Bernat Baby Sport Round Blanket

I finished the edging for this one last night. It probably only took about 2 weeks of crocheting, and it was not the only one that I was working on. Although I did get kind of obsessive with it the past few days! Like yesterday, I was determined to finish the edging!!! It really introduced me to several techniques that I had not done before including crocheting in the round, a 'shell' type stitch, treble crochet (in the edging) and picot edging. I am pretty happy with the results, and very pleased with the colour that I found at Zellers, called "Pretty Girl". I'm hoping that it will show up online as well at some point, but I have yet to see it on the Bernat website.

I like that it is 'more' than a full circle-adds a little bit more to snuggle up with. I still have several projects on the go (what else is new?!) and will have to buy some more yarn to create a special blanket for a friend who is going to have a baby! Fellow flute player-it's her third child, but that doesn't make it any less exciting-for any of us! I'm thinking that I'll find a nice mint-green and make a feather and fan blanket...as I typically do for my friends, due to it's significance. Project Linus I will experiment for, but for my friends-the Feather and Fan blanket.

Summer= More blankets for Project Linus

As those who read this blog last year know, I spent a lot of time last year beginning in February and continuing through August knitting, crocheting, and creating fleece blankets for Bernat's Project Linus Knit-Along and Crochet-Along. In total during those months, I created 15 blankets for the drive, of which I posted pictures online. Well, it's summer, which means time to knit and crochet again! I finally took the pictures of the blankets I have completed so far this year and so, in all their cuddliness, here they are:

This one is a Stripes and Textures blanket in Bernat Baby Cakes, a cuddly blend of cotton and acrylic which has unfortunately been discontinued. Somehow, it always seems like the more practical or fun yarns and the best colours are always the ones that get discontinued...

I started this one last summer, and finished knitting the sides yesterday. Some parts were not that difficult (like the simple blue and yellow stripes) but the pink pattern drove me slightly crazy! And picking up the stitches along the sides was not the most fun thing in the world. Still, the bright results and the many different stitches were fun to combine, and I like the end picture. 

Because this is ME, it's naturally a crochet Wavy Ripple blanket using Bernat Baby Coordinates. Again, one that I started last summer and found in my knitting/crocheting basket when I went looking a few weeks ago. I used leftovers from other projects, and lined up the colours to create a rainbow effect. If only my tension had been the same last year and this year. I guess it's part of only having done a handful of crochet projects so far.

Yet another Wavy Ripple blanket in Bernat Baby Coordinates. This was from a book called Baby Gifts, and I added some extra stripes, including the Soft Mauve and the Soft Turquoise. I also decided to do a single crochet in the Soft Blue along the edges. 

A knitted Fan and Feather blanket, which is the same pattern that my own knitted baby blanket-which rests at the top of my pillow each night-is in. It's done in the Pastel Shades variegated colour of Bernat Super Value yarn. 

At last count, I had five more blankets on the go. I figure a couple of them will be finished before the week is over. And now I am very tired!

Explain this one...

Last September, when my dad and sister went east for two weeks, I was happy for them, enjoyed having the house to myself, etc etc. My dad left for a twelve day trip to Great Britain today, very early this morning. It's his first time over there since he was 21...my age. He's now 63. So explain why I am feeling, well, lonely?Perhaps even, scared? (!!!)  I guess I'm just at a different place then I was in September. September, before I heard those words that changed everything, "You have a heart murmur, did you know that?". Before I started having problems breathing, and eating (physically).

I'm sure it will improve tomorrow. I think this is just a sign that I need to see people my own age again, and SOON. And really chill. I guess things were different because in September, I was in school. And I have to say that I didn't feel slightly creeped out with the windows open, because they weren't! Now, well, I got a bit creeped out when I was downstairs cataloguing yarn/putting yarn away while watching I dream of Jeannie and the windows were open upstairs. But, I wasn't about to just close them up and negate all the cooling evening air. I guess it was really only the living room and dining room windows that bothered me, because they are the ones that are big enough-and low enough-to the ground that someone could come in them. The others, yes, someone could come in them, but they're pretty high up. You'd have to be quite tall and strong or have a ladder to manage it.

I guess this is also part of having entered into the 3 weeks on for more challenging depression. Generally, it seems like I have three weeks of harder depression, and one week where it isn't so bad. It kind of messes up the brain. (Kind of?)

Cataloguing yarn. Having inherited a lot of yarn...in addition to buying a lot on my own...there is a lot of yarn in the house. Fortunately, it catalogues faster than music! A large percentage of it was catalogued and stored back neatly in the closet in the library this evening. Basically the only thing in that closet is yarn. Yarn in boxes, yarn in the two dressers that used to be in my room when I was a little girl, yarn in a couple of bags. Some other craft supplies are in a cardboard chest of drawers that also used to be in my room. For many years it stored sorted barbie things...Now, it stores needle point, embroidery, glue guns, beads...

As I often say to my friends, there are a few things that my house has in abundance: Yarn, fabric, music(both print and recorded), and books. I guess I can add musical instruments to the list as well!

One of the things I want to do this summer is make my first true quilt, and then donate it to Project Linus. I just finished another crochet blanket for Project Linus today, and with all the fabric around, it would be a nice challenge to learn something new. I've done some sewing in the past, but not for a couple of years. Well, I guess about two years exactly...I think that I probably did one or two things after my mom got sick. When it comes to sewing I dearly wish that I had her around for guidance, but I guess I'll just have to rely on my memory and on Sewing for Dummies and any other books that I've since purchased on the subject!

Enough for now. Writing has actually helped soothe me, and I think I'll go take a nice hot bath and then go to bed...with a good 'comfort book' and some music of course!

This is a feeling, this will pass (eventually)

It's a phrase that people with eating disorders often have to say to themselves (mentally or occasionally even aloud) FREQUENTLY. Right now, it's playing through my mind, with less success than I would like to see. My brain is panicking over the smoothie, when it contained oh, 1 banana, 2/3 cup unsweetened almond milk and about 2/3 cup blueberries. It's the banana, really, that does it for me. Bananas aren't 'safe'. I'll blame that one on all the ads that show up online titled things like "5 foods never to eat" and they show a banana. Whatever the case, my brain is panicking, making my stomach feel fat, putting me into a tailspin. Complete, utter tailspin. It's the feeling of wanting to run about 100 miles yet being rooted to the floor. The only crazy thing in all of this is that although my breathing is faster, it's normal. No feeling of lacking oxygen. So, while my brain is in anguish, my body is at peace. Sigh.

I've been realizing that I need to book a doctor's appointment, just with my primary care doctor. For one thing, she's going to expect me to need a new prescription soon (actually, a month or so back), and I really should explain that I lowered the dose of seroquel, but I'm nervous to. I've tried upping the dose, but I can't get past the break-through crazy amounts of sleep. Sure, they probably would stop...eventually. But eventually is too much of a waiting game for me at this stage. Even in the summer, I have lots of things to do, like phone contacts from the last marketing event. Making phone calls is really hard for me to do. There are only a handful of people that I am comfortable phoning, and even then it's still a put-it-off game. This handful includes my current flute teacher, my most recent past flute teacher, my piano teacher, my accompanists, my ICM and well, that's about it now that one of my friends that I was in more communication on the phone with now communicates mostly online with me. If someone else phones me, that's totally okay. If someone phones me asking about MYC, then I am VERY excited and happy to talk with them, but me initiating that phone call-even though they have asked to speak with a teacher from their area-is difficult. It is a bit of a social phobia.

I should end with something positive, so I'll say that I catalogued all the major vocal scores in this house today, amongst them numerous copies of Handel's Messiah (various different publishers). Okay, so that isn't so crazy positive, but I like organizing. Plus, my living room floor is covered in various stacks of music, so doing three piles of scores was something.

RCM Grade 10 Piano Requirements

Given that it has been almost five years since I did my grade 9 RCM piano exam, I've decided that I have got to set a deadline for the grade 10 exam, and the deadline I have set is August of 2013. As such, I've been starting to buckle down on technique. So, today, I made individual slips of note-cards with a single technique exercise that I need to do written down on each. The grand total? 288 slips. I got somewhat tired when I had finished counting!

12 major scales
12 harmonic minor scales
12 melodic minor scales
12 different places to start the chromatic scale
9 different formula pattern scales
9 different major or minor scales in octaves
9 different staccato scales
4 scales separated by a 3rd
4 scales separated by a 6th
4 scales separated by a 10th
12 chromatic scales in octaves
12 major solid four-note chords
12 major broken four-note chords
12 major alternate-note four-note chords
12 minor solid four-note chords
12 minor broken four-note chords
12 minor alternate note four-note chords
12 major arpeggios
12 minor arpeggios
12 arpeggios of the Dominant 7th
12 arpeggios of the Diminished 7th
12 solid Dominant 7ths
12 broken Dominant 7ths
12 alternate-note Dominant 7ths
12 solid Diminished 7ths
12 broken Diminished 7ths
12 alternate-note Diminished 7ths
12 major alternating scales in octaves

Actually, my math must have been off, I probably just miscounted my cards, that comes out to 303...Either way, that is a lot.

Tomorrow, I figure out the flute requirements!

Mother's Day

The past week or so leading up to mother's day has been hard for me. Several nights I have actually dreamed about my mom. Many of the dreams included her very sick, but one included her healthy...like she was during my first year of university, only I was the age I am now. I've spent a lot of the past week or two in that state of wanting to go to bed all day, looking forward to it, but then when I get to bed, afraid to close my eyes and sleep, even if I am exhausted because of the seroquel and whatever else is going on. It's a careful balancing act of which book I should read until I cannot keep my eyes open any further or whether I should watch an episode of Bewitched or I dream of Jeannie on Youtube (my dvd/cd player on my computer is messed up...again...) and hope that it tires me out enough. A very riveting book that I was reading this past week I unfortunately couldn't read right before bed, because it made me dream that I was a murderer...so, not exactly good news for needing pleasant sleep! 

We had a display of pictures of "People who mothered us" at church today. I found a picture taken when I was just shy of two weeks old, of my mom and I. I am presuming that I was that age, because we are all dressed up, me in this tiny little red lacy dress and a pair of knitted booties and my mom in a navy suit, and I know that my parents only missed one sunday church service after I was born...and I was born on a tuesday. My guess is that they probably took pictures of that special day, my first time going to church. There are pictures of my dad and I on that day as well, but I'm asleep in them. For the one with my mom, I am awake. It is one of just a handful of pictures of just my mom and I, and despite the fact that I'm sure she didn't find it a flattering picture, given that it was summer and hot and she had given birth only two weeks previous (think swollen legs made worse with the angle of the camera, exhausted looking eyes, and a slight hint of a double chin due to water and baby weight gain), it is very special to me. What I see in the picture is love, and a great sense of joy and pride. And as the baby in the picture, all there is in my eyes is a sense of security...as there should be.

That awkward moment...

That awkward moment when, in doing your own research about possibly starting on imipramine, a tricyclic antidepressant, you find that one of the common side effects is increased heart rate. Urgh. Given that I deal with an increased/elevated heart rate a lot of the time already (my normal resting heart rate, even when I was able to be running most days was generally over 90, normal for an active person would likely be below 65), this wasn't exactly something that I wanted to read about.

Did I mention that except for the Eating Disorder team at the health clinic I go to for that, it is very hard to get in contact with anyone of my medical professionals? My dentist figured that he would have an answer back from my internal medicine specialist within a week, it has now been two weeks and I have yet to hear from him. I'm going to phone tomorrow, because the last thing I want is further problems with my teeth to continue. And I need to know when I can get these stupid extra teeth out so that I can plan my summer! Amadeus has to be sent off for a tune-up at some point, preferably when my wisdom teeth come out (it will make the separation a lot more bearable and my recovery a lot easier).

But yeah, that is one of those 'awkward moments'. Sigh.