New Year, new apartment, new life

Happy New Year peeps! The truth is I don’t care much for Christmas but my new Year wishes come more naturally. I know this new year mark is something arbitrary but even like that I’ve learn to acknowledge it, even if I didn’t stay up until midnight (also arbitrary). I guess I’m an oddball but I have made peace with it long time ago, so I’m happy with it 🙂

2015 has been a mix of things, and I look back at it with some mixed feelings. I started sewing a lot but then we lost Gerry and I was paralyzed for several months. I couldn’t bear sewing or knitting without my crafting buddy. Wherever he is I hope he’s fine and happy.

We had the hottest summer of the last 10 years, and we decided to adopt two baby lovebirds. It was good to put my insomnia hours to the task of feeding them. Very soon the house was not silent any more, but I hadn’t given up on Gerry. As I never really stopped looking for him, two other rescued lovebirds joined the flock, and we’re now the happy parronts of four naughty lovebirds. Sewing has become a challenge when they’re out, but I love them to bits and they really help to make this our home.

We had repeated issues with our current apartment due to its old age (the building is 150 years old) and a poor maintenance from the owners, coupled with a cheap renovation. When you spend your weekends struggling with a clogged bathroom or trying to exterminate rivers of ants and other bugs, you stop enjoying your home. Also my respiratory allergies have become worse due to mold and the humidity in our bedroom. The building is placed in a very lively area of the city that we love, but due to my health issues we stopped enjoying it almost two years ago, so paying an expensive apartment just to live in the area was not worth it. We decided to look for a new place a bit to the north, so Koen would save time when going to and from work. I keep working from home, so for me it doesn’t matter.

We found a beautiful apartment in an only 35 years old building, just on the area we wanted, and we’re moving tomorrow there. With the Christmas fuss it’s been complicated, but we have almost everything ready for the move.

I’ve been complaining about my machine for months, and avoiding quite some tasks with it, so the moment of purchasing a new one was close. I didn’t expect to accomplish this at such a difficult time but a haberdashery close to our current apartment was running a 25% sale on all machines, so I decided to take the plunge and finally upgrade.

As you can imagine, the machine is still packed and I’m almost biting my nails with expectation.

On the knitting front several things happened. I joined the Penelope kal a bit late but hopeful to finish in time. One of my goals lately has been to take things easy (the paleo way) but I took it too seriously and that was transferred to my knitting to. I had the bodice almost done, but when I tried it, it felt like a sack. It was too large. It was just my lose gauge, since I’ve knit other sweaters from Andi and I’ve learned to recognize my size without problems. I was too fed up with it and Christmas was approaching, so I left it parked inside a bag for after the move. At that time I had purchased two books from Wendy Knits: socks from the toe up, and toe up socks for everybody. I found them second hand through Amazon at a very affordable price. I always preferred to knit my socks from the toe up because it allows you to use most of your yarn by knitting a longer or shorter leg, and these two books had very good reviews. Since I couldn’t make my mind about which one to buy I went for both but second hand. Most of the designs are for 2mm needles, something I don’t quite enjoy, but there are some also for 2.5 mm, and I knit the Van Dyke socks to gift my mother for Christmas. I remember that I fell out of love with knitting socks some time ago for various reasons but I think these books will mean a come back.

I enjoyed so much knitting these that I’m already finishing another pair, this time for myself and dug out my sock yarns to keep my feet warm. I had issues with my gauge again and frogged half a sock and went a size down and focused on knitting a bit tighter. I found the solution at not holding the just knitted stitches with my index finger, something I’ve been doing by accident.

I recently started to enjoy listening to audiobooks while knitting. It all started because I had to do a challenge test in October and had to spend a whole morning at the doctor’s office. My first audiobook was the Martian (haven’t watched the movie yet), and oh boy, I loved it. The story is amazing and R. C. Bray is an extraordinary narrator. It makes you feel you’re in Mars with Mark Watney growing potatoes.

2015 was also the year that I adopted the paleo approach and regained some of my health while I was able to reintroduce quite some foods. The last blood work showed that my antibodies are now within normal levels, so I look forward to continuing with AIP which feels just right.

I don’t have a lot of concrete goals for 2016. It will be in many aspects a clean slate, and I’m looking forward to finding my rhythm and my ways in our new apartment, with my new machine and lots, lots of joy.