Every you and every me (--Placebo)

Sometime this summer I had an epiphany. But first, some background. I had a boyfriend in college and it was a running joke (that wasn't funny) that our song was Liz Phair's Divorce Song. (Apparently they made a music video, but it doesn't seem to be a very interesting video. Maybe this is better.) Not a song for two people in love, that's for sure. But anyway, the epiphany. I realized this summer that the Liz Phair song (because I have such an affinity for old Liz Phair, which is in no terms to be confused with Liz Phair after 1999) that best describes how I feel about Hubby is Supernova. (Having just found and watched this video, I am convinced that music videos ruin songs.) (Also, NSFW--the song is graphic and has curse words and sexual imagery.)

Anyhow, last night Hubby and I were talking and I found out that he used to listen to punk rock (Dead Kennedys, Black Flag, Skinny Puppy, Suicidal Tendencies) when he was a kid. My bridesmaid had this thing about how she and her then-boyfriend had been dating for two years but she was still finding out new things about him, and I suppose it was kind of like that (except instead of two years, put in eleven). I already knew he listened to TSOL, but last night I found out that he bought two Black Flag albums (oh, we are so dating ourselves) when he was in elementary school. I can't imagine that! And it makes me love him even more.

Field trip

We went to the LA Museum of Natural History to cap off Bubby's unit on dinosaurs. It was more fun than I thought it would be and the kids really enjoyed themselves, even Itty-Bitty (who at one, isn't really old enough to appreciate a museum, let alone its architecture, but I digress). This is her, mid-whoa. While looking at the North American dioramas, she was literally whooping her arms, up and down while going "Whoa!"


They had this life-sized puppet for their Dinosaur Encounter:


The kids were entranced. It was a 14-foot puppet with someone inside controlling it, after all. And I learned that tyrranosaurs probably had feathers on them. And that they gained five pounds a day in adolescence, while maturing to adulthood. (And I thought I gained a lot while I was pregnant!) This was about when my camera battery died, so that's all of the usable picture I have. Afterwards we broke for lunch, then went back in to check out the Gems and Minerals exhibit. It was really cool, but I'm not sure how much the kids enjoyed it, although Itty-Bitty enjoyed putting her mouth on the petrified wood (which I was not thrilled about, ewwww).

They had a lot of pretty things in there though, and I learned about benitoite, which is not only California's state gem (since it supposedly is available in gem quality only from San Benito County, California) but has the color of a sapphire and the diffraction of a diamond (sold me). I linked to a gem seller rather than a wiki page because they had prettier pictures.

After a certain point though, Bubby was tired. Itty-Bitty was already tired, so we headed home. It was a good trip.

Floss, floss

I loved Pushing Daisies. Hubby thought it was quirky, but did not love it. He loved NBC's The Black Donnellys. I loved those Oatmeal Raisin cookies by Mother's. More to the point, we loved Conan O'Brien. What do these things all have in common? We loved them and they were discontinued (or led-on for a few months and then heartlessly cancelled). So when Hubby couldn't find his Reach CleanPaste (yeah, not a great name, but whatever) dental floss, he started worrying. It's still on the Reach website, but why is it that none of the stores around us sell this floss? It's a really weird floss too, it's like flossing with elastic--you pull it and it stretches/gets thinner, and that's how you get it into those hard-to-reach places. Hubby loves it. I prefer Oral-B Essential Floss--it's just extra thin.

So now I'm waiting for his floss to get discontinued.

Heat wave = Margaritas

A couple weekends ago I felt like margaritas (this was after having a margarita at King's Fish House, an awesome one at that) so we got the recipe off of Webtender and tried it: limes, tequila, triplesec* and salt. It was awful. Hubby added sugar. Still undrinkable. We put them in the refrigerator for half an hour, then they were drinkable, but just barely. They were really, really sour. Hubby said that he's never made margaritas (for the record, this was my first time ever trying) from scratch that were good, that you need margarita mix for it to be good. Who knew?

*Yes, I know that for a good margarita you should not use triplesec and should in fact, using Grand Marnier, but as I also will not be drinking for a long time in the future, it seemed a waste to buy more bottles of alcohol and just have them collect dust.

Yoga. . . with kids

It's too hot and too late to go running now in our little heat wave, so I am doing a yoga DVD. It's hard though, to relax and to concentrate on breathing when you hear one baby crying in the background and one child singing a nonsensical, made-up song at the top of his lungs while "Old MacDonald" plays in the background and trash trucks rumble in the background. Still, something is better than nothing. . . right?

Pooling, continued

I've gone through extraordinary measures, and this is what I've ended up with. I'm literally working myself into a sweat (why, oh why am I knitting with a wool/alpaca mix during the hottest heat wave of the year so far?) and I'm afraid it still looks like crap, nevermind the amount of yarn I must be wasting by trying to stagger the yarn and pooling.

This is what it looked like before (the cast on edge at the bottom, the more recent "let's try to avoid pooling" part at the top):


So is it an improvement? I can't tell. I think I'm blind, at this rate.

Planning

Since it looks like we're going to try and do first grade, I started perusing our What Your First Grader Needs to Know book and found this sentence very interesting: "We know that the one-on-one tutorial is the most effective form of schooling, in part because a parent or teacher can provide tailor-made instruction for the individual child" (from the General Introduction, p. XVIII). The context is the argument for core knowledge--specific knowledge in every grade in every school in the United States (as they apparently do in Sweden, France and Japan), so that there's a strong foundation and no gaps in children's elementary school education, allowing students to perform better in high school (and one would assume, college).

I suppose that's one of the things I've started appreciated in my (very brief) homeschooling career--I know exactly what Bubby's been taught, what he knows and what still needs to be taught. Last month we talked about lines intersecting and not intersecting, right angles and different types of triangles. He's too young for me to introduce degrees, but since I know what he's been exposed to, I can build on that.

Last year in Bubby's preschool class, a mother with a sixth grader in the GATE (California's Gifted and Talented Education program) was telling me about the class' reading list and how her daughter had already read the books in fourth grade. So I suppose that's an argument for Hirsch's core knowledge agenda.

Progress report

Bubby finished all (language arts, math and science) of his Learning Page worksheets for his dinosaur unit that we've been doing the past few weeks. I picked some out from the Kindergarten , but they seemed like things he already knew, so I moved onto first grade. There, I printed out all of the sheets (about 20 per subject). I also printed out the dinosaur fact sheets so that he could learn more facts about 21 specific dinosaurs. We also read Amazing Dinosaurs, by Douglas Dixon, and the DK Eyewitness book on dinosaurs. He put together a little punch-out kit to make a velociraptor skeleton one weekend. We talked about prefixes and suffixes, and going over dinosaurs helped cement what carnivores, herbivores and omnivores are. So that's what we did for dinosaurs, not including the regular calendar, calisthenics and other stuff.

I think a trip to the museum of natural history is in order. Not sure how many dinosaur bones they have though.

Enemy, your name is pooling

So I cast on for Imogen yesterday and knit 36 rows, alternating between the three differently dyed skeins of Fleece Artist Aran Alpcaca, to avoid pooling and different parts of the sweater completely different colors. And I still have pooling:


How bad is it? Is it worth ripping and starting over? At this rate I'm going to have a gazillion ends to weave in: I'm thinking of knitting from both ends of all three skeins at this point, but maybe I will still have pooling, not sure how to break it up.

Last night

Conversation from last night's dinner:

Me: Your grandparents want to take you to San Diego and then Arizona, how do you feel about that?
Bubby: I would love to go to San Diego again! And I want to go to Arizona too, but I cannot, because I cannot speak Spanish very well.
Me: What?!

How did he equate Arizona with Spanish-speaking? We don't let him read the front section of the paper so he shouldn't have had any clue. Does "Arizona" sound Spanish?

FO pics--minImogen

Eventually I'll get pics of Princess wearing the sweater, but for now, she prefers her Tulip sweater that she already outgrew, go figure.

Originally I cast on 60 sts for the back length and did 59 rows for the width, then used 30 sts for the right arm sleeve. But upon having her try it on, the arm seemed too tight and the back too narrow. So I ripped the arm, cast on four underarm (in this case in-front-arm) stitches, and reknit the sleeve. It was much better. But the back was still too narrow. Since I started with a provisional crochet cast-on, I just added eight rows to the left side of the back. It was much better that way.

Also, I made the sleeves extra long so that it fits for awhile. Unfortunately, she doesn't like the fact that the sleeves have to be rolled up right now. A year ago we had to roll the sleeves of her Tulip sweater up two times for it to fit her, but she was an infant then so I suppose she doesn't remember that.

At the end of the front/sides, you're supposed to knit a row with two strands held together, then bind off with two strands, but due to the colors I had left, it looked awful. It didn't even match the rest of the sweater somehow. So I dropped the extra strand of yarn and bound off with just one strand, even though I'd just knit a row with two strands. It looks better that way and at least most of the time it's hidden.

Yesterday I'd wanted to go to Jo-Ann's to look for a big plastic button so that I could do a loop and button closure, but after Target with the kids, I wanted to go home. So now I'm thinking of buying some pink Fimo and making my own button, since I have the molds and all.

I haven't had much experience with Noro yarns, but Taiyo is at least soft enough for next-to-skin wear (assuming of course, that you picked out all of the scratchy vegetation matter). I think it's because of the cotton and silk, because the Kureyon I'd tried earlier was soooooo scratchy. I'm fairly happy with how the color changes ended up though, especially because each skein of Taiyo I had had knots that connected one strand of yarn with others that did not continue the color gradation at all.

Best place to buy kilt pins?

Any recommendations on where to buy interesting kilt pins? After I've finished my Imogen I'll probably need a shawl pin, but I don't like them because they have that pokey part sticking out. I don't want to stick the kids or myself with it, nevermind breaking the thing too. So I looked on Webs, and they have some, but I only like one of them (the gunmetal kilt pin and besides, it's backordered), so where else can you get a kilt pin?

I plan on knitting my mother an Imogen in Dream in Color Classy (she was thinking red, so I'm steering her towards In Vino Veritas), so she'll need a kilt pin or some sort of fastening too.

Imogen, what should I do?

I have a problem. I've always wanted to knit an Imogen for as along as I knew it existed. And I wanted to knit it in the Fleece Artist Aran Alpaca that was the recommended yarn. But FA Aran Alpaca was discontinued recently, and stores put it on clearance. So I jumped at the chance to buy some, and bought three skeins, the suggested amount for a small or medium Imogen. And the skeins came and they were beautiful (I chose the Merlin colorway, which doesn't seem as popular as some of the other colorways, I don't know why, but I digress). But one seemed a little different from the other two. And after I dunked them in their hot baths* and rolled them into center-pull balls, it was glaringly obvious that one was not like the others (not that the other two were identical matches, but they were certainly at least in the same ballpark). One ball is much redder than the others. I was already planning on alternating skeins to avoid pooling, but with one skein so dramatically different from the other two, am I sentenced to alternate with THREE skeins? Will I go nuts doing this?

The yarn is beautiful. The yarn feels beautiful. But one is not like the other two. And I don't want say, the sleeves or the back of my Imogen to be a completely different color than the rest of it. That would just not look right. Eventually I will probably post on the Hand Maidens board, but for now, just this.

*In the back of Barbara G. Walker's Knitting from the Top, she recommends throwing non-superwash yarns into a hot bath for 10 minutes and then throwing the wet hanks somewhere to air dry. I do this.

An old FO-- Vine Yoke Caridgan

So this is an old finished object from at least three months ago, but I only got around to taking pictures of it in the past week.



A Ysolda Teague pattern. I was fascinated by its construction (starting along one button band and then going around your body, with short rows for the shoulder raglan/shaping) and while I'm glad I did it, I'm not sure how much wear I'll get out of the sweater. I knit it out of Malabrigo Twist which, while soft, seems very likely to pill. Also, this is a short-sleeved sweater (I already lengthened the body and sleeves by eight stitches). If it's cold enough to wear a sweater, a wool sweater, shouldn't it be long-sleeved? And it's a lace pattern. If it's cold enough to wear a sweater, do you want holes in your sweater? So it's kind of a spring sweater. Except that I'm in Southern California, where everyone wears flip-flops and shorts nearly year-round. And this is my own personal problem as it's a lifestyle thing, but this is kind of a dressy sweater. And I love its dressiness, I think it's pretty and dainty and something you'd wear to church or brunch or something semi-formal (to me if you bother going to church, you should bother getting dressed, I'm offended by people who talk about going to church in sweatpants) except that I don't go to church or brunch or anything semi-formal. I have two young children, so almost everything I wear has to be guaranteed to be something I can handle getting saliva, urine, feces, vomit and food on.

But that's not the sweater's fault. I should have made it out of Dream in Color Classy. It wouldn't be as soft, but it would be much more of a workhorse.

Not double-blind, but it will have to do

Someone got a new Scotch (The Famous Grouse) and a rye (Old Overholt). So we had Hubby do a blind taste test. Apparently (I don't know for sure, I didn't try them this time) rye has a very distinct flavor so he was able to tell which was which. I have been busy enjoying my Amarula and root beer liqueur.

As you can see, I've been enjoying a lot of it (although in my defense, I have not been enjoying it alone). Story: So this particular root beer liqueur has been featured in the LA Times Sunday Magazine at least twice (maybe in the past six months), which was how it originally caught my attention, but when I looked it up at BevMo, they didn't carry it. The last time I went though, I saw that they started carrying it, but it was a bit more (like, 50 percent) than the normal (college) DeKuyper brand of root beer liqueur. I splurged though, and I've got to say it's worth it---it's very smooth and I can't wait to try it in a root beer float. Also, it's 100 proof.

As to the Amarula, I tried it first on a cruise to Mexico. It's probably along the line of Kahlua or Bailey's (although I'm not sure I've tried Bailey's) in that it's creamy and sweet, but Amarula is from the fermented marula fruit which is from South Africa. It's good by itself, cold or over ice.

Catching up (and computer woes)

Last week my hard drive died. So hubby had to replace the hard drive. I took a picture of the iMac with its glass off, before we removed the LCD display. Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of all of the hardware underneath the LCD display because by the time we got to that point, my hands were busy holding the LCD display (which was still connected to the rest of the computer).

And two nights ago, in a violent fashion, I accidentally killed my mouse. I really, truly killed it, so now I am using a corded Microsoft mouse with my iMac. Sacrilege, I know.

Overheard

Bub: I need to do an eye examination.
DH: Well, you don't need to do an eye exam with a hammer.

A FO, with no FO pictures

I finished my summer sweater today, with little fanfare. It was a top-down raglan knit in the round, out of a merino/linen mix. The linen made the knitting a bit rough on my hands, so I'm glad it's over with. This is the sweater I started in the beginning of the summer while Bub was gone. The sweater I hoped to finish the month Bub was gone. That ended up taking all summer. Such is life.

So even though I'm also working on a first sleeve of a Whisper, I'll be casting on for Imogen soon. And I thought that before I started the Imogen, I'd knit a child's top-down raglan cardigan out of two balls of Noro Taiyo. But I can't bring myself to do it quite yet, because I apparently have a love/hate relationship with these particular balls (it actually ended up being six balls of varying sizes since each skein had knots in it) of Taiyo.

I've seen some people do mini-Imogens, and they're cute, so now I'm wondering if I have enough Taiyo to make Princess a minImogen to match a MommyImogen. The colors wouldn't match, but she's cute on her own.

Pics: Fleece Artist Aran Alpaca in Merlin (2); Noro Taiyo in the middle of winding into center-pull balls.

A FO, and not mine

So awhile back I was trying to figure out what to do when Bub expressed an interest in knitting. And so, before he left for Florida for a month, I bought him a potholder kit thingie. You know, where you have those loops of fabric that seem like pantyhose but in bright, non-nylon colors and you weave them together to form a potholder? And he loved it. And he did one immediately, but after binding off, decided he didn't like it and took it apart. And then Bub started another one, with a more interesting pattern, but he didn't quite finish it before he left for Florida (this was in the middle of June). Well, since he's gotten back, he finished the weaving and most of the binding off, except for the last side (which, according to Dad, is very difficult). So tonight, Dad helped to do the bind-off, and now it's (finally!) complete. And I am very, very happy to finally be able to put away that loom and crochet hook, until he wants to do another one (which I think really helped his motor skills).

Taste testing

A couple weekends ago, we did a Scotch/whiskey taste test. The boys felt the Johnny Walker Green Label was too smooth, but it was my favorite, along with the Glenfiddich or Glenmorangie and the Dalwhinnie. The boys had more similar tastes, preferring the Highland Park with one of the Glens and I forget their last favorite. With nine whiskeys to try though, the end got hazy so we may have to do another taste test some time.

Focus

I have not been posting because I cannot decide what the scope of this blog should be: homeschooling, knitting, material stuff, philosophical stuff. Since the constancy is homeschooling, perhaps I should start there. After all, we've just started (this is week three), and I could use the blog to chronicle that journey. More to come. . .