Spring is in the Air

Check out the new spring shoes!

I've actually had these for a couple of months, but it only just occurred to me that they'd look great with handknit socks. (I mean, of course, in a knitterly sort of way. I'm not expecting to see this look in Vogue anytime soon.) I rarely wear my handknit socks, because I don't see the point when they're hidden in shoes, and because mine always seem to slide down. I'm not sure if that's because I make them too big, or my ankles are too thick, or all my slip on shoes (the only kind I wear--I'm lazy that way) pull them down as I walk. Whatever the reason, it hasn't been a problem at all with these shoes. I think the strap over the instep holds the socks in place.

(How do you get a good picture of your own feet?) I know I've said before that I don't much like knitting socks--too much work for something no one is going to see anyway, and those dpn's get a bit old, but with shoes like these...

...who can resist? (And note the single, extra-long circular needle--one of the women at my knitting group showed me the magic loop method, in about ten seconds. So. Much. Easier!)

Growing Pains

Doing a home improvement project is like growing out your bangs: they both look worse before they look better.

This is the bathroom yesterday morning:

And this is the bathroom this afternoon, after a visit from the dry waller, some quality time with the tile saw, and several hours of crawling around on the floor and cursing silently (okay, quietly):

Slow but noticeable improvement. The drywall patch still needs priming, painting, and tile. The floor needs grouting and sealing, and another trip to Home Depot for baseboards is in order. But the ugly yellow sheet vinyl (and some very scary stuff that was stuck to it) is now history. I would be ecstatic if I weren't so tired. Tiling always wears me out. I think it's the crawling around on the floor and getting up and down a thousand times with heavy pieces of tile. But with a couple of tiling jobs under my belt, I was confident enough to try something a little more difficult and laid this tile on the diagonal, instead of in straight lines. I really like the result. Much more interesting. It's kind of like quilting, without all the sewing.

A Thoroughly Messed Up Day of Minor Disasters

Some days you just shouldn't get out of bed.

Exhibit 1: One of the printers in our home office was smudging, so the DH decided to carry it down to the kitchen to clean it. The office is upstairs at the front of the house; the kitchen is downstairs at the back of the house, and the kitchen sink is the farthest possible point in the house from the printer's home on the office desk. I now know exactly how far it is, thanks to the trail of large, black, liquid ink pools that we spent the morning cleaning off the carpet, the stairs, the wood floors, our shoes...

Exhibit 2: I laid the tile on the bathroom floor yesterday. This morning the dry waller called and said he could come out to fix the hole in the wall. Not wanting to miss this unprecedented opportunity, I checked the tiles and deemed the adhesive "dry enough" for him to walk on. I was wrong. Totally, completely, horribly wrong. After he left, I went in and discovered that my carefully-measured, marked, spaced, and leveled tiles were...not. Not spaced, not leveled, not measured. They had, in fact, slid in all directions everywhere he had stepped or knelt. This was not his fault. He had carefully laid a sheet of dry wall atop the tiles and covered that with a tarp, but the adhesive just wasn't set up yet. I almost cried. I spent the rest of the morning carefully prying and sliding and spacing the tiles, trying to shift them gently back into position without breaking whatever bonds they might have formed with the floor.

Exhibit 3: The bride-to-be of Icarus fame is completely out of control. I suspected she might be heading down that very slippery slope when she had an engagement party and two bridal showers, all of which her bridesmaids (of whom I am one) were expected to attend, bearing gifts, notwithstanding the fact that none of us live in the same city. I was pretty sure she was well on her way when she sent out a call for "one or more" of her bridesmaids to come to her final dress fitting to learn "how to put it on"--even though the closest of us lives over an hour away. And folks, I know we ostentatiously call it a "bridal gown" but it's just a dress. I even wore one myself. I don't need a lesson on how to fasten hooks and button buttons. Now she wants to have a "spa day" with her bridesmaids, next weekend, again near her home, which is a three-hour drive each way for me. Aside from the expense (gas, spa treatments, and lunch for myself and my share of hers), I actually do have a life, which includes, on the day in question, one music lesson, two karate classes, football signups, a birthday party, and a trip to Nana's house. I politely, and without so much as a tiny white lie, explained that I just can't make it, please go on without me. I got an indignant email in return, suggesting that we either make it for a different day or meet the Friday before the Sunday morning wedding, three hours from my house, for a girls' day. I already have to spend two days--one for the rehearsal, one for the wedding--away from home. But now we should get together a day earlier to...what? Talk about how exciting this all is and how happy we are for her? It is, and I am, but I've about exhausted my stock of things to say about it. And frankly, I think I've already spent more on this wedding than I did on my own.

With the sort of day I'm having, I'm not about to handle sharp knives or heating sources. We're going out to dinner.

Green With Envy

Look what I got!

This is a sweater's worth of superwash worsted, hand dyed just for me by our very own Sharon, of Chickenlips Knitting/Stitchjones/My mom made this. She has gorgeous colorways of sock yarn available in her Etsy shop, but she will also custom dye larger lots in different weights just for you, if you're so inclined. Just drop her an email (sharonfs@comcast.net) and let her know what you have in mind. She calls this colorway "Sligo" after a county in Ireland, and this picture probably gives you a pretty good idea why. The actual color is a bit more intense and will be perfect for spring. It will also be perfect for Project Spectrum for April. I don't have anything in this color and I can't wait to cast it on--right after I finish (ugh!) Death By Cables.

The Dickinson Pullover, as it is more correctly called, is coming along. Not perhaps as fast as if I weren't also refinishing furniture, painting and tiling, and trying to look like I know about astronomy, but progressing, nonetheless. I have the back and the front done and am working up my enthusiasm to cast on the first sleeve.

I have been a little distracted by this:

I know I said I wouldn't cast on for anything else until I finished Death, but the Knitting Goddess and I have made an arrangement. (Technically, I have made the arrangement, and I am inferring that she concurs by the absence of dropped stitches, lost needles, gauge nightmares, and missing yarn. I could be mistaken, but I'm thinking she may have taken some small amount of pity on me after all the teeny-tiny charts and recognizes that I need a little plain stockinette, just to take the edge off, or things could get a bit grim around here.) I call this one the Great Green Glob. More green. Hmmm. We may have a theme going, here. It has an official name, but after many miles of lumpy stockinette--it is a thick and thin wool--I can't remember what it is. I can tell you that it is not a sweater. And also that I'm not going to tell you any more for a while. Sorry.

You Want Me to Coach What?

If you've been reading this blog for a while--and by "a while" I mean since last March, which is when I started it--you may have a vague recollection of Science Field Day, that exciting day-long science competition for elementary school kids. This year, I agreed to coach "an event." So did my husband. He got "Structures." This means he gets to teach his group of kids to build a bridge out of drinking straws that will hold the maximum amount of weight possible. He gets straws, the kids build, job done, right? Not exactly. My super-achiever, former aerospace engineer hubby, who spent years teaching corporate courses in his previous career, put together (in about twenty minutes, I'd like to add) a presentation and course materials worthy of a college class. Yesterday afternoon, he held a dozen bright kids and their teacher enthralled while he explained the concepts of force and load. He had packets. He had folders. He had labels. The teacher said he was the best coach yet.

I got "Starry Night." When I asked the teacher what this entailed, he told me, "They just have to learn the constellations." Yeah. Okay. To me, stars are shiny things that you sing lullabies about. I think they're made of silver. Or diamonds. According to the star chart I borrowed, there are eighty-eight constellations. So I asked my son, what did you guys do in the competition last year? (I was there. I was outside the door. Parents aren't allowed in.) He said they went inside a room-sized inflatable planetarium and identified constellations. Then they took a written test about planets, stars, the solar system, the moon, and current events in astronomy.

So if we add it up, I am supposed to teach a dozen kids to identify eighty-eight constellations, complete with the names and locations of their major stars; the solar system, whatever that includes; the moon and moon phases; and, oh yeah, what's going on today in the exciting world of NASA. There are no teaching materials available.

I've been hyperventilating for three days. I've Googled and Yahooed. I've looked at star charts and sky maps. I've tried, unsuccessfully, to get a mental grip on how to teach a large amount of material that I frankly don't know myself. I may even have whined a little.

Last night at dinner, my dear son "reminded" me that our first meeting is this Friday. Instead of throttling him on the spot in a minor fit of major anxiety, I explained that I'm having a wee spot of trouble figuring out how to, um, present eighty-eight constellations. To which my darling first-born replied: "But we only have to know the twelve that are on the sheet." 'Scuse me? The sheet? Which sheet would that be? I didn't get any sheet. If there were a sheet to be had, surely I, as the purported coach of this incipient fiasco, would have it, right? "The sheet the teacher gave us," the fruit of my loins--who has been witness to the last three days of parental stress--clarified. This would be the teacher who assigned me this onerous task with the oh-so-helpful direction that "they just have to learn the constellations." Who also failed to make available to me any sort of "sheet."

When we arrived home from art class, I tore apart my son's binder and found The Sheet. In less than two pages, it explained exactly what the kids have to know and how the competition is set up. It also gave a list of the constellations and stars the kids need to know: twelve constellations; twelve stars. Totally doable. Maybe someone could have let the coach know.

My New Friend

I brought a new friend home from Lake Tahoe. Oddly enough, there are several "Alpaca" shops in South Lake Tahoe. Unfortunately, they don't sell yarn or fiber (which I considered extreme false advertising, but decided not to point it out to the manager, who looked a little frightened when I burst through the doors, credit card in hand, and maybe a little wild-eyed, hot on the trail of my favorite knitting material). They did have really cute stuffed animals with alpaca fiber fur. My older son chose a dog, my younger son chose a teddy bear, and I...well, was there really any doubt what I would pick?

Stalled

What I'm supposed to be doing today:



Why I'm not:


Ugly, isn't it? I'm hoping that's just a little mildew, and not some sort of toxic mold that's going to cause my kids to grow third eyeballs and require a home equity loan to repair. I have put in calls to the various drywallers I rely on in situations like these, and now I'm sitting by the phone in the pathetically optimistic hope that one of them might actually call me back today. Is it just a local thing, or is it virtually impossible to get a drywaller everywhere?

If I can't get someone out by tomorrow, I'll be trying my hand at the repair myself. And why? Because I can't live with this anymore:


Do you see the 30-year-old sheet vinyl floor? That is the last vestige of the 1970s in my house. This is the kids' bathroom, and when we looked at this house nine years ago, I immediately decided this would be the first thing I replaced. (I was kinda wrong about that.)

Here's a close-up:

Trust me: it's even uglier in person. It is at least clean, though. I spent the morning ripping out the baseboards and scrubbing everything in reach with bleach solution. Do you have any idea what collects under the baseboards in a boys' bathroom? Neither do I, but it's disgusting.

I finally reached my limit with this floor before the holidays, when I tripped over the curling edge of the vinyl while washing my son's hair and nearly landed in the shower with him. I saved myself by grabbing the shower curtain, which yanked the curtain rod down, and the curtain rod whacked me on the head while the wet, mildewy shower curtain wrapped itself lovingly around my face.

I fully intended to tile the bloody thing three months ago--right before I was inundated by uninvited relatives who took over my house for two months and left me on the verge of screaming hysterically at them to just get the hell out of my house already! I didn't, however. The last of them finally left in February, we're back from our ski week, the kids are in school, and now I can finally get to work--or so I thought. See "drywaller" above.

So, since I'm stuck by the phone and cannot work on the bathroom, I need another project. Hmmm...what could I possibly do?