Birthday Insanity

November 22nd, Thanksgiving:

For Thanksgiving we went to the Plumed Horse. It's a terrific restaurant- it had a very classic feel before, now it's got a hip-per feel to it. Though I'm not a fan of "hip", the food and wine are still excellent. We had their Thanksgiving tasting menu (with the wine pairings), and it was all mind-blowingly amazing.

After dinner, we dropped Mom off at home, and headed over to the in-laws. The plan was, have some dessert, exchange names, go home.

At every in-law gathering, my SIL starts a conversation about eating brains, predominance of elderly and white child molesters, or some other random or "unsavory" topic. I feel that she does this to bait me into talking about it (which I try to do in an intelligent and academic way), and then does the teenage girl "Oh-my-God-you're-such-a-freak!" thing.

On Thanksgiving, one of the kids accidentally slipped and called her "Uncle", so she starts going on about gender reassignment. She started in about how "simple" it would be to become "Uncle".

A little knowledge can be dangerous, and I pointed out that from what I understood "M to F reassignment is usually more successful than F to M."

"M to F? F to M?" SIL asked.

"Male to Female. Female to Male," I said, and tried to leave it at that.

At this point, the discussion turned to how exactly one would construct a penis. Despite the small amount of knowledge I have, I refrained from sharing, refusing to be baited.

In my family of origin, this would be fairly common dinner conversation, without the insensitivity, in a genuine exchange of knowledge, regardless of the "appropriateness" of the dinner conversation.

After dinner, we headed home, and discussed the insanity of the sales going on the next day. Andrew mentioned that the Gilroy Outlets were starting their sales at midnight. Banana Republic was having 40% off of the whole store. Forty percent is enough for me to consider going just about anywhere.

Friday, November 23rd

Despite my plans to get up at 5 AM to be at Purlescence for the Pajama Jam Jammy sale at 6 AM, I agreed to go to the Outlets at midnight. So, at midnight, we get in the car, and drive. Around 1 AM, we are in Gilroy, stopped on 101. Not just stopped. Parked.

"It must be an accident. This can't be shopping traffic," Andrew said.

He turned on the radio. No accident.

"I'm sorry, if this is the traffic, I don't have the balls to do this," I tell Andrew, "Let's go home."

As we exited the Southbound freeway, and went over the ramp to get back North, I looked over, and for five solid miles, all you could see was bumper-to-bumper brake lights. I shuddered as we drove home.

We arrived home at 2 AM, I brushed my teeth, put on my pajamas, and fell into bed at 2:30.

5 AM: Alarm goes off. I call Cynthia to remind her that we're going, at her request. I wake Mom up. Curl up in bed for 15 more minutes to snuggle with Andrew and the dogs. (Snuggling the dogs is required, upsetting the routine is bad.)

5:30 AM: Brush teeth. Notice that my Thanksgiving makeup (applied less than 12 hours before) still looks fresh. Add nude lipstick. Wish for a swift and sudden death, since I am so tired the world is spinning. Regret all "good" ideas.

5:45 AM: Whine at Mom to get moving. Dither. Wonder if I can get out of the brunch plans I may have made before the "good" idea to go to the Gilroy sales.

6:00 AM: Start driving.

6:13 AM: Get a call from Cynthia, asking where we are. For once, we are late, and she is waiting for us. Mom and I laugh.

6:15 AM: Arrive at Purlescence. People are chipper. I collect the handful of items that I want to purchase, pay, and sit in a chair, trying to stay awake and not barf from exhaustion.

8:30 AM: Everyone finishes their purchases, and decide that they want to go to brunch. I agree.

8:45 AM: Get to Stacks, get on their ridiculous "list". Wait and complain. I secretly decide that Stacks is the devil, and I'm never going back. And their coffee sucks.

9:00 AM: Get seated. Eat. Let the Minions know that I'm planning to veg and eat cupcakes (in honor of the birthday), and they're welcome to join me.

We spent the rest of the day, spinning, knitting, vegging out, and Mom made me Devil cupcakes (at my request) based on a picture I found in Flickr.

[Photo by freakgirl, used with her permission.]

Cute, huh?
I'll post pictures of the haul from the sale later.

Holidays and “It”

I'm not one of those nice knitters who knits for everyone. "Nice" isn't really a word I would use to describe myself, but that's a whole different story.

I went to Purlescence for movie night, and Tony read one of Stephanie Pearl-McPhee's short bits from The Yarn Harlot- "It", and I realized, that in the last seven years, I have NEVER been defeated by "It".

Maybe, it's because one year, where I thought I would knit for The Boyfriend's whole family, my mother sat down with me, and pointed out that I was killing myself over something that wouldn't matter to them. Fair enough. This whittled down the list from six knitted items, down to two. Baking is faster than knitting- and more appreciated by the non-knitters.

The first Christmas that Andrew and I were together, I was so in love (in lurve, even) with him, that I knit him a sweater. I knit him a sweater in Silky Wool on size US 3 and US 5 needles. I hunted down the missing color on the internet, and got it from an online yarn shop that was closing it's doors at the end of that week.

I finished it two days before Christmas. Ends woven in, and everything, so that he could wear it to the holiday stuff we were doing. I also didn't knit on it in front of him, which was a challenge. But I did it.

Since then, the only other Feat of Insanity was when I decided that in the two months between Stitches West and Andrew's birthday, I would knit him SIX pairs of size 12 men's socks. With colorwork. Clearly, I needed to up my meds. Those got finished, too- even though I wove in the ends right before I got to the restaurant for the birthday celebration.

For Christmas, I have usually only knitted my father a hat, to match whatever running suit Mom and Sam bought for him. This year, he asked for two. (Pictures to be posted when they're taken.) I'm also working on a Top Secret Project for _____ with _____. ______ totally kicked my butt on her half, so I have to catch up, or risk utter shame and a wicked asskicking from both _______ and _______. I bought the tools for success, so I should be able to get on that, but spinning has my heart for now. And possibly my liver and kidneys as well. But the holidays are coming, and I committed to doing this like two months ago. (My half is half done, so we're 75% there, minus the finishing.)

So, my Christmas knitting is limited to two hats, and ½ of the Top Secret Project.

Not bad for having more than 25 days to finish, right?

A Quarter Of A Century

On Saturday, we celebrated my 25^th birthday Minion-style: we went on a ROAD TRIP! After a fair amount of haggling and wrangling, we ended up with a Christian Youth Group style van (seats 13) for a song. (The best part about renting this van was seeing people's faces when I was driving it. I look about 14 without makeup, and here I was, commandeering a land yacht.)

See how comfy everyone is? They had to be- to get to Sacramento, it's a 2 ½ hour drive each way.

You might wonder why we would choose Sacramento- I would, too. Franklin Habit was there doing a shoot for his 1000 Knitters project. How cool is that?! The Minions were all good sports, and the ride up and back went as smoothly as anything could. (Well, it could have been a smoother ride. Colleen may have caught some air after we hit some of the bumps on the freeway.)

We got to Sacramento around noon, found the building where the shoot was scheduled at and went and had lunch at a terrific Mexican restaurant. Not only was the food great, but you could order ceviche by the POUND. I did. It was glorious. Then, by some act of evil Minionage, this happened.

Sombreros. Singing. Startling. When I find out who did this, there will be a proportionate response.

We went to the shoot, and Franklin charmed each and every one of us. I didn't know that most of the Minions don't like to be photographed, but evidently, he managed to immediately put everyone at ease. As always, we have a shot of the Minions with Franklin, and Franklin with my sock.

I have to admit, I was completely uncool. I was so star-struck that my brain just froze. Franklin asked what the yarn was, and my brain went BLANK. I stammered. I don't STAMMER!

I looked at the yarn, and I started talking. "She has a 'C' name… She does that wonderful silk…"

Finally, Mom saved me with "Claudia?"

"Yes! Claudia!"

Ok, I can remember where, when, and how much I paid for yarn. I can usually tell you the yardage from memory. I may not know what today's date is, but I KNOW my yarn!

All-in-all, it was a pretty terrific 25^th birthday celebration.

[Here is a shot Rachel got of me during the 1000 Knitters shoot:]

Knit in Public Day!

Yes, the Minions made it out for Knit in Public Day. We even had a Mini-Minion join us!

We chose Santana Row for a number of reasons. Santana Row is this chi-chi, expensive, pretentious, pseudo-Italian little shopping center. Knitting there smacks their indulgent, consumerist ways right in their faces.

It was very public, very in your face. Cynthia and Julie secured AWESOME space in the shade, and everyone had their boba/coffee/tea/Ben & Jerry's. (Ok, if not for all of the socio-political reasons I listed earlier, the presence of a Ben & Jerry's always tilts the balance in favor.)

Nobody approached us, and I only noticed odd looks while I was herding the Mini-Minion and juggling Bobas. I think that was because I was afraid that she would randomly dart into traffic or something, and you could totally tell.

[NOTE: She's a terrific kid who would never run into traffic. In fact, I am much more likely to chase a ball into traffic. She and her little sister are the kind of kids that make it seem like a good idea to have a dozen or so.]

Stitches West- the Saga (Part IV- Finale)

Sunday was the last day of Stitches, and the best day (in my opinion). Katie generously offered to pick up coffee from Barefoot for everyone (which was WAY nicer than I would have been), while we stoked out the front of the e-ticket/raffle ticket line.

We did the very last of our shopping early-ish, and sat down to listen to Jane Sowerby talk about her book, Victorian Lace.

I just recently caught the lace bug and had Victorian Lace on order, but truly didn't think I could knit anything out of it right away. After listening to Jane talk about the whole thing, and seeing them in person, I now have the confidence to knit about 90% of the stuff in the book.

Even Andrew, who has NO interest in knitting lace, was thrilled at how much effort and research had been put into the book and Jane's eloquent explanations of how simple it was.

Jane was so inspiring that after her talk, I made a beeline for the WEBS booth (where I had earlier bought a cone of 80% alpaca/ 20% silk in a gorgeous burnt orange) to see if there were any other colors of laceweight that I wanted. There weren't.

We sat down and waited for Julie and the girls (whom I got to borrow for a bit over the weekend) to show up, critiqued what we saw on people, in booths, etc, and I decided to stop being a dumbass and go and buy the Don't Drop Spindle and glass orifice hook from the Ernst's.

See, I had gone into their booth like four times, picked up the two things I wanted, chatted with Michael and Sheila and hemmed and hawed about buying something so decadent and beautiful. I normally wouldn't, but they're made of Pyrex, and typically the equation looks like this:

Glass + Jasmin = broken beautiful thing

All I could think about what how heartbroken I would be when the eventual event would occur, and I would in the end destroy this beautiful thing. But I went back FOUR TIMES. It was Sunday afternoon, and my two things were still there. It was fate telling me that this time could be different.

I told Andrew to hold down the fort, I sauntered myself right into their booth, grabbed my two things, and announced to Sheila that budget be damned! I was buying these, wrap them up please, ma'am!

I also wanted some of the glass needles, but I know I can call and have them send me those any time, and it was only budget-be-slightly-damned. It's going to have to wait until (at least) Persian New Year in the hopes that my father will give me some cash to play with.

I hung out until about 3:30, when I left for home and wrapped up my Stitches. Wrap up and photos of the haul to come.

Stitches West- the Saga (Part III)

Saturday morning. We knew it was going to be a massive cluster … issue. The group had a game plan (which meant sprinting to the back of the convention center to grab the stuff we wanted) to be out by noon, when classes let out.

Ally, Colleen, Erica and I managed to get out around 11:30, and went to the Atrium to find a place to crash during the lunch rush. While at a dinky table (with uncomfortable chairs) I scoped out a cozy little zone with couches. When the ladies at the two couches left, I sprinted over to claim them as Minion territory.

There was a guy sitting there, but his wife was done shopping about an hour after we got there, and he was great at pretending we weren't there (saying things like "penis" and whatnot), and once he left, it was the Minion Crash Zone. We relaxed, ate our lunches, knitted; it was glorious!

The best part was that those of us who weren't * quite * finished shopping yet could go back (at 1:30, once the craziness subsided as people filed back into classes) while the others put their feet up and chilled like the villains they are.

The end of Saturday plan was for the Colleen Crew (those of us who rode in her trusty burgundy stallion) to leave at 3:30 to get the house ready for Donna's arrival (at 5). We lost Ursula, and even though she drove in by herself, we wanted to make sure that she didn't think we were ditching her. We found her and left the building at 4.

We were still okay, my room wasn't a complete disaster and I got set up for Donna well in time for her arrival and the commencement of the massages. Oh yeah, and we had POWER in the living room!

We, again, showed off our respective loot, ate the pizza we ordered (ahem, the pizza guy found us just fine, thank you) and knitting in glorious, resplendent light, provided by Andrew (and his brother).

Donna did five massages, and everyone sort of filtered out once they were done on the table. I, being the selfish beast that I am, took the last slot and rolled into bed afterwards.

Stitches West- the Saga (Part II)

It's Friday morning. Lunches have been packed. Backpacks have been prepared. Wallets are loaded and online tickets have been procured.

The Plan for Friday was for some of us to meet at the house and the rest to meet us at the convention center. I told the people who were driving up with me that if we rolled from the house at 8:30, I would stop for coffee. With that kind of incentive to move, we made it to the convention center around 9:15 or 9:30. There was a line, but we were towards the front.
My assumption was (yes, I know what they say about assumptions) that people who bought tickets online would be scanned and have badges printed out- like Fandango. Noooo, that would have been too smart. Instead, we waited in lines all three days, and had to wait to be scanned and handed a raffle entry ticket as our key to entry.

The system was stupid, and to add insult to injury, we were charged a "convenience fee". There was very little that was convenient about the setup, I assure you. Once we walked through the double doors, all annoyance was forgotten as we began to indulge in what can only be referred to as a Yarn Orgy.

I had three Stitches Virgins with me (we threatened to make them wear lipstick "V"'s on their foreheads, like at Rocky), and they did very well. I went through my list, bought everything on it and then went on to buy other interesting stuff.

Julie and Cynthia joined us in the afternoon, and we left around closing (perhaps a little earlier). The Minions headed back to my house to show off their plunder and build the plan of attack for Saturday.

We ordered Chinese food, and it got there an hour and a half later, because the delivery guy couldn't find our house. (WHAT?!) When the food finally arrived, we fell on it and afterwards knitted (basically) in the dark. Andrew assured me that he had called his brother (who is familiar with electrical work) and he was coming over in the morning.

Andrew then made an interesting observation that this is the second Stitches where something broke in the house. Last year it was the pipe behind the dishwasher, which Andrew (the manly-man, repairer of all things) fixed and showed us proudly when we got home. I think this is coincidence and not a higher power messing with me.

Again, we worked out the plan for Saturday, dispersed, and went to bed.

Mom’s 50th Birthday Extravaganza!

You only turn 50 once, and we celebrated my Mom's half-century mark with an excellent fiesta. Julie did a bulk of the cooking, and all of the food was incredible. There were margaritas, massages and music.

Oh, and lots of photos:

Julie and Linda cooking away in the kitchen:

The Minion Birthday Sombrero, worn first by Mom:

She obviously loves it:

Even moreso with a margarita in hand:

Of course, there was cake:

Oh yeah, there were also yellow birthday hats, modeled by the Sarah-saurus:

Happy 50th birthday, Mom!