Silver Goddess Wanna Be

There comes a time in a woman's life when she has to admit she isn't young (by society's standards anyway) anymore. This past September I turned 50. I also went through some pretty traumatic life changing events. As I struggle to reinvent and relearn myself, I am thinking of making some serious changes.

I have been struggling to cover gray hair now for close to 25 years. I had my first silver strands in high school. It was kind of cool back then. Just one or two glittery strands amid the dark brown. By the time I was 21, I had two silver streaks, one at each temple. Still not too bad. But by my mid to late 20's, the gray hairs were starting to get a little out of control. Time to take action!

At first I used the color that washed out after several shampoos. That worked for a while, but eventually the gruesome grays got too plentiful for even that. I started down the slippery slope of permanent box dye. That lasted until this past summer when I decided enough was enough, I would get my hair professionally colored and highlighted. I now sport a pretty brown color with caramel streaks.

I have been toying with the idea of letting my hair go its natural color now for a while. I have talked about it with my hairstylist, Dottie, many times. But I always chicken out. To be honest, I have been saying for years that I will stop coloring my hair when I turn 35. Then when I turned 35, I put it off to 40. Then 45. Then 50. When I turned 50 last September, I told Dottie I wasn't ready and it would be 55 or 60, or whenever my face became too old looking to dye my hair any longer. We've all seen those ladies that have the dyed black hair and older faces. It makes them look even older. I don't ever want to do that.

But I don't want to look old, either. Then I discovered Pinterest! I happened across some pictures of women who decided to embrace their gray hair and while looking at the before and after pictures, I discovered that each and every one of those ladies looked better with the natural gray than the dyed hair! Wait, what? Yes, it is true! And the abundance of gorgeous, young looking women with a crown of glorious silver hair has made me rethink my own decision about continuing to have my hair colored. Plus,I really like long hair, and one of the reasons I have not been able to have long hair was that the hair dye eventually dries it out and it has too much damage and has to be cut. If I don't dye my hair, I won't have that problem. Long gray hair?? Doesn't that drag your face down and make you look older? Well, I thought so, too, until I started doing some browsing on Pinterest!

Why now? Well, several reasons. First, it is a time of change in my life. Something I actually find rather freeing. What could be more freeing than releasing yourself from the trap of having to dye your hair? Besides, I figure if I do it now, when my face still retains some of its youthful look, it will not make me look as old as if I wait until I am in my 60's when my face will carry 10 more years on its surface. And my grey is that gorgeous bright silver color! I can see it very well in the "roots" of my current haircolor.

Monday, December 16, 2013 was the last day I had my hair colored and highlighted. I made the final decision to go Silverlicious almost 1 month later, on Jan. 18, 2014. This is what I looked like on that day.

You would have to blow up the picture to see the faint trace of gray roots sprouting in this picture. Now, with tomorrow being my 2 month anniversary since the last time I had my hair dyed, I look like this:  

I am actually pretty excited about this transition. It is really interesting to see my "real" haircolor appear as my hair grows. The front is going to be mostly silver, while the back is going to be very dark pepper with some silver salt. Pretty wild!

So what does all this have to do with knitting?? Well, never a fan of a skunk stripe, I am researching knitted and crocheted headbands! Even Silver Goddess need a little fibrous adornment once in a while! :-)

Time Flies

We have all heard that saying. We have all used it. But going through the remnants of someone else's life puts it in an all new perspective and forces us to confront the reality of it.

My mother in law passed away on December 24th. What a difference a month makes. Thanksgiving dinner was a "regular" holiday with a big family dinner and laughter and hugs and the excitement and joy of the holiday season that was just beginning. A little over a week later, my mother in law fell and had a heart attack. Or had a heart attack and fell, they were never sure which came first. It was painfully obvious at that point to everyone, even her, that she could no longer safely live alone. A week after her heart attack and fall, she was moved out of the hospital and into a rehabilitation center to start working on getting her strength back. Rich and I found a place that we thought would be great for her once she was ready. A retirement home that specialized in Alzheimer's patients, a disease that she had been struggling with for a the last couple of years. Then came the flu and pneumonia. She began deteriorating at a rapid rate. The Call came early Christmas Eve morning from the nurse practitioner. Time for the family to gather at her side.

My husband is an only child and my mother in law's siblings do not live very close by. There were only 4 of us there, Rich and I, one of her sisters and a dear family friend. We did not sit there for long. She passed away at 2:40 in the afternoon. Watching someone take their last breath is a very heart wrenching thing. Death does not come easily and neatly like it does in the movies. It approaches slowly and stealthily and relentlessly. And the human body which is designed to survive does not go without a fight. Even a weakened body like my mother in law's still clings to life for all it is worth. A tug of war between Life and Death with the human body as the battlefield. No, not easy at all. We held her hands and talked to her and tried to comfort her and each other as we watched the battle drag on. When it was over, we called the nurse in. After confirming that she had indeed passed, the nurse reached over and slid the window open just a bit. That seemed like a fairly odd thing to do considering it was a very cold and windy day outside. As the blast of cold air blew the curtain back and made us all shiver, we looked at each other in puzzlement then back at the nurse. She smiled and looked a little embarrassed. "It's something I learned in nursing school. When someone passes away, you open the window so that their spirit can fly away." I didn't know they taught that in nursing school. But I found that thought beautiful.

Christmas Day and even New Year's were lost in the ensuing mind numbing blur of endless funeral details and preparations. Then we were faced with an even more formidable task. Her house. Her things. Her memories. Her beloved possessions. Her clothes. Her everything. It is sad and extremely difficult to be left to dispose of the things that someone else dearly cherished. How would I feel about someone coming into my home and disposing of the things that I cherish the most? Taking my beloved books and yarn off to charity or worse, the trash dump. All of my memories just junk to someone else. It tore at my heart.

No matter how hard it was for me, it was absolutely NOTHING next to the torment Rich must have been feeling. At first he could not even spend more than a few minutes in her house before he had to leave. We started clearing out the "easy" stuff first. The clothes. Those we figured we could donate to Goodwill and someone would be able to use them. Somebody could use them! That was it! Inadvertently, we had hit upon the idea that saved us from the worst of the grief as we went through her things. Instead of just blindly disposing of everything, first try to find someone who needs it! We gave her dishes and silverware to a coworker that had lost everything in a fire. Her pool table to friends with sons who would play with it and enjoy it as Rich had when he was a boy. We began gathering up the items that she loved the most, her angel collection, her puzzles that she so lovingly spent hours putting together and taking apart over and over again, her collection of holiday decorations, etc. We began matching up people who shared her love for these particular items, people we knew would feel the same joy from these things and cherish them as much as she did. I can't help but feel as if she approves. It really helped us to think of it that way. It helps us still, as we are still a ways from being finished.

As we were sorting through the items in her house, I was surprised at how many things we found that she had been saving for "later." Items saved for "good," or for "someday." How sad. She had obviously bought and collected these items because she liked them, and in the end she never got to use them because that "Someday" had never come. It had lost the race to Death. We have begun the process of bringing some of her furnishings and items to assimilate into our own home, and as we do, we are now faced with the prospect of weeding through our own things to make room. Forced to face the march of time in our own lives. As I have been doing this, it has come as a terrible shock to me to find those things in my own life that I had been tucking away for "Someday."

Time seems to creep by, but that is an illusion. In reality it is flying. This point was cruelly driven home by yet another life altering event that occurred during December. My oldest nephew had been diagnosed this past spring with diabetes which he was unaware he had until an infection developed in his foot that led to the eventual amputation of his right big toe. He had healed and gone back to work and conquered his diabetes with diet and exercise and weight loss. All of his "numbers" were back in the normal zone. He was feeling good and getting back to his normal life with his wife and young daughter. Until December. Until he discovered another "spot" on the bottom of his right foot. After many agonizing weeks of tests and waiting for results and more tests followed by more waiting, the diagnosis was in. He would have to have his right leg amputated just below the knee. Surgery was scheduled for mid January. He found this out on the Thursday before Christmas. How could this be? He had done everything right! He had followed doctors orders and diets exactly, lost over 50 pounds, brought his numbers back to normal! Yes, the doctors agreed. But the damage had already been done. It had been done in the years before he even knew he had diabetes. Like time, it had been marching steadily on as he lived his life unaware of its advancing.

He called me after he left the doctor's office that day. Bill has always been more like a little brother to me. Only 10 years of age separates us. My mom babysat him the whole time he was little and we were always playing together. I took him everywhere I went. We were inseparable. After we hung up, I cried like a baby. The sudden reality of all those years gone by hit me. We were no longer kids laughing and playing and having the time of our lives with not a care in the world. We were in our 30's and 40's and both being forced to face some hard realities in both of our lives. One again I was forced to ask myself where had all those years gone?

December came and went last year as it does every year. But this time the elderly white haired man that came to visit our family was not the jolly old Santa Claus, but the somber and wizened elder Father Time. In his sack he did not carry toys and Christmas cheer and joy, but hard life lessons.  I have tried to pay attention to those lessons, as difficult as they have been. So I have dug through my yarn stash for that expensive, heavenly merino yarn, those silk and sequins yarns and all of those other gorgeous yarns that I had been "saving" for "someday." And I have started to knit them.
Don't put off joy for tomorrow when you use it today. Yesterday is gone, tomorrow is not promised and today is all we've got. Because "Someday" is an illusion. It doesn't really exist.

Hokie Bird Wings Shawl Takes Flight

I finished the Hokie Bird Wings Shawl yesterday! Finally. It took a lot longer than I had originally expected. I had a lot of "assistance" whenever I started working on it. Remember Bella the kitten? When I took her back to the veterinarian for her kitten shots, Dr. Dixon managed to talk me into taking one of her sister kittens, too. So, now I have Bella and Stella the Knittin' Kittens! (shown here with Megan, my niece the shawl was knitted for).

They are two very sweet kitties that love yarn! I had to do most of my knitting either as passenger in the car on day trips or when the kittens were asleep. For kittens, they sleep amazing little! Bundles of total energy. I wish I had some of that energy! I could have knit 50 shawls!

I thoroughly enjoyed knitting this shawl. The pattern is Wingspan, and I used Green Dragon Sock Yarn in the colorway Squires. It had 490 yards in one skein. One was not enough. I was running low when I got to the 8th and final "wing" but luckily I had another skein that I had bought to make matching fingerless mitts. I estimate that it took about 600 yards altogether. I used a US 4 knitting needle. I have seen really cute shawl pins in both orange and maroon in various shapes at Backstitches, one of our LYS. I am going to take the shawl by there and get one to match later this week.

 Now that Hokie Bird Wings is complete, I will go back to finishing Flamingo Wings Shawl. It is my other Wingspan I had already been working on but stopped to do Megan's shawl. I wanted her to have it to take back to Tech in mid August. I can't believe that the summer is flying by so fast. Flamingo Wings is not far from being finished itself. I am on wing #6 of 8.

I finally decided I couldn't stand it anymore and purchased the first 3 Swing Knitting workshops from Ravelry. I am totally fascinated by Swing Knitting! I need to find some plain sock yarn to work with to do that. All of my stash sock yarn is variegated. I have really been inspired by some of the beautiful versions of Wingspan!

Addiction

My name is Lisa and I am addicted to the Wingspan pattern! There. I've said it. It's out. I love that pattern! I currently have 2 wingspans in various stages of completed "wings." The original is Flamingo Wings. I am on wing 6 out of the 8 "wings" of this shawl.

I was on a real roll with this shawl until I was hit by The Lightning Bolt of Inspiration. I had some Green Dragon Sock Yarn in Squires colorway (aka Va Tech) that I was planning to use to make something for my niece Megan. ZAAAAAAAAAAAP!!!!!!!!! Wouldn't that yarn make a great Wingspan shawl???? Thus, Hokie Wings shawl idea was born! I am currently in the middle of wing 4 of that one.

Harley approves. 

Normally I hardly ever knit the same thing more than once. Exceptions have been a Farmer's Market Bag pattern that I knit 3 of. One for my Mom, and one each for my 2 sisters ( and I have the yarn for one for myself). The other pattern has been the No Hair Day Hairy Chemo Cap. But Wingspan is such a fun pattern! The possibilities for this shawl are endless and exciting. If you don't believe me, check out the board on Pinterest named "Wingspan - examples and adaptations by dihenydd." But I warn you, it can lead to addiction! I will not list the yarns and ideas I now have swirling through my head thanks to this board lest you realize the depths of my addiction! Let's just say I have been Bewitched. :)

My progress on these shawls has been slower than normal due to one main reason.

Her name is Bella, and this little kitten apparently shares my fascination with knitting and all things yarny. Currently the only "safe" place to knit free of Miss Bella's "assistance" is in the kitchen standing up at the bar. If I don't take frequent breaks from this position, my back begins to protest, and it is quite loud.

Bella came to us after the loss of our 15 year old cat Zuni to cancer. I won't go into details here mainly because it is much too painful, but it is safe to say that I was devastated. More painful still was watching our other cat Harley suffer from depression after the loss of his friend. Animals grieve, too. Thanks to our veterinarian, who is an absolutely wonderful woman, Bella has come to live with us. How it happened is a study in "meant to be." She captured our hearts immediately and Harley is once again animated and playful.

Even Louis the Pug loves her!

I call this picture "The Three Stooges" and I think it says it all!

On a totally different side note, I found a new knitting shop on a trip to Roanoke last week! My friend had told me there was a new one, but she didn't know exactly where it was. I found Wyrd Sisters Yarn (thank you, Google Navigation!) and popped in for a quick peek. Regretably, I didn't have much time to browse since I was in a bit of a time crunch, but I saw enough to know I will go back again on my next trek to Roanoke! I saw lots of yarny goodies and was absolutely captivated by a felted witches hat. I have to go back and get the details about that hat!

And another new shop opened in Bedford this past weekend, Whistlestop Wool and Fiber. I haven't made it to that one yet. It is gratifying to me to see these new yarn stores opening up. It means I am not alone in my fiber addiction and that my options for finding new and exciting ways to knit Wingspan are expanding even further. The possibilites truly are endless!





You Ain't Got A Thing If You Ain't Got That Swing.......

I have become obsessed! I have started a new project, Flamingo Wings, using a pattern I found on Ravelry called Wingspan. On Pinterest there are examples posted of all the different Wingspans created by different people. They are breathtaking! One of my favorites uses a technique that I have never heard of before called Swing Knitting. I can't seem to find any info on it except for a workshop book to purchase on Ravelry. I am going to ask our master knitter at Motif if she knows how to do it. Hopefully she can teach a class if she does.

My obsession is two-fold. I am obsessed about finding out how to do Swing knitting, and I am obsessed with this pattern, Wingspan! It is fun! Here is my version:

I am using Pagewood Farms Verano yarn. This picture was taken yesterday morning when I had just started the second triangle. I started the third one this morning. I am already planning future wingspans using novelty yarns and sock yarns and contrasting yarns, etc. This is a very addictive pattern!

This past week I finished my Voodoo Magic Shawl, so named for the gorgeous yarn I used to knit it, Voodoo by Creatively Dyed Yarn. It was also a fun knit. I actually started it last fall, but put it aside for a while and recently picked it back up and finished it in about a week.

This picture doesn't really do the beautiful colors of this shawl justice. I have asked my cousin Graham if he can give me some pointers on how to take better pics of my finished projects. He is a very serious amateur photographer.

I usually post pics of my finished knitting projects on facebook. I have been asked many times if I sell my knitted items. People just don't understand when they ask you to knit them something and you say "no." They always say, "Well, I'll pay you!" How do you explain to them that they couldn't possibly afford it! My knitting time is absolutely priceless to me. I don't knit to sell, I knit to destress and relax and unwind. The more stressed I am, the more I knit. (It is much cheaper than a therapist!) How do you put a price on that???

Tempus Fugit

Occasionally in life there are moments that make you stop and realize just how fast time really does fly by. They stop you in your tracks and almost take your breath away with shock as you wonder where have all those years gone???  One of those moments happened recently to me.

My Mom called me in tears one evening last December to tell me that an old high school friend of mine had just been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. What????? How could this be??? Candy is only a month older than me, she is still young, healthy and active. There must be some mistake! I clung to this hope of a mistake for a while, but that came crashing down when an exploratory surgery in late
December confirmed the doctors' diagnosis. I was devastated.

We moved from New Jersey to Virginia in the second half of my freshman year of high school. There is nothing worse for a teenager than to be uprooted at that age from their friends and all they have ever known growing up and transported to a totally different high school, much less state. I hated it. It was like moving to a foreign country.  I had a very hard time adjusting. I was different. I was called "Yankee" (I wasn't aware the Civil War was still going on! I had learned from history class that it had ended long ago.) I was teased for my accent and I felt like I didn't belong, the ultimate disaster for a teenager. That summer I retreated into my room and immersed myself in books. Luckily for me in that same summer, a thin, long blond haired girl from up the street named Candy took the initiative to extend the hand of friendship to The New Girl. We became fast friends and for a while were inseparable. Eventually our studies took us in different directions and different classes. We eventually grew apart and lost touch after high school. Throughout the years, I heard about her from Mom who is still friends with Candy's Mom, Judy. I knew that she had moved to Japan for a while and that she had come back to the US a few years ago and was now living in Va. Beach. It didn't really seem like that long ago to me that we were in high school. Until that phone call. As I stood there in shock the realization of just how many years had gone by hit me full force. Where had all those years gone??????  Shock. Confusion. Anger. Disbelief. Horror. Fear. Sadness. I felt them all. I also felt helpless. There was nothing I could do! Or was there? Much as I wanted to reach out and cure her, to wipe the terror from her life, I could not. But I could let her know how much I cared. As I had during just about every turmoil in my life, I turned to knitting. I picked a beautiful shade of yarn of the softest yarn I could find and I started knitting her a prayer shawl. I also asked Mom to find out if she would like me to make her a rosary in her birthstone colors of peridot. She did. So I made her one of those, too.

Mom told me that Judy had brought Candy home here to Lynchburg from Va. Beach for Christmas. She was due to start chemo treatments in January. I bought a "thinking of you" card and mailed it to Candy and gave her my phone number and told her to call me if she needed anything or if she just wanted to talk. She responded the day she got the card. In mid January, Mom and I went to go see her. I took her the rosary. She read the Praying the Rosary instructions that went with it and smiled and said, "There is a lot here that this old Protestant girl can understand! It's not that different after all. I don't believe that there are separate entrances in heaven for the different religions." Neither do I.

Candy's Rosary

During that visit, it was just as if those years had never flown by. Just for a brief moment in time, we were once again those carefree teenagers with our whole lives in front of us and not a care in the world. She certainly looked much the same as I remembered. She still had those beautiful long, blond natural curls I had always envied. My hair is very dark and very straight. And she still had that naturally slender, athletic build. For me, weight has always been a struggle. So I had always envied her that, too. During that visit, I could almost convince myself that nothing was wrong. She was fine. Almost.

Candy and Judy returned to Va. Beach the next week to begin chemo. I continued my knitting on the shawl that was 2/3 of the way finished. As I knitted it, I thought of those two teenage girls and cried. I poured all the love, hope, prayer, good feelings and intentions and all the positivity I could into those stitches. In each and every stitch was a memory, a prayer, a hope, a dream. Now, I have this odd habit. Whenever I knit something that takes me a while, I become attached to it and I name it. The shawl started out as the Prayer Shawl, but as I knitted it, I realized that the beautiful blending colors reminded me of a kind of old fashioned candy that we used to have when we were growing up - ribbon candy. Thus the shawl's name became Ribbon Candy Shawl. Especially appropriate for someone named Candy, after all!

Ribbon Candy Shawl

Judy and Candy returned to Lynchburg the following week and Mom and I went once again to visit and take her the Ribbon Candy Shawl. She loved it and she really loved the name. She and Judy now also call it by its given name. Before they returned from Va. Beach, Judy had told Mom on the phone that Candy was losing her hair due to the chemo. I make chemo caps for the cancer patients using one of my all time favorite chemo cap patterns, the "No Hair Day Hairy Chemo Cap." As the fun fur fad has faded over the last few years, I had taken advantage of all the balls of it that I could find in the dollar stores and I have amassed a rather large stash of it for these really cute chemo caps. I took all of the colors I had with me to show Candy so she could pick out one. She chose a variegated purple color. Appropriate since purple is the color for pancreatic cancer. Candy still did not look that much different. Her long hair had been cut into a short chin length bob that was really cute on her with her curly hair. It didn't look thinner. But then she showed us how fast it was falling out. "Watch my parlor trick," she said as she ran her hands through her hair. She held her hands out and between the fingers was a great deal of hair. She was due to go back to Va. Beach the next week for more chemo. Judy said they would return to Lynchburg in 2 weeks. I told her I would have her "No Hair Day Hairy Chemo Cap" ready.

Candy's No Hair Day Hairy Chemo Cap

http://www.headhuggers.org/patterns/kpatt10.htm

Two weeks ago when I saw Candy, I could detect the toll that the chemo was taking. She was now painfully thin and fragile looking, and her hair was noticeably thinner. She went back the following week for the last of the chemo treatments and she is due this week to have CT scans and other tests to find out the status of the cancer. From there, they will decide on the course of further treatments. Next on the list is radiation treatments.  When those are finished, Judy plans to bring Candy home to Lynchburg to stay.  When that happens, I plan on spending some more time with Candy. Mom and Dad and I plan to take her and Judy to the beautiful Awareness Garden dedicated to cancer patients and their families and anyone touched by cancer. http://www.awarenessgarden.org/awg/.  There are lots of places I want to take Candy to see when she is feeling up to it. She has been away from Lynchburg for a long time, and much has changed. But the friendship we shared as teenagers did not change. It did not fade away and die. I realize now that we are, and always have been friends. I have a feeling I will be spending a considerable amount of time with Candy for another reason.  She told me when I took her the chemo cap that she wants to learn to knit so that she has something to do while she recovers. She said that she really wants to learn to knit chemo caps for others patients going through the same thing she is going through. It is a request I am more than happy to grant. After all, what are friends for? And I have plenty of fun fur to share! I hope knitting brings Candy as much comfort and joy as it has me throughout the years. It seems fitting to me that knitting has created a bridge for us to cross the very fabric of time itself to reach those teenage girls we thought we had lost so long ago, only to discover they have been in our hearts all along. 

"FO's" and A Gathering of Knit Wits

First, the FOs:

The Magical Mobius

The Aloha Virginia Tech Scarf

I am still working on the I cord necklace.  I wanted to make an I cord long enough to loop around twice, but alas, it doesn't look like there will be enough yarn for that, so I will have to settle for one loop.  I hope to finish knitting the cord today and then dig through my beading supplies for the perfect clasp to finish the necklace off. And I think I have the perfect glass pendant to use.  I would like to have it finished in time for The Gathering of the Knit Wits that will take place after work tomorrow.  Last Friday, Robin, Ronni and I had such a good time at Motif that we decided to meet this Thurs. after work (the one day that Motif is open past 4 pm).  Ronni is taking the Magical Mobius class and Robin and I are bringing our knitting along to cheer her on.  Bonnie and Ronda are also planning to come along.  I am going to bake a pan of chocolate chunk brownies for the occasion.  Last week when we were in Motif, another customer brought in some homemade zucchini bread which Karen shared with all of us there.  She joked that bringing in food was one of the new "rules" for sitting and knitting.  I thought it sounded like a pretty good rule, so I decided it would be "my turn" this week.  Maybe we can start a Thurs afternoon tradition this way.  Sounds like a fabulous way to unwind after work to me! 

Now, what shall I knit at The Gathering?  The choices are:

1. to start the Katia Triana lace scarf,

2. to continue working on my Ella Mae lace merino socks that I started when my cousin Cynthia was visiting

last month  

or

3. give up trying to resist the Siren Call of the Magical Mobius and start another one in a lovely sparkly yarn

The Sparkly Magical Mobius choice is currently in the lead!