SNOW, ok, just had to get that out of my system. Yes it is snowing, and then the weather people say that it is going to rain which will not be so fun. Mostly just sitting in my room watching the snow fall, enjoying the heating, not so much the view because that is grey.
There's snow there, I promise
In really good news, Obama won! And Maine has marriage equality (hopefully to stay).
Apparently instead of stress eating I now stress spin since I got Merlin. I ended up making 3 small skeins of yarn while listening to election results and learned to Andean ply. Andean plying is kind of amusing to do, I do need to work on my technique a little bit so that I have better control of my yarn.
Drying
Hanks sitting on my bed
Much work has been done on Grandma's hat, more to go.
It will be a hat, I swear it will be.
I won a $25 gift certificate to Amazon for completing a survey, buying fiber with it. We shall see how this goes.
Just because I can, and I am banned from xmas carols before Thanksgiving.
In the month since I last posted I have in no particular order: helped organize a small naginata seminar, driven to and from Washington DC for a naginata tournament, drove in Washington DC, watched Doctor Who, finished my mystery knitting which was my grandmother's birthday present, visited New Jersey, mostly finished Mom's xmas present, started on a present for a friend, decided on some other relatives xmas presents, spent more time on computers then is probably safe, taken lots of random pictures, grafted stitches mostly successfully, debated if I have enough time to attempt to write a book.
Naginata and related things first. On the 22 of September I helped to lead an one day seminar/extended practice for my naginata club with a visiting sensei from our regional federation. It was fun and many people learned lots of new things. The bigger thing that happen was in October. On the weekend of October the 7th 9 members of the naginata club drove to DC to take part in a seminar, taikai, and shinsa. It took us two cars, three drivers, and ten hours to drive down. I ended up driving the entire way down in a rental vehicle due to a SNAFU situation with the transport plans. After we arrived in the early evening (yes we went on the Jersey Turnpike, no we didn't die) we went and got some food before we got to the house that we were staying at. The old captain of the team had us stay in her house and her parents were wonderful hosts. The seminar was fun and I learned lots, as did the rest of the club who went down, I hope. The taikai went well, I got third in both of the events I competed in, most of the rest of the club did really well in their events and enjoyed themselves immensely. The shinsa went pretty well, we had a range of ranks earned from 4kyu up to 2kyu. The same day as the shinsa there was also a section on bogu training, it was fun and informative.
The HMS Toaster
The participants
After the events we went into Washington DC to go to the Smithsonian and the monuments. I went to both the Air and Space museum and the Natural history museum. Then we went to the monuments in the dark, we went to the war memorials, they were indescribable.
On the knitting front I have gotten a fair amount done. I made a mini-Cthulhu for a gift, someone else made him a mini-naginata. I have almost finished Mom's xmas present, I just need to weave in the ends and decide if I want to put fringe on it. Also finished was my mystery knitting, aka Grandma's birthday present. It was a lace shawl in a forest green, I am pretty happy with how it turned out, even if I did spend a couple of days acting like I was crazy. Currently I am working on a gift for a friend who likes the Legend of Zelda games.
Cthulhu will get you in your sleep
Grandma and her shawl
My hat model is a lion
Apparently when I need to finish knitting something in a rush I turn to excessive watching of the Lord of the Rings movies. It's rather fun, if a little strange that I was knitting lace while watching them.
The Link hat that I made involved grafting stitches together in the band, I managed to graft them mostly correctly.
I have started to work again on the pair of gloves that I started over a year ago. Not sure why I stopped working on them at all. Wait I know why, I hate doing the fingers.
I HATE FINGERS
When I visited New Jersey it was the weekend after the naginata event, I spent most of it rushing to finish Grandma's birthday present. I did spend some time with my relatives too, just not a lot of sleep.
In Doctor Who news, I watched the last Pond episode, there was crying and funny noises involved. Baby weeping angels are terrifying, absolutely terrifying.
Also for more random things I have been taking lots of pictures of things around campus.
I got back to college last Sunday, after much packing, and moved in with my roommate. We actually live in a suite, have separate rooms with one door to the hallway. I am in the same dorm as last year, on the north side and the third floor.
My Dorm, from the hill.
Once I got everything in the room, I started to unpack, that was the easy part. The hard part was the decorating. It is mostly done, just the entry way needs to be decorated. Above my bed I strung some multi-colored christmas lights, only half the string works, and it looks so cool.
My bed with lights and posters
Other neat things found on campus include: lots of turtles, two types even, and pretty plants, also a paper mache and duct tape Kermit head.
Plants by Prospect
Turtles on a log
Baby Snapper
Kermit
In semi good news, my orchid is growing two mini orchid of course this is because the main plant is a little dead; but we're all good. My jade plant seems to be very happy on his window sill. My roommate gave me a mostly dead rose plant that I managed to finish off.
The mystery knitting is going along quite well, I have stated on the next phase of it. I crocheted myself a new soap bag after my old one was retired, it is a fairly simple pattern that takes no time to make.
Other than that I have been going to class, drinking large amounts of peppermint tea, doing homework, watching Doctor Who, and practicing getting on my bed without a running jump. I lofted my bed up high enough for my fridge to fit under the bed. That was so that I had enough room in the room as one of my closets is taken up by a wardrobe that I named Narnia.
Weather is evil, on the first 2 days of classes we had rain and then Friday and now today we have sunny warm weather. It is so much easier to do homework when the weather is crummy. Weather aside the homework objective for today has been met and now other business can be taken care of, like blogging and the other random things that need doing.
On the knitting front the gauntlets are continuing to progress and are for now my in class knitting which may change at a latter date to another project, also a Cthulu has been started on, he will be a kind of minty green in color.
In some very good news my bike is in full working trim after I had to bend the kickstand away from the wheel where it was rubbing and creating a horrible vibration. I now have my primary form of distance transportation back which will also help with getting to class faster, or meals.
On a random note the first official meeting of the naginata club is tonight and also I am having an enjoyable time playing with some figures and rubber ducks, the top of my printer was empty and looked lonely.
