Tuesday morning thoughts

[magid]

crochet
I've been working on a crochet project, making a vest from the vast reserves of DMC 8 I bought for making kippot. The next step is to work on the edging, for which I assume I'll need a box (10 or 12 rolls, I don't remember) of black. Yesterday, I went to Windsor Button Shop to get it, and found to my dismay that they carry everything but DMC 8, even though, I was told, they've had a number of people ask for it. The only other place I know that definitely carries DMC 8 is the Israel Book Shop, but I'm hoping to find some on this side of the river, or downtown. Any suggestions? (Buying online is possible, but shipping costs and timing make it far less appealing.)

justice?
How can this be justice? I understand the fines between the adults involved, but to betroth a vaguely-related toddler to a middle-aged man?!

Firefly
OK, I'm hooked, half a season in. I'm already annoyed by the likely lack of story arc conclusions, and looking forward to the movie.
(Thanks to Queue and ZZBottom for facilitating.)

dilemma: March 13-14
As usual, everything happens at once, and sometimes it's hard to choose. The options:

1. Go to NYC overnight, taking a day off from work, to see a friend who lives in the midwest (a) for the first time since her wedding last summer, and (b) for the last time before the baby arrives. Plus I'd get to see/hear some kind of performance her brother-in-law is in. On the other hand, I don't know how much time there'd be to hang out, and I'd have to figure out housing and timing for getting back in time for my regular Monday night gaming. It might be better to spend more (for the travel to her), and know there'll be time.
   
2. Go to Waltham, taking a day off from work to go to a local JOFA conference. I wish it were all day Sunday and a half day Monday, but it's Sunday night and all day Monday. There are going to be some dynamic teachers there, and it's very local (read: convenient). Cost: $36 for the whole thing, including lunch ($45 at the door).
   
3. Go to work as usual. (The advantage being the saving of a vacation day. On the flip side, of course, is what I'd be saving the vacation day for.) [ETA: There might be something fun going on at work that day, too, it being Pi Day...]

Comments

[zzbottom.livejournal.com]

Always willing to be an enabler. :) Glad you're enjoying it.

[magid.livejournal.com]

:-)

Course, once it's done, I'll have to figure out if there's a next program...

[queue.livejournal.com]

You could always start on Buffy.

[magid.livejournal.com]

Everyone else's already watched that, though.

[ruthling.livejournal.com]

Firefly is way cooler than I thought possible (especially since I'm one of those "freaks" who never liked Buffy). Based on a Boskone panel, the movie might actually be really good.

Scheduling conflicts suck. Roll some dice.

[magid.livejournal.com]

I've only ever seen one episode of Buffy, the musical one, which I have to assume is much better if one knows the show.

Dice: well, really, I have to figure out the balance points for each. Right now, I'm thinking about the conference, and more frequent phone calls with long distance friend, perhaps a visit once the sprog is grown a bit (read: sleeps more regularly, leading to greater parental sanity).

[ruthling.livejournal.com]

That sounds reasonable. 18 years should be about right ;)

18 years

[magid.livejournal.com]

No way! That's when they're not only in possession of a driver's license, but likely no longer living under the same roof... Parents stay up all night wondering where their kid might be wandering...

[ichur72.livejournal.com]

I assume the thread you're using for the vest is very thin, like most types that are used for making yarmulkes? If so, I am impressed. I can't work for long with thread that thin because it's murder on my hands and arms. I've had good results with using 2 or 3 strands together, though -- made a nice snood that way.

[magid.livejournal.com]

Yes, I'm using regular kippah thread. The vest is going to be made of many circles, zig-zagged together with the black, and I've finished my guesstimate number of circles. Luckily, I can crochet on the T, so I usually end up not crocheting for very long; my hands aren't fond of crocheting for hours on end.

I hadn't thought to strand them together. Do you twist them to make them more of a yarn themselves, or just use three strands all parallel? I guess I'd think of buying some of the wonderful yarns I've seen before stranding the thin stuff.

[ichur72.livejournal.com]

I don't twist them together exactly; it's more like holding them together. That is, I use the same hook to crochet all of them at once, but I just put the spools on the floor in front of me and pull out extra lengths from each simultaneously rather than taking the trouble to wind them together. The strands usually end up twisting around each other as the project progresses, but there's no need for me to do it deliberately.

I thought of using several thin strands together because I wanted to make a snood. I would have used yarn, but by and large most of the yarn I can buy is acrylic, meaning that even the lightest-weight yarn I can find will turn into a heat trap once I put the finished product on my head. And with the climate in GA being what it is, it's not worthwhile to make a head covering that will keep me warm. Wool yarn is a problem for the same reason -- and besides, wool makes me itch like mad. By contrast, the thin stuff you can use to make yarmulkes is available in cotton, which is much cooler than acryclic even if I'm using three strands at once.

If you're interested, I can see about posting a picture of my snood somewhere so you can get an idea of what it looks like. I like the effect of several different colors at once, and since the strands do not always fall in the same place the color is not perfectly even.

[magid.livejournal.com]

Crocheting three strands together: got it.

I hadn't thought about the heat-trap properties of head coverings (a function of not wearing them except for weather or fashion reasons). Aren't there cotton yarns available, too?

Don't go to the trouble of putting a photo up; I can picture it fairly well (the colors and such) from your description.

[ichur72.livejournal.com]

I honestly don't know if there are cotton yarns available. I've looked, even at specialty stores, but never seen anything but wool and acrylic. Cotton twine does seem relatively easy to obtain and is available in thicknesses comparable to some yarns, but ... the range of color is not wide. Mostly I've seen beige/jute color, with the occasional white. And since I'd rather not make a headcovering that looks like a giant macrame project, I'd rather work with several strands of thin colored thread. It seems to work fine, so why not?

[magid.livejournal.com]

Hey, it works, so don't fix it, definitely. I just thought I remember years ago seeing some nice, colored cotton yarns.