I'm Back!

Yep, I realize it's been 5 months since I've updated my blog. Wow! I actually didn't realize it had been that long until I went on here. Just want to let everyone know I'm still alive, and post an update on what's been going on with me (warning - this is a LONG post!).

 The past few months have been really busy (and interesting). I (finally!) started a new job at the beginning of September. A real, permanent full time job with better pay and benefits! I'm working as an administrative assistant for a nonprofit organization that oversees and provides food and services to over 100 hunger centers and hot meal sites in the Cleveland area. It includes one hunger center in my suburb, which had been a great help to my husband and I during our employment struggles of the past year and a half.

So, it's not the best paying job, or the most exciting, but I am making a lot more than at the BOE (no more phone calls from irate voters either, ha, ha!), have a nice boss and coworkers, and a lot more flexibility with my schedule (no more last-minute, mandatory overtime!). It's also in a great location downtown - 5 minute walk to the bus stop (no more taking two busses every day either!), and close to restaurants and shopping (well, what little shopping we have downtown anyway). Mostly I'm just thankful to finally have a permanent job, and to be done with all the stress and frustration of job hunting. I was especially thankful after my first week there, when my boss had me send our rejection letters (!) to all of the applicants (over 50) who I beat out for the job!

On the down side, my husband is still laid off, and hasn't even gotten many interviews. He's been out of work for 7 months now, and is feeling pretty depressed about it. Fortunately Ohio has had a lot of unemployment pay extensions, so when his unemployment ran out in September, he was able to get an extension, and keep receiving benefits.

In other news, my daughter started 6th grade at a new school this fall. She was diagnosed with a math learning disability in 3rd grade, and we've been struggling with her previous Catholic school since then to get her the help she needed. She was being pulled out of class several times a week for tutoring, but was showing no progress in math, and too many of her regular teachers had little patience with her learning problems. Several of them completely disregarded her IEP, which allows her accomodations like extra time on tests. Her 4th grade teacher essentially told me that Bethany was lazy, and that she could do fine in school if she was more motivated. At the same meeting, the school gym teacher expressed her "concern" about Bethany's lack of interest in sports, and her difficulty in learning the rules of basketball. WTF??? I'm not athletic. I've never been athletic, and never will be. I admire people who are athletically talented, but I don't think the world is going to come to an end if a child can't play a sport! I think the emphasis on gym class should be the children getting exercise, and if they participate in class, that should be enough, and from what the gym teacher said, Bethany was participating, even if she didn't enjoy the class.

After 4th grade, things just really went downhill for Bethany. She had a terrible year in 5th grade, failing nearly all of her classes, despite her keeping up with her assignments and homework. Her teachers, unfortunately, did a lousy job keeping my husband and I informed about exactly how badly Bethany was doing in school. She hated going to school, and was getting increasingly anxious and frustrated. I also found out, belatedly, that Bethany had problems with a number of kids harrassing her and making fun of her (which her teacher never mentioned to us), and which she said her teacher did next to nothing to stop.

The school principal waited until several weeks after school ended to inform us that Bethany would have to repeat 5th grade unless we could get her private tutoring 4 days a week, several hours a day, and Bethany could "demonstrate competency in the 5th grade" material. Besides the fact that with my husband being laid off, and my working at the BOE for $10 an hour, that paying $200 or more a week for tutoring would have been impossible, I also felt it would do little to help Bethany, because I've felt for quite a while that she possibly has ADD and anxiety in addition to her learning problems.

After a lot of research and discussion, my husband and I decided to try to put Bethany in a small (110 kids from kindergarten to 8th grade) Catholic school here in the Cleveland area, for kids with learning disabilities, ADD/ADHD, and mild autism, about a 20 minute drive from our house. It's a beautiful school, in a converted mansion that a wealthy Cleveland area family left to the Catholic diocese in the 1950's, to be turned into a school for learning disabled kids. It's on 5 acres of land, all wooded, with a lot of deer and wildlife. The school is only one of two of its kind in the Cleveland area, and draws kids from the entire seven county region. Some of the kids have an hour to a hour and a half commute to school every day. It's also very racially and economically diverse, considerably more so than Bethany's last Catholic school.

The school has an excellent track record for its kids going on to be successful in high school, and go to college, and quite a few of their graduates have gone on to graduate from Ivy League colleges. I even found out that Bethany's LD tutor at her previous school is a graduate of this school as well. I had read about the school in our local newspaper a few years ago,  and it seemed like the right place for Bethany, but I figured we couldn't afford it, and I wanted to keep her in a school in our neighborhood. I contacted the principal of the new school, and she was absolutely wonderful from the time she first emailed me - so kind and understanding and helpful.

We went to visit the school, and I was really sold when I saw their beautiful art therapy room with clay, a pottery wheel, kiln, sewing machine, fabric, all kinds of drawing materials, and, the best part, knitting needles, crochet hooks, loom and yarn! Yarn! I asked the principal about it, and she said some of their autistic students like to knit in class, because it helps calm them down, and helps them pay attention. How awesome is that?! The principal and teachers truly made us feel welcome at the school, and thankfully, they were not only able to admit Bethany, but, even though we got Bethany enrolled late in the summer, enough financial aid to knock the tuition down from $10,500, to $3,500,  the same tuition we would have paid for Bethany at her previous Catholic school. It's still a struggle to pay with my husband being out of work, but I am so grateful Bethany is going there now.

Bethany is in a small class of only 15 kids (only three girls including Bethany!) with two teachers, and they have the ability to pull the kids out into even smaller groups, even to teach kids individually. The kids can take classes at higher or lower grade levels, depending on their needs. Bethany is in 6th grade, but is taking 5th grade math. She's getting weekly art therapy and occupational therapy, because she struggles with handwriting. The 6th, 7th, and 8th graders also have a bi-weekly social skills class. 

Bethany's only been there 3 months, but already it's been like a complete transformation. She wakes up every day eager to go to school. She does her homework without me reminding her, and without complaining. She's making a lot of friends, getting along well with all of the kids, participating in class, and keeping up with all of her assignments. She got her first quarter report card, and got A's and B's in every class. Her improvement in math has been nothing short of amazing. Her teachers are kind and caring, and I can tell they truly enjoy working with special needs kids. Everything about the school is very child centered, and much less strict than her previous Catholic school, yet they still hold the kids to high standards, and believe that all kids can be successful in school, despite their learning problems. I truly regret now that I didn't try to enroll Bethany there a few years ago.

My son Dominic, who started 1st grade this year, is still at Bethany's old Catholic school though. I don't care much for the school anymore, but the public schools in my suburb are for the most part lousy, and nearly all are in a voucher program through the state of Ohio (Ohio EdChoice), so I am able to receive a voucher to pay Dominic's full Catholic school tuition. I feel this is the best option for him right now. My husband and I are hoping eventually to move to another suburb close to Bethany's new school, that has very good public schools, and send Dominic to public school.

Hard for me to believe, but high school is only a few years off for Bethany, so I am already thinking about where I'll send her to high school. I don't know how well she would do in a large public high school, with her special needs, and having only been in small Catholic schools, and I don't want her to feel singled out and stupid being in a special education program within a regular school. It's going to be a tough decision when the time comes.

In addition to being busy with my new job and the kids being back in school, I've been busy with doctor's appointments for Bethany in regards to her school struggles. My husband and I took her to a developmental pediatrician at a local children's hospital here, and she after meeting with us individually, meeting with Bethany, and various testing and questionaires, the pediatrician diagnosed Bethany with an anxiety disorder and ADD. She gave us a referral to a psychologist at the same hospital, who specializes in anxiety in children, and also said she said she'd like to see how Bethany would do with a low dose of Prozac.

I personally would like to try counseling first, and see how Bethany does with that. She's already on several medications for asthma and allergies, and I'm reluctant to put her on something else too. I'm also concerned because there's been a lot of things in the news lately about how one of Bethany's asthma medications, Singulair, which she's been on since she was 5 1/2 or 6, Singulair, can cause psychological side effects in some people. The FDA just recently mandated a warning label for the medication, about side effects including depression, fear, and mood changes. I'm going to talk to the psychologist about whether I should stop giving it to Bethany. It has helped her asthma a great deal, but I won't keep giving it to her if it's at all responsible for her anxiety. My husband and I have an appointment for a parents-only consultation with the psychologist on November 21st. I just want to get Bethany the help she needs now while she's still young, so she won't have to struggle as an adult.

Well, I hope that wasn't too boring! I have been knitting (a lot!) over the past few months. I haven't bought any yarn in ages, and my only decent pair of knitting needles is a pair of size 8, circular bamboo needles (I've come to the conclusion that I hate metal needles, and that I'm not too fond of straight needles either), so the only things I've knitted are stash yarn projects, where I can use size 8 needles. I've been meaning to take pictures, and post on here, but my digital camera has been messing up lately. Hopefully I'll have some pictures to post in the next week or so. Now that I've gotten the hang of knitting, I'm really enjoying it! I still like crocheting, but I'm glad to be able to do both crafts. Maybe one day I'll get around to learning how to sew too!

For anyone who's been patient enough to read through this whole long post, here's a picture of my kids in their Halloween costumes yesterday. Of course, as luck would have it, it was 60-70+ degrees for the past two weeks, windless, and sunny, through Friday, then Saturday ended up barely 50 degrees and cold (yes, I'm a wimp - 50 degrees is cold to me!), overcast, and windy. We took the kids trick or treating with my brother and sister in law, my sister, and the kids' cousins and had a great time. My daughter also had a sleepover with her best friend, her 11 year old cousin Rosie.

My brother and sister in law recently moved to an upper-class suburb, and wow, those folks out there sure were generous with the candy! A lot of people were giving out full-size candy bars, some 2 bars per kid! Sure beats when I was a kid, and was lucky to just get mini candy bars, and of course, there were always some folks who gave out stuff like apples, boxes of raisins, or (usually from the older people), bags of pennies, ha, ha!

So, here's my hippie girl and Harry Potter boy (who refused to wear his Harry Potter costume glasses for the picture) at my sister's house:

Thanks for reading!

Updates

Wow, I was just looking at my blog and realized I hadn't updated it in nearly two months. I didn't realize it had been that long.

Well, where to start...

I'm still working at the Board of Elections. When I went back in March, they brought back me and 4 other temps with the plan of eventually hiring us to fill 5 open permanent positions they had. The 5 positions ended up being cut to 2, and then brought back up to 4. 4 positions and 5 temps interested in them = 1 person not being hired. Several weeks ago the positions were opened for any current temps to apply. They interviewed 9 people (all temps from different departments), including me. Last Thursday they announced who was hired, and well, I was the one person from my department who wasn't.

What's so frustrating is that the lady who's head of the department told me how happy she's been with my work, how the quality of my work is excellent, etc., etc., but they didn't choose me because I can't work a lot of overtime during election seasons (because of my kids and if my husband goes back to work on nights). Of the other 4 temps they did hire permanently, three are young, single, and childless, and the fourth has a teenage daughter in her last year of high school, so none of them have child care issues to worry about. Stupid me assumed my not being able to work a lot of overtime wasn't too much of a problem, since they brought me back as a temp this time, even though they had dozens of other temps to choose from, who could work a lot of overtime.

I'm still employed at least, probably through the end of the fall, maybe through the end of the year, but having that permanent position would have meant more money. Health insurance (which I desperately need since my husband's and kids' insurance runs out June 30th, and I haven't had medical insurance in over a year). Sick time. Vacation time. Holiday pay. When I wasn't the only temp in my area, it wasn't so bad. We (the temps) liked to commisserate about the lousy job market and our need for permanent employment. Now, being the only temp, I feel like the unpopular kid who didn't get invited to the big party of the year. It was really, really hard dragging myself into work on Friday knowing my best chance at permanent employment had been dashed.

I hate having to start all over from scratch now - fruitlessly searching for jobs, applying and hoping for interviews, going through interviews, hoping to be hired, and being disappointed all over again when I'm not. I'm truly burned out on it. If my husband weren't still out of work, I wouldn't feel so overwhelmed, but his being out of work just compounds my stress.

About the only good news we've gotten lately is that our landlord, who has amassed quite a collection of rental properties, and who is looking to add more, asked my husband today (knowing our situation and given my husband's maintenance skills) if he would be interested in coming to work for him as a property manager, handling repairs on his properties, working with city inspectors and the Section 8 program (for his tenants that get assistance), etc. It wouldn't pay as much as my husband was making at his last job, but it would relieve a lot of stress financially, while my husband's waiting to when/if he'll get called back to work at his old job.

Last Friday, my 11 year old niece, Rosie, slept over on Friday and Saturday night. On Friday night, we ate at Cici's Pizza (if you've never been to one, it's a good, cheap alternative to fast-food restaurants). Saturday turned out to be rainy and chilly most of the day, but the kids talked my husband and I into taking them to the playground. There's a fantastic playground here next to a Jewish community center, all set up to look like a miniature town, with a pretend bank, fire station, school, houses, etc. It was built by volunteers and with donations, as a public playground for both disabled and non-disabled kids. The kids had a lot of fun, despite the rain. Here's some pictures:

After the playground, we went to the library and rented some DVD's. The girls and I watched "Kit Kittredge: An American Girl", about a 10 year old girl growing up during the Depression. I wasn't expecting much, but it turned out to be a pretty good movie. Christina, I think Piper would really like that movie.

In fiber-related news, after two and a half years of drooling over knitting patterns, admiring gorgeous projects on crafty blogs (ahem, Bezzie and Christina!), I decided to sit down, break out my knitting needles and some books, and learn how to knit. After struggling mightly with casting on (long-tail cast on), knit stitches, purl stitches, and binding off, I finally got the hang of it, and have now been knitting for 3 weeks! Yep, it's true! I even have a finished knitting project to show!

Ta da! It's a knitted kerchief with a crocheted edging, for Rosie, who asked me last weekend if I could knit or crochet her something (and she's such a sweet kid, how could I say no?).

I got the pattern from a library book, "Find Your Style and Knit it Too". I had several pairs of knitting needles I had collected over the past 2 years, during previous unsucessful attempts to learn how to knit, but my Dominic, having decided that knitting needles make good pretend pirate swords, lost or broke nearly all of them, except for a size 8, 16 inch bamboo circular needle, and a couple of aluminum straight needles (which I despise - I have the hardest time keeping the stitches on them). I wanted to knit something besides swatches, and having little extra money for new needles or yarn, I decided on this kerchief, which was perfect to make on the circular needles.

This is actually the second one I've made. The first was in some stash Cotton-Ease, and I ripped it out and restarted it literally at least 15 times. I kept messing up the yarn overs, purling when I was supposed to knit, and knitting when I was supposed to purl. I finally finished it after several days, but it had a lot of mistakes, and I just wasn't happy about giving something with a bunch of mistakes away. Yesterday afternoon, I started on this one, in some stash Sugar N' Cream (Pinky Stripes), and finished it this morning. I'm pretty happy with how it came out.

I have a stack of knitting books from the library sitting on my kitchen table now, tempting me with all their patterns. I've come to the conclusion that knitting is considerably slower than crocheting, that it's much more complicated, and it's way harder to fix mistakes, but so far, I really like it! For my next project, I'm hoping to knit this baby blanket (a big impetus for me finally learning how to knit!) for my husband's best friend and his wife, who are expecting their first child (a boy) in August).

In non-knitting related news, I hope everyone had a good Memorial Day. My husband and kids and I went to my oldest brother's house for a cookout. My brother's wife is Arabic (Palestinian) and a wonderful cook. Her aunt brought over a whole lamb for the cookout, and we had chicken kabobs, lamb kabobs, the most delicious hamburgers (from the Arabic meat shop - they had garlic, onions, and spices ground right in), and tons of side dishes and desserts. The kids had fun playing with all of their cousins, and of course, I was happy to see my little 16 month old niece, Jenna. Isn't she just the cutest little thing?!Of course, now that I know how to knit, Jenna is going to be totally spoiled with all kinds of cute, girly, hand-knitted gifts!

Well, off to bed. Holiday Mondays always go by too quick!

Baby Photos!

I forgot to mention a few other crochet things I found last week...a lady on the Yahoo Crochet Partners group mentioned a magazine called Crafts N' Things, that has a whole section of crochet patterns this month. I found the magazine at a drugstore by my job, and it had a bunch of really cute patterns, so I bought a copy. While I was looking at the magazines, I also found a knitting magazine, Knit Simple, that has an article about Vanna White and her new line of Lion Brand yarn, with cute crochet patterns for a blanket and a jacket. Yep, sometimes knitting magazines have a few crochet patterns thrown in! Definitely check out those magazines!

Right after I finished my blog post last night, my brother sent me some pictures of my new little Arabic, Italian, Irish, Slovak niece! I'm still trying to figure out the correct spelling of her name - my sister said my brother told her it's "Genna" with a G, but my brother spelled it "Jenna" with a J in his email, so I'm not sure how they're spelling it. Same name though! Here's the pictures:



Isn't she just TOO cute?! Naturally I'm probably biased because I'm the aunt, but I still think she's pretty darn cute! And so roly-poly! I can't wait to see her in person! My son was a roly-poly baby too, but now he's just a tiny little thing, really small for his age. I don't think I've ever posted any pictures of him on my blog, so here's one (an older picture, but he still looks the same, just a little older). That's my handsome little boy wearing a hat I loom-knitted for him, before I learned how to crochet. Speaking of loom knitting, I think I've probably only used my looms once since I learned how to crochet - I just find crocheting faster and easier, but after seeing these awesome (pink!) slipper socks on Isela Phelps' website, http://www.isela.typepad.com/ (couldn't get the one-word link to work right) I'm tempted to break out my looms again. We'll see!

How I Learned to Crochet

Hello, and welcome to my blog! I hope you like it! I thought I'd write my first post about how I learned how to crochet, so here it is:

I enjoy painting and stenciling wood items, and last year was browsing Joann.com looking for stencils and paint. I saw an ad on their website for Knifty Knitter knitting looms. I clicked on the ad, and was fascinated. I had always thought it would be great to be able to make hats and scarves for my kids, but had no knitting or crochet skills. My mother tried to teach me and my younger sister how to crochet when I was about 9, and my sister was 7, but I couldn't grasp making anything other than chains. Fast forward to 2006, and I couldn't even remember how to do that! Upon seeing the looms, I did a little research on them, read reviews of them, and ordered a set. Once I got the looms, and figured out how to use them, I was hooked! I made a bunch of hats, a few scarves, a pair of mittens, and even a full-bed sized blanket for my sister (done in panels).

After a while though, I became frustrated with the looms. They are a very large gauge, and so require using multiple strands of any yarns that are less than a super bulky weight, which ends up using quite a bit of yarn. Décor Accents (and a few other places) sell beautiful handcrafted wood knitting looms in a variety of gauges, but they are pricey. There was also such a limited variety of loom knitting patterns out there at the time, although this is improving, as interest in loom knitting grows.

Around this time, I received a Lion Brand yarns catalog in the mail, and fell in love with this gorgeous granny square blanket, and decided it would be perfect for my then 8 year old daughter (in more girly colors, of course). Not knowing how to crochet at all however, I needed to learn the basic stitches, so I bought a Lion Brand Learn to Crochet kit, complete with pink (my favorite color!) yarn, a jumbo pink crochet hook, and instructions to make a pretty openwork scarf. I eagerly sat down with the yarn and the hook, and figured out how to make a chain, but after numerous attempts at trying to make a single crochet, gave up in frustration. I got a learn to crochet book out of the library after that, and felt totally stupid because I could not comprehend any of it. I finally resigned myself to not being able to learn how to crochet, and went back to my looms, using the pink yarn to loom knit a child's hat for a charity hat and mitten collection at my job. I thought about taking a crochet class at a Joann's store, but balked at paying $40 for a class, and I didn't know anyone else who crocheted who could teach it to me. My mother crocheted when I was a kid, but hasn't crocheted in years, and had pretty much forgotten the stitches.

A few months later, in February of this year, I came across this DVD on Joann.com: - Leisure Arts' "I Can’t Believe I’m Crocheting!". After reading rave reviews about it on Amazon.com, I used a 50% off coupon, and got it for $10 at Joann's. I sat down and watched the DVD before attempting any stitches, and was eager to get out some yarn and a hook and practice the stitches, but life interrupted.

I work in very cold downtown Cleveland, and was walking to the bus stop after work one evening, when I stepped on what I thought was a puddle in an alley, but which was actually a patch of ice. I promptly slipped, fell backwards, and landed right on my wrists. I came down so hard that my messenger bag I always bring to work flew off my shoulder and landed a few feet behind me. I felt instantaneous pain all through my right arm, wrist, and hand so bad that I had to sit there for a few minutes before I could manage to get up. My arm felt like it was on fire, and my hand was so swollen I couldn't use it at all.

I managed to make it to the bus stop and stood there in incredible pain, holding my arm, waiting for the bus to come. When it finally came after what felt like an hour wait (but in reality was only about 10 minutes), I had to try to fish my bus pass out of my left inside coat pocket and get on the bus without any use of my right hand. Fortunately, I was taking what's called a "Park & Ride" bus that day (a bus that picks up riders from a parking lot, where they can leave their cars, and ride straight downtown without the bus making any additional stops), and my husband was picking me up at the Park & Ride lot . When I finally got there, we headed straight to the emergency room, and after an aggravating five hours, found out I had broken my wrist, and possibly my thumb as well. I went home with my hand, wrist, and forearm in a cast so tight my fingers turned bluish. After a very loonngg three days in the cast, and an appointment with an orthopedist, I was able to get my cast removed, and got a much more comfortable wrist brace.

I still had very limited usage of my right hand however. I had to learn how to brush my teeth, zip my pants, and eat with only one hand. I have long hair, and rarely leave it down, as it annoys me, but I couldn't manage to get my hair in a ponytail with one hand. I tried to recruit my husband to put in a ponytail for me, but it was so loose, looked so bad I promptly took it out. I ended up spending the next few weeks at home, on medical leave from work, totally depressed, frustrated and bored, not to mention broke, as I only got 50% pay for my leave, and my husband was laid off from work at the time, and collecting unemployment pay. Any other time, having 3 weeks off from work might have been nice, but I couldn't do much of anything with only having full usage of one hand. Surfing the Internet with my left hand stunk, I type two-handed, and so typing with one hand took forever and was barely worth the effort, and I couldn't hold a pen or pencil to write anything. I could read, but I couldn't hold a book. And of course, I couldn't practice my crocheting. Or could I?

One evening after a day of complete boredom, after putting my kids to bed, and tired of watching TV, I got out a crochet hook, and found that I could maneuver it even with a brace on. For the next few nights, I sat on the couch with my wrist throbbing, and practiced making chains and single crochets. When I finally had a swatch, I was absolutely thrilled! After a month from the time I broke it, my wrist was pronounced healed, and I was able to head full-speed into learning to crochet, although I still wore the brace when crocheting for a few weeks afterwards, as my wrist would get sore without it. Unfortunately, even now, my wrist still gets sore if I spend more than about an hour at a time crocheting, but I keep a tube of Icy-Hot cream in my crochet bag for those times.

After getting the basic crochet stitches down, I began eyeing that granny square blanket again, and the pattern was ranked "Easy", but granny squares still looked impossibly difficult to me. Luckily though, I found out about a crafting group, the Sisters of the Thread, at my job. The group does crocheting, knitting, beading, quilting, etc. They meet once week during lunch time in the building, so I decided to join, and some wonderful ladies taught me to make granny squares! I never did get around to making that Lion Brand granny square blanket though, partly because I realized I hate having to sew or crochet multiple squares together, and partly because I really dislike the recommended yarn (Lion Brand Jiffy, and haven't found a good substitute for it). I had used it awhile ago to crochet a small blanket for my son to take to daycare, and it was rather scratchy, and got fuzzy almost immediately. My son loves the fuzziness though, because he likes to pull "fuzzes" off the blanket while he holds it and sucks his thumb.

After my daughter repeatedly asking when she was going to get a crocheted blanket, I started on a "granny rectangle" blanket for her. The pattern came from a label on a skein of Bernat Super Value yarn. Instead of starting the granny in the round, it starts with a long chain, with double crochet groups worked around both sides of the chain, which makes it form a rectangle instead of a square. I'm using Bernat Camouflage yarn in "Go Girl Camo", which looked fairly pink when I saw it online, but which is actually mostly shades of purple with only a dab of pink. I'm doing a border in Bernat Super Value in a purple shade. I'm about 75% done with the blanket, but ran out of the camo yarn. I bought 8 skeins of the camo, and thought that would be sufficient, but here it turns out I actually need about 13. My daughter keeps asking me when her blanket will be done, and as we're heading into winter here in Cleveland, and the nights are freezing, I'd better get going on finishing it. Well, that's the very long story about how I learned to crochet! Hopefully that wasn't TOO boring!

Right now, my crocheting goals are to:

1) Improve my crocheting skills so I can handle patterns that aren't only labeled "beginner" or "easy".

2) Learn how to make a variety of fancy crochet borders (right now I can only do shell stitch, picots, and ruffles).

3) Be able to tackle crochet garments, and items that require more than simple shaping. I have Debbie Stoller's "Happy Hooker" book, and there's so many gorgeous clothing items in there I'd love to make if I had the skills.

4) Find a second crochet group to join. The ladies in my Sisters of the Thread group are wonderful, but I'm the only "young" person in the group that comes to meetings, and most of the women that come regularly have grown children and/or grandchildren, while I'm still dealing with younger kids at home, homework, etc. It would be nice to meet some crocheting women closer to my age group. From looking at crochet blogs online, and the popularity of "The Happy Hooker", apparently a lot of younger woman are into crochet, but I just haven't met any yet. My local library has a knitting and crochet group that meets once a month or so, but I don't know how to drive, and I don't want to bother my husband to drop me off and pick me up there, not to mention that he works nights now, and is usually resting in the evenings before he goes to work. I do belong to an online Yahoo! crochet group, Crochet Partners, and it's wonderfully helpful, but it's not the same as belonging to a group in person.

5) Teach my daughter to crochet (or get her signed up for a crochet class). She's been asking me about it a lot, and there's a Girl Scout "Yarn & Fabric Arts" badge (she's a Junior Girl Scout) she can earn, which learning to crochet would count towards. She also tells me that few girls in her class at school (she's in 4th grade) crochet during "indoor recess" (when it's too cold or wet for the kids to go out to play), and she'd like to be able to crochet then too. I did try to sit down with her one day and teach her how to crochet, but I guess I'm not a very good teacher, because she couldn't even make a chain. I've been wanting to take her to a kids' crochet class at Joann's, and they're only $20, which is a bargain for a two hour, two session class, but again, not knowing how to drive makes it difficult to get her to a class. And yes, I realize more and more that I need to learn how to drive. I'm just afraid that I wouldn't be able to learn. I've never been very good at "physical" things. I didn't even learn how to ride a bike until I was 17, and my younger sister taught me. I want to sign up for driving lessons through a driving school (I think I'd feel more comfortable having someone "objective" teach me rather than my husband doing it), but the $300 cost is a big obstacle. I was encouraged lately about learning how to drive by reading about Isela Phelps and her adventures in learning how to drive. She got her license just a few weeks ago on her 30th birthday - very exciting!

6) And finally, I want to learn how to needle knit. I still love crocheting, but I always see these gorgeous needle knit patterns (Isela has some beautiful patterns on her website) that I wish I could make. I bought a knitting DVD - Leisure Arts' "I Can’t Believe I’m Knitting!" from Joann's and a pair of knitting needles, now I just need to find the time to sit down and get started with it. I'm rather intimidated by the idea of learning how to knit, as it looks so much more difficult than crochet, but if that DVD is as good as the "I Can't Believe I'm Crocheting" DVD, hopefully I'll get the hang of it.

Whew, I think I covered everything! Stay tuned for more posts with some pictures of crochet projects I'm working on, and maybe some news about my learning how to knit!