we’ll have halloween on christmas

It’s true for me Christmas is more an extension of halloween. So it seems fitting my gifts have a  halloween overtone.

Sometimes  I think it’s a bit narcissistic and capitalist to put up a list of the christmas haul, but this is an extension of some greatness, for instance, I know mom has been hunting out bargins and wool shopping in other cities to compile my presents for months. So really while it looks like a haul (and is by it’s own right a substantial round of gifts, which make me feel truely lucky), it is much more, its thought, concecutively throughout the year. It also makes me happy that a lot of the gifts come from small stores or stalls at craft fairs, I mean it’s one thing to get the latest and greatest Old Navy jumper (okay really it’s not, nothing there could fit me, and if it can its just wrong) that everyone is wearing, it’s another to find a little gem in a craft booth.

Okay, bad shot but you try taking a picture of the back of your head after christmas supper. This is probably also going to double as a shawl pin, it’s a gorgeous handwrought copper hair holder thingie (very technical I know). This picture so doesn’t do it justice, at all. Seriously.

Hard to see all the cool stuff, the tall tealight holder in the back is so adorable, KnitKnacks Id tags *squee* and wine markers, and you may ask, “Wine markers?” and you’d almost be right, they make killer split ring stitchmarkers, and now I have a couple dozen sweet halloween themed ones, yes there are bats 😀

There was a theme, between mom and Alisha it seems, I got a new apron, oven mitts, and pot holders from mom, alisha got me skully cupcake cups, halloween colored sprinkles, and the two disc special feature sweeney todd, I smell some demon cupcakes in my future.

Let the yarn parade begin, two skeins of mini mochi, I’m thinking socks or a shawlette?

The Tanzenite Woobu is  of particular importance to me, unbeknownst to my mom, I wanted to make a Clapotis out of some Woobu after seeing Carin on round the twists clap, albeit I wasn’t a fan of the true blood pink. Mom knew I wanted a skein of Woobu but she got me the tanzenite, which I have been wanting to get for a long time. See I used to have a beret out of the STR heavy weight mom had gotten me as a birthday present years and years ago. It was a magical beret, the kind that you can put on over really bad hair and come up looking like audrey hepburn or cyndi lauper. The beret was lost tragically forever when it was forgotten at an ex’s house, and while I wanted it back it wasn’t the kind of ex you can just pop by and get your crap. I really loved that beret, so now I will have a most magical clapotis, I am truely stoked, Printer ink must be procured immediatly.

Last but not least the STR in hard rock lightweight. The pink shockingly doesn’t suck, it’s compleatly perfect with the purples and blacks. I’m thinking a minimalist cookie a pattern?

Well thats all for tonight, there is more, but as I’ve also moved around part of my living room tonight to accomodate my new crafting lamp I am le tired.

I hope everyone had an amazing christmas, and shared some laughs with their fellow man. Thank goodness it’s done for another year.

4 more years. 3 if I work really hard.

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“if dreams are like movies, then memories are films about ghosts”

The reason for the seasons, Peatrie curled up with Beatle on my jacket. While I will most likely be furry tomorrow as a result of this, it does me good to see her curling up with her sister again. She’s also putting on weight, and dispite the spikes in her glucose that I still have to watch out for it’s getting better slowly. You can’t see her shaved injection spot and probably can’t tell that her ears are all scabbed up from pokings but she’s starting to get back to herself. That’s probably the best christmas gift ever.

Some of the last of the mandatory christmas knitting as it blocked yesterday, the Alhambra scarf in Wollemeise and a roughriders themed hat for my bro. They are currently in boxes awaiting the wrapping fairy. But I appear to be getting the christmas cold I usually do, this year courtesy of my nephew. My face feels like its packed with cotton balls and I’ve been taking sinus congestion pills every 4-6 hours, yay.

As I am a glutton for punishment as I was blocking the last of the knitted gifts I thought, hey I can bang out a kindle cozy. True to form it’s almost ready for seaming and buttons I may have time to block it pre christmas even. Go figure. Perhaps that second yoga sock for stacy will get done by christmas day, but then again it could just be me being delusional.

So I’m starting to get the christmas gifts ready by the door. Thats right I’m getting ready for the family extravaganza that starts tomorrow and will culuminate with a 24 hours blood glucose for Peatrie on Boxing Day. I imagine I’ll be hard to pin down, hell I’m near impossible to catch right now. Merry Holidays to everyone no matter what you’re celebrating, may your family be happy and your stress levels down. If I don’t post until the new year so it goes. Know I’m sending my happy vibes to everyone and their families as I try not to fall apart or have my sinuses explode. Peace.

pre-christmas checking in

I know I know I haven’t been around, and probably won’t be as I am entering the christmas crunch. Basically this is the time where sleep and I we don’t talk and I knit like a mad fiend and block everything like crazy.

Unfortunatly last week was hell. Peatrie, the cat who graces these pages often, and is in fact the cat in the header picture for the blog scared me crapless. She really hadn’t bounced back after the bladder infection she had a few months ago, lately she was getting only moist food and whatever she demanded. I knew something was off with her as she started crying at the bathtub, but before I had much time to think or deal with that, the nightmare of every pet owner happened. I couldn’t find her, I took out the wet food and called for her, searched every nook I knew she hides in occasionally, and after 40 minutes had not been able to locate her. Finally I found her, she’d wormed her way through the cat barrier in the back landing and was sitting surrounded by bloody vomit next to the furnace. I touched her she growled, barely but she tried to growl, I picked her up and she cried hysterically. Not good not good at all. I brought her to the living room and set her on the couch she stood up and fell over, she couldn’t walk and she was crying non stop.

When she did finally sleep I was convinced that when I woke in the morning I would be one cat shy my usual full load. Crying and girlie behaviour ensued. I took her to the vet, and unlike her previous visits which had garnered her large caution signs she just sat there crying and shaking. Very un-Peatrie-like. I left her with them for the day having been briefed by the vet that it could be kidney failure as is seen in more older cats, she’d lost almost three pounds in the last few months having gone from 8.9 to 6.1. After they ran all the tests etc I got a call, a mixed blessing of a call, it’s not kidneys, Peatrie is severly diabetic. Her blood glucose was at 29, and the vet was almost postive the pukeing and everything was the edges of a seizure or a diabetic coma. Now several days into learning this and edging closer to a grand in vet and meds, her insulin is almost stabalized. This does mean that I had to do a 24 hour glucose check on her, which involved bleeding the poor love every four hours to check the levels. Which I will have to repeat christmas day/boxing day to see if the injections are fixing things. She’s also on twice daily insulin injections and glucose checks currently. This has also meant not a lot of knitting has been done, mostly I’m running on fumes and minimal sleep. But once she gets back to normal, and she is starting to mend, slowly but these things take time, I’ll be back up to snuff. I am glad that I am only one mandatory christmas present shy getting them all knitted up. I have a few mini extras that might get done christmas eve day or the day before pending completion of the last of the big ones.

All in all I’ve decided I’m not a fan of the month of December, I think the Counting Crows had it right when they sang: “It’s been a long December, and there’s reason to believe, maybe this year will be better than the last”. I’m hoping 2011 isn’t such a gong show, because this year I’ve realized some of my breaking points, and I’d rather not get stressed out this much and pushed to the brink again for a while.

I want things, a christmas rant

That’s right, I want things. Not actually things I need mind you, not even tangible things, I just want stuff. Crap if you will. And I for one blame christmas. I don’t need more stuff, stuff isn’t going to make or break me, stuff in fact will inevitably (unless its fiber related or tangentially useful) become clutter. My little socialist heart knows, it does not need stuff, the measure of love isn’t in frippery, it is in expression and action and word, it is not in new underwear (but hey every one gets underpants at christmas and with my dogs weird underpant eating fetish I can always use them).

This want of things disturbs me, and while I contemplate the value of useing Kolenar to supress this urge, I also understand that in this time of the year people expect gifts in exchange for other gifts in this weird gift giving capitalist conjunction. And while I could prattle on about “The Gift” by Marcel Mauss a pretty sussinct look at gift giving in an anthropological fashion, I won’t I will merely say this want, this yearn to have stuff, bugs me deeply.

Peatrie wanted to make a 2 am appearance. And what she wants she gets, she’s still a bit off, so she’s on a soft food diet. In the case of Peatrie, what she wants even if it is only stuff, she gets.

For christmas I have set about knitting something for almost everyone in my family. Cheap yes, but the time constraints are enough to lead to hair pulling, combined with the 45 pages I’ve written in the last week you can see how I’d be a little under the gun now.

One of the presents still languishing away on the needles is the second sweater, this one for my niece Immy. I just finished the body up to the yoke, and now can start on the sleeves which are just no fun for me right now, the pattern is great (Little cable hoodie) but little fiddly bits can get me in a tizzy and 4 year olds have such tiny arms.

While I have completed quite the haul in terms of knitterdom hats socks scarves legwarmers shawls, I still feel like I haven’t bought/done enough, even if you factor in that the legwarmers were the shortest knit and they were about 4 hours a pair.

Basic plain jane socks for Stacy, they should go well with any work outfit and will keep her most assuridly warm.

I keep feeling like I should have more done by now, that I should be sitting on a mountain of finished objects with a back of up of multitudes of store bought items.

Simple Saskatchewan Roughriders themed hat for my oldest brother.

I might not have as much money as I would like, because if I did it would be a christmas of epic proportions. My only hope is that with each gift the recipiant knows that while they may not be big, they have a lot of heart. Some of the gifts have been ruminating for a very long time in my head, and while knitting the same sweater pattern three times has made me want to kill in the past and may come again, hopefully everything fits and is loved.

While the gifts from me may be small this year I give them expecting nothing in return, just that they are enjoyed and serve their purposes. It may not quell my want of stuff as illogical and useless as that is, it will give me joy to give these to their respective recipiants. I am currently three knitting projects away from my first round of knitting completed. There are a few addons I may try to pull out at the end, but if they don’t at least the gifts proper are ready. Either way, it’s a slim christmas, all I ask from it is that we try to love one another and enjoy the company.

my life (non-knitting gory glory)

Ever wondered what I do when I’m not knitting or spinning etc? Well here it is, notes, lots and lots of them, file folders of articles, post it notes everywhere reminding me which ideas I had and where they go.

Two papers due soon, two papers that will run me into the ground, then another paper a week later, oh and about 200 papers to grade for the 100 level classes. Welcome to masters student TA hell.

I’ve actually found myself sneeking knitting time, sneaking my friends, that’s what I’m reduced to only christmas knitting (because 22 days isn’t actually enough by any mortals standards to get another batch of things done). What I have left to knit for christmas includes but is not limited to: another sweater for a niece, finishing stacys socks (second sock heel is where I’m at), a panta, a calorimetry, mom’s scarf, jody’s hat, countless dishclothes (ten last time I checked) and if I have time, two more sets of leg warmers for the nieces, and some yoga socks for stacy. <— crazy?

Tonight will begin the blocking/finishing extravaganza of the stuff that’s already done but needs blocking or finishing of some kind. That and I have to get my 25 page draft in to my advisor, although I’m pretty sure if i get to half way on that and send it off to her she’ll be fine with it, but either way, so much writing and knitting… and my house is a mess. I could so use a cleaning elf. It would make things easier. Either way, if you see a tattooed arm sticking out of a pile somewhere, know that it’s me, and I’ve been crushed by the season.