Project Organization

I am not an organized person. The old president of my office would sometimes close my office door so he didn't have to look at my desk and the piles of paper and binders and envelopes (oh my!).

I am also a bit of a pack rat. It's in my genes. My grandmother was an incurable pack rat -- she would return from trips to Hong Kong with loads and loads of cheesy "Oriental" furniture (black laquer with mother-of-pearl inlaid tigers) and plaster casts of elephants. Not that this state is something I want to emulate, but I'm just getting it out there to let you know that I have a certain genetic predisposition for collecting stuff.

Past collections include amber jewelry, Barbies (mostly vintage), ceramic masks (it was the 80s, people), among others. For a while, I'll go hog-wild about a certain subject, buying more things than I have any need for, and then it will die down. I still enjoy my amber necklaces and earrings. I still cherish my mint condition brunette Bubblecut Barbie with pristine box. (Ok, the masks, I'm over) But the passion eventually passes onto a new collection (or two or three).

Current collections include early copies of the Anne of Green Gables books, yarn, fabric and vintage knitting/crochet/sewing magazines. Let me state now that I live in a one-bedroom apartment with my husband, 2 cats and a turtle. So where do these collections reside? Well, mostly scattered about in bags & boxes strewn casually about the living room (although Barbies & Anne books have a comfortable and safe environment in display cases). My husband is thoroughly patient with all of my crap, but even I felt it was getting a bit out of hand, especially since the famous Fern Smith estate sale where Faith & I bought hundreds of vintage knitting magazines for pennies.

So this weekend, while Richard was in Columbus to meet his internet friends (Nintendo RBI Baseball fans -- he's just as weird as I am!), I knew it was time to organize.

Faith and Laurie and I spent a fabulous Saturday shopping downtown at the Michael Levine Loft (fabric Mecca where you buy fabric by the pound -- $2 a pound, to be exact, unless your good friend remembers to bring coupons for 1/2 off, so $1 a pound!). After two hours of digging in refrigerator boxes full of polyester (this whole place is a powder keg!), I emerged with 9 lbs of faux fur (electric blue), black flocked cotton, and lots of stretch jersey. I felt a little guilty because where was I going to put all this fabric? My fabric cabinet was already overflowing.

We decided to head to Ikea for their summer sale. After a much needed wash down in the ladies restroom (my arms and face were covered in little flecks of black flocking, sweat and dirt), we sauntered through the store. I managed to find cheap magazine holders (5-pack for $2.50), two bed trays (since we only eat on the ground in front of the TV because the kitchen table has my knitting machine set up on it), and a lamp shade. I said a fond farewell to the ladies and headed upstairs to begin the organizing.

I was amazed by the transformation. The magazines are now grouped by decade (50s, 60s, 70s, modern), although a couple of titles deserved their own holders (Mon Tricot, Interweave Knits). I was so inspired (and I had holders left over), I also organized my kitchen bookcase, which I always wanted to be exclusively cookbooks, but which had become a receptacle for old mail, fliers, bills, etc. I couldn't stop there.

Sunday, I headed over to Organized Living, which is having a going out of business sale. It's going out of business because most things are ridiculously overpriced, and even at the sale, things are only 20% off, so most things would still have been cheaper at Target, but I was on a roll and could not be stopped. I left with a 10-pair over the door shoe hanger (to supplement the 24-pair hanger that is already full), an over the door iron hanger ( to match the over the door fold-out ironing board), a medium Sterilite plastic box to hold oversize magazines that don't fit in the magazine holders (1950s-1970s McCall's Needlework & Crafts) and assorted vintage craft books, and a large Sterilite platic box on wheels to house the additional fabric that doesn't fit in the fabric cabinet.

My apartment, while not actually clean by any act of imagination, is at least clear of lingering cardboard boxes and plastic bags. I feel like I accomplished something important. I should also mention that while filing all my magazines, I also set about repairing the ones which had ripped covers and pages falling out (using linen acid-free tape that I originally bought for mounting the embroidery project for my friend's wedding present). When I finished, it felt like a big weight had been lifted. It's stupid, but it's true.

Spatial Relations 101

Why would a former Tetris addict have issues with figuring out how a knitting pattern would actually come together? This should be simple spatial relations, but somehow, it's not.

Ok, I'm making good progress on the Vintage Spinnerin Shrug (description: bulky knitted shrug, made in one piece; simple moss stitch with garter stitch borders). My gauge is good (3 1/2 sts = 1", 5 rows = 1") and I'm knitting pretty fast (for me, anyway). I'm at the point where I've worked the body, and I've cast on extra for the underarms. And as I'm reading the pattern, I'm trying to figure out how the pattern will come together into a finished piece. And I hit the wall.

I should state that I'm normally pretty comfortable with patterns. I've been sewing for years. I took "Intro to Apparel Construction" at OTIS College of Art & Design. I've made quite a few pieces, sewn & crocheted, from vintage patterns. But, for some reason, I can't get my head wrapped around this pattern.

Here is a normal shrug/bolero pattern:


Knit it up, sew A to B, C to D, and voila! Looking at the photo of this pattern, that's how I assumed this pattern would come together. But as I did the math, I realized that what i would have at the end would actually look more like this:



I drew a diagram. I folded paper. I stared at it for about 20 minutes. I felt like an idiot. How could this be this hard? And a bit of panic, I need to finish this for a birthday present. It needs to be done in a week and a half. I don't have time to frog this!

And then I read the pattern again: "Starting at neck edge, cast on 97 sts." Which means that the 27.75" bottom edge was actually the top edge. I turned the diagram around.



DingDingDing! Light bulb turns on above my head. Sew corner A to corner B, corner C to corner D (armholes), and then sew up to create sleeves. Hurrah! We'll see if this actually works or not, but my fingers are crossed and my eyes less so.

why does work have to get in the way of knitting?

I am a rebel.

We have a big meeting at work with people from our national office, and I didn't wear a suit. Ha! It's a beautiful day in LA, the June gloom appears to finally have burned off, and I am not going to wear a suit for an internal meeting. Instead, I wore a turquoise colored top and a dirndl skirt that I made out of this fabulous vintage fabric (cream with an abstract "painting" of Central Park in turquoise, brown & green). Hmm, maybe if I wore suits, I'd get more "rewards," but I think I've decided that being true to my inner fabulousness is more important.

I am making one concession to the politicking thing -- I have to miss SnB tonight to go to a "Congratulations" dinner to celebrate our fundraising walk success. I'm hoping I can sneak out early and make it for the last hour or so tonight in Santa Monica, but we'll see.

On the shrug front, I am making progress, but this yarn is a bitch to see the stitch pattern. I've had to unknit a few rows already. I'm just about at the point where I need to cast on for the sleeves. I'll try to remember to post pictures of the progress soon. Our meetings are supposed to be all day tomorrow, so I may or may not be able to steal a moment to post. And what else is work for, if not for updating your blog?

and we'll have fun-fun-fun till your husband spills red wine all over you

Had a very good weekend, which after the week I had, was very needed. Friday night we spent in, had Indian food delivered (hurrah for living in the city) and played Scrabble. We have ourselves so loaded with activities and seeing friends (SnB, kickball, etc.) during the week that we felt we just needed a night in with each other.

Saturday was Crazy Aunt Purl's barbeque. I made my famous candy-crack brownies (named from the exclamation "oh my god, these brownies are so good, they're like crack!"). I do have to be honest that it is not my recipe: it's from a book: The Chocolate Bar, which I highly recommend. The barbeque was a lot of fun. We got to see Aunt Purl's lovely little house, and fab back yard, and even the burned out crack house! Rich actually said, "this is such a nice neighborhood; you'd never think there would be a crack house here." Which you wouldn't. But to read more about the crazy kissin'cousin crackheads, read this.

We had to leave the barbeque early to make it out to Cinespia to meet assorted kickball/SnB friends. The film was "Some Like it Hot," which is zany Marilyn at her best. Everything was going nicely, different groups of friends were mingling, and then the junebugs arrived.

Junebugs. In Los Angeles.

Let me state for the record that junebugs are one of the reasons I avoid Kingsburg (Rich's hometown, about 20 minutes south of Fresno) from Memorial Day to Labor Day. These brown beetles are about the size of your thumbnail fly and often hiss. I hate junebugs.

Up until Saturday, the only place I've ever seen junebugs is in Kingsburg. But apparently, they like cemetaries, too. So, at about 8:15 p.m., they start their mating ritual, which involves thousands of them flying around trying to get a little lovin'. Unfortunately, they seem to like landing in hair. I'd like to think I maintained my composure, mostly. It took self-control of steel not to go running to the hills, but I tried to look sane to the friends of friends (the real friends know me too well to be fooled).

But I was not the only person ill at ease with the bugginess. Richard, with his cherubic locks, was also freaking out when the junebugs would go for his hair. Unfortunately for me, he forgot he had a big yellow plastic party cup filled with red wine in his hand when he freaked out. The wine went all over me, my cute turquoise tank top, and, most heartbreakingly, my so-brand-new-I-just-finished-sewing-it-this-afternoon tiered prairie skirt. Red wine. I almost cried. But I'd had enough wine not to get overly agitated.

Lucky for Rich, the material was very patterned, a swirl of flowers and geometric shapes in pinks, blues & greens. After pre-treating it and then washing it, the skirt was fine (tha tank top, not so much, but it was a $10 Old Navy one, so I wasn't so worried).

Sunday was fun. We went & saw "I Am My Own Wife" (2004 Tony award winner for best play & best actor and 2004 Pulitizer Prize winner for best play) at the Wadsworth. So good. It's the true story of a transvestite who survives the Nazis and the Communists in East Germany. I highly recommend it. After we came home (we went to see a 2 p.m. matinee. We were the youngest people there by at least 30 years. There was actually a tour bus from Palm Springs that brough retirees in. Boy, are old gay men grouchy), Rich took a good long nap and I worked on the shrug. It's supposed to me in a modified moss stitch, but I must have dropped a stitch somewhere (probably at Cinespia with all the red wine), so I had 6 rows of 1x1 ribbing. If this were a crochet piece, I'd rip it out, but it's knitting (which is not my strong point), the yarn is so busy, it's hard to see the pattern anyway, and it's a birthday gift (needs to be completed before I leave for Lake Tahoe on July1) for a non-knitter (she'll probably never notice the mistakes).

As my SnB leaders, Shannita & Faith, would say, "There are no mistakes, only design elements."