gift, free-bee, gift, free-bee, etc. I think there were only a couple of skeins of yarn i actually bought myself! it still manages to multiply in the night though, so i've decided due to my budgetary constraints to try and knit from my stash as much as possible in the next several months which means that i might actually *gasp* attempt socks again. but first the christmas knitting must begin.....

Drop Spindle Fun

Uh oh, a New crafty/fiber endeavor!
So my new fascination with spindling started when Amanda started talking about getting her FIL to make her a spindle. I didnt know what it was and she directed me to this very helpful knitty article. I thought they were super cute and was intrigued. THEN I saw a girl on the 66 bus spindling while riding the bus! (clearly, it was a sign from the fiber goddess) And it looked super fun. When the lot of us went to Rhinebeck I looked at all the pretty spindles, but I wasnt sure which one would be right for me. I also know nothing about roving, so I didnt buy any fiber. I found a Golding drop spindle starter kit near the end of the day but it was a large portion of my budget, and I had already spent most of it on yarn. Lucky for me Danielle mentioned that she had several spindles she could loan me if I wanted to try it out AND she had some alpaca roving she'd be willing to give to me since she's allergic. Yay! Sadly, I havent seen Danielle since Rhinebeck, but she saw Catherine last weekend and then I saw Catherine tonight for some random knitting.
I was all excited to get the spindle and fiber before the holiday weekend and boy was I ever pleasantly surprised. I hit the fiber jackpot! I was expecting one bag of alpaca, not a bunch! And in so many colors! There's creme, black, solid grey, brown, and brown and creme heather!
After a quick tutorial from Ariel, I was off and running. Well, kinda. I'm not very good and my end product is all different thicknesses, but I'm sure I'll get better with practice.



Look at all that fiber goodness!
Thanks Danielle!!















Here is a real live alpaca at Rhinebeck. Cute!

















This one was a prize winner and a bit of a prima donna - she didnt want to look at anyone!










I'm not super worried that I'll give up knitting or stop buying yarn or even blow all my monies on a wheel because I'm not really interested in making my own yarn. I just like spindling for the novelty of it. Its tiny, portable, and cute. Another technique for me to master (its my thing, I like trying new techniques (in lots of disciplines), mastering them, and then moving on - keeps my brain hopping!) and maybe a little fun side hobby if I get any good at it. Because I have soo much extra time that I can now add side hobbies you know (;{ Maybe I'll get lucky and someday even have a beautiful little spindle to call my own, even if I never get into it as much as knitting they are ever so cute! And it kinda gives me street cred in the gansta fiber life. Just kidding!
I'm so excited I've nearly forgotten that my little sister got engaged (she's 22. they've been dating ~7 mos) and I'm in the wedding but clearly not important enough to her for her to tell me before she told all the rest of the family and her friends and even started checking out reception venues for the past two weeks. Yeah. Ouch. And now that my mom has an official almost grandson to be she has no need of me. Which is clearly why she doesnt call anymore and is too busy to talk to me when I call. Anyway, lets just move right along b/c its obvious that that is a sore spot right now.


Alpaca fiber saves the day!