Stash to Treasure: Creamy Möbius

I've always gotten cold easily.  My hands are usually cold, and my arms chill quickly.  If Dandelionslayer had known how frigid my toes can be, he might have gotten cold feet himself.  I wear socks and slippers all winter, and I've never had any use for three-quarter-sleeved sweaters. 

In the past couple of years, I've developed another reaction to chilly weather.  When I am cold, my shoulder muscles tense up severely.  This can happen even when my extremeties don't mind the temperature yet.  It hurts to be cold.

Considering the problem, I wondered, is that why old ladies wear shawls?  And is that what I have to do when I go out?  I started looking for patterns, and found an alternative:

The Möbius.  Remember the Mobius strip, a surface with only one side, one edge, and all sorts of odd mathematical properties?  Well, I followed this pattern to crochet one.  It might be more mathematically convincing if I had made it from only one length of yarn.  But from a destashing point of view, it was quite satisfying to use up three leftover hanks.  Even if they don't quite match.  It really does help to have an extra layer over my shoulders during windy evening soccer games.  I don't have to tie it, or figure out how to hold it closed.

I think I'll wait a little longer to wear shawls, until sometime after I succumb to wearing bifocals.

Project Management

"You should always have three quilts: one on the cutting table, one on the quilting frame, and one in your head."

Thus advised the sweet old ladies who taught me to quilt. I find that it applies not only to quilts, but to all the projects I do. And I always seem to get the most excited about the next project, the one in my head.

For example, I've been working on Halloween costumes. These were mainly designed by the boys, and have been easy, and satisfying. One challenging part remains, and I should be trying to solve it. But during the costume construction, we've been struck by inspiration for a birthday gift for Scoot. It'll be really cool. I can't do it yet. While I wait for a supply to arrive, I should be working on another gift that I already started for him. It's mostly done. It will be easy to complete. Oh, and there's another quick one that's not so interesting, but necessary. But now I'm getting excited about a Christmas project. It's time, isn't it, to start on Christmas projects? How many shipping days are left?

Some people I know rarely move beyond the planning stage. I do like to finish my projects, but the satisfaction of finishing one is inextricably mingled with the anticipation of beginning the next.

How about you? Do you focus on one thing at a time, scatter your attention among different works in progress, or keep lining up more plans as you go?

I won't even mention the quilt in my head. It can't be next yet.

"This must be Thursday . . . "

"I never could get the hang of Thursdays," lamented Arthur Dent, in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.  I have to agree.  Thursdays are pretty chaotic around here.  The boys' schools run on different schedules on Thursdays.  Every week I have to make notes in my planner to be sure that I drop off, pick up, and receive the boys at the right times.  Then there's a piano lesson, a soccer practice, dinner in a couple of shifts, and everyone goes to Scouts.  Thursdays are a mess.

But maybe D2 has a solution.  His kindergarten teacher has provided him with various memory-enhancing songs, including one about the days of the week.  He insists that it goes like this:

"Sun-day, Monday
Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday,
Sa-turda-ay,
Seven days a week."

I've tried to tell him that this doesn't add up, but I cannot convince him.  D2 doesn't believe in Thursdays.

Sounds good to me.  Too bad my den-leading partner wouldn't appreciate disbelief in Thursdays as an excuse to skip Cub Scouts.

Which day is busiest for you?

Sleigh Bells Ring

I've received an early Christmas gift this year. 

My story, "Foreign Exchange," has been given the Publisher's Choice award in LDS Publisher's 2011 Christmas Story Contest!

Love and encouragement from family and friends are more wonderful gifts, which helped make this surprise possible.  Thank you!

Christmas in September

It's that time again!  The choir director is picking music for the Christmas program, and the Relief Society is gearing up for Christmas crafts at Super Saturday.  And it is time again for LDSP's Christmas Story Contest!  I have entered a piece, and there are quite a few other entries.  So take an early peek into the closet of Christmas spirit, and vote for your favorite stories before midnight on September 30.


Voting instructions and links to the stories are here.

I'm still in the Unpublished category.

Ho, ho, ho!

Happy Birthday, D2!

Five years ago, the midwife looked me over and gave me a 50-50 chance of going into labor that weekend.  I knew which 50 I believed.  Our first three boys had been born increasingly late, and it was still two weeks before the fourth was due.  So we spent Labor Day doing some preliminary shopping for a vehicle that would fit us all, in a couple of weeks.  That night, with very little warning, D2 made his surprising way into the world. 

This Labor Day, we celebrated the fruit of that labor by taking our little boy to the beach.

We found a great driftwood fort for our base of operations.

As usual, Scoot and Rollo spent the most time in the water,

while Dandelionslayer found a comfortable place to relax,

and D2 assembled a Museum of Cool Things.

Back at home, we enjoyed a cake that D2 designed, inspired by one of his favorite books.  See what I mean about pink?

D2 missed being born on Labor Day by a couple of hours, and was actually born on the first day of school.  This year the first day of school was a day later, and quite chaotic.  But here are some pictures from the second day of school . . .

which was also D2's first day of kindergarten. 

They say time flies on wings of lightning, but maybe it rolls on the tires of a big yellow bus.

Mount Saint Helens

Scoot has an abiding interest in volcanoes.  He does a school report on volcanoes every couple of years.  When we went to Japan, he said he wanted to "walk on a volcano."  We figured out, too late, that he meant "hike up Mount Fuji."  This summer, we decided it was time to visit Mount Saint Helens.

Dandelionslayer and I remember the big 1980 eruption.  We were on the other side of the country, of course, but we remember hearing about it, and seeing the movies at school.  My parents' friends, who lived in Yakima at the time, sent us a vial of ash the next Christmas.  So we felt a sort of connection to this place that we hadn't visited.

Much of the surrounding area has been replanted with noble firs.  They stand there like round hairbrushes, the limbs sticking out so straight that you can barely see them.  But I was surprised at the barrenness of the mountain itself.  A ranger told us about forms of life that braved the conditions of the crater soon after the eruption, only to be disrupted by later events. 

This dome in the crater keeps growing, as does a circular glacier that surrounds it.  And the steam rises.  This is definitely a live mountain.

Plant life is creeping in around it, though, like this paintbrush . . .

. . . lupines, blooming a little later than at our sea level home, and . . .

. . . I really don't know what this is.  Any ideas?

Of course, the geologic formations are easier to see without so much plant life.  I particularly admired this amphitheatre,

and this frosted ridge.

Some of the tourists were pretty cute, too!