10 on Tuesday July 31, 2007

I haven’t done this in awhile. Today’s topic is “10 Countries You’d Like to Visit“

1. New Zealand. Not just for the unrequited boy (he’s not even there right now).  Also silently includes Australia (many Canadians visit both in one trip because it’s so expensive to get to that side of the world from here).

2. Portugal

3. France. Especially Vimy Ridge.

4. Italy. Especially Venice.

5. Ireland

6. Wales

7. Poland, to find where my grandfather was born (which may well be impossible).

8. England, again.

9. The States, again, because I’ve only seen a few things in a few States.

10. Peru

One Thing Down July 29, 2007

I mostly finished my socks for Sockapalooza 4 last night. I just have my k2p2 bind-off instructions at work because I keep forgetting to bring my book home, so once that’s done and after a good blocking, I’ll take pictures and send a post to the plig.  And then I’ll mail it off with some extra goodies and be relieved that that’s done.  I’ve had a busy and stressful month and unfortunately those socks loomed over my head along with the gazillion other projects.  But, they are one of the first projects I have FINISHED in a long time (I have a lot of single socks out there right now).

Things I Should Be Doing… July 27, 2007

Still No Photos July 27, 2007

I’ve started deep water aquacise with my friend Magnolia. It’s been a long time since I did that and I’m realising how much I missed it.  We’re kind of hooligans in that we buck the counter-clockwise trend and do laps instead of cycles because everyone goes in their own speed and there can be a lot of collisions that way. It will be harder to do on the day that the ropes are up, but we’ll deal with that as it comes. Last night we had to do a noodle train and Magnolia had quite a few little titillating comments for that one

One of the instructors we’ve had makes us giggle.  Magnolia said he reminded her of Napoleon Dynamite’s brother, so we’ve nicknamed  him Kip.  He’s quite intense in his teaching method and plays 80s/90s rock for our motivational tuneage.  Absolutely a riot!  He has quite a variety of moves for us too, which is nice for targeting multiple areas.

And there were two boys the night Kip taught us who were definitely not hard on the eyes…

Wednesday night I attended a staff function that involved a farewell to my very good friend who has decided to move on from his current position. Things will definitely be less exciting with his exit.  It was a fun evening, filled with some old faces who made cameo appearances, as well as bats and “mistletoe”.

Tonight: Spider Pig.

I’ve also “started” running. I’m not a runner. One of my friends once told me that women shouldn’t run because of the threat of tilting the uterus (and I felt that was good enough reason as any to not run), but I’ve often noticed that people don’t look happy when they run. However, my dear friend P says that he feels so much better after he’s gone running, so maybe he’s right. I didn’t feel so great the other day (my first time), and I didn’t do nearly as much as my friend who challenged me did, but I have never been much for physical endurance, which is why it’s good to start.

I did get my last installment of the Hello Yarn Fiber Club. It’s beautiful, and I can’t wait to get started on it, should I ever have a spare moment to do so. I wanted to continue on with it, but I haven’t had a lot of free time lately, and I have to concentrate on my homework. There’s a lot to do and I’ve barely started; I’ve only done a tiny bit of research. But I did some show and tell with one of my coworkers yesterday, explaining the various fibres I’m working with and describing their uses and processes, so that’s a good way to keep up with it.

I hope I’ll get some more interesting and less mundane things to show and/or tell you…in the meantime, you’re getting updates like this one.

Morning July 25, 2007

I’m not a morning person. But I listen to CJSR to wake up, and this morning the DJs announced my friend’s ex-roommate is pregnant and a little later they played Do the Bartman in honour of the impending release of The Simpsons Movie.

And the other day I woke up to the sounds of a hot air balloon a block away from my window. It was flying awfully low…

Sometimes mornings are pretty not bad.

Ooh July 24, 2007

The new Knitty surprises are up.

I really like the top but I think I would turn it around and do the fun ribbon detail on the “back”. I like a scoop neck on me, not a boat neck, so just turning it around would make sense to me.

Not that I need another project.

The bag’s pretty nifty too.

Crafty Update July 23, 2007

So the store picked up a new (to us) line; we’re now carrying South West Trading Company products. I knit a sock out of TOFUtsies that is a lot of fun, but I hadn’t taken a picture of it so maybe I’ll do that when I’m back in the shop. It’s a comfy sock. And my boss decided we’d carry spinning fibre now too, so she picked up some Karaoke, Soysilk, and Silk Latte, as well as the Black Diamond Bamboo. I spun up the Karaoke and set it in a warm water bath and this is what my sink looked like after 20 minutes with the stuff…not impressed with their dyers.

And yesterday while doing some spinning homework research I came across information about Inkle Weaving and realised I had seen one before in one of our storage facilities in the Park. So I grabbed the girls because they had never been up there (that room has a particular scent) and we went and did a little poking around, and sure enough there was an inkle loom that was already set up with quite a bit of weaving already done. I took the item back up to costuming and played with it to get the feel for it. Enough had been woven that I finished that which was already on it, and last night I took it home and sacrificed the yarn for my Tubey sweater and this is where I got in two hours of play.

As I was working with it in the shop, I joked to the girls, “This is just what I need; another craft!”

Meanwhile, there has been some sewing going on…much of it for 1920s.

Sorry about the blurry photos, the lighting was bad when I took these shots and I was too tired to really care…

Fashion Rant July 21, 2007

I’ve probably had this rant on a previous blog; it’s an issue that’s near and dear to my heart because I make (and wear) clothes.

Today I bought myself the second cutest bathing suit. It’s a tankini and it would have been the cutest bathing suit if I had gone with the other top, but considering the type of activities I intend to do in said top (swimming as opposed to lounging around), I decided to go with the sensible racer back rather than the PLUNGING halter. And the sensible racer back is a size 8.

I also got some core pieces to the start of a more professional wardrobe. I did have a problem in that I couldn’t find tops to go with the outfits; nothing seemed quite right, but that isn’t the thing that is rant worthy.

What made me a little angry at the modern fashion world is this: in an effort to make the bigger woman feel better about herself, they’ve made sizing so that your size is smaller than you are. So I bought a jacket today that is a size 6; I should be a 10 at least, especially considering that in pattern sizes I’m a 14/16. To compensate for this, they’ve had to create 0s and 00s…this doesn’t help the psyche of the smaller girls like my brother’s classmate who used to wear two pairs of sweatpants under her jeans so she wouldn’t be ridiculed for being so thin. And when the media says that Marilyn Monroe was a size twelve, they mean closer to pattern sizes and DEFINITELY not today’s modern size 12. Yes, I got some satisfaction out of getting that wee jacket, but it felt hollow; I’m still chesty, I’ve still got a tummy, and it kind of offends my sensibilities that they’re messing with my brain that way.

Although, I’ll admit that I was glad that I got a pair of trousers that fit my thighs and wouldn’t easily be pulled off without undoing them though; that was pretty nifty.

Interesting Article July 14, 2007

I clicked on a blog that was being highlighted on the WordPress welcome page and was impressed with the author’s wide variety of stories. One article caught my eye because it had a really great picture, and it’s about some of the geography of my home province so I thought I should share it. The only thing is the article has the provincial capital stated as Calgary when it should be Edmonton, but whatever. Calgary always wanted to be the capital, so I guess they can be in articles about Google Earth.

Where is my camera? July 14, 2007

I think I left it at work after taking some photos of the latest 1920s costume we built.

But that’s okay as I actually have some photos from the trip home on the computer already!

This is my uncle driving his Ford Fairlane (I never remember what year…could be ‘64) in the local Canada Day parade.

West Central Repair’s poorly edited sign.  But hey, they have a dog on their “float”, they get bonus points.

Miniature Ponies pulling a really small buggy.  There were teddy bears in the back of the buggy, advertising the toy horses.  They were wee horses.  I think you could keep one in an apartment (if you could get over the smell).

And some draft horses for a bit of comparison.  There were a lot of horse/waggon combos, several antique cars, a ride-style lawn mower towing children on a train of tipped-over cream cans, a truck with square dancers, and some fire and rescue trucks to follow up.  And there were candies thrown out, but I didn’t go grab any; the ditch in front of where we sat was pretty steep.

But it wasn’t all about the celebrating or the schooling while I was at home…nope, there was the fishing too.  I LOVE fishing in the belly boat.  Getting out on the lake is just so lovely, and peaceful, and I don’t mind taking my poor old broken camera out on the lake with me, so I got some photos of that too…

There are chicks on the back of this female loon.

Her mate wasn’t too worried about me taking pictures of the family; he was busy preening.  But when the boaters did get too close they’d all start with their howling to scare people off because they wanted their chicks left alone.

The camera isn’t the awesomest at getting close ups of the wildlife when one is in the middle of a lake.  But I saw something in the bushes, realised it was a deer, started whistling to get his attention, and was mildly surprised and amused when he walked down to get a look at what was making all that racket.  I saw him again an hour or so later, he wasn’t too concerned about our presence on the lake.  I like that you can still see his velvet on his antlers.  I also got to see a doe, but she was much farther away so I couldn’t get a decent shot of her.

Things have been fairly crazy since I got back.   They hired some more people so I’ve had to scramble to get them clothed, I’ve been perusing the library for books on wool and braiding and needlepoint for my homework, doing a little non-homework related spinning, and I have a secret project.  And it’s one I don’t know when I’ll be able to let you know about it.  But it’s awesome.

So things are going well here, but busy.

Oh.  And Transformers is HOT.  Like.  Sexy.  HOT.