A New Addictive Hobby

My sister-in-law got me this amazing gift for Christmas this year - a Drop Spindle and plenty of roving in a gorgeous color!!!

I haven't started using it yet, but I can't wait to! I've looked into spinning my own yarn before, but thought I shouldn't even attempt to convince my husband I need ANOTHER form of wool. Now I have no excuse! I can't wait to see how this colorway works up. It looks like pink and purple cotton candy right now, and is insanely soft.

My Fancy Yarn Box

A good friend of mine's retired father loves woodworking. While I'm over at this friend's house playing D&D, I often bring a crocheting or knitting project along to keep my hands busy. All of the ladies in my friend's family also work with yarn, so the father has been making by hand gorgeous accessories to make life easier for them. He described a yarn box that he was interested in making and a few weeks later showed me this masterpiece and offered me one! It's two different kinds of wood all cut, sanded, and lacquered by hand. It comes in handy to keep the working yarn away from my helper-kitties, that's for sure.

Other than crochet...

I realized I have a bunch of non-yarn-related craft projects waiting for me in the basement. I have a metal coffee table to repaint, a cool chalkboard-letterbox thing to refinish and repaint, and a small end-table to sand/refinish. It needs to warm up a little more to get rid of all of the snow outside so I can get to work on these things! You can be sure that once I'm working on them, you'll see pictures.

In the meantime, while it's been cold outside I've been experimenting with cooking. This is a very brave venture for me, as I'm the kind of person who burns EVERYTHING. I once ruined Ramen by forgetting what I was making part of the way through and I drained all the water and strained the noodles. Once I realized my mistake, I tried adding hot water from the tap. It didn't taste good. I had Papa Johns Pizza on speed-dial when I lived alone. All of the delivery people knew they'd be greeted with a cloud of smoke when I opened my apartment door. But I'm trying to fix all of that by making easy recipes and staring eagerly at my family while they eat, asking constantly "Is it good?"

Here's some awesome Sugar Lemon cookies I made. They were a little bit too-tasty, and disappeared shortly after I pulled them out of the oven. I made something edible AND delicious, yay!

Holiday Season!

A while back for Chelsea's Birthday I made her this awesome Cloche hat.

It's terribly adorable. I think I need a pink / grey one...

This is a super-short post to say: I'm sorry but I'm terribly busy. Super busy. Ridiculously busy. I have to come up with 4 original lessons (completely put together for demonstration/ use too), a term paper (roughly 15 pages), my 3 other school observations, 4 assessments, and oh-god-I'm-forgetting something all by December 4th. These next two weeks, I just might cease to exist. 

Also, it's a completely home-made Christmas in this household this year. While cheap, it is time consuming...time, which is more valuable than money to me right now. I would post all of the super awesome things I've made, but it would be ruining many surprises. :D

Where does time go...

So we've been really busy lately (surprise surprise!)

Last week, our friends from out of state were visiting. You can read about their visit here.

My weekend classes have started again, hooray for rekindling my passion in what I do! I have tons to do for my internship, which I'm ok with. (I lie, I'm stressing out.)

I've been working on a gift for a Crochet Exchange, in between classes and friends visiting - I'm doing awesome Hybrid animals, and so far they are completely rockin'. I will post pictures of them before I ship them off. I promise!

Both Shane and I are hoping to get back to the flow of things here rather shortly....wish us luck!

Raaaaaaain. We want raaaaaaaaain.

Seriously, 110degrees out today. WHY. At school today we were trapped inside the entire day. Opening the door makes you go face to face with a breath-stealing wall of HEAT. Who thought it was a good idea to start a city here? I want to do nothing but lay in a pool with a chilly Margarita and eat ice cream.

I started making a knit Princess Peach washcloth, until I realized my count was off by 4 so I had to undo the whole thing. I am now tired of knitting. :P

I feel really guilty about going on a long haitus from my 365 project. In fact, I feel so guilty that I try not to even think about it at all. I see things every day to take a picture of, I just feel so sapped lately. I haven't been knitting, crocheting, or sewing. I haven't really been writing either, if you keep up with my Montessori Blog. I have finished a few books, and started some new ones. In my head, I keep telling myself that June was BIRFDAY MONTH and therefore a get-out-of-stuff-free card. I think for once the idea that I NEED to be doing something is what is preventing me from actually doing it. After a long break, perhaps I will feel the WANT again.

Birfday LOOOT!

Hooray for Birthdays! They seem to sneak up on you, then BAM they're gone again!

Thanks to everyone who gave me cash, as that is always greatly appreciated! Saving for various things is hard!

I recieved a dozen PINK roses, very colorful carnations, a delicious Oreo mini-cake, cookies, many knitting accessories, crocheting stuff, a handmade knitting needle holder rollup thingie, pink origami cutie animals, some in-game WoW pets (omg nerd), super-funky socks, love, and SOME AWESOME PURSES!

This one is from Shane's Mom, Jan! HOW COOL IS THAT!? The little teabag is a magnetic closure, and the top flops over to access the inside of the purse! The top is a little coin-pouch. I'm adding to my bizarre purse collection!

This one is from Eva! SHE KNIT ME A PINK PURSE!!!! I love it I love it I love it! Handmade stuff is the greatest.




As for the latest with myself, I'm sewing a purse currently (when I feel up to it!). I've also signed up for an online knit/crochet random exchange, which is neato, I plan on making an Erica Scarf (the red one I've pictured before) in a different color, since that's one of my favorite things I've ever made. Still working on Chelsea's blanket, and I'm still building a base of stuff to make an Etsy shop eventually.

As well as all of this, I was contacted by an online magazine, and asked to do an article for their Fall edition! It's a natural living / family magazine that does quarterly issues. HOORAY! Writing my Montessori blog is actually doing something!

Sewing ain't hard!

Really! I did it!

I made a pillow for a good friend as my first sewing project. My seams are mostly straight, and the pillow-form fit in when I was done. I am so excited! I added the crocheted flowers because a plain blue pillow was too much.    All in all, I think I did an O.K. job! 

Things should be changing up soon! I will hopefully be starting to work in the morning for my coming internship instead of evenings, which is weird considering since I've worked at the school, I've always been there in the afternoon! I welcome change, however, as it gets me more of a chance to see the classroom in action. Plus, I'm hoping it will feel like I actually have more of a day left, instead of coming home when it's dark. Working in the middle of the day can be a little wonky.

The only crochet project I'm working on right now is a flower-motif blanket for a good friend. I need approx. 590-600 flowers to make the blanket. Go go go go go! I'm thinking of making a belt, I've been wanting to make one for a while for myself. 

A small part of me wants to make some stuff and try my hand at selling on Etsy...But I don't know how good I'd do. Handmade knit / sewn things are pretty common, but I also think "What could it hurt?" Maybe some of the things I make would be right up someone else's alley? Not like Etsy charges you an arm and a leg if anything doesn't sell. Just wondering, what would I make and put on there? *ponder*

My reading lately has consisted of Bill Bryson's In A Sunburned Country, a travel-log of Australia. Bill Bryson is absolutely hilarious: we own many of his books. Laugh out loud funny, and very informative!

I am THRILLED!

By chance, I stumbled across a flyer for a local food co-op!http://www.bountifulbaskets.org/

Basically, you pay a little bit of money, and you get a giant amount of locally grown food. $15 on this specific site gets you a fruit / veggie full of 6 different veggies and 6 different fruits. This co-op has been operated for a long time, and they've got the costs nailed down to a T - by buying a basket, you save 35$ on what you would normally spend buying these things at a grocery store. It also has different ethnic food packages, (The mexican  one is OVERKILL) bread, desserts, and snacks. You select what you want when it's time for your location to order, then you pick it up that Saturday during your designated time at a location you select. Is that not awesome? I've been looking for a way to add more fruits and veggies to our diet, and my findings in our local grocery store's fresh food department has been rather lackluster lately. We're thinking of splitting the cost and the basket with someone else, because it seems a bit overkill for just two people!

I've been looking to find one of these for a long time, and didn't know where to look. Hooray!

Where have you been?

Let's see:

End of term for classes, sickness / maladies, general "screw-it"ness.

I have one more night of class for this semester, then I'm done until August. HELLO FREE TIME! I can't wait, I'm so excited for all of the possible crafts and things to do, I'm already looking forward to it! Of course, in the general styling of myself, I'm thinking of far too many things to do that I'm becoming overwhelmed!

• Finally complete that sewing tutorial I signed up for
• Lessons for my afternoon class
• Sew lots of pretty things
• Finally master knitting
• Start getting my year-long project together for my degree
• Make more things for friends and family
• Work on my mailing etiquette

Also, I haven't been changing purses nearly enough lately. We must fix this!

Well do they?

It's a great and hilarious thing when your brain gives up on you. Suddenly everything you do and think feels very muddy and thick. Today I apparently left my grace and "smoothness" at home, because I nearly killed myself three times in one hour today. Can you blame me? This week has been rough. Rough barely defines it, it's been exhausting. Familial happenings, final inspection after moving, upcoming birthday party for a sweet boy (oh god I haven't started his gift yet why do I do this to myself), unpacking, many many missing people at work.

Some time I'd like stress-free week. No?

As a great philosopher once said: "im can dream"

Wowie~!

Where indeed does time go?

I'm lately finding my time consumed by my Montessori Blog and just reading as much as I can.

This weekend should be interesting - No class Saturday, No school Monday, no class Monday night. Doesn't mean it's not a weekend chock-full of things to do! Free-time can be overwhelming!

We watched what we could of the Olympic Opening Ceremonies tonight. Shane and I were dying laughing at Canada's interpretation of it's own culture. Really Canada, Fiddle-playing is an important part of your heritage? Tap-dancing? Sarah McLaughlin? The floor light show was neat though. We both sat there hoping the giant lighted polar-bear was going to eat the random performers.

However as sarcastic as all of that may be, watching the Olympics procession of countries was very inspiring. We're all whipping about through space at breakneck speed on this blue globe of water, and we can still all somehow find something we all have in common enough to set aside our typically rocky relations.

Something else very interesting that I found - I have loved Stephen Colbert for some time now, and after reading his wikipedia page tonight was linked to the video of him addressing the White House's 2006 Correspondents dinner...That man has some guts, seriously. I was dying laughing not only at what he said, but the reactions of the people in the room. Most were sitting there uncomfortably, adjusting their clothing. The few who realized what was really going on were rolling laughing, the less-brave ones stifling laughter. Shane couldn't believe that I had never seen that before. I don't exactly remember how I was introduced to the Colbert Report, but I've found it funny for a few years at least. Sad to see I missed out, but I'm glad I was able to find videos on youtube.

I'm working on a few crochet projects - I'm making a birthday present for my boss, a pair of socks for a co-worker, and hopefully after this weekend, starting a blanket for my friend! We're going to convene sometime this long weekend to plot our ideas. Whee! I just find it so much easier to make things for other people, instead of myself. Projects of my own keep getting put down because I keep thinking "Oh, I can finish that some other time." Even though I do have plenty of things I need to make! Such as -

This scarf, which I made, and didn't realize how cool it was till I blocked it, dried it, and mailed it off! I have some pretty silver thread that I think will look good. Hooray lace!

(Love you guys, my favorite picture ever Erica!)

Superbowl Sunday

I only watch for the commercials. A few have made me chuckle, but I think that the overall pizazz of Superbowl Commercials over the years has dropped. It's not as big of a deal anymore, I wonder why. Speaking of which, how much did Doritos pay this year, jeez. They've had one commercial per break.

I'm so excited, my Saturday Montessori classes are right next to Bookmans in Mesa. I LOVE BOOKMANS. My study-buddy and I went there yesterday after class, but my ADD wouldn't let me focus on trying to find anything I wanted. I do plan on making a more detailed list so I can look for certain things next time... muahahaha.

I'm loving my new hair, it's so easy to do! Brushing my hair doesn't take half an hour anymore! Everyone needs new hair!

Gathering thoughts

I've taken a small hiatus from crafting (gasp~!) and writing to gather my thoughts. I've actually been reading a bit more about Montessori classrooms, teachers, theories, and environments. I've learned a ton in the past two weeks about it, and I do believe I'm going to let those thoughts continue to flow in the form of writing. I know this won't really be interesting to anyone but myself, but I'm going to start a separate blog just for this reason. I contemplated doing it here, but this is more for my personal life. After reading these AMAZING Montessori blogs - http://www.themoveablealphabet.blogspot.com/  and http://www.sewliberated.typepad.com/, I have realized I want to know everything I can about Montessori, and see the growth and enlightenment it brings.

Now to stop boring you!

I'm starting a neato purse from some awesome yarn my boss gave me ("It just screamed Nena!") on my crochet hooks, and I'm going to start a hat sometime soon (When I stop being afraid of circular needles, and stop obsessing about gauge).  I also participated in an awesome internet yarn-stash swap. I scored some really pretty royal blue bamboo/wool yarn and some neon pink/black/and white wool yarn. Having never really used wool before, I'm thinking of trying my hand at felting (the process of washing wool in warm/hot water, agitating it so you can no longer see the "knit" stitches, it just looks like a solid piece of fabric.)

The past two days has been a torrent of rain in Phoenix, which is weird. Us Phoenicians don't quite know what to do with ourselves when water falls out of the sky. This of course leads to accidents, one of which happened at about 10pm last night, knocking out our power for 3 hours. We walked to the corner store and grabbed soda and some Snickers bars, then came home and played Scrabble by candlelight. It was actually really fun, and I was able to keep my uber-competitiveness in check!

Yes yes

My "Study-buddy" and I went and picked up our books for this semester tonight, very excited. I'm not sure why, I know I'll be exhausted before too long. The thing that excites me is that this semester I'm learning about the area of Montessori I like most - Sensorial. Very very neat materials, with awesome and very intelligent purposes.

One part of my teacher quest is trying to better myself as much as I can. I read something about how being a Preschool Montessori teacher (or teacher in general) is very difficult, because we ourselves have to become what we want the children to do. We have to carry ourselves like we're teaching them to, use words like we want them to, be perfect examples, otherwise what we teach is pointless. An engineer has a difficult job calculating specifications, yes, but they don't have to emulate what they're trying to engineer. Hard to explain what the concept is, I guess. So daily I observe the teachers around me, and nitpick myself to try to be better at what I do. It's very hard, actually, trying to change habits about yourself, nuances, subtle things you do to make yourself a great example. I watch the head teacher of the classroom and make mental notes constantly. She is so amazing at what she does, I learn something new from her everyday.

Enough about that!

I've been a complete vegetable since the Winter Break - when I get home at night, I loaf around, crochet or knit a little bit, that's about it. I guess I shouldn't feel too guilty about it though, I keep pretty busy usually, and things are definitely about to pick up in pace again.

The meal-plan calendar is working magnificently. We've saved a ton of money, and stuck to it! (Except tonight, when I was coming back from getting my books, I found my FAVORITE RESTAURANT on the way home, when I had no idea there was one there. For reference, Erica, it's the sub place I made you guys go with me when you were here. They've for the most part, all closed down due to "economic stress" so when I saw one, I was overjoyed!) Other than that, we've only eaten out once in 2 weeks now. Drastic improvement. Our grocery trips now cost at MOST 25$.  Zip-a-dee-doo-da!

Reflecting on 2009

30 Minutes left in this year. Lets review, shall we?

Started off 2009 getting married. I do believe we didn't do much on our wedding night, I'm pretty sure we went to bed early. Oh, I remember now, we were housesitting at the time. We're so boring. Working at my wonderful job, not a whole lot changed. I did start school to get my Montessori Certification, that's exciting! Shane's parents flew down here in the Spring, and we had our belated wedding celebration. Spent a week with them - actually pretty fun! Went to Blizzcon in August - tons of fun with Shaun and Erica - Realized we had more fun being with them than the whole trip, really. Became a crochet-a-holic, making tons of projects for friends, family, and myself. Huzzah! Aquired a funtastic and cute kitten, Nymeria, who's been a valuable learning tool for Shane. (muahahah)

What hasn't changed?
 Residence (hopefully in the next few weeks it will!)
Marital Status (this is a good thing)
Job
Love for Chocolate

All in all, I'm not going to reflect badly upon 2009. I know some people had a bad year, but unfortunately in life, you cannot fully appreciate the wonderful years without a bad year thrown in. I'm hoping that 2010 (It's so hard to write that, I keep putting 20010...TWO ZEROS DAMMIT) will be a good year for everyone. I love my friends, I love my family, and I wish everyone nothing but the absolute best.

(I do however want that loud, drunk, yelling jerk outside to stop hooting and playing bad music.)

________________________________________________


On another note, non-New-Year related -

I made a meal calendar for us. I went all crazy, did a spreadsheet in Excel, and made a 6day, 4 week calendar (One day free for whatever we want / leftovers). It was a truly wonderful experience for my terribly anal side. I even made a special Shopping Check List to make our Grocery trips more efficient. The Calendar/ List has numerous reasons for it's creation.
1. If I pick what I want to eat, it's too hard to accommodate what I want each night, so our pantry was artificially bloated with odd-cravings foods.
2. I'm usually absolutely starving when I get off work at 6, so Shane is going to use the calendar to make food ahead of time, instead of waiting an hour to get settled, then have dinner.
3. If the food is already made, I'll eat it - we all know I can't cook.
4. Weight loss method - Much healthier options are on the menu - No more "white" foods. (Just as a general food, not because they are actually white. Starchy foods like white bread, potatoes, etc)
5. Money saving method - By doing this, we actually save a ton, because we're using what we have in our pantry MUCH more efficiently. For example, I did things very planned out. If we buy ground meat one week, we use it for a few things that week. If tortillas are bought, it's planned that the whole package gets used before the expiration date. We found we'd buy things like buns, or fresh veggies, and they wouldn't get completely used before they went bad.
6. I'm anal, and this killed 2 nights of planning / editing / printing. YAY!

So...aside from that little anal tangent, I'm still working on my ugly Franken-dishtowel. It's all....looped on some spots. As I go, it does get better, but the beginning isn't pretty. I have been ultimately motivated to make  my own household items. I'm going to make a really neat set of placemats, a big lace tablecloth to fit our octagon shaped table, etc. This is my plan because of our new dishes that we got. They're beautiful - plain white, flat, slightly square shaped. I love completely neutral things like that, and adding kooky accessories. The placemats are all going to be different colors, different techniques, but the same size. Our glasses are all crazy too, trust me, I have a theme! ECLECTIC!

Oh god...I'm turning domestic. One year of marriage-----It's sinking iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn

The other night, as a solution to Vixen sometimes beating up Nymeria, we bought her Soft Claws.

 THEY'RE PIIIIIIIINK. I must say, I'm jealous. She's been really good with them too, not chewing them off. Plus, it's stylish.

Oh, there, look. I took so long to type this, it's 2010. Happy New Year!

Happy Day After Christmas!

This Christmas did not disappoint. I received many wonderful gifts, one of which I'm using right now! My new pink laptop!!! Fancy, I know. All I could manage to say was "It's PINK!!!" over and over again. Shane and I also received a nice 48pc dish set, and 45 piece silverware serving set. We can be fancy! I don't think we'll unpack it until we move - then we can just toss out all the old cracked, chipped, and mis-matched dishes, and start with a new, fancy matched set! From Amelia I got a beautiful frame I can't wait to use, and a set of Crystal (!) ornaments. I got two Knitting books from Chelsea - one of which was on my Amazon Wish list! (Stitch n Bitch, one of the greatest knitting books ever!)

Speaking of knitting, I've nailed cast-on, knit, and purl! Woohoo! Now I can move on to actually making stuff! It is a little harder than Crocheting, but it's more versatile. However I did just learn how to make lace with crochet, which is something you can do with knitting, but is easier with crochet.

I think a good first project with my sewing machine is going to be a laptop case - WOOOO!!! (pink of course!)

POST REDUEX

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaackplbtysh! I made a huge post, clicked publish, and it tells me there was an error and to hit back. I go back, everything's gone :(.

Basically, I've been really busy getting ready for Christmas with the kids at school, and then all last week I was really sick with the stomach flu. Wheeeee. While I was sick, I recieved my Secret Santa gift - I got two really awesome and cute pink reusable grocery bags, a pink ADIDAS toiletry bag, a Gingerbread house cookie jar, and a couple other small things. Yay Christmas! The charity of strangers!

Yesterday was busy as hell, Shane and I had to go mail some stuff (Secret Santa gift, and something for his parents). Afterwards we went shopping, and I picked up some pink knitting needles, so I can teach myself knitting over the break. As soon as we walked home (6mile roundtrip, walking eesh) my boss called to say that she was on her way to pick me up to go to our work Christmas party. That was a lot of fun, we did a "Bad Christmas" or "Yankee Swap" type thing where you can either steal someone's already opened gift, or pick an unopened one. I designed (I guess you could say) a really neato scarf, which Amelia recieved and loves. I got 3 cheesecakes (one cherry, chocolate, and regular)  which are currently missing some pieces already. :D  Immediately after the party, Amy took me to my babysitting gig. It was nice, I got to reflect on the busy busy day.

So over the break, I'm babysitting mon-weds on both weeks. I plan on practicing with the sewing machine, and teaching myself to knit. Yaaay! I'll be turning our now spare desk (since the old computer bit the dust) into my little work station. This way I don't clutter up our tiny diningroom table with it, since it is kinda large. I've built up a teensy supply of neato fabrics, and I already have a ton of ideas. (Mostly purses, you guys know me.) We also are going to be looking for a nice place to move while I'm on my break, perhaps we can move while it's not 120degrees outside! We're looking in the same area, of course, as I have to be near work. Maybe something not on the main road so it's a little quieter, or a little more towards Scottsdale. It'll be a little more expensive, but then we won't have to deal with the awful, hideous neighbors we have been dealing with. This place is SO noisy all day long, it's so icky. OH CRAP I just remembered we put laundry in almost an hour ago.

Christmas time, christmas time!

I LOVE this time of year. We spent this weekend out and about, shopping! It was great - We actually didn't spend that much money, but we got plenty! Our focus was getting things to complete our Christmas Gift projects, and prepare to mail out our Christmas Cards. I've never done my own Christmas Cards before! Yay! I've been collecting everyone's addresses in my fancy new address book. Getting mail is fun.

I also recieved the name of the person I'm getting things for for my internet Secret Santa exchange. I'm doing a very neat and awesome scarf, I'll post pictures of it once it's done.

We found out the other day that apparently, we've been living in this apartment without a lease for 3 months now - so I think we might just go ahead and move...I've got two weeks off at the end of the month, and it's not horribly hot outside like it usually is when we move!

Hey - guess what I did last night - I baked cookies! I didn't burn the apartment down! And they're actually pretty tasty! I did it all by myself too, Shane didn't have to help!

I have a TON of projects on my plate at the moment, which for someone with my ADD makes me happy happy happy! I need to make something for the work Christmas party next weekend, finish my two urgent gifts, finish one for the family for Christmas Day, and a few for friends! And somehow make myself something in between too. One of my co-workers the other day said "One of the high points of my day is seeing what new scarf Nena has on today." I didn't even realized that I owned that many. I really could benefit from living somewhere colder.

Yesterday when we were at the store, I was dressed like a ragamuffin. I was wearing grey sweats and a grey sweater, and my messy unbrushed hair was tossed up in a ponytail - I ran into one of my kids' families, and a co-worker. Ugh. Why only when I look like crap? Why not the rest of the time when I look halfway presentable?

Black Friday

It was magical! I watched Breakfast at Tiffanys, ate delicious cookies, and stayed in my PJ's. I rarely get days like this, because I usually don't let myself do nothing. For some odd reason, I feel lazy when I relax. I feel like I wasted an entire day if I do nothing but chill. What can I say, I'm crazy! I can't really say I didn't do nothing though, I did spend about half an hour this morning cleaning.

I'm hoping to babysit tomorrow night to get a little cash. I'm dying to go to the store and get some thread so I can try the sewing machine! I've watched a bunch of tutorials, now I'm just at the point that I need to try. Yay! I also need to buy another skein of yarn for one of the Christmas projects, it's taking much more yarn than I thought it would. I have the feeling that once this is done, and people see it, it'll be something everyone wants :P .

I'm thinking I might spend some time reading, I haven't been able to do that in a while. Comfy fleecy pj's and a nice book...mmm. This Christmas should be nice, I have been at my job for 3 years now, so I get paid for the whole two weeks off. I will also be babysitting for a few hours in the mornings, so I won't feel bored and like I wasted my vacation. I'm looking forward to it though, holidays all behind, no more stressing about projects! Then I can make all of the things that I want for meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. Is that selfish? Nah, I have some cool ideas!