Cuban Sleeves

For several days now I've been trying to solve the problem of not being able to complete a bright yellow babysweater I've been working on because Walmart does not carry the yarn anymore. I've been buying at Walmart and Michael's because basically I'm not a very skilled knitter yet and I can't bear the idea of spending $10 for a skein of good yarn that I may just mess up. However, after several weeks of ferociously knitting these sweaters and trying to put them together, I feel that I have learned a thing or two. I've certainly learned enough and become skilled enough to take a chance and buy something really off the wall and move towards a more creative solution for these sleeves. To that end, I purchased something feathery and multi-hued at the little yarnshop here in town - Purls and Girls. Unfortunately, they do not have a website so I can't share it here. Anyway, the contrast is going to look terrific and I can hardly wait to jump into it. I can also use the yard to put the pieces together. I think it is going to look really sweet not to mention that the sleaves will end up looking very Cuban. Here's a picture of the bright yellow yarn and the feather yarn together.

Wonderful Thursday

I am so happy this morning. I am sure it is because tomorrow is a holiday and I get a three day weekend. Kris and I are leaving for San Jose Saturday morning to spend the night at Francine's and visit for a while. She is taking off again for parts unknown so must take this opportunity to see her before she disappears again. Quanah and Kris traveled quite a lot last year. Q lived in Rome for four months and caught up with Phaa for a couple of days in Naples. Kris traveled to Paris and Tunisia early in the year. The picture posted here is Q with Phaa in Naples and Kris with Phaa in front of the Louvre in Paris.

Postcards

Lately with postcrossing inspiration, I've been making postcards and sending them to a few friends who also share my passion for this fun way of communicating. Current postcard pals are Vicci, JaneJane, and Sam.

Not too bad

Well, the impulsive hair thing from last night turned out not so badly after all. My brown hair is still brown and no lighter than this picture so not light at all.

Working on intense project at work today. More later, whenever.

Taking a Risk

It's pushing towards midnight Tuesday and I've done something so spontaneous and impulsive that it is either going to be a huge success or a total disaster. Kris colored her red hair with a lighter red to brighten it up. Having short hair, she used only half the bottle. I, on the other hand, have brown hair. One guess where the other half of the bottle ended up. At the moment I feel quite out of my mind. But I won't have long to wait to discover if it is ok or not. 25 minutes til I wash and rise and then ten more to blow dry. What a way to end the day.

Wind'nsea Beach

The postage stamps I ordered a couple of weeks ago arrived yesterday. I ordered 24 cent stamps to use on my postcards. Here are the images I used.

Wind'nsea Beach is in San Diego and decades ago I used to spend a lot of time there. These pictures were taken in winter 1971. Winter is my favorite time to visit the beach but in San Diego 35 years ago, any day was a great day to go to the beach.

Back then I had not heard of the artist, Edward Hopper. I didn't discover him until a few years later when I went to San Francisco and there was an exhibit of his works at the de Young Museum that I was lucky enough to see. Ever since then I've collected Edward Hopper books and I call these my Edward Hopper photographs.

Monday Musings

EVENING - The day is ending quietly. I had no luck with the yellow yarn so picked up another at Michael's and started again. I have a bit of the other left so I'll keep it with me and match it up sometime down the line.

Quanah called tonight. Job searching is very active now. There is a school in Concord and another in Sierra Madra in Southern California. Praying hard for a job before he graduates but more importantly praying that he passes his Comps. They are in two weeks.


LATE AFTERNOON

Just looked outside the building. It's raining again. There's just no getting away from the March weather. In like a lamb and out like a lion.

We had a day and a half of great weather and now we are in a new storm front. So much for planting the herbs and roses I picked up yesterday.




LUNCH HOUR - Well, that was frustrating. There are only so many places where I can buy yarn around here - Michael's and Walmart. Have been to both and all of a sudden I am on the great yarn hunt for the yellow color and texture I need to finish the fluffy baby sweater. Lesson? Find something I like and be sure to buy several in many colors OR keep meticulous records of the brand and where I found it and and and. . . . Darn IT!!!!!!!

MORNING - After a busy and fruitful weekend, I'm back to Monday - at work again. Looking back on my "to do" list of the weekend, I'm reminded of how much better things work out for me when I keep a list. As I mark things off as "accomplished" I end up with a tangible record of what I actually managed to do. The biggest thing in my mind this weekend was the baby sweater. I am learning so much as I go through the process of knitting it and putting it together. As I study the results, I learn what I like and don't like; I learn what works and what doesn't; I learn about the weight of the yarn, how it feels and what I feel comfortable with. Currently I'm putting together a newborn size sweater knitted on 3-ply yarn. The results will far outstrip my first effort but as I put this one together I am also working on a third effort. The weight of the yarn of this third sweater is softer, heavier, textured and overall much more comfortable to work with. I am guessing that when it come time to put it all together, the results will be more substantial and satisfying. Eventually I will have pictures to post to this musing but first I have to figure out how to use Don's digital camera. Studying the camera book was one of the things I DIDN'T get to this week. More later, I'm sure, as my Monday progresses.

Solesmes, FR Summer 1996

I had lunch with Joe today at Vito's and we talked about Iraq and the ancient history of the region. We also were talking about weekend plans and I mentioned my upcoming visit to Francine with Krista. That lead to a comment about attending Mass at St. Joseph's Cathedral in San Jose since Kris had never seen this beautiful church. Joe hadn't either and was interested in seeing it. That lead us to talk about churches we have seen in Europe and finally to my memory of the Benedictine Abbey in Solesmes, France (pictured above).

I visited Solesmes for a day in June 1996. Solesmes is a quiet, pastoral village southwest of Paris, France. The Abbey is THE imposing structure of the village. As you can see above, the abbey is on a river which contributes to the quiet of the area. The houses are made of rock and mortar. Homes are adorned with shutters, a wild array of flowers, and niches occupied by saints and other holy figures. The entrance to the Monastery is through a driveway/walkway courtyard filled with tall, sheltering trees.

I was with a group of students who were on tour with the Modesto Symphony Youth Orchestra that year. Quanah was 15 years old and going. I certainly wasn’t going to have HIM going to Europe when I hadn’t even been there yet, so Don and I signed on to be chaperones but that is another story. We were attending Mass there that Sunday morning because James Klein, the conductor, said “you can’t go to Europe and not experience the roots of Western music – Gregorian chant”. The music and liturgy was truly wonderful to experience but it was the Little Boy and the Monk who caught my attention.

Across the aisle and about two rows up from Don and I was a young family, a mom, dad, and little boy about 3-4 years old. The little boy wasn’t being noisy but he was very restless. His constant squirming occupied his parents enough to distract them from the Mass. Out of nowhere, a monk in black cape and hood glided up to the family and leaned in to the little boy. Monks at the Abbey for the most part follow the rule silence and it was amazing to see how the monk’s silent admonishment to the little boy settled him down immediately. A bit later at Communion there was again a moment of silent communication between the young child and the monk. As the monk walked to the front of the Abbey, he hesitated just for moment at the pew where the young family sat and looked once again at the child. And the little boy peered up quietly at him. There was something of the Norman Rockwell in this final exchange though with an appearance of old European elegance rather than American folk-art.

I tried to imagine myself as the child seeing this tall and imposing figure in black and I had the sense of being approached by the large blackbird. He wasn’t scary but he WAS startling. Upon reflection I realized that I have never once in all my years of church-going seen such a thing in an American church. In fact, my opinion about parents NOT even trying to control their children could easily become a whole separate entry here. In the meantime, this moment in time is as sharp in my memory and the day it happened.

Rainy Day but busy despite

So much to do today and it is raining to beat the band. However, there are a few things I can do inside where it is warm and dry.

I'm still going to complete my memory of my visit to Solesmes, FR and post it to the blog;


Get the chicken legs going in the crockpot and do a bit of housecleaning.

Go to WalMart and check them out to see if they have the Modge Podge for paper product. It will be cheaper than Michael's.

Later I'll take my mom out to get her hair cut. I hate taking her out in this weather but we'll make it fast.

More interior keep me warm and dry activities will include putting the pieces of Lindsey's baby sweater together. Biene and I went to House of Java after work and she showed me how to put it all together. I put two pieces together and it looked wonderful. THEN right in the middle of a totally unrelated conversation I realized that I had sewn the front panel all the way across the back panel leaving no space for the baby's neck. Jeeze!! The good news in that I managed to take it apart (with a good dose of help from B) and then cleaned it up last night. All is well and I should have it finished quickly and then I will continue on to my next sweater which will be a fluffy yellow one. I might even be able to post a picture of the completed sweater as long as I manage to get a new battery for Don's digital camera today.

David just called. Looks like we will be meeting for our coffee at Starbucks as usual I love getting together with my brother like this.

Tea for Jane

Taking a Break

It is coming on to 4:00 p.m. I’m going to lean back for a moment, take a break and stretch a bit. It is actually feeling like Spring in the valley. The sun is shining, the temp is in the high 60’s, the almond trees are blooming white, the clouds are sparse but the few that are here are fluffy cotton balls. It is the best time of the year now. Like early Fall, it is so bright and crisp and the worst of the allergens have passed, at least the ones that bother me. I started a postcard for Jane last night using my new watercolor pencils. This is a new medium for me and I like it very much. I plan to stop by Michael’s after work and pick up some Diamond Glaze. I think that this will make a better seal than modge podge because it is not so tacky feeling. My stamps I ordered from Photo Stamps were shipped today. I’ll send my card to Jane after the stamps arrive so she can see my personalized artwork stamps. I hope they have a nice appearance. The picture on the order form looked very jagged. With luck, the stamps will have a clear image. Tomorrow Biene comes down off her mountain to show me how to put together the parts for a baby sweater I am knitting for Lindsey and Charlie. With luck, I’ll be able to take the afternoon off and we can play a bit. It would be nice to go to Purlz & Gurlz to look over the 2-ply yarn selection since Michael’s does not seem to have 2-ply, only 3-ply or heavier weight. I’ll scan the postcard in after I finish it (tonight?).

Postcards from Vicci

Evening. Feeling better now. Of course, I'm home and feel out of the tangle of the world. I went to my Bible study group tonight after missing it for two weeks. I'm sure that contributes to my feelings of well-being.

I received another postcard from Vicci today. Here are the two I've received from her since we discovered that we both did postcrossing.

Customer Service

If I really tried –and not very hard – I could probably go on a long and sustained rant about the lack of customer services in the world today. I’ve lived long enough that I notice the change from when I was much younger. In fact, I notice the change just based on the way I was raised. So the day has been icky and annoying. I go to lunch to work on my checkbook and enjoy a meal and a young mom will not effectively take care of her weeping and wailing baby who’s probably around 4 months old. Can’t blame the little one but I can blame the young mother. When a child is crying that much, you do a little more than just bounce them on your shoulder. You PAY ATTENTION. Twenty minutes later baby is finally settling down but as I leave I see that the young mother had finally given the baby a bottle. You know what that tells me? It tells me that she has some wrong-headed idea about keeping a kid on a schedule and of course to hell with everyone around you.

So baby aside and lunch indigesting, I head over to Michael's to get my watercolor pencils. While there I also find a really cool 4 x 6 watercolor tablet that is perfect for my whatnot bag of art supplies I schlep around with me. I find a box of pencil at $5.99. How great is that?! But at the checkout I’m charged $19 something for the two items. This is way too high. Of course the gal at the checkout is on her first day. No problem. I understand first days. Turns out the box of 24 pencils was hanging on the wrong hanger. And there was another 24’er also in the wrong place. $5.99 applied to the box of 12. No problem. I don’t mind having a smaller box. BUT, when the cash register won’t take my check, and the training checker won’t help the new checker figure it out, I start steaming. I have to get back to work. And I’m getting subtle vibes from the trainer that I don’t have a right to feel antsy and need to get back to work. Finally I make an issue of it. I need to get back to work. This has been going on for 15 minutes. Trainer finally pays attention and fixes everything in an instant.

Why oh why do I imagine that this woman probably let her kids cry too when they were babies? I didn’t see much difference between the young mother at the restaurant and the old trainer not effectively helping the new clerk.

What a Day

What a frustrating day this has been so far and it only 10:30 a.m. I'm working on faculty workload reports that take forever. Then, I knock over my calculater and the paper spool comes apart and has to be fixed. Of course this involves crawling around under my desk and my left knee just LOVES that. Then I disconnect the printer. Sheesh. Have cleared my desk now. All is repaired and I'm getting back to work. I wish I was at home dumping more stuff that I don't need in my studio. The good news - YES, there IS good news - is that I received three email confirmations yesterday that postcards had arrived in Finland (2) and Portugal. So that freed me up to ask for three more postcards from http://www.postcrossing.com/. If you have not seen this site, check it out. It is fabulous. THEN I received two cards in the mail. One each from Portugal and Finland. I sent a message to both of them via postcrossing and asked if they wanted a postcard from me. I like to return the favor. Portugal said yes. I find it interesting that not everyone says yes to the offer of an unofficial postcard because it is a very common thing that is done (according to the website). Anyway, four postcards in the outgoing mail today. It's 75 cents each but so worth it. More later. Back to work. SIGH!

Rain Rain Go Away

Lord, will it ever stop raining? I like rain a lot but going from house to car to work to car to wherever to home IN THE RAIN is getting old. If I have to be in the rain, please put me on a winter beach somewhere. Better yet, put me in a lighthouse so I can be surrounded by water and watch the rain. Lord, will it ever stop raining?

Bits and Pieces

Following the lead of a couple of friends,
here is MY contribution to the Bits and Pieces questions:

Four Jobs I’ve held
1. Pre-school teacher (blessedly short-lived)
2. Archeologist/Surveyor (while in college)
3. Legal Secretary (least favorite job)
4. University Music Department ASC (17 years now)

Four Movies I would watch over and over again
1. The Quiet Man
2. To Kill a Mockingbird
3. Flawless
4. Man on Fire (1987 version out of Italy)

Four TV shows I watch without fail
1. Anything CSI
2. Stargate SG-1
3. Stargate Atlantic
4. Gilmore Girls

Four Website I visit daily
1. BlogSpot
2. Google
3. Yahoo
4. MSN Today Show

My four favorite foods
1. Mexican
2. Spaghetti and meatballs
3. Straight up Coffee
4. Ice Cream with Chocolate fudge and peanuts

Four place I would rather be right NOW
1. At home
2. The Ocean
3. On an Art Retreat
4. Italy

Four Places I have lived
1. San Diego CA (where I grew up)
2. Idylwild CA (my favorite)
3. San Jose CA (my least favorite)
4. Rhinelander, WI (dad’s side of the family is there)

Sunday morning, later

I made my first bread pudding today. This is my husband's favorite dessert and I only made him wait 28 years (less one month) to make it for him. LOL Vicci, I have you to thank for the inspiration. In fact, I have this blog to thank you for too. We are so alike, I'm going to lift your list (more or less) since you've done all the legwork. As seems to be usual, one thing or another on Blogspot isn't working. Today it is pictures. I'm four days old on blogging and I already have it figured out that Blogspot seems to come with a lot of ticks. I have a picture to put here but it will just have to go in later. Now I'm off to the kitchen to clean up. Not only are cooking and baking not my thing, but I also make the biggest messes while the process proceeds - hah - how's that for aliteration?

P.S. Well, my blog is living up to its name. My camera is MIA so I tried using my DH's digital camera. The battery is dead. Now I can't take a picture of my first bread pudding and the mess I left in my wake. I sure am bumping heads with technology today.

END OF DAY

The weekends are too short. Just about the time I start to feel that I've given myself one complete day to no one else but myself and I'm ready to start all the "have to's", "need to's", and "would like to's", it's Monday again. The cycle starts again. I wish I didn't have to go to work tomorrow. We are in a slow period. It's very hard to fill 8 hours but this job can change just like that so hi ho, hi ho, it's off to work I will go.

Sunday, 1:30 a.m.

Saturday was a wonderful day. I met Dave at Starbucks for coffee, visited with a friend I had not seen in AGES, and downloaded Picasso2 for SFASMT. I gave the computer over to Don so he's could continue working on our living trust and will. Yuck, but necessary. Plenty to do so I'm off running to jump into another project.

I've been waiting all week for a day like this. Work is such a drudge. Four years to retirement. Can't get here soon enough. I ended up getting my hair cut, stocked up on lunches for Kris, and Quanah called and he had lots of news for us re: Erin, work, school, comps, his future plans for the summer, etc. etc. I finished putting together my art journal binder, cut up my $3 Big! Lots poster with all the money images and worked on a page in the art journal. Unsatisfying effort. I'll work on it some more tomorrow. Continued to work on the babysweater and in between did dishes and made dinner.

It was a glorious day. A wind came in and swept all the clouds and overcast away. The sky was a clear, sparkling blue. Have not seen such a sky in several weeks.

St. Paddy's Day

Early morning: Well, all it took was one simple fix and I am now actually IN. Yesterday was just a preview page. Now is the time for real excitement. Whatever I did, it's actually working. I'm up early this morning, have corn beef, potatoes, carrots, and onions in the slowcooker. Dave and Yolanda will pick up mom this evening and we will all have dinner together. The house will smell marvelous by the time I get home.

It's after lunch now and I have slipped into a serious slump. Thank God it's Friday and I have the weekend. I stopped by Raley's this morning before going to work and got a little green corsage for the day. Lots of green around here and Melissa Pederson showed up in her as usual predictably funny outfit. Wish I had a picture but think green square dancing skirt covered in shamrocks worn over jeans and well, you get the picture.

It's late evening. Dinner is finished and was enjoyed by all. Don showed a side of himself he doesn't let out much and had Yo laughing like mad. He can be very funny when he chooses. I have a camera somewhere but it was hiding so I couldn't record the evening. Lots of laughter.

I'm IN

Oh my. I am in, finally. Oh boy, how did I do that? Here I go again.

getting started

This is tougher than I expected it to be. And wouldn't you know it but I set up my blog and then can't view it - a particular problem that many others seem to be having. Not discouraged but really annoyed. Oh well, it's the journey not the destination.