Birthday! May Also Contain Traces of Zoo.

So, it was my birthday two days ago! Alas, I had a lot of study to do on Monday, and several hours of classes to not only attend, but also lead discussion in, so there was not a lot of birthday-ing on my actual birthday. However, last Saturday we celebrated with (another) trip to Melbourne Zoo. Yes, I know that there was a zoo trip only a few months ago. But the zoo is fun! We all brought cakes and biscuits and savouries and picnicked on the grass near the seal enclosure. This was the first time in over 10 years that I'd dared to plan an outdoors event for my birthday - Melbourne has enjoyed torrential rain on May 17th for the last two years running, so I was a little wary. But I am happy to report that the sun shone on both my plans and all of the intrepid (cake-bearing) adventurers who came along for the fun.




I had never seen the bottom of a bear's foot before. It looks entertainingly like a slipper (these slippers in particular). And just to make sure our good old Aussie wildlife is represented:



After the zoo, there was a knitting at the pub, and I ate a cupcake with a criminal amount of icing (I got some assistance from The Boy, and even so I was barely able to finish!). On Sunday, my family presented me with some new cupcake and muffin tins, a new teapot, and a couple of nice leather notebooks (I plan on lugging at least one of them along with me on my travels). And yesterday The Boy and two good friends organised a surprise dinner at Kamel, which was lovely. We ate the vegetarian banquet, and walked out very full afterward. Oh, and they gave me the Wuthering Heights mug that I have been coveting for months now.




In knitting news, I made an impromptu hat for my brother's birthday. Amusingly enough, it's from the same pattern as his Christmas hat, but instead of stripes I made up a chequered pattern in red and black. I think he liked it. Pictures next post, if I can coerce him into modelling for them.

I've also been knitting away on my Tea Leaves cardigan, but it's been a little while in finishing because I just can't make up my mind about the sleeves. More specifically, I can't decide whether to make them 3/4 length or full length. I am pretty sure I have enough yarn for full length, but not 100% positive. So then I started considering 3/4, and now I just can't decide. I've reached the stage on one where if I wanted to go 3/4 I would have to start the garter edging, so I'm thinking that I'll just slip the stitches onto waste yarn for the moment, knit the other sleeve, and then see how I'm going for yarn when they're at matching lengths. I've already knitted the button bands, so I don't have to factor those in. Urgh, I hate indecision - it's the single biggest enemy of creativity, in my experience. Even more so than procrastination.

On other fronts, I've just been busy busy busy. I'm trying to get final assignments going, trying to organise my internship for next semester, and just dealing with all of those other random things that crop up (like, oh, I don't know - planning an overseas holiday that starts in LESS THAN A MONTH!). Still, busy is good. Makes you remember that you're alive! Or something.

Project Banishment and a Trip to the Zoo

A few posts ago anyone reading even slightly attentively would have seen a project I was working on - a summery top made from my long hoarded Sanguine Gryphon 'Dance' yarn. Looked a little like this (and yes, I am blatantly reusing the picture, because I am a Slovenly Blogger).




Last post I believe that I made mention of the fact that I was having trouble figuring out how I was going to finish it. Well, alas, progress was not made - or very little of it anyway. It got to the stage where I just didn't really feel like knitting any more because I knew I should be working on this, and it was niggling at me whenever I worked on something else. Obviously, one does not indulge in hobbies with the goal of feeling unpleasant about it, so I decided that something had to be done. So, from this point onwards, this project is banished to the naughty corner. Life is too short to knit things that you are just not that enthused about. I have knitted things that I have enjoyed making but have worn very little - that is not the ideal, but it's still far from a waste of time. I have knitted things that were completely tedious, but that I adore and wear to death once they're done - again, a worthwhile endeavour. And of course, there are those wonderful projects that you love every moment of, both the knitting and the wearing. But I'm not willing to spend time on knitting something that I am so underwhelmed by.

I would like to salvage this one if I possible, as that much stockinette in such a small gauge has taken forever and a half - all the more so because the bottom was deliberately designed with A Lot of negative ease. But this is gorgeous yarn and I don't want it to languish forever on something that I don't really wear, so if I have to rip it out and start over, I will. At least now I'll have a better idea of how the yarn behaves, and can design with that in mind. The amusing part is that I feel so much better now that this decision has been reached - it never ceases to amaze me how liberating a decision can be, even when it's a decision to abandon something.




In other news, life has been busy around here (all the more reason I do not need to be spending my precious leisure time on knitting projects that I'm not really feeling the love for). I got a new fishbowl (a lovely big 12 litre number) and three lovely (but tiny) white cloud minnows. This is not a good picture, I know - I found the bowl quite difficult to photograph, but at least this one shows off the beautiful plant. It looks quite lovely against the black gravel, and I've had a lot of compliments about how the whole set up looks.

I've also been working a lot, which eats a lot of my energy, especially when it's this hot (we have no air conditioning inside the shop, which means working in temperatures going all the way up to the high 30s and beyond - not fun). And I've been doing a lot of writing and sewing, and also hunting for a new job. It's been fun, but I am beginning to realise that I probably need to cut down on hobbies if I want to keep my sanity once uni starts again - I had to go home sick from work last week simply because I was so tired that I was dizzy and disoriented, and classes aren't even running at the moment! So unfortunately I think that the future holds more rest and fewer fun things for Anna - perhaps I need to learn to knit while I sleep.




And as alluded to by the title of this post, last week there was a trip to Melbourne Zoo! I went with the boyfriend and a couple of friends, and a very good time was had. It was the first time I'd been to the zoo in years, and definitely the first time I'd been since I'd gotten my mitts on a digital camera. Behold, the incredibly cuteness that is the red panda. Though the highlight for me was some leopard rays that were in a small tank near the seals. They were amazing - like big friendly curious frisbees with funny little faces and oddly human looking eyes. I fell a little bit in love with them, proving I think that deep down I will always be that little kid who collects bugs and creepy crawlies in jars.

I was going to blog a little about my newest project, but I recently came to the conclusion that this blog would probably be a lot better if I posted shorter posts more frequently, rather than the (comparatively) huge but sporadic posts I make at the moment. So in the spirit of this resolution, you'll just have to wait until next time!