This Little Light of Mine

Here we are for our second round of chemo at the Farm Journal Building. When we arrive in the patient area, the first thing we do is scope out an area that will fit all three of us comfortably.  Today we lucked up on a semi/pseudo private area complete with two chairs for me and Aunt Glo.  We had a view of the Walnut St. park across the street.  This is great, but the weather sucks big time.  It’s cold, super windy and the rain is coming down in sheets.

Settling into our little "room" for the day, we wait for a nurse to come over to get mom hooked up and started.  One comes over and, once again, she has trouble finding mom’s veins.  They use heat bags on one arm while coaxing the other arm with light taps.  They tied that rubber band around her arm to get them to pop out.  Nothing.

During the wait, mom pulled out her crochet project and begin to unravel a row or two she needed to correct.  It’s a poncho for a dear friend who is leaving to live with family in NY.  She’ll be missed, be she’ll have a gift of love to take with her.

The magic number seems to be three.  As in, it took three different nurses to try before one was finally able to get one to pop out.  This was a good thing because the only other option would be a shunt and that is not a road we want to travel.

So, for now, the IV is in and that’s a good thing.  Looking at the time, we realize it’s lunch time (where did the time go?).  I ask Auntie what she brought for lunch (she mentioned sandwiches earlier) in her suitcase of a bag.  I missed breakfast and right now I was overdue to eat. 

Auntie digs into her magical lunch bag, which always seems to have an endless supply of food, and pulls out a fabulous surprise.  She made sandwiches!  But not just any kind of sandwiches.  She made fancy sandwiches.  These sandwiches was a work of art and much welcomed on such a nasty and cold day. 

What was the sandwich made up of you ask?  Well, I’ll tell ya.  It was sliced grilled chicken, top with roasted red peppers, on a bed of spinach drizzled with garlic olive oil, beautifully living between two slices of rosemary bread.  Mmmm…soooooo good.

It was a long day, but we had a wonderful time.  We also made two new friends, Steve and Greg, who were in the space next to us.  They were great and helped pass the time.  We ended the day in prayer lead by our new friend Steve.  And, as promised, we will keep them both in prayer.

I also want to mention that the nursing staff at the care unit is awesome.  They are attentive with volunteers who come around with the sole purpose of making your journey a more comfortable one.  Mission accomplished.  God bless and keep them.  They have an important job  and you can tell they love what they do.

Last week I decided to toss a crochet scarf project I’m working on and use the yarn to make a scarf using the Cameo Faggot Stitch (as in cigar). It would seem that in order to keep the side even when crocheting, you need to count stitches. Well, I didn’t count 1 stitch and now the scarf looks drunk. The sides are weaving in and out and I just can’t bring myself to take it out again. So, I’ll finish it for myself and start over with a knit project.

After searching the patterns on Ravelry, books and websites, I chose the The Cameo Faggot Stitch Scarf. The finished project looked good and the pattern seemed interesting…as in easy.

And a way we go. I found videos at Knit-Help.com that demonstrated how to do 2 of the things the pattern called for. YO (yarn over) and k2tog (knit 2 together). I have my yarn, needles, know how. I’m ready to make it happen.

I have taken this thing out 50 million times. The stitches seemed to be a bit to twisted, so I had to be doing something wrong. Right? As it turns out, I was doing it all correctly, I just needed to do enough rows to see the progress. After that little gem of info was discovered, I was off and getting the hang of the stitch. Until I looked a few rows back and saw that I missed a YO. So, being the rational person that I am, I assumed I could carefully go back a few rows and make the correction. Everything went well until I couldn’t get the stitches back on the needle correctly. So, I had to start over…again.

The gift scarf saga continues. I’ll post photos after I finally get it going.

Who said boys only likes football?  Well, this put that lie to rest.

Can’t view it from the blog?  See it here.

I am anxiously awaiting this year’s Philadelphia Writers’ Conference. Last year was the first time I attended and it was intense. There were so many great workshops that it was hard choosing which to take. When it was all said and done, I was exhauasted, but in a good way.

I had the opportunity to meet local writers and authors like romance writer Alice Wootson, horror writer Jonathan Maberry, and paranormal and romance writer Leslie Banks. I had the pleasure of taking Ms. Banks workshop and she was the bomb! She made time for anyone who had a question and all of her workshop classes were lively and real. After picking up a few of her books at the conference, I am addicted to her stories.

This year is going to be no different. I still haven’t figured out which workshops to take, but I know I will have my butt in a chair taking notes. Lots and lots of notes.

If you are a budding writer and have never been to the Philadelphia Writers’ Conference, you should diffinitely attend. It’s a great experience.

Or in my case, knit! This week I went on a yarn shopping trip with two fellow crochet and knitters, Monique and Ciara. After looking up local yarn shops on Ravelry, we realized there was one right in our backyard. The Tanlged Web at 7900 Germantown Ave. It’s nice little shop filled to the brim with yarn of every kind. The sales people were as friendly and helpful (even when I asked a dumb question about the yarn winder thingey).

There will be moving to a new and larger location soon which promises to have a place to chat and create inside or outside. Sounds like we’ve found a new place to hang out this summer.

After leaving there we made our way to a thrift shop I used to frequent in Norristown. I went to find off to find yarn and needles and the ladies headed for the shoes and purses. By the time they made their way to the craft section, I’d found a $3 bundle of 9 sets of needles and a few bags of yarn that looked interesting. Can you believe that? Nine sets of needles for 3 bucks. I was a happy camper.

Then it was time to hit Michaels on the way to lunch at the Cheesecake Factory. I found some yarn to break up a red blanket I’m working on (crocheting) and some chenille that was on sale. Of course, when I got to the register, it wasn’t on sale. The yarn was in the wrong bin. Fine. I put it back and we headed off the Factory.

Three lunch specials and a Coach bag later, we were on our way home with our goodies. Now we actually have to make something. Oh, and I did share my 9 pack with fellow knitter Ciara. She got 3 sets of needles out of the deal.

I’m finally going to start the Sampler Afghan from Vickie Howell’s book Knitty Gritty Knits (DIY): 25 Fun & Fabulous Projects (DIY Network). It seems simple enough.

You use 1 main color and 3 different contrasting colors to make blocks with a height of 8″ & 24 stitches wide. The stitches used for this project are:

• garter (basic knit stitch)
• loopy square (I will most likely change this since I don’t like the way it looks)
• lace square
• hurdle stitch square
• checkerboard square
• popcorn square

Except for the garter stitch, these are stitches I will be trying for the first time.

I’ve chosen to use Red Heart’s Super Saver Yarn-Pink Camo, Light Raspberry, Cafe, & Baby Pink.There’s a shade of green in the Pink Camo yarn that I wasn’t able to find so we’ll go with this for now.

I’ve gotten 1 of 11 squares of the Pink Camo (MC) done using the garter stitch. I really link this color combo so I will probably use it in another project some where down the line.

So, back to knitting.

This video is HIL-LAR-RI-OUS!!!!!!!!!!!  It’s Andy Samberg’s digital short about the Chronicles of Narnia.  It is a must see!!!!!!

Can’t view it from the blog?  See it here.

I am so excited!  A few weeks ago I signed up to the invite list (yes, there’s a waiting list) of Ravelry.com.  It’s an online community for knitting and crocheting complete with forum, free patterns and tons of tips (wow, that didn’t sound dorky at all).

This is an awesome little community where people who are crazy about knitting and crocheting meet to chat, troubleshoot, share patterns, yarn, and share tons of other useful information.  It was started as a way to find everything that you need in one place instead of spending hours searching the web looking for yarn, patterns, etc.  It’s not live yet, but there are so many people here you would never know that.

It’s also like an online notebook to track your tools, yarn stash, library and projects.  There’s even a status bar for current projects.  There are some really nice looking pieces on this site.

I’m still getting my "room" set up but it does put me in the mood to create.