Smooth Move
Okay… Here’s something I might regret posting about, but for me it’s a new discovery I’m sure to exploit. I have the reputation in the family of being the “weird” one. This post will either prove that right, or prove me a genius.
So last week, I was confined to the house by a series of torrential storms and found myself going crazy, HUNGRY for something to snack on and there was nothing, nada in the house. As I rummaged through all the places I store food I came upon a can of crushed pineapple. Aaah, I thought to myself. Suddenly I had remembered a Weight Watcher’s snack/dessert my mom used to make. It was a pack of single serving chocolate powdered Alba skim milk and the serving measurement of crushed pineapple, mixed up and put into the freezer for a delightful dessert for only one serving of fruit and one of milk.
I am not on that diet and did not remember serving sizes and nor did I care to. All I had was a can of fruit and an envelop of regular powdered milk. I pulled out a mixing bowl and dumped the envelop of milk in there, then added the whole can of pineapple and 2 TSPS. of baking cocoa. Stirred it up and found it too liquid-y. What to do, what to do? The light bulb goes on and I added, get ready for the kicker, 2 TBS. sugar-free orange Metamucil. You read that right. I was looking for something to absorb all that juice and was not disappointed. Spread the mixture on top of a piece of aluminum foil, wrapped it up and put in the freezer. I love orange/chocolate flavor… and this was SO good that it was all I could do to stop myself from eating the whole thing before it hit the freezer. Well, let me just say there was an unexpected benefit from eating this snack. Do I really have to say? TMI? Let’s just say I was one happy camper the next morning!
Over the weekend, Father’s Day weekend, I told my family about my recipe and I got gawks, comments and laughs. My family’s like that; but I’m damn proud of myself! So happy to invent a great tasting, low calorie snack that won’t penalize you for indulging. So what’s your reaction to this slightly different recipe?
FYI about the recipes below. I’ve not personally made any of these, though will try them at some point.
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- Vodka Slush (mapleleafblondie.wordpress.com)
- Pineapple-Mango-Banana Smoothie with Spinach & Chia Seeds (marenellingboe.com)
- Pineapple-Papaya Salsa (julesorganicliving.com)
- Pina Coladas (mapleleafblondie.wordpress.com)
- Vegan Coconut and Vanilla Panna Cotta, Macadamia Tuille and Pineapple (thewayfaringbaker.com)
- THINK FAT-FREE MILK IS HEALTHY? 6 Secrets You Don’t Know About Skim Milk (secretsofthefed.com)
- Pineapple Smoothies (leannstastes.wordpress.com)
- Coconut Tapioca Pudding With Toasted Pineapple (theeightytwentyrule.com)
- Pineapples, Brussel Sprouts and Avocados (sistersinseparatecities.com)
Follow up to Yesterday’s Post
I got so caught up in my own experience with being bullied (This is a Bully Free Zone). Usually I just have a burst of writing, then publish right away without editing and refining my thoughts. But where this would normally lead to is my hopes for my child, new to the public school system in an urban area. Sometimes I see my son as a fragile flower… yeah, that’s me; but it’s definitely a product of also knowing that school aged kids can be with most ferocious of tormentors and I worry about that.
We had an incident this year with bullying, where the adults of the school did not properly, nor thoroughly, assess this incident to appreciate the full story. What they saw were two kids who accosted my child, one holding his hands behind his back and one punching him in the stomach. What would that tell you? These were kids from my son’s second grade class. They also saw my son laughing, so they presumed that they all were playing. THAT turned my stomach. Autistic kids cannot read or present appropriate facial expressions or body cues. The teacher in the lunchroom did not have the training to recognize this and so she thought that they all were playing. After I got done flipping my wig, I got ahold of the principal and blasted his ear on the need for training for ALL personnel who come into contact with my kid. I explained to him what happened and that I had extensively questioned my son and concluded that this was not playing. As an outcast during my school years, I realized that he, who also does not have many friends, must have been happy to have attention from his peers, in ANY form, hence his laughter. Also, he did not realize what had actually happened. My son said that they thought he was a “robber.” It took several separate questioning sessions to get out of him that he was not playing with them in the first place and that their actions HURT him. I think he still was totally clueless as to what had transpired. Thank GOD that the school acted accordingly in that they have zero tolerance for those actions whether it was play or not play. These boys are now separated in the classroom.
Getting back to educating our teachers. Yeah, does that sound like an oxi-moron? It does to me. These school districts do not want to pay for the continuing education and training for the teachers in their schools. Our principal is suggesting or urging our teachers to get training in autism. It may not seem like it, but it’s a pretty BIG damn step! At the very least, he is acknowledging the need, but sadly not ready to have the district pay for it. Hopefully, they will have more of these workshops included when teachers have to go for their “inservices”. It’s a day when the district’s kids have the day off, but teachers must go to these, I want to say, conventions and take workshops.
Plain and simple. I do not want my kid bullied. My rant of yesterday stems from that; but as a mother of one, I feel for all children, not just my own. Forget about No Child Left Behind. NO CHILD SHOULD EXPERIENCE THE PAIN OF BEING BULLIED, period. My heart is bursting.
Related articles
- Back-to-School Bully Busting – A Safety Guide for Parents by SimpliSafe Home Security (simplisafe.com)
- Be A Victim: When Your Kid Is Being Attacked, Teachers Are Just Minutes Away (philosophers-stone.co.uk)
- How to deal with a Bully (carlislekarate.wordpress.com)
- Student reprimanded for stopping a knife-wielding bully at school (informationliberation.com)
- Parents of Bullies Get Citations in Wisconsin Town (americanlivewire.com)
- Life with Autism in the Public School System (kwillis2009.wordpress.com)
- To Those Who Bully Back (itstheinterwebz.wordpress.com)
- Why School Bullying Must Be Stopped Immediately (breitbart.com)
This is a Bully-Free Zone
A great article: http://www.crsd.org/Page/10947
Two recent things are prompting me to write this post on a subject that I’m pretty sure I’ve written about before (though I can’t find my post) and that is “bullying”, more specifically, my own. First, as I sat down to check out what was going on with my facebook friends, a familiar name jumped out at me. It was in my high school’s group page and it was the son of an old teacher of mine. It was pretty simple. He wanted her old students know that she was alive and kicking and that she was on facebook; and he invited us, her students, to come to her page and say “hi”. That one post might just have the most comments of the group and it’s only been a few days. Secondly, yesterday a read a post from Single Dad Laughing, “Memoirs of a Bullied Kid” and so many things he talked about happened to me. My story is a bit different, but all the main ingredients were there for me to resurrect my own writing. Oh yes, we try to close our eyes and get on with our lives, but it always comes back every so often to remind us from where we have come and it’s not pretty.
It “officially” started in first grade, but had its beginnings in kindergarten only because there were some kids who shared those grades with me. The torment lasted through to my eighth grade graduation. I went to the Catholic school of my own parish, so you’d think that would be a pretty safe environment. Oh how wrong you’d be. I was always a shy child and hardly ever spoke. I had a terrible stutter and it was literally painful to try to open it up to speak, let alone getting any words out, so I never spoke. Also, I could never speak up quickly enough with what I wanted to say and before I knew it, the conversation was way past and forgotten.
One day in June, it was my birthday. My mother bought me a wrist corsage to wear to school. I was bursting with happiness and couldn’t wait to get to school. I remember sitting at my desk and one of the girls wanted to know where the cupcakes were… and the kids around me were not happy about the missing birthday cupcakes. From then on, it was down hill. The verbal abuse was surrounding my weight. I’m sure my mom or grandmother would’ve made them but I’m not sure if they even knew that was the custom. From that day, I became the butt of every joke and prank and this was unending for eight years of the delicate and impressionable time of my life. I got beat up, verbally taunted, pushed, laughed at, scribbled upon with pens. I got called all the fat names in the book, yet when I look back at photos from that time, I realize that I was NOT a fat kid. All those years I believed what I heard and thought I was fat and so, I did become fat, resigned to that imagined fact.
I experienced almost everything Dan of Single Dad Laughing did. I had the vengeful, hateful fantasies about bad things happening to those kids and I had suicidal thoughts. I withdrew into my own little world of reading, drawing and music, in particular Barry Manilow. His music, and I’ve said it before, literally saved my life. I felt his songs reach my heart. Also, do not make fun of a good Catholic upbringing that says that if you kill yourself, you are condemned to hell. This was probably the only reason I didn’t actually do it. I laugh at the irony now because I’m not even sure that hell exists. It was a creation of man in medieval times with the intention of controlling the general and ignorant, uneducated public. My brain cannot even do a quote here, but believe me.
One time I went to the bathroom at school, forget what grade, and came back to a tack on my chair. I saw it and my decision to sit on it so that they would know it did didn’t hurt, was the worst thing I could ever do. The outburst of laughter was so loud, yet the teacher said nothing let alone investigate what caused such a disturbance. That tack hurt me something terrible and I did manage to sit there like it wasn’t there, which probably fueled the idea that I had so much fat that insulated me from feeling it…. ugh.
Okay I could go on and on with details and really don’t want to, but this particular one was a catalyst of sorts to put some of the hate and aside and let go of decades of hurtful baggage I carried. In my late thirties I met some of my classmates and they acted like those childhood events never happened or maybe they were too ashamed? Nah. So, I thought to myself that I was walking around with all this hate, resentment and with the “victim attitude,” and the people who caused my misery were walking around, living their lives as happy as you please, with no acknowledgement, not a single thought of how they killed my life. What killed me the most was that these people seemed like nice, good people… with the notable exception of one guy who is still has the meanest streak, though he says that he is a “good” guy… um.. nope. I see how he treats other people and know the kind of guy he still is.
I think back to the priests, nuns and lay teachers who must have known what was going on… they KNEW, and did nothing. Oh, I know that they knew because at one point, my parents went to the school to complain and nothing was done. I was one of those kids who LOVED school and the learning, yet dreaded every single day of it. I had nobody. CATHOLIC school. I wonder if these religion=pushing people ever think of the disservice, the blatant contradiction of their faith. I was betrayed by the very people outside of my own family who were the most trusted. My family trusted them… but let’s not get into what my own family did or didn’t do to help me with this situation. At one point, they tried to teach me how to fight, but I was a very passive kid who shrunk in the face of a confrontation. Eventually, they knew what was going on because I, got in trouble for fighting and got detention. It was a predominantly Irish parish and we Italians were the outcasts, or so my mother described enough to justify herself not getting involved with the church or school. Oh, I also remember, and now have as a facebook friend, a girl from school who tried to teach me how to fight. I always remembered her kindness… but still, she didn’t seek to make friends then, but had enough compassion and sought to help me in the way she knew best.
But this brings me to the facebook revelation that one of my teachers, 91 or 92 now, is on facebook. That brought back memories of a kind and compassionate teacher who, at that time, was a mother and maybe a grandmother, or soon to be one. Mrs. Ann Strazza, my 5th grade math teacher. I remember her telling me of her story of when she met her husband. She did ask what was bothering me, but I told her of my fear of never having a boyfriend… HA… I could not tell her the truth, but it was part of the truth anyway. I remember her advising my parents to give me chores at home, structure. So, aside from making my bed, I now had to do household chores of washing/drying/putting away dishes, dusting, vacuuming, washing the bathroom… Whew, at least I shared these with my sister who, in the grade behind me, got caught up on the chore bandwagon.
All these memories coming back like a flood just serve to remind me of how hard I have buried them behind the back of my mind. I don’t think of these things now, but I’m positive the effects haunt me in some way from time to time in just how I live my life. Thankfully, during the summer of my graduation from that school and before high school I realized that I was going into a new school where nobody would know me. I could be anyone and nobody there would know me from before. That thought gave me the courage to look forward to a new era of my life. That courage was so strong that I actually crossed a picket line to get into the school on the first day. My mother begged me not to go, as other parents in our neighborhood stopped their kids from going; but I was resolute… I. WAS. GOING. and I did. Slightly discouraging, though, things did not change much for me socially. I was still painfully shy and felt it hard to talk to anyone. I was still the same plain jane, wore no makeup or fancy clothes. HA. The one time I wore a dress, my Spanish teacher awkwardly tried to render me a compliment and told me that I had “nice ankles”… WTF ? Yeah. I was still overweight and maybe she was trying to compliment me but could not other than noticing I had slim ankles. Maybe she was surprised by that. The major thing, though, was that I was not afraid to go to school. I looked forward to it every day and when I was “periodic”… (love that word and swiped it from lovable Wendy Williams) I did not stay home like my sister and so many other girls. It was horrible, but for me, I valued learning more than the pain and discomfort of the monthly.
Gotta give a shout out to Wendy Williams…. I love your show! I never thought I’d watch the show for more than the first time because I consider myself serious and a lover of the cerebral; but you have grown on my something fierce. I love your personality. I love how you just speak your mind and never in a nasty way. You are really the only tv personality today who is vivacious and projects a love for life and fun that refreshes me whenever I watch the show.
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- Catholic School Teacher Fired for Getting Pregnant via Artificial Insemination Wins Lawsuit (patheos.com)
- Texas district promises change after teacher abuse (kens5.com)
- Barry Manilow offers tickets in exchange for instruments donated for Dallas schools (khou.com)
- Police investigate racist bullying at Catholic school (helpusstopbullying.wordpress.com)
- To Always Be Alone; To Never Be Noticed (kenziebug24.wordpress.com)
- VOICES: What do you do if you witness a bully? | GALLERY (courierpress.com)
- Olympia bullying victim: ‘It’s constant, everyday harassment’ (komonews.com)
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God Don’t Like Complainers
Um…. I guess that would be me. So embarrassing to say that, but yeah. Life is so weird. You live, you try to sculpt yourself into the person you’d like to grow up to be; then as you try to “be” that person, you say to yourself that you’ve got to be you, you’ve got to voice your opinions. That’s paramount and you assert yourself. But let’s see where that got me……
Before I go further, I must state that I am fully blessed. Despite my many failings, I am deeply loved. That gives me the courage to write about myself and my flaws and failures. First and foremost I am loved by God and have the firm belief of His profound forgiving nature. There is a quote that speaks to this and I read it every day. I have a firm belief that God has a purpose for each and every one of us, despite our imperfections. He literally has a specific need, or finds a specific need for our specific imperfections. We are useful despite it all. This give me hope for my own soul.
“My imperfections and failures are as much a blessing
from God as my successes and my talents,
and I lay both of them at His feet.”
~Mahatma Gandhi
All my life I was the quiet one. The one who desperately strove to melt into the background, and blended in, right in between those gigantic flowers, painted onto the wallpaper in our kitchen. I was a stutterer and I could not get a word out before the several attempts that usually bored people right before they moved on to other subjects. Get the picture? Not only could I not communicate, but I did not learn the social skills in order to interact with other human beings. So I listened. I listened to exchanges that totally, totally bored me. I simply was not interested in most female conversations regarding curtains and home decor. So what developed was that I became judgmental of females…. well, whether I am justified or not on that is still out for debate… pfst. To this day, I find a conversation with a man much more interesting than talking to women…. sorry gals.
Anyway, so I’ve gotten to the point in my life where I can hold a conversation, but struggle with the social cues. I do not stutter, except under stress it might come back a little. I find that I am a woman who has a problem recognizing and honoring moderation. I seem to be either this way or that–to the extreme. Like, I could abstain from soda for months, yet if I get one taste, I’m off and running consuming more soda in one day than one has a right to. WTH? Same with water. One day I’m consuming massive quantities of it, and the next I am a camel in the desert and you could not force one drop down my throat. As a matter of fact, I need some right now……..
I’m back…. So, now that I’m going verbal, my Gemini self cannot shut up and every single thought in my head is out and off the tongue no sooner than my brain gets a hold of it. Well, some thoughts should stay unspoken. After years of keeping my mouth shut tight, the flood gates are opened and with my relatively newfound confidence, I speak my mind whenever and wherever and to whomever. And it’s not all good. You know if you can’t say anything nice, then don’t say anything at all. The bottom line for me is that after I speak my mind, I feel better. But taking my judgmental self outside and giving the double-parkers blocking traffic with their cars a piece of my mind, well, that can’t work for anyone but me. Even then, afterwards I usually feel that I could’ve handled the situation a lot better. I can’t abide inconsideration in any of its forms… but I really shouldn’t be getting into confrontations like I do. Maybe writing about this will help me remember that next time.
Today I was listening to Alan Horvath who is a musician who does videos about the bible and religion. I do suggest checking out his videos on youtube if you have a desire to listen to the Word with the names in their original languages. I’m hoping the meaning of these books go back to the beginning, without the contamination of the human pen. I watched one video about Alan’s experience during Frankenstorm Sandy and he talked about how he heard a lot of people complaining. He said, “God doesn’t like complainers,” and I thought, O.M.G. that’s me. I complain long and loud to anyone who would stay quiet long enough for me to do so. But you know, even though we didn’t have power for ten days, we had everything else, until our food spoiled; but even then we could still travel to towns every day to pick up some food for that day. Yes, we were in long lines at the gas station, but heck, it was not bad enough to complain about. I think people today don’t want to wait for anything. We are under so much pressure to do it fast, then move on to the next thing. I used this blog to complain, I also complained on facebook, I got together with my neighbor and we complained to each other… sigh. But it was driven home to me, an active member of a Roman Catholic church, that God does not appreciate complainers. Should that have been news to me? Nope. The whole book of Exodus tells us of the Jews complaining every other day and you know what? God kept them wandering in the desert for forty years. You’d think they’d learn their lesson. You’d think that I would have by now, also. My hubby is an excellent example. He doesn’t complain at all. Usually, that plays out well for me when I am involved, but if it’s something outside this house, I get frustrated with him, but you know, he’s got the right way to go. It shows, too. God is with him. He’s just one of those people, that you just know.
I need to really learn my lesson. It’s not like I’m an ignorant bitch…. not really. So I will close with stating I am truly blessed. Things are never really as bad as my first impression. Regarding Hurricane Sandy, we got through it. We did not flood though this house has a long history of flooding. Because we did not flood, we kept our hot water. We had a gas stove to cook on. No heat, but plenty of handmade blankets to keep us warm at night. We had radios and thanks to the presence of our seven-year old, plenty of batteries to keep the radios and flashlights going. I was so grateful for NJ101.5 to keep myself connected to the outside world. Finally, I had my loving husband and my beloved son with me. What more could I possibly have the audacity to ask for?
Related articles
- Your Body Not Your Body, To Complain ! (ubebetternotbitter.wordpress.com)
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- The Complainers are Alive and Well in America (jewishpress.com)
- Grumbling and Complaining (dailybibleplan.com)
- When the answer comes, don’t run from the giants… (mytotallyother.wordpress.com)
- God’s Timing is Perfect! (nackynice.wordpress.com)
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I am Alive With the Sound of Music
Okay, so I couldn’t resist this one. Daily. Prompt.
What role does music play in your life?
I am not a musician, though I did learn how to play the guitar later in life, which I think is so cool, but I’ll talk more about that. Music literally saved my life. That belief is so embedded in me that it’s a part of me. I grew up in a depression. I know that now. In my teens I had serious thoughts of suicide. I had a pretty vivid imagination and I would fantasize exactly how it would happen. As a pre-teen, I’d fantasize about near-death situations usually by writing scripts for favorite TV shows. One was the Wild Wild West, starring Robert Conrad. This was the TV show that the recently made movie was based upon. It was high tech for it’s time, which was cool, and I might be able to say it was sort of Steampunk because of that… hmmm that’s a thought.
The other was a show about rescue personnel, a helicopter and one guy had a rescue dog, a German Shepherd. Don’t remember the name, but I’d type out the scripts on my grandfather’s old Underwood typewriter… I mean OLD. One of those that had the exposed keys…..
Typing on this thing was a bitch but I loved it. I got to really know the machine and could fix it, tweak it… I made it work for me. When I really got going, the carriage would fly across and I’d promptly hit the carriage return. To this day, computers have a “Return” button, well, it used to be called Carriage Return. It was a lever at the upper left on the carriage. The carriage was the roller and the thing that held the roller in place. The paper would be inserted at the top, in back of the roller and you would roll it down, around and into place for typing. At the top, the carriage return was just employed and the paper is back to the starting position, ready for typing another line… Anyway, I see I’ve digressed again… with pics to boot.
So you should have grasped the point by now that I was depressed and suicidal, or at least had suicidal thoughts as a teenager. I am alive to this day because of Barry Manilow‘s music. I would sing along constantly. His music touched my soul in such a way that I felt that someone out there understood me. All along, the range of my voice was on the lower end, but I can also sing higher now. I know almost all of his songs by heart and every time I sing something, I feel that little tear, meaning tear drop, in my heart. I am so grateful for that, for his music. I’m sure that he already knows what his music has done for this world, but I’d somehow like for him to know how deeply it/he has touched me. Mr. Manilow, you saved this life.
I can’t end this post in such a dark, non-presence of light. All music touches me. Growing up, and I hated it, my dad would play classical and yes, the old country music. Now, I can say that I love almost any kind of music and I owe that to my dad. My dad country music and my mom the top hits of the 50′s and her 45′s. When I was very young and had the chicken pox, my parents got me a Close N Play phonograph and gave me quite an assortment of 45′s from their own collections, mainly from the 50′s and early 60′s. I learned the lyrics to those by closing and playing all day long until I got all the words written down. I’m sure my mother appreciated that… HA. Oh, it was because of a wacky song or pseudo song called, “The Flying Saucer,” by Dickie Goodman that I came to love those story narratives with parts of songs inserted to fill out the story. 
Through music, I started writing lyrics to songs, and then poetry… or maybe visa versa. Sad though because I’d never post them up on the internet because I know that someone will steal it for their own.
In my later 30′s I learned how to play the guitar from a friend. It was a trade off. I stayed with him while he recuperated from surgery and he taught me the chord of the guitar. He’d play melody and I played rhythm. I enjoyed that, but because of a lack of understanding, and math, I could never learn to read music. That makes me sad, but I like that I can play by ear. Even playing just the chords touches me deep inside; and just knowing that I can do it, makes me really happy. I sang in our church choir for a few years and that was very satisfying as I could sing in front of people… and they actually liked it!
So in closing, what music means to me is memories, both good and bad… but mostly good. Through music I can relive my past, know exactly where I came from and not be very bummed out about it.
Thanks for listening.
Related articles
- Confessions of a Fanilow: Mama, Music, and Manilow (theviewfromwe2.wordpress.com)
- Music for Sex or Sleep: 4 Tips for Love or Sweet Dreams (psychologytoday.com)
- Photo Coverage: Barry Manilow Meets the Press! (broadwayworld.com)
- Photo Coverage: Barry Manilow Greets Fans at MANILOW ON BROADWAY Opening Night (broadwayworld.com)
- I miss good old-fashioned manners (debbie-carr.com)
- Music (slightlysublime.com)
Dearly Departed Daily Prompt
First let me make the question: Is participating in the Daily Prompt cheating? Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful for them. The words come easier when there is a stated goal… But. Is just answering the question being too lazy to come up with something on my own? So today, I’m going to forgo the Daily Prompt because I really can’t bring myself to write my own eulogy as it would soon turn into a shameless love fest and I’m not up to it right now…… So what to write.
I’ve not written about my knitting for a while, so maybe that would be good to do today. As posted previously, I am aching to start the Shipwreck, in Knitty’s Spring 09 issue. It’s a circular shawl with seaweed, shells and ocean spray all in one pattern. I love how this flows and I have the perfect yarn, Knit Pick’s Palette Yarn in Marine Heather colorway.
See the beautiful beads? Love the effect they make of reflective droplets of ocean water. Definitely want to do beads. Probably would need hundreds of them, if not thousands… well, maybe not THAT. Yeah, check the pattern, doof. Oops, I need to cough up 5000 beads. I’m not kidding. See the beautiful beads? Love the effect they make of reflective droplets of ocean water. Definitely want to do beads. Probably would need hundreds of them, if not thousands… well, maybe not THAT. Yeah, check the pattern, doof. Oops, I need to cough up 5000 Czech glass seed beads size 8/0; beads. I’m not kidding.
Oh well, getting on to my last FO. I’ve been working on this, off and on, since Oct. 30, 2011. I can’t believe I let almost a whole year go by after putting it down for the summer. Never put stuff down, except maybe a blanket…. grrr… not even an afghan, which I have one that is still floundering since it was started, OMG, January 2008~!
This is the Tappan Zee Cardigan. I just threw it on, unblocked, to take this pic. While I am really happy to finish it and happy with how it came out, looking at this pic, I’m definitely not happy with the yoke. I’m not happy that I only have these bulky crew neck tops to wear it with. I’m considering doing something… it’s the “S” word that nobody really wants to talk about. I’m wondering about steeking the tops of the shoulders and short sleeves to somewhat shorten the yoke, then allow me to attach long sleeves, then either wear this with a camisole type top or closing the front to make a pullover. I’m sure I can do either thing and I do have two more skeins of Valley Yarn’s Prescott which I would LOVE to feel on the bare skin of my arms and shoulders… This stuff is SO soft, but unfortunately is discontinued yarn. Oh geez. Just realized that before I can close up the front of this, I’ll have to take out and reknit the five stitch garter bands on both sides of the front…. eeeeek~! Oh well… I’d do it for that fine 100% alpaca softness.
Another quickie project (and last-minute or no reason) is what I call “Neck of Zebra,” a long black and white striped cowl which can be worn long or short. 100% Cotton gives this a feeling-really-good soft feel. Dotted throughout are gigantic puffs of cotton. I used US sized 11 needles just because of these puffs and I probably should’ve used larger, except the skinny parts of this yarn are really skinning. All in all a really nice effect.
- DIY Thursdays ~ Feather Earrings (aurajade.wordpress.com)
- Mardi Gras 2013: “Catch and release” bead trailer to be at three Jefferson Parish parades (nola.com)
- Good Wednesday Morning To All My Dearly Loved Family & Friends! (witchesofthecraft.com)
- WIP – Entrelac Scarf (sageyarn.wordpress.com)
- Just a Post (threesistershomeandgarden.wordpress.com)
- Get your WIP, Get your WIP Wednesday here! – 1/23/13 (iknead2knit.wordpress.com)
- Great Tips for Bead Crochet (crochetme.com)
- Completed Project: The Clapotis Wrap (thestitcherati.com)
Daily Prompt: Ready Set… GO
Set a timer for ten minutes. Open a new post. Start the timer, and start writing. When the timer goes off, publish.
My first thought was, “yeah, open a can of worms.” But, I’ll slip past THAT and move on to an accomplishment of last night. I finally finished knitting the Tappan Zee Cardigan, sweetly called “Tappan ME” on my Ravelry project page. It’s something that I’m really, really pleased with how it came out. After blocking, I will do a more detailed post. Oh. This is the perfect time to start a pattern that is part of my New Year’s Resolution, which I hardly ever make, but I’ve been planning this pattern for over a year and I even have the yarn required. It’s called Shipwreck…. Isn’t she pretty? It requires beads being knitted into it, but I think they don’t come until the middle part. I can start this, commit myself to it, and have a little time to get the beads.
Another thought is the anticipation of my next crochet group gathering (as we’ve come to call it) in Brooklyn with my Posse. Yes, I have a posse, people! We meet once a month, but oooh, the last time I saw most of these ladies was back in October and that wasn’t even with half of our people. I’m planning on being there this Saturday, though, and will probably drive into Brooklyn early just to cruise around my old neighborhood. Yep, I’m a Brooklyn girl, born and raised.
Wow. I’m HUNGRY~! Need. to. eat.
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Sweet Sixteen… 43 Years in the Making
When you were 16, what did you think your life would look like? Does it look like that? Is that a good thing?
Wow. Something for me to think about. In a way, my life has turned out exactly as I thought it would at sixteen, but the downside is that it took me just about 30 years to get here.
My life is a good one, but it definitely has not shaped up as I had envisioned way back when. Growing up in the seventies did not provide hope to this sheltered, painfully shy girl. I grew up with the understanding that all girls get married and stay home to raise a family, period. Not one thought rested on the idea of going to college and having a career because back then the only career open to women was to be a secretary… or so I thought. Career Day in high school didn’t have anything directed toward us girls. I loved science, but was woefully inept in anything but the very basics in math. I just did not get it and it was my understanding that to be able to do anything in science, you needed to be good in the higher math which was calculus, chemistry, geometry, ALGEBRA… Well, it was hard work, but I did eventually pass algebra and I needed a tutor to just pass geometry. I just didn’t get it and that dashed my hopes of ever pursuing a career in the sciences. So, with my illustrious science career raking in the coals, I turned my attention to the Domestic Engineer, meaning wife and mother to some very lucky guy… heh.
There was just one problem. I was not high on the list of conquest for any male my age. Those suckers! But I digress. I did work at a series of clerical jobs, none of which I could deem “career worthy,” yet I managed to learn a lot during those years. Lessons that I would carry with me throughout my life. Well, to make a life long story short, at the age of 42, I finally met and married my husband and we now have a seven year old boy who, I’m sure, is the love of both of our lives… outside of each other, that is. I have the life now that I had envisioned for myself–34 years later! Ironically enough, I am a stay-at-home mom, but sadly looking for work at this time. Back in the seventies it was the accepted norm… and expected that women would have their babies and stay home. Now, after a couple of decades of women keeping their jobs after having babies, more women are returning back to the old ways of staying home with their broods.
I actually love being home. My son is going to school full-time and I do have the whole day to myself, basically, to do whatever I choose whether it be cleaning or just writing this blog. I volunteer at different places and last week I had that extra time to drive quite a ways to teach seniors how to crochet. If I had a nine to five, I definitely could not do that. I value my time and love to give it to volunteer where needed. I spend a lot of time doing research on autism since our son was diagnosed with it when he was six years old. However, I am in a position right now where we need me to go to back to work. I find myself at actually another fork in the road, mentally. I am loath to the idea for many reasons. One being I feel I need to be home for the “just in case” something happens in school and I need to be called. Huh? Yeah, this is not something that would happen on a regular basis, let alone a tremendous long shot of it happening even once. Another reason is that I am hating the corporate world right now and the devalued status of employees now-a-days, in general. Everyone is dispensable. Companies are almost looking for a reason to fire you almost as soon as they hire them. Get the job done for cheaper, and no employee is safe from being cut from the ranks. So this is the frame of mind I have right now concerning prospective employers. On the other side of the coin, I really need to chip in right now and find a job that brings in some money and we also desperately need medical insurance. This month, I’ve been putting in applications, taking online tests and what have . I don’t have the luxury right now to take a part-time job. DH is Still, waiting for his degree from which the graduation is listed as Jan. 20th 2013 on the university’s registrars’ web page. I know that we have not heard anything from the university, yet they have our money for graduation for over a semester now. grrrr, another tangent.
As I look at all these words, I realize that no matter how confident I think that I am, I have fear in me. My view of the working world out there is that they carry standards too high for me to live up to. A lot has changed since I was a young person out there in the real working world. A world that was and still is a very intimidating place. Inside me I know that I have a lot to give, but freak out while wondering what an employer will expect of me now, in this day and age where youth is celebrated over the older, more experienced person… especially a woman. I feel pressured to present myself in the youngest possible light and that is not so easy anymore. I have more aches and pains than when I was in my 20′s, 30′s, heck even 40′s. I have more outside-the-job responsibilities than I had back then, too. I now have a school aged child that needs me at home when he gets here. Back then, I could win an employer over with my receptivity of staying later than my quitting time. I always stayed until I got the job done. I just don’t have that freedom any longer. Ah so, I’ll have to close. I can ruminate about this all day, but I’ve got to let this go at some point.
Have a great day and keep warm!
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Gabriel's Birth Story (Private)
It's 11:50AM and I am expecting Gabriel to wake up from his nap any minute. Nothing out of the ordinary today; but later we will go shopping for a crib. Gabriel has almost outgrown his cradle, the one in Ed's family for a generation. All his brothers and sisters and nieces and nephews have been in it, and now, our son.
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