On Lifetimes, Turning 30 and Learning to Write

I don't remember when I first saw this comic from Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, but I do remember the impact it had on me.

See it for yourself here: SMBC Lifetimes

I think about this message a lot: that with the time we have in our lives, being alive, how can we spend it best? Do I want to spend my life complaining that I never have enough time? Do I want to be old and dying and think that I wasn't given enough opportunities or that I could have accomplished more if I only had had the chance?

Free Pattern Wednesday: Basic Mug Cozy for your Basic Mug

Yay! Free pattern Wednesday! Let's start this off with a real easy pattern to work up. If you're new to knitting, wanting to get back into it, or just want something to do with your hands for about 30 minutes to an hour, this one is for you!

Are you a tea/coffee/whiskey-disguised-as-tea-or-coffee/hot cocoa drinker? Is your mug always too hot? Or maybe it has been complaining that it's too cold and it needs a sweater? Well hush those annoying complaints and sip your whiskey in style! Here is a simple mug cozy pattern that you can whip up lickety-split!

That's a happy mug

New Story on Wattpad: Sherlock Holmes in Space

I've started a new story on Wattpad! It is an adaptation of The Sign of Four, a Sherlock Holmes mystery from the late 19th century.

The story follows Mildred Bailey and her doctor, Mary Morstan as they try to track down Mary's stepfather and uncover the mystery of the strange packages someone has been leaving on Mary's doorstep.

New chapters will be released on a semi-weekly basis. 

Read the story on Wattpad and please leave feedback and thoughts!

On Experimentation, Long Distances and Cozy Covers

I'm a huge experimenter with my knitting. I could say that I like to look up patterns, and then tweak them to make them my own. But it's probably more truthful to say that I sometimes goof a pattern, so I'm likely to switch it up -- in the immortal words of Bob Ross, we don't make mistakes, just happy little accidents. So sometimes I end up with a weird little thing I wasn't intending to make, but I've learned something about my craft.

Usually, my happy little accidents or experiments find their way to my little sister. She's the best baby sister a girl with too much knitting ambition could hope for. She's always accepted my gifts with grace and sweetness. We're 12 years and 600 miles apart, since I've been living in Oregon for the past 5 years. It's tough for us to stay close, but especially now when she's going to be graduating high school and going off to (gasp!) COLLEGE, it's top priority for me to be the big sissy she needs. Oh, I'm making myself tear up!

ANYWAY, for the past couple of years, I've been making her special projects with themes on her favorite movies and TV shows. She's a HUGE Harry Potter Fan (it's something we have in common); last year for her birthday, I made her a sweater in the style of the ones Molly Weasley makes for Harry and Ron in Sorcerer's Stone.

Happy Holidays

Star Wars Style: The cozy side of the Force

Happy Star Wars day! Today is the official release day for Star Wars: The Force Awakens! I got to see it at the "midnight showing" - at 10:30 last night. I'm not sure if that really qualifies as a "midnight showing" technically speaking. But I'm not actually complaining, because it was totally worth the temporal displacement. I'm not super into spoilers, so I'm not going to say anything about it at all except that I liked it.

What I really want to share with you is two special Star Wars projects I made recently in eager anticipation of the new movie!

My Year in Books - Short and Sweet Reviews 2015 part 1

Good evening, follow reader. This year I beat out my Goodreads goal of 25, by reading 35 books/graphic novels! I'm a comfort-reader, in the same way some people might be comfort eaters or comfort movie watchers. Actually, I'm also a comfort eater and movie watcher, as well as a comfort knitter, comfort cat-petter, and comfort napper. I do a lot of things for comfort, ok? That being said, it's been a bit of a tough year (work and family stuff, you know?) and I really hit the books with a determination to bury myself in fantasies and carefully crafted pseudo-realities.

My appetite was a strange mixture of all different kinds of books: fiction, non-fiction, young adult fantasy, memoirs, and classical literature. I basically just picked up whatever looked good at the time and dove in. So, here are my findings for 5 books from a year of reading, with short and sweet reviews:

Ice Breaker Games: Ball Toss

This game will get students up out of their seats and encourage some healthy competition! Great for first day of class or workshop, as well as a good tool to reinforce new information.

Participants toss a ball to each other in a pattern.

Good for: Middle School, High School, Adults

Indoor or outdoor, standing in place

Maximizes energy and concentration

Facilitates getting to know each other, vocabulary development

Materials needed:

• 2 - 3 small, light balls (think whiffle ball or plastic ball filled with air from Dollar Tree; DON'T use a baseball, or any kind of ball that would really hurt if you caught it in the face)

Set up:

• Ask the group to get into a circle-ish form, where everyone can see everyone else easily. There should preferably be nothing within the circle that people can trip over or bump into if they're moving around. Be a part of the circle to help demonstrate the game as the facilitator.

On Introductions, Dissatisfaction, and Resolutions

The beginning is always the hardest. You want the way you start something to set the tone for whatever comes next. We're told we need to grab attention from the get-go, we need to catch attention, hold interest, and wow them from the first. We're trained on elevator speeches; we should be able to say everything that's important in no more than 15 seconds.

To that I say: high expectations, sir, are often paired with disappointment. But whatever, right? Who cares? For most bloggers, of whom an overwhelming majority are amateur writers (including myself), we are our own greatest critics. We may have very high standards for ourselves, individually, but there is no standard globally. As a people, as a species, we shall express ourselves as we will, always have and always will.