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By kilax, May 14, 2015 6:22 am

• Knitting update! I am finished with the washcloth order for my Grandma! I started on Friday May 1st and finished yesterday, May 13th. At first I was getting one done a day (they take about three hours each) then I slowed down at the end (which means I was sitting around less, and not knitting, ha ha). Next up: more washcloths (my mom requested some, and I’ll do some more monogrammed ones for my Grandma), a new scarf pattern, cactus push pin holders for Christina, a request for something from Gina, and that laptop sleeve (oops, that’s been in the queue awhile).

• More knitting news! My mom received the scarf I made her for Mother’s Day and loved it! She wore it to work and said she was excited to show it to a coworker who knits all the time. Errr… how about let’s not show it to someone who will see all the mistakes in it? Ha ha… sorta kidding. When I see my mom (tomorrow!) I’ll have to ask her what that coworker said!

• I’m CPR/AED recertified! Yay! What a long day though – I was in training at work from 8-4, then rode the train to the CPR training and rushed to get there for the 6-9 class. I slept well last night!

• Who else ate macaroni and cheese with hot dogs as a child? Who else still craves it from time to time, now? Me! And guilty! We have some vegan mac n’ chreese (<— not a typo) mixes from FakeMeats at home, and when I saw the vegan hot dogs at Target I knew the combo needed to happen. It was so good. I think it will hold me over from craving it for another year, though.

• I keep looking at my bird books but can’t figure out these species visiting our feeders. Fail.

Ha, I will forever recognize red-winged black birds, though!

Link to Random Thoughts Thursday 71

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By kilax, May 1, 2015 6:54 am

With this darn scarf!

It felt like it took for-freaking-ever! I think it felt that way because:

• I didn’t care to work with this yarn (Patons Metallic in Blue Steel*). It kept snagging on my fingers and that was making me bonkers. It was also easy to accidentally knit through the metallic mesh, revealing the black yarn underneath it.
• This was my first time using this pattern, and I didn’t fully understand it until I’d been working on it a few days. With patterns I’ve used a few times, I become familiar with what the stitches should look like as I am working on it, and it’s easier to fix mistakes because I can tell something is amiss. Er… not so much the case here, at first! The end of the scarf is definitely prettier than the start, but you can’t tell by looking at it… from far away… if you have bad eyesight.
• I was eager to finish this and start something new. Mica was telling me she heard that a hat may be a better beginner knitting project than a scarf, because it goes faster. I think I would agree (although I haven’t made a hat yet). I want things to move quickly, apparently.

All in all, it didn’t take too terribly long – I started it on a Wednesday morning and finished it on a Thursday night a week later. And although I kind of hated it when I was working on it, and thought it was fug, I actually liked it a lot when I tried on the finished product! I hope my mom does too! It’ll ship off to her today for Mother’s Day. I will laugh if today happens to be the one day she reads my blog and sees this!

It’s actually my maternal grandmother’s fault that I was so eager to get this scarf finished and start something new. Ha ha. She called me last Friday and was raving about how much she loves the dishcloths I made her, and asked if she could pay me to make some for her to use as gifts for her friends! Sure thing! Dishcloths are fun and quick to make! And this meant I could go get some fun new yarn colors to try:

Note: she asked for six washcloths and I bought enough yarn for fourteen, ha! (that yarn on the top is to make a scarf like the one above for her).

Of course, I am not going to make my grandma pay me for labor, but I think I will ask for a few dollars to cover the yarn (it was on sale, woo hoo!).

This is getting hella long but I have to share this tidbit about my grandmother. For as long as I can remember, she’s always had a damp washcloth inside of a plastic bag, in her purse. Whenever we were sticky as kids, there she was, to clean our hands and faces. Why does she still carry it? Ha, because my cousins’ ages are staggered enough that she is still looking over very young children, to this day!

So I was thinking of that when I first made her the monogrammed washcloths. But I knew she would use them for dishes, because she prefers a washcloth to wash dishes… and thinks it’s an abomination (slight exaggeration, written jokingly) that we use a sponge at our house. She actually asked me last Friday, “So does this mean you are using washcloths at home now to do your dishes?” “Er… no, grandma, I haven’t made myself any yet…” Ha ha ha. “Oh. I suppose you put most things in the dishwasher, anyway.” Buuuuuuuuuuuuurn. Ha!

*Totally missed opportunity to do a Zoolander face when posing for these photos, ha ha.

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By kilax, April 23, 2015 7:09 am

• I finally started another knitting project (I hadn’t knit since March)! This will be a scarf for a certain madre for Mother’s Day. I am using a pattern that has some techniques I hadn’t done before (on purpose, anyway) – yarn over (ko) and knit two together (k2tog), so it’s good to be learning something new! I realized I have to knit much looser so I can do the k2tog. I also realized my fingers are way too rough to work with this yarn – it keeps snagging and fraying it! Grrrr.

• We sent 20 postcards when we were in Mexico, and as far as I know, no one has received them. I feel bad about it, because instead of bringing back gifts for everyone, I thought the postcards would be a nice way to tell people we were thinking about them while we were there. Also… 20 postcards took awhile to write and weren’t very cheap. Ha ha. Maybe they’ll show up someday!
• I am digging xaarlin‘s throwback travel posts from Europe 2002. It kind of makes me want to write some for my trip to Spain in 2002! I have all the pictures, and a journal. I wonder if my journal will be as cringe-worthy as xaarlin said hers was (probably!!!)!

• Did anyone else see or read about the man who lead the Boston marathon for the first mile so his kids could see him on TV (pdf here)? Then fell back and finished the rest of the race feeling crummy because he did this? Anyone else think this was kind of a “not cool” move?
• Remember Cats with Bats? The softball team I was on last spring/summer? The team will not be getting together this summer. I enjoyed playing and looked forward to each game, but it was a lot of work to organize, and another summer night commitment I don’t want this year. As only one person asked me if the team is getting back together, I think most everyone is on the same page! We’ll all just have to get together and do something else, besides lose softball games.

• My new boss brought in a homemade breakfast burrito buffet to welcome a new team member during our weekly staff meeting yesterday! And included vegan options!!! I really like my new boss, and not just because she feeds us!

Link to Random Thoughts Thursday 70

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By kilax, April 9, 2015 6:15 am

• Oops, I didn’t make the connection when registering for this 33.5 mile ultra on Saturday that we had a seven hour course limit (with an option for eight hours if you start early). That averages out to a 12:32 minute mile. Which seems like a lot… if you don’t spend too much time at the aid stations. Ha ha ha. I am sure Rachel and I will be just fine! We hope to be done in around six hours, which is a 10:45 minute mile average pace (our first ultra, which we did together, was a 50K that took us over seven hours, but was on much harder terrain). I won’t be upset if it takes us longer. Trail races are about having fun (for us!), anyways!

• Autocorrect is so confused on my phone. It’s already pretty wonky to start with, but I am still practicing Spanish on my phone so now it thinks I want to autocorrect words misspelled in English to Spanish words. Que molesto.
• I question almost all studies I read, but I have to say, I like the results of this one (pdf here) – “A new study tracked mortality rates and found that excessive exercise carried no increased risk of dying.” To super simplify the results, the study found that people exercising up to 10 times or more the amount recommended per week (equivalent to 50 miles run per week) were not at risk for death (and that some health benefits continue to increase the more people in the study exercised per week). Why do I care about this study? Because every once in awhile, someone wants to talk to me about “running too much.” These comments never make me worry about my health… just look at me – I’m not injured, I’m obviously not exercising this much because I am obsessed with being at a low weight, I don’t do it when I don’t enjoy it (hello, most summers), and I don’t complain about exercising. But these comments do get a bit old. So maybe next time I will throw this study back if I feel like it. Ha ha.
• Ugh. This music video. All the sads. Again, SPOILER ALERTS for Furious 7 – this pretty much shows the ending to the movie. Sigh, sometimes a good cry feels so good, but I don’t think I should watch this anymore. Also… doesn’t Charlie Puth kind of look like Andy Samberg from his side profile?

• My maternal grandma called me to tell me she loved the washcloths I knit her (I wasn’t able to give them to her in person), and that she was already using them to wash dishes! Yay! She particularly liked that they were knit tight, and not loose. Ha ha… yeah. I knit tight. I need a new project. I haven’t worked on knitting since last week!

Link to Random Thoughts Thursday 68

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By kilax, March 31, 2015 7:22 am

Buah ha ha. You guys can totally tell what this pattern I knit is, right? RIGHT?!

Oh, maybe a close-up would help:

What, you still can’t tell?!

Any last guesses before I show you the pattern?

Ha. That monstrosity, is supposed to be this:

No, not a knitted scene of Data, Steven’s slipper, and an arrow pointing to a knitted pattern of three cats, ha ha. It supposed the pattern the arrow is pointing to.

Um, yeah.

Even Data knew it was crap. Look at that judgy face when I was getting started!

Seriously, mom? You’re such a loser.

I could kind of tell after the first few rows that the pattern was not going to turn out. But I decided to keep going for practice. And now… I get to practice un-doing the whole thing and hand winding a ball of yarn! Ha!

The good news is, I can read a pattern. The bad news is, I can’t tell which patterns are bad, simply by looking at them. Eh. I was kind of bored after knitting a washcloth with an “I” monogram and wanted to try something different. And now I did. Ha ha.

Steven and I are actually looking for a pattern for a knitted laptop sleeve (for me to make), but I can’t find one that we both really like that isn’t crocheted. The search continues!

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By kilax, March 24, 2015 6:23 am

The scarf Data was modeling last week wasn’t actually Waldo inspired… but Wisconsin Badgers inspired!

With Rachel (who’s a Badgers fan) visiting last weekend, and March Madness going on, I thought it would be humorous to knit these for her cats, Leo (above) and Sox (below).

I expected them to be annoyed by the scarves, but Rachel said they didn’t mind and ended up sleeping with them! Aww!

I was eager to move on to another project, after I finished the cat scarves. But what? When I finished the infinity scarf for my snister in February, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to work on, so I started another scarf with the same pattern. I enjoyed working on it for a good month (it’s almost done now), but I got a bit bored with it. It was just the same pattern, row after row after row after row. This time, I wanted to try something that had a bit more variety, and would be done quicker (ha – that scarf has hundreds of rows, and I picked a new project with 61 rows!).

So I looked around on Ravelry and found this pattern for monogrammed dishcloths. I’ll be seeing my maternal grandmother in April and knew she would get a kick out of them! I often buy her handmade soap, so why not some handmade cloths to go with?

I started on Thursday night and finished on Sunday night. I did the pink one first, and really liked it, then moved on the to multi-colored one. It was my first time working with a skein like that and I had NO idea what it would turn out like. And… I don’t really like it, ha ha! I like the green one the best, because of the color, and because I was holding the yarn tighter, and I prefer the way that made the spacing turn out. Of course, I’m sure my grandma will think all three are great!

I ended up buying the entire alphabet pattern for these dishcloths, because I liked the font style, so it’ll be fun to knit other letters. It’s pretty cool that just by varying whether you are knitting or purling a stitch, you end up with a design!

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By kilax, March 16, 2015 6:13 am

And lost my dignity in the meantime.

Just kidding! I bet my coworkers thought it was totally normal when they asked me what I was knitting in the break room and I answered, “A scarf. For a cat.”

Totally normal.

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By kilax, February 24, 2015 5:18 am

Once it dawned (ha, pun) on me that we were by a body of water that faces east, I knew I’d have to get up for a sunrise run.

The thing is though… you can’t really run along the beach to see the sunrise unless you are running in the sand (because all of the buildings along the beach front block the view of the water). Yeah, I actually wanted to move, so I wasn’t doing that! So my run to see the sunrise included a lot of me running to the peer, seeing it wasn’t up yet, running up and down the street, and coming back. It was worth it, though (when isn’t it?!)! This brought back memories of when my dad and I got up early to see the sunrise over the Alboran Sea in Spain!

After a few miles on my own, I stopped back at the condo to see if anyone had bitten on the note I left “running a few, back at 8:00 if anyone wants to join me!” I got back and Steve was in his gear, ready to go!

I took him to a street Gina and I had discovered a few days earlier. I mentioned the owner of our condo told us a few places to run – Playacar, the bike path along 10th Avenue, and a track, north of the condo. Err, even with my best intentions, I never made it to the track! But I think Gina and I may have run close to it, when we took the 10th Avenue bike path north, and discovered it stops pretty soon after it leaves the touristy area.

But on that run, we cut back over to Fifth Avenue, just north of where the touristy part of it ends, and discovered a paved trail that runs along the road. We saw lots of other people working out there, and felt safe.

And we got to see lots of beautiful tags as we ran! So I took Steve there, to see it, as well.

I am surprised the condo owner didn’t tell us about this street, as well! It seemed like you could run out a good amount on it!

The rest of this day was laaaaaaaaaaazy. We hit up the pool around midday. I read a bit, swam a bit, knitted a bit…

I managed to get an AWESOME sunburn, which just peeled last week. If you look at the photo below, it’s the two red marks, under my shoulders. Yeah… I put some sunscreen on my shoulders, and didn’t get much further than that! (Ignore the weird dark lines on our backs – that’s a shadow!)

The afternoon included me teaching Gina how to knit!

She got off to a great start! Unfortunately though, I didn’t get to show her too much, because Steven and I had a date to go to that night… with Luca!

Date night included a stop to see Pedra, and give her treats:

table-made guac at dinner:

a Mayan Flyer show (yes, they climb up that thing then swing their way down!):

We also had tips from our condo neighbor to see the “fire show” – a Mayan dance show!

first dance without fire

second dance with fire

Luca really got in to the dancing! It was so cute (I was dancing with him too… I won’t be posting that video, ha ha!)!

Obviously, date night needed to include some sugar, right before bed time:

Ha ha!

Luca is such a good boy! He listened to us the whole night, and was very good about going to bed when we got back. We had a lot of fun taking him out!

When Gina and Steve came back from their date night, they had a gift for me and Steven: tía and tío bracelets they had custom made (Gina also got me a beautiful scarf, too!!!)!

Those are the Spanish words for aunt and uncle, and it really meant a lot to me that they got those for us – I cherish that Luca calls us “Aunt Kim” and “Uncle Steven”! (Ha ha, as I write this, I am remembering he asked on this trip, what “aunt” and “uncle” mean, and I said “it’s your mom or dad’s brother or sister.” We were all like “he’s asking tooooo sooooooon!” But earlier that day I had called myself his honorary aunt (when someone called me his mom), so we used that word. You know. Since little kids understand the word “honorary.”)

Steven, Gina and Steve and I stayed up a bit after they came back, being giggly and sharing stories of our nights and planning future get-togethers. Also, as I write this, I realize we didn’t have a ton of that sitting around and chit-chatting, like we typically do during our get-togethers, probably because we were on the go quite a bit, and the four of us weren’t always together. I hope our next trip includes more of that! More goofing around, please!

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By kilax, February 21, 2015 7:54 am

After I was done practicing the washcloth pattern I learned at Unraveled Yarn Shop, I was eager to start something different. Something someone might actually use!

Like… what am I going to do with this? Ha ha – I think I will give it to Data to keep him warm. It seems silly to “waste” an entire skein on learning the basic skills of knitting, but I am happy I did it so that when I started my next project, it wasn’t a complete mess!

Who did I pick as my first victim? Muah ha ha, my snister! She has made me things in the past, and I’ve never been able to do the same for her… until now! I was really excited at the possibility of FINALLY being able to make her something.

So I picked out this seed stitch infinity scarf pattern, and asked Christina what color of scarf she needed – ruby red, or gray.

I went to the yarn shop to buy the yarn and pick their brains about the pattern – this would be my first time using more than one skein on a project, and I had no idea how to bring a new one in.

In fact, there is SO much I don’t know. Ha ha. When I walked in, the Cascade Yarns rep was there, and saw me come in with the orange yarn in the photo above. “That better be Cascade Yarn!” Um… what is that?

Funny enough, it was. And, that is the brand of yarn I ended up buying, in “Data” gray. Oops, I mean “charcoal” gray.

I was super eager to get started! I wanted to have a bit done before I left for Mexico, and took the project with me!

Christina knew I was making it for her, so I sent her lots of progress pics (annoying, much?)!

I know it’s dorky, but I was so excited to be making something for Christina for the first time, and couldn’t wait to get it to her (I wanted to make sure she could wear it when it was still cold out)!

I started the scarf on Saturday January 31st and finished it on Monday February 16th. I ended up making it longer than recommended in the pattern (mostly because the yarn was so thick) – well over 70 inches long! And I used almost all of the five skeins (or whatever they were called… not hanks… who knows)!

We mailed it to my snister this Tuesday and she got it on Thursday. Yay yay yay! And she wore it to work on Friday! It looks great on her!

Now, let’s see if she holds up to her promise:

Ha ha!

I enjoyed making this even more than those silly washcloths, because it had a purpose – it was going to someone! The whole time I was knitting, I just couldn’t wait to get it to her!

So… what’s next? Steven asked me to knit him a hat. Eek! Can I do it? We shall see! I really want to get started on something new, soon – I miss it! After I drafted this, I found myself pursuing the yarn aisles of Hobby Lobby (OVERWHELMING!!!) and ended up getting another thick yarn to make a similar scarf for… me? Someone else? Mostly for practice! Next up, I DO need to learn how to use circular needles so I can make that hat, and maybe a blanket!

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By kilax, February 18, 2015 5:02 am

Maybe I should have saved this post for tomorrow, when my area has a high of 3°F for the day (9°F today isn’t much better!)? Ha ha! That’s okay, I’ll just keep doing what I’ve been doing since we got back – looking at vacation pics for virtual warmth!

Our weekend in Playa del Carmen was all about the beach (la playa)! Each day started with a run:

Food consumption:

And meandering over to the beach:

I did bring my GoPro to Mexico! More on that in later posts!

You can’t really tell in any of the pics, but I wore these bikinis (tops here, bottoms here) while in Mexico, and really liked them (I bought them just for this trip – looking forward to wearing them this summer, too!). 

One day we got crazy, and went to the pool, after we got back from the beach. I was amused by the fact that I was working on knitting a super warm scarf, while wearing a bathing suit:

This is exactly what I wanted most of the vacation to be like – totally chill (ha, relaxing, not the temps). No schedule. Lazing about. Getting to things, eh, whenever we got to them. Perfection.

We did have a few adventures other than the beach. On Saturday night, we went to Babe’s, a Swedish owned restaurant with a specialty for Thai noodles and “Asian European” cuisine. I got the recommendation for Babe’s from a super enthusiastic coworker, who said it’s the best Thai food she’s ever had.

I used my Spanish a bit there (with a lot of mistakes, but more on that in a later post!) which was fun. And I did find out that almost all of the dishes had fish sauce in them, so they made a special dish for me and Steven!

That was not the highlight of dinner though. The first was this Daiquiri:

Then Steven and Gina working on this masterpiece:

And Luca asking if he could use my phone to take pictures. So I gave it to him and asked him to take a picture of the four of us.

Oh my gosh, we were laughing so hard. And that got the attention of the ladies at the table next to us who did come over and take a picture of us five – now it’s one of my favorite pics!

We had a fun time at Babe’s.

And after, Steven got what he said was the best thing he ate the whole time in Mexico – a Marquesita – a sort of crepe (made with flour and milk), cooked on the spot, then filled with something sweet or savory of your choice (Steven chose Nutella).

And our wild adventure the following day (Sunday)? Prepare for this folks, I party hard.

Laundry.

Ha!

Steven and I packed with the intent of doing laundry while we were there. And there was a laundromat right by our place! Gina and I bought soap on Saturday and headed over on Sunday to check out the laundromat… only to find it closed. Drat! I spoke in Spanish to the lady at the smoothie shop next door to ask here if she knew of another – no luck!

But! We had passed a laundry place the day before, that was also really close. Would it be open? Ding ding, it was

And. AND! I didn’t even have to wash it! I gave my instructions in Spanish (lavar en frío, secar en delicado), with some use of writing on a notepad too, and paid, with instructions to pick it up at 8:00 pm.

GUYS. I paid the equivalent of, like, $4 USD for someone to wash all these clothes (my bag only) and fold them so nicely!

Does that service exist in the states at that price?! Gina and I were a bit excited!

Oh, and since you can’t have too much Mexican food (wait! you CAN!), we made it for dinner that night, too! It wasn’t getting old to me… yet…

Don’t worry, we saw Pedro on the weekend, too. Only, we figured out she might be a girl, and re-named her Pedra. After that day, every time we left the condo, Luca would call for her. So darn cute (and super funny to me to imagine what the locals were thinking to hear a little boy call “Pedro! Pedro! Where are you?!”)!

We bought her some cat treats and started carrying them with us (just like I did in Rome, ha ha). She would see us and come running to us! It’s dorky, but it made me miss Data a bit less (and feel guilty for giving another cat some love at the same time)!