Fellowship Revisited

This past weekend was the annual American forum of the Europe fellowship thing I did this spring. It was great to see almost everyone again. I was one of 16 people and 10 of us showed up for the forum.

The forum was kind of like the fellowship: going to meetings all day, not all of the topics were interesting to you, so you had to figure out how to stay awake (surreptitious stockingnette knitting in the round, which I can do without looking, under the table really helped), lunch meetings, and late nights.

The forum was held in my city, so at least I could go home, spend some time with my husband, and sleep in my own bed every night. I had to leave every night at about 11:30 so I could be home by midnight. I know I missed some partying, but that's okay. Some times I felt like "But I'm gonna miss something fun! I don't want to miss anything good!" But then I realize driving home dead tired would be really stupid and dangerous.

Besides, these forums are held annually in the US and in Europe, so I'll see these people again, and to see new people too. It's not like this is the one and only chance I'll ever have again.

All in all it was a really good weekend.

The week's not getting any better

Just got the call from the temp agency that the accountant they had been sending us turned out to have a criminal record, regarding fraud.

Let me repeat that: the accountant, who deals with our money, who had access to our social security numbers, who had access to the bank information, has a record of fraud, of cheating people or governments out of money. Gah!

This is just too bad. I really liked her, and she worked hard, and she gave me answers I was looking for, and I had thought about hiring her permanently.

The temp agency will be sending someone else from now on.

And I will be looking to hire someone permanently and will be sure to conduct a background check.

Since I'm working on the budget, I'll add a line item to pay for background checks.

I'm going home, going to have a beer, do a little knitting, and then go throw pottery.

The week started by reading in the paper that someone I know in a similar work situation has been arrested for fraud. Then I spent Monday with the treasurer of the board who wants the budgets presented in all different kinds of ways. By the way, the fraudulent accountant came through with all the answers. Then yesterday I got a call from a funder placing severe restrictions on how we are to spend their money. Then this morning was spent defending the budget to the full board (at least it was only a handful of people). And now this. And it's only Wednesday!

The week isn't over. I wonder what's next. I'm buckling up for the drive home today.

"Lesser" Harry Potter character quiz

Take the survey and find out which lesser character you are - I turned out to be Bill Weasly - "I'm cool, really cool"

http://atypically.net/hp/lesser.shtml

Got my Ravelry invite!

Finally got my Ravelry invitation and set up my profile over there as redisforpassion.

From what I've heard on knitting podcasts and blogs, Ravelry has real potential for becoming a real time sucker. I have a little trepidation about that, but I've started anyway.

I envision using Ravelry mainly as a place to see how other people's knitting has turned out, to see if I really want to make that pattern or not. And to see how other people have used X yarn. Maybe it will help me figure out what to do with all that Manos I bought in DC over the weekend.

It couldn't last

Long story short -- A situation that I willingly turned a blind eye to for a year has come back to bite me. Now I will have to figure out a solution. Which will require more money, of course. Sigh.

Fell down and went boom

I had a great time hanging out with Sister. We stayed up past 1am talking, drinking wine, and looking at magazines. She's renovating her condo, so she was all into the Blueprint and Real Simple magazines I bought.

Food summary:
Friday dinner: Korean. Saturday brunch: leftover Korean. Saturday dinner: Chili's. Sunday brunch: Dim Sum.

I so need to get back to the gym.

I had my knitting going of course. I really cranked on My So-Called Scarf, and have almost finished one ball:

Saturday we were going to have the Korean massage but we decided to go shopping instead. I wanted to visit a yarn shop and Sister wanted to go to Ikea to scope out living room furniture.

Before we went, I drew out a floor plan with measurements, taking into account things like location on A/C unit, height of window sills, etc. I also took measurements of her existing furniture. She didn't buy anything and was rather disappointed that the perfect piece wasn't available.

As for the yarn shop, we went to Aylin's Wool Gatherer, the only yarn shop listed in Sister's town's yellow pages. It was very well hidden, and I have to say, the staff gave lousy directions over the phone. But once there, I fell down and went boom. They had a 15% off sale, so I went nuts buying:

2 skeins of Manos del Uruguay 119 Adobe: 4 skeins of Manos del Uruguay colorway 111, Eclipse. You might be able to tell that 2 skeins are lighter than the other 2. Here's one skein of Malabrigo Purple Mystery (it's really darker than seen here) and 2 skeins of Manos del Uruguay 117 Violets 1 skein of Malabrigo in Tiger Lily: 2 skeins Wildfoote sock yarn in the Bluegrass colorway 1 ball of Jo Sharp Silk Tweed in color 124 Jewel. I had taken a stack of my knitting books, mostly from Interweave press, and told Sister that since Bi-colored Cables cardigan wasn't working out so well, that I'd make her something else. She liked the Paisley Shawl from Folk Style, but wanted it in a deep eggplant or russet red. I told her to pick out a color she'd like and I'd use it as reference when buying yarn for her shawl. So she chose the Jo Sharp. Maybe Knitpicks or Elann will have something appropriate.

I also offered to make Sister's boyfriend something and he liked Ela's Favorite Hat from One-Skein Wonders. He was wearing dark red and grey at the time, so maybe I'll make it for him from a skein of Manos in Bramble, like My So-called Scarf above. He doesn't use scarves, which is too bad because then I'd have one winter present done. Ah well.

What will I do with all that yarn? I don't know. Maybe a bunch of scarves. I'm really enjoying My So-Called Scarf. I'm also thinking of making another Argosy scarf. I told Husband that I went to a yarn shop and bought a lot of yarn. He said he erased that message as soon as he heard it.

All in all, a really fun weekend. And in 2 months, I'll be seeing them again for Thanksgiving. Perhaps I'll have fixed Bi-Colored Cables by then.

Sister's Birthday -- Pig!

Tomorrow I fly to DC to spend the weekend with Sister. It's her 36th birthday, meaning she's done 3 Chinese zodiac cycles (12 years each), so that's something. But the 60th birthday's the really big one. It means you've lived 5 cycles, and back when the average life span didn't quite reach that far, doing 5 cycles was really something special.

I'm not sure what's planned other than going to the spa on Saturday. Sister warned me that it's a Korean spa which is really, really exfoliating. Hm.

I'm taking her Bi-Colored Cables cardigan, gorilla sleeves and all, to pin up how it should really fit on her arms. Then my options are to cut and sew up, as if steeking, or to re-knit. If the cutting and sewing doesn't work, I may end up reknitting anyway. At least I'll know how many stitches wide to knit it.

I'm also packing the Manos So-called Scarf in Bramble and the Pagewood Farms sock yarn in Crayon (much more pastel than shown on the site, even more than the Pretty Pastels colorway) I got at Knitch last night. I'm playing around with it now, doing a So-Called Scarf swatch on size 8 US needle.

By the way, it's the year of the pig.