Tuesday Teatime

We're continuing our 2007 theme of celebrating major Chinese holidays. This week brings us the Mid-Autumn Moon Festival.

As usual, my main reference was Moonbeams, Dumplings & Dragon Boats by Nina Simonds, Leslie Swartz, and the Children's Museum of Boston.

Of course, you can't have an Autumn Moon Festival without moon cakes. I made my own based on the recipe in the book, which is quite similar to this recipe:



I didn't have a moon cake mold, obviously. I started out putting various Chinese symbols on them with a knife, but ended up just making random designs. Also, instead of making my own filling I just used coconut-covered date rolls, which can be purchased at Whole Foods or Trader Joe's.

The moon cakes are to be eaten by the light of the moon, but out weather forecast was for clouds and rain. Our compromise was to have tea time after supper. We used a red tablecloth for good luck, and brought out many of our Chinese knick knacks. We also had grapes on the table (because they're round like the moon), and lit many candles:




Our beverage was choice of decaf tea or blackberry juice (the blackberry juice was in honor of upcoming Michaelmas -- sometimes we mix our holidays, especially when there are so many interesting ones all in the same week).

We read the story of Chang E and Hou Yi, and we read about hiding notes in the moon cakes to overthrow the mongols.

Later that night, after the kids were ready for bed, we realized that the moon had magically appeared from behind the clouds. We all ran outside to see it hanging so bright and round and heavy. We looked for and found the Jade Rabbit in the moon. We looked for Chang E, but didn't see her -- perhaps Hou Yi had already come to visit, and they had retired to the jade palace?

A Mnemonic

Kid1 was reading a zoology book to Kid2. They were discussing taxonomy. They were discussing figuring out their own mnemonic to remember classification -- kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, species.

"Okay, we're supposed to come up with a sentence that uses the first letter of each of those words, see? So the first word will start with K."

K
P
C
O
F
G
S

For pete's sake, it was time for Star Trek! Do you know how long kids can linger over a puzzle like this? It was a crisis, and I felt I simply had to intervene.

"Klingon!..." I exclaimed (since it was time for Star Trek), pointing to the K, "...potty chairs!..." (always a popular phrase to insert) ...

"Klingon potty chairs on freighters glow softly! See, sometimes the lights on the Klingon freighters are low...wait a minute, do Klingons even have freighters, or do they just fly around on Birds of Prey?"

"Yes, they have freighters, " my Trekkie daughter assured me.

"Okay, then, sometimes they keep the lights low, so they have the potties glow in the dark so they can find them." Those Klingon ships always do seem sort of dark to me, you know.

Kid2 danced around the room repeating the sentence over and over. KLINGON POTTY CHAIRS ON FREIGHTERS GLOW SOFTLY. KLINGON POTTY CHAIRS ON FREIGHTERS GLOW SOFTLY.

I feel confident that she will remember this mnemonic the rest of her life. Can you picture her chanting that in college?

Best of all, they were able to finish up the project, turn on the TV and watch Star Trek. Which, wouldn't you know it, featured Klingons.

Iggly Plops!

What is an iggly plop? Well, that's what giants call "little people" -- iggly means little, and plops are people, at least in the language of Groilish. And, according to Julia Donaldson, Groilish is what the giants speak.

We discovered the language of Groilish, as well as much more about giants, in Donaldson's book The Giants and the Joneses. This was one of our read alouds last week, and definitely our favorite book of the pile. Within a few days we were all speaking Groilish (there's a dictionary in the back of the book). Shoot, I wish we could pick up Latin as easily as we picked up this imaginary language. Maybe Julia Donaldson needs to write fiction in which the characters speak Latin or Greek -- that would be huge help to our homeschooling efforts.

It maybe weeks before we stop calling beans "bimples" (the book refers to many journeys up and down a bimplestonk) and stop referring to the cat as a "spratchkin".

I can already see that this is going to be one of those books we talk about for years to come. Sharing books together as a family is so cool. I should write thank you letters to the authors of our favorites. Well, assuming the authors are still alive. And in Julia Donaldson's case we'd write a letter saying "oidle oy!".

Another Weekend, Another Feis

The Graham Feis flew by for us.

We checked in on Friday night, and the girls were each given a bag of Teddy Grahams as their "Graham Treat" (cute, eh? Although, if someone hadn't explained it to me, I never would've gotten the pun). We had some time to explore the DoubleTree hotel and figure out where the stages were. Stages 1,2,3, and 4 were all on the indoor tennis courts in the sports center.

MrV spent much of the evening reprising Ceili Band. It appears to be our feis themesong. Not that we remember any more of the song than we did 3 weeks ago (I'm getting him the CD for Christmas, I swear). At this point we've started inserting the line "we're a Ceili Band!" randomly into most of the songs we sing.

Since the kids were dancing on stages 3 and 4, we opted to park at the sports center's entrance the next morning (hurrah for us for knowing that there was a separate door and parking lot back there, as the tennis courts are a looooong hike from the front entrance of the hotel). As a bonus, the sports center also has nice locker rooms, which we used to slip into the don't-wear-in-the-car-lest-you-crush-it school dress. Can I tell you how nice it is to use an actual locker room instead of a tiny bathroom or hallway corner to change in? Absolute luxury.



This is what it looked like on the tennis courts early Saturday morning. That's Kid1 and Kid2 warming up in the front left of the picture.

There was a heavy chemical funk in the air, and it was warm and cozy, but as the morning progressed they kicked up the HVAC -- it cooled off some, and the smell was tolerable. I don't know if it was from the finish they painted on the stages or something else. By the way, the stages really did look nice. They had advertised that dancers wouldn't need to tape their shoes, and I think they were right (nb: you put duct tape on the bottom of your hardshoes to help prevent slipping if you're dancing on a wonky surface).

As I said, the feis flew by for us. No knitting was accomplished -- there was no time! The First Feis and Beginner 1s went through all of their dances right after the team dances. The kids were zipping up to the check in almost as soon as they were finished dancing; at one point the check in for their next dance was while they were on stage. We were finished by about 11AM or so. We hung around a bit to see results (some of the slip jig results disappeared for awhile -- as in "over an hour" -- so we were killing time).

During this time we wandered over to stage 8, which was the Arts and Crafts competition. And, you know what? I could've thrown my socks on that table, and won a prize. Well, except I was wearing the socks that irishgirlieknits knit for me, so really she would've been the one to win, not I (but, she's done the feis-thing before, so that would've been appropriate). Anyway, I need to do some Celtic crafting, no doubt. And figure out how to enter into that part of the feis.

Speaking of wandering around, this feis snaked all over the place. It was amazing! Our area of stages 1-4 was wonderfully compact (not crowded at all, but everything we needed was right there), but the trip over to the Feisworx room was a major hike. I think the more advanced dancers had more of a chore to get from place to place, as they were in various meeting rooms here and there.

The kids' scores were ... interesting. Kid1 did her reel with grace and confidence, the best I've ever seen her do. Her score was way below those of the girls who placed. Kid2 forgot her hornpipe halfway through; she place 3rd out of 6 competitors, just 2 points from the winner, with the sole comment of "timing" (umm, yeah, her timing sort of slipped when she slowed down to remember what the steps were). So, we just shrug and say, "that's a feis for ya", and go on with life, I guess. After all, we're at Beginner 1 level, so it isn't as though the scores greatly affect much of anything. I imagine it starts getting more cutthroat at Beginner 2, and the pressure builds as you work up through the levels, since where you place affects what level you're considered to have attained.

We also saw the PC/OC girls dance their 8-hand, during which one of the musicians messed up. THAT was interesting. I heard a mom ask, "does the judge realize the musician messed up, not the dancers?" I think the judge is supposed to be in charge of the musician, right? so theoretically the judge should know. (If you don't hang out in the Irish Dance community, PC/OC is the elite level Beginner 1s dream about.)

(Let me insert here that I think the job of the feis musicians seems unbearably dreary to me, and they must be very special people to take on the task. The musicians sit there hour after hour after hour playing the music over and over and over. One mistake in 8 hours isn't a bad average. I was just interested to see what happens and how everyone reacts when someone makes a mistake like that. Overall, I think all feis musicians deserve medals just for showing up.)

And we saw a foot injury when 2 of the girls ran into each other; one of them had to be carried off the stage. I think she was crying from the sheer tension of the contest as much as from the pain.

One of the most interesting sights was the discovery of private baton lessons at the Doubletree! The kids took baton lessons back in Ohio. This Irish Dance mania has somewhat replaced that activity. But it's still a bit of information to tuck away, should we decide to go back in that direction.

Best of all, we were home in plenty of time to tidy up the house and have a birthday party that night!

If I Had a Completed Sock for Every Sock I've Knit...

Sheesh, if I actually completed all the socks I knit, I'd have socks for everyone in my family, plus pairs to spare.

Instead, I spend most of my time knitting, ripping, reknitting.

Boilermaker sock, take 1, the fussy, mosaic concept.

Boilermaker sock, take 2, the long, skinny version.

And, now, Boilermaker sock, take 3, the chunkier, possibly-could-fit version:



It's been a good week for sock knitting. We had a homeschool class at the zoo, and a homeschool class at the science center (and, yes, we actually made it this time), a Girl Scout meeting, a dance performance, and a piano lesson (by the way, it's been a crappy week for getting actual homeschool-at-home lessons done, as you can imagine). I turned the heel during piano lessons, and now do not have to worry about turning the heel during tomorrow's feis (bonus: the wonky stage assignments for Kid2's hornpipe appear to have been changed, too). All I have to cope with are the gusset decreases. Woohoo! Too bad I've totally lost interest in Irish Dance, and have moved on to a new obsession....

It happened rather abruptly, this loss of interest. Kid1's Girl Scout troop is planning a weekend camping trip for the fall. Kid1 has never been on a trip like this, so we were looking over the packing suggestions together -- it's sort of like gathering a trousseau, for pete's sake, with multiple pairs of underwear, multiple pairs of pants, 2 pairs of pajamas with pants ("hmm, you know, we could sew those"), hat for daytime, stocking cap for sleeping ("fleece or wool would be good for that, since it should be soft and snug"; "Do you think you could knit one in Junior Girl Scout green? With maybe a little pink trim? Wouldn't that be cool!"), multiple pairs of socks ("that's so if you get them wet you can change them; if they were made of wool it'd be really nice, wouldn't it, since wool stays warm even when wet ... wow, would you want me to handknit socks for this?"; "No, I'd rather have the hat"; too bad, I want to make the socks anyway), etc. And, well, before you know it, we're pulling out sewing patterns and knitting patterns, and looking over yarn and fleece and flannel options.

Here's the problem we're having with the packing list: she's outgrown practically all of her clothing. She can use a lot of my clothing on this trip since 1) she is now as tall as I am, and weighs almost as much as I do, and 2) all of my clothing looks like it's spent a few weeks grubbing around a campsite already, so it's not like she's going to ruin it. But we do need to get some items for her (after all, she has no cool weather clothing that fits whatsoever), and why not drive ourselves crazy trying to make it all ourselves? I mean, that's the way we do things around here, after all. And the camping trip gives us a deadline, so we aren't still trying to get around to this, oh, say, next March.

As to whether the Boilermaker socks ever get finished, well, who knows. If I'd knit straight through without ripping I'd already have a pair. As it is, I have half a sock, and a head full of ideas for other things I want to knit (or sew) instead of these.

Help! I'm being sucked into an Irish Dance vortex!

The other day, after dance class, I looked out in my backyard to see these strange creatures hanging out under the playset:



Within 24 hours they had metamorphed into something more like this:



That's 3-hand they're doing, by the way. It's mostly taught in ceili class, although apparently my kids have picked up enough in regular classes to do it well enough for the crowd at the parish fair.

About once per month their teacher comments, "They really should be in ceili class."

And I counter, "You're probably right, but ceili meets on blah-ti-blah night, and that's when swim class meets."

Yesterday morning I got an email from her. "Good news! Ceili for under-8s is now on blee-ti-blee night!" Kid2 is in under-8. So, both kids could now do ceili since the under-12 ceili meets late enough on blah-ti-blah night we could make it.

So, when we arrived at dance class last night I started quizzing other parents -- how much of a commitment is ceili? The moms cried out "It's HUGE!" and the dads tended to just sort of snort that snort that means "you really don't want to know". I don't know how other schools do ceili, but ours sends the teams to Oireachtas (which a year ago I couldn't even pronounce, let alone consider having my kids compete in) (I'm pretty sure I'm still pronouncing it wrong). Competing in Oireachtas is a huge time commitment, as well as monetary -- there's the hotel stay, of course, plus a brand new wig just for the occasion, and a new pair of ghillies. And the competition pressure, I'm sure, is enormous.

But, you know, it would be sort of fun to see the solo competitions at Oireachtas. Just sayin'.

So. Sigh. I'm sure the kids would enjoy the class itself, and getting close to the other families on the team would be cool, and I'm sure it would help the kids' technique. But. The extra-curricular activites are such a delicate balancing act, and this could easily send the whole thing toppling.

In the meantime, I announced that I had reached a significant turning point in my career as an Irish Dance mom -- I want to buy my child a wig because I'm sick of putting hair up in spikes. We have a feis this Saturday, so I will be spiking 2 heads of hair again on Friday (this works out to 5 days out of 8 that I'm messing around with dance classes, performances, hair, or dance competition here in mid-September).

Saturday's feis is obviously planned specifically to drive me crazy. First, they scheduled it in September, a hugely busy month for me. They also scheduled it at a point when my knitting will involve turning a sock heel, which, as I've said before, I can't do well at a feis. I'm almost positive the feis committee discussed these things when setting up this feis. It's beyond coincidence.

Plus they've posted the stage assignments, and, well, they're weird. All over the place they announce that they have 7 stages. And then I read the stage assignments and discover that Kid2 is dancing hornpipe on stage 8. Well. Now. That's interesting. Is she going into the Twilight Zone for this competition? (Seriously, if you read through everything you discover that stage 8 is for arts and crafts, baking, and music. I'm hoping there's some sort of dance-able area to it, and we can figure out when the heck we're supposed to go to that room to dance. I'm pretty sure other kids from our school are in the same boat, and their moms probably aren't going to be fretting about sock heels at the time, so we can maybe just follow them around.)

By the way, yes, it's possible to buy an Irish Dance outfit from American Girl (although we don't much like this year's model). And it's possible to buy one from an online vendor such as this one. Joan Hinds has a pattern in her book Sew the International Wardrobe for 18-inch Dolls, which is probably what I'd go with, since I could make it look a bit like our school's dresses. Of course, we'd still need ghillies and some sort of headband or tiara.

What's funny about all this is that we're not even very Irish.

To Every Thing There Is a Season

It's time to admit to myself that I'm not going to get around to sewing up all of the summer clothing I had planned. I've put away the fabric piles, and started thinking about fall sewing.

The kids and I all need new capris and pants, having outgrown last year's wardrobe (I seem to be having a horizontal growth spurt).

But the first item on the seasonal checklist is Birthday Sewing. And this year that means making items for American Girls dolls.

So far Kirsten has a new dress:



I wasn't so sure about elasticized sleeves for Kirsten, but I looked over the birthday dress from American Girl and realized that they implied drawstrings for the short sleeves.

After I finished this dress I found some tiny pink checked gingham and some tiny white ric rac. I've been considering making the birthday dress, but, really, does Kirsten want a knock off?

To make the above dress I used Joan Hind's Sew the Essential Wardrobe for 18-Inch Dolls. I sort of used the cover dress. Except the skirt of the cover dress was too full, and the collar was all wrong, and I wanted to line the bodice, and I thought the skirt opening could be done better than shown in the book, and skirt side seams looked more attractive. And probably some other stuff I'm forgetting. But, the book was inspirational, and gave me a jumping-off point. And it took less than a day to zip together, from tracing out the pattern to sewing on the daisy trim around the hem and neck (which really stinks to sew on, by the way, either by hand or machine).

This dress was for one child who likes to celebrate her Swedish heritagevia Kirsten. Her sister found some fake daisies and made someting like Kirsten's birthday headdress.

As a matter of fact, her sister's birthday is coming up soon, too. Expectations are running high: "Mommy, I think you could make Kit's birthday dress or school jumper -- they look pretty easy." Umm, no, they look pretty freakin' impossible to me. But I think I can manage some sort of jumper.

September is birthday season here. No doubt about it.

Eight Random Things

Kristen at A Day in the Life tagged me to write 8 random things about myself.

1. This is great because my natural tendency is to ramble on and on without making much sense. Proof of this:

You're Ulysses!

by James Joyce

Most people are convinced that you don't make any sense, but compared
to what else you could say, what you're saying now makes tons of sense. What people do
understand about you is your vulgarity, which has convinced people that you are at once
brilliant and repugnant. Meanwhile you are content to wander around aimlessly, taking in
the sights and sounds of the city. What you see is vast, almost limitless, and brings you
additional fame. When no one is looking, you dream of being a Greek folk hero.


Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

So, blurting out 8 random things is right up my alley. Although they're more likely to be vulgar than brilliant. And as for repugnant, well, decide for yourself. I certainly don't have a clue what you find repugnant. Although I suspect if I told you about the time I ... oh never mind, I'm almost positive you'd find that anecdote distasteful.

Hat tip to Tammy for the quiz.

2. I would've done this meme yesterday morning, but I always mop the kitchen floor on Thursday mornings after MrV leaves for work and before the kids get up. I play NPR on the radio, and have some quiet time to myself scrubbing away. Afterwards, if the kids are still asleep, I do a yoga tape; generally I choose a tape by Rodney Yee or Baron Baptiste, but sometime Shiva Rea.

3. Morning is my favorite time of day. The world seems ripe with possibilities in the morning.

4. York Peppermint Patties are my current favorite form of chocolate. I keep them in the refrigerator.

5. At one time I was vegetarian, and yes, even vegan for a brief stint. Now I'm not.

6. When I walk around the neighborhood I think about all the secrets the houses seem to hold -- all the joys and sorrows that I can't even begin to guess at. Lately I've been thinking the same thing about blogs I pass through reading -- what joys and sorrows are hidden in the heart of the writer? And who am I to judge the tiny glimpse I do see, given how much is hidden from view?

7. I tend to think most people are about the same level of smart as am I. And I tend to be startled when I discover that I'm often wrong about that. Then again, I like to present myself to the world as shallow and dippy, because then people don't have annoying expectations of me. I wonder if some of the people I think are shallow and dippy are doing the exact same thing.

(Okay, I need to add something here -- plenty of people startle me by being so much smarter than me that it sort of makes me dizzy to think about. It's like realizing that you're blind to something others can see -- other people have such comprehension and intelligence about things I just do. not. get. So, the point is that I tend assume that everyone is exactly like me, and I'm always surprised when I discover they aren't. You'd think I'd catch on. But I don't.)

8. I really, really hate to shop. Having to make a decision to purchase one thing and not-purchase another just paralyzes me. It's sort of the same feeling as trying to decide who to tag with a meme versus who to not-tag. So, I tend to avoid shopping and tagging.

Thanks, Kristen, for giving me the opportunity to aimlessly babble. I love, love, love this type of meme, and would do it weekly. Except I don't like reading random bullet-point stuff like this on a regular basis (I was just reading a Thomas Sowell Random Thoughts column this morning and thinking how much I dislike that writing style since the author never develops any of the ideas) , so then I'd hate reading my own blog. And, you know, that just seems so very wrong, to write a blog you wouldn't want to read yourself. Not that I read my blog. Who has time? I need to read all of your blogs! Including your 8 Random Things, because in small doses it's lots of fun!

Tuesday Teatime

This week's teatime shows just how easy having a weekly teatime can be.

While grocery shopping I picked up a package of creme filled wafer cookies. I think those wafer cookies are sort of vile, but the kids thought they were a great treat, and I had great hopes that I wouldn't eat the entire package myself (cookies are a great weakness of mine). I also picked up a bottle of lemonade.

And while at the library I picked up a copy of When We Were Very Young by A.A. Milne. It's a wonderful little book, and we should probably own a copy, but we don't. The library had several copies.

And, then, when we were ready to have teatime yesterday afternoon we decided it was a beautiful day and we should be outside. An outdoor teatime had an added advantage as it meant we didn't have to clean off the dining room table.

I took a blanket out to the playset, and spread it out on the platform up at the top of the slide. I also carried the book, the napkins, and the package of cookies. The kids followed with the lemonade and non-breakable cups.

As they settled in I read the introduction to the book. Then I read various poems at random.

After about 20 minutes of reading and chatting, we decided we had had enough. We picked up various items, slid down the slide, and carried them into the house. I then mowed the lawn while the kids attended to some other activities they had wanted to accomplish.

Tuesday teatime can be so very easy. Or it can be quite elaborate. And it's lots of fun to mix it up and vary the type you have, along with varying the poetry. You could even have one today!

Sshhh, I'm Trying to Read

I rarely, if ever, read the popular trendy books that everyone is reading. So it's sort of surprising to me that I placed a library hold on Rob Gifford's China Road as soon as I heard about it. It's a great book; Gifford's writing is engaging, and he breaks down his complex subject into digestible bits. Unfortunately, I know that others are in line behind me at the library, and I won't be able to renew it. Right now I seem to be reading it just to get it read by the due date, rather than reading it for the joy of reading.

Also, for all of his talk about forces that shape China, he doesn't talk much about dirt. Oh, sure, he mentions loess midway through, but he doesn't really ponder the significance of the matter. It's a good thing I have David Montgomery's Dirt: the Erosion of Civilizations.

Ah, Dirt. Montgomery's book is so good that I feel guilty reading it. Who knew dirt could be so fascinating? Actually, I enjoyed soil science back in college (the fact that I tended to fall asleep during lecture was strictly because the class was right after lunch and the room was warm, you know). I mean, I wasn't hardcore about it -- I drew the line at attending soil judging contests, which I considered a little over the top insofar as dirt-appreciation goes (although, really, I think I'd kick butt at one). Actually, you don't have to be a dirt-o-phile (dirthead?) to enjoy this book. A history buff would find it fascinating, as it gives a new look at the rise and fall of civilizations.

And, of course, when not reading up on China and/or dirt, I'm pulling out a copy of Eric Franklin's Conditioning for Dance along with some theraband knockoffs from Target. This is a book you don't so much read as experience. I work on the exercises myself, then share them with the kids as ways to dance with more ease. My interest in the subject was piqued by the amazing dance kinesiology posts at Taoknitter. I get such a thrill everytime my bloglines page shows that she's posted something new -- she's as exciting as, well, as dirt! I love to soak up the information I'm finding on how the body moves, and how to support children as they learn to move in ways dictated by dance or sports.

The above are all library books, being read with the tyranny of the due date in mind. The books I actually own tend to get shoved to the bottom of the stack. For example, I had originally gotten Enzymes for Autism and Other Neurologiacl Conditions through Interlibrary Loan; I hurried right through the book since it had large NO RENEWALS stamped all over it. And then I bought me own copy. I'm re-reading it now, after which I will loan it out to others that have expressed interest in the subject. Except, you know, there's no due date on it, so I don't have a deadline for finishing it. Which is a shame, because it's a life-changing book that I really should finish up and loan out.

Oh, and should I mention Ani's Raw Food Kitchen?. It's a really creative un-cook-book. I mean, once you get over how many trees were destroyed to fill the pages with photos of Ani, and once you get over the incredibly rambling writing style, and once you get over your hang up that a 100 percent raw vegan diet is deeply flawed, well then, you can enjoy the book. Raw cooks have some pretty creative food prep ideas, and Ani has some of the best of the lot.

I'm not counting in this list the various books our Sunday School has been studying, given that I never finished the last one (Ortberg's If You Want to Walk on Water) and haven't started the next one (Hybel's Too Busy Not to Pray). And, frankly, as I was starting to type that sentence my computer crashed, leaving me to ponder that maybe I'd get more reading done if I actually opened the books instead of sitting here writing about them. Must. Go. Read.

Homeschooling When You're Too Tired to Think

Yesterday we were tired and dull. Well, often we are dull, and tired happens, too, but we were exceptionally tired and dull after a busy weekend.

But we still need to learn stuff, by golly! Or, at least be able to write something educational down in our log book.

So.

Up in the morning, breakfast and a read aloud. Then head out to The Butterfly House. The Butterfly House has free admission for county residents on the morning of the first Tuesday of the month. They don't advertise this anywhere that I know of, and, frankly, I'm not sure of the exact hours it happens. But we take advantage of it whenever possible.

We looked over the various insects and arachnids on display in the entrance. My disaster-obsessed child has now turned her attention to brown recluse spiders, so we spent some time at that display; too bad the spider was being so, you know, reclusive.

Then on in to the actual butterfly house. It was a sunny day, and the butterflies were very active. We, on the other hand, were not active at all. I think the bromeliads were livelier than our group. As I saw the other moms busily engaging their children and doing stuff to make it educational, I felt that we were sort of zen in our calm acceptance of the butterflies flitting around us. Sometimes they landed on us. We were one with the scenery. We were ... tired.

On the way out, we stopped at the gift shop to pick up some chocolate covered ants. Scientific investigation at its finest! Comments from the back seat: "They just taste like chocolate, but the antennae prickle on your tongue," and "You can sort of feel the exoskeleton in your throat." We made it home without anyone barfing, including me (I chose not to indulge in this treat).

Lunch, and another read aloud. Then, yes, it's time for RETURN OF TUESDAY TEATIME.

Last spring we drifted away from Tuesday Teatimes, mostly because of Tuesday afternoon piano lessons. We have now moved piano lessons to another day. Why didn't we move Teatime to another day last spring? Well, for one thing, we liked the alliteration of Tuesday Teatime. Plus, we were busy pretty much every other afternoon, sigh.

The kids set up the teatime. This involved selecting a tablecloth and napkins, getting out plates and glasses, and decorating the table with a candle and fake insects:



Kid2 is decorating her cupcakes with frosting-in-a-tube, making ladybugs.

We had some mini cupcakes from Trader Joes, and some pink lemonade. Kid2 and I read out of Joyful Noise, Paul Fleischman's wonderful book of insect-themed poetry written to be read aloud by 2 people. She thought reading the poems aloud together was great fun; we'll probably continue to read these poems for the rest of the week.

Afterwards someone apparently thought it would be amusing to put doublestick tape on the insects and post them at various places throughout the house; last night I found a large roach crawling up the wall of the hallway (fairly startling, as the roach is the most lifelike of the batch) and this morning there was a gigantic unidentifiable something next to the light switch in the basement. Ahem. All you moms out there with all boys take note: having girls doesn't mean you get off scott-free from this sort of thing, although there's probably less of it going on in our house than in yours.

That night as we brushed teeth we found a few little black spots ... ants, perhaps, had stuck to the teeth all day? Who knows. All-in-all, it was an interesting day.

Note to Self: Turning a Heel and Attending a Feis Simultaneously Doesn't Work

Because I loose my place in both the heel and the feis.

We stayed at the Hyatt in downtown Kansas City. On the one hand, they goofed up our reservation regarding the roll-away bed and how many people would be staying in the room (hotels always goof up the roll-away, so we had brought our own aerobed). On the other hand, they had ESCALATORS! Right there near the check-in desk! So, like, when Mom is checking in, you can run over and ride up and down them several times!

The feis was at the Westin, which is connected to the Hyatt via a walkway. On Friday night we checked into the feis, rode the Westin escalators a few times, and visited the Irish Festival. We watched The Fuchsia Band, who we enjoyed (we spent most of the weekend singing their song Ceili Band ... except the only words we could remember were "we're a Ceili Band", so it was a bit monotonous). Overall, though, the event served to remind us that we really don't like street fairs that much. Oh well. The Hyatt gave out complimentary tickets to the Festival, so it wasn't as though we had spent out money on it. And the Festival did have a knitting contest -- the kids thought I should enter it. I didn't feel like messing with it, though. Maybe another year.

The feis itself was on Saturday, and was fun. I liked the layout -- it was easy to find everything (except the restrooms). The feis didn't charge for spectators, which was nice since many of us had invited Kansas City relatives to come see our kids compete. We were on stage E and stage F, along with all the other First Feis, Beginner 1, Beginner 2 and Novice. The room for stage E was a bit small, considering the number of spectators. I felt like I barely had room to knit



I was working on transforming August's UFO Resurrection sock into something I might actually finish knitting and perhaps even wear. I'm making up the pattern as I go along. So far this hasn't been the easiest project to carry along -- I seem to have lost one of the needles down the side of Mrs. Piano Teacher's chair last week, and making up a heel whilst simultaneously keeping track of where we are in the feis schedule really did. not. work. Of course, it didn't help that the Slip Jig competition went on forever, partially because one of the dancers threw up at the check-in station (I never did hear whether it was just nerves or what, let alone the answer to the primal question of did it get on her dress?).

Stage F was in a larger room, and blessedly cool. It was also right next to the hotel concessions. Grandma and Grandpa spent most of their time there.

Other thoughts on the feis: My older daughter was mortified that they were to sit in chairs in the waiting area, as she felt it crushed her dress. I liked that they clearly announced when the lunch break would be. I liked how caring the adjudicators were, pausing to publicly congratulate all the First Feis contestants for getting up and dancing (apparently one little boy on stage F was so distraught before dancing that the adjudicator went over to him and spent a few moments soothing him), and generally make sure the Beginners had a chance to have fun and do their best. They still managed to briskly wrap up the competitions we were involved in (in spite of the vomiting incident) by lunch time.

We collected our awards (some of which the sock is wearing in the above picture -- no, the sock didn't win a 2nd and 3rd, but that's part of our collection). I was impressed that the kids placed so well, considering that they had been up late riding escalators rather than practicing and/or getting a good night's sleep.

We spent the rest of the afternoon enjoying downtown Kansas City with some relatives, then swimming in the hotel pool, riding escalators, and watching the Irish Fest fireworks.

Sunday we checked out of the hotel, went to church with relatives, then over to my sister-in-law's house. We headed home later in the afternoon; I spent the ride undoing most of the knitting I'd done at the feis, then re-knitting it.

We were exhausted Monday morning, but had tickets for the Cardinal's game. Well, MrV and I had tickets. The kids went to a relative's house (which has a pool) here in St. Louis. I gotta tell you, these were Amazingly Good Seats, and if I had a camera phone I would've been calling Weaver to show her, since I know she would've been impressed. Mostly, though, I wanted to take a nap, and the game went downhill fast. Gees. You'd think the Cardinals had been up all night riding escalators or something.

So we have now Travelled to a Feis. And we had fun doing it. This puts us in the realm of hardcore Irish Dance families. Or maybe it's just that we like to ride escalators.

Just dropping by to say "hey"...

Note: this entry has been IMPROVED! It now has links to info about feising, for those who might wonder what I'm prattling on about. Irish dance competitions are sort of like a cult; it's hard to explain to an outsider. Or maybe it's just hard to explain to me, since I'm still not entirely sure why we feis. Anyway, if you have a burning desire to learn more, now you have some links.

I've had ideas for "real" blog posts, but no time to type them out.

At the moment we're getting ready for another feis.

Errand running is completed, I think. We now have a new camp stool ($4.98 in the Walmart hunting department; it has a camo look to it) so Kid1 can sit down without fear of crushing the stiffening in her dress. We have new glue sticks to glue socks onto legs, since Kid2 can never get her old glue stick open (I think it got glued shut in the excitement of July's feis). We have non-messy snacks. We have a printout of our stage assignments with our dances highlighted, thanks to the aid of a more experienced mom who assured me the assignments really and truly were on Feisworx (I was looking on the wrong page -- oops). We have boatloads of bobbypins for our dancer who will wear a wig. We have a new jar of setting gel for our dancer who will have to suffer through having her hair set on spikes once again, although she really, really, really wants a wig bad (the other wig was given to us, else we wouldn't even have it).

(Tips for attending feiseanna here, although you can't take flash pictures either, so I'm not sure what's up with saying you can. Oh, wait,this is better. Shoot, I wish I could find one with pictures, so you could see the mayhem of hundreds of curly-haired girls running amok. Frankly, this list is my favorite, buty it maybe has too many inside jokes.)

Kid1 is polishing her ghillies. Kid2 is on notice that she needs to practice her dances with the wig on, so she doesn't freak out about wearing it. I need to mow the lawn and vacuum, just because life goes on whether we're at a feis or not.

I can't believe there are families who go to feiseanna pretty much every weekend. Yeesh. Once a month is more than enough for me. How did I get sucked into this lifestyle?

Cool Enough to Try On Sahara

Yes, the temperatures have finally dropped to the point we can open the windows and listen to the neighbor call for her cats incessantly. (She seems to enjoy letting them out at night, then getting all wound up that they aren't waiting by the door to be let in next morning. Phase 2 of this scenario will be when she comes over later this morning and announces she's sure one of the has been eaten by a coyote. She must enjoy this, right? because she does it, oh, maybe once a week at least.)

And I quickly donned Sahara for a photo:



The photo was snapped quickly, too, as I was working between sneezes and nose-blowing (see those tissues in easy reach?) and coughing fits.

I think the t-shirt I have under it is rumpled, thus some of the lumps down the back. I think I have no interest in wearing a sleeveless, close-fitting top at this time of year. I think I have enough yarn to make some sleeves. I think the bottom looks sort of wonky in this picture, possibly because it IS sort of wonky. I think that having knit it top-down doesn't make a huge difference in my decision to maybe redo the bottom, since I am not averse to cutting the bottom off of a sweater knit bottom-up and redoing it (been there, done that). I think the entire "top-down means you can try it on as you go" was sort of useless given the neckline of this thing, since it was hard to judge fit until the neckline was finished.

Mostly I think I shouldn't critique sweaters while my neurons are clogged with snot. I am maybe not in my brightest, most positive mood today.

Knit in Classic Silk by Classic Elite Yarns. No idea how many balls it took since I have no idea how many I had to begin with.

Fever

Another insight into our family life: if I sign us up for homeschool classes at the Science Center, someone in our family will develop a fever that day. Every. Single. Time.

This is made more memorable by the Science Center policy of paying in advance (probably to cut down on the no-shows). They need payment for every person who will be in a classroom, not just the students. In other words, if you were to have a child that is going to freak out being in a class with a bunch of strangers without a parent or older sibling around so you decide to go ahead and sit in the back of the classroom not really participating, just sort of existing (even though this means you miss out on the free Segway rides homeschool parents are offered while waiting for their child) you have to pay for that. Which means if your family doesn't show up, you've lost even more money.

We like to rotate who gets sick, instead of having the same person get sick each time. This time it was Kid1. If it is possible for an illness to have an accompanying fever, she will develop one. As a matter of fact, if whatever is going around usually has an accompanying fever, she will develop a higher one that most people. It's just the way her body works.

After living with her for years, it now seems like an interesting phenomenon. It wasn't always something I would've called "interesting", though. When she was an infant she gave us our first Scary Moment in Parenting when she had a febrile seizure. After that I found myself reading a lot about fever in children, particularly in books like The Holistic Pediatrician by Kathi J. Kemper, MD (I remember sitting beside the bed reading the passage on fever over and over during the night one night while Kid1 tossed and turned beside me), Take Charge of Your Child's Health by George Wootan, and Naturally Healthy Babies and Children by Aviva Jill Romm (who I've often wished would come take care of me when I'm sick).

Having absorbed the message in those books, I view occasional high temps as a natural part of life. We rarely use antipyretics such as ibuprofen and acetaminophen. As a matter of fact, I'm pretty shocked when I hear someone casually comment, "I realized my child had a fever, so I gave him/her some Tylenol". It seems to me a knee-jerk response to a natural immune function. The important things for the child are rest and plenty of liquids.

Overall, fevers aren't scary around here anymore, just exasperating when they always pop up for certain events. By the way, it's my turn next to get sick when we plan a trip to the Science Center. Just saying.

More about childhood fevers here and here. And, yoohoo, yes, I know there are exceptions when high temps do need to be brought down. That's why God gave us brains, so we can discern those times.

(This post written in part so I'm less inclined to write caustic comments when I read on blogs or discussion boards that parents are pumping their kids full of antipyretics. I've now said my piece on fevers, so I can more easily keep my mouth shut when others blurt out things I consider, ummm, less well-informed on this subject. I'm trying to think of a label for this sort of post, because there are some other things I read and hear regularly that bug the snot out of me, and I really and truly do wish to be tactful and polite, but, criminy, what the heck are people thinking when they do some of this stuff. I know we're all trying to do the best for our kids with the information we've got, but I think sometimes people don't have the best info. Suggestions? )

Ruminating on the odd places life takes us ...

I was just out putting a sprinkler in our backyard when I heard the phone ring. MrV had found this news report, and thought the 4th photo down on the left side looked like our old neighborhood (the one we were living in 2 years ago today).

I'm not so sure -- I talked to a former neighbor just yesterday morning, and she said the water was up over the side street, but hadn't actually come over the section of street we lived on. Of course, that was 6 inches ago, I think, so who knows.

There have been days I've regretted moving away from small town America. Life in big town America seems so much more complex, y'know? But right now my dry little city neighborhood feels pretty cozy.

RightStart Geometry

The continuing saga of our adventures using RightStart Geometry and RightStart B. I have an 11yo and a 7yo who have average math ability.The 11yo has done Miquon, Singapore, RightStart Transitions, Level D and Level E; RightStart has saved her from a life a math phobia.

I try to update our adventures on Tuesdays, although sometimes it doesn’t get done until Wednesday. And sometimes we really haven’t done that much math, so I skip it entirely.


RightStart Geometry:

(I think we have skipped some lessons here in my chronicle of our time with RightStart. I suspect Kid1 did them last June and I never got around to commenting on them.)

Lesson131 Basic Trigonometry

Day one:

I am not prepared to be “back to school”, but Kid1 has decided to bustle around doing school this morning. Her resolve to get into the school groove starts to crumble as she reads through the RightStart explanation of trigonometry. I read through it -- it’s thorough and succinct. I help her through the first problem, finding sine, cosine and tangent of a 45 degree right triangle, showing my work on the chalkboard (I love doing math on a chalkboard -- whiteboards just don’t cut it for the tactile satisfaction). Her eyes are glazed, she keeps asking why, as in why the heck would anyone DO this? I suggest we drop it for today and try a different approach tomorrow.

Day two:

I have googled various websites on the uses of trigonometry, trying to choose ones that will interest her. She is unimpressed. Next we get out Zaccaro’s Challenge Math and read through the chapter on trigonometry in it. I point out the exciting concept that triangles can be different sizes yet have the same ratio of opposite side/adjacent side. She rolls her eyes at this -- it is such old news. But she starts to realize that this isn’t some weird new branch of math someone dreamed up just to torment innocent young students -- this is a logical outgrowth of things she already knows.

We look at a few of the word problems in Challenge Math but decide against doing them. I like the way RightStart approaches trig better, mostly because it’s the way I learned trig many years ago.

Day three:

Ready to tackle the RightStart worksheet again. We work through the sine, cosine and tangent of a 30-60 triangle together, using the chalkboard. Then she starts filling the The Chart -- it’s a chart of sine, cosine and tangent of 5 degrees, 10 degrees, 15 degrees, etc. on up to 85 degrees. She is to measure triangles on the second worksheet, then use her measurements for her calculations. No indication is given whether it would be better to measure in metric or inches, but she decides metric would be more accurate.

I am on alert, since I’ve noticed that this business of measuring can turn into disaster -- sometimes the reproduction of the worksheets is a scootchy bit off, leading to different interpretations of length. Since she’s going to be using millimeters to calculate, she could rapidly end up with an answer that’s fairly different from what it should be (especially since she’s to use the table she’s making for the next lesson). We hit on a strategy -- first of all, I look at the answer sheet and discover that every hypotenus is 10 centimeters. Aha -- I figured there would be some constant somewhere, since that’s the way elementary math books tend to work. Plus “10” is easy to divide by, so it makes oodles of sense that every hypotenus would be ten.

I keep the answer sheet out. She measures the sides of each triangle, then tells me what she gets for the measurement. I tell her what the answer sheet says. We quickly ponder the difference (can she see why they called it what they did?), then she uses the “official measure” for her calculations. I draw traingles on the chalkboard for her and label the angles and sides with A,B,C,a,b,c. She soon sees the patterns that are forming with her answers (which is why it’s so cool to do this exercise, and why I wanted to do it instead of just doing the Chalenge Math -- you can discover the relationships between sine, cosine and tangents of the various angles as you calculate them).

The lesson took 3 days and plenty of parental involvement, but in the end she is confident that trigonometry is something she can deal with.

Lesson 132 Solving Trig Problems

Kid1 zips through this lesson, using the chart of trig ratios from lesson 131. She feels good about this.

The discussion of Problem 1 comments that “your answer may not quite agree with the solution. Trig ratios cannot be calculated very accurately by measuring as you did.” Umm, I feel like we’ve been caught cheating on yesterday’s chart!

Lesson 133 Comparing Calculators

MrV’s scientific calculator uses Reverse Polish Notation, so I decide to spring for the calculator specified in the book instead of making do with his. I bought our Casio fx300MS from Amazon since our local Target didn’t have it and I was able to get free shipping (driving around town looking for one was going to use up as much gas as the price differential).

It looks rather like a Star Trek data pad, which makes it a very satisfying addition to our household. The kids quickly figured out how to use it. Kid1 didn’t make it all the way through the worksheet, though, as she started feeling woozy, heralding a fever. She'll get back to this lesson after she recovers.

UFO Resurrection for August

Frankly, the 105F temperature has sucked away my will to live, let alone my interest in knitting. And my UnFinished Object pile struck me as particularly icky this month; it appeared to me the best thing for it was to pitch the entire pile in the trash bin. Then again, everything has been striking me as particularly icky this month and in need of pitching in the trash -- see above comment about temperature.

But we have reached a moment of crisis -- we are to go to a High School Musical 2 party tonight, and I need some knitting to take along. And I have nothing "current" (as opposed to "icky unfinished object") on the needles.** And heaven forbid I face an evening of watching a movie with nothing to do but sit and watch the movie. That just seems so ... warped.

(Aside: Actually, we had never seen the original High School Musical until last night, when we watched it on the Disney Channel in preparation for tonight's event. We are so out of touch with current popular culture. Sigh.)

(Aside to the above aside: We are so out of touch with current culture that when the kids are playing dolls I overhear the dolls being made to say things like: "I'm calling my boyfriend on my cell phone. My boyfriend is Rafael Nadal. We're secretly engaged." And while I'm impressed that they came up with a male figure who isn't part of Star Trek or Star Wars, I can't help but think that choosing Rafael Nadal over someone a little more mainstream like, say, Zac Efron is a bit odd.

Then again, these are kids who have a mom who's currently panicking about what knitting to take to a movie, so maybe I shouldn't be too surprised. Our family is always on a different page than everybody else. Sometimes we're not even in the same book)

So I dragged out the box of sock yarn to spend some time in quiet contemplation. And I discovered this:



I was making a Caeser's Check mosaic sock out of Lorna's Laces Bee Stripe with Lorna's Laces black for my dad, Purdue fan extraordinaire (Purdue's colors are gold and black, in case any readers are heathen enough to not know the school colors of all the Big 10 schools). The pattern is from Charlene Schurch's Sensational Knitted Socks. I really like mosaic knitting, and I think that's a nifty looking sock-start there BUT the black yarn with the black-and-gold yarn was Too Much Black to Knit This Pattern -- I needed high beam lights to keep track of where I was in the mosaic pattern. So I had ripped out the needles and shoved it in the bag.

(I'm glad I ripped out the needles, else I might be tempted to start knitting it again ... and in about 2 more inches I'd be hating myself.)

Ooooooh, if I rip this up, I could start a pair of socks from the Bee Stripe with black ribbing, toe and heel ... just in time for football season, too. I could make them for me. Or my dad. Or MrV. Or, heck, my mom would probably like a pair of handknit socks.

So, still some details to hammer out, like what pattern, and for whom. And still the perilous journey to the bottomless pit of needles to find appropriate tools. But I think I'll be set to watch Zac Efron tonight; and since Rafael Nadal has withdrawn from Cincinnati, Zac is where it's at for now.

**Sahara is totally knit and blocked. No pic, though, since if I put it on touches my skin, and in this weather I need loose clothing or else I start frantically clawing the offending garment.

Sensitive to the Subtle Signs That the Kids Are Ready to Start School

I got out of the shower yesterday morning and heard voices downstairs. Voices that were not my children or Jim Weiss (we have a lot of Jim Weiss audio books, so hearing his voice around the house is pretty normal). As I reached the stairs I realized it was ... Rosetta Stone.

Yes, Kid1 had popped Rosetta Stone Spanish into the computer and was contemplating whether the hands and eyes were opened or closed. When I got downstairs she finished up and asked if I could read her a list of spelling words. After fumbling through Spelling Power to figure out where we had left off when we abruptly lost interest last spring, I read a list. She did well with it, then moved on to Mavis Beacon typing.

I returned to my grousing that I'd never had a proper summer vacation -- days spent lazing at the pool or watching Doris Day movies without a care in the world -- and generally fumbling around the kitchen in a Monday morning haze. And she popped back into the room to ask if I remembered where she'd left off in the Latin book.

"Didn't you have some work or something you were sticking in a notebook somewhere? Couldn't you look at it and sort of figure out where you are?" (Couldn't you not expect me to have a clue?)

"Oh, yes, it's the blue notebook. Could you hand it to me, please? The blue one is for Latin, not the purple. Hand me the blue one, please."

Yeesh, I'm trying to remember what I usually do on Monday morning to keep the household running, and she's expecting me to remember what the Latin notebook looks like? Give me a break.

After Latin the perky let's-get-going-on-school came to a halt when she got out RightStart Geometry. After reminding me several times that she was going to need a scientific calculator soon ("It's only 2 more lessons, so I'll need it later this week. I think I saw some at Office Depot. Do you think you could go there in the next couple of days?") she plunged into the next lesson. Trigonometry.

And came to a screeching halt.

"Mommy, I think I need some help"

and

"Why do I have to know this?"

Oh, joy of sine, cosine, and tangent. I had a wonderful teacher for trig. He was inspiring. The best math teacher I ever had. He lead us into trigonometry as though we were explorers working together to chart a new country. I could draw those waves in my sleep, we studied it so thoroughly. How do I convey this to my child?

We set the book aside. I told her we'd try a different approach on a different day. I'm not ready for this yet -- the entire morning caught me by surprise, and an impromptu discussion of Why Trig Is Cool was beyond me.

Like it or not, we seem to be back to school in our homeschool.

Black Is Not My Color and Helmet Liners Are Not My Style

Ready to send off to 5 Element Knitter:



where it will be sent to someone who values functionality over looks.

Knit in Cascade 220 Superwash, with quite a little pile of yarn left over from the skein. I went down a needle size, assuming that my guage would be massively larger than that called for in the patterm (I'm a loose knitter). The liner still fits my large head quite nicely, so I think the size came out okay.

(I just re-read that last sentence, and it sounds as though I have several heads I tried it on. "Oh, look, it fits on my LARGE head, but on my smaller one it's a bit loose!" No, I'm not related to Zaphod Beeblebrox. I'm just too tired and hazy to figure out better syntax.)

Knitting Needles Revealed

Or, "Why I Stay Out of Needle Organization Discussions" (given that I have maybe a few more knitting needles than many knitters)

The double points are fairly easy to deal with. Some are missing from the shot, of course. I can think of at least 4 sets stuck in projects around and about the house. And I KNOW I have several sets of size 3 double points, so who knows where the rest of those are.



The circulars are a little tougher. There are at least 5-6 circs not pictured, currently at work on projects. This number (5-6 missing) assumes I remember what projects I have currently "on the needles", which is, of course, poppycock. I often open a canvas bag and discover some knitted thing taking shape (sometimes I have no idea what it was I was working on; like, there's this pink thing in the closet that I'm really puzzled by. What was it supposed to be?).


The Addis and Crystal Palace are definitely mine; the large ziplocs with marker definitely Grandma's. Who knows who bought the rest.

I store all of the needles in a large plastic tub. The double points and circulars form the upper layer. After digging through those packages, things get sort of odd. We have the bag of a dozen stitch holders (Grandma aparently believed you could never have too many stitch holders), the bag of miscellaneous cable needles and needle-sizers, and then the black moire taffeta needle holder:



Oh, hey, there are some more double points in there! How about that! The needle holder belonged to someone else, who either died or lost interest in knitting (is there a difference?). The needle case was then given to Grandma, who gave it to me. It's very nice, and can hold about as many needles size 1-6 as most knitters would ever need, except for the lack of space for circulars.

But, of course, most of my single point needles don't fit in it:


This is the bottom layer of the plastic tub. And, yes, there are some missing from the shot due to their obligations with knitting projects in my closet or on the nightstand or ... somewhere. The ones in the rubber band are the latest installment from Grandma.

(Note the rogue wooden crochet hooks that missed the crochet hook photo shoot a few days ago. They are decades old; I'm not sure if they were Grandma's or Great-Grandma's.)

I am so beyond the concept of storing needles artfully in a vase


I was going to get a better shot of this, and I was thinking about lining them up end to end and seeing how far they'd stretch, but then I realized that my neighbor was in her yard, watching me kneeling in the ivy taking pictures of 50 pairs of knitting needles whilst still clad in my jammies. Suddenly my creative flow screetched to a halt. But you can click on for a close up, if you'd like. And, yes, I did take a quick count of the needles themselves, and there are 100 needles there.

Recent Knitting

My UFO Resurrection sweater for July made great progress during the past month:



The sleeveless version of Sahara, knit in Classic Elite's Classic Silk. I found the rest of the yarn I was using, I seem to be knitting it in the same size I had planned. All I have left to do is pick up the stitches for the neck, then block. The problem is that "pick up the stitches for the neck" business, as this requires getting out a longer circular needle than the one I used to pick up and knit around the armholes. And going and getting the correct needle out? Well, let's just say the needle-control situation here is totally lacking. It's overwhelming. It's a mess.

(By the way, I also have fabric for a coordinating skirt, so now I have an entire Unfinished Outfit piled up here!)

So instead of dealing with finding the correct needle, I cast on something else, something using easy-to-locate needles:



A helmet liner. Except now I'm to the point that I need to switch to double points. Which means getting out needles. Which I really, really do not want to have to deal with.

I'd rather go mow the lawn in the 100F heat, then go swimming.

Aaahhh! At Last I Have a Chance to Put My Feet Up

Yes, the houseguest is on his way home, and I have a few moments to relax before starting to prepare for the next batch later this week. Houseguest A was certainly a lively guest. Within about 24 hours of arrival he had re-injured his eardrum (it had ruptured last week, a fact which he forgot about until after he dove deeply into the swimming pool and felt it "go") and lost a contact (a prescription of 5.5, which in contact-speak basically means "I cannot see without these").

How nice that in the midst of the mayhem I got this ultra-cool package from Irishgirlieknits:



featuring not only the lovely, soft socks (which, by the way, smell like my sock-knitting-friend's house, which is just a hoot), a bar of Ocean Mist soap from River Soap Co., a package of Soak to try, a cute little memo book to carry in my knitting bag which I can theoretically use to keep track of what I'm doing, Emperor Norton Sourdough Snacks, Notorious Sock Knitters bumper sticker, card with beach/knitting photo that she took herself (as we are now living in a landlocked state, beach pictures seem so exotic), and a mini-skein on a ring.

Close-up of socks in their former life before being torn away from their beach-going former life here. Okay, I don't know if these socks ever hit the beach, but the poor things are arriving in the nation's armpit in the midst of a heat-alert, with temperatures around 100F and a heat index even higher, and a relative humidity of instant-sweat-percent. It's the sort of weather that leaves you exhausted whenever you engage in activities like, oh, you know, blinking. It must be a comedown from their former life.

BUT, I will love, love, love them with all of my heart. I can't wait until it's cool enough to wear socks again.

In Which I Discover I Have the Coolest Sockapalooza Pal Ever

I am up to my eyeballs in life right now. As a matter of fact, those eyeballs are starting to leak tears at random intervals due to sheer stress.

And I totally forgot to expect a sock package anytime soon.

And it came today and it is so cool beyond words. But no pics, because I have no time to mess with iPhoto and Blogger (they often don't like to play nicely together). You'll just have to trust me that the socks are perfect. Quote from Kid1: "I want socks exactly like that for Christmas." Hmmm, her feet are about the same size as mine, so I'm going to have to keep on eye on her to make sure these don't disappear from my sock drawer.

Pictures of the coolness will appear in a few days when (please oh please let it finally happen) I get a break.

But for now, just know that I am loving these new socks and soap and memo pad (which Kid2 is trying to claim) and chips and note about Irish dance! (the kids don't do the team dances, you're right).

Gotta go deal with ... stuff. But with a little bounce back in my step now!

Plans

Okay, the general plan for this week was to have a few quiet days taking the kids to the pool, maybe getting a haircut, maybe making an appointment with an opthamologist, and generally recovering from the Big Stressful Event aluded to in my previous post (the BSE was actually the An Samhra Feis, about which more later).

Much staring at the wall was planned. Also, I'm starting to feel guilty about not planning out our next year of homeschooling, other than a vague idea to continue what we've been doing so far. It seems like I should be planning it down to the week, at least, if not down to the day. Other homeschoolers are posting their Big Plans, or at least mentioning that they have Big Plans. I am so very UnPlanned. Yikes!

But now my plan for my planning week has already been shot down, as I have discovered that we are having out of town visitors for much of the week.

In other words, I am apparently unable to even plan on planning.

Ah well.

The feis went well Saturday, as far as I could tell. We've only been to one feis before, back in February, so we don't have a huge feild of comparison. The one in February seemed like mayhem, but I think the first feis you ever walk into ALWAYS appears to be mayhem (plus that one had icky weather, and was the same weekend as the Mardi Gras parade nearby, which made parking tough, and meant many drinking parade-goers wearing Mardi Gras beads were wandering around outside the hotel, while hundreds of girls with those surrealistic curly wigs and gaudy dresses were wandering around inside the hotel, and, well, it was just mind boggling). We came away Saturday with some medals and some new friendships, which I think is a pretty good thing. Parking was bad, although I expected that, given the venue. Kid1 broke a bracket eating a cup of ice cream from the Cold Stone Creamery there, so that was pretty weird (another unplanned event -- a trip to the orthodontist this afternoon).

I still have reels playing in my head. Listening to 4 hours straight of Irish music will do that to you. I can't imagine what it's like to have to stay there all day for the later competitions. Let that be a warning to those of you considering Irish Dance as a hobby.

(A year ago I would've read this post and wondered what the heck a "feis" is. It's an Irish Dance contest. The world of Irish Dancing is very ... unique and unexpected. There were over 800 people entered in this feis; I saw maybe a dozen boys, and 3 adults amongst the competitors. The rest were girls, almost all of whom had The Hair and some variation of The Dress. You have to see it to believe it.)

Vacation Bible School

This week has been VBS week here at our house. The kids are going, but I'm not. They've got some sort of space theme going, as you can see by this flying saucer that Kid2 made during craft time:



Why, yes, that IS the symbol for the Star Trek version of the Galactic Empire (the mirror universe that showed up in the original series and in Star Trek Enterprise; Kid2 knows it from the Enterprise series). An interesting choice for a Bible School craft. I found myself pondering which is more important: spreading the Gospel in the ruthless, assassination-prone Galactic Empire, or spreading the Gospel in the godless, New Agey Federation. But I'm not involved oin helping with VBS this year, so these deep ponderings will go undiscussed. (That piece of paper on the edge is covering her name, by the way -- it isn't some funky docking port.)

One weird quirk about VBS this year -- when I pull into the driveway after picking the kids up there's a doe standing in the neighbor's yard. The same doe, day after day. She just sort of stares at us, her mouth full of Stella D'Oro daylilies. Then she wanders off to check out the geraniums. I feel a little guilty for not scaring her off (the neighbor really likes those daylilies), but it's all so surreal that I find myself hesitating.

What I've been doing whilst children are learning about VBS-type stuff:

Day One: Browse in bookstore. Shop at Whole Foods without having to spend 15 minutes at gelato bar -- heck, I didn't even LOOK at the gelato bar. Purchase magazine and pastry for myself; sit at home with cat on my lap enjoying both.

Day Two: Sew. Complete pair of capri pants for Kid2 (amazing what you can get done with no interruptions). Read book from library. Eat Snap Pea Crisps.

Day Three: Sit at Midas in cold waiting room while brake pads are replaced. Alternate knitting and reading library book while waiting, waiting, waiting. This takes entire VBS time, but now my brakes are much more brakey, and not making that odd noise.

Day Four: Run errands relating to Big Stressful Event taking place Saturday (this is the event I've been dreading for about 4 months now; it's here, it's happening, and I'm about to throw up from nervous anticipation). Also, browse in bookstore more, and finally find new journal.

Day Five: Today! Blog! Clean house! Make lists of things to be done by Big-Stressful-Event-time tomorrow, as well as lists of things to take along.

VBS is over early today, so I must get moving. Blogging will probably become more regular after I recover from Big Stressful Event. I think I might even think about homeschooling again -- you know, start thinking about what we might do this coming year other than taking the car to be repaired, sewing, knitting and watching Star Trek.

That night I dreamt of seam rippers

I was in a fabric store and saw a really FUN fabric -- polka dots! in pink and green and black! Fun! And could coordinate with, well, with pink or green or black!

Oh boy! What FUN pattern could I use to sew this up? How about something with a flounce, because nothing is quite so FUN as a flounce! Better yet, an asymmetrical flounce, because asymmetrical is not only FUN, but also whimsical. Ooooh, a FUN, whisical skirt ... I can hardly wait.

I traced out a skirt from Ottobre Woman 2/2007 -- design #13. And that flounce was hard to trace, by the way. I ended up using yellow highlighter on the original so I could follow the pattern lines on the Pattern Ease.

And I whipped up that FUN skirt.



(Still working on how to shoot a non-flash non-blurry picture in a somewhat dirty mirror, as you can see)

Oh. Oops. Just because the fabric and pattern are both FUN doesn't mean they should be used together. Even the cat looks as though she is rolling her eyes.

MrV commented that the higher swoop of the flounce looked like I had fabric bunched up in my undies. Which struck me as pretty funny. But, really, how can you wear a skirt in public after a comment like that? Also, this length makes my legs look fat. Also, I was sewing with the windows open whilst someone in this town was playing Led Zeppelin's Houses of the Holy at such a volume that not only did it flatten all the trees in a 5 mile radius, but it also lodged itself in the very fiber of this skirt so every time I look at it I hear the song in my head.

Well, what did I learn from this experience?

Invisible zippers are a heck of a lot easier to put in with an invisible zipper foot. Last time I tried one I used a regular zipper foot. It was not a good experience. This one pratically put itself in. I felt like I was cheating.

Putting in petersham at the waistband is a cinch, and does work well.

Ottobre skirt patterns have bigger fronts than backs. Its been ages since I sewed an American skirt pattern, but I vaguely remember that the backs are bigger than the fronts. I suppose this causes it to hang differently. Or perhaps European women are built differently. Next time, though, I will make the front smaller.

Also, having chosen the size based on my hip measure (per the Ottobre suggestion) this was huge in the waist. I deepened the darts, and added an extra set of darts in the back. Next time I will alter the waist before cutting out.

I have discovered an inner compulsion to finish items even though they don't look that great. I hemmed it and tacked the lining to the zipper after I realized I will probably never wear it.

And, most of all, I really really need to get a grip on visualizing what finished items are actually going to look like when put together and placed on my body.

(I really did dream of seam rippers after I made this. They were dancing around like the dishes in Disney's Beauty and the Beast. Amazingly enough, they were NOT dancing to Led Zeppelin.)

Crochet Hooks

All fiber-craft bits and bobs in our extended family eventually filter down to me. Fabric, yarn, knitting needles, quilt frame, embroidery hoops, tatting shuttles ... eventually someone decides that I am heir apparent to these collections.

My grandma was particularly fond of crochet. Now that she has passed away I have all of her hooks.



It doesn't look like such a huge collection in this little photo, but believe me, that's a lot of crochet hooks to have in one place.

Some of these are my hooks, particularly some of the large ones. The ones with tape around the bottom are ones I used to teach crochet at Girl Scouts (the tape identified them as loaners for the girls who didn't happen to have a hook).

But those little steel ones? Those are pretty much all Grandma's.

Crochet was the first fiber craft she loved. She used to carry her crochet with her everywhere, tucking it into her pocket. One day she was walking along the lane, crochet in pocket. A neighbor was driving by in his horse-and-wagon (this was when Grandma was a young girl, you know). The neighbor offered her a ride. She jumped up in the wagon. And the crochet hook went right into her leg, digging right into the flesh, hook-end first. Years later she was fairly succinct about the incident -- it hurt a lot and was very hard to pull back out.

I find myself looking at these hooks and wondering if one of them is the actual hook in the story.

I think that would've been enough to put me right off of crochet. But she kept with it. And, towards the end she gave up quilting and knitting, but she stuck with the crochet.

Grandma died 2 years ago. But her legacy remains.

Downsizing

My parents have decided it's time to sell their 3-bedroom house and move to a smaller apartment. This move involves clearing out quite a bit of Stuff.

Most of the furniture has been taken care of, as well as the yardwork related items (we now own a hammock and a snowblower, among other things). And now they're getting down to the real knitty-gritty of moving -- sorting through the momentos of a lifetime, deciding which to keep.

Through the years people have been quite fond of giving my parents handmade gifts. Quite, quite fond, as a matter of fact. I'm not sure what it is about Mom and Dad that radiates "hey, if you make stuff why not give us a sample?" Dad is a retired pastor; perhaps people like to give their pastor handmade gifts? (And, if so, does that indicate love or passive-aggressive thoughts about religion? There have been those items that make one pause and wonder ... most of those have quietly disappeared in previous moves, though.)

This afghan didn't make the cut to go to the new apartment, so I rescued it from the Goodwill bag:



It was woven on a Weavette. Each square has a finished size of 3.25 inches; there are 192 squares. Those grey squares are green in real life.

The guy who wove it (no clue what his name is -- Mom and Dad remember, but he wasn't a close friend of the family) finished it off with cross stitch and a crocheted border:



At least I assume he finished it off himself. Maybe he farmed that part out. Who knows? But, isn't it a triumph of the imagination? How many people with palm-sized looms would decide to weave up a couple hundred squares, put them together into a throw, and then give it to someone with whom they don't have a close personal relationship?

How did he design it? I can picture coloring in squares on graph paper, but who knows. Perhaps there are Weavette patterns floating around in books (this was before the Internet, so I know he didn't simply download it).

By the way, Mom and Dad's house sold within a week, so they'll be moving later this month. In the meantime, they've learned that Dad has a rapidly growing cancer, so he will also be starting radiation treatments this month. Sigh. This was already earmarked as The Most Stressful Month of 2007 on our calendars due to the huge number of Important Things We Must Do this month, which means we can't be there to help them. On the bright side, if we all make it through all of this, the rest of the year should be a piece of cake in comparison.

UFO Resurrection for July

It's time to get back to Sahara



One could argue that this didn't really achieve UFO status since I always planned to return to it once I finished the Sockapalooza socks.

But it HAD reached what-a-mess-I'd-like-to-stick-this-in-a-bag-and-forget-about-it status. When I pulled it out to work on it the other day I realized that I had no idea where I was in the pattern, and didn't really recall what size I was making. After about an hour of fiddling around with it yesterday I managed to figure out where I am (I think I'm at the waist, although I wouldn't be surprised to discover otherwise) and the probable size. I even managed to knit a row.

I'd feel better about plunging into this UFO resurrection if I had any inkling where I put the rest of the yarn. Once I finish this skein I may return to the stick-this-in-a-bag-and-forget-about-it method of dealing with this sweater.

Stay tuned.