Well, it wasn’t a great week, but not a complete bust, either. I exercised Monday and Tuesday, and ate appropriately. Wed, Th, Fri… I slipped. But I’m ok. I was busy and I didn’t have a lot of good food choices in the house. So I snacked a lot, which makes it harder to track in Calorie King, so I didn’t do that, either.

And I’m REALLY sick of chicken. I don’t want to eat any more chicken for a couple weeks.

I’ve gained 4 pounds from where I’ve been sitting for awhile, and I don’t know what’s up with that. I didn’t mess up that bad. It must be fluids or something. My body is doing something weird. Four pounds?

I’m going to have to drop my weight regimen until my elbow heals, but I’ll continue my physical therapy. Maybe I’ll add a little bit of treadmill or neighborhood walks? I don’t know.

How was your week?

I don’t know what is causing it, but my right elbow has hurt for days, and this morning, it was rather extreme and physically limiting. I don’t know if it’s the guitar playing, if it’s the lace knitting… I know that something (I can’t remember what) was aching while I was knitting recently, and I ignored it.

So, in looking online, it seems that it might be Tennis elbow or Lateral epicondyle. Though, it hurts more when I make a fist than when I open my fingers up, which sounds more like Golfer’s Elbow, or Medial epicondyle. Either way, it sucks. And what sucks the most is that aside from possibly having to go to the doctor, I have to stop the activity that caused it. Not knowing if it’s guitar or knitting, I should probably quit both, which I REALLY don’t want to do. I’m supposed to quit for weeks.

This is so unfair.

And it hurts so much that I can’t just do something else, like clean out the garage, which I’ve wanted to get done. And I’d imagine that I shouldn’t do it anyway.

So what do I DO for 3 weeks? Assuming that I’m going to rest it like I’m probably supposed to.

I absolutely loathe being unproductive. I hate feeling like I’m wasting time. That’s why I knit. I learn. I create. I make things.

Ooooooh. Wait a minute.

I’ve been wanting to do some serious catch-up in the family scrapbook/photo albums. (Yeah, I’m YEARS behind). I suppose I could do that for a few weeks. I could possibly spin, too. Fortunately, I’m ahead of the game with my deadline knits. The only problem is that I’m in guitar lessons, and I can’t exactly go to lessons if I’m not playing. And I REALLY don’t want to stop playing! I enjoy it so much, and I’m making such good progress…

Dangit, dangit, dangit.

So, my brother has lent me his new guitar to play around with.

It’s an auditorium, or concert bodied guitar, meaning it’s smaller than the standard dreadnaught I’ve been playing which is my mom’s guitar, also on loan. I think a concert body will help my elbow, if my injury is guitar related, because having as much in front as I do, and with my freaky small shoulders and such, sometimes it’s difficult to get around the guitar to play it.

Ooh, ooh, and check out this incredibly cool guitar strap I found.

It’s a velvety corduroy pink/brown paisley and I love it.

So, I don’t know what I’m going to do. I’ll take a couple days off of knitting and guitar (pout), ice it, Advil, rub eucalyptus oil into it to increase blood circulation, do some stretches I found online, and we’ll see what happens.

This is SO lame.

Continuing thoughts that were added later-

Maybe it’s my weight lifting? It really hurt the last couple times I did my biceps. I could go 3 weeks without weight lifting.

1. Sam’s Scarf

I’m finally to a color change. This scarf is extremely long, at his request, and it’s all been black Donegal Tweed until last night, when I finally reached a stripe.

Sam asked for 4 red stripes on one end. The stripes will be 3 1/2 inches of red, flanked by 3 inches of black. I’m 2 1/2 inches into the first stripe, so that leaves….. 23 inches of scarf left to knit. Sigh. I’ll be done with this sucker eventually.

2. Talent Show

Liv sang with a friend in the school talent show on Friday night. She was stiff as a board, but sounded great. She was really cute with her little hand balled into a fist at her side the whole. time.

3. Guitar

I was really excited this past week. I was playing around in my Simon and Garfunkel book (Roger, my teacher is amazing. I love him. I’ve learned so much, and he’s really warmed up. I love my lessons) and Abby asked about “Hazy Shade of Winter”.

A side note- she has only just recently discovered the song. The Bangles version, of course, because it completely rocks. As I was playing it for her, I noticed that a lot of the the chords are chords that Abby knows on her Ukulele, so I copied the music for her and she’s going to play around with it. I’m excited for her. She was disappointed to have missed the cut off for talent show entries, because she wanted to get up there and play her Uke. I never would have guessed. She’s a little shy, like me. I’m hoping she’ll still want to do it next year.

Anyway, to speed up the story, I was playing around and Abby asked about “Hazy Shade of Winter”, and I looked it up and played the chords. Then, as I was looking at the notes for the beginning guitar bit, I realized that I’d been reading and playing most of those notes in the music Roger has written out for me in my workbook. (Ode to Joy, Dueling Banjos, and a little “guitar boogie”, or so he calls it). So I figured it out! I can play the opening bit to “Hazy Shade of Winter”, and I did it by myself! And I’ve told practically everyone I’ve seen since, I’m so excited, and I’ve played it 500 times!!!

I’m giddy.

4. Miscellaneous silliness

I have many playlists on iTunes. The biggest is called “La Likes”, and it has 494 songs on it. According to the computer, it’d take 1.3 days to get through the whole list. So there are songs I don’t hear very often on La Likes. Well, at 9:30 this morning, Guns N Roses came on. Hee hee. I don’t have a lot of GNR, and I don’t hear it very often, but when it pops up, it makes me smile. We’re rockin’ out to GNR and I’m not even out of my pajamas yet.

It’s going to be a good day.

Well, it was a good week, not so great of a weekend. I’m not breaking momentum though. I figure, two good weeks is halfway to a month, and a month is an accomplishment. I’m working towards a month, then we’ll work on 6 weeks.

I ate pretty well, avoiding sugar (’til late Friday night, and Saturday, and, uh, Sunday too) and I exercised every day. I feel good. My skin is better.

My wheatgrass is ready, I’ll start juicing it tomorrow.

I’ve noticed a couple of things. Firstly, my motivation and determination seem to be directly linked to my menstrual cycle. I’m always gung-ho about a day or two before my period starts and that’s when I tend to initiate. It’s gotten kind of ridiculous in it’s predictability because it isn’t intentional, but it’s consistent. (And yet, it continues to take me by surprise which brings my intelligence into question).

It HAS to be a hormonal thing.

Interesting…

Also, I’m scared. I’m scared of a lot of things.

I’m afraid of losing momentum and quitting, again, and feeling like a total loser, again.

I’m afraid of NOT quitting, only to find out that what I was sure would work for me won’t. Then what do I do?

I can’t decide which I’m more afraid of, but I’m feeling extremely fragile. And it isn’t that time of the month. If it was, I wouldn’t have caved this weekend.

I take consolation in the fact that if I wasn’t working on my body and my health (inconsistent and inadequate as my efforts may be), I’d unquestioningly be in worse shape than I am now.

And that’s something anyway.

And that’s my update for the week.

While purple and red are one of my favorite color combinations, deep plum and deep red specifically, my hair and this shawl completely clash. So I included myself in some of these photos! Hee hee.

Once again, it amazes me how warm these light, airy shawls are.

and very soft

It appears from the photos, that I need blocking wires. In person, you don’t notice the bumpy edge, but I’m seeing it quite distinctly in the pictures. Darnit.

So, I was thinking last night about the next shawl. And I was thinking that delicate laceweight might not be the smartest way to go, because I would like the intended recipient to wear and enjoy it without worrying about snagging or ruining it. SO, I think I’m going to knit the third into a Flower Basket Shawl with fingering weight. I even have the right yarn (I think). To please the intended recipient, I might also add a lot of beads, like, perhaps in every basket? What do you think? If it were for me, I wouldn’t, but the idea intrigues.

Of course, I had this thought after buying some laceweight alpaca to sample the Azalea pattern with. So I’ll probably mess around with that at some point, too.

That’s what Clark says when he sees a carpenter ant in our house. He got it from the girls, but it’s incredibly cute when he says it.

We have ants. They’ve been sprayed, but we’re waiting around for them to actually die. I’m vacuuming them up by the hundreds.

It’s disgusting.

It took a lot more of yesterday than I’d anticipated, but the purple shawl is done and is soaking right now.

I’ll pin it out later this morning to dry before the girls get home, then I’ll bag it up with the other one for a month or so. But I’ll sneak a photo shoot in somewhere.

So what’s next? Well, I still have the third to do, but I haven’t decided which pattern to either use or write, and I still need to acquire some smooth laceweight to do my testing.

My brother’s scarf needs to be finished, and although he’s whining about how it’ll be warm outside before it’s done, I’m not feeling that motivated. But it’d be nice to have it off my plate.

There’s the shawl for me that I’ve started, but I’m having second thoughts. I think I need to knit a bunch more on it before deciding if it’s the right yarn for the job. The bummer is, I finally got that wretched circular start right, and I hate for all that effort to go to waste.

There’s Liv’s cable sweater, which doesn’t have a prayer’s shot of being done before the sweater season is over, particularly because I’m going to rip most of it before starting again. (I was cutting too much length).

The handspun for Clark’s sweater still needs to be dyed and then knit. So that’s looking like a “next year’s” sweater, too. Dangit.

Then there’s any number of things, the Philosopher’s Wool included, that I’d like to knit for myself, but I need to get through my knitting chores/commitments/obligations first.

Short answer? I have no idea. I’ll probably be working on Sam’s scarf for awhile, since I won’t have to think on that one.

And to come full circle, I set my oven to self clean this morning and it stinks. I have a headache.

Ewwwwww!

Yesterday was a house cleaning/errand running/great-grandma visiting/guitar playing day. I didn’t knit a stitch. But today I’m sneaking in an hour or so before heading out. I’m hoping to finish the edging on the purple Shetland Triangle today.

Does anyone locally want Girl Scout cookies? I could meet you somewhere. Veronica is a Brownie this year, and I’m picking up a mother load of cookies later this morning in the hopes of selling them.

The Lemon Chalet’s are really good. I, of course, am not eating them right now as I’m on a sugar purge, but I’m hoarding them so that in the future… mmmm.

After this repeat, I’ll finish up, beading the edging with the same iridescent beads I used on the last one.

I’ve added a few repeats to the pattern like I did with the Angel Shawl, and I’ve used a lot less yarn that I expected. I don’t know why I’m not getting the gauge that Evelyn does, but it doesn’t really matter. I just keep knitting ’til I get the size I want.

And now, I’m being me again.

So, I have one more shoulder shawl to finish this spring, and although I have the yarn (Artyarns again, in the most delicious shade of pink and white I have ever seen), I haven’t yet decided on a pattern. I was thinking of the Flower Basket, which is nice, but I can’t quite commit to it. There’s the Swallowtail, which can also be pretty. There’s any combination of lace patterns in Evelyn’s book I could do easily enough…

But there’s this luncheon set in the First Book of Modern Lace Knitting that has a gorgeous stitch pattern in it. Azalea, if you’re curious. The problem is, it’s knit in the round, it’s a hexagon (which is giving my brain the most grief as I’m trying to alter it), and I don’t like the edging. So I’d have to do some modifying. Some rather significant modifying, swatching, transition rows, etc. Fortunately, it’s charted, which will make some of this much easier.

It’ll be a lot more work. But I’ve loved this stitch since I first saw it. And if I figure out how to do it, and I like it, I can make one for me.

Or, I could just whip out another Evelyn shawl and be done.

Hmmmmm.

I’m guessing we’re in week 34. I know we missed a couple of weeks with Madrona and Mid-Winter Break.

I’m feeling better so far today, but it’s still early. How are you all doing?

Like I said yesterday, I’ve been working on it this week. I quit sugar, and have exercised and drank a lot of water every day. I’ve been tracking my food in Calorie King, but have had a tough time being consistent. For the week, I’ve averaged out just fine, but I’ve had high days and very low days. A couple days, I was 500 calories under my target, and I just didn’t want any more food. Other days, I went a couple hundred over.

No wonder my body is such a wreck. I seem incapable of taking adequate care of it.

Anyway, I’m considering this a good week, and while I dreamt of eating canned fruit in heavy syrup last night, I’m determined to make it through the weekend clean. Next week, I get to start juicing my wheatgrass which will help the cleanse.

And on a completely different topic… I had something verified at Madrona that I keep forgetting to tell you.

In my Short Rows class, the lady sitting next to me had taken the Make It Fit class that I couldn’t get into. I asked her what the most valuable thing she learned was, and she talked about armhole shaping, which was what I needed to hear. She said that the teacher said that everyone, no matter their size, has a 3 1/2 to 4 inch shoulder.

Everybody.

I couldn’t resist, I had to measure myself right there and then, and as I suspected, my shoulder is freaky small. It’s 2 1/2 inches. 2 1/2 tiny little inches of shoulder. That’s all I’ve got. I’ve always known my shoulders were extremely small, because I can’t keep a purse or bag strap on them to save my life.

It. Won’t. Stay. Up.

Never has.

I can never find clothes that both go around my bust and fit correctly in the shoulder. So this was good to know. It confirms what I suspected, that I’ll need to modify sweaters that I make for myself. Changing the armhole seems doable enough, but then subsequently altering the sleeve cap, well, there I’m not so confident.

Remember back a few years ago, when I was fitted for a bra and the lady had a hard time with me because I was too long in some places and too short in others? (I think it was a short armhole and long ribcage, or the other way around, I don’t know). And now my shoulders are significantly smaller than everyone else’s…

I’m abnormal. But I guess I knew that. :-).

How was your week?