Month: March 2006

May the celebrations begin…

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We thought about a birthday party for Vince this weekend, but it fell through based on our poor planning, but I did manage to get a cake. We are planning to have a birthday party at school – goody bags are made and a cake will be ordered.

Walking in the park.

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Our weekly park visit. I have Edda’s arm in an adult’s wrist brace to prevent her from putting her hand in her mouth. But I think she’s figured out about her other hand. Hmmm… 2 braces? It’s better than the Elizabethian collar that I was thinking of using.

I love Fridays!

I was hanging out at Vince’s school this morning – his preschool is on the 4th floor of an office building and after I drop Vince off, I have Edda walk around the corridor which is long and empty and she can toddle around without getting in anyone’s way. Today I was talking to Auntie (all ladies of a certain age are Aunties. I’m an Auntie too which makes me shudder a bit because I like to think of myself as still pre-Auntie. It’s kind of nice, you never have to remember anyone’s name. At Vince’s school, there is the snack Auntie and the potty Auntie and other Aunties who have duties I’m not aware of, perhaps shirt-tucking-in Auntie (I never tuck Vince’s shirt in, but he comes home neater than when he left)) and mentioning that Edda has some autistic tendencies and she was chatting about her neighbor who has a son who is autistic, (everybody I mention autism / mentally retarded to has a nephew, neighbor, son, friend, etc who is autistic or mentally retarded – interesting) and blah, blah, blah, we are chatting away…

Then I realize, I finally get a chance to see Vince in action at school! They usually keep the front door locked and Vince is in a classroom with that door shut – a double barrier between me and my son – but this morning I’m inside the air lock! I tiptoe over to the classroom and look through the glass window to see my little sweetheart. I imagine he’s sweetly singing and clapping to the “Good morning” song. As I look into the door, I see that he has physically grabbed another boy in his class and is hauling this poor boy to another spot in the circle and as he is doing this, he’s telling the teacher that he’s singing the words wrong. Hmmm… This was not in accordance with my fantasy. Next week is parent/teacher conference. I think we’ll hear about this a bit more.

Hermione mittens

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Pattern: Hermione mittens by atypically.knit
Yarn: Jaeger Shetland Aran #037
Yardage: Approximately 1 skein (100g)
Yarn Source: eBay – Janette’s Rare Yarns
Needles: Boye Balene double pointed needles size 4
Gauge: 5.5 sts/inch
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These mittens were nice to knit, I did learn a lot of things – how to make bobbles (I don’t really like them, they don’t seem very elegant and there are small holes on either side of them which makes me think that cold air will rush in) – how to make a single cable, which I do like and I did with a cable needle, although I do know a method exists to cable without a needle. I don’t really like the weird side cables that run straight up and down the sides of the mitten, they don’t look very attractive they just seem to take up space. Can you see the dog hair embedded into the knitting?
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Also, where I picked up the sitches for the thumb, it looks kind of bad. I’ll have to figure out another way of doing this..flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; }.flickr-yourcomment { }.flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; }.flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; }

The back of the mittens, you can see that my tension is not incredibly consistent, even after I blocked these mittens, but I think it will improve upon practice. These mittens are going to Afghans for Afghans, I hope someone will like them!

Starting my socks.

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Well for sockapalooza, I’m starting my gauge swatch. I was thinking of doing a super-plain sock, but I think I’ll end up doing Jaywalkers by Grumperina which a million people have done before, so I’m not very original. Oh well to that.

Things to be happy about.

  • Ruby is having a sleepover party on Saturday night at a friend’s house! Our dog, our first daughter is having her first slumber party… Well actually, our pet sitter Elaine wants to help us watch Ruby for the month that we are gone from Singapore, but she’s swamped with work and can’t make it out to the boonies here in Choa Chu Kang twice a day. She has a corgi who doesn’t like guests, but Elaine apparently has a pal 10 minutes away from her place who is dog-free right now and is willing to take on Ruby for a month so Elaine can just pop on over for a quick walk. Ruby is going to spend the night for a test run, to make sure that no barking, chewing or unauthorized peeing goes on. Ruby has to be on her best behavior (none of that eating 2 bars of Toblerone or a whole tube of diaper cream and then puking it all up later on carpet the exact opposite color) or else we are totally screwed. Ruby is moving up in the world, hanging out on Orchard Road. Maybe she’ll buy herself a Louis Vuitton wallet (4 outlets within a mile of each other!).
  • I finished my mittens for the Olympics! A day late and a dollar short, so I can’t actually collect the cool knitting gold medal, but whatever. Actually, I screwed up on the last row of the mitten and I did it over three times, but in the end I couldn’t figure out what I was doing wrong, so I said, the hell with it and ended my misery and bound-off.
  • I pep-talked myself out of a miserable mood at 3 pm today. Jeremy called from work during the miserable mood and he was put on alert, but by the time he got home, I was as chipper as a squirrel. Don’t mess with my acorns.
  • I cooked a pound of pork chops today for dinner. Lately, the kids have been just loving the pork chops. Edda likes it minced and mixed with cottage cheese, Vince likes it cut into stripes. The last meal, they were scarfing the chops down so fast that Jeremy and I were nervous about eating any pork, lest the children want more and we would have to deny them because we had selfishly eaten up the rest of the pork. So late last night, I went to the market and by 7:30 pm, the selection had dwindled to almost nothing, all the chops were gone and so I ended up with a pound of shoulder butt (what the hell is that?) and we fried it up with onions tonight and mmmmm, was it good, but the kids ate none of it. None. So more for us and some for Ruby of course.
  • It was sunny all day today.
  • I had some chocolate cake for lunch and chocolate ice cream for dessert.