Cardio-Knitting

Well been awhile hasn't it but that is some times the way it goes...

I thought I would share some experience I have had with a new thing for me. Cardio-Knitting. It is when you do your exercise and knit at the same time. I walk... I very happily walk. Not interested in much else, except maybe riding a bike and since I don't own one of those I figure I would walk. I walk about a mile and a half every other day around my block. I decided this month to add in knitting. I chose something simple enough and went at it.

I decided on wrist warmers/fingerless gloves. Simple round the needles no fancy pattern go at it type thing. I picked out a great yarn and boom went to town after casting on. 

Now what you do have to understand I am not in a high end neighborhood. I live near a Sheriff Station which is located at a jail (don't know if it is county or state) so I have a lot of cops around. I am used to it.

The first day I walked with my knitting going at it was right around the shift change. (I think.) I see a Sheriffs car drive by and I smile at them but keep moving because they don't know me, I just always smile at them when I see them. Then another one passed a minuet or so later and kinda slowed down. I smiled like I always do but again kept going, thinking yeah guys I am knitting. Then a moment or two later a third drove by and visibly slowed down as he passed me. I just at that point in time got this image of the first one driving by radioing to his buddy about this crazy woman knitting while she walked. And when the second one passed radioing say yeah I think she is but I am not sure. Then the third one coming up slowing down and say yeah guys she is knitting.

But that is not the amazing part for me. As I was Cardio-Knitting I found I wasn't noticing my legs hurting as much. So I deiced to take it along on the 5K walk I signed up for on the 8^th of October. 

I loved it... I got asked about four times about my knitting and how can I do that when I walked. I simply told them it kept me distracted from my legs. I will say now however I felt the last mile and a couple of times on hills (because it is a very hilly course) that I had to stop knitting to focus on getting up the hill but that was okay.

I have some ideas for next year for fundraising... but I will see how it goes.

I also decided to make the fingerless gloves for NANOWRIMO... Should be fun... and no I did not knit all of that just from walking this last week. But I need to get them done before October 31^st.

Well I guess I need to walk a little bit more.

And my 'mud' creations....

Okay... I thought I would continue with some of my older art work pictures.

One of the things that I enjoyed and actually continue to enjoy is working with clay and sculpting clay and making pottery and even painting pottery.

So I am actually going to start with the first of the painted work.... my Day of the Dead Mugs. I really really really liked how they turned out...

Now however I get into my pottery/sculpture work. I miss it building and structuring pieces.

These are my singing lizard temples...

This was the second set that I created and the set I feel is the better set...

I started with the two small ones....

… and then went on to the larger one.

I am really proud of this set and the glaze job that I did on it.

And for the record... I made these back in 1994

And so that you think I only did sculpture structures...

I did make a pitcher. I liked the design I cut into the clay and then rubbed the glaze so that it stand out.

Some old, some new and some inspiration

As I sit here looking over my past year I have realized just how much I have grown in my artistic ways. My horizons have expanded and I have had a desire to continue on with my best foot forward. But I shouldn't forget the past. So this week I am going to be looking back at the art that has passed out of my mind and into the world at large. And since I am working on drawing I thought I would start there.

There are actually not a lot of pieces I really really like. I also do not feel I have a lot of color work. I have a ton of line work but not a lot of color work.

Ferrets have been something I have loved and kept close to my heart for many years... (check out my other blog the Furry Slinkies... my random ferrety adventures are spoken of there.)

The first couple of pictures are old ferret drawings... when I gave them really short noses...

I have since altered my style slightly...

Not colored but still enjoyable.

Some earlier work shows how I liked to draw the fur when I inked.

Though one piece I am actually very very proud of is this one...

Chalking her way to OZ Shows my love for ferrets and my love for the wonderful world of Oz.

There is one more piece I want to show off for the day...

Hopefully you will begin to see more of him... he is definitely an inspiration to my life... after all he is my muse.

Doggie Holiday Fun.

I feel the need to share a bit of my holiday experience as well here... now that I have some of this crazy holiday spirit.. 

Well on Christmas Eve I go to what I affectionately refer to as my third family.  My roomie's family always invites me over for dinner Christmas Eve... they have done this since before I actually lived with her.  I will have to say probably about seven or eight years now. 

They have dogs... I won't say how many but they have dogs.  Boomer (named such because he booms around the house) and Tucker like to help with opening presents.

Going at one but it was the second one that Tucker really got into.

Look at him pull.

But Boomer had to come back and help him out.

They are great dogs and fun to watch on the holiday.

It is longer on the inside...

So I thought I would show off the loverly present I gave my roomie.  It was a lot more hand sewing than I prefer but that is life.  I think it turned out pretty cool and she is wearing it. 

Now here are the details of it... the full scarf.

and in this one you can see I actually sewn letters for the little notice.

I attempted to do the same for the Police Box at the top but I screwed that up so I sewn on the black peice and did puff paint, because I would have killed something otherwise.  Hope you all enjoyed this little show and tell more stuff to come.

Restoring the Holiday Spirit

I got the Christmas Spirit this week.  So feeling like I might have sucked it out of my roomie because of my lack of one up until Monday previous I decided to put up the scraggly fake tree I own and put all the presents we have underneath it...

There is every gift that is wrapped and a few that she had gotten from other people but that looked really cool in their packaging.

I know kind of pathetic but it is cool.  Next to it is the stockings for my roomie and an ex-roomie who still lives in town.

What can I say I like giving gifts.  It makes me happy to give people wrapped gifts and watch their faces light up when you give it to them completely unexpectedly... a little surprise in brightly colored paper.

Coming back to create

Okay I know I haven't posted in a while, but I am back now and working on things.  Why you might ask?  Well because it helps keep me happy.

Those of you who know me know I fight depression every day.  Some days it is a struggle to get out of bed, other days it is not but I always seem to have this shadow hanging over me.  One of the things that helps me is creating things.  Weather it is in writing, drawing, weaving, knitting, or painting there is a joy for me to do those things.  So for my artistic endeavors I have come up with a plan, a List of Five.  I did this with the generalities of my life over on my personal digging through the dredges of my soul blog.  This List of Five is specific to my artistic/creative endeavors. 

1. Knit one toy a month ~ I love knitted toys and feel they are highly underrated for giving joy. 

2. Write for at least fifteen minutes a day on some sort of story ~ this does not include blog or journaling posts. 

3. Take more pictures ~ go for walks and bring the camera, do a deliberate walk downtown. 

4. Pull out and 'finish' one un-finished project a month ~ I hate finishing in my fiber projects, which is the reason I like knitting in the round, not as much finishing. 

5. Draw something of The Moosehold Chronicles each month ~ I have been wanting to work on this for a while but am savvy enough to know the way of the book now to e-book reader.  So, I will work on both ways. 

But I suppose you want to see some pictures too...

Yep I finished it... a little bit ago but I finished it.  I gave myself tennis shoulder which was aggravated by my job but I finished it.  I will in the next couple of weeks have photos of the other things I have been working on (including a little hand sewn project for the roomie) but they are gifts and well I don't want people to see them yet. 

So the HAPPY THING for the day... oh I should explain the HAPPY THING. 

HT is a promise I have made to the people around me to find one happy thing about the day.  Hey I am a depressive sometimes that happy thing is kinda hard.  So... here I go. 

The HAPPY THING for today (well actually it is yesterday), Chavi curled in my lap for about 45 minuets.  (Chavi is the wiggly one so that is unusual.)