Martha's So-Called Life

happy new year

2014 has been quite the year.  It started out with a trip to Africa and ended with a new job. 

I flew 58,144 miles, read 30 books, and ran 402 miles.

 

I'm excited to see what 2015 brings.  I know it's going to be vastly different from 2014 (no traveling, lots of school), but I'm ready.  

3 x 5 x 365 // week 1

I'm done with the first week of my index card art challenge!  So far so good.  

I'm not going to nitpick any of these because that is not the point.  There's a lot of collage and doodling going on in these, which is neither good nor bad.  Just an observation.  

Some days its very hard to come up with something and it usually results in me cutting apart a page from a magazine and putting in back together in collage format...or in the case of #5, a Christmas card.  

fraternal stripes socks

I FINALLY finished this pair of socks I've been knitting for my dad since June.  

They are knit out of one ball of Online Supersocke 100.  I split the ball in half by winding it into two separate balls starting from opposite ends of the original ball, which is why the stripes are opposite.  

I knit these two and a time and from the toe up.  I used the fish lips kiss heel for the first time (best. heel. ever.) which was recommended by a knitter friend.  I learned how to knit socks using a heel flap, but find that to be frustrating and just doesn't work well for me.  The fish lips kiss heel is a short row heel that is a little different from other short row heels.  The pattern costs $1.  Completely worth it.  

Next up is...another pair of socks!  I immediately cast on these Ginkgo Socks with some yarn that I've had for awhile and been unable to decide what to do with.  

Happy knitting!

weekend reading

 

The Reconstructionist.org is a website celebrating remarkable women.  Every week in 2013 they posted a portrait of a female icon, a hand lettered quote, and a mini essay.  

Another perspective on the messiness of life (read my thoughts here).  

This artist drew one thing she bought each day for eight years!  This would be another great idea for a daily art/creative project.  

Katy Bowman is a biomechanist.  And she writes about movement.  It's fascinating.  

I'm thinking about new ideas for how to share interesting links in 2015.  I haven't come up with anything that I'm satisfied yet...

Happy last weekend of 2014...make it a good one!

 

christmas 2014

The holidays are always busy around here.  John and I generally have to juggle three different sets of family engagements on any given holiday (his mom, my dad, and my mom).  Fortunately we do Christmas with his mom on Christmas Eve and then all of my family on Christmas day.  

On Wednesday, we both worked a half day and were home by 1pm.  I headed went out for a ski before dinner.  It was lovely...but a lot of work!

We went to his mom's house around 5pm.  We had seafood chowder and roasted veggies for dinner...delicious!  Then we did presents.  I got some awesome Icelandic yarn from his brother (who recently went to Iceland), the Apple magic mouse (amazing!), and some other goodies (coffee, a gift card for more yarn, and some spice mixed that turn into dip with one or two ingredients added).

Christmas morning we woke up late (well, I woke up at 6 and John at 8) and headed to my dad's house for breakfast.  He made creme brulee french toast (amazing).  Christmas morning breakfast has become a tradition with my dad since I moved out.  It works out well in the overall timing of family obligations.  

After we were fully stuffed from breakfast, we opened more gifts.  My dad and I got John new skis! I got a new Kindle (not here yet) and the FitBit band that measures your heart rate (not released yet, but coming in early 2015).  

The morning started out with dumping snow...and quickly turned 35, windy, and gross.  I think I'm giving up on winter.  

In the afternoon we headed to my grandma's house for late lunch (which also served as dinner) of ham and various other goodies (crab, spinach dip, cookies, etc.).

We were home by 4:30 and ended up sitting on the couch watching Hugo.   Then it was up to bed and some Veronica Mars after that.  

Overall a really great, and busy, couple of days...the only way it could have been better is if the snow had stuck around instead of turning to rain!  Hope everyone had a great Christmas with family and/or friends!  Next up, bring on the New Year!

dreaming of a white christmas

3 x 5 x 365

For some reason I got a wild hair and decided that I wanted to do some sort of creative/artsy/crafty challenge.  As if I need more things to do.  I feel like I spend a lot of time absorbing other people's creative/artsy/crafty works and adventures and not enough time making my own.  There's a lot in my head that I can't seem to get out and I'm hoping that the good old concept of practice makes perfect applies here too.  

I came up with many ideas for this challenge, but most of them were too inside my comfort zone.  So, inspired by this artists tiny works of art and this artists numerous something every day for a year challenges, I came up with the idea to create a piece of art on on index card every day for an entire year.  

At first I thought I would start on January 1, but that seemed a little too cliched.  Also, I'm currently suffering from lack of general inspiration because it's chilly and dark and there's minimal snow (although it's coming this week I've been told).  So I started on Sunday.  

I certainly intend to do this every day for a whole year, but I'm also not going to beat myself up over it if I miss a day or it doesn't work out.  

I chose index cards because they are small, cheap, and I feel like I can commit to the amount of time it will take to create a piece of art on one, whether that's five minutes or an hour will be up to me on any given day.  

I didn't purchase any extra supplies for this other than some index cards and plastic box to put them in.  I plan on only using what I have around and the only rule is that it has to be done on a daily basis.  Other than that, there are no rules!  

I created a new category (same as the title to this post) to tag any posts for this project.  Time to get creative!

thoughts on eating well during the holidays

This holiday season has probably been the best for me in terms of not falling off my totally made up nutritional wagon.  I attribute this to my new job, a better grasp on what works for me, and a more laid back attitude about the whole thing.

It's important to not beat yourself up over any dietary indiscretions that may occur.  It's not the end of the world...and no, it doesn't mean that you have to start all over...you simply just move on. 

In a recent interview on the Balanced Bites podcast (my source for witty banter and good nutritional advice) Robb Wolf talked about how most people have the 80/20 rule all wrong.  Rather than striving for 80/20 you should strive for 100% and be fine with coming out 80/20.  If you only strive for 80/20, you might come out 60/40 or worse...so strive for perfection and don't beat yourself up if you never get there.  

I've been sticking with what I know works for me...and paying the price when I don't.  We often get lunch brought to us at work, which is great, except I've broken up with gluten, and lunch is often full of sandwiches and pasta.  Last week there was salad, potatoes, and fruit which I ate.  However, I did not read the ingredients on the salad dressing and paid the price with a stomach ache for the rest of the afternoon.  

With sweets and treats around sometimes it's really hard to pass them by.  Fortunately, I've been too busy to spend much time lingering in the break room around all the goodies.  However, when I do drop in, I save myself for the really good treats. I pick all the dark chocolate out of the boxes of chocolate, which is time consuming and self limiting.  On Friday last week I did eat one too many salted caramel chocolates (not dark chocolate...but so good!) but then I got over it and moved on.  

Another way to combat treats is to make your own.  This is especially useful if you avoid gluten and you are up to your eyeballs in cookies at work.  Make some tasty gluten-free, cookies and bring them to share.  Need ideas?  Google any sweet treat and add "paleo" to it and you'll find some less bad alternatives. 

I've also been making extra tasty food for dinner (and leftovers for lunch) so that I actually look forward to my meals and don't think about snacking in between!  

Happy Holidays!

weekend adventure: pink mountains

On Saturday we headed down to Girdwood for a lovely Christmas brunch at my aunt's house.  There was ham, french toast, egg and sausage casserole, and all kinds of other delicious food. 

I failed at taking any photos. Mostly because I was too busy eating and talking.  

On the drive home we noticed that the Alaska Range had some spectacular light on them.  This time of year when the angle of the sun is not very big, the lighting on things you see every day is very different and often makes things look very dramatic.  When we drove around the corner into town, we realized that you could see all the mountains from Kenai to Fairbanks, which is extremely rare (there are usually clouds somewhere).  On a whim, we decided to drive up to the hillside and check out the panoramic view from there.

It was amazing.  These photos do not do any of this justice.  My mom (who has lived in Alaska since she was in Jr. High) said that it was the best she'd ever seen in her life.  

I'm so sad that I didn't have my good camera with me.  My cell phone did a good job, but it is not so great at taking photos of far away things.  

The only thing I did to any of these photos was sharpen them slightly.  The colors are real.  

The thing that you can't see in any of these photos is the wicked case of Fata Morgana that's going on out there.  The mountains to the left of McKinley and Foraker looked like the walls of the Grand Canyon.  It was crazy.  

It's stuff like this that makes me love it here (and stuff like the 1mm of snow we have that makes me angry and hate it here).  Thanks for the kickass show Mother Nature.  

 

weekend reading

Are you as sad as I am that Serial is over for a while? Here's Slate Magazine's 25 best podcast epidsodes.  

I fully support unlimited vacation too!

Hilarious Serial parody...

Cool salvaged textile bags.  Would make a great (but probably late) Christmas gift!

Don't believe everything you see on TV.

Go window shopping with Google...all from the comfort of your couch!