Monday, May 04, 2009

Stuff and nonsense.

I'll let you decide which is which. A jumble of topics running through my head.


-250 yards of Froggy goodness.

There's a better photo of it, in a skein, but it's on the camera and I'm feeling rather inert at the moment. I need to hurry up and finish the other half of frogginess, because when I sold the Summer Berries yarn I bought more raw wool to spin, and it'll be here this week. I got silk/merino blend. It'll be interesting to see how it spins up.


-Lately I've been wondering how much fun I could have had if I'd bitched out everyone who ever did a negative review of one of my Knitty articles on their blog. I probably wouldn't ever write for Knitty again. And wouldn't have time to do anything else. The history of knitting article was particularly popular - some people didn't like hearing that Arabs invented their hobby. (Oh geez.)


-There are debates that rage, both in real life and on the internet, about children watching TV and how educational it REALLY is. Well. The other day I gave the Goob a ribbon flower for her hair. She's calling it 'the marigold barrette'. I don't ever in my life remember telling this kid about marigolds, and no one around here grows them. The other day she was telling me about monitor lizards (one of her favorite shows is an animal show on PBS), and I KNOW the hub and I never taught her anything about monitor lizards because WE don't know anything about monitor lizards (dey're weally big, an' have gween scales). I guess it depends on the kid, but this one's going to be watching documentaries on DaVinci and building clocks soon.


-The new anti-inflammatory is officially an epic fail. I'm back on the old one until I can get into the doc to change it around AGAIN. In a way it's kind of good to know I need the medication I'm taking, but damn.


-Is it wrong to feed your kid pizza two nights in a row, if she loves pizza? It's all the food groups, isn't it?


-The French book is cool. Apparently all those fancy restaurants in France exist because they were founded by chefs who cooked for the aristocracy; after the Revolution swept through, the aristos were executed, and the cooks and assistants found themselves unemployed. So they went with the more democratic restaurant idea and have never looked back. Am now deep into the varieties of French cheese and how they make them; this will be darn useful the next time I try to make a French recipe and they don't have the exact cheese I need at the American grocery stores I have to shop at. (There are similar chapters on all their other types of food, so I have hopes of eventually understanding the GIST of the recipes, instead of just seeing an incomprehensible list of ingredients. Beef cheek? What?)


-Every summer I dress the Goob in sun dresses, not so much for the girlie factor, but because they're the coolest thing the kid can wear (other than going naked, which is frowned upon around here). This summer she's gotten enthusiastic about it and is demanding dresses to wear - and wants the pinkest, frilliest ones in the closet. I fear another trip to the outlet store is in the future, one to pick up pink frills.


-Speaking of pink. I've also got a pink phone. When I was a teen I dyed my hair pink. Always loved the color, no idea why. I like the clear, bright pastels. (Terby just rolled her eyes and muttered 'no kidding'.) I'm not forcing the Goob into pink, partly because it's cliched and partly because I think it'll make her sick of it. Personally I think she looks best in lavender and blued purples. But I let her choose colors and styles when we're in the store, and inevitably she goes for pink and frills.

14 comments:

amy said...

Pizza is absolutely fine for dinner. Very well rounded. I'm also of the opinion that cereal & applesauce for an occasional dinner never killed anyone.

Geek Knitter said...

"...some people didn't like hearing that Arabs invented their hobby."

No, really? That's just... just... oh, nevermind...

Amy Lane said...

Pizza works for me!

And as for pink? NOT my color--has never been. And yet Chicken went through a pink stage, and now Ladybug is going through an ENTIRELY pink stage--redheads. A brown-eyes redhead and a blue-eyes red-head, all wrapped up in PINK. Goober looks much better:-) (Although Ladybug just cutes through the color-clash, I have to admit. If we ever saw Chicken smile, she could have pulled pink off as well. As it is, she's fine with punk instead:-)

Barbara said...

She is absolutely beautiful no matter what she wears. Of course pizza is real food. You have to look at the whole day or even a whole week when you're calculating what your toddler's eating. Some days it's all peas but the next might be all fruit or all meat. My son spent 3 months eating nothing but frozen peas, tiny hamburgers without buns and catsup. He is now 6'2", 195#, and gorgeous. It all evens out.

Galad said...

Pizza works for me as a food group!

I think pink is a phase a lot of girls go through. Might as well enjoy the frills cause in a couple of years she may hate them completely.

Donna said...

16 years on, and my kid still lives in pink. She even has pink fairy lights around her bed head that make the bedroom look like a strippers den.
And it was never my favourite colour, but I think she's converted me by osmosis or something.

Mandy said...

Pizza has all the basic food groups in one convenient package (especially if you made it yourself with whole wheat flour, but most people don't). It's good hot or cold, and you can eat it with your hands. It's the perfect food! Heck, I'd let her eat it for breakfast too!

Terby said...

My kid eats chicken nuggets and noodles. At least you're getting a vegetable in there.

And not eye-rolling. Muttering. Yes, muttering. About murky muted dull colors. Browns and greys. Nice dark things. Ah. Better now.

Hey - I might have some yarn for you. I'm pruning back the stash, and you might actually like some of the things I have on the cull pile.

TinkingBell said...

Odd about pink - I hated it as a child - wore some during the 80s - mainly bright bright pink - and why I thought for a moment it would look good with auburn hair and freckles I have no idea. But we all did things in the 80s we regretted later. These days its green, orange, red yellow and turquoise - which it should have been all along.

My daughter - adores pink - once she could speak it has been difficult to get her into anything else. She has now adopted yellow also. She looks best in red and rioyal blue, but, pink it is for the forseeable future. Sigh.

Roz said...

This whole post made me laugh!

And in harmony with the Arabic word for later -- yalla -- my word today is: hallut.

Although a piece of grilled halibut wouldn't be bad right about now...

Emily said...

My daughter went thru a pink phase, too....frilly dresses, no less, as a pre-schooler, when I was desperate to get her into something to protect her knees! That lasted about a year. Now she's dressing HER daughter in pink.

Louiz said...

I met up with some people I met through my antenatal classes on Saturday. *All* the girls are going through pink and frilly. One mum called it "the Princess phase".

A quick easy frilly pink skirt? Long piece of ribbon, strips of netting/tulle/pink fabric. Knot the strips onto the ribbon and tie it round her waist. It works in a pinch anyway:)

Any horse recipes in that French cookbook? Apparently it tastes like beef (and when they say cheek, that is probably exactly what they mean)

And about the invention of knitting? I love the history of it, but in a practical sense, does it matter who invented it, so long as you can sit down and do it? Arabic numerals also came from the Arabs, so anyone offended by that could try counting with Roman numerals after all...

Unknown said...

For the most part, I let my kids wear what they want . . . with some really incredibly ugly combos coming out of their rooms. It just wasn't a battle worth fighting. Of course, as the girls hit their teens, they are appalled when I pull out the pics of the plaids and strip combos.

Pizza is the perfect food. It has been my benediction for years. And when the kids were little, I used homemade pizza as a tool to get the veggies in. Trust me, grated zuccini disappears in a tomato sauce that is simmered for about 20 minutes. Carrots are little harder to hide.

My son has developmental growth delay. He is 8. Weighs 42 pounds and is 47 inches tall. His swim trunks are a 2T. I can fit my hands almost around his waist. The nutritionist told us toss out all the rules. So, he gets, within reason, anything he wants. He eats dinner and wants a corn dog for dessert . . . why not. Last night he had two corn dogs, two tubs of yogurt and a bowl of cereal. My mother is rolling in her grave.

Anonymous said...

At her age a lot of little girls love the pink and frilly. Just as in the middle teens a whole lot of them insist on black everything.