Knitters-Knitters

Ticky Tacky

For the first several days of living here we had no satellite service, which means no TV.  Instead, in the evenings I watched season 2 disc 1 of Weeds, which was entertaining, but I imagine even moreso if you've actually seen season 1.  My favorite part is the theme song.  It leaves me with nagging questions about ticky-tacky, and if I've been using the word wrong all these years.  I'd assumed ticky-tacky was an adjective ascribed to certain facts that were minor data points--things with which those of us getting the Big Picture should be unconcerned--but apparently, ticky-tacky is also a building material.  And you can use it to make houses.  Perhaps it's something like Spackle, or stucco, or even particle board.

I like my old definition better, and as one who oftens concerns herself with the small stuff, it gives me a perfect jumping off point to share some details about where I live now, and, as the young people say, where I'm at.

It is a 15 minute drive from this house to Olive's day camp.  It's odd that here in the suburbs, where you hardly need them, traffic lights with green arrows abound.  Note to self: stop turning left on red lights.

Olive is still wait-listed at Keshet, and is unlikely to secure a placement there for the fall: at least, not the fall of '08.  We have not heard yet where her public school placement will be, but likely, it's going to be Hickory Point: a very small, leave-it-to-Beaverish school for grades 1-3.  It participates in the NSSED program, and is approximately 40 yards from our house.  We wouldn't want it any closer, really, lest we be trampled at the end of every day by a throng of children stampeding past our house, like in You're In Love, Charlie Brown.

There is a harmonious flow to an attached garage which exceeds, benefit-wise, the aesthetic charm of a house where the garage is not visible from the street.  Especially when one is carrying groceries.  And, undoubtably, this will prove even more true in January.

If an architectural visionary designs and constructs a house with built-in display areas, it is possible that his tenants may choose to show off a very different collection than what he had in mind.

If you run out of yarn for a project and have to order more--even if you pay for expedited shipping--you run the real risk of starting a new project in the meantime.  A project which you have no wish to set aside once the new yarn for the old project makes its appearance.

If in making sure you have enough yarn for your new project, you un-knit a previously abandoned item and use that bit of ravely yarn across the chest, you will see a glaring swath of warbly demarcation.  Intellectually you know that this will not show after the sweater has been washed and blocked, but still, it nags at you.

The fact that the pattern you're using specifies a rolled neck and hemline will not change the fact that leaving off the ribbing (or hem facings) strikes you as a depth of laziness to which you will not allow yourself to sink.  Frozen pizza for dinner, wet towels draped over the radiator and a Hefty bag that doubles as a clothes hamper is one thing, but a sweater with no edge treatment?  You'd never be that sort of mother. 

The Sad Go Shopping

A week ago, there was a story on the news about how people who feel sad spend more money than people who feel happy.  They proved this by showing one group of people a sad video, and the other group a not-so-sad video, and apparently, the group that saw the sad video bought more bottled water after the viewing than the other group.  What they neglected to say was what the sad movie was about: people dying of thirst, perhaps.

I was really feeling more S.A.D. than sad when I stopped at this shop yesterday, on the way to Autism Academy.  How is it that I've passed this store every school day since July 18th, and only now decided to stop?  And what made me decide to stop yesterday?

It may have been the weather--the same climate and degree of winter sunlight as Northern Finland... without all that cool Finnish stuff.

I thought I was only this sad (these are fireplace matches, photo taken on the front seat of my car):

but apparently I was this sad (socks and shirt for Olive)

...and then some.

This clock makes me very happy, and validates my decision to have remained kitchen clock-less lo these past 5 years, forcing the children to squint at the microwave.  Sabina quickly pointed out that Moomins are Finnish and not Swedish.

Did I mention that this shop also carries...

wool?

Not a big variety (and yes, Sabina, I see that the yarn is actually Norwegian), but the shop owner is nice.  No Yarn Store Hustle, and no posse of reproachful knitting table ladies. And, it turns out we "know" each other a bit.  She was complimenting my choice of sock color, and I told her I that since I have a child named Olive, I feel compelled to purchase any and all children's clothing I find in this particular shade of green.  This caused her to flash an expression of recognition: turns out she'd seen LB pushing Olive in a swing at the park, and she was wearing a very nice sweater.  Soon, Hollywood will descend on the name Olive (it's already started) and you won't be able to swing a dead Snork Maiden without hitting one.

My Scandinavian score put me in such a good mood that when I got home, I cleaned something.  It's a shame I didn't take a before picture, but this is the top of the art supply cabinet. 

Previously, it was strewn with the many unguents and salves necessary to acclimate Olive's skin to the climate of Planet Earth, pins, needles, hair ornaments, hair brushes and detangling sprays, library books, a forgotten juice cup (ewww), antibiotic ointment, eye drops, nose squirter and everything else that must be kept Up High.  But it turns out, we have some shelving in the bathroom that also serves this purpose.

Olive in her new socks:

Skating Away

It's natural to conclude, during physical discomfort, that something is wrong.  Your internal body temperature is around 99 degrees, and yet outside it's 5 below zero (my apologies to those who think in Celsius), and a discrepancy of 104 degrees sounds very extreme.  Heck, you're not a scientist so even a discrepancy of 29 degrees just doesn't sound right, but there it is: you're comfortable in 70 degree weather, but not in -5.  And your car, she's uncomfortable too, protesting loudly first thing in the morning and making that threatening putt-putt-putt during your left turn on a stale yellow arrow, daring herself to stall and extorting small little pulses from you--not too hard now--on the accelerator.  But she keeps moving, and the hot air keeps blasting at your feet and your face because that's the setting you've deemed least uncomfortable, and you know you're lucky because you can remember driving around in old beater cars with windows that didn't close all the way despite frantic revolutions of the handle.  All around you there are motorists less fortunate: pushing their cars, pulling them, cursing them, encroaching on your lane with their salt-crusted, newly dented flanks.

And just when you're starting to wonder if the fact that you have to wear driving gloves and you hate to wear driving gloves because they choke at the wrists and your hands can't breathe might be all Al Gore's fault, you make your every-11-second check in the rear view mirror and you see that the strange little person in the back seat is smiling.  She's smiling because the curve of the offramp gives her a satisfying downward pull in her seat, her coat is very fluffy, the bone-dry road is sparkly in the sunlight, and there's a song on the radio with a guitar intro that's sprightly, full of whimsy.  There's ice mentioned in the song and skating, and Little Strange-o in the backseat has never been skating but you have.  You've owned skates and you've rented skates, and you've been on indoor skating rinks and man-made outdoor rinks, and yes, you've skated with your friends on a frozen lake surrounded by giant pine trees.  You've ignored the frozen snot tucked into your scarf, the ache at the ankles that will hurt more later, the surprising smack of falling down on a substance that won't absorb its fair share of the blow.  You've cracked the whip and because you've always been small, you've gotten to be the caboose at the end of the train that gets to soar the farthest and the fastest before being released, airborne almost, into that windswept expanse.  You have gotten to do this many, many times.

And the song?  It's from your own childhood and you haven't heard it in a long time.  You are suddenly, glitteringly happy, and now, you're that strange little person in the back seat.  You get it.  It's Chicago and it's January, and it's supposed to be cold.  You're still driving, of course. You can't floor it, let go of the wheel and shout wheeeeeeee like it's Pine Lake in 1981, and you know that the woman who's watching her car get towed to the shoulder probably wouldn't appreciate your rolling down the window to shout, Thank you for rounding out the periphery of my experience!  But you can sing along.

T Minus 2

It's pretty obvious vacation has gone on long enough when, on hearing that Daddy is taking Olive on a field trip to the dry cleaner's, three of your other children immediately materialize in front of the big pile of soiled dress shirts clamoring, "Oh, boy!  The dry cleaner's!" 

The unexpected break gives me the opportunity to play with one of my favorite new toys, a Christmas present from LB's mom.

She made this little felt wool purse which contains four cards of beautiful buttons, to say nothing of the buttons on the outside of the purse. 

This gift brings out my inner dachshund, and I have been very distracted by my instinct to hide the little purse, find it again, snarl at everyone within a four foot radius, and then hide it again. 

Thus far I've been able to resist the temptation to scent-mark it.

The conundrum is so obvious it hardly bears saying: how do I use my buttons when that means I won't have them on the pretty cards anymore?

Excuse me, I have to go hide them again.

Olive's new smock is almost done, and bears little resemblance to the Elizabeth Zimmermann February Baby Sweater that inspired its design. 

It's complete except for a few inches of sleeve: so close and yet so far away.  It's not lost on me that if I were making this for Sabina, I'd be done by now. 

My personal deadline is TONIGHT, thus giving me time to block it for Olive to wear on Monday, AT WHICH TIME vacation ends and Autism Academy resumes. 

I miss Olive falling asleep easily at 9 pm and staying asleep until the next morning.  I miss the Sacred Notebook entries. I miss the hours between 10 am and 1 pm during which I am free to use the washroom in the solitary manner nature intended.  I miss--dare I say it--The Drive.

Following The Rubric

Several years ago, I had a work-at-home job where I graded video course exams in continuing ed. for public school teachers.  Learning to grade these exams involved many 3-hour meetings at the college that offered the courses, and an innumerable amount of hours spent watching the videos themselves.  And then there was The Rubric: a sacred document presented at one of those interminable, stale bagel meetings.  The Rubric was big and scary, and contained exhaustive instructions on how to grade what were basically subjective essays with the finality and black-and-whiteness of a true/false test.  There was, however, a wink-wink-all-around understanding that these rubrics were to be ignored, the essays skimmed, and for God's sake don't bother watching the videos themselves!  This cushy gig all came to a brutal end when the college went through its accreditation review, and someone decided to start paying attention to those continuing ed. classes and how they were assessed.  This meant that the graders were now expected to actually follow the rubric.  Dang, I miss that job.

This is a long way of saying that now that the Edens is getting its accreditation review much needed construction, the days of blithely checking the traffic website and assuming an 8.5 (the traffic is rated on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the worst) means, oh, 40 minutes instead of 35, are over.  Now these numbers actually mean something.  Yesterday it was 8.9, and it took an hour and fifteen minutes to get to Autism Academy.  Today it was rated 8.4, and it  took exactly 60 minutes.

But the good news is, taking clear pictures while driving is a whole lot easier.

This fellow doesn't realize how good he has it, waiting for the bus.

I saw some romance...

...between roadblocks.

I got to look at the underbelly of the overpass for a really long time.

Some actual construction, including measurable improvement.

This sign amused me.  If I'd been so inclined, I could have turned off the engine, gotten out of the car, set up a tripod, taken several shots from different angles, and gotten back behind the wheel with no worry of having hindered the progress of traffic. 

As Wise Cate (Olive's speech therapist) once told me, "I was offered a job out there in the 'burbs once, but turned it down.  It's the sort of commute I could make for my own kid, but not someone else's."

But here's a happy pic: Miss Olive in her fall duds.  It's a dark and somewhat blurry photo but what makes it special is she's posing.  She gets it.