Finished Results

Having completed my hat and afghan, I feel I've earned the right to display some pictures. I'm especially proud of my quick knit hat (a design I adapted) The best part is, it's just a rectangular square you knit then fold in half and sew up (so that the points will cover your ears)! Then I cabled the trim along the front, back and little side bits. The pattern on the main part was something I added to give it a bit of interest, and I decreased the stitches at the top so it would not have the elf-like point (which always makes me look like an idiot).











And my afghan, which became more of a lap blanket after I ran out of yarn. Basic granny squares with a cute little scalloped edge. The colours don't come out properly in this picture, but you get the idea.
If you think those colours are pretty, have a look at my new yarn (for the fair isle hat-scarf-mitten extravaganza)!

Tea and Crochet

It's been a crazy couple of days. Way too much mental energy required! I had my first grad school midterm on Monday, which I did pretty well on I think. It was on the statistics component of my Assessment for ESL course, and the combination of my understanding of the material and my savvy test taking skills served me well. Other than that, I've been busy with answering hundreds of questions (literally) from undergrad students about the assignment coming up in the assessment course I TA for. It is a satisfying feeling to always have the answer, though! I had to laugh on their midterm, a majority thought the word "deleterious" meant "to delete." Something like Use of nose sprays may have a deleterious affect on... the sinus. Students were supposed to write why it was a bad test item, and many wrote "Well, obviously you can't delete your sinus, so it's a clue for the students." Ha. Actually some of the graders didn't know what deleterious meant, so I probably shouldn't have found it quite so funny. A sales pitch: at the end of a long day, on my cold walk home in the dark, I always take comfort in the anticipation of my cup of tea. I've never been a real tea lover, but I have found the perfect tea. If you are in need of a comforting, relaxing, warming tea, go buy this (it only costs $1.90 for the box, so it's low risk). It tastes a lot like the heavenly tea they serve at Aveda salons, and I never realized that it is licorice root! It doesn't taste a thing like black licorice flavour, don't worry. It has an unusual aftertaste that feels like warmness in your throat for a few seconds. Yum. That's all for now.

The Chill Has Set In

I'm freezing in Edmonton. On my walk to school this morning I thought my hands were going to fall off. Yes, I was stupid for not wearing mittens, but how was I to know? The problem with living in an apartment building is that, by the time you realize you've misjudged the weather, you're out of time to go back and change. (At this point someone will comment that I could step out on the balcony. True.) I have been frantically knitting a fabulous toque with earflaps (just wait till you see the picture- my own design!) and I have a fair isle toque, scarf, mitten combo in mind next. I went a bit overboard on my last trip to Michaels, but all the yarn was so gorgeous! I love cable knitting and fair isle- I'm always amazed that following those silly little directions results in something so beautiful.

Anyway, yesterday was Thanksgiving!! I had gone to the store and picked up my very own Thanksgiving feast. It might have been a bit overboard, but this is only my second Thanksgiving in Canada since 1999! I'm not much for cooking (I hate things that take time to prepare) so I bought the cheaters supply of Thanksgiving goodies:
Delicious! I didn't actually get to eat my food on Thanksgiving day, though. My friend Amy from the TESL program called to invite me to her family's house for dinner! Thoughtful, eh? It was an amazing meal and no one in their family likes brown meat so I got to bring the leftovers home (or they were going to feed it to the pets). They had three cats and two dogs. Two of the cats were lovely. The kitten could fetch! If you sat on the bed and threw a hair elastic onto the wooden floor, she would pounce down, run over, pick it up in her teeth and bring it right back to you on the bed! Without fail! I was amazed. One of their cats was so sick though. He has seizures which have caused blindness and sometimes he just lies around so lethargically. He didn't really move, couldn't keep his balance and kept tucking his paws under him in awkward ways (the vet said he can't feel pain). The poor boo. As for the dogs, one was okay, the other was a demon dog. Seriously. Would not stop barking when they put him in a bedroom. The let him out and he ran around barking (or staring at me menacingly). He was short, squat and looked like some kind of science fiction creature (pug face, severe underbite, bulgy black eyes, oversized pointy ears). I survived the ordeal thankfully. By the way, I took my camera but I didn't get to take any pictures. I'll try to get a picture of the demon dog and a video of the fetching cat for you eventually!

Louise's Visit

In the middle of last week, Louise sent an email saying that her boss had given her Friday and Saturday off. She took the greyhound bus up from Banff and we had a great two days bashing around Edmonton. I made a decision to forget about schoolwork for two days (thankfully I have this week before Thanksgiving to catch up) and we both just relaxed. Well, not relaxing in the normal sense. We packed as much fun, shopping, talking and action into 40 hours as is possible! I picked her up at the bus station around 6am on Friday and I took her to my focus group to take notes (she had the hard job!)
The focus group went really well: it was basically just talking with international students about the issues they face listening and speaking in the classroom.
Then we took off to West Edmonton Mall for a shopping fiesta. The main purpose was buying a ton of snowboarding gear for Louise's winter adventures (cheaper here in flat Edmonton than in the tourist-y ski resort town of Banff).
I had to try it on! I don't think I have a future in snowboarding, eh?
Friday night we had bangers and mash at an Irish pub (yum) and Saturday morning we went into downtown Edmonton. We started at Chinatown, but were shocked by the lack of anything in Chinatown. Seriously! A big archway and one restaurant were about it.

We walked along the river and took some fall pictures then had a great Vietnamese lunch (as good as food can get!) In the afternoon we did some more shopping then back to my apartment for Chicago-style deep dish pizza. We decided to see a movie that night, Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist, which we really enjoyed. Then I dropped Louise off at the bus station, and we both went back to reality. Hopefully I can go visit her soon and try out her snowboard? Or maybe just take my ice skates and find a lake somewhere.