Crochet and Beer

Last year I took up crochet. At our knitting group all the knitters decided to take up crochet and the crocheters tried knitting. As it turns out, I really like crochet. It's much faster and I can do all these cool stitches and it seems easier. Plus, I can make hats quickly without having to use double pointed needles. I have one pattern for the hats and each time, depending on the yarn, I have to frog it several times and start over to get the size right. I made myself a purple one with Homespun yarn and absolutely love it, especially on these cold days.

I also made a blue and grey/silver scarf to wear to the ODU football games. However, it wasn't cold but on one occasion this season. My best girl Lisa has season tickets and invited Bill and I to join her when her husband had a band conflict. (sips sangria) I made a blue hat to match but ended up giving that to my girl Stephanie.

I now have two of my crocheted hats for sale on my Etsy page.

I am enjoying being on Etsy. I've sold 3 things this year and all of them have been shawls. I decided I needed to make more of those and now that I can crochet I figured I'd try my hand at that. I decided to do a very basic double crochet pattern and then have Lisa show me how to do the fans that she just learned and put on a pink scarf. I won't hold it against her that it's pink. It's not like I have to wear it. :-P

So today I started chaining for the shawl. I got to about 200 stitches and then put it around me to see if it was long enough. While I was doing that and not paying attention to the things going on around me, I knocked Bill's beer over into my knitting bag! Funny thing is I had the yarn in there that Lisa refers to as the "devil yarn". I also had just put the other skeins of yarn I needed to finish the shawl. (Insert horrified noise here) So, after soaking up all the beer and tossing my bag into the laundry, I laid out the yarn to finish drying. Most of the beer got on the "devil yarn" thank goodness. However, after I finish the shawl I'll have to wash it. I'm thinking of trying to find some lavender soap to help mask the smell. If it ends up smelling like beer I'll just keep it for myself and make another one. I keep replaying it in my head in slow motion (probably because I'm watching football and they show everything in slow motion).

Before the beer/yarn catastrophe, Lisa came over to do ear candles. My cousin/friend Katie and I have decided to go swimming twice a week to help us get back into shape. (I float/swim differently now since I had the baby and stretched my ab muscles all to hell, but more on that later). On Tuesday I got water in my ear and got all but a little of it out. On Thursday I figured getting back into the water would help get the rest out but to my horror I ended up getting more stuck and now I can't hear out of my left ear. Today is Saturday, I was over this half deaf thing. I tried peroxide and that helped for a second. I tried Swimmers Ear and that didn't seem to do anything. I went bought "wax removal" drops and that did nothing. Lisa had thought ahead (because she's the best) and picked up some ear candles when she was out shopping. She came over to do that with hopes that it would work. It was fun and I got a lot of wax out and some of the water. I still can't hear but some of the pressure is gone. She said to wait and see if it gets better after I sleep and shower. If it's still stopped up I might try peroxide again in the morning since that was the only thing besides the candles that had an effect.

Jackson had mixed vegetable baby food today and seemed to like it. We've been trying different foods one at a time to see if he has any allergic reaction to them before we start mixing them up. We thought he was allergic to bananas but it might be the oatmeal instead. We're keeping him off the oatmeal for now and paying very close attention to the other foods. We've realized lately that we have him a little behind in the baby food realm. He could be using a sippy cup and eating larger amounts of the food in addition to his formula. Now that we realized that, we can move him on along. He's so funny when he eats. Sometimes he makes this "yum" noise and sometimes he says "huh" (not "huh?") and opens his mouth for the next bite. He's a wonderful baby and such a good little crawler. He was flirting with Lisa today when she came over and then played with her after she was done. I'm so glad he's at the stage where he remembers people. He has so many people that love him and this way he can remember them and feel loved. People keep teasing me about when we'll have the next one. I keep telling them I'm taking a break and then I remember that Jackson is 8 months already!! I said I wanted our babies to be at least 2 years apart and no more than 3. That means I'm gonna have to get pregnant in about a year. Yikes!

I need to be making more money before #2 arrives. I'm hoping to pick up some adjunct teaching jobs in Women's Studies. Hopefully something will open up soon or I'll get a promotion. I really love my job now, but I am not paid what I should be for the amount of work, experience, and skill level I'm at. It's complicated, but hopefully soon it will work itself out. (sips sangria)

I'm thinking about changing the name to my blog. Especially now that I crochet as well as knit. It's so hard to think of a name that covers it all though. Maybe it will come to me in a dream, or maybe someone will have a good idea and share it with me. Until then, I remain "Knitting Pidgen".