Christmas Presents, Schoolwork

I've already started thinking about Christmas presents again, since it was nice to have everything done in time last year. So far:

-Grandmas - tea cozys
-Grandpa - socks

And that's it ;) I'll think of more in awhile. I've got lots of time after all!

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I need to make another list of school items that need to be done, so that I can check them off and make myself feel less overwhelmed.

1. Anthro paper on cloth in Incan and Aztec society
2. Communications Topic Assignment II
3. Communications Topic Assignment III - 5%
4. Prepare Communications presentation (Due April 3)
5. Volcanology Lab 6 - 80% (Due April 7)
6. Volcanology Viscosity Lab (Due April 7)
7. Volcanology Lab 7 (Due April 7)
8. Volcanology Term Paper (Due April 7)
9. Receive corrections and rewrite Topic Assignments II and III (Due April 10)
10. Communications Poster (Due April 10)
11. Correct and rewrite Sapphire term paper (Due April 10)

Quick update - most of my tests came back normal, so it's not large-bowel Crohn's (could still be small bowel, esp. since I'm not absorbing nutrients well, according to my new bloodwork). At any rate, this means I'm having surgery on Dec. 7. It's a laparoscopy to try and see what the heck is going on in mah belleh. I shouldn't have to stay overnight, unless they find some adhesions (somewhat likely) that need a fair bit of work (unlikely). It means all my finals are put off until January, and I get a week of sitting on the couch with actually no need to do ANYTHING but knit. I'm going to rip out my Silk Garden One Skein Wonder and make it into mittens, as well as making myself some glittens. I also need a warm hat, so I want to get to Michaels before Dec. 7 to buy a couple skeins of Patons SWS for a palindrome hat.

In Christmas news, I am now at the following percentages:

Lace Hat - Done
Felted Clogs - 50%
Fingerless Mittens - Done
Tea Cozy - Not started
Socks - 50%

In school news, I am now at the following percentages:

Labs - 1 done, 1 left
Lab final - not studied yet
Min Dep paper - 20%
Min Dep presentation - not started
Isotope Paper - 33%
Isotope Presentation - not started
Petroleum Group Paper - not started
Petroleum Group Presentation - not started
Thesis - oh I don't even want to think about it

Eeep.

Christmas Presents

I've been thinking about (and working on) my Christmas presents, with all the spare time that's unfortunately been dumped into my lap. I decreased the number of presents significantly from last year, so that I don't end up crying in my knitting on Dec. 24. On the list are the following:

Lace Hat - Done
Felted Clogs - 50%
Fingerless Mittens - 50%
Tea Cozy - Not started
Socks - 40%

Possibly to add to the list, if I have time (if not some people will be getting bought gifts):

Toque
Convertible Mittens

I'm enjoying the knitting so far, although the socks are sucking the life out of me a bit at the moment. They're currently glaring at my from the table. Thing is, I'd like to make something for myself, so I'm very guiltily knitting on a pair of convertible mittens for me instead of knitting on Christmas gifts OR studying, both of which NEED TO BE DONE. The snow now sitting outside is helping to alleviate a little of that guilt though.

I got a scholarship as well, $500. I'm particularly proud of this one, because it had two contraints: high marks and an essay on your understanding of the life of a mining geologist. Hopefully I'll be eligible for a bursary as well (you find out at the end of December) and I can put even more payments on things. We're slowly but surely paying off some credit card debt we'd accrued awhile ago, and it's a relief to be putting decent payments on things.

Many pictures

I found my camera's battery charger!!! That means that I can finally take pictures without using expensive bought batteries. So I have lots of pictures to share finally!


Heather and Chad's quilt is DONE DONE DONE. It's lovely and soft, and although I cleaned it I included instructions to toss it in the washer again as soon as they get it - I'm pretty sure Heather is allergic to cats and I know I can't get it perfect with two cats in the house! TI hink it turned out quite well. It has a few flaws, the lines didn't match perfectly across the horizontal, and I mis-cut one strip of the brown and green pine/feather pattern, meaning I had to piece it back together (since I had limited fabric amounts bought from the States). I hope they'll like it though, it's going out with a video for them to snuggle and watch :)



My Bus socks. I'm knitting socks while on the bus, since it's a fairly long ride. I actually started these in September and had to rip them out 3 times before I got it right (1st - too many stitches, 2nd - not enough ribbing, 3rd - not enough stitches for the heel flap). I'm finally at the point where I can start turning the heel on them, and then make the other!




My lovely candy-cane socks from Angela. However, I'm a little unhappy with what I did with them. Angela had the beads strung on this white wool initially, but the pattern says that they should be on the same yarn as that for the body of the socks. Therefore, I went with the pattern and strung them on the red yarn, so that the white will peek through (hence the reason I took the picture this way). What do you think? Should I do the beading with the white yarn or leave it? Should the white yarn peek through regardless of what colour I use to knit the beaded portion? If it's not apparent in the above photo, those gaps are actually holes where the knitting underneath shows through, it's not knit in like it is in most honeycomb mitten patterns.

Two more pictures can be seen at the locations given below, but as they are (belated) Christmas presents I'm providing them as links instead of in the post.

Don't click Sean!

Don't click Angela!

R, S, T, and U are for...

R and S are for...ring and Sean! Finally, the long-awaited picture! Although this isn't a clear shot of the ring (next time) you can see it on my finger, and of course the FHF (Effing-hot Fiance) Sean. I look a bit rough in the picture, but that's because it was awfully cold here today (OK Marcia, not as cold as you! :D) and I had put on and take off my hat a bunch of times. Sean looks tired because he's in the midst of a term paper. But anyway, here's my alphabet.

R is for ring.

This is the ring Sean gave to me when he proposed in August, 2006. It's white gold, set with a .25 ct Type IIa brilliant cut diamond (can you tell I'm taking gemology?). It's absolutely beautiful and very simple. For a wedding band to go with it I think I'd like another white gold band, with a small amethyst and maybe a chip diamond on either side.

S is for Sean.

The wonderful, marvelous, hot, caring, loving, nerdy, techie Sean. My fiance. We met in Geophysics class in January 2005, and were introduced (to be friends!) by our friend Keith. Although Sean says his first memories are of watching me stretch in class - the chairs were uncomfortable, so I would arch my back over the back of the chair, not realising that this was drawing the attention of every boy in the class - the other thing we really remember is the day that one of the replacement professors started writing random multi-variable calculus questions on the board. While our much-younger classmates started going glassy-eyed, Sean leaned over to me and muttered "I don't know if that's Geophysics or he's giving us instructions to build a Warp Engine.". When I burst out laughing, he decided that I was definitely a girl of interest! :) We started hanging out and eventually dating nearer the end of the school year, and have been together ever since. We've been hiking at Cascades Park, visited the Mall of America, and lived in 3 different apartments together. A sure sign of our relationship is the way his cat Kyp has bonded to me - he spends every moment either lying beside me or sitting in my lap or on my chest. I love him with all my heart!

S is also for Sushi...



Another thing Sean introduced me to. The first time I tried it was in Mall of America, at Tiger Sushi. I only ate the vegetarian California Roll, which had pickled carrots, cucumber, and avocado. I wasn't thrilled, and particularly hated the taste of the nori. Later on, he convinced me to go to The Sushi Bowl in Thunder Bay, where I was suprised to learn I was liking Sushi! Since then I have become more and more obsessed, and no longer limit myself to the veggie stuff. My favourites are California Roll - with Crab!, Tekka Maki (tuna), and Firefly (a local special, it's tuna, salmon, chili and wasabi, and tempura flakes).


T is for...



Tea! I LOVE tea. When I worked at the Fort, we usually drank it at least once a day, if not twice. Mornings were Orange Pekoe, Earl Grey, or Lady Grey (for me), and afternoons were Moroccan Mint by President's Choice. The best mint/green tea I've ever had. Anyway, I love tea in all of it's forms. I am a big fan of the roasted tea you get at Japanese restaurants, which contains roasted, puffed rice and tastes toasty and a little nutty. I drink it for the flavour, not for the caffeine kick. Favourite flavours are Lady Grey, Prince of Wales, and Monk's Blend. The last two can be harder to get ahold of, and you might need a specialty tea store to get them. Monk's Blend in particular is amazing, because it contains vanilla and grendaine flavours.

U is for...

Umbrellas! I am obsessed with the Gryffindor umbrellas we see in Prisoner of Azkaban, during the Quidditch match. I would like a picture, but couldn't find any! They are pretty pig, burgundy with 2 or 3 gold stripes around the bottom edge. I lurve them though, and make it my quest to find one someday.

And some more present pictures: only click if you are NOT the person mentioned in the link!

NOT JENNY
NOT DAD

PATRICK! So glad to see you posting :D I'd like to know how to do silk-screening, I've never tried. It looks kind of hard to set up :P I need your e-mail address and your picture site because they somehow got lost in the shuffle and no one seems to have them!

White tree I painted on a long-sleeved t-shirt last weekend. I have a t-shirt with this on the front, but it's crooked and the paint cracked badly, plus the stencil leaked a bit. On this one I used freezer paper (so wonderful for stencils!), and instead of a brush I used a little sponge roller to put the paint on. Plus I mixed the paint and fabric medium in a more balanced ratio. This means that although it cracked (since it's a knit fabric) it doesn't stay split and looks all pretty.


Woot! I took a break from term paper 1/term paper 2/presentation/studying and made this recon (reconstruction). It's my Shinerama (for Cystic Fibrosis) t-shirt from University of Alberta. However, it was an XL, as all free t-shirts seem to be. I drew around the body and armscye of a t-shirt that fit well, then cut it and resewed it up the sides and across the bottom (salvaging the collar and part of the shoulder seams). Then I copied the shape of the cap sleeves of the well-fitting shirt, and cut new sleeves (again, salvaging most of the "cuff" seam) and sewed those in too. Woohoo! So much fun. Now I wish I had more free t-shirts to mess with - Value Village here I come!


Another t-shirt I reconned last summer. It was a little too big, since this was bought before Sean's Mom met me and she insisted to Sean I couldn't be so small I'd need a Youth M instead of a Youth L. This didn't require as much reconstruction since it was much smaller, but now it fits me perfect.

In terms of presents, I got a wonderful package from Angela containing presents from Europe, pictures very promptly. And speaking of Angela, as long as you're not her :) you can click here: NOT ANGELA to see one of the things I've done for Christmas for her so far.

Wow another Karlie spelled my way, that's amazing! My parents always say how it never occured to them to use a C or Y (and I prefer my spelling anyway) but there are very few people with the name! Anyway, here's some updates:

1) I don't have celiac disease, which is very exciting. I can eat wheat again! It also means that I have some (expensive) cookbooks to sell, since they were sooooo certain I had celiac and it's pretty much impossible to go gluten-free without cookbooks. Anyone know anyone who could use some gluten-free cookbooks?

2) This means that we have don't have a good idea why I'm exhausted, losing weight, and have a persistant cough. I think my Plagues and People class is getting to me, because I'd laugh if it turned out to be TB.
NOTE: I'm not being paranoid I have TB :) The website is just for interest's sake because I thought the topic was really fascinating

3) I made this:



The shirt, that is. It was a little miserable to sew, partially because it's brocade so I had to stitch around every edge to stop it fraying as I was sewing, and because the collar didn't fit, so I had to do a whole bunch of fiddling around. However, not only did I make the shirt, I made the buttons myself out of soutache braid, using a knot-button pattern.

4) I made a new blog: A Long Yarn (Christmas) where I'm going to post all my Christmas gifts as I make them. I'm hoping that this way I can use links to the posts, so that people who don't want to peek at the progress can choose not to.

5) That said, here are some peeks:
NOT Heather or Chad
NOT Dad
NOT Mary
NOT Becky


Other gifts will be forthcoming, once I've started them.

I can mark one Christmas present off the list! The thrummed mitts are done (see link in my sidebar), although one is slightly larger than the other. I think this is my gauge changing over *cough*1.5years*cough* I still have a whack of other ones to start, but I just can't do that until I actually have some yarn to work with. You'd think with ALL the yarn I have I could find something that would work, but no. Oh well. Once I get a little bit of money (I have two job interviews!) I can buy a bit more wool. I also have a bit of fabric to buy. If anyone has scraps of blues or white fabrics with a snowflake/snow/winter theme I'd absolutely love to take them off your hands :D I'm looking for abstract patterns. You can see the fabric I have already here in the middle of the post (click for a bigger picture). Mostly snowflake patterns, although some are a little abstract or have stars instead.

If you are looking for quilt scraps let me know, maybe we could do an exchange!