Grief and Loss

 This week is going to be hard.  It’s been a year and 1 day since we lost Eric.  Today is the one year anniversary of his funeral.  In five days it would have been his 31st birthday.  Although we tended to celebrate Eric’s birthday all month long and when ever we went somewhere special.  I am not sure how the week will go, but my goal is to try to stay in the now and not eat my way through my grief.  I also plan on a lot of walking. So far so good on the eating and walking front.  

Since stress makes my arthritis worse and I still have 6 weeks before I can try knitting again.  I know that I can spin and weave but I might not have any creative mojo this week. I just might go on a cleaning and de stashing spree.  So a few people might just get some calls to pick up some crafting supplies.  I am sure that you won’t mind. I just don’t know about you’re families will like it  

If you are so inclined to remember Eric a donation in his memory would be most appreciated.  The first that I would like to suggest is www.ML4.org as they are continuing to do research on this disease that turned my family upside down.  ML4 was Eric’s primary diagnosis. The second  is your local community food bank, like all kids with ML4 Eric loved to eat.  Eric also loved making donation runs around Thanksgiving every year.  We would fill up the van with a donation that Eric would hand off while I slipped in a check.  He was delighted when the volunteers remembered his name and that he like to hand them the food. 

I will miss his smile this week and his delight in having the birthday guy sing happy birthday. Eric might be gone physically, but he is not forgotten. I love him to the moon and back. 

More Hats

 I was not on my game today. So my solution was to knit and get up and walk every few hours to walk around the house.  The end result was three new hats for my favorite charity and 10,000 steps.  So I made the best of a bad body day.  

I Am in Better Shape

Today after our morning 2 mile walk, I had a glass of water and proceeded to clean house for an hour.  I had 8,300 steps by 10:30 am.  I finished the day with 14,396 steps which is 5.58 miles and 66 active minutes.  I don’t think I could have done that in March.  

The only down side was that by using my hands for cleaning the house, I could not knit today.  I am hoping that as my hand heals this will not be the case.   

Feeling Better

I am starting to feel better after my dental surgery. Almost human again.  I have worked out a new pattern conundrum.  Listening to a book and still resting.  I am doing light chores. And still working on my hand physical therapy.  I even walk about 5,000 steps today. 

My Question of the Day is?

I have a very interesting question. I’ve been walking a long time to get in better shape. When my step goal was 8000 steps a day I struggled to make the 8000 steps a day. However, when I switch my step goal to 10,000 steps today I seem to be exceeding it almost every day. I am totally confused by this. Does anybody else have the same issue?

Monday’s Rollercoaster

Today was a roller coaster with some very good highs.  Seven bags made it into the recycling bin, I am hopeful it will squish down if necessary.  One additional bag of trash made it out of the house along with a broken piece of pool equipment from the pump area into the trash.

On the down sloop I started dropping stitch’s on a lace work pattern that I am working on and put it away for the day.  I have 3 hats in progress and could not seem to finish just one.  I meandered my way through the house doing a little throwing and putting things away.  Not much progress was made.

I will end on a good note of walking over 13,000 steps and over 5 miles today.  So goodnight and stay safe.

3 for 3

Today was the third day in a row that we made charity drops.  Today we filled the back of my car to capacity with dog pillows for the animal shelter.  There were 9 in all plus a few odds and ends. Thank to new donation procedures we did not even have to get out of the car. We just popped the hatch and they took what would have been several trips for us. I did not even have to stop knitting. The result is a much cleaner craft room.  Although I still need to vacuum.

I also tried starting my day with a walk around the block, that seemed to help my mood. We also cleaned out part of the garage and put the new patio umbrella up.  All in all a good day.

Steps

I looked down at my steps and wondered how I got over 8,500 steps today. I goal alarm did not even go off. My day was filled with chores, knitting and taking to Teri.  A good dY all around.

Stay safe.  

I Am 3 for 3

Today was a puttering kind of day.  Over breakfast I found out I could get my favorite Trader Joe’s snack food from Amazon, at a slightly higher price. I justified it because Trader Joe’s does not deliver.

I got laundry, walking and cleaning done in dribs and drabs.  Yes, John’s polos came out wrinkled, but I did it so I can’t complain about.  I honestly can’t quite remember when the last time it happened, but I think Teri was in preschool.  Since John is working from home I am the only one who is going to see the wrinkled shirts.

My fiber crafting was quite scattered today also.  I spun 2 ounces out of 16 ounces which means that I have 4 ounces on the bobbin.  I can’t decide if I want to get a bright hot pink silk to ply it with or just ply the yarn back on itself.  Twice as much yardage or the regular 2 ply yardage.  Then it was off to the modular  baby blanket after dinner. I finished 1 square and found a mistake in another that needed to be fixed before I could continue with the blanket.  I fixed the mistake and moved on.  I am decreasing stitches on the current hat.  Since we are not eating out at all or going for car rides not a lot of hat knitting is going on.  So I worked on 3 projects and finished none some that is how I am 3 for 3 today.

Three Port Keys Opened Today

Ok, my title of this blog does not make much sense to those who don’t play Harry Potter Wizards Unite by Niantic. She who will not be named got me hooked on the game with the very basic information. None of my local friends play, so that left a lot for me to figure out. I had a lot of fun along the way.  I must say that I really like the game.  I even played at home when I was sick by finding lost items.  Although I have to leave the house to find green houses, inns and fortresses.

You have to walk between 2 km and 10 km per port key.  I was almost finished with the 1st port key last night and walked 5 km to get the next 2.  There is a daily bonus for walking .25 km. So if you want to have fun while walking, please join me in playing this delightful game.  For those of you who are curious, I am on level 21.

A big thank you goes out to the programmers, lawyers, W.B. Games, and of course J.K. Rowling’s for making this possible.

Exhausted

Tonight I am exhausted. Partly because of an arthritis flare up. Partly because John and I were very busy today with friends and chores.  Even though I was exhausted I managed to get my steps, drink my water and eat right.

I hope you all have a wonderful and productive weekend.

Knitting Books

I have got to really organize my knitting books by subject matter. I spent one and a half hours looking for Domino Knitting by  Vivian Hoxbro, for a class I am teaching tomorrow. I decided to take one more quick look before bed and found the book in the sock knitting section of my library.

This means that I really need help to sorta d organize my books.  I would trade this for duplicate books or hand spun yarn. I think I am down to about 10 feet of shelf space for knitting books.  I am not the best at organizing despite my best intentions.

On the bright side while I was looking for Domino Knitting,I managed to fill two bags with recycling. These things will never have to be dealt with again.  I also manage to get over 9,000 steps today. Then just like that it is almost 11:00 p.m.  so good night.

Bits and Pieces

I came up short on steps by 2020 steps. I think I will let it go today. My nap was more important than walking.

I started my sister-in-laws shawl. I finished the warping and got the first 5 inches woven.  The picture is earlier in the weave before the color change.  I am using the 24”wide loom which is harder to weave on than the 15 inch wide loom.

Stress Management

If you read my blog on a regular basis you might have noticed that I am doing a lot of cleaning and Zenning lately.  My inner circle knows what all the stress is about.  For right now that is what I am comfortable with.  I am stressed to the point that my creativity has dried up, so new patterns will be on hold for a while. I still need to keep busy.

So I have been turning the house upside down. Digging into the back of closets. Trying to be realistic with my cleaning.  I am never going to get back into my pre kids clothing, so to Goodwill the clothing went.  The Tupperware that was being stored in the garage went to a friends daughter. I have been dropping of delivery’s to Goodwill at least once a week.  If a magazine is a few weeks old it will go to Eric’s day program for the young adults.  Today’s results are 3 empty boxes of paper that at one point I had no time to look through.  I filled the recycling bin to the top this week.

I have also been doing a lot of walking.  My daily goal is 8,080 steps a day.  Most days I leave that number in the dust.  It seems to be helpful.  The only hiccup has been my Knitter’s elbow.  Right now it is one week without knitting, my elbow is better but not good enough to start knitting again.
I hope that it is better soon as I have a hard time finding  the right time to warp the loom.

Extreme Zenning

For the last two days I have been in the extreme zenning mode. Yesterday it was a closet. I have filled three bags of clothes that will be going to Goodwill. There is actually room in my closet now, not much but a little more. Unless I find the time to ride about 100 miles a week on my now nonexistent bike.  Swim laps for 90 minutes a day, six days a week and rock climbing a few days a week these cloths will never ever fit again. I am sure that some very skinny person will love these retro clothes.  As mom to Eric that level of fitness is never going to happen.  I am lucky on most days to walk 8,000 to 10,000 steps, just a small fraction of the steps my younger self took. As a grownup, I do not have as much time as my teenage self to get all that movement in every day.  

The Zenning continued today with old paper work that no longer needs to occupy space in my closet. Eight bags of shredded papers from the 2010’s  made their way into the recycling bin.  I managed to fill it up half way.  We have a 90 gallon bin.  I need to save the rest of the bin for every day recycling. As a bonus I found enough none expired coupons for a free case of diapers.  This has inspired John to find more old papers for me to shred.  

Even though I took most of the day off from knitting to let my knitting elbow rest, the rest of the world knows this as tennis elbow. Let it be known that I no longer play tennis so , therefore I can not possibly have tennis elbow.  I have decided that I must start finishing projects other than hats, which seem to fly of my knitting needles. I am really great at starting projects. Not so much with finishing.   Speaking of knitting needles, I might give some more away to a young mother who home schools her kids and teaches knitting to the next generation.  More space. I need more empty space in my closet. 

Well it is getting late and I need to try to rest, ahem I mean sleep.  

Knitting

I had a day of knitting. Two hats were finished and  considerable  Progress was made on two more. Pictures to follow when I have better lighting. It’s a little dark for using natural light.

I did a lot of walking to reduce my stress and ended the day with 14,896 steps which is about 4.68 miles. Noe to call it a day.

Me Time

I am not quite sure why but lately me time involves a 2 to 3 hour nap.  Which in turn messes up my plans for the day.  Although I have to admit that I feel a whole lot better after the nap.  I still did manage to get to 2 grocery stores and get most of the house restocked.  I even managed to find a turkey breast to cook for dinner.  The leftovers will be tomorrow nights dinner.  A turkey salad with pecans, celery and cherries served over a nice salad.

I did not manage to catch up on the laundry. My prediction for this weekend will be knee high.

I even managed to finish knitting a hat and cast on the next.  For the bonus points I emptied a knitting bag.  Tinked two half finished wash cloths. I do not need any more wash cloths, I have a few dozen in a storage tub if anyone needs some.  The yarn went into the hat bag. The extra knitting bag now very empty went into my closet.  The knitting needles will be put away tomorrow.

John and I started binge watching Highlander tonight.  We got through season 1 episodes 1 & 2.  So far it is fabulous.  I am wondering if some of the actors were also in The Game Of Thrones?   The  scenery is wonderful too.  I like all the costumes.

Eric spent most of his day sleeping.  That about sums up today with the exception of steps. I got over 12,000 today.  I am trying to  exercise away the stress.

The ISP

After being up with Eric a lot last night the last thing I wanted to do was prepare for Eric’s ISP which is short for an individual service plan.  Better understood by parents as the  quarterly we want to annoy you and tell you how you are not living up to some silly  bureaucrats idea of how we should be living our lives and that our kids are not making enough progress. Can you tell how much I hate the process? Every few years they decided to revise what they want and this was the year.  So instead of taking a much needed nap, I went through 42 pages of regurgitate questions.  Before I even got there to look through the questions, while eating breakfast, I was the very annoyed recipient of 16 robo calls in 32 minutes. I do not pick up calls when I don’t recognize the name and instead let it go to voicemail.  Yes, all 16 calls during breakfast went to voicemail and did not leave a message.   This did not make for a calm start to my day.

I did manage to make a good friend very happy with a box of gluten free cupcakes and a half a loaf of bread.  I also introduced her to goat cheese sandwiches.

With all that was going on today, I forgot about my step count and had to walk 5,000 steps after dinner to meet my daily goal. Well Eric is asleep so wish me luck tonight. I hope I get a full nights sleep tonight.

No Carpe Deim

Not all days are a Carpe Diem kind of day around here. Some days my standards are very low as long as everyone is alive at the end of the day and the laundry is not above knee level, I will call it a win.

I did get some Spinning done. This is going to be plied as an art yarn.  Pictures will follow when finished.

I did barely manage to get my 8,000 steps today.

I had a very enjoyable day. I went to the n4th Avenue Street Fair today. All my usual parking places were gone. I truly mean gone. The church parking lot is now a building under construction. My others were filled with vendor booths.  So I parked at the Tyndall garage at the University of Arizona and walked down hill to the street fair.  I did do a little shopping but skipped the street fair food.  I picked out a few things for my birthday while I was there.

It was a very good step day with over 10 thousand steps.  Just before bed my body decided what it thought of all the days activities. Let me tell you that it hates me at this moment.  I am hopeful that a good nights sleep will fix everything.