Kiss My Knits!

Tvini vs. the Postal Clerk

Second day of Spring break here. Knitting’s going slowly, as you might expect when you have a little girl at home all day who wants to play make believe that her Barbie doll is exploring the Amazon.

Yesterday, Em and I went over to the Girl Scout store to pick up badges which the girls have earned, as they’re eager to gussy up their uniforms. While I was there, I looked at the other “fun patches” they had available. These are patches the girls get for doing activities that don’t qualify as badges, but which are still fun enough that they want to commemorate them. My girls love collecting things, so they’re all over anything that gets them a patch or a badge.

Specifically, I was looking to see what they had available that might be good for them to have to commemorate the visit of my friend the vet. She’s agreed to talk to the troop, and I’ve got a few fun ideas planned for that visit that I’m running past her. This will actually count toward both our “animals” try-it and our “careers” try-it, both of which we’ve half completed. But hey, Dr. Laura deserves a fun patch in her honor.


Looking around at all the other patches made me think about other people in my life I can use encourage to help the women of tomorrow.

Now whom I do I know who I can try to sucker in who might like to help…

Let me think…

Starts with I, ends with lliane…

Hmmm…

What did I do yesterday instead of knitting? First, I joined Facebook. Welcome to the World of Tomorrow!

Next, I tried something new with my husband. No, not like that, you weirdos. A new role playing game. No, not like… oh, I give up. See, when we cleaned up for my daughter’s birthday party a while back, we also went over the bookshelves in a way we hadn’t done in a while. Steve uncovered his old D&D red box. It still had old character sheets from high school in it.

D&D and board game ‘Runebound’ under the cut.

Today I developed cracks on my fingertips on my left index finger, in exactly the spot I use to push my needletip, and my right thumb, in exactly the spot the yarn hits when I’m moving my stitches.

Hmm… it’s almost as if my body were trying to tell me something…

I’m all band-aided up, but there’ll be no knitting tonight.

Powering through the list!

Examples of the”swaps” my Brownie troop will be making today. The top campfire is triangles of felt glue-sticked to a barrette back. We may add logs in the form of twigs which the girls scavenge, weather permitting.

The bottom s’more is craft foam glue-sticked together, with a face drawn on the foam marshmallow. They’ll be attached to pin backs which already have adhesive on them. I found these craft ideas at the link from yesterday.

I find it’s a good idea to make one example ahead of time so they have a point of reference. They’ll naturally jump off and do their own thing, which is good, but it’s handy to see what you’re jumping off from.

So yesterday my mother…um… I’m going to go with “encouraged” me to get to bed at a reasonable hour. We made a deal wherein I promised to go to bed by 10 if she promised to not gallivant all over town but to REST that day. You may recall that she just had surgery. Nothing slows this woman down.

True story about my mom: After she gave birth to me, her doctor walked into her hospital room and found her standing up with her palms flat on the floor. “I just wanted to see if I could still do it,” she said. Her idea of recovery time is different than the rest of us mere mortals’.

However, she is nothing if not a woman of her word, and so she e-mailed me this morning to tell me she’d lived up to her part of the bargain, how’d I do?

I was in bed by 10, as promised. Then the cat, who is on a diet, started begging for food at 3am. And my daughter got up at 5:30. But I was in bed by 10!

Even though my sleep was broken up into little chunks, I really do feel better. Leave it to Mom to know what’s best for her girl.

At right: Emily and her grandparents at a school function, 2006.

New Joss Whedon musical? With Neil Patrick Harris and Nathan Fillion? I’m there, baby!

I have a dentist appointment tomorrow morning, which wouldn’t be an issue except that I also have a Girl Scout meeting tomorrow afternoon which I don’t have supplies for. Frankly, I’m really, really tired today, even though I got to bed at a semi-reasonable hour last night. Sleep deprivation from the time change has finally caught up with me. The appointment couldn’t be rescheduled without a fee, so I’m going anyway, and I’ll make do with the scouts.

Some of our girls are going to an overnight camp in April, and they’re required to learn a song to share with the other campers and also to make some swaps to trade with the other girls. Six girls are going (including little sisters of some scouts), four girls aren’t, so it’s kind of weird to be running a meeting to take care of the needs of half the girls. A half which doesn’t include my daughter, who elected not to go after she found out just how much her nighttime routine would be disrupted at camp. Oh well. There’s a daytime camp coming up, so I think I can sell it as something they’ll still use in the future. And I found a page with some swaps I think my girls can make that won’t require too much in the way of supplies.

Although Emily doesn’t want to sleep under the stars, she has expanded her astronaut interest to include the constellations. It’s a pretty natural fit for her. She’s already interested in space, and she loves sets of things. When she goes to bed at night, she likes for us to lie in the dark for a few minutes and point out imaginary constellations on her ceiling we see. Well, the constellations are actual constellations, it’s just that obviously they are not on her ceiling. Maybe I should invest in one of those little planetarium orbs like my dad got for my mom when I was a kid. I’m sure it couldn’t cost that much for a kid-friendly version of one. (ETA: Sky Turtle? Wow.)

Em keeps asking me to tell her a new constellation I haven’t told her before. I’m having to really reach at this point, for more obscure things like Saggita the Arrow. As a result, now she knows unusual things for a 9-year-old girl, like that Gemini contains Castor and Pollux. I’m having to brush up myself, too, so that I can recognize more constellation in the night sky. So this is good for both of us.

It also gives me something quick to put on her lunchbag in the morning – provided I can remember what the various constellations actually look like. This might also be a good intro into the Greek myths. Hmmm, maybe it’s time to check out the D’Aulaires again…

For my own reference, a few constellation links:
http://www.abc.net.au/children/space/games/skypictures/default.htm
http://spaceplace.nasa.gov/en/kids/st6starfinder/st6starfinder.shtml
http://stardate.org/nightsky/constellations/
http://www.kids.union.edu/fsnCannedConstellations.htm (if you know anyone who still has film canisters)

Possible books:
H.A. Rey’s “Find the Constellations”
Michael Driscoll’s “A Child’s Introduction to the Night Sky” (includes glow in the dark star chart)
D’Aulaires Book of Greek Myths (may be a little advanced)