LoopyKnits

I’m doing fine in the wake of my sinus surgery; healing nicely according to my doc. It’s been a *mostly* painfree experience. If you want the blow-by-blow updates (which, being about schnozzes, rate rather high on the ick-o-meter), you can see my posting on the Septoplasty Forum. If for some reason the following link doesn’t take you to the right place, it’s posted in the post-surgery forum under my username of “cbahm.”

And in happier news — KNITTING news, even — I have finished with all but the seaming of a Beehive Hat (well, and also I still need to make the little bee. But still. Almost finished!). It’s a fairly simply Knitlist.com pattern, but I thought it looked snazzy. It’s going to be another charity hat, but I may enter it in the Mid-South Fair’s knitting competition first as part of the hats designated for MIFA donations. Although I’m also thinking about making something fancier, too. Not sure what, though. Maybe one or two or three of the gorgeous shawls available at NeedleBeetle.com. (Update: Didn’t submit anything to the fair — whatta wimp! Maybe another year.)

[Above, my unseamed, unblocked Beehive Hat]

The cool thing about making hats is that our Guild is thinking of helping fiber artist Lindsay Obermeyer with her fall community art exhibit of 500 knitted hats … all connected by a cord and worn by a *lot* of people all walking around. She calls her projects “Attachments” and has done one previously with about 60 caps. All caps are donated to a local charity afterwards, although we’re allowed to tag our charity preferences, if desired. Our Guild is trying to work things out with MIFA, the fair, and the exhibitor so that our hats can make it through this knitting trifecta. Should be a blast. (Update: We didn’t do much. But I did donate 3-4 kitchen-size trash bags full of acrylic yarn for Lindsay to use in her teaching visits to local schools. It was keeping me from buying yarn that I LIKED and also keeping me from knitting since I didn’t love the stuff. (Most of it was inherited from my mom’s long-shelved knitting and crocheting projects, or else it was yarn I bought and then didn’t like. But it’s perfect for someone who doesn’t want the trouble of washing wool items.)

Meanwhile, I’m making caps this summer! This first one I chose because (1) it’s cute, (2) it gave me a chance to practice my honeycomb cable stitch, and (3) it’s a tiny little seaming project, and I simply *must* learn this skill sometime if I want to progress beyond afghans and knitting in the round. Too many cute pieced sweater patterns out there.

So, as for this beehive hat, I made it to gauge — I swear I did — but it makes up REALLY, really small, as I guessed after my first few rows. It might fit an elementary-age child.

[Beehive Hat, opened up and unseamed. The pattern went to plain stockinette stitch across the top — the middle of this fabric — to make folding at this edge easier.]

I bought one of those No Dye Lot (yeah, right) RedHeart skeins of yarn in 0321 Gold and didn’t use up more than 1/4 of the 8-ounce skein (if that much) for the hat, so I have plenty for the larger version I’m making next.

Now if I can just get past my total loathing of all things related to “seaming.” The audiologist and desk clerk at my ENT’s office (both of whom have started knitting since I’ve been coming in there with all my yarns and needles) recommended that I stop by a local yarn store’s Monday-evening free knit-in sessions for some seaming advice. An excellent idea! I only wish today were Monday! (Patience is not one of my virtues. Nope. Not at all.)

[Here's my first, okay second — OKAY! FIFTH! — attempt at seaming it. We'll see how it progresses. I may need a "fifth" before I'm finished!]

Best wishes to you knitties out there!

Technorati Tags: sinus surgery, Beehive Hat, MIFA, hat knitting, cap knitting, charity knitting, Lindsay Obermeyer, Attachments knit project, knit art, knitblog, LoopyKnits.com, Carolyn Bahm

Well, the cardiologist said I have atrial fibrillation, but I haven’t spoken directly to him yet. The internet is full of dire stories about what this means, but he doesn’t seem to be very concerned. I guess I will find out next week when I have more energy to hunt him down.

I had my scheduled sinus surgery yesterday. They called it a bilateral ESS, septoplasty, and turbinate outfracture. It’s supposed to make it easier to breathe and correct my deviated septum, as well as remove some infection. For about an hour while I was in the waiting mode, I did some knitting and snagged the general interest of most of the nurses in the area. I shoulda known — many nurses love crafts of any kind. (My mom, a retired RN, is the poster child for buying everything from applique to fabric paint kits, not to mention yarn and mercerized cotton, etc.) And since I was in the second surgical time slot that morning, I got to hear all the little babies and toddlers who were in the first slots. Some were crying but all were SO cute as their mamas tried to explain why they couldn’t get down, couldn’t eat or drink, etc. (Poor mamas.)

It was a little scary to go under general anesthesia, but it went fine. No real pain afterward, although my knees were wobbly from the anesthesia and I’m now wearing what I can only call (there is no other name for it) a nose diaper. (The official medical term is, apparently, a moustache dressing.] It’s a little folded triangle of gauze taped in place just below my nose. The only gross part, really, is having to do a nose rinse with an Aklalol/water mixture and another salt/water mixture seven times a day; yuck. But it helps healing, and I’m a good patient. My kids are being sweet and waiting on me at home, and everyone’s in a good mood because today was the last day of school. Hubby even brought home some ice cream, which I love. If only I could breathe through my nose — everything would taste better!

Technorati Tags: sinus surgery, heart disease, atrial fibrillation, nose diaper, knitblog, LoopyKnits.com, Carolyn Bahm

Today at the doctor’s office was quite the full checkup. I went for a cardiac stress test as a followup to an abnormal EKG (Update: Late found out it was an equipment error — my heart was fine). So, the first thing they do, after numbing you with paperwork, is to slip you into their easy-access clothes and hook you up to a drip. Then they pull something out of a lead-lined container and inject radioactive thallium into the drip. No sweat. So far.

Then it was just a matter of me lying on a narrow ironing-board of a bed, placing my arms “comfortably” above my head while the easy-access clothes demonstrate that they are a little TOO accessible, and soon I was aware that a component of the machine that was formerly humming by my side was now humming over me and slowly approaching even closer. They assured me I was not about to be steam-pressed. After 22 minutes of me trying not to twitch, scratch, cough, talk or fall asleep while the equipment whirred around me, they were finished taking pictures of my radioactive-thallium-illuminated heart.

Then after they had looked through their paperwork some more, they shuffled me off to a blessedly private room to get hooked up to EKG monitors (still keeping the drip in) and a blood pressure cuff. And in all my easy-access-clothing glory, I began to walk on the treadmill. Hey, this was easy!

Then they said, “Okay, are you warmed up enough?” And they cranked up the incline and the speed. Whoops. While I was struggling to keep up, the gal at my left said, “Okay, now give me your left arm so I can take your blood pressure.”

You have GOT to be kidding.

But she did, and — to my eternal surprise — I didn’t go flying off the back of the treadmill, even when they sped it up and ratcheted the incline up some more.

So far so good. I’ll know the results in a couple of days.

In knitting news, I pulled out the Tinky Brown Hairball afghan and worked on it in the waiting room, to the great interest of three women and, apparently, two men. It’s funny how KIPping will make friends of strangers. ;o)

Back at home, my youngest daughter was VERY excited to show me the Ladybug Hat she made in art class. Here’s her interpretation of bugdom (see the wee little face drawn on the top yellow loop?):

Her big sister’s only comment was:
“Mom, she WORE it home from school today. ”
(Big sister walks her home.)

(Update, 5-19-05: I just realized what this hat made me think of. The kids’ book, “Go, Dog. Go!” where the pink poodle gets the fancy party hat. - cb)

Gotta run — will be working on the Memphis Knitting Guild’s newsletter for the next few nights. But I couldn’t let an opportunity pass to share a hat like this.

Technorati Tags: checkup, cardiac stress test, heart disease, treadmill test, Ladybug Hat, Go Dog Go, Memphis Knitting Guild, MKG, knitblog, LoopyKnits.com, Carolyn Bahm

Way too much going on lately! Lots of 50- to 65-hour work weeks due to this being a busy season in my office. So very little time lately for knitting.

I am, however, going to:

• Have a cardiac stress test tomorrow morning (oh joy — if there’s anything I love more than trotting on a treadmill, it’s trotting with electrodes attached while I mentally stress to the max
• Volunteer for an afternoon with Habitat for Humanity on Thursday
• Be the Girl Scout mom going on our troop’s all-night Zoo Snooze on Friday
• Have (yuck) sinus surgery next week

Other news:Had a *great* time on April 25 with other knitters, listening to Yarn Harlot Stephanie Pearl-McPhee read from her book (”At Knit’s End: Meditations for Women Who Knit Too Much”), and then we listened and knit while she fielded questions from a crowd of about 30. Here’s a photo of Stephanie (center, front row, white shirt, luscious green shawl) with me (gigantic red dress, happy smile) and other members of the Memphis Knitting Guild.

If only I had not been such a shiftless ass — in the intervening weeks since the picture was made, I have gradually lost my grip on all the little anecdotes of the evening and just remember a fun time. But our local newspaper did a feature story on this event and (I can’t believe this) took a closeup photo of my hands working with the Nautilus Cap’s green yarn and four DPNs. At least they waited until after I had tinked and reknitted it correctly (AGAIN).

And, of course, I also attended our older daughter’s spring choral event, a dinner theater performance of Broadway hits. My camera failed to work on the close-up shot, darn it, so I’m showing you my blurry distant shot of her onstage. Notice how your eye is mysteriously and unerringly drawn to her beauty and style. I’ll bet you can pick her out of the crowd even if I don’t say what row she is on.

Now that I’m caught up again with my blog (sort of), I’ll start posting again regularly.

Technorati Tags: busy at work, cardiac stress test, Habitat for Humanity, Memphis Zoo, Zoo Snooze, Yarn Harlot, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, At Knit’s End, Memphis Knitting Guild, MKG, Nautilus Hat, Nautilus Cap, Ginny, choral concert, knitblog, LoopyKnits.com, Carolyn Bahm

My, it’s been an eventful week, although NOT for my knitting, which is only showing creeping-crawling progress. *sniffle* These are typical stories of my life:

Tooth Story — I had joined a craft book club, greedy gal that I am, for the cool knitting books whose titles I just couldn’t resist. The box got here on Tuesday, and it was a nice surprise when the box also contained a sample of one of those calcium chews. Yum-yum, orange flavored. One chew into it, and I was pulling out a calcium-enriched blob with one of my dental crowns attached. (Hint: Never look in the mirror at what remains in your mouth after a crown pops off. Eech!) My mother lives with my family, so the next morning I was yelling up the stairs to tell her that I’d be away from the office that afternoon because I had an appointment to repair the crown I’d lost the previous night. There was a puzzled silence, and then she said, “Where did you get a crown?”

(From the throne room, where I keep my scepters and tiaras.) But I popped that thought bubble ruthlessly.

Soccer Story — Enjoyed yesterday afternoon’s soccer practice, watching my little gal charge back and forth across the field. She’s got the attention span of a gnat sometimes, so she kept diligently guarding her opponent without paying any attention to that pesky soccer ball that kept interrupting her efforts by sailing by. Still, she was doing better than a teammate, who got her shoes so tangled up in the soccer net that she ended up sprawled on her back and needing rescue.

Sofa Story — I was madly typing away last night, sending my knitting guild’s newsletter out, and also trying to listen to TV when I noticed that I was having to adjust the volume upwards every few minutes. There was another person snoring in the vicinity — my dear hubby. He was stretched out VERY comfortably on the chaise end of our big sectional sofa.
“Uh, honey — don’t you think you’d be more comfortable upstairs in bed?” (hint, hint) “Uh, HONEY?”

“(yawn) Mmm-hmm, I’m going up in a minute …. (zzzzzz).”

A few minutes later as I mentally compare his snoring to a blender (too tame), an ice crusher (perhaps a bit too harsh) and a lawnmower starting up (that one’s close), I try again. He once again reassures me that he is on the very BRINK of getting up. I think his snoring begins again before he finishes the sentence. I sigh and crank the volume up a bit more — why keep torturing the guy?

I finally tucked in on the other end of the sectional to wait him out. This morning, I wake up to find him gone, his afghan neatly folded and his glass (not mine) put in the sink. But he has thoughtfully turned my Ott light off.

This morning: Now I think I’ll take another look at the Tinky Brown Hairball Afghan to see why there were only three stitches where there should have been four on one of the diamonds in my last row. Grrr.

This afternoon: One hour and near gale-force winds later (er, that’s the weather outside — not Dear Hubby’s snoring), I have to say “Woo-hoo! The Fusions are now 4-0!” (Thus speaks the Soccer Mom.)

This evening: I tinked two rows and the problem solved itself. And now I can proudly proclaim that I’ve gotten to row 57 on the Tinky Brown Hairball Afghan — YES! In more excellent news, I’ve found the cable that connects my digital camera to my laptop, so I can post pictures. In a typical development, I have also discovered that the USB port on this dratted computer is now … broken.

Technology taunts me.

Technorati Tags: lost crown, dental crown, Caitlyn, Memphis Knitting Guild, MKG, hubby, snoring, Tinky Brown Hairball Afghan, knitblog, LoopyKnits.com, Carolyn Bahm

The start of 2005 seems like an auspicious time to begin my first knitting weblog. So here goes. I haven’t done a website in a looooong time, so this will likely be pretty clumsy at first. But that’s never stopped me from learning something new before (or re-learning old & rusty skills).

Background: I’ve fumbled around with knitting off and on since the second grade when I carefully unraveled a patch of knitting, stitch by stitch, as part of a role in a school play. My teacher was astonished — she thought I was actually knitting rather than tinking. Since then, I’ve started and stopped knitting several times. So you might classify my skill level as “long-time beginner” or “verging toward intermediate knitter.” Anyway, I’m nuts about the stuff.

Past projects include afghans, sweaters (still can just follow a pattern — I intend to learn how to customize the fit this year, though), scarves, mittens & caps, and miscellany. In late 2004, I picked up knitting again after a long hiatus and knitted a poncho, two scarves, MOST of a duster-length sweater for myself (eventually abandoned due to errors that reached critical mass), my first-ever sock (didn’t do the second one — the first was … waah! … too small), and am currently using up the basketful of brown acrylic yarn (that I still don’t know why I bought) for an afghan (update — this project also abandoned because of growing dislike of acrylics). Next purchase: Some yummy, expensive yarns in wool, mohair, and other natural fibers.

Technorati Tags: new knitting blog, long-time beginner knitter, knitblog, LoopyKnits.com, Carolyn Bahm