Some Pig
One of my Christmas gifts was a copy of Knitting Mochimochi
The pig itself is knit with about 1/3 of a skein of cascade 220 in tutu pink, and the crazy Marie Antoinette Beehive wig is green apple malabrigo worsted. All together, the knitting only took me a few days; the instructions are very clear and and there isn't a ton of crazy fiddly assembly. For this worsted weight yarn pig I used 12 mm safety eyes from 6060.etsy.com.
The photos were taken at the Science Factory because its awesome stripey colored walls seemed the perfect backdrop to a silly knitted pig.
A little handy tip for a perfect curly tail and happy wig embellishments is that you can curl the pieces around a pencil or double pointed needle and then hit it with a good spray of hairspray. It's a little trick I picked up from another toy pattern and it works really well to help the curls keep their shape.
After finishing this pig , I decided that clearly the next logical step was to make another, smaller pig. I'm doing this with fingering weight yarn, and the tail is so cute and tiny.
Sadness
Dad, October 2009 with two dumb goats and a bull.
Two weeks ago, in the wee hours of the morning, my father unexpectedly passed away. He was 57, and it would be an understatement to say that my family is devastated by the loss. After a whirlwind trip to Maine, I'm back to the chaos of my day-to-day life, working hard to keep my head above water. I'm not ready to eulogize my father here yet but I'm going to work hard to spend more time here, documenting. One of my dad's most frequent complaints to me in the past year was that I was not writing here enough and while it's too late for him to read future entries, it's not too late for my to write them for other people in my life.
2010 in Review: Daily Life
What a year. I keep saying that 2010 has been terrible (and it has) but as I looked back through my photos for the year I realized it was also full of a large number of great things. Recapped here for you, 2010 at Casa de Baya.
January: I knit a kidney for my mother, who has to have one removed. D and I take a trip to meet friends in Portland, and while he spends an afternoon playing computer games with the hipsters, I am surrounded by yarn and knitters.
February: I fly east to help my mother out after her surgery and am able to visit all-too-briefly with my friend Lisa and her husband. It's a short month, because it always is, thankfully.
March: I start seeds for a garden that will eventually produce very little because of a very long, damp and cold spring and a very strange growing season.
April: We celebrate D's birthday with a trip to Portland to see a Q&A with Kevin Smith, and are simultaneously super disappointed to be missing Conan O'Brien's show here in Eugene (on the same day). We had a fantastic time none-the-less. We also undertake the next step in our massive overhaul in the front yard landscaping that leaves us exhausted and feeling accomplished.
May: We spend a large amount of time figuring out just how goofy we can be.
June: It's my 29th birthday, our 3rd wedding anniversary and Black Sheep Gathering all in one action-packed month. My handspun and handknit pygora shawl brings home a perfect score and a 2nd place ribbon at Black Sheep Gathering.
July: A far-too-brief pair of visits with one of my too-far-away friends (which reminds me that somewhere there are a few more photos from her visit). We visit with Jodie and Anthony and have a great pizza adventure. There are a few days of hot temps, hot enough that the kitties look like they might melt, but not hot enough to justify the work and cost of moving the window a/c unit into the bedroom to deal with them.
August: I spend a lot of time preparing a moderately sized wholesale order of knitting themed cards for a yarn club, and plan to launch my etsy shop (launch does not happen. March, I hope.) There is the continuation of a stressful situation, and we go to an awesome 50s themed party to watch Dr. Strangelove.
September: We help our friend April harvest the delicious honey from her apiary and I meet Heidimonkey and Emily for a short romp through the Oregon Flock and Fiber Festival which is more crowded than I have ever seen it and extremely humid due to rain. We eat tiny pies and knit together.
October It's hard to remember the first half of October, but we get the front yard weeded and use our wee Toyota Prius to bring home 15 cubic feet of bark-o-mulch and mulch the heck out of things. Front yard finally looks reasonably done. On October 30th, we go out to eat and D royally screws up his back which leads us to...
November and December which are a flurry of doctors appointments, physical therapists, bed-rest and hoping for results before finally an eventual MRI shows us that he has a badly herniated disc in his back that requires surgery. We manage to have great Thanksgiving and Christmas celebrations in spite of this, and that brings us to now.
Now we're waiting patiently for this trying year to end, and for the surgery to get here and be done with. We've got big plans for 2011 and they don't include being confined to the house for a day longer than necessary. We're hoping that it'll be a great year, and I wish the best year ever for all of you out there!!
The year in knitting and crafting will be coming soon!
Happy Merry
It's been a long two months, but right now we're relaxing and gearing up for a low-key holiday celebration with my in-laws. We'll be eating lasagna and spending time together, in a modified version of our normal crazy huge Christmas celebration. There will be gifts, delicious food, and--most importantly--a house full of love. May you have joy and love to surround you whether you're also celebrating Christmas, or just enjoying a beautiful post-Solstice Saturday.
Joy from Extremely Unexpected Sources
It's been a rough ride around here lately. In addition to a host of other things, my beloved husband threw his back out very badly; he has been laid up for 2.5 weeks and on bedrest for 12 days. I'm not looking to throw myself a pity party, but yesterday all of the frustrations of everything stacked up and eventually I had a miniature meltdown and vented my frustration on twitter. I posted this:
Dear Universe, Could you lay the heck off me for a couple of weeks? I'm not sure how much more frustration and stress I can take. xoxo Bon
Then I gathered myself together, took some time, scooped the cats' litter boxes and went to bed. When I woke up this morning and checked in on my stream, I had received the following @reply from the user: The_UN1VERSE:
I'll See What I Can Do. But You're Doing Fine So Far.
This may sound dumb, but it was really actually helpful. Just that little piece of random encouragement set me up for a great and productive day. I have no idea if it's a real person or a bot behind the account. If it's a real person, they dealt me a huge measure of kindness with this one silly post, and for that I thank them. I'll try to pay that kindness forward.