yarn and books and all things crafty

I taught all day yesterday, so today I am rewarding myself with a (planned vacation) day off from my regular job. The timing is pretty excellent, since I stayed up late-late (for me) last night watching the Academy Awards, which ran long, as usual. I was so thrilled to see The Hurt Locker win a crapton of awards. Tim and I watched it on Saturday night and we both loved it. It’s difficult to make a movie about the current war in the Middle East without a) being political; or b) being manipulative, and I thought The Hurt Locker managed to not do either. I can’t stand movies where I feel like my emotions are being manipulated–that’s why I hated Crash, which won a few years ago. I thought The Hurt Locker showed us people who were real and heroic and flawed and broken, and I loved it for that. I am also thrilled that finally, after 82 years, a woman won the Best Director award. I thought Mo’Nique’s speech was inspiring and I was creeped out that everyone sitting in James Cameron’s section seemed to be wearing Avatar-blue.

So it was a late night for me after an eventful week (teaching all day Sunday, guest-speaking in the fantastic Dorothea Salo’s collection development class on Saturday–seriously, GSLIS is lucky to have her as an instructor) and I am happy to have the day off to unwind.

The plan for today: I’m going to grocery shop and buy ingredients to make a lasagna. I’m going to go to lunch with Tim, who is working diligently upstairs in his office. I’m going to read, since I have a pile of books to review and an impending deadline. I may watch some or all of the Masterpiece Classic adaptation of Emma, which is sitting on the Tivo. If I get really ambitious, or if I need any of the stuff in the sink for cooking, I might do the dishes. I was going to take pictures of some new yarn acquisitions and add them to Ravelry, but the fog and rain is making this a bad day for that.

Also, I am going to knit. I haven’t picked up my needles in over a week. You’d think that, given the stressful time I’ve been going through, I’d be knitting like mad right now, but I’m not. I’ve been coming home from work and sitting with Tim, talking and making jigsaw puzzles or watching TV. I have so many projects that are thisclose to being finished, and I’d like to get there on a few of them before it gets too warm to wear handknit socks and handknit shawls. I’d also like to make sure that I have a handknit gift for my mother, whose birthday is on May 2. (She has come to expect handknit gifts from me, and I don’t blame her!)

So now, on with the day.

So for the third time in a row, I have not finished my Ravelympics project during the Olympics. This time out, I was knitting an Ishbel (the large size) out of some magnificent red Bugga (Longhorned Beetle, to be exact). I didn’t have any problems with the pattern–I found it very straightforward. My excuse? A rotten week at work, which made me too preoccupied to knit in the evenings, followed by four days out of town at an intensive leadership/technology training workshop.

I could have done some knitting last weekend, but I had to grade papers for the class that I teach, then I got sucked into playing a game on my computer.

I think I am just destined to never finish a Ravelympics project. I ask myself, “would I have finished if all had been going swimmingly at work? Would I have finished if I wasn’t out of town for four days?” Perhaps. Or perhaps I would have found something else to take the place of those two things, some other distraction that would prevent me from meeting my not-so-lofty goal.

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Knitting Olympics 2006 (the pre-Ravelry days): I attempted to make a Cheryl Oberle cardigan. I got about 3/4 of the way through it, messed up a three-needle bind-off, and threw it across the room (literally) in disgust. Tim forced me to take a time out from the project after that incident, so I did. I ended up finishing the cardigan in August of that year during a big UFO clean-out. It’s a lovely cardigan but it desperately needs a washing. It’s covered in cat hair.

Ravelympics 2008: I do not remember what I attempted, I only remember that I didn’t finish it.

Ravelympics 2010: One Incomplete Ishbel. It’s going to be gorgeous when it’s done.

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I did finish an awesome pair of Jaywalkers, though. (Picture to come.) And now I’m in the midst of the March UFO Madness challenge–I plan to try and finish a few pesky UFOs by March 15. I have some pretty strict plans for finishing the projects that I’ve started. My goal is to get most of them finished by the end of May, and I don’t plan to start more than a couple of gift projects between now and then. Like everything else, we’ll see how that goes.

So I shared something lousy that happened to me yesterday, and I heard from quite a few people, which made me feel much, much better. I miss Twitter a lot, and I assure you, I will be back, although in a somewhat sanitized format. No more “indecency” from me, at least, not on the surferrosa account.

I’ve done a lot of thinking over the last day about library people (in particular) sharing things that have happened to them that are not positive. We all want to shout from the hills when something good happens, and there’s nothing wrong with that. I love hearing about others’ successes. But I also think that sharing things that happen that aren’t so sunny can remind others that they aren’t alone in whatever professional problem or crisis they’re facing.

I remember reading a post by a blogger with a very big soapbox where she described how frustrating it was to feel like you get little (if any) respect at your workplace, yet outside of your workplace people believe in you and encourage you. It was a very brave thing to write, and I think that most of us (myself included) would shy away from putting themselves out there in that manner. I read that and I felt like I was less alone. Here was this woman who has probably accomplished more in five or six years than most of us will in our entire career, and she was going through the exact same thing that I was (and that I continue to go through). She was professionally active and well-respected by many in the field, yet at her workplace, she was nothing but chopped liver. I hadn’t accomplished a tenth of what she had, yet her disclosure made me feel better about my similar situation. I will never forget how hurt I was when a “leader” at my workplace was extremely dismissive of a major professional accomplishment. All of my respect for her completely vanished, and has never returned.

Many of us out there have the same problems. We’re not alone. We’re trying to toe the line between who we are and who our supervisors want us to be. I’ve been at my job long enough to know that I’m never going to be the person my supervisor wants me to be–and that’s fine. She’s never going to be the supervisor I want her to be–and I have learned to live with that too. We are different people with different styles, and are unlikely to see eye to eye about most things. I’m not the same kind of leader she is. I value different things. That’s not an insult to her or her legacy or her accomplishments–that’s reality. But sadly, I often feel that blazing my own trail–doing things the way I feel is right, or connecting with the profession differently, or being open and vocal and yes, sometimes a little bit crass–is seen as an insult. And it’s not.

There are times that I wish I could start a Dream Library with a Dream Library Staff–a group of people with similar values and perceptions, an unstoppable brain trust who would get things done and have a damn good time doing it. People who wouldn’t be afraid to make fun of things that are worthy of being made fun of, but who can throw down and do the serious work that needs to be done. We could do great things. And maybe someday we will. But for now, we need to remember that we aren’t alone, that our problems and concerns are not just ours, and that there is someone out there–probably multiple someones–who are going through the same thing that we are. And based on everything I’ve gone through in the last day, not feeling alone makes things seem a whole lot better.

I have no plans of turning this into a work, professional, or library blog. Don’t get me wrong–I love what I do. I enjoy being a librarian. I like the people I supervise. I enjoy helping the public find information. But the idea of writing a library blog just doesn’t do it for me. There are plenty of other people who do it better.

But sometimes I feel the need to take over my personal webspace (which I don’t update very often, ahem) to talk about something professional, and tonight is one of those nights.

Before we proceed, let me be clear: I am not writing this while at work. I’m at home. And this is my web space, which I own, and my views and opinions do not belong to anyone but myself. Because I am not my workplace.

I’ve noticed a distinct divide sometimes at work. There are people who live for their jobs. And there are those, like me, who prefer a very distinct balance between worklife and real life. I don’t check work e-mail from home. I don’t work overtime unless there is something specific that I need to do. I tend to not let work-related issues take over my free time. My free time is far too precious for that. Forty years ago, when people left the office, they left the office. They might have taken work home with them, but they weren’t constantly connected to the Mothership via e-mail or mobile phone. I’ve noticed a couple of other co-workers have stopped checking work e-mail when they’re taking vacation time, and I say hooray for that. More people need to start respecting their leisure time.

So I am very angry–no, livid–that worklife is invading my home tonight.

Since this is my personal space and my personal time, and since I am a person who is pretty open about most things, I will tell you this: this morning, I was reprimanded by my boss for using Twitter. Yes, Twitter, that thing that millions of people worldwide use to stay connected, vent about random things, talk about the weather, and describe what they had for dinner. I’ve been on Twitter now for over two years and have developed a professional and personal network that, frankly, means a lot to me. I’ve met and become friends with some brilliant people through Twitter, I’ve had questions answered, and yes–I have vented about some of the various frustrations of my job. I have dropped the s-bomb on occasion (which is mild for me, as you probably know if you’ve talked to me in person on a casual occasion).

I was told that things I’ve said on Twitter were “indecent.” I have seen indecent. It was a lot worse than the word “shit.”

I was told that the things I said on Twitter would impact my ability to get a library director position. I follow several library directors on Twitter. Some of them have said things on Twitter that I wouldn’t even consider saying.

What galls me is this idea that I am constantly representing my workplace, no matter what I’m doing. Am I representing the library when I get my underarms waxed? When I’m using the toilet? When I’m at the doctor’s office, about to get another invasive and annoying exam? No, I’m not. I’m representing nobody but myself. Even if I get a promotion and become Benevolent Dictator of the Library, I’ll still be representing only myself.

In our social media-crazed world, I think most people are aware that individuals are not representing their workplace in everything that they say or do. Unless you’re posting from an account that explicitly belongs to your workplace, the personal/professional divide is in full effect. I don’t think that my colleagues are representing their prestigious academic research library when they talk about their child’s poopy diaper or how pissed off they are that their flight has been canceled. And I’m not representing my workplace when I say, in an offhand comment to a close friend on Twitter, that milk comes from teats.

(Nor are teats indecent. They’re a cow’s udders!)

So I’m furious, I’m offended, and I’m torn. I’ve spent a long time building a social network on Twitter. I follow and am followed by a lot of like-minded library people. I know that if I have questions or concerns about professional issues ranging from unanswerable reference questions to YA book recommendations to sticky cataloging problems, I can find an answer from my friends on Twitter. I’m resentful that I may have to let it go and switch to a brand-new (or anonymous) account, or have dual accounts–one where I can be honest and be myself, and one where I pretend to be some kind of prudish, inoffensive, shiny-happy-librarian. I can’t be perfect. I’m not. I’m human, and I get frustrated with things as varied as people wearing pajama pants in public, students in my cataloging class whose poor planning causes needless conflicts, the fact that my body does not seem to work properly sometimes, and the pile of icy, slick snow just beyond my driveway. And I see absolutely no harm in being open about my frustrations, or venting them in public.

But I can’t flout authority, as much as authority is severely pissing me off at the moment. It’s not like jobs are out there for the picking, and I do like the one I have very much. So I think my best option at this time is to lay low and be quiet. Don’t be alarmed if you don’t hear much from me for a while. I’m fine, really. Maybe a little more angry than usual. Buy me a beer, and I’ll tell you exactly how I feel–just don’t assume that I’m representing my workplace when I’m drinking, having a good time, and using “indecent” language.

Tim and I met some friends for breakfast yesterday morning at a little coffeehouse in Urbana. The coffeehouse serves German food for dinner during the week, and one of the items advertised on the tablecards was gluhwein: a mulled wine with citrus and spices. Mulled wine seemed like the perfect thing for our current spell of nasty-cold weather, so I decided to throw some together to enjoy with the neighbors. I used a combination of a recipe from the Cook’s Illustrated Family Cookbook (which is my go-to cookbook) and some of the ingredients listed on the tablecard at La Gourmandise in Urbana.

Mulled Wine

• 1 large bottle dry red wine (cheap stuff is fine, we used Gallo Cabernet Sauvignon)
• 1 orange, halved, plus the zest of half of the orange
• 10 whole cloves
• 3 cinnamon sticks
• 1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise
• 1/2 cup sugar

Dump the wine into a crock-pot. Add the sugar and vanilla bean, and stir.

Over medium heat, toast the cloves and the cinnamon sticks until fragrant (3-5 minutes).

Zest half of the orange and squeeze the juice into the crock-pot.

Wrap the cloves, cinnamon sticks, and orange zest in cheesecloth and place in the crock-pot. Make sure that the pouch o’ goodness is fully submerged. (If you don’t have cheesecloth, you can put the ingredients directly into the crock-pot, but you may want to strain the wine before you serve it.)

Set the crock-pot to low and heat for at least one hour, stirring occasionally.  You really don’t want the wine to boil, but it’s not a disaster if it does.

Drink, and be merry!

I was going through my yarn this evening, looking for a skein of not-particularly-variegated sock yarn so I can test-knit Ellington (woo hoo! test knitting!) and I realized that I never wrote about my experiences at Sock Summit. So, four weeks later, here goes:

I conned Tim into a trip to Portland with promises of beer and fine dining. I hoarded my money for a couple of months so I could blow it on fairy-fart sock yarn, Blue Moon Fiber Arts Rare Gems and Mill Ends, and other yarn that struck my fancy. I exceeded my budget by an amount I would rather not discuss, but the yarn I purchased…just wow.

My trip mainly centered around the market. Because this was a vacation for Tim and I, I didn’t want to leave him on his own for an entire day (or half a day) while I took a class. After everything that happened with the class sign-ups, I’m glad that I made that choice. I entered the lottery to try and get into the one-hour wonder for Judy’s Magical Cast-On, and was shocked when I got a space in the class. I never win anything selected by a random number generator, but I guess I won the one time that it actually counted! So I learned Judy’s Magical Cast-On directly from Judy Becker, and lo, it was indeed magical. Judy is also a very patient and pleasant teacher, and I came away from the class confident in my ability to repeat the cast-on.

Anyway, the market. I decided to go on the student preview night because I could (and because I wanted the best possible yarn choices). Sock Summit reminded me of ALA (American Library Association, for non-libraryfolk) both in terms of attendees and in terms of the near-riots over free shit. I had no idea that my professional and my personal interests attracted such similar crowds!

So there was a line (obviously) to get in to the preview. And when the doors opened, there was a crush of people all trying to get to a few places at once. Number one on most lists (mine too) was the Sanguine Gryphon booth, home of the mythical Bugga. The quest for Bugga at Sock Summit was not for the claustrophobic or faint-hearted. I managed to grab two skeins before I got frustrated with the hoarders who were purchasing 15+ skeins (most likely to use as currency on Ravelry). I buy yarn because I want it. I don’t buy it so I can trade up or whatever. I buy colors that I like and that I plan to use, and I have little patience for people who purchase mass quantities of the Yarn-of-the-Moment in whatever color they could grab so they can exchange it with someone else for something else. So to the woman in front of me at the Sanguine Gryphon booth who had so much Bugga in her arms that she couldn’t even hold it–and who was yakking on about how she’s traded Sundara and Wollmeise and whatever for other yarn–I hope you rediscover the joy of buying yarn that you actually want. Perhaps some of these “fairy-fart” yarns would be more available to others if the hoarders would lay the eff off.

Following my Sanguine Gryphon experience (which was made okay by the super-niceness of the women working the booth–grace under pressure, I tell ya), I headed over to the Loopy Ewe booth to see what goodies Sheri had in stock. And, speaking of fairy-fart yarn, she had Numma Numma. I saw one particularly lovely skein (Toasty in Black Cherry Jam) but none of the other colors were of interest. When I was getting ready to check out, I saw a really pretty skein of purple yarn, and it, too, was Numma Numma (The Usual this time) so I bought it as well. As I was checking out, the dyer stopped by the booth and she was very sweet and gracious (and kind of taken aback by the several people in the booth who went all fangirly over her).

Rainy Days and Wooly Dogs (home of GothSocks) was my next stop. I’ve chatted with Stephanie on Ravelry, and I knew I would like her. She’s really fantastic and just as cool and goth-y as I expected. You wouldn’t know it from looking at me now, but I was really into the goth/industrial scene in the early-to-mid-1990s, and there are things about the goth aesthetic that I still like. Stephanie’s yarn “speaks” to that side of me. So I bought a lot of it. I’m glad I did, because I think she sold out!

I wandered around on my way to Blue Moon and picked up some great sock blockers with cats on them, a couple of skeins of yarn from Crafts Meow, including one of her Dye for Glory entries, and some patterns from Knitspot (at the Briar Rose booth).

I went a little nuts at Blue Moon. I told myself that I wouldn’t purchase any of their regular colorways, because I still have my Rockin’ Sock Club coupon that I can use until the end of the year. So I bought mill ends and rare gems, and I bought a shitload of them. Seriously. They needed their own carry-on to go home. I did buy them over three trips to the market, so it’s not like I blew my money all at once. I did it gradually. And I got some great stuff, too. It’s all in my Ravelry stash (my Rav name is nanette) so you can take a look.

The trip to Portland was awesome overall. I had some great meals, drank some excellent beer, and did some good shopping. It was nice to go somewhere with Tim that didn’t involve attending a conference of some kind. I even dragged Tim into the market once, and he bought me a Paradise Fibers swift for our anniversary (the 5th anniversary, conveniently, is “wood”).

I’ll try to return with an update later this week that actually involves pictures of the stuff I’m knitting! I’m about 40% (maybe further) through Girasole, and I just bought yarn to make a second one for the home office. (Tim is changing jobs in November and will be working from home, and we’ll need a blanket to put over the fancy desk chair he’s planning to buy so the cats won’t scratch on it.) I’m about 2/3 of the way through the first of my Cleopatra’s Stockings (the toe-up project I started in the Judy’s Magical Cast-On class at Sock Summit), and I started a pair of Sunday Swing socks with my Bitchy Witchy GothSocks. So the needles are full, at least for now, and I should take some progress photos. But now I am tired, and this entry has gone on long enough!

A love of knitting almost always corresponds to an insane accumulation of yarn, which requires a creative storage solution. Yarn is usually pretty to look at, so it makes sense to find a way to put it out there where it can be admired.

My stash was stored in plastic containers in a closet that I refer to as the “craft closet,” mainly because it contains all of my craft-related supplies (and other crafty crap). It’s not very well-organized, despite my best intentions. I usually pull everything out of there once a year and put it back, but the amount of “stuff” in there has exceeded the closet’s capacity. Getting obsessed with sock knitting has helped somewhat–sock yarn takes up a lot less space than sweater quantities of yarn–but still, there’s no room for it, and I like to look at my sock yarn rather than discover it two years after I bought it, cowering in the back of the craft closet.

Tim and I were browsing at Target one weekend (about a year ago), probably looking at closet organization systems for one of the guest rooms, when we found the Itso line of furniture. Remember Multiples clothes from the 1980s, where you mixed and matched different pieces to create hundreds of outfits? Itso is kind of like that–you buy the pieces you want, then mix and match them to suit your needs. They’re not particularly deep, so they fit nicely along the back of the wall, and the furniture and accessories come in different colors so you can choose the ones that look best. Also, they are not very expensive, which always helps. I now have two sets.

Because I’m a cataloger, the yarn is organized by dyer and by club. Nerdy, eh?

Here’s some photos of my yarn storage:

I’ll probably need to buy another cubby for the shorter storage unit after I return from Sock Summit. I’ve been hoarding my money, so I plan on buying a lot of sock yarn!

Meanwhile, work continues on the Girasole, which I’m making as a Christmas gift for my mom. I’m almost to the end of Chart C, and the end of my first skein of yarn. The pics aren’t that great so far–it kind of looks like a poofy hat on the current needles–but you can check them out on Ravelry if you like. Once I get some better photos, I’ll post them here.

I’m also in the midst of two pair of socks: the Over the Rainbow socks, which are the first installment of the Woolgirl Oz Club, and the Tilting Cables Socks, which came with the Glinda the Good Witch kit from Woolgirl (Oz-themed, yes, but not part of the Oz Club proper). Over the Rainbow is a simple knit/purl pattern with garter-stitch heels and toes, and it’s been going quickly. I should be able to finish them by the end of the month so I can get my credit for Sock-a-Month. I just need to make some time to knit.

Tilting Cables–that’s another story. I usually try to finish one pair of socks before starting a new pair, but I bought a set of Signature Needle Arts DPNs with some of my birthday money, and I was aching to use them. One of my goals with the Woolgirl Oz Club has been to keep up with the kits, and since I was nearing the end of Over the Rainbow, I thought I’d back up to the Glinda kit. I’ve never cabled without a cable needle before, and I’m having some problems with it. It’s getting better now that I’ve been through the full pattern repeat once, but it’s still driving me nuts. Some of the cables look a little mangled. I haven’t taken a picture yet, partly because I’m embarrassed by my mangled cables, but the Madelinetosh sock yarn is pretty (a petal-pink with flecks of grey) and nobody is going to be looking all that closely at the cuff of my sock anyhow. I may switch from the Signature needles (which are very slippery) to one of my other sets of sock needles to see if that helps with the cabling. I probably just need practice, though.

I also have a lonely single Monkey that needs its companion. Once I’ve finished Over the Rainbow, I’ll probably cast on for the second sock. I probably should have knitted these consecutively, since I had the pattern pretty much memorized by the time I finished the first sock, but I was ready to move on to something else. This is in Madelinetosh sock (yet again), colorway Frida:

As far as knitting content goes, that’s all I’ve got–I’ll update with some reading content soon!