Month: January 2011

If Only We All…

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Trying out my technique on the boy again:

Me: “Tell me something happy that happened to you at school today.”

Boy (completely serious): “Ummm, being a Zen Buddhist.”

Me (trying to keep the smile out of my voice): “How do you be a Zen Buddhist?”

Boy: “Well, I try to be like Stillwater and am just very peaceful and quiet.”

 
 
 
*As a side note, I highly recommend all the Jon Muth books. “Zen Shorts” is a good place to start.  Great stories that introduce Zen principles and approaches to life problems in a way that kids understand, all illustrated with beautiful watercolor paintings.

The Cowl that Swallowed Me

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For Christmas, my sister gave me a project to knit! At first, when she handed it to me, I thought she was giving me yarn and a pattern to knit a scarf for her, and was like, “Oh…how thoughtful of you for yourself.”  But no, it was for me!

Pattern: Chunky Seeded Cowl

Yarn: Blue Sky Alpacas Bulky Natural

I love this! It’s big and chunky and I feel for a second like I’m a hip Brooklynite walking in Park Slope instead of a Denverite schlepping it on Larimer.

I would never, never have bought this color for myself–am not usually a fan of chartreuse, but I think it looks just lovely all knitted up.

The fabric is lofty  and heavily textured:

And in case of a sudden snowstorm, I can pull it up over my head to protect my coif.

I happen to have a skein left over and think that a slouchy hat would be the perfect companion piece.

Thanks, Sapana!

Fixing Nemo

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[Let me start by saying that I had  a clever idea for this blog post comparing my quest of the perfect Nemo hat to that of Ahab and Moby Dick.  It was funny.  Then, I mentioned this to Eric, who proceeded to tear it apart bit by bit until it was unusable.  Something about how Ishmael isn’t Ahab and how Ahab hated Moby Dick for eating his leg and how nothing really fit and I really don’t care because every time I’ve tried to read Moby Dick all I can think about is how I’m wasting precious minutes of my life being bored out of my mind, but still, it ruined my analogy and I didn’t want to get mocked by other intellectuals so instead you are left with this:]

The girl hates hats.  The girl loves “Finding Nemo.” It is cold in Colorado, and one needs a hat for the winter.  I thought, why not make her a Nemo hat?

While I was making it, she seemed pretty excited–it’s pretty fast and only took me a few days.

Once I added the eyes, though, she backed away slowly, fear in her eyes.  I got the boy to model it:

Pattern: Fish Hat: Dead or Alive

Yarns: Loops and Threads Impeccable Worsted

I guess it might be a little freaky to see friendly little Nemo eating your head. And before someone starts, I know that it’s not an exact replica but it’s close enough for a 2 year old’s hat.

So after much discussion, we figured out that the big felted eyes were scaring her.  She insisted on a change to “puh puh buttons,” or “purple buttons.” Her favorite color is purple.  So we dug up a few buttons from a sewing kit that the boy has, and he insisted on sewing them on himself.

 

 

 

 

After that, it must have been slightly less scary, because she agreed to put it on for a little bit.

Then she wore it to the store, where it kept falling off her head and I realized it was too big, even though I’d sized it down for her head.  I added a messy looking but functional dart in the back, figuring it would be hidden by the floppy tail.

 

And did she love it then?

No. She completely and fully rejects the Nemo hat.  Won’t wear it.

The boy likes it, though, and will wear it.  With one request–“Mom, can we put the big eyes back on again?”

 

 

The Hills are Alive…with Bandits

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I recently got the Sound of Music, now restored to a very nice high-def.  Now you can really see just how ugly the children’s curtain playclothes are and realize that Captain von Trapp had every reason to be horrified.   I remember when it was broadcast on network TV once a year and the whole family would gather around to watch.  I’d always take a break right at “Climb Ev’ry Mountain.” Blech.  I still can’t stand that song.

The boy and I watched the first half the other night.  It is long.  Really, really long and you see how much they cut out of the movie for the TV version, which I’d never known.

What was kind of funny, though, was the questions that the boy asked while we were watching it.

“What’s a telegram?” he asked after Rolf delivered the first one. I suppose there’s no reason he’d EVER know what that was!

“Well,” I began, “It’s sort of like an email, but they didn’t have computers so they had to deliver it by hand.” I figured I’d leave the whole lesson on Morse Code for another time.

The next one came shortly after that, when Liesl and Rolf are frolicking before the impending thunderstorm.  “What’s going to happen?! Are they going to be okay?!” He was genuinely terrified for them.  I think this is sort of interesting, but I wasn’t sure where it came from.  I wonder if it’s because many kids’ movies nowadays have their characters in almost constant peril.  Think of the latest Toy Story movie–I mean, the characters are rarely just enjoying a free moment.  Some of it might be that thunderstorms are just scarier to little kids than they are to adults.

My favorite, though, was during “Do Re Mi” when Maria and the children begin to sing at their picnic and then all get up and dance away across the hills. He asked, “Why are they leaving all their stuff there?”

“Well, kiddo, they’re just having fun and singing. Why do you ask?”

“Because a thief might come and take all their stuff!” cried my little city kid.

I’m so delighted that my child can watch the first, non-scary half of the Sound of Music and still find a way to find danger lurking in every scene.  I wonder how the second half is going to go when the actual bad guys appear.

New Year and Holiday Wrap Up

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Happy New Year!

Holidays were so, so fun this year.  We did our usual tradition of pierogies and started a new tradition: skiing on Christmas day.  There was no one on the mountain, the weather was beautiful, and we came home to open presents in the evening.  The boy had his first day on the mountain ever!  At the end of the day, he said, “I couldn’t stop or turn but I loved going down the mountain really fast!”  Sapana, as always, flew out for the holiday and it was so wonderful to have her here.  While she has no current plans to leave New York, I’d like to take this opportunity to point out that Denver is a fabulous place to live.

I love that the kids are old enough now to really enjoy things.  I know there’s some of you out there that are real baby people, but I’m a bigger fan of the walking/talking set.  It’s just so great to see both of them excited to decorate the tree, open presents and participate in the marathon pierogie making.

Oh! The doll! The knitted doll went over very well, and, as I suspected, was promptly named, “Baby.”  The girl received a set of baby accessories from her other aunt and was pushing her around in the stroller and putting her to sleep in the pack and play.

We also watched a few movies over Christmas, with varying reviews.  First up, “Scott Pilgrim vs. The World”–I loved it, Eric hated it, Sapana just thought it was weird.  “Get Him to the Greek”–we were expecting a “Hangover”-like comedy, and instead just got awful awful awfulness.  Three thumbs down.  “Black Swan”–creepy and scary.  Three trembling thumbs up.  And finally, an old favorite, “The Big Lebowski.”  Sapana and I were so tired we fell asleep halfway into our white russians and were only awakened by Eric’s guffaws throughout the film.  One thumb up, two lame movie snoozers.

And to finish, a wrap up of the year’s knitting and a slideshow of the holidays.  I hope everyone had a great month, and here’s looking forward to 2011!