Almost at the finish line...

My first full year back and I am THRILLED that it is almost over. Maybe when it is I'll actually get back to crafting. I started going back to the gym and that is a good sign.

Double crap.

This is not a knitting blog today.

I'm freaking annoyed. I wanted to get Hubby Yankees' tickets because of the whole stadium closing-need to sit in seats one last time-kind of thing. Hubby is a die-hard-from-birth Yankee fan. Me--not so much, but then again, I'm a NY Rangers' fan, so I respect dedication. I got this brilliant idea--I'll get in touch w/ Hubby's BFF and best man, Sean, and get them a block of tickets! Hooray! Hubby will be happy, see Yankees, hang out with best bud, and I don't have to sleep through baseball! Everyone wins! Hooray, hooray.

Except, I e-mailed Sean on Myspace w/ brilliant idea, last night, but I can't check Myspace from a DOE computer while I'm at work, and by the time I checked his e-mail today--you know what's coming right?--no more tickets. Ugh. I'm so pissed.

I'm just venting; don't pay any attention to me.

Bleh.

Linkin Park/Jay-Z

Linkin Park at MSG tonight was freaking AMAZING. Like totally clap your hands and jump up and down like silly schoolgirl amazing (and before you ask--yes, I did).

AND---the icing on the cake? Jay-Z came out and did an encore with them. Literally. They did Numb/Encore and Jigga What/Faint. It freaking rocked my world and I swear, the Garden was only as loud once before when I was at a Rangers playoff game during the '94 season and they kicked the living sh*t out of the Devils (good times, good times...sigh).

I just thought I'd gloat. Nanny-nanny-pooh-pooh b*tches

My AP English Class

Can I just say that I am absolutely, completely, head-over-heels-in-love with the AP English class I am teaching right now? I love them. No really. They want to learn, appreciate my sarcasm (I think--maybe they are just pacifying me), and--get this-they hand in homework. No shit.

My second semester is already WAY better than my first and I no longer contemplate whether or not I made the right decision to come back to teaching. If I could teach my AP English class forever, I would. I love them so much I want to take them home with me at night so we can talk about poetry and iambic pentameter and figurative language.
Next week I'm introducing them to Chaucer. THAT is exciting.

In knitting news, I also love my swift and have a strange desire to wind ever single skein of yarn that I own. Very enamored. AND third pair of socks (for me this time! Whoo-hoo!) is well underway--sort of. More than the cuff is done, so that is good, yes?

Life is pretty darn good right now :-)

ASPCA poem

My volunteer coordinator at the ASPCA sent this out and it got me all weepy, so I thought I'd share it...please remind all those you know that are contemplating getting a pet--any kind of pet--to go to their local animal shelter and adopt a homeless animal. There are too many homeless pets out there that die every single day in kill-shelters simply because the supply outweighs the demand for house pets. Think about that before you or anyone you know even thinks about buying an animal. Go to a shelter!!! And get your animal spayed or neutered!! Responsibility saves lives.


Here in this house...
I will never know the loneliness I hear in the meows and barks of the other cats and dogs 'out there'.
I can sleep soundly, assured that when I wake my world will not have changed.
I will never know hunger, or the fear of not knowing if I'll eat.
I will not shiver in the cold, or grow weary from the heat.
I will feel the sun's heat, and the rain's coolness, and be allowed to smell all that can reach my nose.
My fur will shine, and never be dirty or matted.

Here in this house...
There will be an effort to communicate with me on my level.
I will be talked to and, even if I don't understand,
I can enjoy the warmth of the words.
I will be given a name so that I may know who I am among many.
My name will be used in joy, and I will love the sound of it!

Here in this house...
I will never be a substitute for anything I am not.
I will never be used to improve peoples' images of themselves.
I will be loved because I am who I am, not someone’s idea of who I should be.
I will never suffer for someone's anger, impatience, or stupidity.
I will be taught all the things I need to know to be loved by all.
If I do not learn my lessons well, they will look to my teacher for blame.

Here in this house...
I can trust arms that hold, hands that touch...
knowing that, no matter what they do, they do it for the good of me.
If I am ill, I will be doctored.
If scared, I will be calmed.
If sad, I will be cheered.
No matter what I look like, I will be considered beautiful and known to be of value.
I will never be cast out because I am too old, too ill, too unruly, or not cute enough.
My life is a responsibility, and not an afterthought.
I will learn that humans can almost, sometimes, be as kind and as fair as cats and dogs.

Here in this house...
I will belong.
I will be home.

by anonymous

Another pair!!!

I FINALLY finished my second pair of socks--and let me tell you--it was not an easy road with these babies. I commenced knitting them almost immediately after I finished my first pair. That was roughly April of last year, mind you. The first sock went off without a hitch. Then I stared the NYC Fellows program. Let me tell you--driving to work everyday seriously cuts into your knitting time. I didn't start to turn the heel until Brad and I went to visit my uncles in Florida at the very end of last summer. And then, in the airport on our way back to NYC, disaster struck. I screwed up god-only-knows-what, and I frogged the whole heel. Then I knit it again. AND I FROGGED IT AGAIN. Do you see a developing pattern here? By the time we got back to NYC, I gave up. There was no point. I started teaching in another week and that--let me tell you--has consumed my life for the past 4 months! Oh I've picked them up, knit a row or two, and then went right back on my tirade of how my students can't seem to construct proper sentences, lesson planning, paper-grading mania of the last semester. Over Christmas break, the socks and I recommitted. I was told that I had been neglecting my yarn and that the yarn fairies were determined to play tricks with me until I paid them their homage, finished the socks, and started knitting like I used to--that is--constantly. I will humbily oblige, oh yarn fairies. I never want to invoke your wrath again.



Sawyer appreciates the socks!


And just so you know, I hate this colorway and will never knit it again. Though my husband picked it out and the socks are for him, I deserve a medal for knitting day-glow socks.

First Semester Finished!

I seriously cannot believe that I made it through my first semester at the H.S. I teach at. Considering it's 95% boys and I'm a fairly young(ish) woman, it was that much more difficult.

I'm glad that I came back to teaching, but it is very hard to not be jaded and frustrated, and believe it or not, sometimes it is not the students that have me pulling my hair out when I get home. Hearing things like, "Our students aren't ready for us to insist on homework as a major part of their grade," and "We have to realize where these kids live," etc., etc. just annoys me. Perhaps because I come from the very unique perspective of having taught at both the 4-year and 2-year college-level, I feel a great sense of urgency in the education and preparation of my students. I have very high standards. (Not to say that others don't, of course.) I expect them to learn and value their education, now, immediately, and to realize that if they have any plans of getting out of whatever potentially bad situation they are in, they can only guarantee it with a solid education. The excuse is just that--an excuse. Everyone must work hard, and I admit, some have an unfairly more difficult starting point than others, but complaining without actively doing something about it is not going to help them get a high enough score on the SAT to place out of remedial English and Math.

I've taught remedial English on the college level. It is not a good place for ANYONE to be, especially students just graduated from NYC public high school who are entitled to that same education they will get in remedial English--and pay for--when they were high school students for free. Making excuses and claiming "Our kids aren't ready," just allows them to become comfortable with mediocrity--because ultimately, aren't we claiming that because of their race, socioeconomic status, and zip code that they do not have to be held to the same standard of academic excellence? And isn't that doing them a greater disservice than insisting on excellence from the get-go? And isn't that racially, socially, and economically biased? I'm sorry, but I'm just not comfortable with that.

I've seen what happens when teachers make excuses for their students--and I've taught those students, struggling through their third, paid for, semester of remedial English, still struggling to pass the CUNY WAT (Writing Assessment Test). No one will convince me that the test itself isn't significantly flawed. I've graded it, and it is. But at the moment, it and other college-level writing assessment tests are what our kids are facing--and those tests, and eventually their bosses--don't care where they grew up, or what happened in their neighborhood the night before, or what financial difficulties their family might be having--they want results. They want high-performance. They want a student and an employee with skills. As an educator, aren't I obligated to prepare my students for this world--cold and harsh as it is? Because if I don't prepare them, and I don't give them the tools and skills to succeed--aren't I not doing my job? I'm not going to be able to write out 120 resumes for each of the seniors I might teach in a year, and I'm certainly not going to go on a job interview with them and explain to their hopefully future employer that, "Yes, Mr./Ms. So-and-So, Billy does not speak or write standard written English and he has not mastered the art of managing his time to successfully meet deadline, but you see, he's not ready for that, yet I think you should hire him anyway." How's that going to go down? Shame on anyone for not thinking about that aspect of their students' educations.

Perhaps I should be more idealistic, but that just isn't me. I could put on those perpetually rose-colored glasses and say that yes, all kids want to be successful and they want to achieve. I could say that--but I won't. I'm pragmatic. I want to deal with the issues now--not two, three, or four years down the road--because that is just too late. I'm okay with saying that many, if not most, of my students are content with mediocrity. Sure, they probably wouldn't mind being academically successful, but they aren't currently going out of their way to do anything about it. They do not realize how dire--how truly urgent--their situation is--and isn't it my job to instill that urgency? To make them realize just how dire the situation is? For whatever reason, there IS a culture of under-achievement in our educational system. To lie and say that it doesn't exist seems insane to me. Education standards need to be high--in all areas, for every student--and I will put the blood, sweat, and tears in to make sure they are successful, but I'm not going to lower my standards because of claims of readiness, race, or anything else, because if I did, my students are going to be the ones to pay for it--literally.

Four Kitties on a Windowsill in B'klyn...

So I haven't been blogging because I've been insane with the teaching. That doesn't mean I haven't had time to take pictures of my cats.

Two weeks down...HOW many more to go?

I'm off from school today--and I've got to praise the Jewish faith for having Rosh Hashanna exactly when I was beginning to think that I was going to have a nervous breakdown. Holy crap. Teaching teenagers is freaking rough--I thought teaching college was hard--that's nothing compared to this. I don't know how I'm going to make it to Thanksgiving. I just spent the last two days doing all of my lesson plans for next week. During the week, I need to get started on the following week. I've come to the conclusion that if I don't stay at least this far ahead, I will never get to sleep, ever. I get up at 5 so I can get to school by 7 so I can get my crap together for when classes start at 8. And also so that I don't get stuck in two hours of traffic. I nearly had a nervous breakdown when it took me over an hour to get to work on the first day of school and I staggered in at 7:40. Talk about cutting it close! So I really need to start going to bed between 9 and 10 instead of between 11 and 11:30 like I have been or I'll collapse from exhaustion any day now.

No, I haven't knit or crocheted anything lately. I've laid off the socks. I'm pathetic. I need to get back to crafting or I really might just loose my mind. It really sucks that I can't take the subway to work--that was always where I made the most progress. Maybe I'll look into doing that on the days that I don't have grad school at night...we'll see.

First Day of School

Tomorrow is the first day of school. I'm sort of crapping myself right now. I know it's going to be fine and I'm over-prepared, but I'm freaking out all the same. I want to try to enjoy labor day, but somehome, the looming thought of school is clouding my ability to do anything more than continue to freak out and squelch a desperate desire to go make more copies so as to be even more prepared. UGH!

By the way, in the craft department...let's just say that I've ripped out the heel of the same pair of socks three times. I think I need to set them aside. I want to work on another project that I can actually contemplate finishing sometime soon. I'm also stuck in limbo on the baby blanket I'm making for Sandra's daughter. I've got too much to do.

Remembering Katrina...

This time of year has been difficult for me for the past two years. Anyone who knows me, knows that my husband and I were stuck in Hurricane Katrina two years ago--that we were actually holed up in the airport when the hurricane hit and during the aftermath. It was a life-changing experience. Not only did it confirm my complete lack of faith in the president (I didn't vote for him) and the government, but it also made me realize who and what was really important in my life. I did a bit of friend and family pruning not long after that. That was also the catalyst for pondering if I should go back to teaching. I wasn't going to move down to NOLA, but I felt like I needed to do more than just work in publishing. I wanted to interact with people--to maybe make a difference. Teaching is also a way for me to do more than add to the consumerism of this country (and yes, though I firmly believe in my former-company's products, they're also a profit-driven company--something I was never able to fully reconcile with myself). And now, two years later, I'm literally days from really beginning my new(ish) career and going back to a profession I had abandoned not long after 9/11. I'm always contemplative around this time--a good thing, I think--and I can't help but re-live the experience and thank god that my husband and I made it--when I know so many people didn't. Click on the title to link to the original (sort of--I originally had it up on Myspace, but I don't blog there anymore) Escape from New Orleans blog.

Holy crapola

This is going to be a very, very brief blog.

I'm now an NYC Teaching Fellow and have been for the past month--which means I have NO LIFE. I plan lessons. I read. I plan more lessons. I write papers. I plan lessons. This is my life. Tomorrow is my birthday and you know what I'll be doing. You got it--planning lessons.

Cool thing happened in summer school this morning--a girl brought in her crochet rug she's working on (I was impressed let me tell you). I showed her my sock-in-progress. We're going to do more tomorrow! Hooray! I want to start a yarn club at my high school.

Anywho, I have finished one project (yes I am lame--only one!):


That would be Helena (or Fatty Longwhiskers as I like to call her) sniffing out the catnip in the nifty new knitted mouse toy. Meow!

It's been a while...

Almost a month. I find it hard to believe it's been that long since I've blogged, but there are the dates staring me right in the face. It's hard to argue with reality. I've got excuses (not that you're interested) and they are prefectly legitimate...I got a promotion at work so on top of all the usual spring craziness, I've been super busy trying to figure out the ins and outs of my new position. I've got more news that some of you already know about, but I am keeping that to myself until the time is right. No. I am not pregnant. Stop asking. I'll get knocked up when I'm good and ready.
Other news...I shipped out ye olde felted project to one of my best buds Ingrid and she loved it. I made her a felted yoga mat bag and it was pretty freaking awesome if I do say so myself. I kind of didn't want to give it away, but I knew that would be selfish and mean.
Sock news...after i finished the incorrectly knitted sock (knitted the toe correctly anyway) I started on the second one, didn't get gauge, said screw it, and just started on a new pair. One down, second in progress. The incorrectly knitted first sock will be the kitties stocking at Christmas time.
I've gotten an obscene amount of sock yarn lately--I really should post pictures of it all so you can tell that I'm not making this up. It's a little nutty. But then again, I'm a little nutty so it's all good.
I'm more than a little obsessed with this knitted giant glove.
More TK.

Busy and Sick

I've been sort of out of it the past few days with this weird spring-time cold (love the heavy-head feeling and general exhaustion--just makes waking up such a pleasure). Between my cold and work--which is flat-out insane (so insane that I've been taking crap home with me every single night because I can't bear to be in the office late and can just work from home when necessary)--I haven't been blogging or knitting. The second sock is in progress, and though the gauge is slightly different from the first sock, I think it'll be fine and Hubby will still be happy with his first pair of hand-knit socks. I'm not at all happy about the difference in the patterning of the sock though--the first one has this big ole spiral thing going on while the second is looking very stripey. I wish they were both stripey, but there really isn't anything I can do about changing that, so it is what it is.

I finished my very first felted project and it looks bloody awesome if I do say so myself. I'll post pics of it after I get confirmation that the recipent has received said present.

That's the news for now. Not very exciting, but I never claimed to be an exciting person.

Sock pic & Grendel

A pic of the finished sock:



Now I just have to get gauge and do the other one (hopefully just one more).

And a pic of Grendel who really likes to play with my yarn. Meow!

One down...

I finished one sock (I'll post pics tonight or tomorrow), and I am going to attempt to get the same gauge as the first without knitting into the back of all my stitches by going down a needle size or two. I knit the first sock on 3.25's (#3), so hopefully if I go down to 2.5 or 2.0 it'll work, otherwise I'll have to knit a whole new pair and the one I already have will become a Christmas stocking for the kitties.
On the bright side, my new koigu should get here today.

I met the Knitting Yoda...

And boy-o-boy did I get spanked. Holy crap. I felt like Luke Skywalker after Yoda tells him "Do or do not, there is no try." Man. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Okay, so what the hell happened? Well since I've been on a sock craze for the past couple of weeks, all I can think about is buying more sock yarn. Saturday Brad and I had a gazillion things to do--including going to the dentist (yet again--I don't think I'll ever be finished. I'm tempted to tell him to just rip everything out and give me implants, but I know I'd regret that) and running out to the island to go to Trader Joe's to get good cat food (since this whole pet food recall, I'm even more grateful that Brad and I only feed our kitties the Trader Joe's Holistic Cat Food). So since I know we have a ton of errands to run (including ending up at Mommy-in-Law's house), I figured that since we'd be out there anyway, it was a good day to stop by Knitwits in Bayside. I'd heard good things about it on a couple of people's blogs I've been lurking on, and specifically remember it being mentioned as as stop on one of the yarn crawls coming from Long Island and Queens for the Harlot's Represent event a couple weeks ago (I can't believe it's been that long) so I figured it was worth a stop.

So I get to Knitwits' with Hubby, we ooohh and aaaahh over the yarn, I gleefully discover that they have steel DPN's (I think I like those better--I feel like the points of my bamboo ones aren't consistently pointy if that makes any sense), and hand over my purchases to Joan, the Knitting Yoda. I ask her if the yarn I'm purchasing two skeins of will be enough to make a pair of socks. She says, "It depends on your pattern." So of course I whip out my sock of which I am so proud which was near completion and tell her that I'm either going to do this pattern again or change it slightly because this is my first pair of socks.

And then she tells me I'm twisting all my stitches. Holy f*$!ing F*$!-nuts. All this time, I've been knitting incorrectly--or as she told me, not wrong, just making my life much more complicated. She asked how I learned and I told her out of a book (which she then pooh-poohed because she said she "didn't think much of it" and the author) and she then showed me how to not knit into the back of the stitches. I sat there on my knees knitting at her feet like a good little padawan-learner while she ruled over three other knitters telling one, "This is wrong; rip it out"; another "Undo the stupid stitches--why did you do that?"; another "I don't know what you did, but you're going to have to do it again." It was tough love. The knitters submitted to her critiques determined to please her--I was equally determined. While all this was going on, Brad stood in the corner trying not to laugh at me too much--he knows how I hate not being perfect at things, and the other knitters heckled him: "It's a good thing she already has a ring or we'd tell her to keep the socks for herself!" "Don't you laugh, or you'll never get anything hand-knit again!"

After I had successfully knitted and purled several rows correctly, she allowed me to purchase my needles, but wouldn't sell me more yarn because--get this--she wants me to come back and show her my progress to make sure that I'm not totally screwing up my socks. She let me leave with these final words--"You're a good knitter, but you've got to perfect your technique. There's no point in knitting if you're going to knit incorrectly." How do you argue with that? You don't. I'm a perfectionist, so I totally agree.

So what the hell am I going to do about the socks? Well, after Hubby patiently let me have a minor nervous breakdown in the car, (because of course I had to find this out just as I'm getting to the damned toe of the sock) I've decided to finish the sock in question--using the correct stitches of course--and go back to School Products, get another skein, and then really make the damned socks. That settled, he lead me to DSW for some shoe therapy.

In spite of being extremely humbled from this whole experience, I'm actually glad that it happened. It totally sucks that I'm going to have to make two more socks instead of just one more sock, but overall, it's much better that I know how to do things the correct way because it'll make me a better knitter. And I have to be honest--the fact that she told me I was a good knitter has carried me through all of this--not to mention Brad giving me knitting pep talks all along the way (he's such a good hubby--I don't know who else would put up with my knitting nervous breakdowns).

The knitting Yoda cut me down to size, and in the long run, I needed it.

May the force be with you (and your needles).

Sock Progress and Yarn Porn

So here's the progress of the sock--I think I'll actually be able to finish it by the end of this weekend (I hope, I hope, I hope). Now if I can only be assured that the second sock will go as quickly (probably more so since I have more of a clue this time around)...



The sock is actually a little longer already. This was before I did another 15 or so rounds last night.

Hubby was a victim of yarn porn yesterday. I sent him a link to the koigu at Purl and after much e-mailing back and forth, he decided to get me some yarn so I could make a pair of socks for myself (something for me! Oh my!). I think that it is really cute and sweet that he gets excited on my behalf about yarn--when we went on our mini yarn crawl last weekend, he was amazed at all the textures and colors. Now I send him pictures and he buys me yarn. How awesome is that? Riding the subway into Manhattan this morning, he asked me not to send him any more yarn porn because he'd have to buy more. Yeah, like that's going to happen ;-)

My new Koigu:

For your viewing pleasure...

May I present Sawyer:



Sawyer is lying in his snuggly bed--an empty wooden wine box with a pillow and covered in an old blanket--but if you look kind of closely, you can see a peek of a blue, grey, orange, and seafoam blankie; six 7 x 9 swatches I made as practice before I dove into the world of "serious" knitting. It's ugly as sin, but his favorite thing to cuddle with (besides sitting between me and my husband and showing us his belly). I want to bite him, he's so cute. Supercute!

In sock news, I'm done with the gusset and working on the foot...I'll post pics of that tomorrow. Meow!

My first heel turn

Thanks to the comments I got on my blog and all the responses on the NYC Sn'B group, I got home last night--after two unsuccessful attempts on the subway which proceeded in lots of ripping, followed by storming into the house and complaining to my husband that I must be the stupidest person on the planet (with lots of four-letter words thrown in)--I went into my office, looked at all the comments and e-mails again, pulled up KnittingHelp.com, and I freaking did it! I did it!!! I swear, I felt like the smartest person in the world. My husband definitely looked at me crooked after my "how ya like me now" happy dance followed by much air punching and general giddyness. I owe it all to the awesomeness of the knitters who helped me out during my knitting crisis. Thanks everyone!!
Check out my wonderful, beautiful, not-perfect-but-darn-close-enough sock:

This is what I started with...


Check out my heel!!!