2013 Year In Review

Here it is, the year in review. Can I just say that I am SO ready for 2014

Shoe Queen matriculated from the college of her choice.

There also might have been a wedding.

I might have started but definitely not finished a 365 photo project. We will see if I can do any better in 2014. Hope springs eternal.

 

We traveled here and there.

Nashville

Naples. I SO want to have the guts to wear tights like this with WHITE shorts and black heels.

Chicago

New YorkTucson

 

And I might have actually done some work that people paid me for!

I am always so tired after photographing a wedding. And then I look at the pictures and want to do it all over again.

There might have been some baseball. Is it summer yet?

My wonderful dad went home to be with Jesus. I miss him every day.

I got to hang with my oldest friends in the world. We have known each other…..Well never you mind how long we have known each other!

We might have sold a house and bought a house.

I might have spent an egregiously large amount of time taking pictures of cow butts at the fair.

And Bonobo breast self exam

There might have been some ornamental stealing that went on. Where are the police when you really need them!

And that was my year. Have a wonderful New Year. I will see you in 2014.

It Just Doesn’t Want To Be That

If you are a knitter you are going to understand this little bit of whining and general fiber bitching. (sorry, I said a bad word).

If you are not a knitter then you might want to come back tomorrow when I am, hopefully, doing my year end review. That will be sure to set you to napping because it has been SUCH a quiet year around here. Did you catch the sarcasm there?

Now back to the fiber that will not behave.

Yarn/fiber is not an inanimate object of our affection. It doesn’t just sit there and let a knitter do whatever we want with it. Not all yarns are meant for all projects much as we might wish otherwise. Sometimes it is just a matter of the wrong weight or composition of the yarn. Sometimes it is just the “feel” of the yarn. And sometimes the yarn is just a recalcitrant pain in my big fat bahookie and won’t cooperate no matter how much I might wish it to.  I SO wish right at this moment that I could say to that lovely and soft worsted weight yarn,

BE WHAT I TELL YOU TO BE!

But alas, the yarn is not listening to me. Not listening at all. Not paying attention. Not playing nice. In fact, I am sure that if I turn around that yarn will be running with scissors.

I want to make this…..

This is Guernsey and we want to be together forever. I have been thinking about this wrap since just about the time Jared Flood put it up on Ravelry. My KnitSib, MamaC, just finished one and it is…oh it is…just fabulous. And when Knit Picks had that latest, evil and enticing sale…..I might have bought some yarn.

Yes, I know I have an entire cupboard full of yarn. But I just didn’t have the right yarn. Nothing in the yarn depository spoke to me and said that it wanted to be Guernsey. But the Swish Worsted Superwash said that it would LOVE to be a Guernsey. And I believed it when it told me that.

But it lied.

The yarn itself is lovely and soft and squishy and once it is washed and blocked will be marvelous. It just won’t be a Guernsey. I have cast on and frogged back THREE FREAKING TIMES on this actually very simple wrap.

THREE. TIMES.

Three strikes and you are out.

It isn’t that I made a mistake each time and had to start over. No, each time I was right on with stitch count and all the other things that go into a wrap. It is just that it didn’t look right. Yes, I know that it wasn’t yet blocked and that blocking can and does change things dramatically. I have had some lace projects that looked like a total disaster until I blocked them within an inch of their yarny lives and they then became things of beauty. But not this time.

I took the project to NYC with me, figuring that I would cast on yet again and make some headway since it is a boat load of hours of driving. And I did make head way. Pretty substantial head way. But each time I looked at the work that I had done…..

I just wasn’t happy.

Folks, I am a third of the way through the entire project and I am not happy. I put it in time out for almost a week, thinking that it was just being naughty and needed some time to get it’s little yarny brain with the program. I hoped. I prayed.

I took it out today and looked at it.

Nope.

So, I am going to frog the entire thing and make something else. I know what I WANT it to be now. I have the pattern. I have all the yarn.

We will see if the yarn cooperates. Cuz if it doesn’t then it might just be going into the cupboard for a good long time.

Stupid yarn.

7 Quick Takes (Vol 240)

The presents are unwrapped. Santa is putting his feet up and having a reindeer sized glass of wine. You know what you have to do. When you are finished unwrapping the blather you need to click on the picture above to be whisked, at the speed of the crashing reputation of UPS, over to Conversion Diary to see what has been going on.

Blather that helps with holiday recovery.

1.
HHBL and I are recovering from our New York City Christmas travels. One of the best things about a trip is actually coming home to your own “nest”. I think this is Friday but I am not sure as I have been confused about the days of the week since I left home. It felt like Saturday all day yesterday.

If this isn’t Friday then just leave me in my delusion. I will catch up eventually.

Let’s see what else we did over those days.

2.

We had sushi for lunch. And Thai for dinner. And fresh ham (which tastes like pork and not like ham because really it is just pork and not cured ham but still delicious.) And deli sandwiches. And grilled chicken from the little store down the street. And craft beer from a Long Island brewery. And about two dozen gluten free chocolate chip cookies. And VERY good wine from somewhere that I have no idea about. I was too busy drinking it to look.

The Norwegian knows his wine.

3.

We had very bad weather which made us wimp out on walking all over NYC. Pouring rain + walking in Manhattan? I have done that before and the experience does not need to be repeated.

And we had very good weather which then meant we went out and walked 10.3 miles over the course of a day. Or 20,630 steps, whichever you prefer.

Both photos taken from Cartoon Girl’s front window. Not a bad view to wake up to. And at one time Carlos Danger Anthony Weiner’s office was right across the street.

4.

Cartoon Girl photobombed my panorama shot of Central Park and the skating rink.

Several times.

5.

The Ugly Wall Hanging found it’s final resting place at Cartoon Girl’s apartment. Mimi and I decided that 10+ years of hiding it in each other’s houses was plenty. And Cartoon Girl expressed an interest in actually using it as art (incomprehensible) so we have laid the Ugly Wall Hanging “gifting” tradition to rest.

When Sue and Doug brought that thing back from the Philippines I don’t think they had any clue what we would do with it over the years.

And where we would hide it.

6.

I might have had at least one Starbucks Grande Blonde Roast every single day.

And I might have taken pictures of discarded shopping lists on the table at Starbucks.

7.
To finish off let’s look at all the random photos I took with my iPhone. You know that is how I roll.

I was obsessed with the shadows on the building outside our hotel window. There are LOTS more of these on Big Bertha.

The shelves and shelves and shelves of photography books at The Strand bookstore. I resisted buying the new book on Vivian Maier but only because it was $50! And it weighed a ton which would have meant I would have had to carry the thing all over Manhattan.

Various boring buildings from a street perspective, just like every other tourist.

People’s feet on the moving subway. There are more of these but I don’t want to scare you away.

A lone glove on the ground in Kew Garden’s park. And in case you are wondering……..

As HHBL was……

I actually picked the glove up and took it home with me. It will be washed today and put away for a long term art project that I will tell you about when I am finished. Which may be a while.

I also might have stood outside, barefoot, in the rain, with both iPhone and Big Bertha to get a half way good photo of the view from the terrace of SisInLaw and The Norwegian’s condo.

The things I do for photography.

And I forgot my tripod so this was the best I could do on a dark and rainy night.

Next time I am bringing my tripod AND the wide angle. The view is magnificent.

Merry Christmas!

 

 

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That Toddling Town

 

 

The CityThat Never Sleeps

Guess where we have been enjoying ourselves. Well, actually we hunkered down inside yesterday because none of us, including the "New Yorker", Cartoon Girl, really wanted to hoof it around the city in the rain. We are whimps.

And it was raining....a lot.

We did venture into the city in the evening to go and have dinner at the home of HHBL's sister and her family. Food! Wine! Cheese! Oh the cheese. Seriously folks, these people know their cheeses. We had been steadily working our way through Brie and cheddar and Parmesean and Blue plus some others that I wasn't sure about.

And then The Norwegian cracked open the cheese that sort of looked like a Brie on the outside.....but when you cut into it the round just sort of collapsed into a mass of glorious, buttery, heart attacky cheesiness that oozed out over the cheese board and onto the table, necessitating us to have to scoop it up onto Water crackers and consume it.

It was life altering.

No one could remember the actual name of the runny cheese so I will just have to start testing various cheeses when we are back in The Frozen Northeast Ohio. I MUST know.

The rest of the meal was fabulous, as I knew it would be. The Norwegian always cooks something unusual for us. Last time we were visiting it was Cuttlefish. Did you know you can eat those? It was a whole HECK of a lot of work to prepare them which means that I will not be cooking them...ever. But it was good to be able to add it to "Debbie's list of unusual things she has eaten". This year it was a fresh ham PLUS the cracklings (nomnomnomnom) as well as a sweet and sour cabbage dish with a Norwegian name that I could neither pronounce or spell. But I could eat it...two helpings of it actually. Dessert as Cloudberries in whipped cream. Oh be still my beating (for the time being) heart. We felt privileged to have the cloudberries as they are not normally found in the USA without some effort. They are not commercially cultivated in Norway and are actually gathered only in the wild at a certain time of year. It is one of his Christmas treats for himself and he shared them with us.

Thank you Bjorn.

And oh the wine. I consumed more than my fair share of an absolutely stellar Malbec. And of course I forgot to write down the name. The Norwegian knows his wine.

And now it is back out into the city today. Hope you are having half as much fun as I am.

But my feet really hate me right now.

 

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7 Quick Takes (Vol 239) Or….How Can There Only Be 4.5 Days Until Christmas!

Ho, ho, ho here we go. That is right…..4.5 days until Christmas. Let the panic begin. When you are done basking in the bright, holiday glow of my blather you need to click on the picture above to be whisked, at the speed of Santa’s reindeer, over to Conversion Diary to see what everyone else is doing.

Blather that is both naughty and nice.

1.
This time of year there is SO much to do, or at least it feels like that. And yet, I want to spend all my time with my big, fat bahookie plunked in my chair reading all those “end of the year” lists of “notable people who have died” and “the best photos of the year” and “most noteworthy news stories of the year”.

I just can’t seem to stop myself. Guys I really, really love those kinds of things. That must have been why I always loved those “Big Book of Lists” that were all the rage when I was in Jr. Hi. and HS. Yeah, I was that nerdy. The internet just means that I can find all those kinds of lists at the click of my mouse.

I may not exit my woman cave until 2014.

2.
And speaking of the woman cave……

It was TOTALLY trashed this week and had been that way for a while. I have had so many projects going and things happening and editing to be done that I just had been making piles of things on my desks. Yes, I have two desks.  Total disaster.

I know it is bad when I have to move a project pile in order to start or finish a new project. And I just cannot work that way. It makes me crazy….

Or crazier.

So I took some time yesterday to clean up a bit and put things away. I am much happier when life is organized. It still isn’t as organized as I need. And we won’t even TALK about the unfinished side of the basement. The place of chaos. That is going to be tackled with great vigor and cleanoutedness come the new year. For now, the desk and work space is manageable.

For now.

I hatehatehatehatehate disorganization.

3.
I managed to mail the last of the Christmas presents on Tuesday…..and I didn’t murder anyone at the post office.

But it was a close thing. There was this one woman, several people ahead of me in line, who REALLY needed a big dose of Christmas cheer. In 3h enema proportions. I am not going to explain that and if you are a nurse you will already know. You can look it up on your own.

She could definitely have used a large dope slap upside the head. Really lady, do you think you are going to get any better service from that poor postal clerk if you berate her like that in front of the swarm of other people waiting to do the same thing that you are doing?

Like I said…..large dope slap.

Or 3h enema.

4.
24 hours into the whole having to wear glasses thing, I am still liking them. I have noticed that the only place where they aren’t so great is when I am working on the computer. It isn’t that I can’t use the glasses then, it is the issue with the fuzziness at the edges of the field of vision, which I knew about going is as I have the seamless lenses.

But I think I can just use my cheaters for working on the computer. I will have to as it is a bit difficult to edit photographs effectively when they are blurry around the edges and you weren’t actually going for any Bokeh. Hard to know if your time spent editing and sharpening has been effective.

It is also just training myself to actually turn my head when I need to look at something rather than just moving my eyes. That way my field of vision stays clear.

5.
And speaking of editing and photographs.

I got an email last night from a potential client that just knocked my socks off. Not sure if the job will materialize yet…but a good chance that it will. I am excited and fearful as the company is large, like nationally large. The job itself is local but it would be AWESOMESAUCE on the photo resume. And income is always good. This job is actually an outgrowth of a very small job that I did, for free, in May…which led to a bigger job in November….which segued into another job scheduled for January…..which was announced in a newsletter……which was seen by the recruiting department of another company……who contacted the newsletter people….who gave out my contact info….and thus another job comes to me.

I am scared spitless that I will actually get the job, small as it is.

I hate being so vague about it but nothing is definite.

6.
Mimi sent our Christmas present money last week.

I spent it……..on yarn.

I KNOW! You are so surprised by this aren’t you. And yesterday I cast on a project with some of the yarn that came in the mail yesterday. Absolutely NO willpower where new projects are concerned. And of course I had to make a change or two to the pattern. Add a repeat. Change a needle size. Nothing major (she said confidently). It is Guernsey Wrap by Jared Flood and I have wanted to do one for a long time. Like since he put it up on Ravelry. I spent some time on it last night….and today I am frogging it. Not because I don’t like it but because I am going up a needle size. I gambled and lost on my needle size choice.

It happens.

I sometimes am more of a loose knitter. And with that in mind, even though the pattern called for sz 8 needles, I made the executive decision to use a sz 7. And no, I didn’t swatch. This is a wrap and I am lazy and I hate swatching. I don’t swatch for lace or wraps or socks. So shoot me.

So I will re-cast on some time today. And I will be using special stitch markers from Absinthe Yarn. Oh guys they are LOVELY. I usually just use plain old plastic rings, totally boring. But Kathy sent me some beautiful stitch markers when I ordered a skein of yarn from her Etsy shop and I have been dying to use them. Love, Love, Love.

Kathy and I actually went to high school together. We didn’t know each other all that well, running in different “circles”, and reconnected just a few years ago. We were both SO excited to find that we are KnitSibs of the heart. You should see the skein of hand dyed fingering weight yarn I bought from her Etsy shop!!! She had me at the name………Hot Flash.

7.
I have not baked a single Christmas cookie this year.

And my waistline thanks me.

Gone are the days when all it seemed like I did in December was bake Christmas cookies for cookie exchanges and school functions. I kind of miss those days. But honestly I do not miss cookie exchanges. So many cookies that then had to be eaten. There were always the cookies that languished when all other kinds had been consumed with gusto. The lone cookies that no one really liked. The sad cookies of Christmas with no stomach home.

I will quit now.

But I may have to give in and bake one batch. Then the question becomes which kind of cookie should I bake? Now that is going to be a hard decision.

That Is Four Eyes To You

The day has finally arrived.

The time has finally come.

I officially have glasses that I am supposed to wear all the time.

Oh guys this is going to take a bit of getting used to. After having them for a total of 6 hours now I have come to several conclusions.

1. It is really, really, really nice not to have to take my cheaters off the top of my head ten thousand times a day so that I can read something or work on something. This is especially true in the car.

2. Having these things on all the time plays havoc with my depth perception at times. When I am walking out and about it almost feels like I am going to step off a curb or something. It threw me off several times in various parking lots today and I am sure that the other store patrons, who are already crabby, weren’t all that thrilled by the crazy haired woman who stopped in the middle of the row and made sure she wasn’t going to fall down a rabbit hole or something.

3. I had to have Chick-fil-A today to celebrate.

4. The “seamless” lenses are definitely different and will take some adjustment on my part. Different parts of the lenses are for different distances.

5. Right now I have a bit of a headache, which I was expecting. This will get better. And my friends in the “eye field” tell me that my eyes will eventually train themselves to use the glasses efficiently.

6. My biggest fear?………Losing these things. It isn’t like I can just go to Walgreens and buy another pair. But if they are on my face all the time then I guess it won’t be an issue…..I hope. But you know I am going to have a spare pair of cheaters in my purse just in case.

I sorta……….

Kinda………

Like them.