Rosetta stone

I wish I could take a photo to capture something of the magic that is Sag and Rosetta Stone Home School Spanish (Latin America).

Last Fall, when we thought we might be visiting Vanessa in January, I bought the Rosetta Stone (at a little bit of a bulk discount through Homeschool Buyers Co-op).  Both the kids dove right in, enjoying it a lot.

As it turns out, Sag took to learning Spanish like a fish to water.

Maybe it's no coincidence that this kid loves music so much, too.  Listening to him speak Spanish, to the cadence of his thoughts as they trill through figuring out the nuts and bolts...the clear tones of joy merging with growth and now...

His Spanish is the backbeat of my soundtrack these days.  (He asked me to buy Level Two, it arrived the other day.  Chugging along, he is.)

Purple goodness

I do love purple.  My SIL gave me some squishy and sparkly purple yarn for my birthday.

I spent much of the weekend knitting the blanket.  (Not purple.)  And while it was satisfying, this kind of longterm knitting does take on a sloggy feel to it, for me.  You can't quite completely take the ADDish need for instant gratification out of this girl, as it turns out.

So, late last night, I cast on the purple for a scarf.  And this evening, I wove in the ends.  That super bulky yarn will knit up right quick for you, hear?

I love the sparklies.  For real.  But, I don't love the feel of the 51% acrylic.  Especially when it's paired with mohair which I am coming to realize is not a favored fiber of mine.  No worries.  I can easily wear this not directly on my skin.

I am looking to steam block it.  (Kelly, do you have a steam iron I can borrow?)  Blocking, like swatching, is an aspect of knitting I have yet to embrace very fully. But, these leaves curl slightly and blocking would likely help flatten them, making them more visually prominent.  If the yarn was wool, it'd be a no brainer to block.  But, word is that acrylic is blockable if done carefully (ie. don't stick the iron on those plastic filaments!)

Purple goodness.  Love it.

About gloves

Where we live, we need gloves in wintertime.  Two kinds.  One for serious snowy fun (waterproof and warm).  One for cozy comfort (lighter weight and possibly more fashionable).

When the kids were little, I treated gloves as consumables (ie. buy cheap) because they grew so much between seasons.  As they entered boyhood they didn't need them in the Sacramento seasons.  We moved here and suddenly gloves became consumable for a whole other reason: single gloves would inevitably get lost within weeks of purchase...sometimes days.

For these reasons, gloves were never a significant line item in our clothing budget.

I was shocked when the gloves I ordered for the kids from L.L. Bean arrived a few weeks ago and they were too small.  Like no other item of clothing, kids size out of kid size gloves before age 12!  When I exchanged them today (at a store they recently opened locally), I was able to try on the men's gloves to see whether they would fit the kids.  Indeed, the men's small felt between just right and snug on my hands (depending on the style of glove) and my hands are a smidge bigger than the boys' hands.

Even with the "serious" winter ones being on sale, the total for four pairs of gloves for the kids?  $90!  Yikes.

(I have this thing where I will spend more money on what I consider to be quality items...generally for things which are used daily/heavily and/or things which need to be reliable when they are needed.  Hence, this, these and these...all of which have provided me or the kids with comfort and good looking wear for years and years and years.)

It cracks me up that these gloves are as big as my head.  They do not feel it, at all, when you have them on.  Hopefully they will not get lost (they're too big to get lost, right?) and hopefully they will last for more than a season of growth.  In any event, time to adjust.  Again.

Quiet sunday

Listening to Miles, knitting stitch upon stitch of this colorful cotton blanket (wishing it was more wooly, the wintry wind is a-blowin'), one boy Minecrafting happily, one boy iPad-ing in bed quietly (under the weather), one boy working assiduously on an initial report of the state of adult education, for the State.

Killer killers

Many thanks to Cap who had what turned out to be just the right music on in the kitchen this morning. The Killers...the unexpected balm.

Rest in peace whitney

So sad to hear the news of Whitney Houston's passing. She was the only model who I ever felt I could relate to...back when she graced the pages of Seventeen magazine. And her voice...legendary and such a gift. Thank you for the songs, Whitney, hope you have found some peace.

In progress again

A Cavendish blanket in Noro Matsuri yarn.  I picked it up yesterday evening...it has been hibernating for over a year, methinks.  I couldn't believe my eyes because I had screwed it up significantly.  This blanket has a right side and wrong side and the sides had switched awhile back.  So...half of what I had knit had the right side on one side, and the other half of what I had knit had the right side on the other side!

Yikes.

Luckily, I only had to rip back two repeats of the 20 row pattern (146 stitches x 20  x 2 = 5840 stitches!)  I thought I might end up ripping back all the way because I am not very skilled at picking stitches up.

I was a sleep deprived mess last night and my immune system is in fighting mode today.  This means more knitting and reading.  I've got food cued for the kids and Daniel and Cap is home (though he is powering through a buttload of work and we need to leave him be as much as possible.)

I am back to where the blanket had been, but now with the right side/wrong side mess sorted out.  I LOVE the colors of this yarn.  It's an 87% cotton 13% wool blend.  Perfect for those early or late Summer nights when the windows are open and the breezes portend a change of season.

Unlike the cowls and scarves, this project will require time.  My patience...my attention span...these will be tested.

When it rains...

 Delphinium DPC (Dolores Park Cowl)

Misti Alpaca Chunky

for Lana

 Cuttin' It Close Cowl

Debbie Bliss Cashmerino

one for Mom and one for Donna

 Kogarashi DPC

Noro Kogarashi

for moi

 Alpaca Ariosa Cowl

Elsebeth Lavold Chunky AL

for Vanessa

Garter Stitch Scarf

Debbie Bliss Casmerino and Noro New Ruby

for Ellie

Nothing fancy, all pretty straightforward...but that was a fast six FOs!

Kogarashi DPC

I was going to regale you with images of sleep deprivation/insomnia and dry cracking skin.  How fun would that have been?  Suffering these longer terms symptoms of imbalance (around sugar and gluten/grain in particular)...sucks.  Whether I go to bed at 10:30 or 1:00, I cannot escape, for now, lying awake for over two hours.  My hair has started falling out again and my skin, especially on my hands and lower legs are scaly, cracking and/or itchy.

But.

So far, we're not succumbing to the GI bug we were exposed to.  I was going to take the kids out to see a movie today, but then decided to watch one at home.  No need to push the immune system farther.  Tin Tin will wait.

And.

Going Bovine started slow for me.  Yesterday afternoon I picked it up again and was rewarded.  The book has started to pick up significant steam and I can't wait to read more of it today.

Also.

I wound Kogarashi last night between reading a chapter of Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator to the kids and giggling to 30 Rock.  This yarn is so luxe and fab.  I decided to keep it simple, which I highly recommend when you have a yarn that is going to do all the work for you.  I also went with a cowl so I'd be able to feel the cozy right up against my skin when all was said and done.

My Kogarashi DPC (Dolores Park Cowl w/ some mods) knit up like a dream.

This morning, as I staggered out of bed dizzy(that hasn't happened in awhile) and sleep deprived, I was bummed.  But when I pulled the cowl over my head, a snuggly transformation did occur.  Enveloped in warm and happy there was nothing to do but capture some love and light and smile instead.

Peace and love and how'd it get to be happy Friday.  (Have you noticed how time is flying?)

Pause

Oh my goodness.  YES.  Words to live by.

A test

This tests my ability to not turn bright green with envy like nothing else has in a long while.

Happy hump day

Once I discovered how scrumptious the incredibly intense truffles Cap made me for my birthday were combined with a spoonful of honey...I kind of went nuts with them.  I brought some over to Kate's the other day and some other sugar-free folk were very happy with them, too.

I have a small supply left in the freezer...they are a perfect late afternoon treat set out to defrost in the morning.  Can't eat these at night...with my sleep issues of late my system has been sensitive to caffeine again.

Met up with my mom, sister and sister-in-law Saturday night for a lovely dinner out.  My sister's birthday is in February (the 29th!) so it was a joint celebration with the grown up girls in the family.  We went to Family Recipe, the restaurant of a friend of a friend of Sandy's.  The food was delicious, I wandered off the sugar-free, grain-free reservation for the night and we had a really good time.  (The many highlights included the miso-tahini-shrimp sauce that accompanied the beef short ribs...a true revelation, the Brussels sprouts, the kale salad, the rock shrimp kimchee okonomiyaki, the housemade Berkshire pork sausage, the black sesame ice cream and the coconut rice pudding brûlée...)

Mom treated us to dinner, Sandy knit and felted Lula a Noro sleeve, and Lisa gave me some very purple, very fun skeins.  It was a sweet ending to this year's festivities.

The kids and I are chillaxing today.  We are cruising through Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator (truly a fun book), they are singing and storyboarding as I type, they've played some Math games and practiced their Qigong...  Soon, they will be downloading Skyblock, a map and new item supplier for Minecraft which opens up new worlds and challenges to the game.

This afternoon we will head outside for bar hanging/stretching, Vinny and book shopping for cousin Celeste.

In between, I nourish them and myself with food.  (Loving up the common meal leftovers.)

Gem had meatballs and cake for breakfast :-)  Sag has had a bowl of veggie chili with Jack cheese melted on top.  He ran out of room for cake and is looking forward to some later.

I had a Brussels sprouts pastured egg scramble for brekkie.  With melted jack cheese :-)  I've roasted some broccoli with bacon and garlic for later.

I also put together a dip.  

I had a Neufchatêl cream cheese in the fridge because last week I thought I might make some artichoke dip for Super Bowl Sunday.  (I didn't.)  I've had two cans of artichoke hearts in the pantry from the night we went to Melody's to say good-bye and came home with nearly a dozen shopping bags full of stuff they were giving away/leaving behind.

Monday at Kate's house, I had a few yummy bites of a dip in her spread of party food.  It was profoundly simple and good: cream cheese blended with fresh garlic and a bit of milk.  I loved hearing the story of how the dip has been tweaked by various family members based on their fond memories of Mom's dip, originally made with garlic powder.

My dip: 2/3 of a package of cream cheese, fresh garlic to taste (4 giant cloves today), 2/3 can of artichoke hearts in water (left pretty wet so the liquid would thin the cream cheese a bit), and 3-4 sun-dried tomatoes.  Blitzed it all in my mini-food processor.

Sun-dried tomatoes are my latest fave ingredient.  I bought some for the frittata I made the other day and I've been enjoying them here and there with other dishes.  I thought they'd add nice color to the dip, as well as, some interest in texture and saltiness.

I'm looking forward to having the dip as a side with my pulled pork for lunch.

Peace and love and happy hump day.

End o'day

Again a post at the end of the day.  Not so much inspired as archival.

One family came over for common meal.  The others were scared off by our exposure to a GI bug yesterday (which we found out this morning.)  It was a lovely quiet dinner: fava-pinto bean bake, rice, turkey meatballs, Brussels sprouts and cake.  (I fried two eggs and ate the Brussels sprouts.)

Dishes are washed, the living room (where we eat with a crowd) vacuumed...the kids are quieting.  I could read Going Bovine, but I am tuckered out and feel the pull of last night's House instead.

Peace and love.

Monday musing

What a day.

It was a late morning.  I slept badly again.  Small doses of gluten and sugar (I have a feeling rice is not so much an issue for me) last Sunday and this past Saturday (both nice dinners out) have messed with my sleeping.  There has been a jump from non-existant to persistent perseveration on useless thoughts as I lie in bed combined with insomnia...a tight little corkscrew of "which came first".

(Some digestive symptoms, headache and body ache have occurred as well, but nothing too significant.)

The kids accompanied me on errands this morning (Sag before he ate breakfast).  I needed onions for the slow cooker pork and we needed a birthday gift for Lucy.  It was all quick.  My resolve not to buy anything for the kids (I boosted their allowance instead) lasted a whole month.  Bought the latest 39 Clues book for Gem and Jesus and Shiva magnetic finger puppets for Sag.  (He's been eyeing these for awhile and entertained us with a "Battle of the Religions" puppet show as soon as we got home.)

I surprised myself by not buying a book for myself.

Much of my time last night and this morning was spent composing e-mails to various persons-of-concern about a class Sag has been taking which has not worked out.  Pain.  In.  My.  Ass.  It took up too much of my time and energy...but I can't undo my manatee ways.  I take my time.  (Good news is that it is all over now and resolved well.)

This afternoon we walked over to Kate's.  They moved around the corner from us and we finally made it over there for a big ol' Fiber Artsy birthday gathering for Lucy.  It was eye popping at times seeing how much all the kids have grown.  It was ear popping as it tends to be with this crew.  Sag and Gem were right in the fray, though.  It was heart warming.  Spending time, weaving together some renewed strands.

When we left, walking down their long sloping driveway, the full moon greeted us, brightly, in the wintry dusky sky.  Beautiful.

I gobbled down some pulled pork with mashed guac.  The kids inhaled their rice with meat sauce.  We did some evening puttering and I am about to tuck them in.

After that, Downton Abbey for me.

Peace and love.  And catch a glimpse of the moon if you can.

Kaffeeklatsch

image pulled from web.

Home from nearly three hours of sitting with friends talking and laughing (some of the Fiber Arts crew).  I started with a latte and eventually moved on to a grilled portobello mushroom salad.  Came close to an Irish Breakfast tea some of my klatsch mates were enjoying muchly.

Time with friends, time talking and listening and laughing.  Sharing freely, fearing nothing.  Meandering or zipping from one topic to another.

Time like this feeds my soul and helps me learn and grow.  Time like this fills me with happiness and gratitude.

The time continuum itself doesn't make much sense to me when I think of my friendships (though the growing babes have a way of anchoring us to it).  My affection for/connection to friends scattered around the world remains quite intact.

Any and every moment spent with friends...a good way to live and grow old.

Nine simple patterns

Wow.  An amazing collection of stories.  The details the author brings to life with beauty and painful precision...resonated with power and familiarity.  Words fail me.  Go read it.

Kogarashi

This skein is distracting me with its good looks.  Is it love or lust?  Only time will tell...

Lying in

One of the things that I think about sometimes is:

what would I/my body have done to heal had I not embarked on a life at home ten years ago?


But, there's no easy answer.  And not much sense in pondering for too long.  I am grateful that when I decided to do something about improving my well-being, I was able to.  I am grateful that I felt the need in the first place.  I am grateful to be distinctly healthier and happier now at 46 than when I nudged awake to the outer territories of my potential at 40.

Today is a lying in day.  I have my period and am wiped from the heaviest part of the exit flow.  I don't remember needing/having lying in days when I was in my 20s and 30s.  Was it because I had more energy?  Did I have such "sick days" but was unaware of why/when they were occurring?  Was I simply soldiering on (was I less sensitive?) and having subsequent problems/issues as a result?

I have never been as naturally regular in my cycles as I am now.  I've become the 28 day girl I'd long heard about but never recognized.

I embrace these days of lying in.

I used to feel guilty about them when I realized I needed them, a few years ago.  I felt outside the norm and compared myself negatively.  Not only was I not the Superwoman who raised a family while working outside of the home, I was stay-at-home and tired when I got my period...who the heck did I think I was being so needy?!

No more.  I have learned not to plan out-of-the-house activity for the time around my period.  I allow for rest and quiet during menses.  Like our ancestors did and some native peoples still do.  I believe it benefits my overall health, as well as the health of our family.  It certainly feels ever so right.

What we've been doing today...

Sunrise

It has been so long since I woke early enough to see the sunrise hitting Winter branches.  My breath caught in my throat.

Fleeting tumble of mixed emotions: the inevitable waking with wonder about seepage when the blood loss is at its heaviest, feeling rested despite the rude awakening, the satisfaction that comes with a hoped for shift (family-bedding with the kids for the whole night+decreasing tv time for myself+going to bed earlier=better sleep), noticing how early the sky began lightening through the slats of the blinds, staring at the child asleep next to me, murmuring him back to sleep when his eyes fluttered open to ask me a question, calculating just how early in the morning it was when I left the house to go to school when I started Hunter at age 12, relaxing in the warm comfort of the bed to see if I might fall back asleep, stealthily getting out of bed pulling on fleece socks and vest, entering the quiet of the front room feeling I have a happily long whole day ahead of me, glancing up from Lula momentarily stunned by the gorgeous light hitting the barren beauty of the branches.

Peace.  And love.

Highlights

Cap received copies of his new book, hot of the press!  You can pre-order it at Barnes and Noble, or better yet, through your local indie bookstore.  We are, as ever, so proud of him.  A book!  So cool!

The kids are both in the midst of measuring units in Math.  For Sag, the investigating veered into Science as he played around with displacement.

I am pleased.  Ends have been woven in and a padded envelope secured and addressed.  The cowl will be on its way to Lana tomorrow.  She lives in SF and needs something cozy to keep her warm in her apartment.  If you've ever lived in the Bay Area, you know what I mean.  (That's Gem in the background.)

Had a touch of insomnia the past two nights.  Return of another pre-sugar- and grain-free symptom.  I think the lamb dish at the Turkish place Sunday night definitely had gluten in it.

Anyhoo, I had a lovely hour this morning running errands with the car and without the kids.  Picked up Man On Wire at the library (and did not pick up a latte to go for $4).  My friend, Bridget, is starting up a Documentary Club.  Perfect for me since I'm hoping to watch a documentary a month this year.

Picked up Going Bovine at the bookshop.  I had a pang of regret at the library the other day when I saw a copy in the YA room I was perusing for the first time looking for books for the kids.  (They grow so fast, sniff sniff, blah, blah, blah.)  But once I held the book in my hands while paying for it?  No regrets.  It was gift money well spent.  The kids were both intrigued and tickled by the cover when I got home, too.

I had some "doh!" moments this morning...continued ADDishness.  But, I had the luxury of my own time so I just kept going.  Back towards the library to stop into the yarn store.  I needed needles for a new project.

Then strolled to the truly indie toy shop (the other two toyshops in town are indie, too, but are franchises) for a gift card for a friend celebrating a birthday today.  (Original plan was to get him one to the bookshop.)

On my way back to the car, I passed the other yarn shop in this part of town.  I peeked in and found some Noro I had never heard of before!  Kogarashi.  Very yummy.

All this is to say that it's been a much more energizing day than I anticipated.  The second day of my period is usually a brutally exhausting affair.  I've had my moments, but overall, it has been quite a productive and clear-minded day.

I've called the Museum and spoken to the program director about our concerns with the class Sag is taking, I picked up a hard copy of my lab results from the doctor's office, I cashed a birthday check and ordered another of my 2012 books (kiitos Mummu!)  I made some lamb burgers.  Delish.  (I always forget to include the vinegar and always sub some kind of herb for the parsley I never seem to have on hand.)

Peace and love...off to commune some more with the kids, fold laundry, fix dinner, knit some and read some.