Even though I am working on a big sweater project, which I need to get back to this week, I can't help but think of more techniques that I want to learn when it comes to knitting.

To learn:
--socks
--mittens/gloves
--improve entrelac
--brioche

Currently, I really want to learn brioche, but it seems a bit complicated. I'm sure it's like Intarsia: it seems hard, but then you develop a rhythm and it becomes easy. I found a great website and an amazing book, which I will buy when I have time to further study it. You can research brioche here: http://briochestitch.com/brioche/

Happy knitting!

I have wanted a dog for over a year now. After carefully thinking about the logistics and looking at petfinder.com daily, yesterday, I finally got a dog! I rescued him from Arizona Poodle Rescue, which is a delightful organization to work with. His name is Darcy, we changed it. We have no idea what breed he is, but he is about 2 years old. He hasn't yet barked, seems house trained, and loves to sleep and cuddle.

I don't think I've had this much suspense in a 19th-century novel before, at least not a mystery novel. Francis Burney's Evelina kept me on the edge of my chair the past few days and I'm barely half-way through! She influenced Jane Austen, which was one of the reasons I am reading her work. It is clear that she influenced Austen: both are preoccupied with marriage and have mini soap operas going on. Just like in Pride and Prejudice, Evelina is concerned about first impressions, misgivings, and how to properly act in society. Burney is masterful at building suspense with Evelina's actions and decisions: just when you think she can't mess up more, she does! However, in the eyes of all, she remains perfectly genteel and sweet.

Half-way through the book, she changes her opinion of Lord Orville, who is the only decent bachelor in the book. As soon as I read her change of mind, I instantly turned my kindle off. I could not handle her messing this up to. I was not ready to read a tragedy for another hundred pages.

Two days later, I haven't read it again because I'm still not ready to see her majorly mess up. My boyfriend says it's like I'm addicted to a soap opera. Instead of reading it, I started reading another book. However, today I knew that the suspense would kill me if I didn't read Evelina again. But I was tricky: I took my paper copy and read the ending. I know, cheater. I'm like Harry in When Harry Met Sally. I won't tell you what happens, but I can continue reading again.

If you thought 19th-century literature was boring, definitely pick up this book!

Some of you may know about the knitting life line. It's a strand of yarn (excess from another project) that you thread along the row on the needle. It basically goes against the needle. This way, if you mess up a few rows later, you can pull out your work, but it will stop at the yarn (life line) and you can easily put the needles in again without worrying about dropping a stitch or twisting one the wrong way. Normally these life lines are used in lace patterns.

However, I'm using it for the Big Lebowski sweater. Being a newbie to color work, it takes me 15-30 minutes to knit one row. I wouldn't want to have to go to my local knitting shop every time I messed up. With foresight, I had used a lifeline right before the complicated colorwork--and I needed it today. After spending 45 minutes on a row and a half, I realized that I had miss counted and messed up my ribbing (purl vs. knit). Being a perfectionist, I quickly prayed that I had threaded my life line correctly, and pulled out my work.

And it worked! I didn't drop one stitch. Not wanting to have to use that life line again, I adjusted my strategy. Instead of counting the small boxes each time, I took a piece of paper to cover the part of the chart I wasn't using, and I wrote the number of each color for that row. That gave me the ability to focus only on knit/purl and counting the number I had written. Thirty minutes later, I knit the first two rows of the complicated color work perfectly and stress-free. I'm hoping to do at least 10 rows today.

Pictures to come!

Happy knitting!

http://blog.craftzine.com/archive/2011/07/how-to_cyanotype_print_on_hand.html

This idea can be for those of us too tentative to do color work or for simply a different look. If I had the time at the moment, I would love to try it!

Happy knitting!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVRfVEONxJQ

Regardless of the criticism of this video, I had never even thought of knitting a mattress as an option. Of course, I will never in my life have enough yarn to do so. Also, a knitted mattress must be comfortable: firm yet fluffy.

Food for thought.

Happy knitting!

Some pictures I took of the beautiful Santa Catalina Mountains in Tucson, AZ while at Camp Snowball.

While I am working on a massive project, I did have one project to finish and two scarves. Here are a few of my recently finished projects.

Sorry I haven't been posting regularly. I just started a new job, so that has been a top priority.

As has my knitting. I have started the Big Lebowski sweater. I am working on the Fair Isle on the back piece right now. I'm hoping to have that finished this weekend. So far, so good. It's looking great!

Balancing Work and Life: The On-Going Challenge for Educators | Edutopia

The new school year has just begun. So far, it looks like it's going to be great: two different classes to prepare, tons of technology, and, most importantly, incredibly supportive coworkers. I'm at a new school and I can recreate my identity as a teacher; well, a bit.

Although the year is just beginning, the feeling of swimming or sinking is very strong. Last year, each weekend went up and down: I felt like I could enjoy life when there was nothing to plan, but when the need to plan my classes hit, I felt like I was going to sink. Each weekend I planned my classes so I could enjoy a few days, but then the sinking feeling of having to plan more was always a few days away. As my new principal put it, there's always going to be more work, so you need to take time to enjoy life. She's completely right. While I did spend one day this weekend planning, I'm hoping to spend less time working during my weekends and more time enjoying life.

Everyone says that the first year teaching is incredibly difficult--some say the first three years. I know that last year was really difficult for me, 60+ hours a week and feeling stress so much that I thought it would never go away. Yes, I had to plan 6 different classes a day and write lesson plans, so I was justified in my stress, but I would have preferred to not have been in that situation to begin with.

While I was reflecting on last year, I realized a few things. One, that I learned a lot about teaching, interacting with coworkers, and being in "the real world." I think I learned more last year about the work place than most people learn in a few years! Am I glad that I learned so much so quickly? Normally my answer would be "yes," but under that circumstance, no. Not only would I have wanted more time to learn all that, I realized that I would have preferred reading about it in a book instead so I wouldn't have had to make the mistakes in the first place.

That was my biggest realization: my dependency on books. My entire life, my philosophy has been that I should not make mistakes that I can prevent by learning about them from reading. I can get experiences through characters or from nonfiction. Why should I suffer the consequences when people, real or imaginary, have already done it for me? Do I really need to mark up my own tabula rasa? I'm still of this belief, but others emphasize the importance of learning the feeling and emotion behind making mistakes and learning things the hard way. Perhaps so; I definitely empathize more with the characters I read about. Still, an imaginary character's mistakes aren't so dire as a real person's.

Books are my safety blanket. When I'm overwhelmed with life and just want to forget everything, picking up a book has always been my cure, my relaxation. I want to mark up my tabula rasa with experiences from books and reality. Is that so wrong?

Simply Knitting

Yves Marchand & Romain Meffre Photography - The Ruins of Detroit

Although I've been back from Spain almost a month now, I still haven't really blogged about my time there. I'll blog a little about specific events that I loved, starting with Torrejon. It's a small town in the Community of Madrid. It used to be the location of the American Base. Once the Americans left, the town was kind of deserted. So people who can't afford to live in either Alcala de Henares or Madrid usually move there. In Torrejon, they took a particular part that was filling up with trash and little shacks and they completely transformed it. Now it's a free part with monuments from countries all around Europe. I couldn't believe that it was free! I just wish I had a park like this to walk around in in the US!