I’m in Ravelry! Squeeeeeeeeeeee! I’ve just spent thirty minutes organizing my stuff on there. No where near being complete, but it’s late and my eyes are going all blurry on me, so I should go to bed. Just one more: SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!
P.S. I (heart) the way my Cute Teacher pronounces my name. ^_^
I like taking showers. They let me think. AND I get brilliant ideas for portfolios somewhere in between rinsing out the shampoo and slathering on the peppermint scented shower gel I bought from Bath & Body Works while I was in Montana. Just spent the last 45 mins writing and editing one piece of my portfolio that I need to get done before Halloween. Not bad, even if I say so myself. Some days, especially after writing a lot, I just feel like I’m a genius. Some of the stuff is pretty good actually. Or at least that’s how I’m feeling right now. Let’s wait until I actually have to hand it in and see if I’m sweating bullets then. XD Anyway, this portfolio isn’t due until Nov. 5th, but that’s reading week (which I’ll be spending in Sheffield) and I’m already going over to Oliver’s on Halloween, so I need to hand in my portfolio before I leave. Otherwise it’ll be very expensive to come here, drop it off and go back again or it’ll cost me a whole lot of points. Neither is an option I’m willing to entertain. So I’ve got about two weeks to get it done. I can work on my other portfolio while I’m in Sheffield since that isn’t due until the next Monday. Everyone is already talking about their dissertations and how they have no idea of what they’re going to do them on. I feel just a tad smug about my situation: One, my “dissertation” is only 6,000 words with a 2,000 word commentary (I swear, they need to let me write more than 6,000 words, that’s so not enough for someone like me who likes to ramble) and two, I’ve already begun mine and have about 3,000 words so far! And I’m not even past the introduction yet! Gah. I see lots of editing ahead of me. And I’m thinking about participating in NaNoWriMo this year. Don’t know if I have a whole 50,000 word novel in me, but hey, it’s an excuse to write (as if I need one). It’s gonna be a busy Novemeber. Especially if I decide to compete in the dance competitions as well!
Still knitting the Isabella, haven’t made too much progress on it, haven’t even gotten to the increases yet! On the other hand, I have been busy with Christmas gifts. So it’s not too bad. I still want to buy yarn and roving though. But even more than I desire buying *more* yarn, I want to use up all of the stuff I’ve got in my stash so I can actually justify buying some.
Ran into the cute teacher again today. Wasn’t looking my best today (who is on Mondays?) with my hair doing its weird fly away curly poofy thing. Unlike on Friday when I ran into him when I was on my way to the train station to meet Oliver (I had actually made an effort to do my hair and look nice in general). Ah well. Then again, he looked like he needed another dose of caffeine, so maybe Mondays are just evil in general?
Okay, my stash is calling me. Shall watch an episode of Buffy before going to bed (even though I know that it’s 1 am right now and *should* be going to sleep).
Just wanted to say that I should be getting my Ravelry invite soon. As in there are about 1500 people in front of me on the list. Then me! That is all.
Proper update once I’ve gotten my assignment for Writing Lives done and Oliver has gone home again. :(
Yesterday I heard that my first cousin Jenna is pregnant! *grin* The baby’s due in early April. Now, the question is: Do I make a baby blanket or a baby garment? And what color? No one knows the sex of the baby yet, so I’m thinking something like pastel yellow and spring green and sky blue. Staying away from pink. Maybe some lavender if it’s a blanket that I’m making…
Been dancing, reading some Edgar Allan Poe, “spying” on people (for my assignment, not because I’m weird) and knitting.
I love watching the sea. Especially when there are bigger waves than usual. Like right now. :)
My internet connection decided to die on me last night at around 8:30. Tried restarting, unplugging the cable, all that jazz. Nada. So this morning I called the Network helpline people (I got their number from reception downstairs). They said that they’re working on fixing it. Being the impatient being that I am sometimes, I decided to pay them a visit personally if the connection had not rectified itself by the time I had to leave. God, that sounds ominous. What I meant was that since I was going to be in that building today anyway (had to print off an assignment at the library) I’d stop by and ask again. So I did and they asked me all sorts of questions like do I know my IP address (yeah, right, I have the memorized just for emergencies like this *rolls eyes*) and did I have my laptop with me (Uh, no. It’s heavy. Not lugging it up the hill unless I really have to). Eventually, they wound up printing off some instructions on how to reconfigure my connection settings and if that didn’t solve it, I should bring my laptop up tomorrow for them to take a look at it and help me solve the problem. Luckily, their printed mojo worked. ^_^
Had another class with the cute teacher. *grin* And now he knows that the J in my name is not like “jam” but like “yes”. I’m trying to get the original pronounciation established around here. Sounds more exotic that way. Therefore, I am more interesting. *nods* We got an interesting assignment for next week. We have to “spy” on someone, take note of every little detail and then imagine what their partner is like. Once that’s done, we need to write a short scenario with the two of them interacting. This is supposed to help us define and write a whole character, not just one aspect of it. Hey, if it lets me do people watching, I’m all for it. But he did say that we shouldn’t stalk people because “there are rules against that sort of thing”. XD
I’m off to knit again. I started making an Isabella in light green for myself last night. I just hope that my gauge is right this time. The baby pink one I made last spring turned out to be too big for me. *sniffle* But at least it made a nice graduation present for my sister. :)
Yesterday, the weather was gorgeous. The sun was out, it was warm, but there was a slight breeze to keep things cool enough. :) In the morning, I went to the Farmer’s Market kinda hoping to find some roving like I did in Montana, but I had a feeling that I wouldn’t find any. And I didn’t. I had also given myself a £5 spending limit and since I didn’t see anything at the market that I wanted, I went to Clare’s and bought one skein of Classic Yarns Cashsoft DK (57% extra fine merino, 33% microfibre, 10% cashmere) in a light grey for £2.50 (it was discounted because it was the last of the dyelot). Really pretty. And soft. And I have no idea what to make out of it. I’ve got about 130m/142yds of this and that’s not enough for a scarf. I don’t want to make a hat out of it. Or fingerless mitts. *sigh* Other news on the knitting front: I have finally gotten an idea of what to make for Christmas for Krisi. Not saying what, just in case she reads this, but I like it because it’ll be something practical and I get to do some stash busting. ^_^
Then two hours later, I’m hiking up Pen Dinas with Gabe. He’d messaged me through MSN an hour earlier and asked if I wanted to go. We had lunch up there (swapping halves of our sandwiches; I had PB&J on wholegrain while he had some beef&cheese on white). I’ve got a panoramic picture of the view from the top, but I haven’t uploaded it yet. Oliver called while I was up there. I told him to guess where I was and he immediately said: “Top of a hill.” Apparently, I’m somewhat predictable. Is that good or bad though?
At five, we left for the movies. At this point, let me just say that I think Gabe is out to get me. He saw what it was like for me climbing up Pen Dinas (and boy am I glad that last year I decided to climb up to the M several times during the year, otherwise Pen Dinas would really have kicked my butt) and he wants to get up to campus going through the Penglais forest! At first it seems fine, but it’s a really steep climb and I’m not in the best shape, okay? Then we finally get back onto the road that I wanted to use in the first place and we’ve just spent about ten minutes in the woods just to get to a spot that would’ve taken us two minutes to walk to. Grr. We did make it to the movie in time though. I was melting into a puddle of sweat at that point (something I wanted to avoid which is why I wanted to leave -early-), but at least we didn’t miss the beginning. We went to see “Atonement”. I though it was pretty good. I liked the ending. Now I want to read the book to see how it was written.
Martin is a genius. He knows how to make the shower warmer! Last night, I turned on the water to make it warm up before I get in and it was boiling hot. And I couldn’t get cold water. So I knocked on Martin’s door and asked if he knew anything about showers. And he fixed it! I mean, he’s the one who “broke” the shower in the first place, but it’s really nice to be able to take warm/hot showers again. Before, the water only got to like warm/lukewarm which wasn’t that much fun actually. But now, hot water! *grin*
I was just reading Miss Violet’s (of the hilarious Lime&Violet podacast) old LJ entries and came upon this question:
If you could meet yourself at aged ten, what would the ten year old you think of who you are today?
She’d be surprised that I’m so into knitting (especially since I wasn’t too keen on it when I had to do it at school). Actually, the 10 y/o me would probably think that I was nuts when she found out about my stash. ^_^;; She’d be pretty impressed that I *can* actually speak French (even if it isn’t the greatest in the world) and glad that I’d had the chance to live in the States for a year. She’d also probably be comforted to know that eventually I did get a boyfriend who’s really great. She’d most likely offer me ice cream to make me feel better. Think that it’s no wonder that I moved to the UK since I like tea so much. And wonder why I *still* don’t have my driver’s license. Be amazed that I actually like dogs now and would prefer to get a puppy as a pet instead of a kitten.
She’d probably think a whole lot more things about me, but all in all, be pretty happy with what I’ve become in the following 12 years.
And now I’m going back to knitting Jaz’s Baudelaire socks and watching Buffy.
Let me just say this: a desire to start another project can really speed up your knitting, even when it is cables! I swear, I detest this intricate cabling because it takes up so much time. I’m really into instant gratification, which is why I knit socks a lot because I can pretty much churn out a pair in a weekend. AND it looks like I’m making a lot of progress. I know I can do shawls; I just finished one a few weeks ago. Plus, I’m a fast knitter. I’ve been called a knitting machine by several individuals. So why why why does cabling have to take up so much time? >_<
Anyways, I’ve gotten two Christmas presents done. The socks that I’m working on right now with all of the cables that are driving me nuts are for my mom and since they’re not a Christmas present, rather, they were supposed to be for Mother’s Day this spring, I figure I need to finish these before I go back to school so I can give them to my dad to give to my mom when he goes back to Belgium. Wow that was a long sentence; can you say long winded? At least I got the first sock done and all the ends woven in yesterday. I’ve almost finished the leg part of the second sock. So I’ve promised myself that I will not cast on for another Christmas present socks until I’ve completed at least the leg, preferably turned the heel as well. But, the Christmas socks are a part of a KAL I’ve joined with a couple of other knitters from the L&V message boards… Gah, the temptation!
Side note: Congrats to my lil sis who got into uni! She’s doing Illustration in Brussels. :D
And the shawl is done! o/
I bought this fabulous knitting pattern from Cookie A called the Twisted Flower sock. Sure, the cabling can get annoying at times and my fingers hurt a bit and I’ve had a cable needle in my mouth pretty much all day, but all in all, I really like the pattern. It’s well written and the chart is easy to follow and after doing it for awhile, I just keep it there beside me as a security blanket in case I mess up.
Now, the problem that I’m having is because of the yarn. It’s 100% cotton. And at the gauge I’m getting, it’s so not going to fit my mom’s foot (because this is supposed to be a Mother’s Day gift). Grr. I hate cotton. But since I’ve put so much effort into it already (as in, I’ve spent six hours doing the leg!) I’m so not frogging it. Which means that I’ll probably convert it into a fingerless glove. It’ll be a darn pretty one, but it’s not the sock that I had hoped it to become.
Need to go buy proper sock yarn. Non-cotton sock yarn. On the bright side: Yay! A good valid reason to buy yarn from either The Loopy Ewe or Lisa Souza. And for a good measure, I’ll buy me some yarn as well. You know, as a consolation prize for doing cabling with cotton. ^_~