On Finishing

The knitting is done, but now I have to finish it.

I've never learned how to properly sew up knitting.

This will be an adventure.

Kitty Luuuuvs Cupcakes!

Over the course of this week, we've discovered that our kitty absolutely loves cupcakes.

First, on Tuesday, a law school friend came over to study. She offhandedly commented that she wanted a cupcake. We convinced Mike to make us cupcakes, which he agreed to if I would make the frosting. Deal!

While we were enjoying our cupcakes (a little on the disappointing side- not so flavorful cupcakes with not so flavorful frosting), Arlo decided she wanted in on the action, too. (Apologies for the green-devil eyes in this shot. The red-eye fixer on iPhoto doesn't fix green eyes... go figure)

Then, last night we were sewing up some pillow covers for the giant couch cushions we got to remedy the incredible uncomfortableness that is our futon couch. I keep my straight pins in a cupcake that I knit up last winter. Mike had mentioned once that Kitty got a hold of the pincushion and went crazy, but I had yet to see if with my own eyes. It's intense. There's hissing and spitting and feverish running about the house.

Do you see the fierceness in her eyes? We think she might be incredibly mad at the cupcake because all the pins in it prick her as she attacks it, which make her think it's attacking her back. I'm going to knit her a pin-free cupcake to test our theory.

In non-kitty news, we had brunch at a friend's house on Saturday. Her condo has an incredible kitchen, but unfortunately she's more of a take-out kind of girl. Mike and I have been promising her that we'd come over a cook for her, and Saturday was the day. We brought all the ingredients over (except salt and oil), plus a waffle iron. Turns out, she doesn't have any bowls or measuring cups! We used drinking glasses and an ice cream scoop to measure, and some large cereal bowls for mixing. It was hilarious.

Luckily, brunch turned out fantastically, complete with excellent company. We went all vegan, since one friend doesn't eat eggs and the other is lactose intolerant. I found an excellent recipe for Lemon-Corn Waffles, and vegan sticky buns (I can't find the link right now... sorry!) All was delicious, and adequately measured.

Taking a Deep Breath

This was that week they warn you about before you start law school. Among other things, I had a quiz today in Constitutional Law. Just 10% of the grade, but with all the stress flying around, you'd have thought it was an enormous midterm!

So, this chilly, gray afternoon, I'm taking it easy, listening to the radio, and knitting, finally knitting.

Lazy Fall Saturday

Fall is officially upon us. It's been gray and rainy, with a chill in the air, for the past few days. It's been nice to pull out the sweaters, slip on the corduroys, and snuggle up with a cup of tea.

After doing some pro bono work in the morning (keeping an eye on the police at an anti-war march), and slogging through some Civil Procedure, I rewarded myself with an apple pie.

I think the most difficult part about making an apple pie is deciding how to slice the apples. Growing up, we had one of those apple-corer-slicer-peelers, which was always the highlight of apple season for me. I'm used to thinly sliced apples for pie, but the cookbook (yes THE cookbook) said to cut the apples into 1/8ths. I thought those slices would be too big for eating, so I went ahead and sliced each apple in half, excised the core, and sliced the apples thinly, like an onion.

Tossed with sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice,and a dusting of flour, those babies were ready to go.

After I trimmed the crust, and got the pie in the oven, I had a lot of leftover dough. I squeezed it all back up into a ball and rolled it out into a rectangle. I brushed some egg white on it, then generously sprinkled it with cinnamon and sugar, and tossed on some nutmeg and allspice. I rolled it up and put it in the oven with the pie. 20 minutes later, we had a nice little snack of cinnamon bites.

While the baking was going down in the kitchen, I snuggled up on the study chair with the first sleeve of the Minimalist cardigan. It was nice to be back with the familiar moss stitch, after the brief foray with the Ribbed Lace. The kitten has adopted the chair as her very own, so she was a bit put out to have someone else sitting in it. She took out her anger on the ball of yarn, at first. But then she just sat next to me and watched, not even going after the needles! What a good kitty.

New kitten and an FO!

This weekend we went to a wedding, and today we got a cat!

I was able to finish the shrug the night before the wedding, and it was nice to be able to enjoy the day without a frantic race to the finish with the knitting.

Pattern: Ribbed Lace Bolero
Yarn: Lion Branch Microspun in Sterling
Needles: US 7 (bamboo) & US 10 (aluminum)

Notes: This pattern was great. Very easy to follow, and with quick results! I didn't do the cables to finish off the lace section, because I was on a plane and I didn't have a cabling needle (or the patience) to do hem. I think it looks fine without. Finished was really easy, and the finished product was just what I wanted.

The wedding was in Orange County, and let me tell you how glad I am not to live there. We left beautiful, sunny Portland (riding to the airport in a convertible with the top down, even!), and arrived in rainy, rainy LA. Totally lame. As you can see, though, it was gorgeous and sunny by the time the wedding started. It was still chilly, though, so I was especially glad to have my shrug!

The ceremony was held in the Cal State Fullerton Arboretum, where Mike used to work. Before the ceremony started, we walked all around, looking for pretty places to take FO shots. This first one is next to a pomegranate tree. I thought they were apples, at first, because I'd never seen pomegranates on the tree!

Since the ground was all wet and soft from the rain, I was having a lot of trouble walking in my heels (ok- I have trouble walking in heels anytime), so I took them off. Mike told me this was a red flag to anyone who saw us that I was definitely not from the OC. It is fine by me to have that fact be readily noticeable.
Another way you could tell that I wasn't from the OC was by the fact that I made the guy giving us a ride from the ceremony to the reception (in a giant mansion, right off the set of The OC) stop off at our hotel so I could ditch the heels entirely and pick up the flip flops. I wasn't about to let fashion stop me from dancing all night long!

And that brings us to tonight, and our kitten. She was abandoned (along with the rest of her litter) outside my friend's work. He adopted her and nursed her (with a bottle!) before realizing he has serious cat allergies. And he lives in a studio apartment! We're probably not keeping her, but we're babysitting for the month, until our friend's dad comes to adopt her. Or we find someone local to adopt her permanently. She is so darn cute we might just have to keep her anyway.

Political Bake Sale

Tonight I baked nearly-vegan chocolate chocolate chip cookies for a bake sale at school tomorrow. The National Lawyers Guild chapter is holding a bake sale to raise money to send to the legal defense funds for the Jena 6. (Nearly vegan because I accidentally used chocolate chips instead of carob chips. But I used canola oil instead of butter and flax seeds & soy milk instead of eggs. It's a great recipe, and the cookies came out very similar to the cookies we sold at the bakery in Berkeley.)

Now, onto the reason behind the cookies. I haven't been very political on this blog. I'm sure my (limited) readership is here for the knitting and the baking, since that's what this is all about.

However, in my real life, I'm a very political person. Politically aware, and politically active. And this is a very important subject.

Today (Sept 20) is a day of solidarity for the Jena 6, and students all across the country are raising money and wearing green and black to raise awareness. This is an issue demonstrating the continuing racism and injustice that plagues this country.

I'm posting the whole message from the colorofchange.org website, and even if you're just here for the knitting and baking, I strongly encourage you to read on and take notice of this tragedy. If you feel so inclined, please consider donating toward the cause of these students.
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Last fall in Jena, Louisiana, the day after two Black high school students sat beneath the "white tree" on their campus, nooses were hung from the tree. When the superintendent dismissed the nooses as a "prank," more Black students sat under the tree in protest. The District Attorney then came to the school accompanied by the town's police and demanded that the students end their protest, telling them, "I can be your best friend or your worst enemy... I can take away your lives with a stroke of my pen."¹

A series of white-on-black incidents of violence followed, and the DA did nothing. But when a white student was beaten up in a schoolyard fight, the DA responded by charging six black students with attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder.

It's a story that reads like one from the Jim Crow era, when judges, lawyers and all-white juries used the justice system to keep blacks in "their place"--but it's happening today. The families of these young men are fighting back, but the odds are stacked against them. Together, we can make sure their story is told, that this becomes an issue for the Governor of Louisiana, and that justice is provided for the Jena 6. It starts now. Please add your voice:

http://www.colorofchange.org/jena/

The noose-hanging incident and the DA's visit to the school set the stage for everything that followed. Racial tension escalated over the next couple of months, and on November 30, the main academic building of Jena High School was burned down in an unsolved fire. Later the same weekend, a black student was beaten up by white students at a party. The next day, black students at a convenience store were threatened by a young white man with a shotgun. They wrestled the gun from him and ran away. While no charges were filed against the white man, the students were arrested for the theft of the gun.²

That Monday at school, a white student, who had been a vocal supporter of the students who hung the nooses, taunted the black student who was beaten up at the off-campus party and allegedly called several black students "nigger." After lunch, he was knocked down, punched and kicked by black students. He was taken to the hospital but was released and was well enough to go to a social event that evening.³

Six Black Jena High students, Robert Bailey (17), Theo Shaw (17), Carwin Jones (18), Bryant Purvis (17), Mychal Bell (16) and an unidentified minor, were expelled from school, arrested and charged with second-degree attempted murder. Bail was set so high -- between $70,000 and $138,000 -- that the boys were left in prison for months as families went deep into debt to release them.⁴

The first trial ended last month, and Mychal Bell, who has been in prison since December, was convicted of aggravated battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated battery (both felonies) by an all-white jury in a trial where his public defender called no witnesses. During his trial, Mychal's parents were ordered not to speak to the media and the court prohibited protests from taking place near the courtroom or where the judge could see them.

Mychal is scheduled to be sentenced on July 31st, and could go to jail for 22 years.⁵ Theo Shaw's trial is next. He will finally make bail this week.

The Jena Six are lucky to have parents and loved ones who are fighting tooth and nail to free them. They have been threatened but they are standing strong. We know that if the families have to go it alone, their sons will be a long time coming home. They will lose precious years to Jena's outrageous attempt to maintain a racist status quo. But if we act now, we can make a difference.

Please add your voice to the voices of these families in Jena, and help bring Mychal, Theo, Robert, Carwin, and Bryant home. By clicking below, you can demand that Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco get involved to make sure that justice is served for Mychal Bell, and that DA Reed Walters drop the charges against the 5 boys who have not yet gone to trial.

http://www.colorofchange.org/jena/

Thank You and Peace,

-- James, Van, Gabriel, Clarissa, and the rest of the ColorOfChange.org team
July 17th, 2007

References:

1. "Injustice in Jena as Nooses Hang From the ‘White Tree,'" truthout, July 3, 2007
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/070307B.shtml

2. "Racial demons rear heads," Chicago Tribune, May 20, 2007
http://tinyurl.com/yvh7t5

3. See reference #1.

4. See reference #1.

5. "'Jena Six' defendant convicted," Town Talk, June 29, 2007
http://tinyurl.com/ysxtgg

Other resources:

NPR: Searching for Justice in Jena 6 Case (streaming audio)
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=11756302

Democracy Now! - The case of the Jena Six ...
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/07/10/1413220

Too Sense: Free The Jena Six Now
http://halfricanrevolution.blogspot.com/2007/07/free-jena-six-now.html

While Seated: Jena Six
http://www.whileseated.org/photo/003244.shtml

Nooses, attacks and jail for black students in Jena Louisiana
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/6/28/144445/384

Justice In Jena, by Jordan Flaherty
http://www.zmag.org/content/print_article.cfm?itemID=12783&sectionID=30

The Perpetrator becomes the Prosecutor (and other related entries)
http://friendsofjustice.wordpress.com/blog/

'Stealth racism' stalks deep South
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/this_world/6685441.stm

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*** Michal Bell's conviction has been thrown out, but he remains in jail as lawyers decide whether to retry him as a juvenile.

Ribbed Lace Bolero Progresses

For some reason, I haven't been bringing books home to do work this week. I've been getting enough work done at school, so there's no reason to schlep books to and from school on my bike, right?

And that means I can knit instead of study, right?

Right.

This is the Ribbed Lace Bolero I'm working on for the wedding on Saturday. I definitely procrastinated too long on casting on for this. However, DK weight yarn on US 10 aluminum needles is going fairly fast. The needles are really long- 14"!- which means I can't knit in any chair that has arms. The needles hit the arms and break my knitting-stride. Which I don't really have with this pattern, as all the yo's and the ssk's slow me down a little.

I am glad to be working on the lace part, because I did the ribbing on wooden US 7s, and the wood needles really hated this yarn. The fiber really stuck to the needles and made it hard to slide the stitches around. We're doing much better on the 10s, though. And aluminum needles aren't that bad.

If I start having a lot of work to do later this week, which I'm sure I will, at least I'll have the plane ride to LA for knitting time. And while Mike is out partying it up bachelor-party style, I can stay in the hotel and knit, granny-style. (Or go party it up with his mom, whichever ;-)

PS- Yes, we have two pencil sharpeners. Who knows why? I don't even write with pencils.