New Camera!

Well, after a rough few days I got an unexpected birthday surprise from Declan, plus thanks to his doing a lot of other people (Mom and Don, Brian and Suzanne -the in laws, Wes and Michelle, and our friends Aaron and Erin). Declan is such a good guy and got everyone to chip in to replace my camera. They all knew how much I missed it, and it was a terrific present. So off to Best Buy and I got my new Canon, that has complete manual functions as well as the standard that the digital cameras have to offer. Anyway, I'm smitten and here are some of my favorites from this afternoon.

Our first tomato of the season!

Marley caught General Tso.

Sailor :)

The Day After

Before I go any farther, please excuse or pass over any of these painful blogs, this helps me though.

I do want you to know that you need to take care of your friends. If there is something they are trying to hide, call them out on it. Once, right after high school, Erika and I met for coffee and while we were on the phone planning it she told me not to say anything about the way she looked. I knew what was going to be meeting me there. I didn't say anything. I tried to push it out of my mind. She went through these ups and down, and it seemed like when she shrank it was to half of her normal weight. Strangely enough I only have pictures of her when she was doing better, this is something I am thankful for, and right now I am trying to find those little things. Last summer Declan and I met her and her boyfriend at the Botanical Gardens, she met Abe and even held him, I remember putting him in his little Cardinals shirt, because I knew she was a baseball fan, anyway... when I saw her then she was not doing well. She was painful to look at, and I kept thinking about what everyone else had to be thinking when she walked by them. After that I realized that I couldn't quietly let her suffer. I got in touch with another friend of hers to see how she was doing, called a couple of eating disorder clinics to ask for advice and help, and even called her Mom. Her sweet, sweet Mom was very receptive to me trying to find her help, because she knew that Erika was fighting a losing battle at that point. I remember arguing with myself about what to do next. I thought about my growing family, my job, and the stress Declan was under, and decided that there wasn't much I could do except let her know I was thinking of her, and to try to keep in touch.

Come winter and I was having a hard time contacting her. I was hoping everything was going well, and that maybe her busy social schedule and job were keeping her busy. Just a few weeks ago, maybe a month or two, we finally talked again. She told me that she had been getting treatment, which was when she openly admitted to getting help. She was receiving help at the McCallum Place, which was one of the places I had spoken to and looked up online and they offered much help to me in how to help her. I finally told her how worried I was about her, 13 years later I told her I worried. Even though I was scared I told her about my efforts to get her help and she was so thankful, as I was to hear that she had found some. We even talked about having lunch together, and she said that it was really helpful having people around her when she was eating.

Tell you friends to get help! The happy comes knowing that she knew I was rooting for her. I can have peace in that. I could not have had peace in knowing that her disease was so big that it turned me into a coward.

I also worked up the courage to call her Mom this morning. Her Mom was her biggest cheerleader and I hope that she feels like she is part of the reason that Erika lived as long as she did. Her Mom told me that while going through her computer last night they came across a will that Erika had written in December. She obviously knew the delicate place her life was. She told me that Erika had mentioned me in her will as a good friend that she loved and respected, that is another happy, knowing that I meant as much to her as she did to me. Her funeral will be tomorrow and stupidly I think about what I will wear and why I can't just wear jeans. And then my sweet friend will be buried on Saturday.

Her Mom told me to talk to Erika and let her know everyday that I love her, and last night I did. It was hard having Declan go to work, and me alone in the house, because it's in those quiet times that things get really hard. As I laid in bed, not wanting to read, not wanting to go to sleep I talked to her. I asked her what it was like where she was, and if there was really anything after all of this. I remember her wearing this butterfly ring, and I think she had a necklace too, and while I was talking to her I noticed the butterflies that Marley had made and taped to our wall were fluttering. I know it was from the fan, but I think it was maybe her too.

I have to let all of my family and friends know I love them. And I have to know that no matter what shows on your face, like the smile she always had, that something can be tormenting them, and that they need to know that I am there, thinking about them.

6.24.09

Today I lost a very good friend of mine. My friend Erika had been suffering from an eating disorder for as long as I can remember, and we became friends our freshmen year of high school. She dealt with this on and off and I had always hoped when I saw her at her normal weight that she had finished with it, beat it. Erika was a beautiful woman. She had a kind heart but always had a snappy/snarky comment for you when you needed it. She is the only friend of mine from high school that always sent me Christmas cards and birthday cards. She always let me know how much I meant to her. We had lost touch over the past couple of years, as friends do from time to time. And we were beginning to try to find the time to get together a couple of weeks ago after she had just spent a few months in treatment for her eating disorder. When we talked after she got out, it was the first time that she openly admitted to me that she had a problem, but it was one of those things that was always there and that we both knew about. Today at 2:30pm Erika died of a heart attack at almost 27 years old.

Because it feels better I want to tell you about some of the things we did together. She was one of my bridesmaids. Her nickname is high school was Bogie. We threw a party at a friends house when he wasn't in town. We worked on yearbook together. We stayed out way too late, and got in to trouble together. We went to Atlanta together in high school. She held my hair back and I held her hair back after long nights of drinking. She came to see Marley after she was born. She drove a bright blue Dodge Neon when those things were "cool". We almost ended our friendship over a guy named Matt that worked at Target. We were each others dates to dances. We stayed up late talking to her Mom, Edna. We would go to TJ's Diner in South County and drink coffee and smoke cigarettes all night long. She was terrified of babies. We worked at New Lady Fitness together. She took me out for my 21st birthday and got me to sing karaoke. We liked guys that were going off to SEMO. We watched the Cardinals win the world series while drinking at some bar in South County. She was a cheerleader, a big sister, a daughter, a girlfriend, a best friend. We sewed our wild oats together.

My 21 st Birthday

Erika, and the cowboy at my Bachlorette party, got to love this one.

Erika the bridesmaid.

Can't explain this one.

Before Sweetheart Dance with our bestfriend Kaye.

Senior Prom, Erika, Kaye and I

I will miss her smile, her humor, her cards, and the beautiful person she was and always will be.

Steek!

I did it! I steeked my Epaulet Jacket! Here is the method I used, the crocheted steek. Declan and I were watching The Curious Case of Benjamin Buttons (finally) and he kept looking at me like I was crazy, talking about cutting my knitting and all. I knit a tiny little swatch up before hand and then steeked it to help me gather my strength. After cutting I pulled on it the best I could to see if it would come apart, and you know what... it didn't. The steek ended up leaving such nice edges, and they don't roll they just fold back at the steek. If knitting flat takes up so much time, what with purling and all, and turning your work, I don't know what people don't just steek. I say that, but let's see how my next project goes. Anyway, it went well, I'm happy, here are pictures. I still haven't gotten my camera fixed, but our house guests have kindly let me use theirs.

Muddle Puddles

Wednesday (I think), after work I decided to let the kids loose in the mud that had developed in the backyard after that series of rainy days we had. Abe got stripped down to his nappies, and even though he wasn't entirely sure what to think about the mud, I was able to get a few good pictures of him playing in it.

WIP: Techicolor Epaulet Jacket

I started this guy a few weeks ago after mulling over yarn to use for the pattern, it dawned on me that I had enough Malabrigo stashed away to make it work. Now the Malabrigo was all different colors, and one of the colors, that I had the most of I decided against, canary yellow, not my color, but that didn't stop me from casting on. That Elizabeth Zimmerman, she was one hell of a lady, and this pattern is another great one of hers. It's basically a top down sweater, with saddles, and I love the garter stitch. I kept thinking that it wasn't going to fit me, my shoulders aren't that small, and someone even asked me if it was for Marley, but I kept on, and so far the fit seems pretty perfect.

It isn't knit in the round, but I got tired of the back and forth garter stitch. The weight of it, the fact that it eats yarn like my cat goes through cat food were among the reasons that I decided to add a few extra stitches (4) for a steek and join the sucker to work in the round. It has since grown much faster, and I think maybe this weekend I will steek it. EEEE!!! It is my first steek, and I think that is a pretty big deal, who ever thought to take scissors to their knitting?? Well I'm going to give it a go. I hear it's not really that big of a deal after you do it, but isn't everything that way?

The colors aren't entirely true in the photos, and obviously pay no attention to the time stamp. That pink on the sleeve is a little more neon, bubblegum than it lets on, also under the teal is a block of "Velvet Grape". That color ended up being the perfect tie in... thank you Andi. I am thinking the other sleeve will just be random single ridge stripes of all of the colors so far, and the bottom band of garter stitch, and the button band (post steek) will be the red that I started with at the neck line. I've tried to keep the color changes fairly mindless, but that does get a little difficult.

PS- the pattern is Cully's Epaulet Jacket by Elizabeth Zimmerman, from Knitting Workshop

Recipe: Sweet Potato Banana Smashies

I made some suprisingly tasty little snacks for Abe after work today, and thought I would share the recipe. Abe loves "snacks", but it is hard to find things that really are healthy for him. He would eat pretzels and crackers all day long, but it is hard to get him to eat fruit and veggies. So problem solves, Sweet Potato Banana Smashies. Oh the smashies part is because he always ends up with these little smashed pieces in his fists that you have to pry out, and that is kind of what these cookies look like.

Ingredients:
-2 sweet potatoes, cooked and peeled (I used the microwave)
-2 very ripe bananas
-1 t. ginger
-1 t. cinnamon
-1 t. vanilla
-1 egg
-1/3 c. applesauce
-1/2 c. dry oatmeal

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 F. I didn't grease the pan, but it probably would have been a good idea, because they kind of stuck on there.

In a bowl, mash the sweet potatoes and bananas, and then add the rest of the ingredients and mix well. Spoon small balls of mixture onto the baking pan and bake for 20 minutes. When finished cooking cool on a wire rack. Store in the fridge.

They really are good a little warm, but good cold too. They end up being a little mushy in the middle still, but if they are good enough for Abe, they are good enough for me.

In knitting news I finally gave in to the lace bug that bit me about a month ago. Every day I went to work I would fondle the lace weights and dream about what I would knit. I really wasn't sure what I would knit, and I had a ball of Classic Elite Silky Alpaca, which is about 450 yards, so I wanted something that wouldn't need anymore yards than that. I decided on the Swallowtail Shawl by Evelyn Clark, and once I got the kids to bed this evening I got started. I wasn't able to find my Silky Alpaca, but did find a skein of Habu Textiles Cotton Boucle, which is another lace weight, but 100% cotton, and has a very nice texture. So I am in the 4th repeat of the pattern, and I am smitten.

Then there was cake

Another day without a functioning camera, and it would have been a good day to have one too. Now that school is out for Marley, I have been trying to come up with some type of creative activities to do together because I know how much she loved doing "projects" at school. We sat down about a week ago and figured out a schedule, which she loves, and seems to bring a little order to our chaotic house. We have things planned like Studio Time, where we do some type of art based project, last week we did marble paintings where you lay a piece of paper in a box, drop a few blots of paint on it, then drop in marbles and shake it all up so the marbles roll all over the paint. We have a lot of our wedding invites leftover still so we used the back of those and then hung them up gallery style in the dining room for all to see. This week for Studio Time we did (tried) some wet felting with some of that wool I have. It was interesting... for dye all I had was food coloring, which the wool didn't take too well, we tried yellow, pink, blue, and green, and then the whole felting process was a little tough, so I am going to try and felt ours up a bit more. I told Marley that I liked hers because it was very abstract, and she said "yeah, it's like so random." Other things we have planned are a weekly field trip or play date (she loves calling it a play date when a friend comes over, I think the term is weird, but oh well). We tried to go to the pool today, but U. City's baby/kid pool was closed and then we tried to go to the wading pool at Tower Grove, and there was a lot of traffic and screaming on the way, so we just turned around, and an hour later found ourselves back at home. We did find time to bake the "BEST CAKE EVER!". Marley actually did everything except grease the pan and put it in the oven. She also managed to use two whole containers of sprinkles on top of the strawberry frosting, nothing like a little cake with your sprinkles.

This week has been a big week for Abe too. His walking has gotten so much better, and even has started relaxing his arms when he walks instead of holding them out constantly for balance. Sometimes he will kind of throw them down to the side in this way that you can just see him thinking "ho hum, what's next". He has also started waving and pointing. Lots more head nodding. When I am walking around the house he tries to attach himself to my leg, but I have found out that he is very happy holding my hand, and I can just say "Abe wanna hold mama's hand?" and he just grabs it and happily walks along side me. And he's started wearing a barrette :) His bangs have gotten so long, and I don't want to cut them yet, and without the barrette they hang nearly to his nose. Don't worry there aren't any flowers or fru-fru, usually just a bobby pin, and he doesn't seem to mind. The lady at the drive thru did gasp at what a beautiful baby girl I had in the backseat though.

In between all of the cake and hand holding I've managed to design and knit up a very cute, vintage inspired, beaded coin purse for a class I am teaching at Knit and Caboodle on June 20th. You can visit their website on the side bar for more info on the class. It is using Louisa Hardig Grace, which is a beautiful silk and wool blend, and has a very pretty picot edge. Can't wait for that camera to start working again... grumble, grumble.

Wooly Stories

The flippin' camera decided that the pictures it takes are going to come out looking like what the world looks like to me with out glasses and contacts. So no pictures of knit projects, but I don't really want to talk about those right now anyway. I want to talk about the wool I had gotten a few weeks ago that I finally decided to start to do something with. It came from a coworker of my Mom's and it came, very dirty a smelly, and very intimidating to someone that wants to attempt to tackle it with out any experience cleaning raw wool.

I gave some to Kathy, a friend of my mine, the other day and she took it home and her husband and her cleaned it right away, and told me about her process and how excited she was about it. Bite the bullet Ariel, just get started on little bit. That was what her excitement told me. So I began by picking out all of the large debree, then I gave it a little bath with very mild, vegetable based detergent and very hot water. My friend used a different cleaning technique and I found it very interesting that there are so many different ways, her way said no hot water at all, where I found advice to use hot water. It soaked for a while then I rinsed and did another bath with a little less soap, and the water was not as hot, because the wool had cooled down some, and I didn't want to felt it. At the point of the bath the wool went from looking like it was covered in cocoa powder to a beautiful creamy white. As it was drying on a couple of towels on my dining room table I picked through to get even more little pieces out and began to notice varying softness of the wool. There was a lot of coarse wool, but occasionally I would run across a nice little soft tuft of it. Remember, that I have no idea what I am doing as far as it comes to cleaning wool, so I don't even know if that was the correct way or not, I do know that it got the job done.

As soon as I got home from work yesterday I decided I try my hand at dyeing it, using natural dyes from the backyard. Marley and I went out and picked mulberries, dandelions, wild strawberries, dark purple Japanese irises, and rose petals. I put the stuff in some pots and began to cook and see what happened. This is where things got interesting... the strawberries and mulberries were together in a pot that the water turned a rich wine color, the rose petals and the dandelions went in another pot that turned yellowy brown (like a tea color), and the irises, which were again dark purple and were just the flower with a tiny bit of the green part that they blossom out of, these guys turned kelly green. Kelly green!!! Now all of this was an experiment, so I had no expectations, and it was more about letting Marley play around with the wool and the dyes. So those cooked for about 45 minutes. Then it came time to add a mordant. I had researcher this a little bit and found that while alum seems to be one of the better mordants, I didn't want to go to the store to buy any. Vinegar seemed to get the job done on most dyes, but wait I didn't have white vinegar, I only had red wine vinegar. What did I do? Of course I just used that, remember I didn't want to go to the store, and this was also an experiment. The berry dye stayed the same with the vinegar, the rose/dandelion dye stayed the same, but the iris dye went clear as soon as I added the vinegar. The green was a rich, bright kelly green and it seemed like the just erased it.

So we decided to then try to dye the wool. Wool went into a pot, I poured the dyes on top, and started to cook it. Well, nothing happened, no dye on wool. When I pulled the wool out the dye stayed in the pot, and it cooked for about 30 minutes. Ugh. Like I said before, experiment.

After the wool dried I did spin the little bit that tested tonight. I noticed even more the spots of coarse wool compared to the softer spots and just went ahead and spun it all together. It wasn't carded, and I didn't take much time to prep it otherwise for spinning so it is a little rough around the edges but came out beautiful. This is where I need that camera. But I did ply it which seemed to hide some of the flaws. But really is it flawed? I find it fascinating that the only other thing I could have done was sheer the sheep. It kind of gave me a boost of confidence in the wool. Because of the immense amount of lanolin in it I think the first thing I do with it will be soakers.

June 7

So blog time used to be in the morning after Marley went to school and Abe went down for a nap. School's out and Abe is now wrestling around with the idea of only one nap a day in the afternoon. Soooo.... ugh.

Thank you for the book suggestions! I am reading Choke by Chuck Palahniuk, and enjoying it very much. He also has a book of short stories that I heard about through a friend, I may have to check them out. My Dad also got The Moonflower Vine by Jetta Carleton for me after reading this article in the Riverfront Times. He has since taken it back to read it first. I think Blind Assasins will be next on the list though. Also someone mentioned Pride Prejudice and Zombies in their blog, and then a friend of mine was raving about it, I have mixed feelings on reading it, but maybe someone else will be interested.

In other news, Abe walks now. Not just a toddle here, a toddle there. No, just walks. He falls down a lot, but instead of crawling the rest of the way he just stands right back up. He does try to run, which involves him leaning forward a little bit which seems to propell him a little more but ends up just making him lose his balance and nose dive into the ground. We've also finished nursing. It just happened, kind of suddenly. I'm a little sad still, but we had a good go of it, approx. 13 months.

Oh and Declan had a job interview! I will tell you more when we find out if he got it or not next week.

And I have lots of knit things to show and tell. D has to work tonight (Sunday, darnit) and I will get out my camera and shoot away.

I have to go, I convinced Declan to take the kids so I could get ready for work and finish up some stuff for a class and here I am sitting at the computer instead. I'm afraid I am about to be found out.