Branching Out

Thank you so much for the kind thoughts. It's nice to know that a few of you are still out there. My sense of isolation is certainly lessened knowing that I have a few "virtual" friends.

On to the issue at hand...

When I was a student, many years ago, I wore skirts all the time. In the last several years, skirts have been reserved for more dressy occasions, but I've been feeling a bit nostalgic for those days. I love the comfort and freedom a skirt can give you. The right skirt, anyway.

Back in the day, I favored long, flowy numbers, or short dresses. Neither of these will suffice for everyday wear these days. I've been wanting something like a Utilikilt, or maybe this gardening skirt (although I don't know anyone who gardens in a skirt). Regardless, to suit my purposes it has to be functional, and ideally, less expensive than either of those examples. I've been keeping an eye out, but I haven't seen anything like it in my thrift store travels, so I finally decided to make my own.

Since I'm still pretty crap with the sewing machine, I decided to fall back on that seventies stand-by, the jeans-made-into-a-skirt. I found these instructions online, and with a pair of second-hand carpenter's pants that I never wore, I made this:




I didn't have quite enough fabric from the legs to fill the back panel, so I used a section of an old T-shirt in coordinating colors. I cut it wider than it needed to be so that, combined with the stretchiness of the T-shirt material, it provides a lot of give. It's been tested on a couple of dog walks, and I find it to be both comfortable and practical.

I was feeling very clever and proud of my achievement until I happened to walk by a shop the other day displaying several new, trendy skirts in a very similar style. I had no idea that I was making something that all the local 14-year-olds would be wearing. Oh well, I'm still pleased that I made it myself. I think the sewing machine and I have finally reached an understanding. As long as I don't ask her to anything too strenuous, she performs adequately. Someday I will replace her with a machine that can handle felted wool, but for now, she'll do.

The best part is that this project is inspiring me to do even more crafty business. I have a couple of other pairs of jeans destined for donation, so I may work my magic on at least one more pair, and I've also been inspired to start knitting a pair of legwarmers. I haven't yet decided if I'll feel too silly as a nearly thirty-five year-old woman to wear legwarmers, or if I'll throw caution to the wind and wear them anyway, but I forge ahead with the knitting.

I have also picked up another old friend/enemy (frenemy?): Mariah. I finished one sleeve and started the next, and the front and back are done. Someday soon I'll be able to join all the pieces together and knit the yoke, but I wouldn't want to rush things. It's only been 21 months since I began.

Caution: Slow Knitting

I feel like I'm always writing posts about how I've gotten back in the swing of knitting after a slump. Maybe it's time I realized that knitting for me is cyclical, and I'm simply not as fast and furious as I was in the beginning. I don't think I'd feel badly about that if I didn't have a stash the size of Texas. Apparently even very modest yarn-buying habits get out of hand if you knit slowly.

Meanwhile, one of the nice things about not having posted much in the last few months is that when I do a knitting update, it looks like a lot of progress.

This is the only thing I've actually completed since the green hat. It's a Kitty Pi, thick crust. By that I mean that I knit a double-layer bottom to help keep Barnaby's old bones cozy. I also did a three-stitch I-cord bind-off to draw the top edge in a little.


Here it is post-felting. The yarn was a Christmas gift from my brother. It came from Farmhouse Yarns, and a sheep named Chloe. It's very pretty - natural wool with little flecks of color - but it was significantly overspun and therefore scratchy. The swatch I felted left a lot of stitch definition and biased like mad, so a cat bed seemed like a good use for it. I haven't yet tested it on actual cats, since it's still a little damp, but I'll try to photograph it in action soon.


I have also been slogging my way through Tubey. I know lots of people tore through theirs, but I'm finding it to be one of the most boring things I've knit. I've only got a couple more inches to go before I can go back and finish the sleeves. I think I am going to run out of yarn, so the sleeves will be shorter than called for, but I think it'll look cool anyway. Boredom aside, I'm thrilled that I seem to have finally found the appropriate use for the Morehouse Merino yarn.


If you thought the knitting slump was bad, you should see the spinning slump. I don't know why, but I just don't seem to be able to motivate myself to spin. It seems easier when I have a specific project in mind. This is the only thing I've spun recently - a two-ply yarn out of the beautiful superfine alpaca roving I bought in Sonoma last summer. I had planned to make something for my brother for Christmas, but the plan fell apart (as did I). So now I have these three skeins of fantastically soft aran-to-bulky weight alpaca added to the stash.


That's about it, although I just remembered another project I can show off if I get some good picture-taking light. It's not likely to happen soon, since a much-needed rainy weather pattern has just settled in, but I'll see what I can do.

Surfacing

I had a dream not long ago in which I was on a road trip, and along the way I stopped by the shore to go swimming. It was a hot day and several people had gathered along a seawall to jump in the ocean. I paused briefly at the edge and jumped in. From the wall, it looked to be about ten feet above the water, but when I jumped, it felt more like fifty. I was in the air for what felt like an eternity before hitting the warm water. I sank deep, almost getting my feet tangled in seaweed and muck before beginning to ascend. Again it seemed like the distance grew. I kept thinking I should be at the surface by now, and I would try to gasp for breath, but nothing would happen. I started to panic. I saw the light above me grow brighter and I knew I was almost there, but I still wasn't sure I would make it without sucking in a lungful of water.
Then I woke up.

I've never been very good at analyzing dreams, but this one felt like a pretty good metaphor for how I've been feeling lately. I think the leap I took when I moved out here looked pretty exhilarating when I started, but it's turned out to be a much longer drop than I anticipated. It's not the first time I've struggled with depression, but I think because it's always been mild and I've never really treated it, it sneaks up on me and I don't notice it until I'm in the thick of it. My wacky thyroid and my night job certainly haven't helped things this time around, either.

The good news is I'm making strides in those two areas. Some day soon, when the doctor's office and the hospital get their shit together and communicate properly, I will have my thyroid "ablated." This is a nice way of saying that they're going to nuke it with radiation until it dies. I'm not happy about this for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that I will have to spend a week staying at least six feet away from all other living creatures so as not to nuke their thyroid glands. Plus there's that whole thing about needing your thyroid gland. I was really having a hard time accepting that, at only age 34, one of my important body parts decided to go haywire and needs to die, and no one can tell me why (other than throwing around another fun euphemism: autoimmune disease). Not only that, but even here in hippie-lovefest-alternamedicine-central, they're telling me that this really is the way to go. So I have the fun of being nuked and being on synthetic hormones the rest of my life. Yay.

Let me just pause here to say that I know this all sounds very whiny. I don't have cancer and I'm not dying and lots of people live with this and much worse every day. But that doesn't mean it still doesn't suck. And it's the nature of blogging to be self-indulgent, so that's what I've come here to do. It's my blog and I'll whine if I want to.

On the job front, things are looking up, too. I have just accepted a daytime position as the assistant manager of the bakery. I'll work weekends, and I'll miss having my hands on the dough, but I'll be diurnal again. I will have seven evenings a week to do with as I please. Granted, I can't stay out late every night, but that's the last thing I want anyway. The problem I've been having is, with only two or three nights free, and me being a total homebody, I'm reluctant to go anywhere on my nights off. It adds to the general sense of isolation I've been feeling for months.

So I'm trying to be a little bit positive (although there's still a voice in my head muttering "optimism, shmoptimism") and hope that I will yet make some friends and really enjoy my surroundings. Even if not, just the fact that my new position will put me in contact with many more people every day is going to help me feel more connected. I'm not expecting it to change everything. In fact, it's going to have plenty of challenges and will probably drain me more than my current job does, but I expect that all the other aspects of my life will improve enough to make the job tolerable. And honestly, what more can I ask?

The job change won't take place for a few weeks yet, so there's plenty of time to get used to the idea, and time for me to write long-winded late-night posts (so if you've made it this far and are eager for more - lucky you). As long as I can hold my breath a little bit longer, I think I'll be alright.