Belated Merry Christmas

I hope all my blog readers and fellow crafters had a good Christmas! Mine was OK. To be honest, my job situation has had me pretty distracted lately, and really put a damper on Christmas for me. I went back to work about two weeks ago. The first week back, there was a big water main break downtown a few blocks from the BOE, and the BOE had no water service, so we ended up being sent home at 9:30 in the morning. We had to work on Saturday to make up the time, but Saturday was only a partial day, so between that and the time I missed from work when I took the Census test, I was short a few hours for the week.

This week I stayed home on Monday and Wednesday because the weather was so bad. I've lived in the Cleveland area my whole life, so I've dealt with some pretty nasty weather conditions traveling to and from work. I can deal with snow and cold, but after falling on a patch of ice downtown last year, and breaking my right wrist, I'm paranoid when it comes to ice. Now that I have no medical insurance, the possibility of breaking something else really worries me more than it would normally.

We had freezing rain Sunday night, and by Monday morning, the roads and sidewalks were completely ice covered. My husband had an awful time getting home from work, and said the sidewalks looked even worse than the streets, and he doubted I'd be able to make it to the bus stop OK. A lot of the ice had melted by Tuesday, so I went to work, and then we got hit with even more freezing rain on Tuesday night. When I looked outside on Wednesday, the sidewalks just looked rainy, and not icy, so I got dressed, left the house, and didn't even make it halfway down the street without nearly falling a few times, because everything was completely ice covered. I couldn't even walk in the street, because the street wasn't salted. Things were so bad, many freeways were even shut down overnight, because of the high number of car accidents.

The suburb I live in used to be pretty good about getting the streets, including the side streets salted, but this year they really seem to be lax. I haven't seen a single side street salted (including mine), and the main streets don't seem to get salted until after the morning rush, which is useless. I read in the newspaper a few months ago that the state of Ohio is expected to have a road salt shortage this year (there's endless amounts of salt underneath Lake Erie, but apparently the mining companies can't mine it quickly enough to keep up with demand), so I'm going to be generous and assume that's why the roads aren't getting salted on time.

I felt terrible having to miss those two days of work, when I already haven't had a full paycheck in a month. The BOE kept changing their mind about which days they were going to close for Christmas, and finally they decided to close through Monday, which is great for regular employees, who have paid time off, but not so great for temps, who get nothing. On top of that, we're just about finished with the voter history, and from what one of the other temps told me, based on what she heard on Christmas Eve, next Tuesday might be our last day of work. The BOE had been pushing us to finish up the voter history by December 31st, presumably to get us off the payroll before the beginning of the year, so I'm anticipating being permanently laid off next week.

I knew this was a temp job, so I guess I shouldn't be upset, but at the same time, I had expected to find another job before this one ended. I applied for unemployment pay when I was laid off the first time, but my claim was denied because I hadn't been at the BOE for at least 20 weeks (I've only been there about 16 weeks). Normally they'd take into account my prior employment as well, but my last job was with the national offices of a church, and churches are not required to pay into the state unemployment fund, so the 3 years I spent at the church don't count as "covered employment". In my opinion, just because an employer doesn't have to pay into the unemployment fund, doesn't mean they shouldn't.

I'm just really scared about how my husband and I are going to manage once I'm laid off again. We're already struggling as it is, and I can't stand the thought of having a repeat of this summer, where we had to choose between paying the rent and buying food. The selection of jobs out there has been pretty slim lately, and I haven't even been able to get any interviews for the ones I've applied for. Things have gotten so bad here in the Cleveland area that one of the major hospitals, the Cleveland Clinic, has a hiring and raise freeze. I ran into a friend of mine who works for the other major hospital system in the area, University Hospitals, and he said they cut all of his overtime. My landlord has a tenant who works for Lincoln Electric, another major employer here in Cleveland, and his tenant told him Lincoln laid off a ton of employees, basically anyone who has been there less than 3 years. This is the first layoff Lincoln has had since 1948 - 60 years! If that doesn't show how bad things are with the economy, I don't know what does.

Needless to say, Christmas was pretty lean for us this year. I spent about $250 on presents for both of the kids, and wouldn't even have spent that much, if not for my mother and sister giving me $75 to use towards the kids' presents. My husband and I didn't buy each other gifts this year. Even though I didn't buy a whole lot, the kids were happy with what they got. On Christmas Eve we usually go to my older sister Desiree's house for dinner and a gift exchange among the kids. This year I didn't know anyone had organized a gift exchange, and no one told me about it until a week before Christmas, when I had already spent my extra money on my kids' gifts. My mom bought gifts for me to give to my niece and nephew (whose names I had for the gift exchange), which I really appreciated, because I was pretty much broke before Christmas.

Since I didn't buy anything personally for my niece and nephew, I wanted to crochet something for them. I raided my yarn stash and made hats for both. The first is a newsboy-style cap that I crocheted for my 11 year old niece, Alexis (Desiree's daughter).
I used some Red Heart Kids and Caron Simply Soft from my stash. I had barely a full skein of the Red Heart kids, and it ended up being the exact amount I needed for the hat. The pattern was a free one I found on Ravelry ("Swirls Cap"). I'm really happy with how it came out (although I think the swirls would show better in a solid color yarn), and I anticipate making a lot more of these. Everyone raved about it.

My kids had fun on Christmas Eve. My sister has a big house, so there's a lot of room for them to run around and play with their cousins. Here's the "three amigos" - my Bethany, her cousin Alexis (middle) and her cousin Rosie (right end). That's Alexis's dog, Tanner, in the photo. He's a Labradoodle (Labrador and Poodle mix). Alexis is allergic to dogs, but Labradoodles are hypoallergenic and don't shed (his fur feels just like a lamb's wool - I bet someone could even spin it into yarn!), so Alexis isn't allergic to him.
My kids had fun on Christmas Eve. My sister has a big house, so there's a lot of room for them to run around and play with their cousins. Here's the "three amigos" - my Bethany, her cousin Alexis (middle) and her cousin Rosie (right end). That's Alexis's dog, Tanner, in the photo. He's a Labradoodle (Labrador and Poodle mix). Alexis is allergic to dogs, but Labradoodles are hypoallergenic and don't shed (his fur feels just like a lamb's wool - I bet someone could even spin it into yarn!), so Alexis isn't allergic to him.
Here's my adorable little niece, Jenna with her dad: And Jenna with Bethany:
My birthday was December 26th, and my brother-in-law's was the 27th, so my youngest sister Shauna baked a Christmas tree shaped cake for us on Christmas Eve. I turned 35 on the 26th. Only 5 more years until I turn 40 - boy, does that sound depressing! I was feeling pretty lousy on Christmas, about my job situation. A temp coworker and I were joking around about how it's a good thing we can't see into the future, because if we had looked ahead to 2008, and saw ourselves at the BOE scanning signatures in poll books for $10 an hour, we'd have wanted to scream. I told her if I could have looked into the future to see what I'd be doing when I turned 35, I'd really be upset.

I get introspective around this time of year, and I can't help but feel disappointed in myself. I worked so hard to get an education and work experience - I dropped out of high school in the 11th grade and worked at a fast food restaurant, but I went on to get a GED, went to a trade school to learn some office skills, graduated from college after attending for 10 long years off and on, started graduate school, and got progressively better paying jobs. Now here am I am feeling like none of it mattered. I have a $10 an hour temp job (the last time I earned $10 an hour was in 1999), that is ending shortly, and no prospects for another job. I'm still renting. I have a mountain of bills I can't pay. I have no medical insurance. I can't sleep at night and have been getting stomach pains from the stress. I've taken my graduate education off my resume, thinking it probably makes me look overqualified for most jobs I've applied for, and now I'm at the point where I'm wondering if I shouldn't list my bachelor's degree either, which is a pretty depressing prospect.

I woke up on my birthday not even wanting to get out of bed. My husband tried hard to cheer me up, and I appreciated it. He bought me birthday cards from him and the kids, and bought me some slippers and a fleece blanket (since I'm always freezing). He had gone to Walmart, and wanted to buy me a sewing machine, but couldn't find one he could afford. I appreciated the thought though. My sister Shauna gave me a pair of (pink!) fleece pajamas, and the Doris Chan book, "Everyday Crochet" (crochet books are good!). My good friend Latanya, who lives in Dallas (and who makes me jealous with reports of the warm weather down there!) sent me two flannel nightgowns for Christmas and my birthday. My husband and I kids I went out to eat at Bob Evans for dinner. We don't eat out very often, and when we do, Bob Evans or Red Robin are about as expensive as we get. We're on such a tight budget right now, that I wouldn't have gone if not for having two coupons for free kids' meals and drinks (which the kids got from Bob Evans' free birthday club).

I also got a couple of surprises in the mail recently. Last week I got a box in the mail, and I had no idea who it was from. I opened it up and found a beautiful pink knitted scarf (interestingly the exact color of my winter coat), and some pretty pink yarn. I was racking my brain all day trying to figure out who it was from, until I realized it was probably a PIF gift. I was right - it was my PIF gift from Hayley of Knittyauntie.com. It wa a really nice surprise!

The second surprise was a package of gifts for my kids from
Katrina, which arrived on my birthday. Here's what she sent:

a Hannah Montana bag and notebook for Bethany:
a Disney Cars apron (great for arts and crafts!), and a Cars wallet (I didn't get a chance to take a photo) for Dominic:And yes, there's more - two beautiful Christmas stockings!

Katrina handmade the bag, the apron, and the stockings - aren't they awesome?! The kids love getting mail, and they were thrilled with everything Katrina sent. Bethany thought Katrina had bought the bag, because it looks so well made. The apron looks wonderful too! Thank you so much, Katrina! I am always amazed at how generous fellow crafters on the web can be. Katrina's package really made my day!

That's about all that's been going on lately. My husband's company is shut down until January 5th, so I've been enjoying having him home at night, and it helps that he'll be able to stay home with the kids for their Christmas vacation. Other than the hats I made for Christmas, I haven't crocheted anything else lately. When I'm worried about things, I can't concentrate on crocheting. I've been reading a lot lately though. I just finished a couple of books - "Something Like Beautiful: One Single Mother's Story" by asha bandele (no typo - she spells it lowercase), which I got free from Amazon.com through their Vine program, and "Random Family: Love, Drugs, Trouble, and Coming of Age in the Bronx" by Adrian Nicole LeBlanc. Something Like Beautiful was good, but Random Family was fantastic, definitely one of the best books I've read in a long time. I highly recommend it.

I still have no satellite TV service, so I've been checking a lot of DVD's out from the library lately. My husband and I watched Michael Moore's "Sicko" yesterday. It was excellent, and heartbreaking, too. One story particularly bothered me - a 30 something year old man, married with kids, who died from leukemia because his insurance company would not pay for a bone marrow transplant (his son was a marrow match) because they said the treatment was "experimental". The whole documentary is a real condemnation of the state of health care in this country.

Well, it's pretty late, so I need to finish this up and go to bed. Can you believe that after -20 degree (with wind chill) temperatures and freezing rain for the past couple of days, that it's actually 64 degrees and dry here in the Cleveland area right now??? I'm trying hard not to get my hopes up that it's going to stay that way!

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!