I'm trying to recapture my excitement about some projects that have fallen by the wayside, before I get too excited about others. I have a bad habit of doing that, which is why my desk is like the Graveyard of Forgotten Projects. (And it's messy. Very, very messy.) Since Fairbanks tends to get March backwards (in like a lion, out like a lamb) this is the perfect time to sit at home and finish up those winter projects.
I don't usually watch that many movies and TV shows. We have a few shows that we watch on Hulu and such (mostly while working out), but for the most part we don't have that much (non-internet/work) screen time each week. Since we don't have TV access, we also tend to wait until the end of a season before renting/borrrowing from the library/begging friends for the DVD. We can almost always find what we want that way.
However, we do tend to watch shows and movies when we're doing other things. When Shane is making beer, we turn on a movie we've seen before. (Neither of us has bought a DVD in years, but we still have an extensive collection.) While I love having something to do with my hands during another activity, I find knitting and crocheting by themselves to be very boring except on very rare occasions when I have something big on my mind. (All right, the other exception is when the cat is stalking my yarn. That is quite entertaining.) I can't read while I knit (at least, not easily--trust me, I've tried!) but watching something while I knit is just about the perfect combination. So this week I've been watching more movies in an effort to get back into some of my knitting and crocheting projects. I'm finally making some progress on those socks I've been talking and writing about making for forever. They're looking great!
I also need to make more plarn hanging baskets for my plants from old plastic bags. While this isn't a project I've put off for too long, it is one that needs to be done soon so that we have enough space for all of the plants I want. And sort of alongside this, I need to actually turn all those plastic milk jugs I have sitting around into planters. It's just one of those small tasks that I've pushed off because I've been busy.
My goal of making sandwich wraps hasn't happened yet either. I've got the materials, but I haven't done anything with them. Part of this is because I don't have a sewing machine but since I know how to sew by hand, or could borrow time on a sewing machine (several friends have them, including my next-door neighbor), this is really nothing more than an excuse. I need to make some time for these soon. Summer is the season of sandwiches in our house. They're low-energy, quick, delicious, and they don't heat up the house. There. I've listed some good reasons to get my butt in gear on this project.
As if all of these projects weren't enough, in the next couple of months I need to start working on my spring/summer projects too. I need to find some more big things I can turn into planters for work, and some more tires (I'll be checking the transfer stations for those) or other good potato growing containers. I've been thinking about making a Value Village/Salvation Army run to see what I can find, too. I have a few things to donate anyway, so it can serve double duty. In addition to the planters, I'd love to find some metal spatulas for things like flipping pancakes. We only have plastic ones and they kind of suck. The grip part of the handle is coming off of one, and so it's always gross since food and dishwasher water can get stuck down in it. Another one Shane actually accidentally burned the handle off of by leaving it too close to a hot burner. It's about half as tall as it was. Which, I think, is as good a reason as any to not get plastic kitchen utensils. Anything that can potentially melt when it touches a hot surface is not really something I trust around my food.
I'm not worried about metal scraping off non-stick coating because we only have a few pans like that, and we tend not to use them that often. When we do, we only use wood or silicone utensils with them. For pancakes and bacon, nothing beats cast iron. We have a nice cast iron griddle that I use for our weekend breakfasts.
While I was watching movies and knitting one of the socks, Shane was next to me on his laptop applying for jobs. He told me he applied for one in Sydney, Australia, and in the same breath said, "I won't be getting this job, don't worry." An hour later, that comment was confirmed when he got a rejection email. He laughed about how quick the response was, until he realized that it was the middle of the work day for them. Still, he said, "It's like someone had their finger on the 'reject' button just waiting for my application." And I was totally thinking that this story was funny, until I saw it all typed up. Now it just seems sort of sad, and like a little portrait of the total job market at the moment. Don't worry, though, he applied for a bunch of other jobs. Hopefully something turns up.
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