Saturday, June 11, 2011

More Gluten Stuff

Doing well with the gluten-free eating. I have found a few treats I am adoring, like my morning cinnamon roll

Got a favorite spaghetti

Found the best peanut butter cookies in the known world

Those are the type of foods I was most worried I would loose when I went gluten-free, but it turns out those were the easiest to replace with awesome stuff. The odd stuff I never thought about is what's been hard to fine perfect ones of. I still haven't found a BBQ sauce or a fake maple syrup that's perfect either. I never thought of gluten being in so many of these type of products, why does the cole slaw at KFC need gluten? Why does a salad dressing need gluten? The obvious stuff it turns out is crazy easy to replace with stuff just as tasty as any gluten product, but the other stuff is often made for multiple food allergies so the texture or taste might not be "right". Ah, well I've got the world's best gluten free store to shop in & they carry a ton of yummy things so I'm sure I'll find the perfect veggie soup & everything else soon.

Thursday, June 9, 2011

Now with actual knitting content!

Finished 1 of the blue socks, now to get the other one going. Impressed the hell out of myself by doing the kitchnered toe from memory, didn't look it up at all. Pretty much did the whole sock that way, other than the cast-on number & needle size I just winged the whole thing. The toe decreases are a bit messy as I only did k2tog for it, but I still like it just fine.
Blue Sock

Saturday, June 4, 2011

Gluten Free

I figure I'll start off with the reasons why I fell off the edge of the earth 1st. Mainly I got really depressed & then after that got fixed up I moved halfway across the country. Ok now on to the actual content of the post!

When I moved out here I knew the friend I'd be living with is gluten-free & that the house would be gluten-free as well. For the past 2-3 years I've wondered if I had a problem with gluten for a host of reasons, mainly the neuropathy & the fact most everything I eat makes me sick. I stopped being able to eat lactose first, then casein; after that went carbs & meat at the same meal & then normal sized servings of meat & most fast food along with anything really high in fat. Certain veggies & fruit got the boot over the years & I developed reflux &, well sorry it's probably TMI, what I assumed was IBS. Through it all I thought it probably wasn't a gluten issue because eating just that didn't make me sick to my tummy & I craved it like mad.

Well on 26 May I moved & went gluten-free, no major changes happened at first. Once in a while I'll have a small amount of dairy & deal with "The Sick" as it's known around here. "The Sick" is around 4 hours long & I cry & it's horrible GI stuff that you don't want to know about. I cheated with a bit of dairy 2 days ago & only got a tiny bit sick that lasted for an hour & I didn't even cry.

So was it dumb luck or was it the lack of gluten in my diet? I don't know & while I'd love for it to be as easy a fix as just removing gluten from my diet & getting all the other foods back, I'm not gonna call it yet. I'll be gluten-free in this house regardless of if I have a gluten issue or not & am doing a 100% GF diet for 3 months & at the end will see how I feel & do a gluten challenge & see what happens. If it turns out it is the gluten I'll be 100% GF for good & if it turns out I've just got a useless GI tract then I'll eat gluten when I'm out & none at home.

Saturday, March 5, 2011

Paining the roses red

Well, not roses, rooms. My roommate is plaining on listing this house for sale once thaw comes so between now & then we've got to clean, paint & pack up the nonessentials. Every room in the house, save my bedroom, was painted blue by the old owners. We'd been slowly working on doing all the things we wanted to the house, but painting seemed to fall to the bottom of the list. I think partially due to the fact the smell of paint gives me migraines.

The living room will become a light chocolate milk color, the dining room/my office will become a milkwash shade of lime, not sure about my room yet or the halls & kitchen. Girl child's room will stay pale purple as the only other color she's interested in is red. Not sure what color roommate is painting the master bed room yet either.

We've also got to put new tiles down in the basement & repaint all that. I'd love to pull one of the walls down there down to make a large family room, but I think that's a bigger project than she's looking to do for a house she's going to sell.

Friday, March 4, 2011

Loose tooth

Girl-child has her first loose tooth. It's right in the middle on the bottom & only just able to wiggle so it'll be a while before it falls out. She's so beyond excited about it & has asked around 8 billion times what exact day is it going to come out.

Her need to know exactly what day things will happen & her inability to accept answers like maybe, sometimes, probably & I don't know are one of the harder issues around here. When you're 5 there are a lot of maybes or I don't knows that come at you & when you have a disabled mom there are even more maybes & probablies that come down the pike. It's got to be hard & frustrating for her to get as many as she does & I do try to keep them to a minimum, but they aren't able to be gone all together.

I wonder how much of it is average kid & how much is down to ASD? I'm sure a fair chunk of it is NT, but I think a NT kid is asking because they want the quarter (what are kids getting per tooth these days?), but she couldn't care less about the quarter, she just wants to put it on the calendar so she have it plotted out.

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Ears

I doubt many people show up here to hear about my ear stretching, but it's my blog so I can blather about them a bit.

On the smaller sizes (18g-12g) I was about 3-4 weeks between stretches. I touch quicker than the proper timeline of always 1 mo each. I'd hoped that the 6 weeks suggested on that timeline would be fine to go from 12g to 10g, but it's been 2½ months now & was only now able to go to the 10g.

Based on that I'm thinking it'll be end of May at the earliest to try going up again. I've 2 pair of glass plugs & 1 pair of steel dangles (that are kind of heavy), I think since I'll be at this size for a while (3-6 months I'm guessing) I might get a pair of bone earrings. Those are always so lovely, but they are $$$ & I didn't want to spend that for something that I'd be out of in a flash.

Ribbing! And knit night.

I've gotten to the ribbing on my sweater! I worked a row that had YO before you do the ribbing & a few rows in decided that the holes weren't working. I think they were meant to match the holes created from the YOs on the raglan sleeves but since I did a M1 instead of a YO for those increases it didn't match anything on the sweater. So I tinked back (ripping back is too scary for me yet) & am now only ½ a row in to the ribbing.

We had a new woman show up to knitting & while she could only stay for a short time last night she hopes to come again. She was lovely & complemented how even my stitching is especially for someone who's only been knitting for 2 years which I thought was sweet. I do hope she comes back & not just because she says nice things.

I hadn't been to knitting in 2 weeks, 1 due to the wrist being crap & last week no one felt up to it due to cold & being tired. It was really nice to see everybody again & see what they were up to. It's funny I was worried when I started the group & we got a few people coming because half of the group all knew each other from outside this group & that they might just take over the group & I'd feel left out, but that's never been the case. While I have to watch my love of obscenities & we just all avoid politics & such, I do think we are a cohesive group & I couldn't be happier.

Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Feeling Better, Well a Bit Better

Been going about life trying to just do what needs to be done & not wallowing in feeling like shit & thus far I do feel a bit better. I'm hoping once it gets warm enough to start melting some of this snow that that will help as well. I hate how winter keeps you trapped indoors sue to the bitter cold & the mountains of snow.

Monday, February 28, 2011

I've been robbed! (or maybe not)

This morning I had to get up about 3 hours ealier than normal to go to the worst doctor's appt ever (hell will freeze over before I see that woman again). Then my very tired self gets back home to get the child ready for a day at school. Whilst doing that the mail comes, I trot out to the box & grab it. In the mail is that letter from the bank, you know that one that lets you know that you bounced a check.

As there should have been around $75 in my account after all of my outstanding stuff cleared I was freaked out. I go check online & there are 2 transactions that I totally did not make on my account to the tune of $129. I call the bank & my acct is frozen & an investigation is begun. I call my roommate & she has me check her acct too just to make sure there's nothing amiss there. Her acct is fine & I send her the info related to the transactions & then the mystery is solved.

She paid 2 of her bills from my acct by mistake. Upside is my acct wasn't jacked; downside we're out the bounce fees & we have to drive an hour away to go in in person to un-freeze my acct.

Ugh.

Saturday, February 26, 2011

Clutter

I am a person who always ends up with bits of clutter here & there around the house. I've been trying the last 3-4 months to really declutter up my stuff. I've gotten rid of so much stuff & yet there still seems to be clutter. It's amazing how much junk the average house holds!

One of the things I have that takes up space is yarn leftovers, I'd no clue what to do withe them, they aren't enough for most other projects so I've decided all the ones that aren't worsted/aran weight I'm going to just knit up in to squares or rectangles & then fill with batting & catnip to take down to the shelter for the kitties. The worsted/aran stuff I'm going to try to knit in to squares & maybe someday I'll have enough to make a patchwork quilt.

Thursday, February 24, 2011

Feeling Blue

The blue sweater only needs 20 more rows before the ribbing; then of course it will need sleeves of some sort. (The photo is really blown out, sorry.)
Mary Jane


I've got a sock on the needles that I had hoped to work on this month & get half a pair done, but my wrist has been cranky so I've gotten ever little knitting done this month.
Blue Sock

On the sad news front this hat I knit got up in the washer & dryer & now is tiny.
Hat got felted

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Kindle

When Kindles first came on the market I thought they were stupid & that they only people that would buy them were the same people who though having a calculator watch in the 80s was the coolest thing ever. How could you not love the feel of a real book in your hand, he weight of it, the texture of the paper, those are all part of reading a book & no machine could give you that feeling.

And then I moved, with boxes & boxes, bags & bags of books. Once we got settled in I decided the books needed a bit of a cull. I got rid of over 70 books & you couldn't tell I'd gotten rid of any.

Then I had to buy another copy of a book I'd owned; one I'd bought at least 3 times in my life. First time it was $5, second time it was $6-7, this time it'd be $9, plus I knew I'd read it to tatters again & have to buy it again. I'd be $20 in to this book & a Kindle copy would be $8 & I wouldn't wear the book out. That's a pretty good idea I thought.

I have a bunch of authors who put out a new book each year & while I always wait for paperback those books take up a lot of space & wear out. That's what won me over. Yeah there are some books I'll never be without a real copy of, but there are plenty of authors that a copy on the Kindle is plenty good for. Plus I realized I could always have a good book that exactly what I was in the mood to read with me. Add to that it plays music & that it has a free web browser (it's as slow as when we were all stuck working the net on Windows 3.11) & I was sold. My parents went halves on it & got it for me for Giftmas, best gift I've gotten in years.

The only downside to it is that when you get it you instantly want to buy 500 books, but that's not usually in ones budget. So each month I buy 3-4 books. It's more than I usually spend since I'm a used book junkie, but slowly I will be replacing the books that I love to re-read so that after 6 months or so I expect that I will be down to 1-2 a month & since I won't be replacing so many that will end up being a savings.
My Kindle & Case

So in the end I became a pretty big fan of the Kindle & I think a lot of bibliophiles will be swayed for the same reasons. The fact it holds a whole library in a tiny little device, that you can have that whole library no matter where you are, the fact you never have to re-buy. The only thing that will piss off the bibliophiles is that you can't sell or give away books. That part eats & I am glad that they did decide to allow sharing of books & wish that all the publishers would allow it, I think they will & I think in the end you'll be allowed to give books away too, but it'll be a while before they do.

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Types of Blogs

There really are 4 types of blogs. Type one is the most common & it's the ones that are selling you something, maybe it's contests, maybe it's reviews, maybe it's your favorite author, but all in all they are marketing to you so you'll spend money. Type 2 is also pretty common, but no one out side of a small circle give a shit about it, that the family blog. The ones that are written so grandma on the other side of the country doesn't feel like she's missing out on her grandson's first steps & stuff like that. The 3rd type is the information blog, the one that is educating you & broadening your mind. The 4th type is what I think mine falls in to, it the craft/twee/photo/hobby blog. It's the one that wants to talk about & show off something they've made. Sometimes when I talk about the medical issues my daughter & I have we scoot over in to the information blog & that's the type I meant to write when I started at this. Then I learned to knit & starting play around at photography (while I am getting to be a damn good knitter, I do still kinda suck a photography).

I don't know that there was a point to this post, but it was just bumbling around in my head that no matter how many different flavors of blogs I read they really all boil down in to 4 categories.

Thursday, February 10, 2011

Depression

In the past few weeks I've gotten my ass handed to me by depression. I normally have low level depression at all times, but every 1-3 years I'll get a few weeks (1-8 weeks) of really bad depression.

I was looking stuff up on the internet about how best to self treat your depression &, as long as you aren't about to hurt yourself or others, one of the best things to do is to drag yourself around & kinda fake it. You should acknowledge that you feel like shit, yes, but then go about your day doing all the stuff that needs to get done. Do that in touch with your feeling bullshit, but then suck it up.

So I'm trying. I'm writing this useless post & I'm knitting a little everyday, I'm not canceling every appointment under the sun. I know in a few weeks no matter what I do I'll feel better, but maybe since I won't have let so any tasks & chores build up it'll pass sooner. I wonder if by letting so much not get done I'm creating an extra stressor that keep the depression here long. Who knows & by dragging my ass around this year instead of wallowing won't really be anything conclusive, but it beats crying in the corner.

Saturday, January 15, 2011

Blue Sweater & Holiday Gifts

Still knitting on my blue sweater & while it's going slow it is still going.

Mary Jane

I finished the last of my holiday gifts

Scarf for Inga
I might still put some fringe on this, not sure.


Hat for Dad
Does this need a pom-pom or tassel on top? I just don't know.

Friday, January 14, 2011

365

I decided to do one of those 365 dealies, not one that does just 1 thing for each shot; like the people who do a photo of themselves every day or a certain thing everyday, but rather to do just random shots of my world everyday. I've got the photos over on my flickr & I'm not going to put all of them over here, but I thought every week-ten days I'd put up 2-4 photos in a single post that had been my favorites. So without further ado here are the favorites so far:

This is my aloe plant, his name is Spud (yes, I do name my plants)
Day 7

The crabapple tree in my front yard
Day 4