Year of Using Up the Stash: In which I fall off the wagon.

Throughout the past couple of weeks, Readers, I've learned a few things.

Lesson number 1: That I have a horrid attention span, and that unless I have some sort of plan or conscious schema in place, I rarely accomplish the things I set out to do that fall outside of my day to day duties as an admin assistant/receptionist and as a wife.

Lesson number 2: That when I inevitably let goals/projects slide as a result of Lesson number 1, I get frazzled easily and am much more likely to just throw my hands in the air and inwardly yell, "F--- it"; letting my knitting projects and my book review fall by the wayside.

Lesson number 3: That when I drink, I like to put googly eyes on things.

With that being said, I am going to be setting some solid goals for myself as far as my book review goes. As I've written earlier, unless I light some kind of fire under my bum, this book review WON'T get finished.

I'm finding myself really struggling with CAMD chapter seven. I've done a couple of drafts of the review that just don't seem to work very well; mostly because both of my attempts at the review ended up being overly formulaic and subsequently boring. I find that many of my reviews as of late are looking like this:

1. Orenstein presents an idea,
2. I riff and ramble a bit on whether or not I like said idea for whatever reason.

My clumsy and poorly thought out review attempts, to put it bluntly, sucked. They unfairly represented a piece of very insightful and challenging writing as being overly-basic (SEXY ADULT GOOD, SEXY 12-YEAR OLD BAD!), accusatory (WHY DO YOU GUYS PREY ON CHILD STARS??? WHY??), and banal (LOLOL LINSAY LOHAN!). Chapter seven (and this can be said for the entire book) of Cinderella Ate My Daughter is none of these things, and until I get the review just right, I'm going to hold off on publishing it.

For now, I've got a goal in mind for my CAMD reviews: I want to finish reviewing the book by July.

Now that THAT'S out of the way, I have a confession to make.

I relapsed, Readers.

I bought some yarn.

But I assure you that I have a very good reason! Please hear me out!

I work in the admin department of a very large company as the "PM Receptionist". Besides myself, there are three other receptionists (two who work during the early morning, and one other that works in the evening with me), who for the purpose of anonymity will be referred to as Snap, Crackle and Pop.

Snap, Crackle and especially Pop are well aware of (and are VERY supportive of) Project Using Up the Stash. While chatting on our coffee break last week, Pop pulled me aside and gave me a request:

Pop: "Hey, Jackie, are you still looking for ways to use up your yarn?"
Me: "Yup!"
Pop: "You know those black finger-less gloves you wear all the time? The ones with the twisties?"
Me: "Yeah?"
Pop: "I love those gloves! Could you knit me a pair, but make them a little bit longer?"
Me: "Absolutely!"

I sent her a link to the pattern of the gloves in question, along with a couple of similar patterns from Ravelry. We picked a pattern (slightly different from my gloves, but longer in the cuff and more ornate) and I dug through my stash, looking for the yarn I used.

The next day, I came into work a little bit early so I could bring the yarn to Pop for approval.

Her eyes lit up when I showed her the skein (it was Cascade Yarns Heritage Sock), but as she looked over the yarn label, her face fell a bit.

Pop: "Oh...I don't think this will work."
Me: "Hm? Is it the wrong color?"
Pop: "No, the color is beautiful. It's just that I'm allergic to wool!"

Readers, the glove pattern we picked calls for a fingering weight yarn, and all of the fingering weight yarn in my stash has some kind of animal fiber in it.  I don't want Pop's gloves to make her to break out into a rash!

I made a promise to Pop that I intend to keep, Readers. So, I had to choose between breaking my resolution and breaking my promise.

I relapsed and bought some imported Italian cotton in a gorgeous shade of blue-gray.

I figured that if I were going to buy some yarn, I may as well  get GOOD yarn. 

I have to admit that I seriously underestimated how much yarn was in each ball (I ended up getting 3). Pop is going go get TWO pairs of gloves, and I'll use whatever is leftover to work on my duplicate stitch skills.

In addition to the two pairs of finger-less gloves, I've been working on using up my sock yarn stash. One sock has been finished:

The sole is a bit short, but HOLY SH-- this may be the only hand-knitted garment I own that I will proudly wear to work:

I love this lace pattern!

So, Readers, I'm going to hunker down and try to document all of the "Use up the yarn in my stash" projects I've got going on, in the hopes of organizing my goals a bit better:

1. Socks: 1/2 finished
2. Gloves for Pop: 1/2 finished
3. New snowflake pattern (!!): Almost finished, need to add some beading to the flake (as well as make a whole new one, since I accidentally spilled coffee on the working prototype I've got going).
4: Space Invaders Warm Up America square: Finished the chart, but have yet to begin.

All right! All that I have to do now is to hunker down and FOCUS!

Until next time, Readers!

Haiku Friday. When reading interviews with Farrah Abraham...

Anything she says
Can be said in the voice of
Lumpy Space Princess


...and it would be hilarious.

In which we survived the May Day protest

You know, Readers, I'm really getting sick of this.

http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/01/us/seattle-may-day-protests/index.html

I am getting so sick and tired of this crap.

I'm sure that many of you who are reading this are well aware of the chaos that descended on our fair city of Seattle during Wednesday's May Day demonstration.

For those of you who are not, I'll break it down for you: a group of so called "anarchists" decided to raise awareness about the evils of capitalism by throwing rocks, destroying property, and putting up a wall of newspaper boxes in the middle of the street.

I have no idea what this was supposed to accomplish.  Image found here:  http://www.capitolhillseattle.com/

As of now, seventeen of the rioters have been arrested.

John and I live in the Pike/Pine corridor, so we had front row seats to the ensuing mayhem. I first witnessed this group of anthropomorphized solutions of fail-sauce and bong water while I was on my way home from work:

One of the demonstrators handed me a flyer, that explained the significance of May Day in the way of worker's rights and the reasons why capitalism is evil. Everyone was relatively well behaved at this point (aside from a few shouts of "F--- THE POLICE!", but I suppose that's to be expected), so I just shrugged these people off, snapped a few pictures and went on my way.

I got home, kissed my hubby, and turned on the news.

Oh.

Oh dear.

I wish I could say that this violence and stupidity surprised me. I really wish I could.

I...I can't even begin to comprehend the thought process that led these demonstrators to believe that throwing rocks at a Wallgreens and terrorizing citizens is going to make people pay attention to and respect their cause.

A Kiro 7 reporter tried to interview one of the protesters. I wish I could find video footage of this moment, it gave me the best kind of insight into this whole situation. When the protester wasn't being interrupted by her inebriated colleagues (who were trying to grab the cameraman from behind), she made somewhat of an attempt to explain what exactly it was they were protesting, that was reduced to simple whining about "HOW THE POLICE OFFICERS ARE BEING MEEEEEAAAANNN!!!".

The demonstrators could not even explain WHAT THEY ARE PROTESTING AGAINST.

You know what damned the groups' case against capitalism the most, Readers? The number of smart-phones and SLR cameras I saw in the crowd.

What exactly, Readers, is smashing the window of a Wallgreens supposed to accomplish? What exactly is throwing rocks and glass bottles supposed to accomplish?

I would like to know who is behind planning this "protest", and I would not be surprised if this individual's name is Ralph Wiggum.

I'M AN ANARCHIST! I LIKE TO SMASH THINGS!

 It would certainly explain the logic behind the trashcan/newspaper box wall.

Haiku Friday

Uh Oh. It looks like
The floppy drives went to the
Dark side of the Force.

EHRMEGHERD IT'S TIME FOR A LIMERICK ABOUT MY KITCHEN YOU GUYS!

As quaint as my kitchen may be,
It's the size of a Port-O-Pott-E!
I struggle to look
For space when I cook!
How I'd love a larger galley!

I love our vintage apartment. The location is great, the view is SPECTACULAR, the rent price is just right, and the place is dripping with 1920's charm!

But, the kitchen is tiny.

 Like, SUPER tiny.

It's true that I like to bemoan our kitchen's microscopic size. If we're not careful and slack off on doing the dishes or tidying up, the space can get REALLY nasty REALLY fast. However, since living in this building, my husband and I have found ways to survive in our "one-butt-only" kitchen. Mostly, our survival depends on squeezing as much storage space as humanly possible out of our itty-bitty-eaterie:

Our pot rack may have literally saved my sanity on more than one occasion. The previous tenant put it up, and I think I love her for it.

We've got a small counter right behind the oven, which gives us a somewhat reasonable work space. However, if we're not careful, it can get over-loaded with clutter. It's become a law in our home: KEEP THE COUNTER CLEAR.

 The Hubs put up a few magnetic strips so we can store cutlery and other metal utensils on the fridge and behind the oven. I swear, that man's a genius.

We try to make EVERY surface of our kitchen a storage area. We bought a few of those temporary "no damage" hooks and put them all over the area over our sink.

Cooking is a challenge in a kitchen of this size. But, if we stay organized and keep clean, we can produce some amazing food-stuffs:

 Like these cheese popovers!

Until next time, Readers!

CAMD Ch 6 review: In which I believe that creative play is alive and well.

Good afternoon, Readers! Below is my continuing review of Cinderella Ate My Daughter. 

Chapter 6: Guns and (Briar) Roses.

Chapter 6 of CAMD is centered around three points: Violent Play (or Creative Play, Orenstein seems to use these terms interchangeably in the beginning of the chapter and my brain jury is still out on how I feel about this), Fairy Tales, and the fact that both are needed for a child's healthy emotional development. 

You read that right, Readers. Kids today aren't getting enough Violent Play or Fairy Tales. 

To be clear: when she is writing about the need for violent play, Orenstein is not calling for parents to hand their kids a copy of Resident Evil 4. Rather, she is calling for kind of play where kids run around with cap guns, yelling, "Bang! Bang! You're dead!" at each other. She writes : "...violent play is not by definition bad or harmful for kids. Any child shrink worth their sand table will tell you it can help them learn about impulse control, work out the difference between fantasy and reality, cope with fear." (p. 98)

BUT, 

"...there is a catch: according to Diane Levin, a professor of education and coauthor of The War Play Dilemma, violent play is useful only if it is truly play, if kids control the narratives, if they are using their imaginations to create the story lines, props, outcomes." (p. 98) (emphasis Orenstein's).

Orenstein believes that kids need to have a way to work out their day-to-day fears and frustrations, and that a certain amount of violent play can help to achieve this. However, she's worried that because so many children no longer have control over their playtime (due to over-scheduling, over-supervision, or succumbing to the addictive glow of video games and TV), they are losing out on the small triumphs and the subsequent development of life skills that violent play can bring. 

She blames the fall of violent play on the de-regulation of children's advertising in the 1980's, and the rise of merchandise driven cartoons. Orenstein believes that the relationship between a child and their toys is VERY different today than it was when she was growing up; that the aggressive marketing culture in which we have immersed our children has permanently tainted playtime. 

Orenstein writes: 

"Levin found that, rather than engaging in creative play, children began imitating what they saw on screen, reenacting rote scripts with licensed products." (p 99)

(Quoting Professor Levin,) "When you give kids a light saber, you know exactly what they are going to do with it, and every kid who has one will do the exact same thing. There is no creativity there." (p 99)

So, kids are no longer getting the kind of emotional development they once did through truly creative violent play. Where are they to turn? 

Why, to the Brothers Grimm!

Orenstein takes a look at child psychiatrist Bruno Bettelheim's classic book, The Uses of Enchantment, ("[Bettelheim] argues that the brother's gore is not only central to the tales' appeal, it's crucial to kid's emotional development" (p. 100)) and uses this as a springboard to dive into her own exploration of what children can learn from from the OLD school fairy tales; the ones immortalized by the brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen.  She then spends a great deal of time going over the Grimms' version of Cinderella (who they called "Aschenputtel"), as well as a few other stories, and explores how much of the great value in these tales has been lost once they were "Disney-fied". 

I have to say that while I enjoyed this chapter very much (I especially appreciated her take on the "feminist" children's literature of today, which, she writes, "seems to equate "pro-girl" with "anti-boy""(p 101), ), I'm not sure if I agree that children are missing out on violent play, or on creative play.

First of all, I couldn't help but raise an eyebrow when Levin made the "lightsaber" comment. Sure, we all know what a kid is going to do when we hand them a toy lightsaber, but couldn't the same thing be said if we were to hand them one of Orenstein's beloved pop-cap guns? 

Granted, I'm not familiar with Diane Levin or The War Play Dilemma (I'll add that to my reading list). In my personal experience, though, I can say that both violent play and creative play are thriving in today's kids!

Perhaps I'm biased. I might just be surrounded by awesome people who raise awesome children, I dunno. 

I can't speak for all families, but when I regularly baby-sat for some friends a couple of years ago, their kids were FULL of creative play! Their youngest, at the tender age of five, would create fantastical narratives when playing with her toys, dreaming up dastardly villains, epic story lines, valiant heroes and brave heroines.

She once used masking tape and a green Sharpie to transform one of her Barbie dolls into "The Evil Mermaid", (who lived in Lake Union and would kidnap wayward pedestrians), casting a few unfortunate Polly Pocket figurines as the Evil Mermaid's hapless victims. All hope was lost, until a heroic Zhu Zhu pet defeated the Evil Mermaid and came to the rescue!

It was never a dull moment back then. Good times, good times. 

I find, Readers, that kids are smarter and are more aware of the world in which they live than many people think. The kids I baby-sat were well aware that certain cartoons and television shows were aggressively selling them playthings; but they often lacked the opportunity or the vocabulary to express this knowledge. 

Many of the toys I played with as a kid were hocked to me via cartoon; but as I remember it, my playtime was rarely an "imitation of what I saw on screen". 

I was more interested in the suspense that surrounded the casting of my all My Little Pony rendition of the Phantom of the Opera. Would Sunspot or Moon Dancer get the coveted lead role? OH, THE DRAMA!

I also have to say that I'm not exactly a big fan of Bruno Bettelheim, who Orenstein references throughout this chapter. Bettelheim was, to be fair, very influential in the field of developmental psychology, but many of his theories surrounding emotional development are RIDICULOUSLY outdated (For example, he theorized that autism was the result of a "unemotional and cold mothering". Can you imagine how horrible it must have been back then for a parent who had a child with autism?). In addition, Bettelheim was a Freudian, and used psychoanalysis (the idea that a one's mental development is almost exclusively influenced by events taking place during early childhood) as the main paradigm in his studies. Readers, almost nobody uses psychoanalysis when treating patients anymore, and the people who do use it use a kind of psychoanalysis that is VERY different than the theory that was practiced in Bettelheim's time. 

 Psychoanalysis: Psychotherapeutic theories :: The Model T Ford : Cars. 

Is Bettelheim's theory surrounding the essential need for fairy tales out-dated? I think so, yes. But this does not, by any means, devalue fairy tales!  It is my humble opinion that old-school fairy tales are AWESOME, and can be a great teaching tools for people of all ages!

By all means, bring back Aschenputtel and the Little Sea Hag! They're not necessarily essential for a kid's healthy development, but they are wonderful stories that are worth re-telling!

Many eye-brows were raised, Readers, while I was reading this chapter. But, Orenstein does bring up several important questions, and does so with a delightful "snarky-yet-fair" vibe, that inspires in me fantasies of having her as one of my motherly, wise-cracking, feminist mentors.

I'll have a "Using Up the Yarn Stash" update for you later in the week, Readers! Until next time!

Haiku Friday

You know that it's a
rough job market when even
the Fraggles can't work.

Keep trying Boober, you'll land that rom-com leading role soon :-)