Tavern Wench

My family went to Medieval Times tonight, which is this elaborate dinner and tournament show.  Most of my family dressed up.  I brought my spindle and refused to wear a paper crown in an attempt to be "part of the show".  I gathered a little crowd of enchanted tiny kids and was mistaken for an employee at one point, which basically made my day.

My costume was a Halloween pirate dress my aunt bought a few years ago.  We had to belt it so it would fit, and it still draped rather than hugged, but wearing the "corset" I bought for prom two years ago at least made it look like I had some curves.

Notice my adorable half-curtsey that looks as natural as breathing.  Curtseys have been my default "you exist and I am acknowledging you" gesture while in a skirt for years now, so it's semi-automatic at this point.  I was bobbing curtseys to knights, royalty, and little girls all evening.  (The little girls were the greatest because they would stare in wonder and then bob awkward little curtseys back!) I discovered upon returning home that I actually have the balance required to make those deep, elaborate curtseys that require you to go almost to your knee with your back totally straight while spreading your skirts out, and rising back up without wobbling.  It's quite a feat, and one I'm maybe too proud of.

Oh also, our knight won the tournament and defeated the bad guy.  It was a good night.

Let's take a peek at my February Resolution progress, shall we?

2015 Resolutions Update, And February

Want some good news?  We all survived the first month of 2015!  Go us!

Here's some more good news:  A lot of us did a lot of things!  There was a lot of productivity in this first month of 2015, even with a few major setbacks for some people.  Hopefully we all keep up this great momentum all year.

Let's start with a bit of a review of how I'm doing with my 2015 Resolutions, and then we'll start the February Resolutions.

1) Keep up with 3 Good Things all year
I'm doing really well with this one!  I'm a few days behind writing things down (I think I need to write down Friday and Saturday), but I am taking time to think about them every night.  I just don't always have the mental energy to write them down!

2) Exercise for at least 10 minutes each day
This is working out as well (pun unintended).  A lot of my exercise has just been ten to fifteen minutes of basic yoga, but it's definitely making a difference for me already.  This month I'm going to start trying to get some more serious exercise in.

     a) Bonus points for actually completing C25K this year
          I have not started this yet because I don't feel that I'm in shape enough to do even that.  Plus, it
          was January, and that means it was cold.  This is a resolution for spring/summer months, not
          January.

3) Put up one blog post a day
This has been happening as well, as long as you consider "day" to be "before I go to bed".  Some of them have been very late, past midnight, but I'm going to work on getting them in earlier as I get more used to my schedule.  Having some weekly elements is going to help that a lot, I think.

4) Complete my Year Of Adulting Blanket and accompanying journal
This is sort of working... and sort of not.  There are 32 squares, which means I'm right on top of things as far as squares go, but I'm a week behind in the journaling.  Hopefully I can catch up this week, and then I'll be right on target again.  That's the goal here!

5) Read all 24 of my MERaT books
I got off to a good start by reading both of my January books.  They were really short though, so that wasn't very challenging.  I'll have to plan a little bit better to do as well with February's books.  More on that in a bit.

6) Knit 12 pairs of socks
I'm so disappointed that I couldn't finish my "January" socks in January.  It just didn't happen this time.  But, I'm confident in my ability to catch up and finish them within a few weeks.  More on this in a minute as well.

7) Make sure more yarn is going out of the house than into it
I'm really not sure how I did on this.  I haven't calculated my yarn usage for January yet.  I'll get back to you.

Looks like I'm making some good progress on the 2015 goals.  Ready to see February's?

January Resolution Wrap-Up

Well, I don't have all the right pictures for my Adulting Blanket at this particular moment.  But January ended on a Saturday so it makes sense for me to wrap up my January Resolutions and start in with February's resolutions tomorrow.

I did okay-ish in my resolutions this month.  I think next month will consist of a lot more smaller goals so I have things to triumphantly check off a lot more often.  It's way more satisfying than slogging through some of the bigger ones.

Making A Sort Of Progress, And Other Nonsense

Last night I slept on the couch because my room is also the guest room for lone guests, and my grandmother was here.  I really dislike sleeping on the couch.  My hair is always a rat's nest in the morning and all my bones creak and click when I get up.  It's very weird.

I went to see a play today.  Well, actually I went to see a staged reading of a Shakespeare play, where there's very little in the way of sets, props, or costuming and everyone carries a script.  They're usually a lot of fun but I think I'm going to have to start reading the synopsis before attending because these history plays are absolutely killing me.

Today's production was Henry IV, Part I, and I understand it way more now after reading the Wikipedia synopsis than I did at any point in three hours of watching it.  Apparently that scene at the beginning was a fight over prisoners and the former ally of the king decided to depose him.  Just knowing that makes the whole thing make a lot of sense.  I really disliked the comic relief character, which is a bad thing because he evidently gets a much bigger part in Part II, as well as another of Shakespeare's plays.  Something to steel myself for.

In the area of Adulting I did something very successful today.  I got hopelessly lost.

I've been going to these readings for several years.  I've been driving myself to them for several months.  So I reasoned that I didn't need a map this time because I should be familiar with the way at this point.  And yet, I got to downtown Dallas and I got hopelessly, miserably lost.  I had absolutely no idea where I was, or where the arts center was, or where anything was.  I drove around for fifteen minutes, reasoning that I was at least within a few blocks of it (I knew I had the right highway exit, more or less) and I should be able to find it without calling someone with access to GPS to figure out what I was doing wrong.  I eventually found a street I recognized and followed it until I found another street I recognized and followed that until I knew where I was again and could locate the parking garage.  I was two minutes late for the introduction to the play and had to sit in the back.  For a woman used to front row seats (It's general admission; I try to be first in line), this was bad.

Anyway!  All's well that ends well (points for Shakespeare reference), and I successfully did an adult thing.  Now, let's see how I'm doing in Resolutions, with only one week left.

January Resolutions Mid-Month Update

I promise some of the things are getting done.

First, though:  Today was good.  I spent almost the entire day with Ian, sort of trying to stock up memories so I won't miss him quite so much when he goes home.  Today was my last opportunity to see him until about the middle of February, so we made the most of it.  Plenty of snuggling and discussing schedules so we can for sure stay well-connected this semester.  I also helped him clean out his car, accompanied him on a few errands, and told him stories while he did some packing.

His response to the deck of cards was more than positive.  He read the title card and understood immediately, but asked if he could wait to read them all until he returned home.  I said that was fine, but asked if I could show him the one card I hadn't assigned randomly.  I don't have a picture of this one, but it says "Out of all the girls you know, you still want me", and it's the queen of hearts.  He said he would make the obvious pun, but I'd already done it for him by making the card in the first place.  He also commented that 52 is a lot of reasons, and he was impressed.

Okay, anyway.  Resolutions.  Although I've only marked off one (and a half), things are actually progressing.  Here, see for yourself.

Whiplash Day and January Resolutions

So I've dubbed today Whiplash Day.  I got a call from my manager this morning informing me that he was not going to keep me because he'd had more resignations and needed full-time workers.  So three days of training pretty much wasted.

I spent most of the afternoon watching Once Upon A Time with my mom.  Then I got an email from the library where I volunteered all through high school requesting that I call to set up an interview for the page position I'd applied for early in December.  So I have an interview for that on Thursday.

At about five -- when I should have been going to the shop for training -- I messaged Ian to ask "If I wanted to go out and do something tonight, would you have any ideas?  I don't want food, I don't want to see any more movies, and it's too cold to be outside.  This basically exhausts my ideas of what to do with myself."  He offered to find some live music, picked me up (for which I felt guilty later when I realized I could have driven to his house), and took me downtown to a coffee shop that I swear is in a basement.  Where we discovered that a friend of his was playing that night at that particular shop.  Ian had gone to see a show of his last night.  It was great.  I enjoyed myself in the quiet sort of way that comes from just listening to good music for a while.

So!  That's been my day.  Ready to see my month?  I have six resolutions this month, and five of them are yarn-related.

2015 Resolutions (And 2014 Wrap-Up)

Okay, so I didn't do so well with my resolutions last year.  Partially because I fell off the blogosphere, and partially because I stopped resolving to Do Things and that meant I stopped Doing Things.  Let's give them a look anyway.

1) Get a job
Ironically, I actually got this one done.  On December 30, I was hired as a barista at Saxbys Coffee immediately after the interview.  I'm still feeling surreal about this.

2) Get into a schedule
I failed miserably at this.  It's preposterous how unscheduled I am.  I sometimes go to bed at 3 in the morning.

3) Find and apply to university for the 2015-16 school year
This only... half happened?  I have applications in progress but they are not finished by any means.

4) Complete C25K and begin running regularly
This was such a laughable failure.  I think I started it three times last year, for an overall total of like... five.

5) Read at least 24 books

I have no idea, honestly.  I suspect I managed to do this one because of my December "Whee, finals are over and I can read again!" library hauls, but I can't honestly say.

So that's one, maybe two I did.  One I made some progress, and two I didn't do even a little bit.  Oh well!

Onward and upward!  Here are my resolutions for 2015 (at least some of them -- there may be more.)

The Year Of Adulting Blanket

I did a dumb thing.

I offered help to someone trying to figure out how to do a temperature blanket in squares because 365 will not make a rectangular shape.  (In case you're wondering, a temperature blanket -- or scarf -- consists of assigning a color to a temperature range and working a number of rows or a square in the color corresponding to the day's high/low/average temperature.)  I admitted that perhaps I knew all the math because I was eventually planning to make one.

"But not this year," I said, "Too much is happening this year for that."

Too much is happening this year for me to make the blanket that is supposed to help me document an entire year of my life.

...Crap.

It makes way more sense to pick an important, dynamic year than a year in which only minor changes occur.  For instance, doing it last year would not have been very interesting since the most important things that happened all year were my grandfather's death in April and getting a job in the last week of December.

Which brings me to this year.  I have dubbed 2015 "The Year Of Adulting".  I'm moving out this year, leaving my first college, getting my own car, and various other adult-ish events will also occur (incidentally, at the end of the year I'll be legally allowed to celebrate these events with alcohol).  This is an important year for me, and it makes a lot of sense to record that.

So I guess this is the year for the one-year blanket.  Here's how that'll work.

Summer Fun Bingo, Part Two (Resolutions For July)

(Stay tuned to the end of the post for Tour de Fleece Day -1!)

I've still got five squares left of my first round of Summer Fun Bingo, but Mom suggested I start a new sheet for the rest of the summer so I have more things to do.  Since I have two months left and nothing really pressing to accomplish, I figure I might actually get a third sheet in.  But let's not be hasty.  My 24 squares for Summer Fun Bingo, Part Two also double as my Resolutions for July, since there's really no point in adding more things to my list.  Here's the sheet:

Click to zoom

And here's the breakdown.

Resolution Wrap-Up Plus 3 Good Things

Today you get a twofer, because I'm going to try to add some positivity to my Mondays and it's also the last day of the month.  So, we have the Monthly Resolution Wrap-Up and the first dose of 3 Good Things in the same post!  So here we go.

Resolution Wrap-Up
I did pretty well if you consider them 24 separate goals, but I failed if you consider it one goal.  Also, hilariously, my randomized square position was perfect so I've only gotten two bingos.  It's terrible.  See?

Pathetic, isn't it?  Well, here's the breakdown.

Summer Fun Bingo, Or, Resolutions For June

Sometime before the end of last semester, Ian asked me if I'd like to go to France with him in July.  He has family there and occasionally flies out to see them (and practice his French) for a few weeks.  I said yes, of course, even though I don't speak a word of French and I'd had half-formed summer plans already.  Pretty much nothing takes precedence over Europe.

I'm still not sure if we're going -- planning this has turned into an adventure for him -- but I operate under the assumption that I'll be out of the country for three weeks in July because if I don't I probably won't be able to go.  That means I can't go job-hunting (no one will give me three weeks off when I started working like two weeks ago), and I can't take a summer class (the last week or so overlaps when we're potentially leaving).  Essentially, it means I have to cram my entire summer into June, and hope I won't be here in July.  Enter the Summer Fun Bingo, Year Two.

Click to zoom

This is something we did last year.  I honestly don't remember if I did all 24 things or not, but I at least gave it a shot.  Last year there were categories, and really hard things as well as really easy things.  This year I just threw together a list of 24 things I want to get done, and think I can possibly accomplish in June.

So for this month I have either 1 resolution or 24, depending on how you look at it.  If you think of it as one, my resolution is Complete Summer Fun Bingo Card.  If you think of it as twenty-four, here's the rundown:

Contrary To Appearances

I have now seen "Meet the Colors" four times.  I am consoled by the knowledge that tomorrow, we will be watching "Meet the Letters".  At least there will be 26 of those rather than eight.  We also went out to the lake behind their house to feed the ducks, but the ducks kept running away so we went to the park instead.  I don't think anyone wins points for that.

Where is January going?  New Year's Day was two weeks ago already.  School will start Tuesday.  And I need more tea.

I promised you a progress assessment on my Resolutions, and I'm waiting for the base coat on my nails to dry, so here goes:

You Actually Wanted To Do Stuff?

Lissa is still horizontal.

I went to bed at 9:30 last night and (except for getting up to grab the phone to inform my client that I would not be coming to her house today) did not get out of bed until 2:30 in the afternoon.  I woke up at least four times during the night (drink water, pull Octuple Rainbow over head, return to sleep), and probably could have slept a lot later into the afternoon... but the phone I'd picked up was still beside my bed, and someone called my house.  Booooo.

I've gotten nothing done today.  If I feel up to it, I'll work on the angora swatch after posting this.  Or maybe I'll just go back to sleep.  The only problem with me at this point is the headache, and I think I'm still dehydrated.

So in order to feel like I'm actually accomplishing things, I'll take a quick run through my resolutions for the month.  Ready?  Here we go.

Resolutions, Part Two: January

While everyone is setting well-intentioned resolutions of Things To Do This Year (and you may recall that I'm one of them), some of us are quietly going about setting goals for the month of January only.  Some things don't take a year, or are too trivial to be added to Resolutions For 2014.

Be A Better Human Being This Year!

A new year means another guilt-tripped effort to become A Better Human Being, whatever that means to you.  Last year I didn't bother setting resolutions, knowing  I would simply gleefully break them all as I forgot about them.  Then Resolutions Monthly turned up in my life, and I've been accomplishing goals since May (with a break in November for Life to interfere).  For 2014, I'll be continuing on with Resolutions Monthly, but setting some bigger, year-long goals as well in the hope that I can incorporate them into my monthly lists as well.

December Resolutions: Happy Birthday!

Yes indeed, yesterday was my birthday! I am now nineteen years old. (Now three-fourths of you thinks I'm really young and the last fourth thinks I'm really old!) I have also survived my first semester as a college student and signed on for another one. Aren't I so smart.

I've also volunteered to start and captain a team for Ravellenic Games 2014, and hopefully I'll be doing another post on that later.  Preparation for the Olympic Games in February starts in December for us yarnworkers, believe it or not!

Astonishingly, things have actually gotten done in these last two weeks. An entire list of things. Not the whole list, unfortunately, but a list. Curious? Then take a look!

Resolutions for December: And We're Back!

Hello!  The particularly astute among you will have noticed that there were no Resolutions for November this year, and that is because I was too busy and distracted to make any until about the 20th, and by then I didn't even want to bother.  I did accomplish some stuff in November, including finishing that cupcake that was on my resolutions for I think two or three months!

Now it's the last month of the year.  Christmas decorations are going up everywhere I look, which reminds me I need to clean my room so it's not a fire hazard so I can get some candles going in here.  The Texas weather is going haywire, as usual. Expected high tomorrow is 75°F (24°C), while Thursday we're looking at 37°F (3°C).  That's quite a difference!  I have a pile of blankets on my bed keeping me nice and cozy, and I've been wearing a purple-and-grey plaid jacket every time I leave the house these last few days.  Definitely feels like December.

So let's get this ball rolling again and set some resolutions for December, shall we?  As always, Ravelry users are welcome to join us in the Resolutions Monthly group, anyone with a blog can link back to this post if they desire, and everyone else should feel free to post their resolutions in the comments.

I have a lot of resolutions this month, but I think most of them are fairly attainable.  Some are probably wishful thinking, but I'll do my best.

October Resolutions: What Just Happened?

Someone informs me that October is over.  What?  When did that happen?  Isn't it like the 18th?

According to my music professor this is the part of the semester where school tries to kill you.  My exams and major projects are stacking up within days of each other, making it difficult to plan ahead and forcing me to basically just get through a week at at time. Half the students are getting sick from not taking care of themselves well (not this girl!).  Sleep is in high demand and short supply.  So that might all be part of my confusion and inability to get things done.

As I suspected, this month did not go so well for my resolutions.  Check out the original post here to see what my original goals were, and brace yourself for a crash.  Here we go.

October Resolutions: Wait, It's October?

So October kind of crept up on me this year.  Either the end of September was a lot shorter than usual, or I just wasn't paying attention.  Which one of these things is more likely?

So I guess I should make some resolutions for the remainder of the month.  Or something.  Uh...

I'm super out of it.  Let's see how this goes.  As always, Ravelers should feel free to join us at Resolutions Monthly.  (I encourage everyone else to start a monthly resolution trend on a blog, Facebook page, or even comments here!)

September Resolutions: And Now Playing Catch-Up

Yes, I must admit, after starting this month so well...

...I got behind.

Vacations will do that to you.  Religious vacations involving a two-hour church service every day for a week will do that to you even more.  So yes.  I did lose it.  And yes, I will be spending the first part of October catching up.

But enough with the rambling: it's time to see the results!